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fine you need a lens.
This fake {white dots is a giveaway) even had an English shilling of 1782 in
the glass as "proof." It's the oldest trick in the book.
    Me hired meant we moved on to other kinds of linkage. The dealers
wouldn't speak to me for ending their spree. Women dealers were doubly
scathing. Females don't like other birds. Dunno why.
    Gervetta and me were friends for almost a fortnight. She suddenly
sold up and went to live in Charlottesville, U.S.A., among the ineffably rich.
She left me a fake Ch'ien Lung tea-dust-glaze bowl, having paid a fortune for
it. The five phony certificates—British Museum, Sotheby's—were still stuck on.
You didn't need to check the absence of that curious green hint to the dark
brown glaze, or peer through a surface microscope to see the unnatural
smoothness. It felt dud. Poor—poorer—Gervetta.
    The lesson? Bottomless wells take any amount of gelt and echo for
more. Parable ends.
    •          •    •
     
    So I went to see Jeff. They call him a different nickname, but
he's Dalgleish. Geordie, from the Tyne. He lives with Eleanor, blind and bonny
since birth.
     
    The bus got me down the estuary in time for dark. Jeff teaches
tense people relaxation. Antique dealers always do a spare-time catchpenny.
Jeff's was the easiest I've ever heard of. "Sit down, lady. Nod off.
Next."
    "Wotcher, Jeff. I warn you I want a lift to the Bricklayers
Arms in a few minutes."
    "Come in, Lovejoy." He called my arrival ahead. They
live in a cottage. He's leveled off every floor so there are no ledges, no
sudden steps. The lights are always apologetically dimmed, in self-rebuke for
Eleanor's misfortune. "Glad to see you."
    Jeff has the lowered gaze of the blind minder, forever checking
protrusions. They never lose it. Eleanor on the other hand has the strange
merriment of the afflicted, her laugh straight poetry. She's lovely, vivacious.
Makes me wonder what the rest of us have done. She immediately was up to buss
me, hurrying to make tea. I always dawdle at Jeff's, never move anything. I'm
clumsy enough.
    "Jeff. You sent a ring through Gunge Herod?"
    "Yes." He looked too hopeful. I sighed inside.
    "Take a hint?" He hesitated. I'd been right to come. He
had it bad, lured by some big scam. "Yes or no, Jeff?"
    "Anything wrong, Lovejoy?" He glanced to the kitchen
door.
    "I think so. Suspect," I corrected.
    "I own the ring, Lovejoy." A guarded little speech.
    "Jeff. Before Eleanor comes back." We both spoke softly.
"My guess is, you've been asked to put some money in a scam. Big.
Cast-iron. The money's needed fast, tomorrow. Am I right?" Silence.
"Cut out, Jeff."
    He licked his lips. He doesn't have much savvy. I should talk.
He's the one with the gorgeous bird.
    "You don't understand, Lovejoy." He indicated Eleanor's
trilling. "I'm her mainstay. I'll need help as we grow older. A nest egg's
vital."
    "What if the nest egg's a myth, Jeff? You in clink?"
    He searched my face. I've seen that look a million times, the
ineffable hope of the wistful buyer.
    "You two conspirators done?" Eleanor came swishing in,
carrying a tray. I think she hears everything, and pretends not to.
    "Yes, Ellie." Jeff smiled, as if she could see him. Did
she feel smiles? "Lovejoy's come to warn us. No unwise investments.''
    I felt rather than saw her hesitation, speaking of feelings. She
said evenly, “Thank you, Lovejoy."
    And the chat turned from antiques to innocence, which is never
worth reporting. Over and out.
     
    The Great Marvella and her talking snake is (you'll see why the
singular in a sec) an institution. We've had our wizards, sure. But TGM and HTS
hit us like a typhoon. Nobody quite believed her, until they actually clapped
eyes on. Then, worryingly, some people did. And she was made.
    Jeff dropped me at the door, by St. Botolph's Priory, one of the
ruins that Cromwell knocked about a bit. I could see torchlights among the
gravestones—a local amateur drama, rehearsing towards catastrophe. I bumped
into