chapter 16
previous chapter
This is... a dimly lit street. The last rays of light had faded, and the darkness of the street was punctuated by the half-hearted street lanterns. This was a quiet part of the City: but this was not the kind of quiet where it would be a good idea to settle down and raise a family. Quite the contrary. This was the quiet of people keeping their heads down, keeping out of trouble, and generally maintaining a nonchalantly low profile. The Watchmen kept a close eye on street like these, because people who are keeping quietly hidden in dimly lit streets are, more often than not, up to no good.
One of the doors along this street led to an even more dimly lit shop. In fact, the sheer dimly-litnessity of the shop pretty much outclassed that of the street; it was a really excellent sort of dim, the sort that could only happen through a combination of carefully arranged lighting, specially designed glass and meticulous placement of the furniture, all of which resulted in a shop where, for some inexplicable reason, anyone wandering in would be visible in a really dim light, but the shopkeeper's face was always completely hidden by shadows.
At the back of the shop was a little workshop, and it was a well-used one. What appeared to be a large microscope took up most of the workbench, while various blades and tools were arranged by size on a piece of soft cloth. There was a general sense of neatness about the workshop, despite the shavings of wood and glittery grains of glass scattered on the floor. And a man was sitting there, hunched over the workbench, focusing intently with one eye glued to the viewing lens of the microscope.
He was an old man, white hair, stubbly chin, spotty arms, and a pair of small spectacles balanced like a trapeze artist on his wrinkled nose. He was dressed in a shirt with a lot of pockets, and those pockets were currently full of pens and tiny screwdrivers. The old man's name was Mr Finnigle, and he was a craftsman. A very special sort of craftsman.
The old man raised his eye from the microscope, and blinked. He carefully removed something from the other side of the viewing lens, and placed it on the workbench. It appeared to be... a stamp. Not a postage stamp, of course: it was a rubber stamp, the sort with a knobbly handle on one end, and a large flat square of rubber on the other end. There was a very intricate design carved into the rubber, which resembled, suspiciously enough, a back to front version of the Merchant's Guild logo and motto.
Mr Finnigle sighed happily and rummaged around inside a drawer on the workbench, which dutifully produced another rubber stamp with an identical knobbly handle, but without an image on the clean rubber. Mr Finnigle carefully rubbed the surface of the rubber, giving it a worn look, and then placed it under the microscope.
As he lowered his eye back to the viewing lens, a bell rang.
* * * * *
This is... a brightly lit street, the kind where Watchmen stood at street corners, and the lanterns blazed brightly, turning the night into a sort of darker day. And right in the middle of the street was the office of Miller, Jacobson, Johnson & Johnson, advocates of law.
Unfortunately, one of the major obstacles towards establishing a law firm was the complete and utter lack of a proper judicial system on the island: the Watchmen fulfilled this regretably necessary function, and they have a natural distrust of lawyers. Cleverly, the law firms sidestepped this little inconvenience by employing a small army of men who were very skilled with their hands, especially when holding a weapon of some kind. The lawyers considered themselves to be the negotiators and persuaders, carefully ensuring that everyone obeyed the law by cunningly twisting words and sentences. Anyone who chose not to listen very carefully indeed when a lawyer gives a friendly warning would quickly find out that other parts of their body could, surprisingly, be twisted further than any word.
Junior lawyers bustled around on the lower floors, shuffling papers and speaking rapidly into imp-boxes. There was no concept of night time inside the law firms. Partly because the long arm of the law operates twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, but mostly because most clients prefered to conduct their business under the convenient shroud of night. Money was money, after all.
In the same way that dead seaweed rises to the top of a dirty lake, senior lawyers of Miller, Jacobson, Johnson & Johnson took up residence in the upper offices. The higher up they worked, the higher the rank in the firm, and right at the very top were the offices of Mr Miller, Mr Jacobson, and Mr and Mrs Johnson.
