"Fifteen corlms, my lord." As she picked up the coins she added, mechanically, "Good luck attend your studies."

"I'll echo that." Roy cleared his throat, aware of his previous antagonism and embarrassed by it. "I thought you were taking pity on us at first, but Fiona explained. A superstition, I understand. Well, I'm no man to deny another his search for luck. You're for Ascelius, I see. Just like Bran here." He nodded at his son. "I've got him passage on the Evidia-fifth class, hard but cheap." Then, as Dumarest made no comment, he coughed and ended, "Well, I just wanted to thank you. We all did."

The woman, with her quick wit and the facile lie which had saved her husband's pride, now as Dumarest extended the doll to the child, said quickly, "Don't snatch it, Lavinia. Thank the gentleman properly."

"How can I, Mummy?"

"You'll have to kneel," she said to Dumarest. "Allow her to kiss you."

For a moment he hesitated, looking at the woman, reading the understanding in her eyes. Then he knelt, the doll in one hand, arms extended as the child ran into their embrace.

"Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you for the doll." Then she was warm and soft against him, the touch of her lips moist on his cheek, small hands at his shoulders. A timeless instant which shattered as he rose to stand above her, the silken smoothness of her hair a memory against his palm-a moment she had already forgotten, engrossed as she was with her new toy.

The wind had turned fitful, gusting from the town and blowing over the field, the clustered booths of the fair, catching the rising columns of colored smoke and stinging his eyes with drifting acridity.