This story is a tale of Virtue from Ultima 9

[Shard] - Sosaria
[Type] - Fiction/History
[Book] - Purple - 40 pages

[Title] - Julia and the Clock
[Author] - McCubbin the Wise

[Page 1]
Minoc is well known as
the center of all the
finest artisans and
craftsmen of the land.
Two of the most famous,
Jervaise, the carver, was
everywhere acclaimed one
of the greatest artists

[Page 2]
Britannia had ever
produced. The other was
Julia, the Tinker.
While Jervaise was, above
all, an artist, Julia was
an artisan. It was said
her timepieces would
remain accurate to the

[Page 3]
very second for a
hundred years, if kept
wound and properly
tended. She also invented
many cunning devices of
the sort to make tasks
both simpler and more
precise. When one of

[Page 4]
the great nobles of the
land wished something
that was both beautiful
and intricate, he would
often commission both
Julia and Jervaise to
work together on it.

[Page 5]
As for Jervaise and
Julia themselves, they
were content in their
work, and they charged
their patrons a rate
worthy of their skills, so
they became two of the
most prosperous citizens

[Page 6]
of Minoc, in addition to
being two of the most
celebrated. So it came
to pass that one day a
messenger came from a
rich noble of the city of
Moonglow. This noble
desired a great clock to

[Page 7]
be made, of unsurpassed
beauty and complexity. It
was to be constructed
out of the finest wood
and marbles, and to be
capable of showing not
only the time, but also
the phases of the moons,

[Page 8]
the season and the year,
and to predict the
weather for the day.
All this was to be told
through the actions of
various cunning and
amusing automata, and
accompanied by music.

[Page 9]
The terms for this
commission were to be a
rich sum immediately, for
material and expenses,
generous annual payments
for the duration of the
task, and a small fortune
upon completion.

[Page 10]
Julia and Jervaise took
council together, and
returned a reply that the
clock could be completed
in six years of work. The
messenger received this
news and delivered the
first payment.

[Page 11]
The two immediately
threw themselves into the
work, drawing up the
intricate plans and
sketches, and sending
them to their patron in
Moonglow, where they
were rapturously received.

[Page 12]
At that, Jervaise
ordered the rich materials
for the case and fittings
of the clock, while Julia
began work on the core
of the mechanism.
Two years later the
clock was taking shape

[Page 13]
nicely. Then one day the
messenger returned,
bearing a single curt
letter. It said that their
patron had died of a
fever, and his estate had
gone to his sister.
Which lady, not sharing

[Page 14]
her brother's taste for
finery, had no desire to
continue to pay to see
the clock finished. There
would be no further
payment, but the
artisans could keep the
rich materials as

[Page 15]
compensation for the
breaking of the contract.
At this news Julia
swore in a most unladylike
fashion, and for a very
long time, but in the end
she had to admit that
they'd had a good two

[Page 16]
years' income off the
thing, though what a
pity it would never be
finished. Then she went
off to draft replies to
potential commissions that
she'd been planning to
refer to others. As for

[Page 17]
Jervaise, he just sighed,
and sat looking at the
unfinished clock until far
into the night.
A few days later
Jervaise asked Julia if
she minded if he looked
for a new buyer for the

[Page 18]
clock, rather than selling
it for the raw materials.
She agreed, by this time
rather wishing never to
see the thing again. For
the next year she heard
little from Jervaise. He
politely refused joint

[Page 19]
commissions, saying he
was otherwise occupied.
When Julia inquired if he
had any new buyers for
the clock, he only shook
his head, with a sad
smile.
Then, one day Julia was

[Page 20]
out near the mines on
the outskirts of town on
an errand, and there she
saw Jervaise, pulling a
handcart of ore in the
hot summer sun. Now the
mines of Minoc were a
lways hiring laborers, but

[Page 21]
this was the lowest and
least paid of all tasks in
that city. Jervaise was
stripped to the waist
against the heat, and
Julia could see that his
weathered old skin was
stretched painfully tight

[Page 22]
against his prominent ribs.
As she watched in horror,
scarcely believing her
eyes, she saw the cart
slip from her friend's
frail grasp, as he
crumpled to the ground in
hunger and exhaustion.

[Page 23]
The foreman began to
bellow and shake the
fallen craftsman, calling
him lazy and worthless,
but Julia rounded on the
lout with curses and
wrath, and he fell back.
She paid a pair of mine

[Page 24]
workers to pick up
Jervaise and bear him
back to town, where she
brought him to her house.
For several days he lay
there raving, while Julia
fed him broth. At last he
regained consciousness.

[Page 25]
He then confessed that
after the loss of the
commission, he could not
bring himself to stop
work on the clock, which
he regarded as his
masterpiece. There were
no new buyers, for

[Page 26]
nobody wished to spend
so much on such an
extravagant thing. Yet
he had refused all other
commissions, only taking
occasional odd jobs when
he needed gold for food.
But this last time he

[Page 27]
could not bring himself to
quit the clock until he
was so weak with hunger
that he could not
complete the work he
needed.
Julia was astonished at
this, and she spent long

[Page 28]
hours trying to reason or
bully the old man into
abandoning the clock and
resuming his former life.
He'd listen patiently, but
at last he only shook his
head and said, "Don't you
see - gold is nothing,

[Page 29]
but the clock is all."
So at last Julia gave
up in disgust, but she
saw that meals from her
Jervaise every day. Thus
freed from the threat of
starvation, Jervaise began

[Page 30]
a sort of impoverished
but busy retirement, he
who was once nearly the
richest man in Minoc.
Every day he worked on
his clock, but the work
went slowly, for he had
no money for assistants

[Page 31]
to hasten the task.
About two years later,
Jervaise did not answer
when Julia's servant
knocked with his supper,
and when the maid
entered the workshop she
found Jervaise lying dead

[Page 32]
at the foot of the clock,
his smallest hammer and
chisel in his hand, and a
small, strange smile on
his face. They found a
will, which left everything
to Julia, but by that
time "everything" consisted

[Page 33]
of his ancient workshop,
his tools, and his still
unfinished clock.
On the day they buried
him, Julia went to the
workshop alone. There she
ran her hands over the
intricate carving of the

[Page 34]
case, spotting with her
practiced eye the few
areas still awaiting
attention. As she left
the workshop, she was
accosted by a messanger
from Britain, who told
her that Lord British

[Page 35]
himself requested that
she create for him a new
kind of telescope. "Tell
his majesty thank you,"
she replied, "but I have a
previous commission that I
must complete first."
For the next three

[Page 36]
years Julia was little
seen. She did not receive
visitors, and she dismissed
all her servants and
apprentices except for an
old woman who swept
her house and cooked her
evening meal. Her own

[Page 37]
workshop stood empty,
for she was working in
the one which had
belonged to Jervaise.
And then, after three
years, she put a heavy
lock onto door to
Jervaise's workshop, and

[Page 38]
rehired her staff, and let
it be known that she was
once again receiving
commissions. She was
soon busier than ever,
and she even built the
king's telescope, which had
been kept open awaiting

[Page 39]
her convenience. And in
later years she would
sometimes go all alone
into Jervaise's workshop,
and stay there for hours,
and passersby could hear
faint and sweet music
coming out of the old

[Page 40]
building. But those few
who actually saw the
inside said it was totally
bare, save for a tall box
or cabinet in one corner,
covered with a heavy
cloth.

Wow... That was a good one!