The young fellow shook his head. “Nobody would believe that a locksmith my age was a master. Besides, the work is too… quiet for me. I need something more exciting. Too bad my chum, San, has gone to try his hand at other work. He might have enjoyed the opportunity, and he’s a better man than I at all this.”
Tapper shook his head as if in disbelief. He knew very well that San was the better of the two when it came to solving locks. Because he was still associated with the guild of thieves, Tapper also knew full well where San had gone to and what he was doing. He pretended ignorance, though.
“Hmmm. Perhaps I can understand your position, Gord. I was rather inclined toward excitement myself when I was your age…”
“About the locks,” Gord said with a smile. “Are you interested in buying the lot?”
“Oh, of course. Let’s see now,” Tapper said, and he began a careful examination of each device, recollecting the price for which he had sold them to the lads and assessing their current value now that they had been opened and repaired. “A bronze each.”
“Hah! They’d sell for a silver each.”
“Two!”
“Ten!!”
“Done at five, then, and it’s a hard bargain you drive for one so tender in years, master Gord of Grey College.” Tapper was secretly pleased, proud of the boy. Gord knew the actual worth of things and held fast to his knowledge. Now Tapper would install these locks and charge about a noble for the lock, plus his work. He’d make a few zees on the lock, and extra money for his time would bring the bill to a nice profit even after accounting for overhead. As he rummaged around to find the correct coins to pay Gord, Tapper asked, “Is your mate, San, doing well?”
The boy shook his head a bit and shrugged. “I never run into him anymore, Tapper. I suppose that means he is fine.”
“Probably for the better,” the locksmith said encouragingly. “You’ll have more time to study now that you two aren’t out and into mischief all the time. Say! Do you need another batch of old locks?”
“No. Thanks, Tapper, but I’m too busy with studies to manage the work on them now.” That wasn’t exactly true. Gord simply didn’t find enjoyment in the work anymore. He knew about all he could learn, or at least cared to learn, on the subject, and without San there to encourage him, the effort was sheer drudgery.
Tapper studied the boy for a moment. He’d grown some and filled out well In the last few years. There was lean muscle on the lad, and there could be no doubt that he was nearing full manhood. Gord’s voice was deep and his cheeks showed the darkness of a heavy beard that the boy hadn’t bothered to shave today.
“Sorry to hear that, lad. We had a nice little business going, but all things come to an end eventually, don’t they?” The question was obviously rhetorical, and Gord didn’t bother to reply. “You will come and see me now and again, won’t you?” That was not a question to be ignored.
“If I happen to be around here. Tapper-but I doubt that will be very often,” Gord said in straightforward fashion. “Not much reason to come to Old City-at least other than the attractions of the Foreign Quarter.”
There was some wistfulness in the boy’s tone. There was also pain hidden underneath, but not so deeply that the other man could not sense it. Tapper could understand him not liking to refresh his memories of childhood in the slums or of his stint as a beggar-thief.
“Not much excitement hereabouts, that’s true,” the locksmith supplied. “Here’s your payment, Gord, and luck be with you.”
Gord seemed a little hesitant about leaving. He hated to sever this link with his most recent and enjoyable past, for it was so unlike all of his previous experiences. He took the little heap of coins from Tapper, set them down, and clasped the man’s hand. “You have been a good friend, Tapper. I’ll miss seeing you… Thanks, and you have good fortune, too,” he added in a serious tone.
“If you don’t come to visit me, I’ll drop in at the university to see you.”
The boy grinned. He knew very well that wasn’t likely to happen. “You do that. Tapper. I’ll show you how we students toss off bumpers of ale while singing!” With that, Gord departed.
The whole of the city had altered greatly in the last few years. The Beggars’ Union had been soundly defeated by the Thieves’ Guild, and a new beggarmaster, Chinkers, ruled the re-established organization-called the Beggars’ Guild, of course. As far as Gord knew, he was the only master beggar-thief to have survived the debacle. The thieves and their hirelings had done for the rest-all but Theobald. The hunt was still on for the ex-king of beggars, but Gord knew that the obscenely gross devil would never be found.
Quite a few thieves had been slain in the brief war. Now the number of beggars in Greyhawk was slowly increasing again, but after the last fight-the invasion of Theobald’s headquarters-so many beggars had died that hardly one in six of the old union survived. Even those who only tithed to Theobald’s organization had suffered. The citizens of the city were indeed pleased at the overall result: fewer thieves and not half as many beggars, street gangs nearly wiped out as well, and honest folk the better for it all.
Gord had changed in appearance sufficiently so as to no longer fear recognition as a former Least Master of the Beggars’ Union. Other than San, there was no one alive to recognize him anyway. Well, he thought, perhaps Chinkers also might be able to, but Gord had serious doubts about that. The wily old fellow had been too busy with his own schemes, certainly, to notice a boy beggar-thief; otherwise he wouldn’t be beggarmaster today. Any thieves who had encountered Gord two or three years ago would never recognize him now either.
He and San had feared a hunt for them at first.
They had fled from the Beggars Quarter when the end came. First they’d hidden here, then there-Foreign Quarter, Craftsmen’s Ward, and even the Low Quarter briefly. Then they settled down below the Halls District in the University’s precincts, just south of Clerksburg. They insinuated themselves into the academic community and took up formal studies, primarily as a means of concealing themselves. In the throng of students, the two boys were as invisible as they could be to any search-and probably there had been none at all anyway. Both of them had overestimated their importance, but that was part of being boys.
Of course, being a student had other advantages, too. The time he had spent studying under a tutor and then in a college had served Gord well. He had matured, grown, changed. He was far better educated now and more capable of dealing with the world as it really was. Being able to survive in Old City was by no means a measure of viability anywhere beyond those circumscribed limits.
Gord was pleased with recent events, all in all, yet he missed San. He was near manhood, but the part of him that was still a boy needed and wanted a companion of the same sort. He had been denied that luxury throughout most of his life, and the feeling of being close to another was something that Gord now comprehended and appreciated more than ever. But now San had left, feeling a need to follow his own path, and Gord was on his own again.
Gord paid over a small iron coin, toll for passage from the Foreign Quarter into New Town. Suddenly it occurred to him that he was halfway back to the apartment that he had, until recently, shared with San. He had been so lost in thought that he couldn’t recall most of the walk. Alone again…
“I am meant to be that way,” he murmured to himself as he strode through the streets on his way south to the university area. “I’m a loner, and that’s another reason why San left. I’m pretty poor company.” No, he told himself in the next instant, that wasn’t really true. Gord’s estimation of himself went from one extreme to the other as he tried to take stock of himself and decide what to do next. He knew that when he felt like being so, he was excellent company, always ready to banter, desport, or devise some new prank. Much of the time, however, he did prefer to be on his own. That wasn’t being selfish or reclusive, considering his skills and his lot in life. Study, weapons practice, exercise, and thinking all required time alone.