Warrigrove sighed. “You will think me needlessly obscure, but your question has no definite answer.”
Imbry felt a twinge of annoyance. “We inhabit an impossibly ancient world,” he said. “Every question has long since been posed, in all its possible variants and permutations, and answered fully.”
“That is supposedly the overarching reality of our age,” admitted Warrigrove. “But we may be dealing here with another reality.”
“I am, as you have intimated, a manufacturer of ‘other realities,’ ” Imbry said. “Thus you may trust me when I tell you that no other reality exists.”
“And yet you bring me this,” Warrigrove said. His long, pale fingers reached out and touched the thing on the table, stroked it, then drew back. “You must leave it with me.”
“No.”
“I must study it.”
Imbry said, “I intend to hold an auction. But if you’d care to waive your fee for this consultation, you can be among the bidders.”
Warrigrove agreed with an alacrity that surprised Imbry. The fat man covered the object with the dark cloth, evoking a low moan from the aficionado, who blinked as if awakening from a dream, then looked at Imbry with a puzzled expression. “You did that,” he said, “without effort. Does its glory not touch your inner being?”
“I hope not,” said Imbry. “I prefer to be touched only at my own instigation. Now tell me what it is.”
Warrigrove sighed. “It has had many names: the Grail Ultima, the Egg of First Innocence, the Eighth Path, the Supernal Radiance. Which do you prefer?”
Imbry found none of them satisfying. All had the ring of empty syllables swirled about by vague associations, nebulous connotations. He didn’t mind batting about such inflated insubstantiata when he had been the one to blow air into them, but to be on the receiving end of the “perfumed cloud” was irritating. He again studied Warrigrove closely, but detected no intent to deceive.
“Ambiguity will not serve,” he said. “If you can’t give me more than a misty whiff of its nature, then tell me if it has a function: What does it
do
?”
Warrigrove’s brows rose and his lips pursed, and Imbry could tell that his latest question was no more likely to receive a hard-edged answer than had its predecessors. “Anything and nothing,” the aficionado said. “Fulfill dreams, but only for those who take care not to awaken. Reveal mysteries, though the revelations are no less mysterious than what was hidden. Transform base dross into rare earth, at least in the eye of the beholder. This is something from beyond our mundane existence. It is like one of the wonders of our species’ dawn time, when who could say what might lie beyond the familiar hills, and the mind spun tales of eldritch kingdoms and far off lands upon which any fancy might be imposed.”
Imbry put one plump palm against his forehead, then drew it down his face, as if the action could wipe away a film that obscured his perceptions. “I will summarize,” he said. “We have an object whose existence to date has been mainly rumor; which comes from no one knows exactly where; whose nature and functions are, at best, untested; about which vague yet fabulous and mystical claims may be made. And, on top of all that, it may be merely a cunning forgery.”
“You have it,” said Warrigrove. “Though I doubt it is a fake. It generates in me too profound a passion. Though I am puzzled by your ability to withstand its glamor.”
“We are fashioned from different stuffs. It is why you collect and I deal.”
“That may well be so. We come from different sides of a metaphysical divide. And each must pity the other.”
“Let us leave our estimations of each other’s character for another day,” said Imbry, “and concentrate on resolving this mystery.”
“Very well. I will advance a theory: Perhaps the myriad grails and will o’ the wisps that speckle the history of humanity have always been the same object. Say it is a fragment from a higher realm that somehow found its way into our base continuum—an eternal, unchangeable shred of absolute beauty that moves in mysterious ways from place to place and from time to time. Some of those who encounter it are transported by the revelation of a sphere of existence so much greater, so much finer, than the dull swamp in which we grind out our little lives. Others receive the same knowledge but are merely annoyed.”
Imbry made a tactless noise. “Have you spent much time on that theory?”
“In truth,” said Warrigrove, “it came to me as I beheld the object.”
“Indeed? So it is a touchstone for separating humanity into the high-minded and the prosaic?”
