“Zhe bottle?”
 
“Yes, the bottle.”

“I can open it.”

“I know how you open it.”

Koldin looked at him. Defort held out his hand.

“Give me the damn bottle.”

Koldin handed it over.

Defort took a small opener from his equipment and levered the cap free with one motion. He returned the bottle.

“There.”

Koldin drank.

“Happy?”

“Yes.”

“You've watched me open bottles before.”

“Yeah. Every time I wonder when you're going to shoot your own lunch.”

“It isn't loaded.”

“That doesn't make using a handgun as kitchen equipment normal.”

Koldin glanced at the submachine gun hanging against Defort’s back.

“You're wearing a submachine gun to eat a sandwich.”

“I'm working.”

“So am I.”

“Exactly.”

Koldin thought about explaining the distinction and decided there was not enough water in the bottle.

He ate.

The noodles were heavily salted and soft enough that several slipped from the fork before reaching his mouth. The shellfish had been fried just enough to not overcook it, which Koldin regarded as one of the better ways of treating shellfish. He ate slowly and watched the crowd.

Defort watched too.

Neither ceased patrolling merely because they were eating.

A uniform changed the meaning of stillness. Standing beside a food stall became observation. Looking too long at someone became suspicion. Reaching toward the belt became a statement.

Koldin was aware of the pistol throughout the meal here. He was also aware that Defort’s weapon remained openly visible. Nobody seemed particularly alarmed by it. Lenkerk had enough guns that the presence of one was rarely interesting until somebody put a hand on it.

Koldin therefore kept his hands occupied with noodles. Defort ate half the sandwich in several bites.

“You want the other one?”

“No. You know I can't eat bread.”

“Yeah.”

“You weren't going to give it to me.”

“No.”

They finished.

Koldin drank the last of the water and held the bottle for several seconds after it was empty.

That was all of it. He put the glass into the haversack for return later. Defort folded the waxed paper into a square and put it into a pocket.

“Ready?”

“Yeah.”

They went back into the market.

Another hour passed.

The afternoon had begun wearing everything down. Vendors sat more often. Voices lost some of their enthusiasm. Fruit flies gathered around cut produce. Children became irritable. The canvas roofs sagged beneath old water and new heat. Somewhere a radio had been playing the same six songs for so long that Koldin had ceased hearing them individually.

They had almost completed the final row when his ears turned toward a sound before the rest of him did.

Raised voices. Tilmuhlan.

Not ordinary bargaining.

Koldin slowed.

Defort noticed.

“What?”

Koldin raised one hand.

There.

Beyond a stall selling repaired lamps and bent cookware, at the edge of an open patch where people had spread secondhand goods upon mats, three people stood close together.

One was an homeless human. Beside him sat the blind yinglet. The dog was there too.

It remained tied by a length of cord to the yinglet’s wrist and had pressed itself partly behind him, ears down, body low.

Their possessions occupied a faded mat before them. There was very little worth stealing.

An alarm clock with its back removed. Two repaired lanterns. Several sets of eating utensils that did not match. A cracked televox speaker. A small hand drill. Clothes folded into piles. A box containing screws and electrical fittings sorted by size. Someone had cleaned each item before putting it out.

Standing over them was a man in a dark shirt.

He was not large. He simply behaved as if space belonged to him.

Koldin listened.

The criminal spoke quickly, the words falling over one another in practiced irritation.

The blind yinglet answered more slowly.

Koldin caught fragments.

Then the word that mattered.

“Inkomstenbelasting.”

Defort heard it too.

“Tax?”

“Not zhe real kind.”

The man pointed toward the objects on the mat. The homeless human said something quiet. The criminal cut him off.

The blind yinglet answered again. His voice had become sharper, protesting. 

“Ik.. ik heb niets!”

The dog drew farther behind him.

Koldin watched for hands reaching into clothing.

Nothing yet.

People nearby had noticed the dispute and were making the effort not to notice it. A woman rearranged vegetables. A merchant examined something beneath his own table. Two boys moved away.