This place was crawling with uppity folks right now, and Jewel thanked the ricotta for that.

Ri… gotta? Ragata? He didn’t know what the word was or what it meant, but he’d heard it said enough to connect it to the hordes of tourists that had flooded Whitby recently. More folks in town meant a few things, both of them good:

First, that there was a lot more variety to choose from when it came to picking his marks, and a lot of opportunities to try his schemes again on someone else if they didn’t work.

Second, that it was easier to blend into the crowds. There were too many different faces and accents for most passing strangers to care much about his.

Jewel was passing through one such crowd, focused intently on following the back of some old rich guy’s head, when he felt something bump into him and throw him off track.

“Hey, watch it!” he complained, looking down to see… what was either a child or a very small man.