Celine thought he was rather sweet--the silly man fumbling for his words. She felt a maternal urge to hand the watch back over and pat him on the head, even though she couldn't have been that much older than him. Her experience as a pickpocket had given her an excellent ability of gauging other people, reading them and understanding them almost immediately. Some people, she found, she just wanted to take care of.

But, of course, she wasn't about to give up the biggest haul she’d made all year. She’d only returned because she was intrigued by him. His calls sounded so plaintive. It was foolish, she admitted, but she couldn’t resist. “Yes,” he said, finally answering her question. “There's only one of me now...” He glanced not, Celine noticed, up the hall or past her shoulder, but at the wall of skulls next to them. As though he was waiting for that girl to walk out of them.

He nervously turned back at her. “Please,” he repeated, “name your price. We need that watch. It's...it's extremely important.” He was speaking to her as though she was only a petty thief, she realized, who might have stolen the watch simply for the money--who didn't know what it was.

She played along and grinned coyly. “Do tell.”