Mr Miller was currently standing and quietly staring out of the large windows in his own office. Seated in a comfortable chair opposite his desk was Mr Jacobson, who looked exactly like Mr Miller, except that he was a bit greyer and looked more shark-like than his partner.
"Old Man Fortune was a fool," said Mr Miller bitterly. "All that hard-earned gold, and he's going to just give it away to some bounty hunter, randomly picked off the streets? Foolish madness!"
Mr Jacobson coughed politely. "Perhaps. But he was a rich and cunning fool, and it would have been too risky to keep his will hidden from public knowledge. No doubt he had... other ways... of making sure that such a strange request would be made known. Besides, I suspect he never really trusted us as much as we thought."
"Oh really? How shocking," muttered Mr Miller, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Old Man Fortune trusting lawyers? If he was so stupid, he would have been a lot poorer a long time ago. No... I think he had a reason for such a strange condition to be imposed on the inheritance. All our investigations so far have revealed absolutely nothing about this Cabbage: it seems he was nothing more than a lucky idiot who got picked to be part of the old man's mind games. Confound it!"
Mr Jacobson removed his shiny monocle and began polishing it thoughtfully. He gave a faint smile. "Well.. fortunately for us, I have discovered an interesting fact about the diamond. Something that has, no doubt, slipped your attention during the investigations. Understandable, of course: no doubt you have had a lot on your mind lately."
"Hm?" Mr Miller turned sharply. Mr Jacobson was giving him an innocent little smile, and for a brief moment, Mr Miller felt uncomfortable. In this law firm, you swam constantly among sharks, and if you're not careful, well... one less shark in the sea, and there'll be more fish to go around. "An interesting fact, you say? And pray, what interesting fact would that be? You do realise that I've had the best experts inspecting it, and they found nothing out of the ordinary: the only thing they found was that the diamond was a damn good fake."
Mr Jacobson sighed and replaced his monocle on his eye. "And that is exactly my point. It is a damn good fake. DAMN good. Now.. doesn't that strike you as something really peculiar?"
Mr Miller frowned. He was, by most standards, an extremely intelligent man, but this time he had been caught blindsided. "Peculiar? Well, we were certainly surprised that the diamond was a fake, but there can't possibly be a real, identical diamond of that size. I have clerks researching the histories of all known unusually large diamonds, and there has been nothing resembling this.... bizzare clue left by the old man. It could be nothing but a very elaborate hoax, after all: Old Man Fortune's little joke, at our expense."
"Perhaps so, perhaps so," replied Mr Jacobson, in a voice like honey. His little smile was allowed to become a little broader. "But ask yourself this: what if it really is a clue? Where in the world would Old Man Fortune get a FAKE diamond of this quality? Certainly he did not make it himself, so he would have had to arrange for it to be made somewhere."
Something clicked inside Mr Miller's head. Mr Jacobson continued speaking in his silky voice. "And in this city, there are only a handful of craftsmen capable of producing such a fake. Find the person who made the diamond... and I'm sure our, ahem, other colleagues have plenty of effective interrogation techniques. I am of course surprised that you overlooked something so simple."
"Well, I certainly must thank you for your concern," Mr Miller replied frostily. "And of course, I shall arrange for someone to find and collect this craftsman as soon as possible."
Mr Jacobson's smile vanished as he rose from his seat. "No, that will not be necessary. Someone is already taking care of it. And now, I must return to my own chambers... and I trust that this little matter will be resolved soon, hm?" He flashed another smile, and left.
Mr Miller stared coldly at the door as it closed behind Mr Jacobson.
* * * * *
A bell rang softly, and Mr Finnigle's eyes narrowed. His hands carefully moved into his shirt, and he took out a thin, razor sharp blade, holding it at an angle where it was completely concealed by his hand.
Something moved at the edge of his vision, and Mr Finnigle twisted with surprising speed for such an old man. The blade shot out and stabbed upwards, connecting with somebody else's arm. There was a strangled gasp.
