Speaks the Nightbird

The motion of that lifted chin was enough to cause the torso to swing slightly on its cords. Matthew heard the ropes squeak up in the rafters, like the rats that had plagued Shawcombe's tavern.

Back and forth, and back and forth.

The lipless mouth stretched open. They had spared his tongue, so that he might cry for mercy with every knife slash, hatchet blow, and kiss of flame.

He spoke, in a dry rattling whisper that was almost beyond all endurance to hear. "Papa?" The word was as mangled as his mouth. "Wasn't me killed the kitten, was Jamey done it." His chest shuddered and a wrenching sob came out. The bulging eyes stared at nothing. His was the small, crushed whine of a terrified child: "Papa please... don't hurt me no more..."

The brutalized bully began to weep.

Matthew turned—his eyes seared by smoke and sight—and fled lest his own mind be broken like Lucretia Vaughan's pie dish.

He got outside, was further blinded and disoriented by the glare. He staggered, was aware of more naked children ringing him, jumping and chattering, their grins joyful even as they danced in the shadow of the torture hut. Matthew nearly fell in his attempts to get away, and his herky-jerky flailing to retain his balance made the children scream with laughter, as if they thought he was joining in their dance. Cold sweat clung to his face, his insides heaved, and he had to bend over and throw up on the ground, which made the children laugh and leap with new energy.

He staggered on, the pack of little revelers now joined by a brown dog with one ear. A fog had descended over him, and he knew not if he was going in the right direction amid the huts. His progress attracted some older residents who put aside their seed-gathering and basket-weaving to accompany the merry throng, as if he were some potentate or nobleman whose fame rivalled the very sun. The laughter and hollering swelled as did the numbers of his followers, which only served to heighten Matthew's terror. Dogs barked at his heels and children darted underfoot. His ribs were killing him, but what was pain? In his dazed stupor he realized he had never known pain, not an ounce of it, compared to what Shawcombe had suffered. Beyond the grinning brown faces he saw sunlight glitter, and suddenly there was water before him and he fell to his knees to plunge his face into it, mindless of the agony that seized his bones.

He drank like an animal and trembled like an animal. A fit of strangulation struck him and he coughed violently, water bursting from his nostrils. Then he sat back on his haunches, his face dripping, as behind him the throng continued its jubilations.

He sat on the bank of a pond. It was half the size of Fount Royal's spring, but its water was equally blue. Matthew saw two women nearby, both filling animal-skin bags. The sunlight glittered golden off the pond's surface, putting him in mind of the day he'd seen the sun shine with equal color on Bidwell's fount.

He cupped his hand into the water and pressed it to his face, letting it stream down over his throat and chest. His mind's fever was cooling and his vision had cleared.

The Indian village, he'd realized, was a mirror image of Fount Royal. Just like Bidwell's creation, the village had probably settled here—who could say how long ago—to be so near a water supply.

Matthew was aware that the crowd's noise had quietened. A shadow fell over him, and spoke. "Na unhuh pah ke ne!"

Two men grasped Matthew, careful to avoid his injuries, and helped him to his feet. Then Matthew turned toward the speaker, but he knew already who'd given that command.

Nawpawpay stood four inches shorter than Matthew, but the height of the judicial wig gave the chief the advantage. The waistcoat's gold stripes glowed in this strong sunlight. Add to that the intricate tattoos, and Nawpawpay was an absorbing sight as well as a commanding presence. Rachel stood a few feet behind him, het eyes also the color of Spanish coins.

"Forgive my people, " Nawpawpay said in the tongue of kings. He gave a shrug and a smile. "We don't often entertain visitors."

Matthew still felt faint. He blinked slowly and lifted his hand to his face. "Is... what you've done to... Shawcombe... the white fish... part of your entertainment?"

Nawpawpay looked shocked. "Oh, no! Surely not! You misunderstand, Demon Slayer! You and your woman are honored guests here, for what you've done for my people! The white fish was an unclean criminal!"

"You did such to him for murder and thievery? Couldn't you finish the task and display some mercy?"

Nawpawpay paused, thinking this over. "Mercy?" he asked. He frowned. "What is this mercy?"

Evidently it was a concept the French explorer who'd passed himself off as a king had failed to explain. "Mercy, " Matthew said, "is knowing when..." He hesitated, formulating the rest of it. "When it is time to put the sufferer out of his misery."

Nawpawpay's frown deepened. "Misery? What is that?"

"How you felt when your father died, " Matthew answered.

"Ah! That! You're saying then the white fish should be slit open and his innards dug out and fed to the dogs?"

"Well... perhaps a knife to the heart would be faster."

"Faster is not the point, Demon Slayer. The point is to punish, and let all who see know how such crimes are dealt with. Also, the children and old people so enjoyed hearing him sing at night." Nawpawpay stared at the pond, still deliberating. "This mercy. This is how things are done in Franz Europay?"

"Yes."

"Ah, then. This is something we should seek to emulate. Still... we'll miss him." He turned to a man standing next to him. "Se oka pa neha! Nu se caido na kay ichisi!" At the last hissed sound he made a stabbing motion... and, then, to Matthew's chagrin, a twist and a brutal crosscutting of the invisible blade. The man, who had a face covered with tattoos, ran off hollering and whooping, and most of the onlookers—men, women, and children alike—ran after him making similar noises.

Matthew should have felt better but he did not. He turned his mind to another and more important subject. "A courage sun, " he said. "What is that?"

"What the water spirit gives, " Nawpawpay answered. "Also moons and stars from the great gods."

"The water spirit?"

"Yes." Nawpawpay pointed at the pond. "The water spirit lives there."

"Matthew?" Rachel asked, coming to his side. "What's he saying?"

"I'm not sure, " he told her. "I'm trying to—"

"Ah ah!" Nawpawpay wagged a finger at him. "The water spirit might be offended to hear mud words."

"My apologies. Let me ask this, if I may: how does the water spirit give you these courage suns?"

In answer, Nawpawpay walked into the water. He set off from shore, continuing as the water rose to his thighs. Then Nawpawpay stopped and, steadying the wig on his head with one hand, leaned over and searched the bottom with the other. Every so often he would bring up a handful of mud and sift through it.

"What's he looking for?" Rachel asked quietly. "Clams?"

"No, I don't think so." He was tempted to tell her about Shawcombe, if just to relieve himself of what he'd seen, but there was no point in sharing such horror. He watched as Nawpawpay waded to a new location, a little deeper, bent over, and searched again. The front of Woodward's waistcoat was drenched.

