"Most everything pays better than being honest. You want to work for Block and Relway, you'd better have a bone-deep law and order calling. Now what?"

Kip was making noises. He wasn't as impressed with the sketch as I was. "The eyes aren't right, Play."

"They wouldn't be, would they?" Playmate growled. "Since whenever they look straight at you they go all smoky. And they aren't eyes like ours, anyway. They don't have any eyelids."

"It's not that. It's their shape. They're bulgier... "

Garrett!

The kid jumped, squealed, went paper pale in an instant, scattered the documents on my desk. He moaned, "They're here! They're trying to get into my head again!" He tried to jump past Playmate.

"Hang on to him!" I said. "That's just old Chuckles deciding to pick on me for a minute."

Old Chuckles demurred. He sent, The young man is entirely correct, Garrett. There is an unknown creature in the alleyway out back trying to look into the house. I am confusing it and blocking it but that is extremely difficult. The work requires most of the attention of most of my minds.

The Dead Man belongs to a rare species known as Loghyr. They have that knack. Of having multiple minds capable of parallel and independent function. I've heard that some develop multiple personalities. I can't imagine. Old Bones is a complete horror show being just one of himself.

Simultaneous shrieks sounded upstairs and in the small front room. I don't know what Katie's problem was but it was audibly obvious that the Goddamn Parrot had decided to focus his powers of persuasion on convincing the world that he was about as sane as a drunken butterfly.

The creature is now confused by what I have done. Which is to connect it to a couple of marginally sensitive but completely empty minds. Perhaps it will become equally lost.