The Ear, the Eye and the Arm (38 page)

"I can't," moaned Ear.

"You must!"
It was not Ear's comrade who spoke now but the
mhondoro.
The spirit was roused by the sight of his enemies. He was made up of the dreams and memories of the Shona people, but he was also the spirit of Zimbabwe. A thousand generations of men and women who had cherished the land gave power to his voice. Ear could no more have disobeyed than he could have sprouted wings and flown off the Mile-High Macllwaine. He stood up against the railing and opened his ears wide. The wind bellied them like sails.

He'll get hurt,
Arm said to the
mhondoro.

Be still,
commanded the tribal spirit.

The two detectives looked down, each with his special ability. The She Elephant, hurling insults at her captors, was pushed from one limo. Tendai, Rita and Kuda were dragged from another.

"At last," murmured Arm. The stream of Masks that now swept onto the dock appalled him. Eye could have seen their hideous shapes, but Arm could feel their malevolence. The men were brutish, but the spirits that flitted about them were far worse. They were bloated with cruel animal sacrifices. Rage and cringing fear had created these monsters. All the noble aspects of the sacrificial animals had gone, with their deaths, into
Mwari's
country. Only the evil was left, like a twisted natural force.

Arm felt faint as he watched the human and inhuman spirits gather.

Courage,
Nyaokorefu, whispered the
mhondoro
inside his mind.

Suddenly, Tendai tripped the man who was holding him. They both fell. The man's mask was caught by the wind, and it barreled away over the cement. Arm could sense the spirit: an old, corrupt warthog grown fat on the flesh of its young. The mask rolled into space with the spirit snarling after it. The man howled and dragged Tendai to the railing.

"No! No!" shouted Arm, but the wind tore his voice away. Fortunately, the other Masks prevented the man from throwing Tendai to his death.

"They say the boy will make an excellent messenger. The braver he is, the more force he will have when they break him down," reported Ear. "Someone's going to be possessed by the Big-Head Spirit — ah!" Ear screamed and fell back onto the roof. Arm watched long enough to see Tendai and the others hustled inside. He knelt by his comrade.

Ear huddled on the cold cement. The light of the traffic beacon showed that his magnificent ears had been split by the wind. Blood oozed from the tears. "Oh,
Mwari,"
whispered Arm.

"Now can I go inside?" said Ear.

 
"Oh, Ear. I'm so sorry."

"I think they have bandages in the Starlight Room. The cook asked for one after he cut his thumb."

Tears poured down Arm's face. He knew how close Ear was to going into shock. He called down the stairway for help. The maitre d' and two waiters carried the detective inside. "Call the General and tell him we have evidence," Arm said. "The children are inside the Gondwannan Embassy and so are the masks."

"The Masks!" gasped the maitre d'.

"Tell him to hurry. They're going to sacrifice Tendai."

"Where are you going?" the little man cried as Arm grimly climbed back to the roof.

"I'm sneaking in the back door." Arm uncoiled the rope from the storeroom and crawled out again into the howling wind.

Mother thought she would faint. She had just come into the Starlight Room, after a stormy departure from Amadeus and a high-speed ride to the hotel. She wasn't sure what Arm had meant when he said the children were to be messengers. She did understand that important clues were hidden in the Gondwannan Embassy, and that Arm was going to find them.

Amadeus could shout at her until he was hoarse. She wasn't going to stay home. She was tired of waiting while other people carried her children anywhere they pleased. As far as Mother was concerned, if Arm wanted to blast a hole in the side of the embassy, she would help him.

The wind had been perfectly awful during the flight. The limo had to fight its way through the gusts, and paramedic cars were everywhere. The glass elevator actually hitched a couple of times on the way up. But that wasn't what had frightened Mother.

The maitre d' burst in with a flock of waiters carrying Ear. Eye jumped up to help them. They laid the injured detective on a sofa. "Call the General! Call the General!" yelled the maitre d'. "The children are in the embassy! It's full of Masks, and they're going to sacrifice Tendai!"

That
was what almost made Mother faint. But she took a deep breath and went straight to the holophone. The screen was blank. The computer was down.

"It's the swaying of the building," cried the maitre d'. "It sometimes pulls the power lines loose. Someone has to go down in the elevator."

Two or three waiters volunteered, but the elevator refused to budge. The maitre d' pulled sacks of potatoes and onions out of the service elevator and climbed in himself. The power was out here, too.

"Why do we still have lights?" asked Mother.

"We have an emergency generator," panted the man, crawling out of the potato dirt and onion skins. "The designers of the hotel figured we only needed electricity for that and the stoves. Cursed bureaucrats!" He kicked a sack of potatoes.

"Hey, waiter! How about some service?" called a man from the dinner party by the window.

"Throw him a box of crackers!" shouted the maitre d’. "Listen, you rich, spoiled people. We've got an emergency here. The Masks have holed up in the Gondwannan Embassy, and they've got General Matsika's kids. They're going to
kill
them if we don't get inside. If you want anything to eat, go to the kitchen and find it!"

A shocked silence followed this outburst. The elegantly dressed diners in their
dashikis
and Ethiopian dresses stared goggle-eyed at the little man.

"Well — why didn't you say so before?" stammered the man who had asked for ser
vice.