After another moment, the chief moved to a third location. Rachel slipped her hand into Matthew's. "I've never seen the like of this place. There's a wall of trees around the whole village."

Matthew grunted, watching Nawpawpay at work. The protective wall of trees, he thought, was a further link between the village and Fount Royal. He had a feeling that the two towns, untold miles apart, were also linked in a way that no one would ever have suspected.

The nearness of her and the warmth of her hand put their lovemaking in mind. As if it were ever really a stone's toss from the center of his memory. But it had all been an illusion. Hadn't it? Of course it had been. Rachel would not have climbed up on a pallet to give herself to a dying man. Not even if he had saved her life. Not even if she had thought he was not much longer for this earth.

But... just a speculation... what if by then it was known he was on the road to recovery? And what if... the doctor had actually encouraged such physical and emotional contact, as an Indian method of healing akin to... well... akin to bloodletting?

If that were so, Dr. Shields had a lot to learn.

"Rachel?" Matthew said, his fingers gently caressing her hand. "Did you..." He stopped, not knowing how to approach this. He decided on a roundabout method. "Have you been given any other clothes to wear? Any... uh... native clothing?"

She met his gaze. "Yes, " she said. "That silent girl brought me a garment, in exchange for the blue dress that was in your bag."

Matthew paused, trying to read her eyes. If he and Rachel had actually made love, her admittance of it was not forthcoming. Neither was it readable in her countenance. And here, he thought, was the crux of the matter: she might have given het body to him, as a gesture of feeling or as some healing method devised by the doctor, who sounded to Matthew to be cut from Exodus Jerusalem's cloth; or it might have been a wishful fantasy induced by fever and drugged smoke.

Which was the truth? The truth, he thought, was that Rachel still loved her husband. Or, at least, the memory of him. He could see that, by what she would not say. If indeed there was something to be said. She might hold a feeling for him, Matthew thought, like a bouquet of pink carnations. But they were not red roses, and that made all the difference.

He might ask what color the garment was. He might describe it for her exactly. Or he might start to describe it, and she tell him he could not be more wrong.

Perhaps he didn't need to know. Or wish to know, really. Perhaps things were best left unspoken, and the boundary between reality and fantasy left to run its straight and undisturbed course.

He cleared his throat and looked toward the pond again. "I recall you told me we'd travelled an hour after the Indians came. Do you know in which direction?"

"The sun was on our left for a while. Then at our backs."

He nodded. They must have travelled an hour's distance back toward Fount Royal. Nawpawpay moved to a fourth location, and called out, "The water spirit is a trickster! Sometimes he gives them freely, other times we must search and search to find one!" Then, with a child's grin, he returned to his work.

"It's amazing!" Rachel said, shaking her head. "Absolutely amazing!"

"What is?"

"That he should speak French, and you can understand him! I wouldn't be more surprised if he should know Latin!"

"Yes, he is a remarkable—" He stopped abruptly, as if a wall of rough stones had crashed down upon him. "My God, " he whispered. "That's it!"

"What?"

"No Latin." Matthew's face had flushed with excitement. "What Reverend Grove said to Mrs. Nettles, in Bidwell's parlor. 'No Latin. ' That's the key!"

"The key? To what?"

He looked at her, and now his grin was childlike too. "The key to proving you innocent! It's the proof I've been needing, Rachel! It was right there, as close as..." He struggled for an analogy, and touched his grizzled chin. "Whiskers! The cunning fox can't—"

"Ah!" Nawpawpay's hand lifted, muddy to the wrist. "Here is a find!" Matthew waded into the water to meet him. The chief opened his hand and displayed a single silver pearl. It wasn't much but, coupled with the fragment of pie dish, was enough.

Matthew was curious about something, and he waded on past the chief until the water neared his waist.

And there! His suspicion was confirmed; he felt a definite current swirling around his knees. "The water moves, " he said.

"Ah, yes, " Nawpawpay agreed. "It is the breathing of the spirit. Sometimes more, sometimes less. But always, it breathes. You find interest in the water spirit?"

"Yes, very much."

"Hm." He nodded. "I didn't know your kind was religious. I shall take you to the house of the spirits, as an honored guest."

Nawpawpay led Matthew and Rachel to another hut near the pond. This one had walls daubed with blue dye, its entrance cloaked by a fantastically woven curtain of turkey and pigeon feathers, rabbit fur, fox skins with the heads still attached, and various other animal hides. "Alas, " Nawpawpay said, "your woman can't have entrance here. The spirits deign only to speak to men, and to women through men. Unless, of course, the woman was born with the spirit marks and becomes a seer."

Matthew nodded. It had occurred to him that one culture's "spirit marks" were another culture's "marks of the devil." He told Rachel that the chief's custom required her to wait while they went inside. Then he followed Nawpawpay.

The interior was very dim, only one flame burning in a small clay pot full of oil. Thankfully, though, there was no eye-searing smoke. The house of the spirits appeared empty, as far as Matthew could tell.

"We speak respectfully here, " Nawpawpay said. "My father built this, many passings of seasons ago. I often come here, to ask his advice."

"And he answers?"

"Well... no. But then again, he does. He listens to my problem, and then his answer is always: Son, decide for yourself." Nawpawpay picked up the clay pot. "Here are the gifts the water spirit gives." He followed the flickering flame deeper into the hut, with Matthew a few paces behind.

Still, there was nothing. Except one thing. On the floor was a larger bowl full of muddy water. Nawpawpay reached into it with the same hand that held the pearl, and then his hand reappeared muddy and dripping. "We honor the water spirit in this way, " he said. As Matthew watched, Nawpawpay approached a wall. It was not pinewood, as the others were, but was thickly plastered with dried brown mud from the pond.

Nawpawpay pressed his handful of mud and the pearl into the wall and smoothed it down. "I must speak to the spirit now, " he said. And then, in a soft singsong chant, "Pa ne sa nehra cai ke panu. Ke na pe pe kairu." As he chanted, he moved the flame back and forth along the mud-caked wall.

There was a red glint, first. Then a blue one.

Then... red... gold... more gold, a dozen gold... and silver... and purple and...

... a silent explosion of colors as the light moved back and forth along the wall: emerald green, ruby crimson, sapphire blue... and gold, gold, a thousand times gold...

"Oh, " Matthew gasped, as the hairs stood up on the back of his neck.

Held in that wall was the treasure.

A pirate's fortune. Jewels by the hundreds—sky blue, deep green, pale amber, dazzling white—and the coins, gold and silver enough to make the king of Franz Europay gibber and drool. And the most stunning thing was that Matthew realized he was seeing only the outermost layer. The plastering of dried mud had to be at least four inches thick, six feet tall, and four feet wide.