“I would not put it that way, but it is not an inaccurate reflection of my idea.”
“And you would include Chiz Ramoulian among the elevated?”
“The Red Abandon addict?” Warrigrove tried to disguise his anxiety, but Imbry was a practiced listener. “Is he connected to this?”
“He appears to have been as taken with it as you are.”
Warrigrove attempted to affect nonchalance. “You would feel no need to mention my connection to this matter in Ramoulian’s hearing?”
“At present, he is dining with the Archon,” Imbry said, employing the common euphemism for those who were experiencing the unsought hospitality of the Archonate Bureau of Scrutiny. “I expect we will have this business concluded before they tip him back onto the streets.”
“That is good,” said Warrigrove.
“Indeed.” Imbry briskly abraded one plump palm against its brother. “Very well, let us defer questions of what and why and where. Let us instead deal with
how much
.”
“Ah,” said Warrigrove, “on that score, feel free to let your imagination soar.”
Luff Imbry could scale the heights of passion when entertaining the prospect of his own enrichment. He believed that life, at least
his
life, was not meant to be an exercise in self-stinting. As he made his way from Warrigrove’s, satchel in hand, he allowed himself to indulge in some pleasantly fanciful speculations as to just how much fatter the mysterious object might make his purse. Thus distracted he failed to notice the sleek black volante that was shadowing him at rooftop height on a tranquil residential street until it silently dropped to block his way. The dark hemisphere of energy that shielded its passenger compartment was extinguished, and Imbry found himself under the hard stare of Alwinder Mudgeram.
“I have been looking for you,” Mudgeram said. “I have left messages.”
“I do not seem to have received them.”
The aircar’s operator’s door opened, and out stepped a man almost as large as Dain Ganche, with a tattooed face and shoulders like small hills.
“Good day, Ip,” said Imbry. Everyone always greeted Mudgeram’s assistant with studied politeness, although Imbry had never heard of anyone having received more than a silent nod in acknowledgment.
“Let me offer you a ride,” Mudgeram said and gestured to the empty seat beside him.
Ip reached for Imbry’s arm with a hand whose fingers had been augmented with subtle but strong components. His grip caused the limb to go numb as the fat man was half lifted into the vehicle. The energy dome reestablished itself, and Imbry felt the seat cushion push against him as they went aloft.
“There is this matter of the funds I advanced you,” said Mudgeram. “I was promised a profit to make the senses swim; instead, I suffered a complete loss.”
“There were risks to the venture. They were disclosed.”
“I remember a brief allusion to a remote possibility. Much more attention was devoted to the expected windfall. Pictures were painted, vistas laid out, all bedecked with boundless gain.”
“Without enthusiasm, there would be no ventures at all.”
“I have developed a new enthusiasm,” Mudgeram said. “I now pursue grim satisfaction with the same zeal I formerly reserved for your scheme.”
“That may be not good for you,” Imbry said.
“It will definitely be ‘not good’ for some.”
They had flown high above the city, heading west, and now cruised high above the chill waters of Mornedy Sound. The wave-rippled surface far below resembled the wrinkled hide of some great cold-blooded beast. Mudgeram invited his passenger to look down and envision a sequence of events that would end with Imbry entering the sea at high speed.
“Your funds went to acquire necessary materials for the plan,” Imbry said. He had purchased minor artworks dating from the antique period in which his intended forgery would appear to have been created. The purchased works were broken down into their constituent elements, then reordered into a painting in the style of Bazieri, a grandmaster of the same age whose lifetime oeuvre had been scant. A newly discovered work by the ancient artist would have drawn collectors from at least thirty of the Ten Thousand Worlds along The Spray, each trailing funds like a pecuniary comet.
