The Silver-Plated Dinner Knife

"That girl's name is Sally. I was actually quite familiar with her father."

The bartender fished a dirty glass out of the bucket beneath the bar and carefully wiped it with a rag. "That girl's had a rough life, too. Before she turned six, she had both parents and came from a wealthy family, but everything changed completely when she was six."

"Honestly, I don't know what kind of serious trouble a kindhearted accountant could possibly get into."

"But that's what happened. When she was three, people from the Obsidian Hall took her parents away. After her relatives divided up her parents' estate, they dumped her at the orphanage north of town."

"While it was still running, that orphanage was every child's nightmare."

"Director Blaney was a penny-pincher. He received an allowance from the town government, but in his eyes, raising a bunch of children was still a losing business. So he made the children 'pay their own way'—in other words, he sent them to factories to work as child laborers."

"Child labor." Lude quietly turned the words over in his mind. It was a relatively unfamiliar term to him.

The bartender nodded. "That's right, sir. Child labor."

"When I saw the girl again, she'd been brought in by the orphanage staff. She'd lost all her former dignity. Her pretty face was covered in soot, and she was wearing nothing but a few rags."

"Sounds like a chimney sweep," Lude said.

"Exactly." The bartender glanced at the red-brick chimney behind him. "She was pretty nimble, too. Once she grew too big to fit inside chimneys, the director sent her to work in a textile mill. I imagine she worked as a cotton picker and a winder."

"Cotton picker and winder..." Lude thought back over the meanings of the words. "What do you mean?"

The bartender tapped his own head. "Because the next time I saw her, I noticed she'd shaved off all her hair. Unless a girl's suffering from some sort of hair-loss condition, the only reason she'd shave her head completely bald is to keep her hair from getting caught in the machinery."

"Then how did she end up like she is now?" Lude asked curiously.

The bartender handed a freshly mixed cocktail to a waitress hurrying past, then continued. "Nine years after the orphanage took her in, she'd grown into a lovely young woman. But no one was happy for her. We were all pretty pessimistic about her prospects."

"We'd all noticed that Director Blaney had ordered her to grow her hair out. It was a bad omen."

"Everyone knew Director Blaney was in cahoots with the people on Back Street. The only place his orphanage's pretty girls ever ended up was the brothel."

"But just before she was sent there, something strange happened."

The bartender's voice suddenly took on an eerie tone, making Lude lean forward without realizing it. "What happened?"

"Director Blaney died." The bartender lowered his voice. "And not just him—all the orphanage staff died overnight. Who knows what got into them? Every last one of them hanged themselves from the crooked tree in the backyard!"

"Every tree in the woods behind the orphanage had someone hanging from it. It scared the investigating sheriff so badly, he wet himself!"

"After that, the Blaney Orphanage was shut down along with its master's untimely death, and the children were taken in by various people. By the time Sally showed up in town again, she'd turned into the strange little thief you see today."

Lude furrowed his brow slightly. "I remember that in the Rhine Kingdom, habitual thieves could be hanged right at the town gate."

"That's what makes her strange."

The bartender clinked his glass as he spoke. "She never steals money, and she never targets locals, either. She only steals from travelers passing through town, and what she takes is usually some odd, worthless thing."

"A thief who doesn't steal money." Lude took a sip of his drink. This was getting interesting.

Seeing that Lude's glass was empty, the bartender promptly poured him another whiskey. "Exactly. To the townsfolk, her behavior seems more like some kind of eccentricity than theft. That's why the constable hasn't caught her and hanged her yet. Would you like something to eat with your drink?"

"Some smoked venison, with a little sauerkraut." Lude held his glass. "So how does she make a living?"

"I don't know."

The bartender shrugged as he expertly sliced the venison. "People have wondered about that before. She does buy necessities around town, but since no one's reported anything stolen from their homes, nobody's bothered to look into it."

No job, no stealing money, yet somehow she had enough to spend. This was getting more and more interesting.

By now, Lude was fairly certain the girl's behavior wasn't some so-called eccentricity. She was genuinely working for someone. The mysterious source of the girl's money was one clue; the very specific targets she chose when she stole was another.

A silver-plated dinner knife—that was what the girl had stolen from Lude.

But it wasn't an ordinary dinner knife.

It wasn't Lude's knife, but one of the silver utensils the train had provided for its esteemed passengers. Lord Hypnos had used it earlier.

After the old man left, Lude had noticed that a cold chill still lingered around the knife, so he'd put it away.

But Lude had worried that the old fellow might have left some kind of contingency on the knife, so he hadn't put it in the Glazed Pouch.

The girl hadn't stolen the money on Lude. Instead, she'd taken the knife, which meant she was probably after supernatural items. But if supernatural items were her target, it made no sense that she hadn't tried to steal the Glazed Pouch.

The Glazed Pouch was a genuine alchemical artifact, and a precious Relic passed down from several centuries ago.

Now Lude's interest had shifted entirely to the girl. He was curious who was behind her, why they'd sent her to collect such items, and what else was going on.

The knife didn't matter. Knowledge did. There was nothing in this world more precious than knowledge.

The bartender hesitated, then continued. "If you want to get back what was stolen, you can go to the ruins of the orphanage north of town. She lives there with a few other orphans she grew up with."

"Usually, if the person she stole from comes to ask for their things back in person, she'll return them without a fuss. So I hope you'll... Ah, forget it. Hit her if you want; she's got it coming. Just leave her alive after you've let off some steam."

Was it because anyone who came to ask in person had some involvement in the Hidden World, and she couldn't afford to offend them?

Lude pulled out a silver coin and slid it over. "Take it—no, don't refuse. I don't like making people who work for me take a loss. I'm heading out now. When I get back, I'd like a clean room to stay in. All right?"

"Of course, sir," the bartender replied politely, his expression growing even more respectful.