Here it was. In this dirt wall, in this hut, in this village, in this wilderness. Matthew wasn't sure, but he thought he could hear God and the Devil joined together in common laughter.

He knew. What was put into the spring at Fount Royal was carried out by the current of an underground river. It might take time, of course. Everything took time. The entrance to that river, there somewhere in the depths of Bidwell's spring, might only be the diameter of Lucretia Vaughan's pie plate. If a pirate had taken a sounding of the fount before lowering bags of jewels and coins, he would have found a bottom at forty feet—but he would not have found the hole that eventually pulled everything into the subterranean flow. Perhaps the current drew more powerfully in a particular season, or was affected by the moon just as were the ocean's tides. In any case, the pirate—most probably a man who was only smart enough to loot vessels, but not to vessel his loot in a sturdy container—had chosen a vault that suffered the flaw of a funnel at its bottom.

Spellbound, Matthew approached the wall. "Se na caira pa pa kairu, " chanted Nawpawpay, as he slowly moved the flame back and forth and the small sharp glints and explosions of reflected light continued.

Matthew saw in another moment that the dried mud also held bits of pottery, gold chains, silver spoons, and so forth. Here the gold-encrusted hilt of a knife protruded, and there was the cracked face of a pocket watch.

It made sense that Lucretia Vaughan's pie dish would go to the doctor, as some sort of enchanted implement sent from the water spirit. After all, it was decorated with a pattern that they most likely had figured out was a human organ.

"Na pe huida na pe caida, " Nawpawpay said, and that seemed to finish it, as he held the flame toward Matthew.

"The courage—" Matthew's voice cracked. He tried again. "The courage suns. You say the white fish stole one?"

"Yes, and murdered the man to whom it was given."

"May I ask why it was given to this man?"

"As a reward, " Nawpawpay said, "for courage. This man saved another who was gored by a wild tusked pig, and afterward killed the pig. It's a tradition my father began. But that white fish has been luring my people with his bad ways, making them sick in the mind with strong drink, and then making them work for him like common dogs. It was time for him to go."

"I see." Matthew recalled that Shawcombe had said his tavern had been built with Indian labor. And now he really did see. He saw the whole picture, and how it fit together in an intricate pattern.

"Nawpawpay, " Matthew said, "my... uh... woman and I must leave this place. Today. We have to go back from where we came. Do you know the village near the sea?"

"Of course I do. We watch it all the time." Nawpawpay wore an expression of concern. "But Demon Slayer, you can't leave today! You're still too weak to travel that distance. You must tell me what you know of Franz Europay, and I also have a celebration planned for you tonight. Dancing and feasting. And we have the demon's head, carved out for you to wear."

"Urn... well... I—"

"In the morning you may leave, if you still desire to. Tonight we celebrate, to honor your courage and the death of that beast." He directed the light to the treasure wall again. "Here, Demon Slayer! A gift for you, as is proper. Take one thing you see that shines strong enough to guide your hand."

It was astounding, Matthew thought. Nawpawpay didn't realize—and God protect him from ever finding out—that there were those in the outside world, the civilized world, who would come through the forest to this place and raze it to the ground to obtain one square foot of dirt from that wall.

But a gift of fantastic worth had been offered, and Matthew's hand was so guided.

forty-one

AS THE SUN SETTLED and the blue shadows of evening advanced, Fount Royal slumbered in a dream of what might have been.

It was a slumbering that prefigured death. Stood the empty houses, stood the empty barns. A scarecrow drooped on its frame in a fallow field, two blackbirds perched upon its shoulders. A straw hat lay discarded on Harmony Street, and had been further destroyed by the crush of wagon wheels. The front gate was ajar, its locking timber thrown aside and left in the dirt by the last family who'd departed. Of the thirty or so persons who remained in the dying dream of Fount Royal, not one could summon the energy of spirit to put the gate in order. It seemed madness, of course, to leave the gate unlocked, for who knew what savages might burst through to scalp, maim, and pillage?

But in truth, the evil within Fount Royal seemed much worse, and to secure the gate was like locking oneself in a dark room with a beast whose breath stroked the back of the neck.

It was all clear now. All of it, very clear to the citizens.

The witch had escaped with the help of her demon-possessed lover. That boy! You know the one! That clerk had fallen in with her—had fallen into the pit of Hell, I say—and he overcame Mr. Green and got her out. Then they fled. Out into the wilderness, out where Satan has his own village. Yes, he does, and I've heard tell Solomon Stiles saw it himself. You might ask him, but he's left town for good. This is the story, though, and guard your souls at the listening: Satan's built a village in the wilderness and all the houses are made of thornwood. They have fields that seethe of hellfire, and they grow crops of the most treacherous poison. You know the magistrate's fallen sick again, don't you? Yes, he has. Sick unto death. He's near given out. Now this is what I hear: someone in that mansion house is a witch or warlock themselves, and has fed that poor magistrate Satan's poisoned tea! So guard what you drink! Oh my... I was just thinking... what a horror to think on... may haps it wasn't the tea that was poisonous, but the very water. Oh my... if Satan had it in mind... to curse and poison the fount itself... we would all die writhing in our beds, wouldn't we? Oh my... oh my:..

A breeze moved across Fount Royal on this warm and darkening eve. It rippled the waters of the fount, and kissed the roofs of lightless houses. It moved along Industry Street, where it had been sworn that the phantasm of Gwinett Linch had been seen, hurrying along with its rat sticker and its torn throat, warning in a ghastly cry that the witches of Fount Royal were hungry for more souls... more souls...

The breeze stirred dust from Harmony Street, and whirled that dust into the cemetery where it had been sworn a dark figure was seen walking amid the markers, counting numbers on an abacus. The breeze whispered along Truth Street, past the accursed gaol and that house—that witch's house—from which sounds of infernal merriment and the scuttling of demons' claws could be heard, if one dared approach too closely.

Yes, it all was very clear now to the citizens, who had responded to this clarity of vision by fleeing for their lives. Seth Hazelton's house lay empty, the stalls of his barn bare, his forge cold. The hearth at the abandoned Vaughan house still held the perfume of baked bread, but the only movement in that forsaken domicile was the agitation of the wasps. At the infirmary, bags and boxes had been packed in preparation for departure, the glass vials and bottles nestled in cotton and waiting for...

Just waiting.

