#anywhere

Sobering up a touch, he nods. "You got a deal. And I'll forgo the finders fee, in exchange for you keeping my part in this out of Dame Gladiola's hearing, much as you can."

A wince "She's going to be so pissed at me. You got a deal, and if it leads to somethingg I'll try to get you some part of a reward on the downlow. When I, and whoever else, break in, you best act oscar level so they think you really are afraid of us. Heck, I'm tempted to give you a black eye now to help the illusion. Should I?" Shee hands her harp over

She had a drum here too, but she doesn't care about ita s much

"How's that help? I'm not a thief. But if anything, if I happened, accidentally, to walk out with your harp, I'd not have a black eye for my troubles... but you could still be plenty sore about it? I run a reputable business, I don't want to be getting a reputation for being a burgler."

"Maybe I pocketed your harp, and... say..." He offers out to her a rather lovely silver chain with a charm on it. "This looks like a lover's gift. Maybe you were sore about that?"

HEY. She JUST bought that, thinking how nice it would look on a certain raven-haired lady's neck...

"Hey, well.." She got her one earlier

"Find something around your place that would be missed...." He considers, then snaps his fingers. "Find what the Baron has for his lady. I bet a classy man like that has jewelry on the mind. Small, sparkly, the kind of thing that falls into pockets easily. I bet he'd want THAT back before Christmas Day, no?"

Seeing it isn't the necklace she gave, she settles a bit. For a moment she thought there was a theft, then her jaw drops "You want me to steal... from my baron, for you... "

"Borrow!" He quickly clarifies. "I'd never KEEP anything that important. I'm just thinking - make it believable, if you wanted to call out the posse on me, just one little toodly harp isn't a big deal, is it?"

"We can use a placeholder. No one is going to pry too deep into the story... at least, I hope..."

"Take the harp, and we'll say ... that you took some bling from the Baron or baroness. How's that?"

He looks a bit mollified, and offers a hand. "Deal."

She takes the hand and shakes it, then as she does so "You can be offended but you know I'm going to check over myself after this hand shake ot make sure I'm not missing anything besides the harp, right?" A smile

He shrugs easily. "As you wish." In her hand he slipped her wallet.

"You dropped this, by the way."

"MMPH"

She takes it "Darn Ace, you are smooth"