Mr Finnigle's other hand grabbed a sharp tool, and he slammed it hard into the intruder's head. The important thing was not to let him shout: the intruder collapsed like a rag doll under the force of the blow. Mr Finnigle took a quick glance: black cloak, black clerk's uniform, no visible weapons. Not an assassin, then: probably a thug sent to retrieve him. Which means that they'd certainly there'd be more of them lurking nearby.
Fortunately, Mr Finnigle took many precautions. A job such as his... well, many of his customers would sleep a lot better if he was removed: he knew too much, and in his field, trust was a very rare and dangerous thing. Tiny threads wound around his shop like cobwebs, triggering a small bell when broken. The intruder had been very skilled to come so close before the bell rang... but not skilled enough.
Mr Finnigle opened another drawer, and took out a small case. It yielded a tasty selection of blades and knives. Mr Finnigle pocketed these, and moved towards the entrance of the workshop, separated from the shop by a thin curtain. He peeked through a gap in the curtains, and yes, hiding there in the dim light were two more intruders, standing guard. Mr Finnigle sighed.
The curtain parted like the Red Sea as Mr Finnigle rushed out silently. The two shapes in the semi-darkness whirled around... and Mr Finnigle slashed outwards, four neat strokes on each side. There was a nasty gurgling sound, but Mr Finnigle did not stop. He dropped the knives, groped for the door knob, pulled it open, and then vanished into the night.
As he hurried through narrow alleys, Mr Finnigle glanced nervously behind him. Whoever sent those men will certainly be very angry indeed in the morning. But for now, Mr Finnigle had to get as far away from the shop as possible.
next chapter
This is... a dimly lit street. The last rays of light had faded, and the darkness of the street was punctuated by the half-hearted street lanterns. This was a quiet part of the City: but this was not the kind of quiet where it would be a good idea to settle down and raise a family. Quite the contrary. This was the quiet of people keeping their heads down, keeping out of trouble, and generally maintaining a nonchalantly low profile. The Watchmen kept a close eye on street like these, because people who are keeping quietly hidden in dimly lit streets are, more often than not, up to no good.
One of the doors along this street led to an even more dimly lit shop. In fact, the sheer dimly-litnessity of the shop pretty much outclassed that of the street; it was a really excellent sort of dim, the sort that could only happen through a combination of carefully arranged lighting, specially designed glass and meticulous placement of the furniture, all of which resulted in a shop where, for some inexplicable reason, anyone wandering in would be visible in a really dim light, but the shopkeeper's face was always completely hidden by shadows.
At the back of the shop was a little workshop, and it was a well-used one. What appeared to be a large microscope took up most of the workbench, while various blades and tools were arranged by size on a piece of soft cloth. There was a general sense of neatness about the workshop, despite the shavings of wood and glittery grains of glass scattered on the floor. And a man was sitting there, hunched over the workbench, focusing intently with one eye glued to the viewing lens of the microscope.
He was an old man, white hair, stubbly chin, spotty arms, and a pair of small spectacles balanced like a trapeze artist on his wrinkled nose. He was dressed in a shirt with a lot of pockets, and those pockets were currently full of pens and tiny screwdrivers. The old man's name was Mr Finnigle, and he was a craftsman. A very special sort of craftsman.
The old man raised his eye from the microscope, and blinked. He carefully removed something from the other side of the viewing lens, and placed it on the workbench. It appeared to be... a stamp. Not a postage stamp, of course: it was a rubber stamp, the sort with a knobbly handle on one end, and a large flat square of rubber on the other end. There was a very intricate design carved into the rubber, which resembled, suspiciously enough, a back to front version of the Merchant's Guild logo and motto.