They were almost all gone. A few stalwarts remained, either out of loyalty to Robert Bidwell, or because their wagons had to be repaired before a trip could be undertaken, or because—the rarest cases—they had nowhere else to go and continued to delude themselves that all would be well. Exodus Jerusalem remained in his camp, a fighter to the end, and though the audience at his nightly preachings had dwindled he continued to assail Satan for the appreciation of his flock. Also, he had made the acquaintance of a certain widow woman who had not the benefit of male protection, and so after his feverish sermons were done he protected her at close quarters with his mighty sword.

But lanterns still glowed in the mansion, and light sparkled off four lifted wineglasses.

"To Fount Royal, " Bidwell said. "What it was, I mean. And what it might have been." The toast was drunk without comment by Winston, Johnstone, and Shields. They stood in the parlor, in preparation to go into the dining room for the light dinner to which Bidwell had invited them.

"I deeply regret it's turned out this way, Robert, " Shields said. "I know you—"

"Hush." Bidwell lifted the palm of his free hand. "We'll have no tears this evening. I have travelled my road of grief, and wish to go on to the next destination."

"What, then?" Johnstone asked. "You're going back to England?"

"Yes, I am. In a matter of weeks, after some business is finished. That's why Edward and I went to Charles Town on Tuesday, to prepare for our passage." He drank another sip of his wine and looked about the room. "My God, how shall I ever salvage such a folly as this? I must have been mad, to have dumped so much money into this swamp!"

"I myself must throw in my cards, " Johnstone said, his face downcast. "There's no point in my staying any longer. I should say in the next week."

"You did a fine job, Alan, " Shields offered. "Fount Royal was graced by your ideas and education."

"I did what I could, and thank you for your appreciation. As for you, Ben... what are your plans?"

Shields drank down his wine and walked to the decanter to refill his glass. "I will leave... when my patient departs. Until then, I will do my damnedest to make him comfortable, for that's the very least I can do."

"I fear at this point, doctor, it's the most you can do, " Winston said.

"Yes, you're right." Shields took down half the fresh glass at a swallow. "The magistrate... hangs on from day to day by his fingernails. I should say he hangs on from hour to hour." Shields lifted his spectacles and scratched his nose. "I've done everything I could. I thought the potion was going to work... and it did work, for a while. But his body wouldn't accept it, and it virtually collapsed. Therefore: the question is not if he will pass, but when." He sighed, his face strained and his eyes bloodshot. "But he is comfortable now, at least, and he's breathing well."

"And still he's not aware?" Winston asked.

"No. He still believes Witch Howarth burned on Monday morning, and he believes his clerk looks in on him from time to time, simply because that's what I tell him. As his mind is quite feeble, he has no recollection of the passage of days, nor of the fact that his clerk is not in the house."

"You don't intend on telling him the truth, then?" Johnstone leaned on his cane. "Isn't that rather cruel?"

"We decided... I decided... that it would be supremely cruel to tell him what has actually happened, " Bidwell explained. "There's no need in rubbing his face in the fact that his clerk was bewitched and threw in his lot with the Devil. To tell Isaac that the witch did not burn... well, there's just no point to it."

"I agree, " Winston said. "The man should be allowed to die with peace of mind."

"I can't understand how that young man could have bested Green!" Johnstone swirled the wine around his glass and then finished it. "He must have been either very lucky or very desperate."

"Or possessed supernatural strength, or had the witch curse Green to sap the man's power, " Bidwell said. "That's what I think."

"Pardon me, gentlemen." Mrs. Nettles had come. "Dinner's a'table."

"Ah, yes. Good. We'll be there directly, Mrs. Nettles." Bid-well waited for the woman to withdraw, and then he said quietly to the others, "I have a problem. Something of the utmost importance that I need to discuss with all of you."

"What is it?" Shields asked, frowning. "You sound not yourself."

"I am not myself, " Bidwell answered. "As a matter of fact... since we returned from Charles Town and I have taken stock of my impending failure, I am changed in a way I would never have thought possible. In fact, that is what I need to discuss with all of you. Come, let's go into the library where voices don't carry as freely." He picked up a lamp and led the way.

Two candles were already burning in the library, shedding plenty of light, and four chairs had been arranged in a semicircle. Winston followed Bidwell in, then the doctor entered, and lastly Johnstone limped through the doorway.

"What's this, Robert?" Johnstone asked. "You make it sound so secretive."

"Please, sit down. All of you." When his guests were seated, Bidwell put his lantern on the sill of the open window and settled himself in his chair. "Now, " he said gravely. "This problem that I grapple with... has to do with..."

"Questions and answers, " came a voice from the library's entrance. Instantly Dr. Shields and Johnstone turned their heads toward the door.

"The asking of the former, and the finding of the latter, " Matthew said, as he continued into the room. "And thank you, sir, for delivering the cue."

"My God!" Shields shot to his feet, his eyes wide behind his spectacles. "What are you doing here?"

"Actually, I've been occupying my room for the afternoon." Matthew walked to a position so that he might face all the men, his back to the wall. He wore a pair of dark blue breeches and a fresh white shirt. Mrs. Nettles had cut the left sleeve away from the clay dressing. He didn't tell them that when he'd shaved and been forced to regard his bruise-blotched face and the clay plaster on his forehead, he'd been cured of unnecessary glances in a mirror for some time to come.

"Robert?" Johnstone's voice was calm. He gripped the shaft of his cane with both hands. "What trickery is this?"

"It's not a trick, Alan. Simply a preparation in which Edward and I assisted."

"A preparation? For what, pray tell?"

"For this moment, sir, " Matthew said, his face betraying no emotion. "I arrived back here—with Rachel—around two o'clock. We entered through the swamp, and as I was... um... deficient in clothing and did not wish to be seen by anyone, I asked John Goode to make my presence known to Mr. Bidwell. He did so, with admirable discretion. Then I asked Mr. Bidwell to gather you all together this evening."

"I'm lost!" Shields said, but he sat down again. "You mean to say you brought the witch back here? Where is she?"

"The woman is currently in Mrs. Nettles's quarters, " Bidwell offered. "Probably eating her dinner."

"But... but..." Shields shook his head. "She's a witch, by God! It was proven so!"

"Ah, proof." Now Matthew smiled slightly. "Yes, doctor, proof is at the crux of things, is it not?"

"It certainly is! And what you've proven to me is that you're not only bewitched, but a bewitched fool! And for the sake of God, what's happened to you? Did you fight with a demon to gain the witch's favors?"

