"I thought I saw one of them move," she said, by way of an explanation. She sneezed suddenly, and across the river a hapless passer-by tripped and fell into the river.
"How was the meeting?" asked Chas.
"As always. Though at coffee there was discussion about this new show that's getting rave reviews. Theatre of the Absurd, it's called. It's supposed to be on tour soon."
"Oh?" said Chas politely. Theatre did absolutely nothing for him; unless there were lots of car chases and explosions, he just wasn't interested.
"Let's find some lunch," he said, in the hopes of diverting her before she suggested they go check the show out.
They took the Tube to Camden town, Nics idly reading all the posters lined up along the escalator walls. One in particular caught her eye, an ad for a new musical on the West End, called "The Second Marriage, or, The Triumph of Hope (Over Experience)". From the pictures it looked like a Victorian melodrama.
Chas's attention was caught, not by the ads, but by a small brown mouse that looked at him from the sidewall at the top of the escalator and wiggled its whiskers and twitched its nose at him. It opened its little mouth and quacked at him, just as the escalator took him out of sight of it.
"That mouse just quacked," he said in surprise.
"Must've been a ninja duck in disguise," said Nics absently, engrossed in looking at the posters for the latest films. There was a very large ad up among the usual movie posters. "London, City of Birds," it said. That was all.
On the Tube she stared with a palpable hatred at a man wearing a bright red shiny satin zoot suit. He was carrying a trombone, and was totally oblivious to her stare.
Chas poked her.
"You're being rude..." he hissed.
"He was in my dream," she said, scowling. But she stopped staring.
Camden Town was busy, though not quite so busy as it had been the last time they were there, by virtue of it being a weekday rather than a Saturday. Still though, there were plenty of people walking around, most of whom would be classed as extremely funny looking, were they anywhere but in Camden Town.
There were the punks with their studded leather and multicoloured Mohawks slouched idly against the railings on the bridge. There were people wandering around in platform trainers, wearing silver cat suits and with LEDs woven into their dreadlocks. There were people wandering around in full-length frock coats, men and women both androgynous and interchangeable.
There were also lots of tourists. You could tell them, because they were the ones who were gawping openly at everything, the shops, the people, themselves. Japanese tourists viewed the market through the lenses of their cameras and camcorders, while Americans wandered the narrow aisles between stalls and clothes racks, dragging large suitcases on protesting wheels behind them, blocking anyone unfortunate to try and go anywhere behind them.
Chas and Nics found a quiet bench and ate their lunch. Nics had sweet and sour chicken from a Chinese booth. Chas wolfed down the largest kebab he could find, and then finished Nics fried rice for her. A few opportunistic pigeons waited near them, beady eyes fixed on every morsel of food that could conceivably fall to the ground.
In between mouthfuls he filled her in on his lack of success on the library research side of things.
"It's alright," she said, wiping the sweet and sour sauce off the corners of her mouth. "Maybe this silversmith person can tell us something."
It took them a while to find Pennybroke Lane, hidden as it was under the bridge and down another side street. The lane itself was tiny, overhung completely by the upper floors of the houses on either side. It was paved with tiny cobbles that were very uncomfortable to walk on in anything other than really thick boots.
The door to the shop was old-fashioned and Victorian, the dark wood polished to a high sheen, and words in peeling gold leaf painted on the glass. It read:
"Sven Jorgensson, Jeweller and Master Silversmith
And
Jeremy Grandfather, Clockmaker"
The bell attached to the door rang when Chas pushed it open.
The shop was dark and gloomy, all heavy wood panelling, with a highly polished counter running the width of it. Every inch of wall space was taken up by clocks of all sizes, shapes and descriptions, from cuckoo clocks, to tiny watches, to huge grandfather clocks.
The counter top was made from the same dark wood as the panelling, but had brightly lit display cases inside it, in which could be seen a beautiful array of gold, silver and gems.
"Can I help you?" asked a wizened and dry voice that came from the wizened and dry old man who sat unnoticed in the corner behind the counter.
"Hello, yes," said Nics, stepping forward. "We're looking for a Mr. Sven Jorgensson."
"Yes?" said the old man.
Nics and Chas looked at each other questioningly. Chas shrugged and Nics swallowed uncomfortably.
"We need his opinion on a very old piece of silver that's come into our possession."
Silence from the old man. Nics tried once more.
"A Mr Bradford recommended him to us. Is he here?"
Silence for a moment or two more, and then the old man spoke.
