The Novelty Maker (2 page)

                "Let me grab my jacket," Harlowe said, slipping through the mess of the workroom to the wardrobe on the far side.

                Harlowe returned quickly, shrugging on his jacket over his vest. He led the way out through the back door of the shop, pausing only to lock it behind him. They followed the path down towards the cliffs, the afternoon sun hanging low in the sky. The salty breeze whipped at the folds of Cole's jacket, trying to unbutton it and send it flying open. The ocean was a calm, brilliant blue-green, the sun reflecting brightly off its surface and making Cole look away after a moment.

                The path down to the cliffs was mostly empty—the festival was a huge draw, and most people were working or socializing. The few people they saw looked away quickly when they saw Harlowe and his mask, or stared until they noticed Cole's glower. Harlowe didn't seem to notice—he never seemed to notice, but Cole wasn't stupid enough to think Harlowe was oblivious to the looks his mask garnered.

                They reached the fork in the path, and Harlowe took the right branch instead of the left. The left led down towards the cove, splitting dozens of times and leading to all manner of cliffs and caves. The right led to the top of the highest cliff; it was a bit more treacherous, but gave a grand view.

                Cole didn't comment, just followed along. The path sloped up sharply, but Harlowe didn't slow, pushing himself faster and faster. Cole barely kept up, and he paused once to strip off his jacket, too hot to keep going with it on. Harlowe didn't seem to notice the heat or Cole stopping, and kept going.

                The path abruptly stopped sloping as they reached the small plateau at the top of the cliffs. It was barren; no plants grew up here and no animals made their homes. The teenagers of Cadogan liked to hang out up here, but there was no sign of anyone at the moment—likely the festival drawing most of them. Harlowe glanced at him, his lips turning down in a slight frown when he found Cole a few feet behind him, still struggling to catch up.

                "Sorry," Cole said, giving Harlowe a quick smile, still somewhat out of breath from climbing. "Can't tell I spend most of my time inside, can you?"

                "Tell me to slow down next time," Harlowe admonished, turning his gaze out towards the ocean. He waited for Cole to reach him, then headed towards the cliffs.

                He sat down a few feet from the edge, settling down cross-legged. Cole dropped his jacket, though his mother would scream to see it mistreated so, and sat down on top of his jacket, next to Harlowe's right side, where Harlowe could easily see him if he was so inclined.

                The view was gorgeous:  the ocean spanned unbroken until it faded into the horizon; the sky was a brilliant, clear blue, not a cloud in sight; and most importantly, he was sitting next to Harlowe, who finally no longer looked as though he was inclined to throw his tools at anything that moved.

                Harlowe rubbed at the edge of the mask, where it met his chin and sloped back to hook behind his left ear. The mask molded to the curves of Harlowe's face; it covered most of the top of his head, his forehead, and sloped to the left, covering most of his nose and half his mouth. It was leather, dyed black and worn smooth, with a single flat jewel covering where Harlowe's left eye was beneath the mask.

                "You can take it off around me, if you want," Cole said, wondering if Harlowe took it off when he was alone and no one else was around. "I don't mind."

                "I don't believe you," Harlowe said, bitterly, dropping his hand into his lap. "Everyone minds."

                "I don't," Cole said, shifting closer to jab at Harlowe's arm. "I get if you don't want to take it off, but don't put it on me. I know what's under there, and I don't care. If it's bugging you, take it off. There's no one else here."

                Harlowe sat still for a long moment, then sighed and pulled it off. It came off easily, with no hidden latches or ties, and Cole wondered how Harlowe had managed to get such a good fit for the mask that it stayed in place with all the movement Harlowe did at the shop.

                "There, see, that's not so bad," Cole said. He couldn't see much of the scarring from the angle he was at, just bits and pieces that snaked into Harlowe's profile, and he wasn't going to gawk. He gave Harlowe another smile before sitting back to enjoy the view of the ocean. Harlowe set the mask on the ground in front of him, toying with the edge of it before sitting back slightly.

