She moved aside to let him enter, and as she did so, the light caught her face. (His glance, quickened by emergency, caught in those muddy eyes a green flash of mingled hate and greed.)
“Wait,” he said, and touched her wrist. “Perhaps it is not needed to rouse anyone.” (That covetousness—if he could use it.)
“What do you mean?”
“It is a simple matter; not official accounts.” He fumbled out a coin or two and pressed them in her hand.
The fat face moved into a leer. “Eh, eh, so that’s the story. Want to take her, do you? And poor Mircella will be blamed, maybe sent for instruction. It should be worth more.”
(Money again; he experienced a moment of panic.) “I am from the office of account,” he repeated. “I am to take her there to close her reckoning. You will have the perquisite of her possessions.”
“He, he, and you the best perquisite. It should be worth more.”
“Sh, someone will hear us.” He found another pair of coins. “This is all—if not, give back the rest and call your mattern.”
He turned; she clutched his arm, grumbling in her throat (and he could see she did not believe him in the least, but would be satisfied if given a story to tell). “Come. Come.”
Another stair-journey through a silent house, this time upward. The place had the indefinable perfume of many women. The guide shuffled along in a dark almost complete; Rodvard heard the chink of keys, then a tick against the lock and the door opened.