Well, that was interesting. It could be just some local thing, but it was worth checking out. Especially the reference to scattered , which had been spoken with peculiar emphasis. I glanced around, trying not to be obvious about it, until I spotted the speakers. A couple of fat, older Quinlans, probably local merchants—they were wearing decorative baubles and cosmetic fur coloring that would never survive a swim. If I remembered my sociology, that was a wealth or privilege display, showing that they didn’t have to go into the water.