He found Feretory Street as afternoon began to stretch toward evening. It was the street of the Reliquary Makers.
Now, a thing that Hugo, not being from Nagspeake, did not know, was that there had been a time when the city had been full of holy men and women, and then a time when a plague had taken them all. For some years after that, not long before Hugo had arrived, it had been the fashion to carry relics of those holy folk. But of course it would never have done to carry a charred crumb of a dead man’s fingerbone about in one’s pocket like a stray penny, and so reliquaries became all the rage: special purpose-made containers meant to house those precious miraculous bits and pieces. They could take any shape or style imaginable to accommodate any sort of relic, and they were crafted by jewelers, by clockmakers, by cabinetmakers and coffin builders, by glassblowers and potters and every kind of artist. Most of the reliquary makers eventually found workshops and studios on Feretory Street.
When Hugo arrived and started to read the signs that hung over the doors up and down the lane, he began to think he understood why he had been sent that way. Of course his replacement box would have to be a container made to hold something miraculous. Trailing his wake of fog, the boy headed for the nearest of the workshops.
This one happened to belong to a man called Gaz, who cast his reliquaries in silver metal set with windows of Roman glass for peeking in at the holy object inside. When Hugo entered, he found Gaz deep in conversation with a customer. Afraid of lingering too long, Hugo started to turn away and head back to the door with the fog swirling at his feet. But Gaz, who was perhaps eager to be finished with this specific piece of business, caught the boy’s eye and held up a single finger. Wait.
While the maker of reliquaries concluded his business, Hugo roamed the workshop, peeking into display cases of reliquary jewelry—rings, pendants, pocket-watch cases—and glancing over the presentations of bigger objects—trinket boxes, curio cases, even bookshelves—made to hold larger relics. At last, as Hugo paused to peer down at a box the size and shape of a sarcophagus, the artisan raised his voice to a bark. “I tell you, sir, there is nothing to be done without the winder. I can work with the spring you’ve got here rather than the piece specified by the original plans, but it changes the works. I have explained it and explained it. If you still don’t understand, you will simply have to take my word for it. If you don’t believe me, you are welcome to take your requirements to a different reliquarist.”
“We both know you’re the only one who can assemble the device,” the customer, a tall man with a single bright blue eye, said coldly.
“Then come back with a winder.” The reliquary maker stepped pointedly around the counter. “In the meantime—” He coughed, frowned, and noticed for the first time the smog rising from the general direction of Hugo. “I have another customer who has been very patient.”
The blue-eyed man took a deep breath—too deep, considering the worsening air quality in the room—opened his mouth to argue, and hacked up a lungful of fog instead. He collected a handful of objects from the countertop and stowed them in pockets around his person, then yanked a handkerchief from his breast pocket and held it over his nose and mouth as he stormed from the room, leaving Hugo looking helplessly at the reliquary maker as he observed the curling, clabbering fog with curiosity.
“Interesting,” said Gaz. “Is this the relic that needs keeping?”
“I haven’t got a relic,” Hugo said. “I’ve got a particular. A pea-souper. A proper London fog.” He took the cracked and pitch-wrapped glass vessel from his pocket. “It came in this box, but someone hit me and it was broken, and now I can’t put it back or stop it spreading.”
Gaz waved the boy over to the counter. He took a jeweler’s glass from his pocket and fitted it to his right eye, then carefully unwrapped the kerchief and peeled away the pitch-stained rag. Immediately the fog began to pour forth in earnest. “Oh, my,” the reliquary maker said with a laugh. He dropped the loupe back in his pocket, replaced the seal, then turned to a wall of cabinets behind him and took a jar of thick gold liquid from one and a small paintbrush from another. He uncorked the jar and, working rapidly, unwrapped the box again and painted a line of the gold substance along the crack.
“That will hold for a few minutes, at least,” he said, corking the jar and setting the brush on top of it. He lifted the box, screwed the jeweler’s glass back into one eye socket, and looked at the roil of fog. “I think you’re wrong,” he said at last. “If this isn’t a relic now, it may ripen into one someday. But it hardly matters. Whoever sent you to us was right. Reliquary glass is what you want to hold the stuff. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’m the man for the job.” He coughed again. The sickly yellow fog had reached about the level of the countertop.
“Why?” Hugo asked. “The longer this takes, the more danger people will be in.”
“I can quite imagine,” Gaz said. “But you have come to an artisan quarter, and while it is true that anything may be a reliquary if it holds a relic, on Feretory Street we take a certain amount of pride in crafting the perfect vessel for each precious thing brought to us.” He reached for a bell on the counter and rang it three times. “But don’t worry. The person you