"I am Sven Jorgensson. Please, have a seat."
With one wrinkled hand he indicated two high stools that stood against the wall at the far end of the countertop. Chas picked them both up, and brought them over to the silversmith, the pair sat down on them, Nics trying not to wriggle uncomfortably.
"You have a piece of silver for me to view?" asked Sven.
Nics flushed, she'd nearly forgotten, and tried to dig the locket out of her bag. It wasn't there. She started digging through the contents of her bag, looking very worried, until Chas placed the locket on the countertop and pushed it over to the silversmith.
Nics sighed in relief. "Thought I'd lost it for a minute there."
From behind them, a clock started chiming the hour.
Sven took a jeweller's loupe from a pocket, and screwed it carefully into one eye socket. Picking up the locket with a very delicate touch, he lifted it to his eye.
"Very badly damaged on the outside," he said.
The clock that had been chiming sounded a bell three times.
"I found it," said Chas. "At the seaside. It looked like it had been washed up by a storm."
Carefully Sven set the locket down on the counter and opened it. He tsked when he saw the broken hinges, and carefully set all three pieces out in a line.
The grandfather clock in the corner was next. Three sonorous bongs resounded through the shop.
Nics sneezed, and the shop bell jangled glaringly.
"Excuse me," she said, rooting through her bag for a tissue.
"There's hallmarks on the inside of the piece without the photo," she continued, trying to be helpful. The old silversmith shot her a glance from one pale blue eye, and she quickly shut up.
The hand that had been hovering over the half of the locket with the photo in it moved over to pick up the other half. Sven looked at it intently for a moment, then reached under the counter for a bottle and a cloth. A small bit of polishing by the cloth cleared away some of the tarnish, and he peered again at the locket half.
"Sterling silver," he said, almost to himself, but with a quick glance at the couple to make sure they were still listening. "Made in 1935. Maker's mark is a duck, which I don't remember off the top of my head. Fairly average workmanship."
A cuckoo clock chirped the hour of three o'clock.
He put down the empty half of the locket, picked up the half with the photo in, and peered at it intently.
"Engraving on the inside of the locket says 'Gloria Mundi'," he continued. "Outside very badly salt corroded, hinges snapped."
He set the half of the locket down on the counter gently as a carriage clock on the shelf behind him rang a three note minor chord three times.
"What it's worth, well, the silver alone is worth a few tens of pounds. Unfortunately, its condition is such that most collectors of such things wouldn't look twice at it. Unless you managed to find out who the woman in the photo is, and discover if her relatives or descendents would be interested in purchasing it."
"We've been trying," said Chas. "No luck."
Behind him an alarm clock rang, three short, sharp bursts.
The jeweller lifted the piece of mother-of-pearl to his loupe and peered at it for the amount of time it took for the chimes to ring and hours to sound on five more clocks (Chas counted).
When he put it down, it was with the utmost care. As soon as the mother-of-pearl was out of his hands they started shaking violently. He clasped one in the other, trying to hold them both steady.
As if he'd just come to a decision, Sven reached out with one hand and tapped on the table - tap ti-tap tap tap.
Nics hand were resting on the countertop as well. Her left hand tapped, as if in answer, tap tap ti-tap.
A final clock sounded three, in tones that sounded like a duck quacking.
"Have you told anyone about the locket," the silversmith asked, leaning forward with an expression of worried intensity on his face.
Chas and Nics exchanged glances, confused at the sudden change in his demeanour from bored to terrified.
"No," said Nics.
"Yes," said Chas. "The old soldier on the train, and the librarian at the British Library."
"And the woman in the chip shop saw it," chimed in Nics.
"What did they see?" pressed the silversmith. "Did they see the mother-of-pearl?"
"No," said Chas. "They all only saw the outside of the locket, or the picture of the woman. Not the mother-of-pearl."
The silversmith leaned back with a sigh of relief.
"Maybe, then..." he breathed to himself.
"What's so important about it?" asked Nics.
"You are modern people, yes?" asked the silversmith. "You believe in science and technology and such?"
The two nodded.
"Yes," said Chas. "But what has that got to do with it?"
"Then," said Sven, "you would not believe me if I told you what this was, so I shall not tell you, or risk your disbelief. But let me impress on you, most strongly, that this is vitally important, and you must keep it hidden."
Nics opened her mouth to ask the burning question that was on both their minds, "but why?" But, before she could do so, both herself and Chas jumped out of their skins as the door to the shop rang open.
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