Beguiled, Rossamund stepped out from among the shadows and equipment and into light. An old-fashioned great-lamp lit the space, with seltzer so new it glowed the color of summer-bleached straw. Cluttered about it was a motley collection of damaged and ruined bright-limns, great-lamps, flares, oil lanterns, even a corroded old censer like those that burned at the gate of Wellnigh House. Right in the middle of it all was the singer. He was alone, sitting on a wicker chair and bent over an engrossing task. He hunched strangely in his seat, his face a dark profile against the seltzer light, his legs pulled up oddly in front. His buff-colored hair was in an advanced state of thinning, and what little he possessed grew lank and thin to his jawline. He was winter-wan, and glimpses of his pallid skull gleamed in the clean light.
There was another 'chink,' and the prentice saw the fellow put a small pane of glittering glass upon a stack and then, with the same hand, replace this with another dull piece.This he placed in his lap and, still with the same hand, tipped grit paste from a clay jar on to a cloth laid out on a broad barrel. He did something remarkable then. He put down the jar and, with a deft movement of his leg, picked up the cloth between nimble toes and began to polish. He used his foot-bootless and stockingless even on this inclement day-as easily as another might use a hand.
'H-Hello,' Rossamund said softly.
The fellow hesitated only briefly then kept polishing, round and round with his toe-gripped cloth. 'I felt you there a-shuffling,' he said quietly, almost a whisper, so desperately fragile that Rossamund stepped closer to hear it better. 'Have you come to help me or to hurt me?'
'I-ah… to help, I hope.' The prentice smiled nervously to show that he was not a threat.
'You smell like a helper' was the baffling reply.
Thrown by this, Rossamund stuttered, 'Um… A-are you M-Mister Numps?'
The fellow looked up and blinked languidly once, showing a shadowy preview of a lopsided face. Rossamund tried not to gasp or start in alarm, yet he still took an involuntary backward step. The fellow's face, from the right- hand brow and down, was a-ruin with scars. His cheek was collapsed, the right-side corner of his mouth torn wider than it should have been. The cicatrice flesh went farther, down the man's neck, mostly hidden by his collar and stock.
'No one has called me 'mister' for three years,' Numps said with a sad inward look, speaking with that gentle voice from the left side of his mouth. 'But I was a 'mister' before. Mister Numption Orphias, Seltzerman 1st Class… hmm, that's who I was before. Just Numps now.'
'Ah… well, hello, Mister Numps. I've been set duties with you.'
The glimner frowned thoughtfully. 'All right then,' he said mildly, and went back to fastidiously polishing the pane in his lap, pressing hard at some stubborn grime. Rossamund could see that these stacks of glass panes were for the frames of the lamps and lanterns, big and small.
'What can I do, sir?' Rossamund looked about uncertainly.
'Well, you can tell me what your name is, sir,' Numps re-turned, fumbling and dropping his cleaning rag, then picking it up again with a bare foot.
Rossamund forgot himself a moment, transfixed by this simple, uncommon action.
'My name is Rossamund, Rossamund Bookchild, prentice-lighter.'
'Hello to you, Rossamund Bookchild, prentice-lighter, lantern-stick.' Numps smiled shyly then frowned. 'Oh, wait. That's not polite. Shouldn't say 'lantern-stick' to a prentice, should you? Just Rossamund then, Mister Rossamund,' he finished, grinning bashfully. 'Aye?'
'Aye!' Rossamund returned the grin. This surely was no madman, just a simple, gentle fellow. He reached out his hand for shaking.
Numps sprang from his seat, the pane falling to splinter on the boards. His broken face was aghast, wide eyes dashing up and down from Rossamund's friendly limb to the prentice's horrified expression.
It was only then that Rossamund realized the fellow's right arm was missing and not just the arm but the entire shoulder too. Not knowing what else to do, Rossamund dropped his hand. 'I'm so sorry…,' he mumbled.