Mr Finnigle sighed happily and rummaged around inside a drawer on the workbench, which dutifully produced another rubber stamp with an identical knobbly handle, but without an image on the clean rubber. Mr Finnigle carefully rubbed the surface of the rubber, giving it a worn look, and then placed it under the microscope.
As he lowered his eye back to the viewing lens, a bell rang.
* * * * *
This is... a brightly lit street, the kind where Watchmen stood at street corners, and the lanterns blazed brightly, turning the night into a sort of darker day. And right in the middle of the street was the office of Miller, Jacobson, Johnson & Johnson, advocates of law.
Unfortunately, one of the major obstacles towards establishing a law firm was the complete and utter lack of a proper judicial system on the island: the Watchmen fulfilled this regretably necessary function, and they have a natural distrust of lawyers. Cleverly, the law firms sidestepped this little inconvenience by employing a small army of men who were very skilled with their hands, especially when holding a weapon of some kind. The lawyers considered themselves to be the negotiators and persuaders, carefully ensuring that everyone obeyed the law by cunningly twisting words and sentences. Anyone who chose not to listen very carefully indeed when a lawyer gives a friendly warning would quickly find out that other parts of their body could, surprisingly, be twisted further than any word.
Junior lawyers bustled around on the lower floors, shuffling papers and speaking rapidly into imp-boxes. There was no concept of night time inside the law firms. Partly because the long arm of the law operates twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, but mostly because most clients prefered to conduct their business under the convenient shroud of night. Money was money, after all.
In the same way that dead seaweed rises to the top of a dirty lake, senior lawyers of Miller, Jacobson, Johnson & Johnson took up residence in the upper offices. The higher up they worked, the higher the rank in the firm, and right at the very top were the offices of Mr Miller, Mr Jacobson, and Mr and Mrs Johnson.
Mr Miller was currently standing and quietly staring out of the large windows in his own office. Seated in a comfortable chair opposite his desk was Mr Jacobson, who looked exactly like Mr Miller, except that he was a bit greyer and looked more shark-like than his partner.
"Old Man Fortune was a fool," said Mr Miller bitterly. "All that hard-earned gold, and he's going to just give it away to some bounty hunter, randomly picked off the streets? Foolish madness!"
Mr Jacobson coughed politely. "Perhaps. But he was a rich and cunning fool, and it would have been too risky to keep his will hidden from public knowledge. No doubt he had... other ways... of making sure that such a strange request would be made known. Besides, I suspect he never really trusted us as much as we thought."
"Oh really? How shocking," muttered Mr Miller, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Old Man Fortune trusting lawyers? If he was so stupid, he would have been a lot poorer a long time ago. No... I think he had a reason for such a strange condition to be imposed on the inheritance. All our investigations so far have revealed absolutely nothing about this Cabbage: it seems he was nothing more than a lucky idiot who got picked to be part of the old man's mind games. Confound it!"
Mr Jacobson removed his shiny monocle and began polishing it thoughtfully. He gave a faint smile. "Well.. fortunately for us, I have discovered an interesting fact about the diamond. Something that has, no doubt, slipped your attention during the investigations. Understandable, of course: no doubt you have had a lot on your mind lately."
"Hm?" Mr Miller turned sharply. Mr Jacobson was giving him an innocent little smile, and for a brief moment, Mr Miller felt uncomfortable. In this law firm, you swam constantly among sharks, and if you're not careful, well... one less shark in the sea, and there'll be more fish to go around. "An interesting fact, you say? And pray, what interesting fact would that be? You do realise that I've had the best experts inspecting it, and they found nothing out of the ordinary: the only thing they found was that the diamond was a damn good fake."
Mr Jacobson sighed and replaced his monocle on his eye. "And that is exactly my point. It is a damn good fake. DAMN good. Now.. doesn't that strike you as something really peculiar?"