"Yes, doctor, and I slayed it. Now: if it is proof you require, I shall be glad to satisfy your thirst." Matthew, for the fourth or fifth time, found himself absentmindedly scratching at the clay plaster that covered his broken ribs beneath the shirt. He had a small touch of fever and was sweating, but the Indian physician—through Nawpawpay—had this morning announced him fit to travel. Demon Slayer hadn't had to walk the distance, however; except for the last two miles, he'd been carried by his and Rachel's Indian guides on a ladder-like conveyance with a dais at its center. It had been quite the way to travel.

"It seems to me, " Matthew said, "that we have all—being learned and God-fearing men—come to the conclusion that a witch cannot speak the Lord's Prayer. I would venture that a warlock could neither speak it. Therefore: Mr. Winston, would you please speak the Lord's Prayer?"

Winston drew a long breath. He said, "Of course. Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done..."

Matthew waited, staring into Winston's face, as the man perfectly recited the prayer. At the "Amen, " Matthew said, "Thank you, " and turned his attention to Bidwell.

"Sir, would you also please speak the Lord's Prayer?"

"Me?" Instantly some of the old accustomed indignation flared in Bidwell's eyes. "Why should I have to speak it?"

"Because, " Matthew said, "I'm telling you to."

"Telling me?" Bidwell made a flatulent noise with his lips. "I won't speak such a personal thing just because someone orders me to!"

"Mr. Bidwell?" Matthew had clenched his teeth. This man, even as an ally, was insufferable! "It is necessary."

"I agreed to this meeting, but I didn't agree to recite such a powerful prayer to my God on demand, as if it were lines from a maskers' play! No, I shall not speak it! And I'm not a warlock for it, either!"

"Well, it appears you and Rachel Howarth share stubborn natures, does it not?" Matthew raised his eyebrows, but Bidwell didn't respond further. "We shall return to you, then."

"You may return to me a hundred times, and it won't matter!"

"Dr. Shields?" Matthew said. "Would you please cooperate with me in this matter, as one of us refuses to do, and speak the Lord's Prayer?"

"Well... yes... I don't understand the point, but... all right." Shields ran the back of his hand across his mouth. During Winston's recitation he'd finished the rest of his drink, and now he looked into the empty glass and said, "I have no more wine. Might I get a fresh glass?"

"After the prayer is spoken. Would you proceed?"

"Yes. All right." The doctor blinked, his eyes appearing somewhat glazed in the ruddy candlelight. "All right, " he said again. Then: "Our Father... who art in heaven... hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy... will be done... on earth as it is... is in heaven." He stopped, pulled a handkerchief from the pocket of his sand-colored jacket and blotted moisture from his face. "I'm sorry. It is warm in here. My wine... I do need a cooling drink."

"Dr. Shields?" Matthew said quietly. "Please continue."

"I've spoken enough of it, haven't I? What madness is this?"

"Why can you not finish the prayer, doctor?"

"I can finish it! By Christ, I can!" Shields lifted his chin defiantly, but Matthew saw that his eyes were terrified. "Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our... forgive us our trespasses... as we forgive those who... who trespass... trespass..." He pressed his hand to his lips and now he appeared to be distraught, even near weeping. He made a muffled sound that might have been a moan.

"What is it, Ben?" Bidwell asked in alarm. "For God's sake, tell us!" Dr. Shields lowered his head, removed his glasses, and wiped his damp forehead with the handkerchief. "Yes, " he answered in a frail voice. "Yes. I should tell it... for the sake of God."

"Shall I fetch you some water?" Winston offered, standing up. "No." Shields waved him down again. "I... should... tell it, while I am able."

"Tell what, Ben?" Bidwell glanced up at Matthew, who had an idea what was about to be revealed. "Ben?" Bidwell prompted. "Tell what?"

"That... it was I... who murdered Nicholas Paine." Silence fell. Bidwell's jaw might have been as heavy as an anvil.

"I murdered him, " the doctor went on, his head lowered. He dabbed at his forehead, cheeks, and eyes with small, birdlike movements. "Executed him, I should say." He shook his head slowly back and forth. "No. That is a pallid excuse. I murdered him, and I deserve to answer to the law for it... because I can no longer answer to myself or God. And He asks me about it. Every day and night, He does. He whispers... Ben... now that it's done... at long last, now that it's done... and you have committed with your own hands the act that you most detest in this world... the act that makes men into beasts... how shall you go on living as a healer?"

"Have you... lost your mind?" Bidwell thought his friend was suffering a mental breakdown right before his eyes. "What are you saying?"

Shields lifted his face. His eyes were swollen and red, his mouth slack. Saliva had gathered in the corners. "Nicholas Paine was the highwayman who killed my elder son. Shot him... during a robbery on the Philadelphia Post Road, just outside Boston eight years ago. My boy lived long enough to describe the man... and also to say that he'd drawn a pistol and shot the highwayman through the calf of his leg." Shields gave a bitter, ghastly smile. "It was I who told him never to travel that road without a prepared pistol near at hand. In fact... it was my birthday gift to him. My boy was shot in the stomach, and... there was nothing to be done. But I... I went mad, I think. For a very long time." He picked up the wineglass, forgetting it was empty, and started to tip it to his mouth before he realized the futility of it.

Shields drew a long, shuddering breath and released it. All eyes were on him. "Robert... you know what the officers in these colonies are like. Slow. Untrained. Stupid. I knew the man might lose himself, and I would never have the satisfaction... of doing to his father what he had done to me. So I set out. First... to find a doctor who might have treated him. It took a search through every rumhole and whorehouse in Boston... but I eventually found the doctor. The so-called doctor, a drunken slug who tended to the whores. He knew the man, and where he lived. He had also... recently buried the man's wife and baby daughter, the first who'd died of fits, and the second who'd perished soon after."

Shields again wiped his face with the handkerchief, his hand trembling. "I had no pity for Nicholas Paine. None. I simply... wanted to extinguish him, as he had extinguished something in my soul. So I began to track him. From place to place. Village to town to city, and back again. Always close, but never finding. Until I learned he had traded horses in Charles Town and had told the stable master his destination. And it took me eight years." He looked into Bidwell's eyes. "Do you know what I realized, the very hour after I killed him?"

Bidwell didn't reply. He couldn't speak.

"I realized... I had also killed myself, eight years ago. I had given up my practise, I had turned my back on my wife and my other son... who both needed me, then more than ever. I had forsaken them, to kill a man who in many ways was also already dead. And now that it was done... I felt no pride in it. No pride in anything anymore. But he was dead. He was bled like my heart had bled. And the most terrible thing... the most terrible, Robert... was that I think... Nicholas was not the same man who had pulled that trigger. I wanted him to be a coldhearted killer... but he was not that man at all. But me... I was the same man I had always been. Only much, much worse."

