Rejected by His Heir, Chosen by His Crown

Doss told me, because Doss told me everything now, standing in my doorway with her arms crossed and her chin set like she was reporting a crack in the ninth-ring header.

"Your girl went up to see the clever woman," she said. "By herself. Didn't tell nobody." She let me be afraid for exactly one breath. Then, grudging, and underneath the grudging something that in Doss stood in for pride the way a struck flint stands in for a fire: "Come back down, packed four joints, didn't say a word about it. One of 'em on the header. Didn't blow." A sniff. "She's getting a hand on her. Slow. But a hand."

That was the whole of what Doss thought was worth reporting — the joints — and she said it and went back to work, and left me sitting on the edge of the cot with my heart going like I'd run the tunnels.