Most of the envelopes got caught in the folds of his blanket and stuck all up like the pinions of a ruffled bird; still others swept across the floor.

It took one more trip for him to collect the remainder of the envelopes (thankfully, there weren't much of them, just an armful this time, rather than a shirtful), and these he dumped on his bed as well. Then he sighed, pulled across his seat cushion, set himself into his impression and reached for the nearest letter.

It was a fairly dense one, off-white, a wide rectangle that resembled several other envelopes in the pile; it was addressed to Sephale Den a'Vit and had his address too, No. Thirty-Eight and everything. The from address was the red-ink impression of an extremely squiggly stamp, with a Low translation beneath: High Prevail » Depart. 578 » Dist. Cirromedius.

He grimaced and looked at the other envelopes, picking them up, squeezing their width, verifying the stamp was similar on each one. They'd gotten into his house, found all the rent bills he hadn't paid for the past sixth months, and re-mailed them to him. Great.

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