“Huh?”
“Do you not understand?” Holo opened her eyes and looked at Lawrence.
Her eyes shone, not with scorn or anger but with terror.
Whatever it was, she truly feared it.
But Lawrence could not for the life of him imagine what that was. “I don’t. Unless… are you afraid of the end of our travels?” Lawrence managed to ask, though it took all his strength to do so.
Holo’s expression softened somehow. “That is, of course… frightening, yes. This has been the most fun I have had in a great while. But there is something I fear still more…”
She suddenly seemed very distant.
“’Tis well if you don’t understand. No” – she said, pulling her hand out from underneath the blanket and clasping the hand with which Lawrence still stroked her head – “even more than that, ’twould be troublesome if you did.”
She then laughed at some jest, covering her face with both hands.
Strangely, Lawrence did not feel like this was a rejection.
It rather seemed to be the opposite.
Holo curled up into a ball beneath the blanket, seeming this time to truly intend on sleeping.
–But then she popped her head out again, as though suddenly remembering something. “I do not mind if you go downstairs, so long as you do nothing to make me jealous.”
She had either noticed Eve’s gesture or was simply luring him into a trap.
In either case, she was correct about his plans. Lawrence patted her head lightly before answering. “Apparently I have a soft spot for jealous, self-loathing girls.”
Holo smiled, flashing her fangs. “I shall sleep now,” she said, then dove again beneath the blanket.
Lawrence still didn’t know what she feared.
But he wanted to allay that fear if he could.
He gazed at the palm of his hand, the sensation of her head beneath it was still palpable. He closed it lightly, as if to prevent it from disappearing.
He wanted to stay longer, but he needed to go and thank Eve for introducing him to Rigolo.
She was a merchant who might well be gone from the town tomorrow, depending on circumstances, and he didn’t want Eve to think of him as the kind of man who would tend to his companion before expressing proper gratitude.
After all, Lawrence himself had been a merchant for nearly half his life.
“I’ll be downstairs, then,” he murmured by way of some sort of excuse.
It occurred to Lawrence that what he’d told the barmaid earlier was true – that while he controlled the strings of his coin purse, his reins were tightly held. Frustratirigly, he expected that fact was all too apparent from Holo’s perspective.
“…”
Yes, all he feared was the end of the journey.
But what did Holo fear?
Lawrence was lost in thought like a little boy.
Lawrence saw three inn patrons drinking on the second floor. One of them seemed like a merchant; the other two were probably itinerant craftsmen. If they had all been merchants, it was unlikely they would have been able to drink together so quietly, so Lawrence was confident in his guess.
He reached the first floor. Arold and Eve were still there.
It was almost as if time had stopped. Nothing had changed since he went upstairs. The two of them did not speak and stared in different directions.
“Did a witch sneeze?” Lawrence asked. It was a common superstition that a witch’s sneeze could stop time.
Arold only looked in Lawrence’s direction with his deep-set eyes.
If Eve hadn’t laughed, he would have worried he’d made some kind of faux pas.
“I’m a merchant, but not so the old man. Hard to make conversation,” said Eve.
Perhaps because there was nothing that served as a proper chair, she gestured at an empty wooden box.
“I was able to meet with Rigolo thanks to you. He certainly was a melancholy sort,” said Lawrence, taking the cup of wine Arold offered him. Someone could tell the stoic old man that his beloved daughter had come, and he probably wouldn’t even go out to meet her.
Eve laughed. “He is, isn’t he! There’s no helping a man that gloomy.”
“I do envy that technique of his, though.”
“So you saw that?” Eve said with a smile. “He likes you. If you could get him to help you with business, you’d be able to strip most merchants naked, don’t you think?”
“Unfortunately, he didn’t seem inclined.”
Rigolo was entirely indifferent to such things.
‘“That’s because he’s got everything he could ever want in that run-down, old place of his. You saw the garden, right?”
“It was incredible. You hardly ever see glass windows that large.”
Eve’s face was tilted down, but she looked up a bit and grinned at Lawrence’s purposefully merchant like answer. “I’d never be able to handle such a life. I’d go mad, I tell you.”
Even if Lawrence didn’t feel as strongly about this, he understood Eve’s sentiment.
Merchants thought of profit roughly as often as they breathed.
“So did you hear about the meeting?” Eve’s eyes peered out from beneath her cowl. Arold turned an openly baleful gaze upon her. She looked away.
Lawrence wore a smile, but beneath that, his merchant’s face was ready.
“Apparently it’s finished,” he said.
Of course, Eve had no way of knowing whether or not that was true; she probably half doubted his answer.
That was assuming she didn’t have any background information. If she did, this new revelation might well tell her all sorts of things.
“And its conclusion?” she asked.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t get that far.”
Eve looked closely at him from beneath her cowl, like a child staring at an hourglass waiting for it to run out, but presently she seemed to decide that no amount of gazing would reveal any more information.
