Page 29 of The Trick of It

But Rhys just didn’t like having his fingers constrained.

He thought that was sensible enough.

He followed her down the High Street and into the narrow Twittens, where specialty shops were located, places where work-a-day folk who only spent their coin on grocery and sundry did not often venture, save perhaps to look for Christmas gifts or solve an unexpected problem.

Rhys liked these alleys best. They were his favorite part of Sussex.

He stopped a little behind Seph as she murmured to herself, counting the numbers above each door, to peer into the window of a taxidermy shop, where an aged woman with impressive and beautiful wrinkles all over her face was carefully reconstructing the remains of two erstwhile little birds with the most spectacular orange-and-black plumage over their heads.

“Seph,” he called ahead. “I’ve found my first shop.”

“Do not dally,” she called back impatiently. “You will get lost.”

He chuckled and turned, speeding up to match her. “I’ve never been lost in my life, cariad.”

She paused.

And he did too, frowning.

He called everyone that, he reasoned. It was just instinct. He called Hattie and Monica and Ruby and even Malcolm sometimes ‘cariad.’

“Slip of the tongue,” he said. “I’ve never been lost in my life, gwrach.”

She swallowed, her lips twitching a little at the word, which meant ‘hag’ or ‘witch.’ “Better,” she said. “It’s just over here.”

Wedged between a textile shop for seamstresses and a clock repair shop was a crooked, little blue awning with a rusty bell above it. Seph pushed in, holding the door for Rhys to follow, and called out as soon as the thing had swung shut behind them.

The shopkeeper, who appeared to be a boy of about fifteen, toddled out, serious as you please. “Gordon,” she said. “Good morning.”

The boy had a shaggy mop of blond hair that was sticking up every which way, and the mark of goggles quickly removed around his eyes and wayward eyebrows. “Miss Boswell,” he breathed, with the reverence of a man who has just seen God.

“Iesu,” Rhys muttered.

“I’ve your boxes ready,” the lad said, gesturing to two open-topped crates by the door. “The singles and the tandems. The blue ones are new. There are two there for you to try out gratis. I think you’ll find them good sellers.”

Seph blinked, turning toward the crates and bending down to withdraw a little painted cube in a rich, sky blue, turning it in her hands and pressing gently on the tabs and widgets on its outside. “Why blue?” she asked.

“It’s sea themed,” the lad answered. “There’s a shell inside.”

“Oh, excellent,” she said. “You might as well get me half a dozen more. I’ll pay now.”

It made the boy grin widely and turn to scamper off back to his workshop.

“I thought you couldn’t sell those tandem puzzles,” Rhys said, once he was gone, frowning down at the crate. “You said you couldn’t, when you gave one to Hattie at her wedding.”

“Actually,” she corrected, flashing him half a smile, “you said that. I just echoed it because I thought it was funny.”

“Well, it’s not,” he muttered, and then he snatched the blue cube from her to inspect it himself, dancing away when she attempted to get it back. “I’ll buy this one,” he said, grinning. “Let me have it.”

“Fine,” she snapped, crossing her arms and falling back. “But you’re paying double.”

“Am I?” he returned, grinning and bouncing on his heels.

Once they’d paid and the child who ran this shop had arranged for the crates to be carried to their coach, they set out again, this time in search of midday fare. The Twittens had an abundance of little pubs and soup shops, and they found one right across the street that was brewing up something that smelled sufficiently appealing.

The bread, especially, was very good dipped in the stew.

And while chewing, Rhys had time to think. He’d been thinking in the coach, after conversation had gone abruptly dry. Thinking quite hard, in fact.