Chapter 10

“Well, spit it out, man,” said the Guardsman General.

“Yessir. He said he was being kidnapped, sir.”

Harun felt his heart skip a beat. “Where was this?”

“In front of a house on Pering Street, sir.”

“Show me.”

Twenty minutes later Harun was standing in front of a marble-faced town mansion, like many in the richer parts of the city. It butted up against its neighbors using every bit of its lot, though it was taller than any of them.

“You’re absolutely certain it was right here?” he said to the guardsman.

“Yessir. The other fellow, a gentleman, dressed very fine, but kinda of foreign, was carrying him down the steps right there, and he started to kick up a fuss, and the gentleman dropped him. He shouted to me, and the gentleman told me he was drunk, and he was staggering about like it, I swear, and slurring, and the things he was saying sounded like total nonsense. I’m sorry, sir.”

“You didn’t know. Then what happened?”