Spice & Wolf II (21 page)

“I didn’t catch her—I was caught by her, Chief Tarantino.” Jakob grinned so widely his face became distorted, then he rose laboriously and patted Lawrence heavily on the shoulder, gesturing inside. “Let’s talk.”

The sharp-eyed merchants in the room had noticed the unusual mood of the exchange. None spoke.

Past the lobby was an enclosed courtyard. Looking out over the courtyard with its sparse seasonal decoration as he led them in, the giant Jakob spoke.

“Didn’t you pass the fellow from the Remelio Company?”

“I did. At the front door.”

“Ah. I thought you’d be lucky and miss him.”

“...Why is that?” Lawrence didn’t understand what Jakob was getting at, but he could see Jakob’s shoulders shaking with mirth. “Because there was no noise when we came to blows.”

Holo smirked slightly, and Lawrence relaxed.

Jakob opened the door to a room on the right side of the hallway they were in and motioned for the two to enter.

“This is where I work. There’ll be nobody to listen to our conversation here, so you can relax on that count,” said Jakob.

It was not a large room, but it gave the impression of housing limitless knowledge.

Looking through the open door, they could see the walls were almost entirely covered with shelves, upon which rested carelessly stacked bundles of documents.

There was a small table in the middle of the room wedged between two simple couches of wood and leather construction.

Also facing the door was a desk piled high with a mountain of documents. Though paper was becoming less expensive with each passing year, there were still fine varieties to be had. It was proof that Jakob spared little expense in the preservation of knowledge. Even a well-regarded theologian might not have collected so much.

“Well, then, where shall we begin?”

Jakob faced the table and sat on one of the couches, which heaved a creaky sigh under his significant weight. Normally that was the seed from which a friendly chat would bloom, but in these circum-stances, it was only the authority that bore down on Lawrence.

Lawrence was glad Holo was beside him.

If he had been alone, his mind might simply have gone blank.

“First, I’d sure like to know who and what that beauty of yours is.” Jakob’s gaze fixed steadily on Lawrence.

It was admittedly preposterous for a merchant facing bankruptcy to be walking around with a town girl. Were Jakob a less patient man, he would have given Lawrence the boot as soon as he had shown up with Holo in tow.

“She’s a business partner. We’re traveling together.”

“Ho, a business partner?” Jakob looked at Holo for the first time, seeming to think this was a grand joke. Holo smiled and inclined her head.

“The Milone Company in Pazzio offered me one hundred forty trenni for the furs I was selling, but in the end, they bought them for a full two hundred trenni. She’s the one who made it happen "

Holo’s face betrayed a certain amount of pride in opposition to Jakob’s doubtful expression.

His doubt was understandable. If someone had told Lawrence a similar story, he would have assumed it to be a lie. The Milone Company was known in many nations, and those who worked for it were first-rate traders—bargaining them higher in price was not something that happened easily.

“I said it this morning when I was here. ‘You can’t invest without capital.’” Since the story of the furs was true, Lawrence spoke without fear.

He had not thought about whether Holo would be angry at him for talking about it, but she seemed to understand that it was for expediency’s sake.

Jakob closed his eyes, and strangely, his expression shifted.

“I don’t need to know the details. Your like does show up every once in a while, after all.”

“Huh?”

“One day they just show up at the guild, stunning beauty in tow, everything going well in business and life. And they never want to give details about the woman. So I don’t ask anymore. The scriptures say not to open strange boxes, after all.”

Lawrence wondered if it was a trick to make him tell the truth, hut he didn’t know what purpose it would serve. He tried to rethink his position.

Perhaps the story of the cart horse turning into the goddess of fortune and traveling with a merchant was true.

Lawrence himself was traveling with a wolf spirit who had taken the form of a girl. Merchants like him were too realistic to assume they were somehow special.

"’Tis a prudent decision,” said Holo, which elicited a hearty laugh from Jakob.

“Well, then, let’s speak frankly then, shall we? If you two were a couple, I’d have tried to convince you to head straight to the church and make it official. But if you’re in business together, well, that’s different. You’ll hang together or hang separately—your partner’s fall is your own misfortune. The bonds of gold run thicker than blood!”

Jakob’s couch creaked.

“Let me get the story straight. The fellow from Remelio that just left told it like this: Kraft Lawrence, attached to the Rowen Trade Guild, bought one hundred
lumione
worth of armor from the Latparron Company in Poroson. Were liable for roughly half. Now the Remelio Company holds the debt. Is that it?” Lawrence nodded painfully.

“I didn’t hear what kind of armor it was, but the armor is going for about one-tenth what it previously was, so even if you sell it for that price, you’ve still got to make up about forty
lumione
. That comes out to fifteen hundred pieces of trenni silver.”

