“To find the jeweler who sold the medallion.”
“To go through the motions of finding him. The jewelist on Thistlewaite said only that the man who pawned it came from Harpaloon.”
“You make it sound hopeless.”
The scarred man grunted. “Good. I meant to.”
Harpaloon jewelers, called jawharries, were scattered throughout the town. So Méarana and Donovan compiled a list of shops courtesy of the municipal office, the Kennel chit, and a bit of buckshish under the table; and splitting the list between them, spent several days going from one to another. Not that they expected to find the’ harry who had sold the trinket; but someone might remember that Bridget ban had come asking, and someone might recognize the style or workmanship. It was worth the shot, though Donovan rather hoped that the shot would miss and Méarana would give up her hopeless hunt before it led them to where he feared it would.
They quickly learned that Bridget ban had indeed been asking after the pendant’s provenance. A few jawharries even mistook Méarana for her mother returned, remembering only the red hair and green eyes and the catlike grace in her step, and being greatly deceived on the number of years that underlay them. But they learned, too, only what she had learned then, which was nothing.
Until, as luck would have it, luck had them. Twice.
Or three times, depending on how one defined luck.
The first time was on the fourth day, when Donovan entered a small shop on Algebra Street. This tight-fit lane had been in Preeshdad’s earliest days its central street. Addresses still pegged east and west from it, although the main business district had long since wandered off to the newer parts of town and Algebra Street now sported slapdash boarding houses and brothels, saloons and small shops. The district was called alternately “The Kasper” or “The Liberties.” Donovan thought that in the dark of night the street might appear ominous, but in the bright afternoon it was merely shabby, and teeming with aimless humanity—ragged’ Loons, soi-disant Cuddle-Dong aristos, rough-trousered settlers in from the Boonlands, a sprinkling of more brightly-garbed touristas lured from the city center—all of them seeking bargains or thrills or forbidden pleasures, and hailed from all sides by the hawkers of each of them. The Kasper was strung out and tangled in a warren of streets: Aonsharad and Dhasharad to the east; Trickawall and Trickathanny to the west; but it seemed more crowded because the streets were tight and never straight for very long.
BOO SADD MAC SORLI, the sign announced in Gaelactic, pine jewelry, pawn, and pre-owned. Above this ran a line of gracefully curling symbols that might be a decorative border. Behind the shatterproof window sat displays of all the small, dispensable possessions of men and women who had found the need to dispense with them. Donovan wondered how many, driven to pawn such property, ever rebounded enough to redeem them.
“Donovan,” said the Fudir, “let me bukh with this dukandar.”
A local, pushing by in the throng, gave him a startled look and hurried on.
The scarred man shrugged. “Have at him. I’m tired of all the chaffering. This is the fourteenth shop on our list. I don’t think she’ll ever give up.”
We could simply tell her we’d gone to these places, the Sleuth pointed out. Why waste our time just because she wastes hers?
That would not be honorable.
You are in the wrong business for honor, Silky.
“We’re not in that business anymore,” Donovan reminded himselves.
Boo Sadd, summoned by the door chimes, proved to be a’ Loon: large nose, red hair, hazel eyes, and a dusky complexion against which freckles barely showed. If the approach of a possible customer pleased him, he concealed his joy admirably well. “Shoran, you wouldn’t be off your orbit, coffer, now would you?”
The Fudir smiled and chose to use a Valencian accent. “Ain’t no mover, me. Just a tourista. Got a question bout some jewelry, an’ mebbe you kin help me widdit.” He held out a hologram of Méarana’s medallion. “Guy sold it to me on Thistlewaite, said it come from here, an’…”
The jeweler’s eyes barely flicked to the image. “Ah, no, fendy,” he said, making a fluttery wave of his hand. “As lush, flowing streams on the parched plains of the Jazz, are Thistles in my poor dook. No Harpaloon hand made this. I grieve that I cannot help you.” His face revealed the depth of his grief.
The Fudir leaned on the edge of the counter. “You got a long mem’ry, friend, for such a quick answer. This woulda been a coupla years ago. If it ain’t Harpy work, mebbe you know where it come from. Not too much to ask, innit?”
Valency had famously been ruled by a line of tyrants of notable brutality and, consequently, most people felt an urge to cooperate when a Valencian asked politely in just that tone of voice.
The jawharry took the image in his hand and studied it. “Hard to tell, o best one, from such a poor reproduction. Do I know if the colors are true? No. May I proof the hardness? I cannot. I have seen work—kluzni, they call it—from the Cliff of Anne de Louis, far across the Jazz which… But… No. This is not Louisian work.”
“But you seen stuff like it? Import ware?”
“I recall now a coffer woman half a handful of years past who asked after something much like this. I will share with you what I am after telling her. My dook does not handle coffer work. Such things are harm. But at times it comes into the hands of assdikkas and they bring it to me so as not to pollute their fingers. Allow me to check…” He whispered into a microphone, studied the result, and whispered a few more parameters. After a moment, he swiveled the viewing stage so the Fudir could see the resulting holo. “These pieces, I am thinking, are like in craftsmanship to yours.”
Above the stage floated two rings and a man’s bracelet. Each was inlaid with the same sort of pastel-colored stones, cleverly cut and fitted into impressionistic and abstract patterns.
“Pedant?” whispered the Fudir.
The jawharry misunderstood. “No, fendy. No pendants, only these rings and bracelet.”
What? said the Pedant. Oh. Yes. These pieces definitely arose from the same artistic tradition.
Donovan’s heart fell. The search, it appeared, would go on.
“Where’d dis stuff come from?” the Fudir asked.
The’ harry checked his records. “A man of the sook, who is called Boo Zed O’Culinane. He had them off a Wildman who was less than prudent of his purse.” ’Ah. We learn by our mistakes.”
“Then thanks to Boo Zed he departed Harpaloon a far wiser man.”
The Fudir laughed. “If ya can’t know the truth, ya better know yer errors. Which Wild-world did dis guy come from?”
“O best one! Who may number the grains of sand on the beach of Inch? So many are the worlds of the Wild. But few Wildmen come so far as Harpaloon, and so they are more clearly noted than other coffers…” The jawharry bowed slightly and struck his breast. “Begging your honor’s pardon. I heard that he came from a world within the Burnt-Over District. The name of it was something like Ōram or Eḥku or Enjrun, but who can keep straight such heathen names?”
The back of the scarred man’s scalp prickled. Enjrun, he did not know, but the other two sounded eerily of the old Tantamiž. Without thinking, he bowed over his folded hands, “Nandri, dukandar. You have been…”
But the jawharry’s eyes narrowed. “Am I looking like a moose to you, you farking coffer?” And he mimed spitting on the floor.