"Of course we want to help," said a woman in a silk robe embroidered with little diamonds.

"Oh, good! This is so much more interesting than a dinner party," another woman cried.

Suddenly everyone was bustling around. A doctor bent over the now unconscious Ear and dabbed him with antiseptic. The waiters came out of the kitchen with meat cleavers, toasting forks, iron pots and frying pans to arm everyone. With them was the chief cook, the three undercooks, the sauce cook, the salad master, the soufflé maker and a dozen dishwashers. They rushed to the door.

"Wait!" shouted Eye. "The Gondwannan guards have Soul Stealers."

Just as quickly, the waiters, cooks, salad master, soufflé maker and dishwashers skidded to a halt.

"We need strategy. Does anyone have a gun?" Mother asked.

"I have a Nirvana," said Eye. "So does Ear, but he won't be able to use it."

"Give it to me," Mother commanded. "Now. We need a diversion."

"Leave it to us," said the chief cook and the salad master. The cook, who was built like a five-course dinner, chased the salad master, who was as light as a lettuce leaf, down the corridor toward the Gondwannan Embassy. "I'll teach you to leave snails in the spinach!" roared the cook.

"Don't hurt me!
I
didn't wash it!" The salad master raised a frying pan in self-defense.

"You good-for-nothing! You were only hired because your brother works at the desk!" The cook swung his meat cleaver through the air with a whistling sound.

"Look at that," said one of the Gondwannan guards, laughing.

"I put my money on the cook. He's bigger," a second Gondwannan offered.

"No, no. The little one is faster. Nice footwork." All five guards followed the men down the hall.

"A hundred dollars says the cook gets the runt!"

"Two hundred on the runt! I like his style."

Eye crept into the hall and put himself between the guards and the embassy door. Mother moved silently along the wall.

"Now!" shouted the chief cook. Eye and Mother fired bolts at the Gondwannans. They brought down two. The chief cook banged one on the head with his big fist. The salad master brought his man down with the frying pan. The remaining guard flung himself behind an ornamental vase and fired at Eye.

The Soul Stealer produced a noise like a thunderbolt landing in the hall. The waiters and diners in the Starlight Room fell over one another as they scrambled for safety. The salad master dropped his pan, and the chief cook lost his grip on the cleaver. The shot from the Soul Stealer landed on the wall by Ear's head. It snaked out in all directions, forming a brilliant flash that burned through the wallpaper and melted the paint underneath.

Eye dropped his gun and flung up his hands. "I can't see!" he screamed. The Gondwannan guard laughed and rose from behind the vase. He aimed at the bewildered detective —

— and was felled by Mother on the spot.

"Hurrah!" cheered the waiters and diners from the Starlight Room. They swarmed out at once to tie up the guards. The chief cook and salad master gave each other the high sign. The doctor and the woman in the diamond-spangled dress rushed over to Eye, who was rocking back and forth on his knees.

But Mother coolly studied the door of the Gondwannan
 
Embassy.
  
She
 
was
 
deeply sorry for Ear and Eye, but they were being cared for as well as could be managed. Her battle was only beginning. The metal door of the embassy fitted snugly into the wall. There were no cracks in which to thread razor wire and no hinges to remove. It was as solid as the vault in the Bank of Zimbabwe.

Now what? said Mother to herself.

Thirty-eight

Well, I guess this is it,
said Arm as he tested the rope tied to the railing.

That's right,
agreed the
mhondoro.

Tell me. What happens if I
—
you know, if I fall? What happens to you?

Nothing. I am already in the spirit world.

Arm looked out over the swiftly rushing clouds. The wind blew his shirt back against his chest so that it almost looked glued there. It was cold and getting colder.
What happens to me?

You join your ancestors. You become part of
mudzimu,
your family spirit. You know that.

How much of me will be there? I mean, do I remember this life? Will I be able to look in on Sekai?

Nyaokorefu,
are you stalling for time?

I suppose so.
Arm tested the knot once more. He looked back at the roof of the Mile-High Macllwaine. It seemed a haven of safety now, and it had been so frightening earlier.

Nyaokorefu,
if it's any consolation, I'm taking as big a risk as you. Falling won't hurt me, but the Gondwannan gods can. They can
twist me into a slave for their hateful and perverted designs. Then parents will abandon children, elders will be left to starve. Brother will kill brother, and the land itself will decay. What kind of world would Sekai have then?

You're right. We have to fight,
said Arm.

She's asleep right now and having a really fine dream.

Thank you,
Arm said. He waited for the building to creak back. The sloping side of the Mile-High Macllwaine with the attached landing dock lay beneath him as he went over. His feet rested on one of the knots tied in the rope.

The wind! The wind struck him when he was only a few inches from the top of the building. The warmth was whipped from his body as fast as it was produced. His body was so much longer and thinner than anyone else's. He hadn't an ounce of fat to protect him. His hands began to tingle and grow numb.

The Mile-High Macllwaine groaned back in its cycle. The rope swung out to hang over a mile of empty space as the wall and dock retreated out of range. Arm continued to edge downward, knot by knot. The feeling had completely gone from his hands, and he had to concentrate to keep them closed. His foot slipped on a knot, and he slid sickeningly to the next.