Bethany Cobb smelled the beans. "I declare! You are just too good, rosebud."
They went into the kitchen, a vast cavern with two stoves and a large brick oven. After ringing a bell on the end of a carved wooden handle, Bethany reached high on a shelf for a coffeepot and grinder, and began to work on the beans while the water heated. "My brother will be with you shortly."
Nathan Cobb was a lumbering man with bulging arms and a substantial potbelly. He clapped Duvalier on the back, a blow she absorbed with some grace, and came close to crushing Valentine's hand in a vigorous shake. "Always, always happy to see a new Cat out there. Raise some Hell for me, would you, ummm, Ghost?" he said before getting down to business.
"I take it you need a set of claws?" he asked Duvalier.
"Yes, please, and time is a little bit of an issue."
"He seems to have average-size hands. You want talons like yours, or blades?"
"Talons, and make the fingers stiff-concealment won't be an issue on this job. I want him to be able to climb with them as well as fight."
"That'll save some time. Let's measure you up, son." Cobb extracted a stained tape measure from his work apron, and wrapped it around Valentine's palm. He then measured each finger from the litde well in the center of his hand to its extremity, making notes in neat block numbers in a little pocket pad. "How about a weapon or two, Smoke? Are you going to train him?"
"I'll have to."
"Then you'll want a sword for him, I suppose. We may have something already made up."
An old man appeared at the kitchen at a door from one of the adjoining rooms in the endless house. "Is that coffee I smell?"
Bethany began pouring. "Sure is, Dad. We have visitors, and they brought it. Smoke Duvalier and her apprentice, Ghost."
The elderly man paused in his appreciation of the Java. "Ghost? What's your real name, son? Don't worry, my memory's going so fast, I wouldn't be able to tell anyone if I wanted to."
Valentine looked at Duvalier.
"He's named Valentine," she said.
"Then your father was-"
Valentine rose. "His name was Lee Valentine, Mr. Cobb."
The senior Cobb's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "You sure don't look like him, except a litde round me eyes. You sure you're modier wasn't just making a brag?"
Valentine ignored the insult. "My mother was Sioux, sir. North side of the Great Lakes."
"You're a fair size, but not as tall as your father. Nat, he needs a weapon?"
"Something for a Cat, not a Bear," the son answered.
"C'mon, boy, follow me," he said, blowing on the scalding mug of coffee and shuffling off down the hall. He opened a door to a stairwell and slowly started down into the basement.
Valentine looked around at the others, who simply smiled. He followed the senior Cobb.
The basement had a collection of everything from swords to antique farm implements. Daggers hung next to sickles on one wall, and opposite, pitchforks shared a rack with long pikes. A cavalry saber occupied a place of honor over a fireplace. Valentine stepped up to it and looked at the rather ordinary hilt and scabbard.
"That belonged to Nathan Bedford Forrest, son, but I don't expect you know who that is."
"Confederate cavalry commander in the Civil War. He wasn't a West Pointer, but he sure outwitted a bunch of them."
"Glad to be wrong once in a while. Bound to happen every year or two. See anything you like?"
Valentine picked up a heavy blade with a basket hilt sharing a rack with a similarly sized claymore. He swung it experimentally.
"Valentine, what are you thinking?" Duvalier chided him from the bottom stair. He hadn't heard her on the stairs. "You don't want to be lugging that halfway across the country. Mr. Cobb, let's look at something he can draw fast and swing quick."
"Hummph," Cobb grunted, not exactly disagreeing, but not wanting look like he was taking her advice, either. "I have a beautiful blade and scabbard. Last carried by a Guard with a different taste in sword. They usually like sabers and epees. Let's see what you think of mis."