Chapter 50

“Alright, Doris. At first glance, this looks good.”

Once Doris had taken everything out, the Duke sat down on the bare studio floor with a thud. His casual, un-noble gesture surprised both Doris and Clarette, but the Duke inspected the tubes without a care.

He checked to see if the centers of the tubes were blocked, as if peering through a telescope, and picked out one large enough for a finger.

“Doris, do you have any tools with you?”

“Oh, yes. I always carry some. Here.”

Doris pulled out a hammer and chisel and other tools from a pouch attached to his bundle. Lionel handed him the selected tin tube and gave an order.

“Cut this to about the length of a finger. Make sure it’s neat, without dents or holes.”

Though Doris was puzzled, he did as the Duke asked. Clarette quietly watched, unable to guess what the Duke wanted to make.

“Hup. Will this do?”

Doris skillfully cut the tube with sharp metal scissors. The short tube was round and stubby, like a piece of dried cinnamon bark. The Duke gave another instruction.

“Good. Now press down just one end, fold it thinly. So nothing can pass through, like the straw I chewed on.”

“Ugh. Give it here.”

Still annoyed at the memory, Doris grumbled but kept working.

He picked up pliers and pressed one end of the short tube closed. Seeing the shape change, Clarette finally began to guess what the Duke intended.

The tin tube now looked like a long thimble, able to hold something. Lionel took the finished piece and stood up.

“Clarette, where’s the white paint I asked for?”

“On the table. Over here.”

The Duke approached the table where Clarette always crushed pigments and made paint.

Clarette hoped the white paint she made yesterday was still safe, and opened the lidded earthen jar. She gently poked the white paint with a knife.

“It’s hardened a bit overnight. Just a moment, Your Grace.”

She poured some prepared white pigment and oil into the jar and stirred. Paint hardening over time was nothing new for her.

Once the paint was sticky again, Lionel handed her the tin pouch Doris had made.

“Can you fill this with paint? About halfway.”

Clarette skillfully scooped up the white paint with her knife and did as he asked. Doris, sitting on the floor, watched the Duke’s strange experiment with interest. When enough paint was inside, the Duke turned to Doris again.

“Alright, Doris. Now seal the other end, too. Make sure the paint doesn’t leak.”

“That’s easy.”

Now realizing the Duke’s intention, Doris expertly folded and sealed the end of the tin pouch. The tin tube was now a tin capsule filled with paint.

The Duke checked if Doris had sealed it properly by flipping the capsule up and down. He even shook it vigorously.

But not a drop of paint leaked.

Feeling Clarette’s gaze, the Duke turned to her with a meaningful smile. He placed the small tin capsule on the table.

“Well, let’s leave it here for a day. We’ll open it tomorrow.”

“How will we open it? Can we just use scissors or a knife?”

Clarette asked, and the Duke glanced at Doris, who was gathering his tools.

“Doris, do you have anything urgent today?”

“Yes, well. I have to go back and mine tin. I haven’t been to the mine for a while since I started making what you asked for. Oh, right, you owe me that gold coin!”

Doris sprang up with his hammer, looking fierce, but the Duke just smiled and gave him an order.

“We’ll only know if you did it right tomorrow. So stay at my house for a night. There’s a splendid guest room ready.”

Oliver would have had a fit if he heard that, but Doris was even quicker to protest.

“I can’t, Your Grace! If I stop working until tomorrow, I’ll barely make this month’s quota, and I’ll run out of tin for myself!”

But the Duke easily brushed aside Doris’s worries.

“I can reduce your quota. It’s my mine, after all.”

“Huh…?”

“And three times the gold coin was too little. I’ll give you ten times.”

Faced with the Duke’s overwhelming power and wealth, Doris was left speechless. Lionel patted the stunned young miner’s shoulder and casually suggested,

“Let’s go. Time for lunch.”

* * *

The next day, the three gathered in Clarette’s studio just as before. Clarette and Lionel looked the same as ever, but Doris, after spending a night at the ducal residence, had changed dramatically.

Without spare clothes, Doris wore new ones the Duke had bought for him, and no longer looked shabby. He now resembled a craftsman employed by the Duchy rather than a rustic miner.

“Well then. Let’s open it.”

With Clarette and Lionel watching, Doris rolled up his sleeves and picked up scissors. He held the tin capsule upright and carefully cut off the top.

He handed the opened end of the tin capsule to the Duke. Lionel gazed at the white paint that had been sealed inside for a day.

The paint was still as brilliantly white as snow. Even though it had touched the tin, its properties seemed unchanged.

“Clarette, would you like to try it?”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

Clarette touched the white paint inside the tin capsule with a thin brush. She expected it to have hardened after a day.

“Huh?”

But there was no resistance on her brush. Surprised, she poured the preserved paint onto her palette.

Sticky white paint poured out onto her palette.

It hadn’t hardened at all, still perfectly white, moist as if freshly mixed.

The paint had been perfectly preserved.

“How…”

As she stared at her palette in astonishment, the Duke came closer and encouraged her.

“Is it really the same? Try painting with it.”

Clarette loaded her brush with plenty of paint.

She brought out a piece of brown paper and painted a small flower. Her brush moved smoothly as always.

There was nothing wrong with the paint.

Still unable to believe it, Clarette kept peering into the tin capsule. If paint could be stored like this, without leaking, spoiling, or the container breaking…

It would be possible to bring paint from distant lands and use it freely in the Duchy.

Just as the Duke had said yesterday.

“Your Grace, how did you do this?”

Clarette looked up at Lionel with eyes full of admiration. Her voice was rare, excited.

“How did you ever think of using tin? No one’s ever come up with this before….”

“I realized it at Doris’s house. Tin is used to coat cups and such, and Doris even made a straw out of it, right?”

Lionel smiled playfully at Doris, who stood there dumbfounded.

“In short, tin is resistant to liquids. And you can make it small and light. It bends easily, but it doesn’t break. So I thought…”

He squeezed the tin capsule that had held the paint and said,

“If you seal paint in thin tin, wouldn’t it be good for storing or transporting?”

With the Duke’s grip, the remaining white liquid squeezed smoothly out of the capsule. Clarette shifted her gaze from the small, light tin capsule to the jars of pigment near the table.

It felt as if her entire way of working might change. If she could take paint anywhere, use any color freely, anywhere in the world…

“This is a truly amazing invention, Your Grace.”

Clarette murmured in a voice full of emotion, and Lionel gazed at her and said,

“It’s thanks to you, Clarette. You gave me the idea. If I hadn’t met you, I wouldn’t have thought of it.”