The clipper was part of Garwater’s suburbs: the people there lived below in preexisting cabins. No houses were built on its decks. The Shadeskinner was bronze-trimmed wood, and rope and old canvas. It was without any taverns or cafés or whorehouses, and very few people lingered on its deck. Bellis stared at the ocean, just like a passenger on a clipper at sea.

She stood alone for a long time.

The sea glimmered under the gaslights.

Finally, at a little past nine in the evening, she heard hurried footsteps.

Johannes Tearfly stood before her, the expression on his face unreadable. She nodded at him, slowly, and said his name.

"Bellis, I’m so sorry I’m late," he said. "Your message… It was short notice and I couldn’t rearrange everything. I got here as quickly as I could."

Is that right?thought Bellis coldly. Or are you almost an hour late to punish me?

But she realized that his voice sounded sincerely contrite: that his smile was uncertain, but not cold.

They walked the deck aimlessly, meandering toward the narrowing front, then turning back again. They talked awkwardly, the memory of their argument heavy on them.

"How goes the research, Johannes?" Bellis said eventually. "Are we nearly… wherever we’re going?"

"Bellis…" He shucked his shoulders in irritation. "I thought perhaps you might have… Dammit, if you’ve called me here just to-"

She cut him off with her hands. There was a long silence and Bellis closed her eyes. When she opened them, her face and voice had softened.

"I’m sorry," she said. "I’m sorry. The fact is, Johannes, that what you said to me hurt. Because I know you’re right." His face was guarded as she forced the words out. "Don’t misunderstand me," she said quickly. "This place’ll never be my home. I was taken here by piracy, Johannes: I was stolen.

"But… but, you were right that… that I’d cut myself off. I knew nothing about the city, and I felt ashamed of that." He started to interrupt, but she would not let him. "And more than anything, I saw the… the chance of it all." Her voice grew impassioned. She spoke what sounded like uncomfortable truths. "I’ve seen things here, I’ve learnt things… New Crobuzon’s still my home, but you’re right that there is nothing that binds me to it but chance. I’ve given up on going home, Johannes," she said (and instantly her stomach clenched because it was so nearly true), "and it’s made me realize that there are things here worth doing."

Something seemed to be shifting in him; some expression was burgeoning on Johannes’ face. Bellis suspected that it was delight, and quickly she interrupted it.