Advocate Sleem was a tallj thin man. Covering most of his forehead and spreading down onto his left cheek, reaching the line of the jaw, was a skin ailment that created a cracked scale pattern reminiscent of the bellies of newly hatched alligators. There were ointments that could heal this condition, but it was clear that the legendary advocate of Letherii law in fact cultivated this reptilian dermatosis, which so cleverly complemented both his reputation and his cold, lifeless eyes.

He stood now in Bugg’s office, hunched at the shoulders as if to make himself even narrower, and the high collar of his dark green cloak flared out like a snake’s hood behind his elongated, small-eared and hairless head. His regard was languid in that lifeless way of his as he studied Bugg. ‘Did I hear you correctly?’ the advocate asked in a voice that he tried hard to make sibilant, but which instead came out awkward and wavering. The effect, Bugg realized with a faint start, precisely matched what he would imagine a snake would sound like with words emerging from a lip-less mouth. Although, he added to himself, the specific question hardly seemed one he would expect a snake to utter. Snakes don’t ask for clarification.

Do they?

‘You wear a most odd expression,’ Sleem said after a moment. ‘Did my inability to understand you leave you confused, Master Bugg?’

‘Did you truly misunderstand?’

‘That is why I sought reiteration.’

‘Ah. Well, what did you think you heard?’

The eyes blinked. ‘Have we truly uttered all these words to return to my original query?’

‘I invite you to use some more, Sleem.’

‘Rather than simply repeating yourself.’

‘I hate repeating myself.’

Advocate Sleem, Bugg knew, despised discombobu-lation, although that was in all probability not even a word.

‘Master Bugg, as you know, I despise discombobulation.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘You should be, since I charge by the word.’

‘Both our words, or just yours?’

‘It is a little late to ask that now, isn’t it?’ Sleem’s folded hands did something sinuous and vaguely disreputable. ‘You have instructed me, if I understand you correctly-and correct me if I am in error-you have instructed me, then, to approach your financier to request yet another loan with the stated intention to use it to pay a portion of the interest on the previous loan, which if I recall accurately, and I do, was intended to address in part the interest on yet another loan. This leads me to wonder, since I am not your only advocate, just how many loans you have arranged to pay interest on yet other loans?’

‘Well, that was expensive.’

‘I become loquacious when I get nervous, Master Bugg.’

‘Dealing with you gets more costly when you’re nervous? That, Sleem, is really quite clever.’

‘Yes, I am. Will you now answer my question?’

‘Since you insist. There are perhaps forty loans outstanding with respect to addressing interest payments on still other loans.’

The advocate licked suitably dry lips. ‘It was reasons of courtesy and respect, Master Bugg-and, I now see, certain misapprehensions as to your solvency-that encouraged me to refrain from asking for payment up front-for my services, that is, which have been substantial. Although not as substantial, proportionately, as I was led to believe.’

‘I don’t recall leading you into any such assumptions, Sleem.’

‘Of course you don’t. They were assumptions.’

‘As an advocate, you might have been expected to make very few assumptions indeed. About anything.’

‘Permit me to be blunt, Master Bugg. Where in this financial scheme of yours is the money you owe me?’

‘Nowhere as of yet, Sleem. Perhaps we should arrange another loan.’

‘This is most distressing,’

‘I am sure it is, but how do you think I feel?’

‘I am resisting asking myself that question, because I fear the answer will be something like: “He feels fine.” Now, were I to cling with great faith to those particular assumptions we spoke of earlier, I would now insist that this next loan be devoted exclusively to addressing my fees. No matter what lies I deliver to your financier. Which returns us, alas, to my original utterance, which was voiced in a tone of abject disbelief. You see, your financiers’ present state of panic is what has brought me here, for they have reached a level of harassment of my office with respect to you, Master Bugg, that has reached absurd proportions. I have had to hire bodyguards, in fact-at your expense. Dare I ask you then, how much money is in your possession?’

‘Right now?’

‘Yes.’

Bugg drew out his tattered leather purse, prised it open and peered inside. Then he looked up. ‘Two docks.’

‘I see. Surely you exaggerate.’

‘Well, I cut a sliver off one of them, to pay for a haircut.’

‘You have no hair.’

‘That’s why it was just a sliver. Nose hairs. Ear hairs, a trim of the eyebrows. It’s important to be presentable.’

‘At your Drowning?’

Bugg laughed. ‘That would be fun.’ Then he grew sober and leaned forward across his desk. ‘You don’t think it will come to that, surely. As your client, I expect a most diligent defence at my trial.’

‘As your advocate, Master Bugg, I will be first in line demanding your blood.’

‘Oh, that’s not very loyal of you.’

‘You have not paid for my loyalty.’

‘But loyalty is not something one pays for, Advocate Sleem.’

‘Had I known that delusions accompanied your now-apparent incompetence, Master Bugg, I would never have agreed to represent you in any matter whatsoever.’

Bugg leaned back. ‘That makes no sense,’ he said. ‘As Tehol Beddict has observed on countless occasions, delusions lie at the very heart of our economic system. Indenture as ethical virtue. Pieces of otherwise useless metal-beyond decoration-as wealth. Servitude as freedom. Debt as ownership. And so on.’

‘Ah, but those stated delusions are essential to my well-being, Master Bugg. Without them my profession would not exist. All of civilization is, in essence, a collection of contracts. Why, the very nature of society is founded upon mutually agreed measures of value.’ He stopped then, and slowly shook his head-a motion alarmingly sinuous. ‘Why am I even discussing this with you? You are clearly insane, and your insanity is about to trigger an avalanche of financial devastation.’

‘I don’t see why, Master Sleem. Unless, of course, your faith in the notion of social contract is nothing more than cynical self-interest.’

‘Of course it is, you fool!’

So much for awkward sibilance.

Sleem’s fingers wriggled like snared, blind and groping worms. ‘Without cynicism,’ he said in a strangled voice, ‘one becomes the system’s victim rather than its master, and I am too clever to be a victim!’

‘Which you must prove to yourself repeatedly in the measuring by your wealth, your ease of life, of the necessary contrast with the victims-a contrast that you must surround yourself with at every moment, as represented by your material excesses.’

‘Wordy, Master Bugg. Smug ostentation will suffice.’

‘Brevity from you, Advocate Sleem?’

‘You get what you pay for.’

‘By that token,’ Bugg observed, ‘I am surprised you’re saying anything at all.’

‘What follows is my gift. I will set forth immediately to inform your financiers that you are in fact broke, and I will in turn offer my services in the feeding frenzy over your material assets.’

‘Generous of you.’

Sleem’s lips disappeared into a bony grimace. One eye twitched. The worms at the ends of his hands had gone white and deathly. ‘In the meantime, I will take those two docks.’

‘Not quite two.’

‘Nonetheless.’

‘I can owe you that missing sliver.’

‘Be certain that I will have it, eventually.’

‘All right.’ Bugg reached into the purse and fished out the two coins. ‘This is a loan, yes?’