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. You know some of thathashish-scented incense? We should buy some of that.The smell wafting underthe door will only add to the verisimilitude. By the way, Spence said,  how do you do that with your voice?file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20kruis.d%20Empire's%20Fall%2002%20-%20The%20Sundering.html (237 of 324)23-2-2006 20:21:31Page 172ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlWilliams, Walter Jon - [Dead Empire's Fall 02] - The Sundering My voice? Sula was puzzled. You re talking in some kind of local dialect.It s like you ve lived here foryears. Ah. Surprise tingled through her.She shrugged. I m a good mimic, I guess.I didn t even know I was doing it.She remembered amusing Caro Sula with her accents, pretending to be heridentical sister Margaux, from Earth.She hadn t done her Earthgirl accent ina long time.She d spent the last seven years imitating Caro Sula instead.The next few days Team 491 spent adding to their wardrobe and painting andcleaning the apartment.They bought food from stands on the streets and began to learn theneighborhood.The apartment was finally arranged to Sula s satisfaction, everything paintedor scrubbed, the carpet cleaned, the stove gleaming, the toilet and otherbathroom fixtures fresh-scented marvels of modern sanitation.It didn t looklike a place inhabited by alcoholics, but Sula couldn t bring herself to liveamid squalor.She had once.She wouldn t again.Sula bought a spider plant in a large cream-colored epoxide pot, one thatwould show clearly through the window overlooking the street.She went to thesouth window and put it on the right-hand side of the windowsill. This meansno one s here, be cautious. She moved the pot across the sill tothe opposite side. This issomeone s here, and it s all clear. She placedthe pot on the right side of the northern windowsill. This isimmediate meeting. Moving the pot to the opposite side of the windowmeantmessage waits at mail drop.She turned to look at her crew. If the pot snot here at all, or if it s in the kitchen window, that meansUnsafe.Use safeprocedure to reestablish contact. She looked at them. If it looks as ifyou re going to be arrested here, try to break away long enough to knock thepot off the sill.Make it look as if you re trying to jump out the window.Macnamara and Spence nodded. Very good, miss, Spence said. From now on, Sula said,  we use this apartment only for meetings.We eachget our own place, one that none of the others knows, and we use another setof ID there.Her two team members gave each other uneasy looks. Does the new place have tobe in thisfile:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20kruis.d%20Empire's%20Fall%2002%20-%20The%20Sundering.html (238 of 324)23-2-2006 20:21:31Williams, Walter Jon - [Dead Empire's Fall 02] - The Sundering neighborhood?Spence asked.Sula had to think about her answer. Your new place needs to be someplacecompletely anonymous.It needs to be private.It needs to have more than oneexit.And you need to pay your rent with cash. She gave them a thin-lippedsmile. If you can find a setup like that in a better neighborhood, then byall means. What s our budget? Macnamara asked. Remember, we wantanonymous. Sula considered. I ll go above three a monthfor someplace that s got a lot of advantages, but otherwise try to stay withinthat. She gave them each ten zeniths in change. Remember, you can t whip out a ten-zenith piece and just hand it to someone.People don t carry that kind of money in cash, not if they re& the kind ofpeople who are above suspicion.She sensed resistance in Macnamara as his hand closed over the money. Yes, Patrick? she said.His tone was stubborn. I don t like the idea of you being alone in thisneighborhood, he said. Or, uh, Ardelion, either. He used Spence s codePage 173ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlname, presumably because he d lost track of which alternateID she was supposed to be inhabiting at the moment.Sula laughed. We ve just been through acombat training course,  she said. It s the rest of the neighborhood that has to watch out forus. And as histroubled expression didn t fade, she patted him on the arm. That s a goodthought, Patrick, but really, we ll be all right. And then, as she felt thepowerful muscle in his arm, another thought occurred to her. You grew up inthe country, yes? Well.A mountain village.But yes, more or less. Did you learn any handicraft skills? Carpentry, say, or plumbing, or& ?Macnamara nodded. I m a fair carpenter, he said. And I can stick pipestogether.Sula smiled at him. So you can build, say, secret compartments.Macnamara blinked. I suppose I can, he said. Good, Sula said.She looked around the apartment again, this time with a neweye.Perhaps they weren t done fitting out this place after all.file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20kruis.d%20Empire's%20Fall%2002%20-%20The%20Sundering.html (239 of 324)23-2-2006 20:21:31Williams, Walter Jon - [Dead Empire's Fall 02] - The SunderingThe old and new apartments soon boomed to the sounds of saws and hammers, andthe air was laden with the scent of glue and varnish and fresh paint.Usefulitems were secreted here and there, in furniture, in cabinets, and underfloors, where Action Team 491 could lay hands on them at need.Sula, who wasnot so filled with the majesty of an officer that she disdained the use of herhands, learned some useful carpentry skills.In another couple days Sula found her own apartment in the new neighborhood, asmall room with a toilet, a shower, and an alcove for her bed.She subjectedthe room to the same merciless regime of scouring and painting that she hadthe other places, and carried to it some furniture that Macnamara hadmodified.In the furniture s hidden compartments she hid the same useful itemsshe had stored elsewhere.On the first night, as she lay on her narrow, newly purchased mattress, herneighbors obliged her by having a screaming fight.Through the thin,prefabricated walls she heard the sounds of bellowing, of shrieking, offurniture being hurled against walls.How many nights, she wondered, had she lain awake as a child, and listened infear to the shouts and screams and rage in the next room? The thunder of achair being smashed into the wall, the crack of a shattering bottle, the smackof fist against flesh? Now in the darkness she listened to those childhoodsounds again, and found her heart strangely calm.Physical violence no longer frightened her, and it wasn t because she d justspent the better part of two months learning how to disembowel people.It waswell before the course at the Villa Fosca that she had learned how to dealwith that particular fear.She had dealt with her fear by smashing him in the head repeatedly with achair leg, then having him tied to a heavy object and thrown in the IolaRiver.It wasn t violence that frightened her now.What she feared was failure, andexposure, and the truth [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]