“Who could have foreseen that a vault full of unknown Bazieris would turn up in an attic?” It turned out that the artist had for years paid his rent with masterpieces that to the landlord were no more than pleasant daubs. By the time Bazieri’s genius was recognized, both landlord and tenant were dust and the works long forgotten in a boarded-up cockloft. They were discovered and emerged onto the market just as Imbry prepared to go forward with his fake; prices collapsed, leaving his forged work worth less than the cost of its ingredients.
“I have heard all of this before,” Mudgeram said. “It puts no hepts in my pocket.”
“Just as there are none in mine at the moment,” Imbry said. “Pickings have lately been slim.”
Mudgeram rubbed the blue stubble that always shaded his jaw. “I will forgo the profits that never came,” he said. “But I will either have back my investment or take my satisfaction in other ways.”
“What ways?”
“A number of people have reason to feel that Luff Imbry has had a deleterious effect on the smooth passage of their lives. I will auction you to them. I might yet make a profit on our association.”
Imbry thought of some of those who would hasten to attend such an auction and pay gladly for the opportunity to carry him off in restraints to some remote location where they would not be interrupted. “I do have one excellent prospect,” he said.
“Now would be a good time to tell me about it,” Mudgeram said.
“I will do better. I will show you.”
Imbry opened the satchel and peeled back some of the cloth, enough to let the object’s effulgence show. He saw Alwinder Mudgeram’s eyes light up with the same mixture of appetite and dreaminess that had affected Warrigrove and, he presumed, Ramoulian. When he glanced Ip’s way, he saw no overt expression, but the bodyguard’s eyes slitted as if what he saw brought discomfort.
Imbry replaced the cloth and resealed the satchel. Mudgeram returned to the mundane. “What is it?” he said.
“That remains undetermined,” Imbry said. “But it is the property of Dain Ganche, who has asked me to auction it for him. Ilarios Warrigrove will be one of the bidders.” He saw no need to mention Chiz Ramoulian.
Mudgeram’s face was not hard to read. Imbry watched the evidence of the man’s thoughts as he processed the knowledge that Ganche was involved and came to a decision. “Warrigrove has just acquired a competitor,” he said, then added,“Ip, home.”
As the car banked and headed back toward Olkney, Mudgeram invited Imbry to stay at his house in town, a dour mansion on the Boulevard of Seven Graces. Imbry saw no way to decline.
It was decided that the auction would be held in a second-story salon whose heavily defended windows overlooked the private garden at the rear of Mudgeram’s house. The date was set for three nights later. Imbry had Mudgeram’s integrator connect him to his own assistant, and between them they developed a list of five more collectors who would have both an interest in acquiring the object and the wealth to meet or exceed the exorbitant reserve price Imbry decided was warranted.
On the designated night, each bidder arrived independently, to be met in the mansion’s atrium entrance, where Ip relieved them of any weapons or inquisitive devices that might compromise their host’s privacy. Some had brought hangers-on, and these were shown to a waiting room and offered refreshments while their employers were led through the house to the site of the auction.
Besides Warrigrove, Imbry had also had dealings with four of the other bidders, and he knew the remaining collector by reputation. They made small talk until Dain Ganche arrived, nodding to Alwinder Mudgeram and declining to give up his personal weapon, a medium-powered shocker. At that point, Imbry invited them to take seats in a semicircle of comfortable chairs that faced a long, ornately carved table. On its polished surface stood a portable lectern, before which rested the object beneath its cloth.
When Imbry took his place behind the lectern, his view of the object was blocked. He preferred not to be distracted by its insistent brilliance. Now the room settled into expectation. Ip positioned himself in a corner from which he had an unobstructed view of the proceedings, while Ganche took the chair closest to the barred windows.
“Honorables and distinctions,” Imbry said, “we are gathered to decide the ownership of an article that may well be the only one of its kind in all the Ten Thousand Worlds. If there is another like it, its possessor has not made its existence known. The vendor, Dain Ganche, has set a reserve price”—Imbry named an astronomical sum, but the number caused not so much as an eye to blink among the bidders—“so we will start the bidding there. Let us begin by viewing the item.”