She ducked around the corner and through the alley, taking turns at random, squeezing through narrow passes between buildings and surprising stable hands, until she found herself on Main Street, not far from the courthouse. The Hall of Records wasn’t much farther, and Mrs. Ruth had given her an idea. If the Hall of Records allowed strangers to find out where Mariel lived, then it should allow her to do the same for others. And Lilitha had unwittingly given her a lead to follow: Dr. Daniel.

The Hall of Records was a nondescript building possessing none of the grandeur of other municipal buildings in town. No statues of archangels or founding fathers, no towering columns or divinity-dusted cement. Just a brick building with a slanted roof.

Inside was a businesslike lobby with two large wooden tables, chairs, and three clerk’s windows. At each window was a Taborite, gold and glowing with divinity, their engines humming low and steady.

One turned its faceless head to her as she approached. She had never spoken to an automaton before and wasn’t sure how they worked. She saw no ears, no mouth. But it seemed to be waiting, expectant.

“I’d like to see the town registry,” she said, leaning forward and raising her voice.

She did not know if it understood her at first, but presently it wheeled away to the shelves of archives behind it and after a moment returned with three oversized bound volumes from a shelf. It extended a clawlike hand through the window opening, and she took the ledgers.

“Thank you,” she said, feeling a bit foolish. She did not know if Taborites cared to be thanked for their labor, but it seemed the right thing to do.

She took the registers to a vacant table and got to work. Her pencil in hand, she spread her notebook before her and opened the earliest record. If Daniel was a doctor, he was no doubt in the town registry. All she had to do was find him.

It took her an hour to make her way through the first ledger. She collected twenty men over the age of eighteen named Daniel, but only two had professions relevant to medicine. One was a veterinarian, and the other specialized in ancient medicines.

In the next book, there were more Daniels, but most overlapped from the previous year, and none of the new Daniels listed his profession as a medical man.

In the last book, she netted two new Daniels, one a dentist and one a surgeon.

Four Daniels who could be considered doctors, and she had their last names and street addresses. It was a solid place to begin.

She returned the ledgers to the automaton clerk with another thank-you and headed back out into the day, this time making sure to watch her back.