After all was said and done, Lawrence had come away with about a thousand pieces of silver from the Pazzio affair. Even if he were able to repeat the stunt, there would be debt left over.

“It looks like you were completely taken in by the Latparron Company. I won’t ask the details. From what I’ve heard, that won’t change the situation.

No matter what anyone thinks, you got greedy and made a mistake. Is that right?”

“It is, exactly.”

Lawrence didn’t try to make excuses. Saying he had become greedy and failed summed up his predicament precisely.

“If you understand that, this will be a simple conversation. You must pay back on your own the debt that the guild will, in all likelihood, shoulder. When you meet with fraud or extortion, when you become sick or injured and suffer losses, we in the trade guild put our credit on the line to save you. But not this time. The only ones to come to your aid now will be the gods—”

Jakob pointed a finger at Holo, who glanced at Lawrence.

“—or that beauty.”

“I understand.”

Unlike craft guilds, a regional trade guild was built around assurances of mutual assistance. It ran on contributions from its members, and as Jakob said, it gave aid to merchants who had suffered misfortune and would otherwise be unable to get by. Members would also assemble in foreign lands to protest unfair treatment.

The guild had not been created to guarantee the debts of merchants whose greed led them to ruin.

In such cases, even if the guild temporarily assumed the liability, it would pursue repayment relentlessly. The other guild members wouldn’t stand for the loss, and it served as a lesson in the restraint of greed.

Jakob’s eyes were like bows drawn tight.

“Unfortunately, I’m not in a position where I can show you any compassion—and the reason why I must be so strict is just outside in the lobby. It is guild law. If it became known that this trade house goes easy on its members, it would be a target for riffraff from all around.”

“Of course. I myself would be angry if I heard some other member had been saved from his own failure.”

Lawrence put on a brave face, for if he didn’t, he would have collapsed.

“Also, you surely know this, but guild members are forbidden from lending money to each other. Neither can the guild lend you money. It would set a bad example.”

“I understand.”

Lawrence’s second home was barring its doors to him.

“Based on what the Remelio Company messenger told me, your obligation comes due in two days. Their own investments in armor have failed, so they’re feeling the heat as well. They won’t hesitate in demanding repayment. In other words, your failure will become public the day after tomorrow, and I’ll have to detain you. What have you concluded from this?”

“If I do not collect forty-seven
lumione
in two days and pay the Remelio Company back, there is no future for me,” said Lawrence.

Jakob shook his head slowly, then looked down at the table. “That’s not quite true.”

There was a slight rustling sound next to Lawrence; probably Holo’s tail.

“You future will come,” continued Jakob. “But it will be black, bitter, and heavy.”

The implicit message was that suicide in the face of this bankruptcy would not be acceptable.

“Forty-seven
lumione
could be paid off in ten years of rowing on a trade ship—or working in a mine. Of course, you’d have to avoid injury and sickness.”

Anyone who had ever seen correspondence between a ship's captain and its owner knew that was pure fantasy. Nine-tenths of such correspondence was devoted to the captain requesting fresh rowers and the owner trying to make them last a little longer.

About 80 percent of rowers on long-distance ships were worthless after two years, another 10 percent were finished after two more years, and the remaining 10 percent—unbelievably strong bodied men—wound up on anti-pirate vessels and never returned. And even that was preferable to mine labor. Most miners died of lung disease within a year, and the lucky few who avoided such a fate died in collapsed tunnels.

In contrast, some who encountered misfortune might have their trade house cover their debts and then gradually repay then creditors at low interest—far better treatment.

Those who failed as a consequence of greed had to understand the seriousness of their crime.

“But it is not as though I wish death on you. Don’t forget that A sin must be punished—and it is my duty to enforce that simple principle.”

“I understand.”

Lawrence looked into Jakob’s eyes. For the first time, a flicker of empathy appeared there.

“There’s nothing I can do besides wish you luck over the next two days, but if there is anything I can do, I will. Standard business assistance is no problem. Also, I trust you. I ought to tie you up for the next two days, but you can go free.”

The word trust weighed heavily on Lawrence’s shoulders.

Holo had promised to rescue him if it came to that.

But taking her up on that offer meant betraying the trust Jakob was showing him.

Lawrence wondered if he could do that.

He unconsciously muttered the problem to himself before speaking up.

“I thank you for your consideration. I’ll try to find the money in the next two days, somehow.”

“There are always possibilities in business—and some you can only see when you are in true danger.”

Lawrence’s heart thudded at the statement. It could be interpreted as suggesting illegal activity.

As the master of the Ruvinheigen branch of the Rowen Trade Guild, Jakob had to confront Lawrence with harsh reality, but he was also worried about the young merchant. A person who was capable only of severity would be unfit to be the master of the merchants’ second home.