The doctor closed his eyes and let his head roll back. "I am prepared to pay my debt, " he said softly. "Whatever it may be. I am used up, Robert. All used up."

"I disagree, sir, " Matthew said. "Your use is clear: to comfort Magistrate Woodward in these final hours." It hurt him like a dagger to the throat to speak such, but it was true. The magistrate's health had collapsed the very morning of Matthew's departure, and it was terribly clear that the end would be soon. "I'm sure we all appreciate your candor, and your feelings, but your duty as a doctor stands first before your obligation to the law, whatever Mr. Bidwell—as the mayor of this town—decides it to be."

"What?" Bidwell, who had paled during this confession, now appeared shocked. "You're leaving it up to me?"

"I'm not a judge, sir. I am—as you have reminded me so often and with such hot pepper—only a clerk."

"Well, " Bidwell breathed, "I'll be damned."

"Damnation and salvation are brothers separated only by direction of travel, " Matthew said. "When the time is right, I'm sure you'll know the proper road upon which to progress. Now: if we may continue?" He directed his attention to the schoolmaster. "Mr. Johnstone, would you please speak the Lord's Prayer?"

Johnstone stared intently at him. "May I ask what the purpose of this is, Matthew? Is it to suggest that one of us is a warlock, and that by failing to utter the prayer he is exposed as such?"

"You are on the right track, yes, sir."

"That is absolutely ridiculous! Well, if you go by that faulty reasoning, Robert has already exposed himself!"

"I said I would go back to Mr. Bidwell, and offer him a chance at redemption. I am currently asking you to speak the prayer."

Johnstone gave a harsh, scoffing laugh. "Matthew, you know bettet than this! What kind of game are you playing?"

"I assure you, it's no game. Are you refusing to speak the prayer?"

"Would that then expose me as a warlock? Then you'd have two warlocks in a single room?" He shook his head, as if in pity for Matthew's mental slippage. "Well, I shall relieve your burdensome worry, then." He looked into Matthew's eyes. "Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in—"

"Oh, one moment!" Matthew held up a finger and tapped his lower lip. "In your case, Mr. Johnstone—your being an educated man of Oxford, I mean to say—-you should speak the Lord's Prayer in the language of education, which would be Latin. Would you start again from the beginning, please?"

Silence.

They stared at each other, the clerk and the fox.

Matthew said, "Oh, I understand. Perhaps you've forgotten your Latin training. But surely it should be easily refreshed, since Latin was such a vital part of your studies at Oxford. You must have been well versed in Latin, as the magistrate was, if only to obtain entrance to that hallowed university. So allow me to help: Pater noster: qui es in caelis; Sanctificetur nomen tuum; Adventiat reg-num tuum—well, you may finish what I've begun."

Silence. Utter, deadly silence.

Matthew thought, I have you.

He said, "You don't know Latin, do you? In fact, you neither understand nor speak a word of it. Tell me, then, how a man may attend Oxford and come away an educator without knowing Latin."

Johnstone's eyes had become very small.

"Well, I'll seek to explain what I believe to be true." Matthew swept his gaze across the other men, who were also stricken into amazed silence by this revelation. He walked to the chess set near the window and picked up a bishop. "Reverend Grove played chess, you see. This was his chess set. Mr. Bidwell, you informed me of that fact. You also said the reverend was a Latin scholar, and liked to infuriate you by calling out his moves in that language." He studied the bishop by the lamplight. "On the occasion of the fire that burned down a house that same night, Mr. Johnstone, you mentioned to me that you and Mr. Winston were in the habit of playing chess. Would it ever have happened, sir, that—this being a town of rare chess players and even more rare Latin scholars—Reverend Grove challenged you to a game?"

Bidwell was staring at the schoolmaster, waiting for a response, but from Johnstone there was no reply.

"Would it have happened, " Matthew went on, "that Reverend Grove assumed you knew Latin, and spoke to you in that language during a game? Of course, you wouldn't have known if he was speaking to you or announcing a move. In any case, you wouldn't have been able to respond, would you?" He turned toward Johnstone. "What's wrong, sir? Does the Devil have your tongue?"

Johnstone simply stared straight ahead, his fingers gripping the cane's handle and the knuckles bleached.

"He's thinking, gentlemen, " Matthew said. "Thinking, always thinking. He is a very smart man, no doubt of it. He might actually have become a real schoolmaster, if he'd chosen to. What exactly are you, Mr. Johnstone?"

Still no response or reaction.

"I do know you're a murderer." Matthew placed the bishop back on the table. "Mrs. Nettles told me she recalled Reverend Grove seemed bothered about something not long before he was killed. She told me he spoke two words, as if in reflection to himself. Those words were: No Latin. He was trying to reason out why an Oxford man didn't know the language. Did he ask you why, Mr. Johnstone? Was he about to point out the fact to Mr. Bidwell, and thus expose you as a fraud? And that's why Reverend Grove became the first victim?"

"Wait, " the doctor said, his mind fogged. "The Devil killed Reverend Grove! Cut his throat and clawed him!"

"The Devil sits in this room, sir, and his name—if it is his real name—is Alan Johnstone. Of course he wasn't alone. He did have the help of the ratcatcher, who was a..." He stopped and smiled thinly. "Ah! Mr. Johnstone! Do you also have a background in the theater arts? You know, Mt. Bidwell, why he wears that false knee. Because he'd already visited Fount Royal in the guise of a surveyor. The beard was probably his own, as at that point he had no need for a disguise. It was only when he verified what he needed to know, and later returned, that a suitable masking was necessary. Mr. Johnstone, if indeed you were—are—an actor, did you perchance ever play the role of a schoolmaster? Therefore you fixed upon what you already knew?"

"You, " Johnstone said, in a hoarse whisper, "are quite... raving... mad."

"Am I? Well, let's see your knee then! It'll only take a moment."

Instinctively, Johnstone's right hand went down to cover the misshapen bulge.

"I see, " Matthew said. "You wear your brace—which I presume you purchased in Charles Town—but you didn't put on the device you displayed to the magistrate, did you? Why would you? You thought I was long gone, and I was the only one who ever questioned your knee."

"But I saw it myself!" Winston spoke up. "It was terribly deformed!"

"No, it appeared terribly deformed. How did you construct such a thing, Mr. Johnstone? Come now, don't be modest about your talents! You are a man of many black facets! If I myself had wished to make a false knee, I might have used... oh... clay and candle wax, I suppose. Something to cover the kneecap, build it up and make it appear deformed. You chose a time to reveal the knee when I was unfortunately otherwise occupied." He swung his gaze to Dr. Shields. "Doctor, you sell a liniment to Mr. Johnstone for the supposed pain in his knee, don't you?"

