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"I meant not long for the child," Valentine said.
"It's our second," she added, closing her eyes and sighing.
Petrie came in yawning, a fleshy man with a heavy mustache and a growth of beard. He paused on the way in, a thoughtful look on his face, grabbed the edge of the duty sergeant's desk as though to keep himself from keeling over, and farted abundantly.
"Christ, Petrie," the duty sergeant said.
The marshal took a chained ring of keys and opened his side office.
"A minute," he said to them. Valentine had time to spot a dead houseplant atop a file cabinet before Petrie closed the office door behind him.
He reemerged only to go into the washroom carrying some items wrapped in a towel. He emerged again, shaved and combed.
"Just another minute," he said, nodding to them. This time the station cat managed to flash through the door.
A radio flicked on in the office. Valentine heard the keys employed again, a file cabinet open, the pop of a cork being pulled, and the marshal sit heavily. A minute passed, then the cabinet and keys sounded again.
The door opened. "C'mon in. Open for business," he said to Valentine.
"They were here first," Valentine said, gesturing to the couple.
"They can wait. They're used to it."
Petrie turned heavily away and went to his chair.
"Go ahead," Valentine said to the Quislings.
The couple went in. Petrie didn't bother greeting them. "Good news, Courage," Petrie said.
Valentine watched the interaction "Your application came back, provisionally approved."
"Provisionally?" the man and woman groaned, if not in unison, at least in harmony.
"Your list of references got misplaced somewhere between here and the office." Petrie got up and shut the door, but that didn't matter to Valentine's ears, or to Patel's for that matter.
"Believe you me, it might take a while. I could make sure they get found soon for another five hundred," Petrie said. "You want that kid born a regular citizen, right?"
Valentine flushed. Those poor people. This was how business was carried out in the Kurian Zone. Some combination of an office and a title with a bit of power, looking for his taste of sugar on the transactions crossing his desk.
He and Patel exchanged a look. Patel worked his jaw as though he wanted to spit.
"You'll have it in a week," the man called Courage said. Valentine suspected it was a first name.
"To show you two just how good I take care of you, I'll give you the provisional without waiting." Valentine heard a couple of resounding thumps on the desk as Petrie stamped paperwork. The couple left, the man holding a file folio as tightly as he did his wife.
Valentine and Patel stood up to enter, but Petrie was right behind the couple. He took his keys out and stuck them in the lock.
"Missed your chance," the marshal said. "I'm going to lunch."
Valentine extracted a bill. "I'm in a hurry. How about I buy you lunch in exchange for fifteen minutes of your valuable time."
"You got it, militia." The bill disappeared so smoothly Valentine thought Petrie an amateur magician. He held the door open and they entered his office.
The cat crouched, peering under a bookcase. Valentine suspected a mouse down there.
Maybe more than one. Enough crumbs and bits of paper-wrapped sandwich littered the desk and sat in the unemptied wastebasket to feed a family of mice.
A file cabinet with PENDING stenciled on it had another overflowing box of paperwork atop it marked "priority pending."
