She watched, satisfied, as Jenkins settled back into his seat. He cleared his throat softly. “This still falls under the scope of my investigation...”
“Which ans you won’t have to pay the clown another finder’s fee,” the huntress finished, catching his aning.
“I’m low on cash, and I’m not even sure your information is sothing I need.”
“Ten pounds.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Five pounds.”
“I don’t.”
A silence settled between them for a mont. “I never give information away for free.”
“Three pounds.”
Jenkins fished three bills from his pocket and laid them on the table. “You can sell this kind of tip over and over. Your cost is next to nothing. You’d be turning a profit even if I only gave you one pound.”
The huntress shot Jenkins a venomous glare and snatched the money from the table.
“Alright, listen up. So people say the source of the spirits is a shift in the stars. That’s not entirely right. The truth is, there’s probably a fixed location in Nolan City that’s generating them. Don’t ask where. If I knew, I’d have already gone to the Orthodox Church to claim the bounty.”
“That’s it?”
Jenkins felt cheated.
“There’s more,” she added. “Be careful who you’re around lately. While I was on your case, I ca across an ordinary person possessed by a spirit. You know what that ans, don’t you? A spirit forces its way into a living body, extinguishes the person’s consciousness, and takes over their flesh.”
“Is that reliable? From what I’ve heard, the spirits appearing in the city are all pretty weak.”
Jenkins questioned. This was, admittedly, new information.
“You paid three pounds. You get the result, not the details.”
The huntress elegantly uncrossed her left leg, shifted in her seat, and crossed her right over the left. She held out a hand toward Jenkins, rubbing her thumb and forefinger together.
She had long legs, but with his pockets now empty, Jenkins’s mood was sour.
There was still plenty of the afternoon left. Jenkins walked out of the pub, shoved his hands in his overcoat pockets, and headed back to Pops Antique Shop.
“Back so soon?”
Pops lowered his newspaper. Seeing it was only Jenkins and not a custor, he let out a sigh of disappointnt and raised it again.
“The locksmith was easy enough to find, so I went to look at a furniture dealer’s, but their prices were too high, and the carpenter didn’t have anything suitable either. I was hoping you could help pick out a few pieces of antique furniture, Papa Oliver. Fake ones will do.” Ｒ₳ŊỖ𝐛ÈṦ
He said, his eyes scanning the shop.
“You little rascal.”
Pops chuckled, shaking his head. The sound startled Chocolate, who was napping on the counter, and the cat let out an indignant ow.
The little cat was incredibly good-natured. As long as Jenkins rembered to bring it milk and ham each day, it would never disturb him while he worked.
The only exception was bath ti, during which Jenkins would invariably end up covered in scratches. Cats, as it turned out, really did hate water.
...
“Doug Nicholas, are you sure about this?”
Captain Bincy looked doubtfully at the two hounds at his feet.
“No problem.”
Nicholas, clad in a trench coat and holding the leashes, replied confidently. His eyebrows were unusually thick. “It took three years, combining my unique ability with intensive training, to raise these two. Their sense of sll far surpasses the ordinary. Even an Enchanter with specialized olfactory powers would be hard-pressed to outperform them.”
Bincy nodded. “Alright, let’s put them to the test. Find that black-robed figure who took the Mysterious Object.”
The two n hopped down from their carriage. Across the road lay the collapsed remains of apartnt 431B on Queen's Avenue. More than two weeks had passed, and the police cordon had finally been lifted. Workers in plain clothes were busy clearing away the rubble. A few small, raggedly dressed children scurried about, hoping to salvage sothing of value from the wreckage, only to be barked at and chased away by a foul-tempered foreman.
Once Nicholas released the leashes, the black hounds shot off. They lowered their noses to the ground, sniffing intently, and nearly gagged on the polluted air.
With a shared look back at their master, Nicholas, they took off at a full sprint.
Captain Bincy gave chase, watching as the two hounds tore down Queen's Avenue, colliding with a passing old gentleman and sending a young paperboy scattering in fear.
Suddenly, both hounds shuddered. They clamped their tails tightly between their legs, pressing them flat against their bellies, and then bolted into the distance with renewed speed.
“Are you sure you enhanced their sense of sll, not their speed?”
Captain Bincy grumbled, flagging down a passing carriage to continue the pursuit with Nicholas.
He didn’t notice that the mont the hounds had shown their fear, they had been standing right in front of Pops Antique Shop.
The little black-and-white cat, Chocolate, let out a soft, kitten-like ow, closed its eyes, and drifted off to sleep comfortably in Jenkins’s arms.
The next day, the Williams family hired a carriage and, along with Jenkins, brought his luggage to his new house on St. George Street.
“Isn’t this a bit too big? Aren’t you planning on hiring a maid? It’ll take too much of your ti to clean it yourself, won’t it?”
Robert stood with his hands on his hips, looking at the house from the street.
“Ah...”
The question finally dawned on Jenkins. In the excitent of owning his own ho, he hadn’t thought that far ahead. Of course, he didn’t have ti for tedious housework.
“Young people just don’t think things through.”
Robert patted him on the shoulder. “Don’t forget to go to the Nolan Council to get the steam pipes connected. Rember to visit the neighbors, don’t forget to tend to the lawn, and also, even though this isn’t a strictly managed district like Maidenhaven Road, there are probably fixed tis for trash disposal. Rember to ask around.”
Jenkins stood his ground and gave a wry smile. “Um, is it too late to move back in?”
“Do you need to lend you so gold pounds? After buying this house and getting so furniture, you probably don’t have much money left, do you?”
His father asked.
Jenkins still had about thirty pounds left, which was an improvent from when he had first arrived in this world. He thought for a mont and decided he didn’t need to borrow from his father.
“Is hiring a maid expensive?”
“That depends on what kind of maid you need.”
Mary Williams interjected, “Of course, if you were to get married now, you wouldn’t have to worry about any of these troubleso things.”
Jenkins promptly shut his mouth, not daring to press the subject.
That night, he and Chocolate stayed there.
Unable to sleep, Jenkins carried his cat over to the bedside window. Outside, the red and blue moons hung full in the sky.
“A house, a job, and a cat. I guess that makes a successful person now, right?”
He muttered to himself, then placed Chocolate on the bed. From a cardboard box, he carefully removed his collection of special items: a mysterious blue feather, a wooden badge, a tal cube, Mr. Hunt’s Fruit Platter, a few gold nuggets, and an orange gemstone earring.
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