"Yes, I do. A hogsfat-based liniment."

"Does this liniment have an objectionable odor?"

"Well... it's not pleasant, but it can be endured."

"What if the hogsfat is allowed to sit over heat, and become rancid before application? Mr. Winston, the magistrate mentioned to me that you were repelled by the odor. Is that correct?"

"Yes. Very quickly repelled, as I recall."

"That was a safeguard, you see. To prevent anyone from either looking too closely at the false knee, or—heaven forbid— touching it. Isn't that true, Mr. Johnstone?"

Johnstone stared at the floor. He rubbed the bulge of his knee, a pulse beating at his temple.

"I'm sure that's not very comfortable. Is it intended to force a limp? You probably really can't climb stairs with it on, can you? Therefore you removed it to go up and look at the gold coin? Did you mean to steal that coin, or were you simply surprised at being caught in the act? Did your greedy hand clutch it in what was for you a normal reaction?"

"Wait, " the doctor said. He was struggling to keep up, his own brain blasted by the rigors of his confession. "You mean to say... Alan was never educated at Oxford? But I myself heard him trading tales of Oxford with the magistrate! He seemed to know the place so well!"

"Seemed to is right, sir. I expect he must have played a schoolmaster's role in some play and picked up a modicum of information. He also knew that by passing himself off as having an Oxford education, the town would more readily dismiss the efforts of the man who served as the previous teacher."

"But what about Margaret? Johnstone's wife?" Winston asked. "I know her bell seemed cracked, but... wouldn't she have known if he wasn't really a schoolmaster?"

"He had a wife?" This was the first Matthew had heard of it. "Was he wed in Fount Royal, or did he bring her with him when he arrived?"

"He brought her, " Winston said. "And she seemed to despise Fount Royal and all of us from the beginning. So much so that he was obliged to return her to her family in England." He shot Johnstone a dark glance. "At least that's what he told us."

"Ah, now you're beginning to understand that what he told you was never necessarily the truth—and rarely so. Mr. Johnstone, what about this woman? Who was she?"

Johnstone continued to stare at the floor.

"Whoever she was, I doubt she was really wed to you. But it was a clever artifice, gentlemen, and further disguised himself as a decent schoolmaster." Matthew suddenly had a thought, a flashing sun of revelation, and he smiled slightly as he regarded the fox. "So: you returned this woman to her family in England, is that correct?"

Of course there was no answer.

"Mr. Bidwell, how long was it after Johnstone came back from England that the ratcatcher arrived here?"

"It was... I don't know... a month, possibly. Three weeks. I can't recall."

"Less than three weeks, " Winston said. "I remember the day Linch arrived and offered his services. We were so glad to see him, as the rats were overrunning us."

"Mr. Johnstone?" Matthew prompted. "Had you, as a thes-pian, ever seen John Lancaster—and that was his true name— performing his act? Had you heard about his magnetism abilities while your troupe was travelling England? Perhaps you'd already met him?" Johnstone only stared blankly at the floorboards. "In any case, " Matthew continued with authority, "you didn't go to England to return that so-called wife to her family. You went to England to seek a man you thought could help carry out your scheme. You knew what it would take. By then you had probably decided who the victims were going to be—even though I think your murder of Reverend Grove had more to do with hiding your falsehood than anything else—and you needed a man with the uncommon ability to create perceived truth from wholesale illusion. And you found him, didn't you?"

"Mad." Johnstone's voice was husky and wounded. "Mad... goddamned mad..."

"Then you convinced him to join your mission, " Matthew went on. "I presume you had a trinket or two to show him as proof? Did you give him the brooch? Was that one of the things you'd found during those nights you posed as a surveyor? As you declined Mr. Bidwell's offer of a bed and pitched your tent right there beside the spring, you could go swimming without being discovered. What else did you find down there?"

"I'm not..." Johnstone struggled to stand. "I'm not staying to hear this madman's slander!"

"Look how he remains in character!" Matthew said. "I should have known you were an actor the first night we met! I should have realized from that face powder you wore, as you wore it the night of the maskers' dinner, that an actor never feels truly comfortable before a new audience without the benefit of makeup."

"I'm leaving!" Johnstone had gained his feet. He turned his sallow, sweating face toward the door.

"Alan? I know all about John Lancaster." Johnstone had been about to hobble out; now he froze again, at the sound of Bidwell's quiet, powerful voice.

"I know all about his abilities, though I don't understand such things. I do understand, however, from where Lancaster took his concept of the three demons. They were freaks he'd seen, at that circus which employed David Smythe's father."

Johnstone stood motionless, staring at the door, his back to Matthew. Perhaps the fox trembled, at this recognition of being torn asunder by the hounds.

"You see, Alan, " Bidwell went on, "I opened a letter that Matthew had left for the magistrate. I read that letter... and I began to wonder why such a demon-possessed boy would fear for my safety. My safety, after all the insults and taunts I hurled at him. I began to wonder... if I had not best take Mr. Winston and go to Charles Town to find the Red Bull Players. They were camped just to the south. I found Mr. Smythe, and asked him the questions that were directed in that letter."

Johnstone had not moved, and still did not.

"Sit down, " Bidwell commanded. "Whatever your name is, you bastard."

forty-two

MATTHEW AND THE OTHERS now witnessed a transformation.

Instead of being cowed by this command, instead of slumping under the iron fist of truth, Alan Johnstone slowly straightened his spine. In seconds he seemed an inch or two taller. His shoulders appeared to widen against the fabric of his dark blue jacket, as if the man had been tightly compressing himself around his secret core.

When he turned toward Matthew again, it was with an unhurried grace. Johnstone was smiling, but the truth had delivered its blow; his face was damp, his eyes deep-sunken and shock-blasted.

"Sirs, " he said, "dear sirs. I must confess... I never attended Oxford. Oh, this is embarrassing. Quite so. I attended a small school in Wales. I was... the son of a miner, and I realized at an early age... that some doors would be closed to my ascent, if I did not attempt to hide some... um... unfortunate and unsavory elements of my family. Therefore, I created—"

"A lie, just as you're creating now, " Matthew interrupted. "Are you incapable of telling the truth?"

Johnstone's mouth, which was open to speak the next falsehood, slowly closed. His smile had vanished, his face as grim as gray stone.

