“There you are!” Isengar Took said as he found the cook’s monkey hanging pendant by its tail from the rail over the captain’s cabin. “What do you have there? The crystal bottle of scent the mate bought for his sweetheart?”
The creature’s clever fingers had failed to undo the silver wire holding the stopper. “Good thing you didn’t drink that,” he commented, “or I suspect you would have been dreadfully ill by moonrise.” He took the creature in his arms. “The captain isn’t happy with you since you put that sheet of parchment containing a letter from his wife through the hole of his violin, you know.”
The creature pulled at a button.
As he walked into the galley he called out, “Cookie, you’d do well to keep this one under lock and key while we’re at the wharf in Pelargir, or someone will skewer him with a cooking fork!”