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at her?" Medford asked as they headed down Harborside Road.
    "People will talk about the hours she keeps," Prudy said. "'Tis not right."
    "She turns out enough pots."
    "Not enough for all those hours. She must be slow at night. She's always tired."
    "'Tis not worth such a fuss. Let's run." And so they did, all the way to Peat Bog, shaking Prudy out of her bad mood.
    They hadn't visited the bog for a couple of weeks. They were shocked to see how many rose- and brass-colored leaves had fallen, floating bright in the dark pools between hummocks of peat and grass. They skittered along their path of fallen logs, then crawled like critters through the bramble archway to solid ground.
    Another shock awaited them. The largest tree on Bog Island, some scrawny and Nameless relative of the Sap Tree, had been uprooted in the same winds that had stirred up the waves last week at Seaweed Beach. Dying needles clung sadly to the branches, and the green moss had a ragged black gash where the roots had been.
    "Oh, poor tree," Prudy said, patting the trunk.
    Medford squatted down next to the hole left by the roots, feeling ridiculously sad. It was a Nameless tree, no loss to anyone. But the roots looked so forlorn, the ruptured earth so painful.
    Prudy threw down her food satchel and stood, arms out, eyes closed, basking in the sun. Medford watched a worm explore the hole where the tree roots had been. The worm curled upright and poked its nose at a funny, square rock half buried to one side.
    Medford poked at the rock, too. But it wasn't a rock. It felt cold, like metal.
    He looked closer. It had a lid. "Prudy. There's something buried here." He stepped into the hole, moved the worm out of his way, and scrabbled at the earth. The thing proved to be a metal box, black, battered, and scratched, more than a foot square.
    They had to break the lock with a stone. The hinges broke as the lid creaked open. A strong, musty smell greeted them.
    "Cloth," Prudy whispered, peering in. "Not Common Stuff, either."
    The cloth had so many colors that at first Medford thought autumn leaves must have fallen into the box. When he unfolded it, something fell out: a thin book a foot long, like the one Boyce kept as a journal and Trade record. Prudy snatched it up.
    Medford had eyes only for the cloth. Where would such colors come from? Who would put them on a piece of cloth? The threads had been cunningly woven—he couldn't imagine how—to make a flat representation of a man. Sort of a man.
    Not really a man, because he had horns. They drooped from his crown, weighed down by the pewter-colored balls at the tips. But of course it wasn't horns. It was a hat, an outlandish hat.
    "Cordelia Weaver," Prudy said. "'Tis her journal. In 1830 she wrote it."
    It was hard to decipher Cordelia's handwriting, faded to light tan. The pages were dusty with mildew. When Prudy turned them, pieces came off in her fingers.
    "Careful," Medford said.
    "I'll just find the last entry," Prudy said.
    She found it near the back of the book,
Third Daye of the Sowing Moon
at the top of the page. She held it close to her nose and squinted at it. "
Merit Learned upbraided me today for Unnameable weaving,
" she read. "Huh. Merit Learned. Sounds just like Prune Face.
Master Learned said I be wasting my time seeking roots and soils for color and the Clothe be not warm nor Useful. I must leave this Island and he will burn my Weavings. One only will I save from the greedy Flames, the one that doth depict my secret Friend from afar. I will Bury it with my Journal.
"
    They contemplated the cloth man's droopy hat with the pewter-colored balls on it.
    "That explains the funny hat," Medford said. "He's not from here."
    "
I would know,
" Prudy read, "
as I tread the unknown
world beyond the water, that one of my Nameless objects doth survive me. Stay, my creation, and tell our Descendants that Cordelia Weaver dwelt here and saw a World in Coloured Thread.
"
    Medford wondered why his heart lifted so