“Look, Fafhrd,” the Mouser said on the third of such occasions, meanwhile pretending to study a skinny-limbed pot-bellied beggar girl as if trying to decide whether a diet of lean meat and certain calisthenics would bring out in her a rare gaminesque beauty. “Look, Fafhrd, right here you have what you want, whatever that is — I think it's a chance to patch up poetry and squeak it at fools — but whatever it is, you must have it here near the Marsh Gate, for the only thing in the world that is not near the Marsh Gate is money, and you tell me you don't want that — the more fool you! — but let me tell you something: if you let Bwadres get any nearer the Citadel, yes even a pebble's toss, you will get money whether you want it or not, and with that money you and Bwadres will buy something, also willy-nilly and no matter how tightly you close your purse and shut your ears to the cries of the hawkers. That thing which you and Bwadres will buy is trouble."

Fafhrd answered only with a faint grunt that was the equivalent of a shoulder shrug. He was looking steadily down past his bushy beard with almost cross-eyed concentration at something his long fingers were manipulating powerfully yet delicately, but that the large backs of his hands concealed from the Mouser's view. “How is the old fool, by the by, since he's eating regularly?” the Mouser continued, leaning a hair closer in an effort to see what Fafhrd was handling. “Still stubborn as ever, eh? Still set on taking Issek to the Citadel? Still as unreasonable about… er… business matters?"

“Bwadres is a good man,” Fafhrd said quietly.

“More and more that appears to be the heart of the trouble,” the Mouser answered with a certain sardonic exasperation.