He went out the back door, closed it carefully, and then jumped back to the night he arrived at the mayor’s house. Now, in dark of night, he walked to the main street and followed the many paths out beyond the town toward the hayfields. He knew that because that’s where everyone’s paths had gone on haying day. He picked a stone beside the track and pushed the button under it so it wasn’t visible at all, but still might believably have bounced there.

Then he walked back to Bak’s and Jobo’s house, climbed in the window, and went back up to Jobo’s room. On the way he saw that Bak was sleeping in one of the children’s bedrooms. His son’s bedroom. The door was closed; Rigg saw him only by his path. But he could see, with his path-sense, that Bak slept little. Could see him lying there staring at the ceiling. Maybe not right now, but for long hours of the night, tonight and the other nights since the button was missed and he left Jobo’s bed.

And there was Jobo, faithless woman. Rigg, with his knowledge of all people’s paths, knew well enough how common, and how uncommon, such actions were. More common in the city, less common in small villages, where everyone was known and it was hard to do anything unseen. It really took some ingenuity for Jobo and the mayor to betray their spouses here. And it had only happened twice, two months apart—Rigg knew that. Perhaps after this, never again.

Rigg jumped forward to the time right after he left Ram Odin.

“Got it?” Ram Odin asked.

“Moved it to where I’m going to find it,” said Rigg. “Took a bit of maneuvering.”

“So you’re going to help the conspirators get away with it,” said Ram Odin.

“This time.”

“I’m glad you confined yourself to retrieving the button,” said Ram Odin.

“What else could I have done?”

“You could have spooked her so she ran away before she got to his house,” said Ram Odin. “You could have gone back to the first time they caught each other’s eye and plotted this sort of thing.”

“Should I have?”

“If you did, we’d have a devil of a time explaining what we’re doing in this room, where no one invited us because nobody lost a button.”

“If I had Umbo’s talent,” said Rigg, “I could have appeared to us on the road and warned us away from this village.”

“I thought the facemask let you do everything Umbo does,” said Ram Odin.