'Oh dear, oh dear,' Numps whimpered and begun to shuffle those vulnerable bare feet about in the shards smashed over the floor. 'Oh dear, Numps is dead.'
'No! Stop!' Rossamund cried. 'You'll cut yourself.'
Yet this just seemed to distress Numps more, and he continued to shuffle and murmur, 'Oh dear, oh dear…' A pan and brush were handy, propped against the shining great-lamp. Rossamund snatched these up and flicked the broken glass from the floor and into the pan as quickly as he could. Yet he was not fast enough to stop the glimner from cutting himself badly, and the man began to splish about in puddlets of his own blood.
'Mister Numps! Please sit, sir.' Rossamund tried to nudge the fellow away from harm. He held him off with his elbow and swept up the remaining shards from beneath Numps' feet, brushing up blood with them. 'You must sit down, sir, please! Or step away!' Not seeing any other course, Rossamund stood and gripped the man by one shoulder and what remained of the other and shoved him back with surprising ease against the wicker chair.
Numps sat heavily without resistance, saying over and over, 'Oh dear, oh dear, so much red. Oh dear, oh dear, ol' Numps is dead…'
'We must get your feet seen to by Crispus-no, wait, he is gone away…' Rossamund managed to wrestle Numps' feet into a better position to see their injuries. His right foot was slashed with small cuts, especially between the toes, and the blood flowed easy and terribly free. His left foot had suffered only minor scratches. 'I'll take you to Mister Swill-'
'No!' Numps screeched. 'Not the butcher and his butcher's thoughts!' He wrenched his feet from Rossamund's grasp. The prentice was knocked against the barrel, bumping his head painfully. The glimner's own chair tipped and fell, sending Numps sprawling head over end with a flail of limbs. He lay on the boards, his wounds still bleeding free.
'But you need to have your foot mended,' the prentice pleaded.
'No! No no no…,' Numps insisted in return and began to sing. 'Too much red, Numps is dead…'
Rossamund sat for an exasperated pause, rubbing the smarting egg already swelling at the back of his head. He could not see how he could force Numps to do anything the man did not want. I'll fix him myself, then. I'll use my salumanticum!
He grabbed at the nearest, cleanest looking rags and pressed them to Numps' bare foot, insisting the man hold them there. 'I will be back with potives. Just press firm till then!' he said rapidly and, forgetting his hat, dashed up the avenue of metal and out Door 143. The rain, prodding him like fingers upon his crown, hurt his bruised scalp. The inclement weather had driven all others indoors.The windows of the Low Gutter glowed red, orange, yellow, green, while the noise of working still rang out above the fall of water.
Rossamund was quickly soaked as he dashed up the nearest stair to the Grand Mead, his hasty feet splicker-splack splicker-splack in the quickly growing puddles, his thoughts tripping with him, I didn't mean to scare him, I didn't mean to scare him…
Across Evolution Green he ran, all the way down the Cypress Walk, turned right through the Sally at the side of the manse and dripped water all along the polished floor and down the steps to his cell. His salumanticum always sat beside his bed chest. He took it up and made hasty inventory of its contents. What he needed most was missing: the black powder called thrombis that made wounds clot rapidly. It was all used on Pandome's wounds. Indeed, he had attempted to restock his salt-bag soon after the attack on the calendars, but was still waiting for the correct permission papers from Grindrod.
'Off to the dispensury, then,' he muttered to himself, and ran out of his cell and up the steps again. 'Surely they'll give some to me for an emergency!'
The dispensury was accessed from the infirmary. Entering, Rossamund recognized Pandome in a nearby bunk, despite the bandages that hid most of her face. She was still senseless. With a shudder, the prentice thought of Numps' ruined features.
From the other end of the long room Surgeon Swill glanced at Rossamund dismissively at first, then beadily, discomfortingly, causing the prentice to hesitate. Yet the surgeon said nothing and returned his attention to an attending epimelain.
Through the dispensury door was a small white anteroom with a barred window at the farther end. He
