Chapter 27 A Deafening but Fruitless Search

After lunch, we looked at the flagpoles first in our search for the "tallest and shortest". Four flagpoles were on top of the Flagmaster's rooms, each flying several pennants. One was indeed taller than the others, but the other three were about the same height, so that wasn't it. The organ seemed our best bet, and Dieter had no objections to our visiting it again.

Prestley looked at the place for water again, which was hidden from view. A pipe ascended from it through the ceiling and into the armory. José went up and found the other end: there was a sluiceway directing water around for the smithy, and where the pipe from below came up was a drain. He asked how often they drained the water and the smith said he didn't know what what it was for. So José poured water into the sluiceway and opened the valve.

Prestley said he could see the water coming down into the reservoir. Upon looking further, he saw that the fire from the smithy also heated up the water in the reservoir to power the organ.

We all considered carefully how to sound the thing, and Prestley suggested two keys first as a guess that they were the highest and lowest. We played them and heard both a very high note and a very low note, very loudly. I wondered what this thing sounded like up above, because down here the sound surrounded us and beat us down. Long after the notes faded away, my head was ringing. No clue magically appeared, though.

Goldrim, with little interest in the organ aside from its interesting mechanism, walked up to the kitchen to check on the "range". The rest of continued looking at the organ. The tallest pipe, as we faced the keyboard, was on the right in the back, and the shortest just above the keyboard in the front on the left. There were many banks of pipes. The tallest one was nearly ten feet tall, and the shortest about a handspan.

We tried playing several variations on a theme: the highest and lowest at the same time, one before the other, all the notes between in turn, the middle note by iteslf. We even pulled out all the stops and played all the notes at once. I was certain we would all share Goldrim's sudden hearing loss and could see us all shouting at each other over dinner, drowning out all other conversations.

Hy jabbered at Miara and left. As we contemplated the organ, he returned briefly and then he and Miara and Goldrim, who had returned from a fruitless search in the kitchen, went to look around the smithy.

José also went up to the kitchen and he also found nothing interesting about the range. Prestley and I couldn't stand being in the same room as the organ anymore and went upstairs as well. We thought about the range between the pipes: about 10 feet total, or 5 since the smallest pipes were on top of the back of the organ itself. 10 feet from what? The statue of Yazerin? We searched 5 and 10 feet from the statue thoroughly, but found nothing.

We returned to the organ to see what the others were up to. Miara and José met us. Downstairs, Goldrim was there and said Hy had gone into the hallway that led to the crypt, though he didn't know why. Everyone else piled into the hallway: I stayed in the organ room out of the way and studied the thing in peace and quiet.

After a few minutes, Hy returned, but the others didn't for several minutes afterward. He played a few notes, breaking the pleasant slience. He had apparently enraged the metal statue of the eagle overlooking the sarcophagus, which came to life and menaced him, although he backed off and it didn't actually attack him. The others looked carefully around the room, but there truly was nothing there besides Yazerin, his chest of treasure, and his eagle guardian.

The organ was leading us nowhere, and as we returned to the surface, we discussed other possibilities. The buildings, maybe? But no, all the towers are the tallest, by one story, and almost all the buildings are the shortest, at one story.

We looked at the card again: it showed a wine-sodden monk in a wine cask. The brewer, who also makes the wine, so José informed us? The brewery was above the mill.

The brewer was checking on his latest beer. There was no evidence of wine, but there was wine-making equipment not currently in use. We wandered around the room, poking into things, but found nothing of interest. Hy and the monk babbled amiably at each other, neither having a clue what the other was saying.

We returned downstairs, although Hy didn't come with us. In the courtyard, José said Dieter had shown him the cask room, between our cells. Many casks of wine and beer, but they were all the same size and shape.

Hy still hadn't appeared, and Miara went back up to get him. A few moments later, she reappeared, saying they'd disappeared. She asked Dieter where the brewer's rooms were, and we went there. We couldn't figure out how they got from the brewery to his room without us seeing them, since we were in the courtyard.

Hy and the brewer had apparently been liberally sampling the brew, but much to our surprise, Hy had gotten the next clue from the brewer!

José read it to us: "Staff of life rod of iron", and it held a picture of seven coins. We thanked the monk for his help. His predecessor had given it to him and told him to keep it safe and secret until someone asked for it. How exactly Hy had asked for it remained something of a mystery.

So, our next clue led to the miller. Hy had already began staggering that way, and we caught up to him at the door.