Snappin’ Wizard’s Surplus across the street was open and the tempera-paint sign on the front window glass read, “Chase Lights! Curse Limiters! LEDs! Pre-owned Spellboxes! Big Big SALE!” Tick-Tick slowed down for just a moment; she could never completely resist the siren call of Snappin’ Wizard’s. But she must have remembered that it was her wrench we were after, because it was only a moment.

Outside the Free Clinic near Fare-You-Well Park I thought I saw somebody wave. But I was in pursuit of a feeling with a torque wrench at the end of it, and we couldn’t pause to talk.

We were well south of Ho in a neighborhood full of what had probably been warehouses and light manufacturing back before the Border appeared, with the Elflands on the other side of it, to make Bordertown what it is today. I flagged Tick-Tick to a stop outside a squat brick building with no windows, and she killed the engine.

She tugged her helmet off and smoothed her already precise cap of chrome-yellow hair, fluffing the single long lock that fell, fine as mist, over one eye. She was smiling. “That’s interesting,” she said. “Walt Felkin’s place.”

“I don’t suppose you lent him the wrench and forgot.”

“Good. I’m glad you don’t. Are you in a wagering mood?”

“Um. Depends.”

“I’ll wager you five dollars that he’ll deny ever having seen my wrench until he finds out who you are.”

I snorted. “I might as well just buy my own dinner.”

“Quite right. Never mind.” She was whistling something under her breath as she picked her way through the stacks of old tires at the curb. It sounded suspiciously like Camper Van Beethoven’s “When I Win the Lottery.” There was a broken piece of tailpipe lying against the side of the building; she snagged it up and swung it like an umbrella as she walked to the door.

She used the tailpipe to knock. It didn’t make a friendly sound. After a minute’s wait we heard locks being unlocked. The door opened a crack; Tick-Tick jammed the tailpipe in to hold it open. A wide, watery blue eye appeared in the space.

“Hallo, Walt,” said the Ticker. “I believe you’ve borrowed something of mine.”

“I got nothin’ of yours.”

“Oh, Walt. It’s a torque wrench. I find I have need of it. Do pass it out like a good fellow, and I’ll let you get back to your dirty magazines, or whatever it is you do to pass the afternoon.”

“Get gone, Ticker, or I’ll pass you a couple inches of this.” In the opening, something metallic flashed.