                "You're the only one who's never asked me what happened, you know," Harlowe said, speaking up after a moment of quiet. He'd relaxed slightly, but hadn't stopped fidgeting with the mask. "Everyone always asks."

                "Doesn't matter much. Though I am curious," Cole paused when Harlowe tensed, then continued, "and you don't have to answer this, but how did you make the mask? It's really well done."

                Harlowe laughed. "Of course that's what you want to know."

                Cole shrugged, tilting his head to study the mask again. "I like knowing how things are made."

                "Well, I'm going to disappoint you on that score," Harlowe said, picking up the mask and turning it around so that the outside of it faced them. "I didn't make it. My mother did, and I don't know how she does her leatherworking."

                "Ah, well," Cole said, tucking that away. He'd half-thought Harlowe was an orphan; he'd never mentioned his parents before. "She did a good job with it."

                "Mmm," Harlowe said, letting the mask fall to the ground again. He leaned back, resting his weight on his palms and staring out at the ocean

                Cole didn't push, content with the new tidbit. So Harlowe's mother was still alive. Cole toyed briefly with the idea of trying to track her down—a female leatherworker of that skill couldn't be hard to find—but decided it was more important to respect Harlowe's privacy. He could be content that Harlowe was comfortable enough with him to remove the mask and also mention his mother.

                "So how is your secret project going?" Cole asked. "Are you going to let me see it yet?"

                "It's not done, so no," Harlowe said, rolling his eye. "I'm working on getting the power source right now, which could take a few weeks."

                "Can you give me a hint? Anything? What is it?" Cole pestered, grinning when Harlowe scowled half-heartedly at him.

                "No hints, no nothing. You wait," Harlowe proclaimed. "You'll see it when it's done, and nothing sooner."

                "That's not fair," Cole complained. "Is it a novelty box? A giant, tacky statue?"

                "Yes, I'm taking a page out of Bingley's book and making a giant statue of the summer spirit," Harlowe said dryly.

                "I'm sure any statue you make would be much better than Bingley's attempts." Cole squinted against the sun, eyeing the ships floating in the bay. Would Harlowe agree to go out on Cole's mother's sailboat some day? That would be a lovely way to pass a day, if Harlowe agreed.

                "I think he thinks so, too," Harlowe muttered, sounding upset again. Before Cole could sort that out, Harlowe stood, wandering closer to the cliff. Cole bit his tongue on an admonition to be careful, watching as Harlowe paused a few inches from the cliff edge.

                Cole stood up, leaving the mask on the ground and moving to join Harlowe at the edge. It was a painful, jagged drop down, the cliff face jutting out at random intervals down the face and ending at the bottom in a field of boulders that jutted up from the tide lapping at the cliff base.

                "Want to go get dinner?" Cole offered, trying to distract Harlowe from his troubles with Bingley. "My treat."

                "Someplace expensive, since it's your treat," Harlowe said, quirking a smile at Cole.

                "Sure, as long as it's nowhere my mother would think to look for me." Cole grinned, hooking an arm through Harlowe's and leading him away from the cliff's edge.

                "I think we can work with those limitations." Harlowe made no move to pull away from Cole, much to Cole's delight. He paused briefly to snag his mask and slip it back into place before they headed back towards town.

                *~*~*

                "Will you just leave, already?" Dwight drawled, not looking up from his book. He was sprawled across the sofa, legs thrown over the far end and book propped up on his chest.

                "Mother will yell at me," Cole said, continuing to drum his fingers against the arm of the chair in which he was impatiently sitting.

                "She's an hour late," Dwight pointed out, letting his book fall against his chest so he could stare at Cole. "Her fault she missed you."

                "That won't stop her from scolding," Cole muttered, glancing up at the clock above the mantle. The shop closed in another hour, and it would take him at least half that time to make it there. He didn't
need
to go, but he liked to stop by a few times a week to see what Harlowe was working on. To see Harlowe, really, but also to find out if that damnable secret admirer was still sending him letters.

                "Well, if you're going to stay, stop fidgeting." Dwight lifted his book again. "It's distracting."

