Soon after, Rats, each in his own little cloud of music, slowly drifted away. There was nothing more that seemed to be happening in front of the Coffeepot. Tabaqui circled around on his Mustang, hanging over the side with his face almost to the floor, apparently looking for something. Alexander was pulling threads out of his sweater.
“What are we waiting for here?” Humpback asked. “Or is this where the new place of encampment is?”
“This is where the saliva of the Great Hound is,” Tabaqui piped happily, peering into something invisible on the floorboards. “I knew it! He spit right over here somewhere. He was really pissed, so it’s genuine hate spit. Someone stepped in it slightly, I’ll admit that, but still, putting the voodoo on him now would not be a problem at all.”
“Don’t even think about touching that!” Sphinx barked.
Tabaqui’s giggles became even more ecstatic.
Humpback wheeled Tubby, covered in bread crumbs, past us, and I followed them. I desperately needed some coffee. I also needed to ask Black a couple of questions.
When we reached the dorm, Blind was nowhere to be seen. Black was sitting on his bed. Tabaqui took all kinds of sacks and boxes out of the storage, dumped them in a huge pile, and proceeded to dive into it, emerging from time to time wearing something new and inquiring whether or not it suited him. Tubby bumped his head against the edge of his pen and started wailing. Alexander hauled him onto the common bed too.
By the time the commotion died down a little, Black had already managed to make himself scarce, so I couldn’t ask him anything. I crawled over to Sphinx, lying there all mysterious and inaccessible with his feet up on the bed frame, and inquired what was in that prehistoric Law that Pompey was talking about.
Until I asked the question, everyone was seemingly busy with their own pursuits, but now they all quit what they were doing, came closer, and stared at the two of us.
“I just adore Smoker,” Tabaqui mumbled, pulling another sack full of indescribable stuff closer to the bed. “Listen to the crisp way he frames his questions!”
Humpback looked at Sphinx with what seemed like pity and passed me the coffee. Alexander was hanging off the bed frame, still holding the sugar bowl. These people were real experts in turning anything into a circus show. Must have been years of practice. I already regretted not having wheeled out after Black as soon as he left.
Sphinx did not even deign to sit up. He lay looking up at the ceiling, his prosthetics folded up on his belly. He did explain, though. That the Law to which Pompey took such exception was called “the Law of Choice.” That it was so old that no one in the House remembered who invented it and when. And that it required any moron who followed it—that was exactly how Sphinx phrased it, “any moron”—to die for his Leader. If, for example, a coup was in the making, under this Law the Leader must be defended even at the cost of one’s life. Sphinx talked like he was quoting directly from some moldy textbook. In such lofty tones that at first I didn’t catch the full meaning of what was being said. Once I did, I almost spilled my coffee. Humpback, who was sitting next to me, gingerly propped up my cup. Tabaqui was in hysterics, giggling and snorting like crazy.
“What’s choice got to do with it?”
“It had to do with it that the Law could be ignored. In theory.”
“Sounds very much like prehistoric crap,” I said, agreeing with Pompey.
Tabaqui supplied that the ancestors were simple and austere people and therefore possessed nasty laws in great abundance. “Dark ages, Smoker, dark ages, believe you me.” And he started giggling again.
I inquired whose ancestors he meant by that.
“Ours, of course,” Jackal replied. “Right here.”
“It could be that they thought this Law would protect Leaders from most coup attempts,” Sphinx suggested. “Apparently it even worked for a while. They assumed that the better the Leader, the more people would make their choice in his favor, and, correspondingly, the less chance the usurpers would have. Even though it’s obvious what it would inevitably degenerate into, if only you think about it for one minute.”
Lary’s head emerged from the space between the beds and positioned itself with its chin on the edge of the mattress.
“That was the seniors’ undoing,” it announced. “Blasted Moor had forty hooked on Choice. So obviously, not many survived.”
I asked who Blasted Moor was.
“You’re not old enough to know things like that,” Lary responded grimly and hid his head again.
I did not mention that, in that case, it would have been a good idea not to bring him up at all. I decided to continue being polite and to take part in their stupid games the best I could. So I asked Sphinx what he meant when he told Pompey that it was “useless.”
“It was useless to try and talk him out of the fight,” Sphinx explained. “He wouldn’t have understood.”
“Don’t tell me you were going to!” Tabaqui exploded. “You’re out of your mind! How would that look? Just think about it!”
