Learning a Hard Trade by Jim Webster

Author:Jim Webster
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Magic, murder, mystery, fantasy, epic, vengence, adventure, body, killer, lawyers, food and drink, Destriers, the Urlan, The Land of the Three seas, war
ISBN: 9781783331413
Publisher: Andrews UK Limited 2015
Published: 2015-06-03T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 6

Mr Gleitz, whose professional ability so enriched Kirthoem, Kirthoem, Gleitz and Kirthoem, of Colbig, was not enjoying his lunch. It was a sad reflection on a decaying world that one’s juniors were never as respectful as they ought to be, and one’s stories, culled from a life full of interest and incident, never got the airing they should have. Today was no different. He was lunching at ‘The Quill Abandoned’ at the expense of two young gentlemen. One was Hillan Gor, ‘the younger’, who had followed his father to the bar. Young Gor was one of his office juniors but in the long term Gleitz assumed the young man would try to rebuild his late father’s practice. The other young man was Vukan Cos; a distant cousin of Gor’s who had extensive landholdings along the Colbig Hedge. Cos, Gleitz had never met before, he merely knew he was someone with no legal training.

It was barely a week since the embarrassing interlude in the debtors’ prison and Gleitz had been in poor spirits since then.

It was Gor who started the desultory conversation along a new track.

“Mr Gleitz. What happens now with regard to Lost Trinket Square?”

Gleitz shrugged in a manner indicative of a world-weary lack of interest.

“Well I’m still the owner. The tenants will doubtless, in due course, pay their derisory rents, the fabric of the area will doubtless continue to decay though lack of investment, and any chance of a major capital gain seems to have gone.”

Young Hillan Gor nodded sagely as Gleitz spoke. Then he said, “I have a proposition for you, Sir. My cousin Vukan has accumulated a bit of capital, and I too have a small sum laid by. It occurred to us that you might well wish to sell the Lost Trinket Square properties. With respect, we are both younger, and may well be able to take advantage of the natural turnover of tenants to make some capital improvements and slowly bring the area round.”

Gleitz gazed out of the window and then turned to look at Gor. The old lawyer’s face still wore a look of dejection, but shrewder observers might have noticed a certain sharpness in the eyes. Still when he spoke, Gleitz’s voice was heavy with resignation.

“I suppose it is one of those occasions when youth ought to have its fling.” Gleitz sighed heavily. “It is a matter of public record what I paid for it; you can have it for that, plus twenty percent to cover my out of pocket expenses.”

Hillan Gor looked to his cousin for support and then spoke. “Actually we had thought a ten percent premium was perhaps fairer.” Gor allowed his voice to become more hesitant, “And given our funds even ten percent will put us very close to the limit of what we can afford.”

Gleitz sighed again. “Attend on me in my office in an hour gentlemen. Ten percent it is.” It struck him that one minor source of satisfaction to be gained from the whole sad

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