Mr Miller frowned. He was, by most standards, an extremely intelligent man, but this time he had been caught blindsided. "Peculiar? Well, we were certainly surprised that the diamond was a fake, but there can't possibly be a real, identical diamond of that size. I have clerks researching the histories of all known unusually large diamonds, and there has been nothing resembling this.... bizzare clue left by the old man. It could be nothing but a very elaborate hoax, after all: Old Man Fortune's little joke, at our expense."
"Perhaps so, perhaps so," replied Mr Jacobson, in a voice like honey. His little smile was allowed to become a little broader. "But ask yourself this: what if it really is a clue? Where in the world would Old Man Fortune get a FAKE diamond of this quality? Certainly he did not make it himself, so he would have had to arrange for it to be made somewhere."
Something clicked inside Mr Miller's head. Mr Jacobson continued speaking in his silky voice. "And in this city, there are only a handful of craftsmen capable of producing such a fake. Find the person who made the diamond... and I'm sure our, ahem, other colleagues have plenty of effective interrogation techniques. I am of course surprised that you overlooked something so simple."
"Well, I certainly must thank you for your concern," Mr Miller replied frostily. "And of course, I shall arrange for someone to find and collect this craftsman as soon as possible."
Mr Jacobson's smile vanished as he rose from his seat. "No, that will not be necessary. Someone is already taking care of it. And now, I must return to my own chambers... and I trust that this little matter will be resolved soon, hm?" He flashed another smile, and left.
Mr Miller stared coldly at the door as it closed behind Mr Jacobson.
* * * * *
A bell rang softly, and Mr Finnigle's eyes narrowed. His hands carefully moved into his shirt, and he took out a thin, razor sharp blade, holding it at an angle where it was completely concealed by his hand.
Something moved at the edge of his vision, and Mr Finnigle twisted with surprising speed for such an old man. The blade shot out and stabbed upwards, connecting with somebody else's arm. There was a strangled gasp.
Mr Finnigle's other hand grabbed a sharp tool, and he slammed it hard into the intruder's head. The important thing was not to let him shout: the intruder collapsed like a rag doll under the force of the blow. Mr Finnigle took a quick glance: black cloak, black clerk's uniform, no visible weapons. Not an assassin, then: probably a thug sent to retrieve him. Which means that they'd certainly there'd be more of them lurking nearby.
Fortunately, Mr Finnigle took many precautions. A job such as his... well, many of his customers would sleep a lot better if he was removed: he knew too much, and in his field, trust was a very rare and dangerous thing. Tiny threads wound around his shop like cobwebs, triggering a small bell when broken. The intruder had been very skilled to come so close before the bell rang... but not skilled enough.
Mr Finnigle opened another drawer, and took out a small case. It yielded a tasty selection of blades and knives. Mr Finnigle pocketed these, and moved towards the entrance of the workshop, separated from the shop by a thin curtain. He peeked through a gap in the curtains, and yes, hiding there in the dim light were two more intruders, standing guard. Mr Finnigle sighed.
The curtain parted like the Red Sea as Mr Finnigle rushed out silently. The two shapes in the semi-darkness whirled around... and Mr Finnigle slashed outwards, four neat strokes on each side. There was a nasty gurgling sound, but Mr Finnigle did not stop. He dropped the knives, groped for the door knob, pulled it open, and then vanished into the night.
As he hurried through narrow alleys, Mr Finnigle glanced nervously behind him. Whoever sent those men will certainly be very angry indeed in the morning. But for now, Mr Finnigle had to get as far away from the shop as possible.
next chapter
posted by nerdook at 10:44 PM
2 Comments:
He was an old man, white hair, stubbly chin, spotty arms, and a pair of small spectacles balanced like a trapeze artist on his wrinkled nose.
is it just me? or is there something wrong wif the sentence?? how can he be an old man, some hair, a chin, spotty arms and a pair of spectacles all at the same time?
haha, why not? perhaps he has a penchant for multitasking.. :P
alrite, u just have to read the sentence properly to know what it means. ;) now quit pretending, lol!
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