“What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Skeeve,” the record keeper said, glancing up from the folder. “It seems we don’t have a current address for your associate. The note here says Traveling.’ I guess that, realizing his financial situation, we haven’t been as diligent about keeping track of him as we’ve been with our other alumni.”
I fought against a wave of disappointment, unwilling to believe that after everything I had been through, this was going to turn out to be another dead end. “Didn’t he have a school or business or something? I met one of his apprentices once.”
The Pervect shook his head.
“No. That we would have known about. He may have been willing to instruct a few close friends or relatives . . . that’s not uncommon for someone who’s studied here. But I think I can say for sure that he hasn’t been doing any formal teaching here or on any other dimension. We would have heard, if for no other reason than his students would have contacted us to confirm his credentials.” Now that he mentioned it, I did recall that Rupert, the apprentice I had met, had specifically been introduced as Aahz’s nephew. Overcome with a feeling of hopelessness, I almost missed what the record keeper said next. “Speaking of relatives. We do have an address for his next of kin . . . in this case, his mother. Perhaps if you spoke to her, you might find out his current whereabouts.”
Chapter Eighteen:
“ ‘M’ is for the many things she taught me. . .”
—OEDIPUS
THE SEARCH FOR the address the record keeper had given me led us onto some of the dimension’s side streets which made up the residential areas. Though at first Perv seems to be composed entirely of businesses, there is also a thriving neighborhood community just a few steps off the main business and transportation drags.