“The Glikkuns get their due,” said the clerk, “as I hear it told. The guild of traders has never stiffed the trolls a penny farthing.”

“Contracts hold, but contracts can be unfair, too,” asserted the gentleman.

“We’re in the wrong place at the wrong time,” said the goodwife. “I’d have been a smarter woman to have gone visiting my sister in Tenniken like she asked me to instead of finding myself here on this day of all days.”

“Tenniken! The home of the soldiers,” said Brrr. “Can you get there by train, do you know?”

“I can. Not certain trains are serving the likes of you.”

“I don’t understand why we’re seeing trouble today,” said the young clerk, whose pink-ham face was going pale and his voice cracking in higher registers than before.

“Aren’t you paying attention?” snapped the schoolteacher. “Sakkali Oafish has just learned about the trade inequities. The merchants taking twenty florins for every five the trolls get. She’s spitting nails. She’s declared she’ll call a strike unless the agents of the Shiz merchants pay double the negotiated rate for the emeralds they take, starting with the current shipment. Today. Before the Glikkuns leave. But the agents for the Shiz merchants are balking, saying that they aren’t authorized to enter into a new agreement, nor do they have the funds on hand to pay an unanticipated surcharge. Of course the Glikkuns are mad as hornets. And like all trolls, stubborn to boot. The whole town is waiting to see if they start to riot.”

“Our husbands are getting their guns,” said the goodwife. “They’ll take care of the matter. The Traum civic militia drills once a week.”

“Drills for ten minutes, drinks beer the rest of the evening,” replied the schoolteacher.

“My Aimil is in the service and he can shoot to kill at fifty yards even when he’s dead drunk.” She sniffed in pride. “Good lad.”

“I hope your Aimil is stopping for an ale then, because there will be shooting here before the moon is up.”

“Mark my words. They’ll show those Glikkuns the business end of a blunderbuss. Do some good, to boss the clammy little pasty-blobs about,” said the goodwife.

“Severity rarely helps in instances like this,” replied the gentleman.

“You setting yourself up as a court of justice all by yourself?” The goodwife raised her chins and rounded her lips as if tasting something unsavory. “Why en’t you going to live underground with the mole folk, if you endorse them so pitifully?”

“I’m not a court of justice-merely a commentator for our ignorant visitor,” said the schoolmaster mildly. In the spark of their little exchange, the Lion had retreated farther into the shadows.

“That petticoat will never fit you. It’s a petite,” said the clerk, either nastily or trying to make a joke and diffuse the situation. “A lady is petite.”

“I’m shopping for a friend,” replied Brrr, as frostily as he could, dropping the garment. He had thought it was some sort of headdress, with its lacy eyelets and scalloped hem.