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Durnik held out his callused and burn-scarred hands "I'm a blacksmith," he admitted

"Whoosh!" the dockhand exclaimed " Tis a hot an' heavy line o' work ye've chose fer yerself I labor on the docks, h, but at least it's out in the open air"

"It is indeed," Durnik agreed in that saers at Belgarath "Why don't you see if you can find soested "Get soarathnoises and went to the door to talk to the servant waiting outside

"A relative of my wife's," Durnik confided to the tar-sht, but she insists that I keep hioes"

"Oh, by the Gods, yes Me own dear wife's got cousins by the score who can't tell one end of a shovel from another They kin surely find the ale barrel an' supper table, though''

Durnik laughed "How's the work?" he asked "On the docks, I old fer their-selves, and we git the brass"

Durnik laughed ironically "Isn't that always the way of it?"

"It is indeed, me friend It is indeed"

"There's no justice in the world," Durnik sighed, "and a man can only bow to the ill winds of fortune"

"How truly ye speak I see that ye've suffered under unkind hed "Well," he said, "on to the business at hand, then The prince has got a certain interest in a fellohite eyes Have you ever seen him?"

"Ah," the dockhand said, "that one May he sink in a cesspool up to the eyebrows"

"You've ave me no pleasure, I kin tell ye"

"Well, then," Durnik said smoothly, "I can see that we're of the same opinion about this fellow"

"If it's in yer ht" Durnik laughed

Garion stared in amazement at his honest old friend This was a side of Durnik he had never seen before He glanced quickly to one side and saw Polgara's eyes ith astonishment

At mat moment, Silk came in, but stopped as Velvet motioned him to silence

"However," Durnik went on slyly, "what better way to upset somebody that we both dislike than to overturn a sche for a year or more?"

The dockhand's lips peeled back frorin "I'm listenin', me friend," he said fervently "Tell me how to spoke the white-eyed man's wheel, an' I'm with ye to the end" He spat in his hand and held it out

Durnik also spat on his palesture as old as time Then the smith lowered his voice confidentially "Now," he said, "we've heard that this white-eyed one--may all of his teeth fall out--hired a ship for Melcena What we need to knohen he left, on what ship, ith him, and where he was to land"