                "Yeah, yeah," Cole muttered, and then stood. He didn't particularly want to dodge his mother's questions on marriage and why wouldn't he visit the eligible bachelorette of the week and didn't he love her and want to give her grandchildren before she died? "Tell mother I got hit by a carriage if she asks."

                Dwight lifted a hand in acknowledgement. Cole left quickly, before he could change his mind or his mother could arrive. He walked down the street swiftly, headed towards the cliff edges where Harlowe's shop was situated. He made good time, reaching the shop nearly half an hour before it would close for the day.

                Only one shop girl was tending the shop, and only one customer was browsing the floor. The shop girl, Susannah, waved at him and gestured towards the back, well used to Cole's habit of dropping by at all hours.

                The workroom was much louder than the shop, and Cole grimaced. The excessive noise meant Bingley was back here, working on some monstrosity or another. He specialized in large, moving statues, and translating that into the smaller novelty boxes that were popular at the moment wasn't going well for him.  Heading away from the noise, Cole made his way through the cluttered tables towards the furthest corner where Harlowe inevitably gravitated when Bingley was working.

                There were scraps and warped cogs littering the ground around Harlowe's feet, and he was making a good deal of noise himself, banging one of his ratchets against the corner of the table. Cole stared, wondering what had gone wrong that had Harlowe beating up his tools. Harlowe tossed the tool aside after a last decisive bang, and turned, his eye widening when he saw Cole.

                "Hey," Cole greeted, eyeing the box on the table in front of Harlowe. It was a mess of loose bits and scrambled parts; the only coherent part of it was the box that held the scrambled bits.

                "Hi." Harlowe's shoulders slumped slightly, the tension leaking out of him.

                "Tough project?" Cole asked, sidling closer to the table to peer at the box.

                "Commissioned for tomorrow," Harlowe said, bitterness coating his words. "It's just a simple music box, after all, of course we can make it for tomorrow. And by we, of course he means, me."

                "Is it a simple music box?" Cole poked at one of the cogs that was half on the edge of the box.

                "Simple enough, but even simple takes a few days," Harlowe said, shooting a glare towards the area where Bingley was making enough racket for six people. He pushed away from the table, crossing to another that had the half-finished arm of one of Bingley’s statues on it. Shoving some of the pieces out of the way, Harlowe grabbed a new ratchet from among the mess and returned to the music box.

                "Have you eaten?" Cole asked, watching Harlowe’s fingers deftly realign a handful of cogs.

"Yes," Harlowe said, the word short, clipped. He pinned the cogs in place with two fingers, then ratcheted a tiny bolt into place. Dropping the tool, he sighed, then turned to face Cole. The emerald set in his mask glinted in the shop's light. "Sorry. Just …" Harlowe gestured to the box, frustration in the every inch of the jerky motion.

                Cole nodded, wondering what had inspired Bingley to be so harsh. "I understand." He smiled, running a hand through his hair. There wasn't much he could do for Harlowe—he might understand in theory how a music box worked, given how often he had Harlowe explain them, but that wasn't helpful. "Want company, or should I make myself scarce?"

                Harlowe hesitated, tilting his head slightly to the right as he seemed to consider that. A loud crash came from the area where Bingley was working, followed by rapid cursing. "You should probably go. Bingley might ban you from the shop, the mood he's in."

                "I'd sneak in anyway," Cole said, flashing a grin. "Any progress on the novelty box for my mother? I know it's not due for a few months, but I figured I could ask and then you could tell Bingley I was here on business."

                "No progress, sorry," Harlowe said, rubbing at his cheekbone with the heel of his hand. "I'll see if I can get the final design to you later this week."

                "No rush," Cole said, deciding that leaving was the better part of not pressuring Harlowe into working more. "I'll get out of your hair now. Good luck."

                "Thanks," Harlowe muttered. He glanced towards Bingley's part of the workshop, where the clanging had resumed. "Before you go …" Harlowe's mouth twisted down again, and he opened a pocket on his vest to pull out a folded piece of paper.