She looked away, sipping her wine.
It was time to go on the offensive.
“Have you heard anything yourself, Eve?”
“Me? Ha! No, he’s completely suspicious of me. Still, whether or not I believe you… hmm. Did those words really come out of his mouth?”
“It may well be the truth,” said Lawrence.
If a conclusion had indeed been reached, then there might be others who knew what it was and whose lips would be looser. If the meeting’s conclusion wasn’t something that would profit foreign merchants, then no one would be harmed by its telling.
In the first place, official town meetings were held based on the assumption that their contents would be made public.
“What worries, me, though…” started Lawrence.
“Mm?” Eve folded her arms and looked in his direction.
“… is why exactly you are pursuing this avenue of conversation in the first place, Eve.”
Lawrence thought Arold might have smiled.
In a conversation between merchants, the interests and motivations of the participants were obscure, indistinct.
“You certainly get right to the point. Either you’ve done more than piddling two-copper business somewhere along the line, or you didn’t come to do a proper negotiation.”
It was hard to imagine a woman having such steady resolve.
No, to be a woman and a merchant, she would have to have that resolve.
“I’m like the rest,” said Eve. “I want to know how I can turn this into a huge gain. That’s all. What else would there be?”
“You could be trying to avoid a huge loss.”
Lawrence remembered the Ruvinheigen incident.
Even if one understood such loss intellectually, it was impossible to truly imagine until one experienced it for him or herself.
“People have two eyes, but it’s no mean feat to watch two things at once. Though I suppose from a certain perspective, you’re right about trying to avoid a loss.”
“By which you mean…?” asked Lawrence. Eve scratched her head at this.
Arold watched them, smiling beneath his bushy beard. The two were like longtime boon companions.
“I trade in stone statues.”
“Of the Holy Mother?”
The statue in Rigolo’s house flashed through Lawrence’s mind.
“Didn’t you see the one in Rigolo’s place? It’s from a port town called Gerube on the western seacoast. I buy them there and sell them at the church here. That was my business. Since it just amounts to transporting and selling stone, there’s not much profit in it, but if you can get one blessed by the Church, it’ll sell for far more. The pagans are stronger in this region, so when the northern campaign comes through, it brings throngs of people who want to buy statues.”
It was the strange alchemy of the Church. Just like in Kumersun, where speculation and enthusiasm drove the price of iron pyrite sky-high, religious faith could easily be turned into cash.
It was enough to make Lawrence want to have a go at it.
“Unfortunately, I don’t see any of that profit, but in exchange, I moved a respectable amount. But that’s all wiped out with the cancellation of the northern campaign. I’ve learned firsthand that no one hangs you out to dry faster than the Church.”
It was hard to imagine a greater tragedy than carrying all your assets as heavy, unwieldy statues.
Transport costs would rise. Places to sell were limited. If she had gotten together credit to make her transaction bigger, her business might well suffocate.
Lawrence didn’t think a merchant of Eve’s stature would put all her risk in one place like that, so she probably wasn’t facing utter ruin – but it was still a serious blow.
It would hardly be strange if, in her frustration, she turned her eye to speculation.
“The Church’s influence is waning in the south, I hear. I’d been thinking it was time to stop loading my goods on a sinking ship – figured I’d make one last big deal, then make a break for it.”
This suggested that she wouldn’t be able to make a break for it unless she was able to make that one last deal.
“So,” continued Eve, “we were just talking about how if I manage to hit it big, we might as well head south.”
Lawrence didn’t have to ask with whom.
Beside her, Arold murmured, “Been thinking it’s about time for a pilgrimage.”
A trip like that wouldn’t be much different than looking for a place to bury his old bones.
Arold had been talking about going on a pilgrimage ever since Lawrence had started coming to his inn, but this time he sounded serious.
“So, that’s how it is,” said Eve, pulling Lawrence’s gaze to her. “Want to lend me some coin?”
The sudden request did not seem connected to anything.
Yet Lawrence was not particularly surprised. He’d had a certain premonition that something like this was coming.
“I’ve got some very accurate information about the content of the council meeting,” said Eve. “I can make all the arrangements. I just need money.”
Her eyes were fixed steadily on Lawrence. She almost glared at him, but he could tell that it was something of an act.
“If I look at the details of the investment and decide the risk is worth the profit – with pleasure.”
“It’s the fur trade. You’ll double your money.” No merchant in the world would get on board with such a short explanation, but Eve seemed to understand that. She lowered her voice and continued calmly. “The Council of Fifty is going to provisionally allow fur sales to merchants.”
“What’s your source?” It was probably useless to ask – like trying to get a barmaid to tell her real age.
“The Church.”
“Even though they turned their back on you?” Lawrence shot back.
Eve shrugged, smiling. “We might have split on bad terms, but everyone knows to leave a few sympathetic contacts behind.”
