Buffo was describing the man they were going to meet.
“He is a great collector of stuffed birds. He makes them, too. He sells, among other things, the clothes the beggars wear. He lives behind ‘Our Lady of the Zincsmiths,’ and thinks as I do that the future of the world lies with science.” (Ashlyme, hearing only the word future, looked guiltily in the direction Buffo happened to be pointing. He saw only an old lock gate, behind which had collected a creamy brown curd full of floating rubbish.) “His researches take him into the old towers of the city, and their derelict upper floors. You will not believe this, Ashlyme, but there among the jackdaw colonies and sparrows’ nests he claims to have found living birds whose every feather is made of metal!”
“He should avoid those old towers,” said Ashlyme. “They can be dangerous.”
“It’s interesting work, though. Do you want the last plum or can I have it?”
Presently they came to the cisPontine Quarter and found the old man at home in his shop. The small dusty window of this place was full of birds and animals preserved in unrealistic poses, and above it hung a partly obliterated sign. It stood on one side of an old paved square, entry to which was gained through a narrow brick arch. Fish was being sold from a cart at one end of the square; at the other rose the dark bulk of “Our Lady of the Zincsmiths”; children ran excitedly about between the two, squabbling over a bit of pavement marked out for the hopping game “blind Michael.” As Ashlyme stepped through the arch he heard a woman’s voice, shrill, nasal, singing to a mandolin; and the air was full of the smells of cod and saffron.
The old man was watery-eyed and frail. He stood amid the clutter at the back of the shop, clutching one stiff hand with the other and smiling uncertainly. The skin was stretched over his long skull like yellow paper. He had on a faded dressing gown which had once been embroidered with fine silver wire. A few twists of this still poked out of its lapels and threadbare elbows. He took Emmet Buffo by the arm and drew him away from the door.
“Come and look!” he whispered excitedly.
In a garret near Alves he had found a metal feather. It was the first proof of his theories. Smiling and nodding, he held it out for Buffo to examine. He cast quick, anxious little glances over his shoulder at Ashlyme. Ashlyme looked away and pretended to be interested in the stuffed birds which stood on the shelves as if they were waiting to be revived. The gaze of their small bright eyes made him shift impatiently. The old man looked like a bird himself, with his thin bones and nodding skull. He is frightened I will steal his discovery, thought Ashlyme. Buffo should have come on his own.
“Hurry up, Buffo.” But Buffo was engrossed.
Ashlyme picked his way between the bales of rags and secondhand clothes which made up the shop’s stock-in-trade. He found what he thought was a nice piece of brocade, folded into a thick square and heavy with damp. When he shook it out and held it up to the light from the doorway, it turned out to be a decomposing tapestry, in which was depicted a city at night. Huge buildings and monuments stood under the moon. Along the wide avenues between them, men dressed in animal masks were stalking one another from shadow to shadow with mattocks and sharpened spades. He dropped it quickly and wiped his hands. He heard the old man say, “The clue I have been looking for.”
“What do you think, Ashlyme?” asked Buffo.
“It looks like an ordinary feather to me,” said Ashlyme, more bluntly than he had meant to. “Apart from the colour,” he amended.
“These birds are real!” said the old man defensively. He came closer to Ashlyme, holding the feather tightly. “Would you like a cup of chamomile tea?”
“I think we’d better just look at what we came to see,” said Ashlyme. Buffo and the old man bent down and began to root through a pile of disintegrating bandages. Ashlyme watched uneasily. “What are you looking in there for?” he said. “Who would wear things like that?” He walked off irritably.
“Don’t you want to choose your own disguise?” Buffo called after him in a puzzled voice.
“No,” said Ashlyme.
He stood outside in the square, watching the children run about in the chilly sunshine. Above him the partly obliterated sign creaked. If he studied it carefully he could make out the word SELLER. The fishmonger was pulling his barrow out under the archway; the woman was still singing. Ashlyme closed his eyes and tried to imagine how he would paint if he lived here rather than up in Mynned. He decided that one day he would find out. The smell of the food being cooked was making him hungry. Suddenly he realised how rude he had been to Buffo and the old man. He went back inside and found them drinking chamomile tea. “Can I have a look at that feather?” he asked.
The old man held it out. “You see?” he said. “Look at the craftsmanship. These birds were built long ago, by whom and for what purpose is as yet unclear.” He leant forward. “I believe,” he said, in a whisper so quiet that it forced Ashlyme to lean forward, too, “that one day they will speak to me.”
“It’s interesting work,” said Ashlyme.
Later, as they were preparing to leave, the old man touched his sleeve. “This will surprise you,” he said. “I don’t know how old I am.” Suddenly his eyes filled up with tears. He rubbed them unembarrassedly with the back of his hand. “Can you understand what I mean?” He gazed at Ashlyme for a moment or two, with a look in which could be read only a vague anxiety, then turned away.
“Goodbye,” said Ashlyme. And outside, to Buffo: “Do you know what he was talking about?”
“It means nothing to me,” admitted Buffo, hefting the brown paper parcel which contained their disguises. “I can’t wait to get these home and try them on.” But on the way back to Mynned through Line Mass he stopped suddenly. “Look,” he said. “That’s the fishmonger following us. I saw him in the High City this morning, and he had some nice hake. I think I’ll cook a bit of that for tea.” He was unlucky. For some reason, as soon as he saw Buffo approaching, the fishmonger went into a side alley and made off, his barrow clattering on the cobbles.
THE SECOND CARD
This card implies a transaction which leaves you unsatisfied. Be prepared for unexpected events. If it comes next to No. 14 you will lose a favourite overcoat.
Ashlyme seldom took his own meals at home. Before the plague he had eaten with his friends at the Luitpold Cafe in the Artists’ Quarter. Now, more often than not, he could be found at the Vivien, or one of the other charcuteries on the Margarethestrasse, eating a chop.
One night he had supper there with Mme. Chevigne, who wanted him to design the programme for a production called The Little Humpbacked Horse. This had been devised as a vehicle for Vera Ghillera, the city’s newest principal dancer, illegitimate daughter of a laundress, with a lyrical port de bras, and would run as a rival to Die Traumunden Knaben if that play was ever produced. Ashlyme was not enthusiastic but allowed himself to be persuaded. (Later he was to make two or three sketches for this commission; but they were of young dancers caught unawares during exercises often far from graceful, and they were never used.) The sharp-nosed little Chevigne, who in her time had danced as well if not better than Ghillera, amused him with her scandals until late. When he got home a bluish moon was shining through the roof lights of the studio, giving an odd look of frozen motion to his easel and lay figure, as if they had been moving about just before he came in.
A note had been pushed in through his front door and lay on the mat.