Lawrence obviously couldn’t trust her, but she didn’t seem to be lying, either. It was a lot easier to believe this explanation than if she had just claimed to have heard it from Rigolo. “So what’s the deal?”
“The provision will be that anyone buying furs will have to do so with cash.”
There on the brink of the possible monopolization of the town’s fur trade, Lawrence had wondered what decision would be handed down – but the cleverness of this particular plan made him speak without thinking.
“So they’re not saying ‘no sales,’ but at the same time, merchants from distant places are hardly carrying significant coin.”
“Exactly. But they can’t very well return empty-handed, so they’ll buy whatever fur they can afford with the miniscule cash they have on hand.”
This meant that with cash, it would be possible to buy up the fine furs of Lenos and take them to some other town.
But something bothered Lawrence.
Now that Eve had told him this, there was nothing stopping him from cutting her out of the deal and doing it himself.
“You seem strangely comfortable talking about this with me.”
“If all you care about is making a little extra allowance, then by all means, go do this deal yourself.”
Eve’s expression was unreadable beneath her cowl.
Was she merely looking down on him, or was there some reason why this deal couldn’t work with just one person?
He couldn’t say anything careless, Lawrence concluded, as he waited for her to continue.
“In reality, you don’t actually have that much money, do you?”
“I won’t disagree.”
“Then you shouldn’t waste this opportunity. You didn’t even know Rigolo before I introduced you. Who in this town would be willing to lend you money?”
She was quite correct.
But something occurred to Lawrence, and it sent a chill down his spine.
It was possible that the reason Eve approached him in the first place was in order to evaluate him as an investor. If so, there was a huge discrepancy in the information they had.
Lawrence didn’t know anything about her.
“True, but I could head back to a different city and raise the money there. But isn’t that what you’re counting on me doing anyway by proposing I invest in this opportunity?”
He didn’t have a large amount of cash, and there was nowhere in this town where he could borrow the money, so that had to be it.
But Eve shook her head slowly. “Naturally, I took a look at you and your companion, the way you paid for the inn, and I figured if you went all in, you’d be good for maybe a thousand pieces of trenni silver. But by the time you get it together, the furs will be bought up is my guess.”
The back of the back was the front.
The more careful Lawrence was to stay out of Eve’s trap, the more tangled up he felt his feet becoming.
Wasn’t the decision of the council intended to prevent all the fur from being bought up?
At a glance, the idea of limiting fur purchases to cash only had struck him as a clever plan.
“You don’t actually think that all those merchants outside of town are just hanging out there separately for no reason, do you?”
“Somebody with real money is using them to make an even bigger profit,” Lawrence suddenly realized.
“Yup. This, friend, is a trade war.”
“A trade… war?”
It was an unfamiliar term and was the first time Lawrence had heard the phrase, but something about it made his merchant heart tremble.
“I guess you don’t spend a lot of time near the sea. Go into any tavern in a port town and drink with the merchants there. You’ll hear talk of the trade wars, believe me. It’s not something that just happens out of nowhere. We’re merchants, not bandits. The attacker has to make preparations well in advance.”
That stood to reason. There wasn’t a merchant in the world who didn’t carefully inspect his merchandise.
“
Odds are, the merchants camped outside the town are taking guesses at how the council decision is going to go and firming up their plans. How many people with money do you think there are in this town?”
Posed this question out of the blue, there was no way to be sure – except Lawrence was a merchant.
A rough estimate based on the size of the town appeared immediately in his head.
“The number of trading firms worth mentioning… maybe twenty, of various sizes. Shops specializing in a particular kind of good… perhaps two or three hundred. Maybe the same number of prosperous craftsmen.”
“Roughly, yes. And among those, the question is how many will put their own gain in front of the town’s.”
Lawrence could not answer that question. Not because he lacked information about the town, but rather because people always hid their selfish desires even as they tried to fulfill them.
“Anyway, if even one of those trading firms chooses treachery, they’ll sneak away with all the fur. If they operated through a branch office of another town, it would be easy to hide what they were doing.”
Merchants were a generally sociable group and would not lightly betray a town in which they had operated profitably for years. But enough profit would cause anyone’s loyalty to waver.
“Of course,” continued Eve, “I doubt a large trading company would turn traitor. Nowadays everything’s recorded in account ledgers, so it would be easy to see what they’d done. If they secretly lent money to an outside merchant, it could be traced.”
Lawrence understood immediately. “Even if they had a hidden, unrecorded source of money, the council could stop that with a single line, ‘The source of all money used to purchase furs must be confirmed.’”
He had thought that the foreign merchant registration plaques being handed out at the town gates were to prevent foreign merchants from laying unexpected traps, but now the practice felt much more significant than that.
Lawrence thought back to the strangely thorough inspection he and Holo had undergone. In retrospect, it had probably been to prevent travelers from bringing large amounts of money into the city.
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