"I think he's lived with lies so long they're like a suit, without which he would feel nude to the world, " Matthew said. "You did learn a great deal about Oxford, though, didn't you? Did you actually go there and tour the place when you returned to England, just in case you needed the information? It never hurts to add details to your script, does it? And all that about your social club!" Matthew shook his head and clucked his tongue. "Are the Ruskins even really in existence, or is that your own true name? You know, I might have realized I had proof of your lies that very night. When the magistrate recited the motto of his own social club to you, he spoke it in Latin, believing that as a fellow Oxford brother you would need no translation. But when you recited back the motto of the Ruskins, you spoke English. Have you ever known the motto of a social fraternity to be in English? Tell me, did you make that motto up on the spot?"

Johnstone began to laugh. The laughter, however, was strained through his tightly clenched teeth, and therefore was less merry than murderous.

"This woman who was purported to be your wife, " Matthew said. "Who was she? Some insane wretch from Charles Town? No, no, you would have had to find someone you at least imagined you could control. Was she then a doxy, to whom you could promise future wealth for her cooperation?"

The laughter faded and went away, but Johnstone continued to grin. His face, the flesh drawn over the bones and the eyeholes dwindled to burns, had taken on the appearance of a truly demonic mask.

"I presume you made quick work of the woman, as soon as you'd left sight of Charles Town, " Matthew ventured. "Did she believe you were returning her to the dove roost?"

Johnstone suddenly turned and began to limp toward the door, proving that his kneebrace enforced the fiction of his deformity.

"Mr. Green?" Matthew called, in a casual tone. The doorway was presently blocked by the red-bearded giant, who also held at his side a pistol. "That weapon has been prepared for firing, sir, " Matthew said. "I don't for an instant doubt your ability to inflict deadly violence, therefore the necessary precaution against it. Would you please come back to your chair?"

Johnstone didn't respond. Green said, "I 'spect you'd best do as Mr. Corbett asks." The air had whistled through the space a front tooth used to occupy.

"Very well, then!" Johnstone turned toward his tormentor with a theatrical flourish, the death's-head grin at full force. "I shall be glad to sit down and listen to these mad ravings, as I find myself currently imprisoned! You know, you're all bewitched! Every one of you!" He stalked back to the chairs, taking a position not unlike center stage. "God help our minds, to withstand such demonic power! Don't you see it?" He pointed at Matthew, who was gratified to see that the hand trembled. "This boy is in league with the blackest evil to ever crawl from a pit! God help us, in its presence!" Now Johnstone held his hand palm-upward, in a gesture of supplication. "I throw myself before your common sense, sirs! Before your decency and love of fellow man! God knows these are the first things any demon would try to destr—"

Smack! went a book down onto Johnstone's offered palm. Johnstone staggered, and stared at the volume of English plays that Matthew had devoured, and that Mrs. Nettles had returned to the nearby bookcase.

"Poor Tom Foolery, I believe, " Matthew said. "I think on page one-seventeen or thereabouts is a similar speech, in case you wish to be more exact."

Something moved across Johnstone's face in that instant, as he met Matthew's gaze. Something vulpine, and mean as sin. It was as if for a fleeting space of time the animal had been dragged from its den and made to show itself; then the instant passed, and the glimpse was gone. Johnstone's countenance had formed again into stone. Disdainfully, he turned his hand over and let the book fall to the floor.

"Sit down, " Matthew said firmly, as Mr. Green guarded the doorway. Slowly, with as much dignity as he could cloak himself, Johnstone returned to his chair.

Matthew went to the fanciful map of Fount Royal that hung on the wall behind him. He tapped the spring with his forefinger. "This, gentleman, is the reason for such deception. At some time in the past—several years, I believe, before Mr. Bidwell sent a land scout to find him suitable property—this spring was used as a vault for pirate treasure. I don't mean just Spanish gold and silver coins, either. I mean jewels, silverware, plates... whatever this pirate and his crew managed to take. As the spring was likely used by this individual as a source of fresh water, he decided to employ it for a different purpose. Mr. Johnstone, do you know this individual's name?" No response. "Well, I'm assuming he was English, since he seemed to prefer attacking Spanish merchant ships. Probably he attacked a few Spanish pirates who were themselves laden with treasure. In any case, he built up a wondrous fortune... but of course, he was always in fear of being attacked himself, therefore he needed a secure hiding-place for his loot. Please correct me, Mr. Johnstone, if I am mistaken at any of these conjectures."

Johnstone might have burned the very air between them with his stare.

"Oh, I should tell you, sir, " Matthew said, "that the vast majority of the fortune you schemed to possess is now lost. In my investigation of the pond, I found an opening to an underground flow. A small opening but, regretfully for you, an efficient one as to the movement of water. Over a period of time, most of the loot went down the hole. I don't doubt that there are a few items of value remaining—some coins or pieces of pottery—but the vault has been emptied by the one who truly owns it: Mother Nature."

He saw now a flinch of true pain on Johnstone's face, as this nerve was so deeply struck. "I suspect you found some items when you posed as the surveyor, and those financed your schoolmaster's suits. A wagon and horses, too? And clothes for your cardboard wife? Then I presume you also had items to finance your passage back to and from England, and to be able to show Lancaster what was awaiting him. Did you also show him the blade that was awaiting his throat?"

"My God!" Dr. Shields said, aghast. "I... always thought Alan came from a wealthy family! I saw a gold ring he owned... with a ruby in it! And a gold pocket watch he had, inscribed with his initials!"

"Really? I'd say the ring was something he'd found. Perhaps he purchased the pocket watch in Charles Town before he came here, and had those initials inscribed to further advance his false identity." Matthew's eyebrows lifted. "Or was it a watch you had previously murdered someone to get, and those initials prompted your choice of a name?"

"You, " Johnstone said, his mouth twisting, "are absolutely a fool."

"I have been called so, sir, but never let it be said that I am fooled. At least not for very long. But you are a smart man, sir. I swear you are. If I were to ask Mr. Green to sit in your lap, and take Mr. Bidwell and Mr. Winston for a thorough search of your house, would we find a sapphire brooch there? A book on ancient Egypt? Would we find the ratcatcher's five-bladed device? You know, that was a crowning move! The claw marks! A deception only a talented thespian could construct! And to create a ratcatcher out of John Lancaster... well, it was an inspiration. Did you know that he had experience with training rats? Had you seen his circus act? You knew Fount Royal was in need of a ratcatcher... therefore, instant acceptance by the town. Was it you or Lancaster who created the poppets? Those, too, were very convincing. Just rough-edged enough to appeal real."

"I shall... lose my mind, listening to you, " Johnstone said. He blinked slowly. "Lose my mind... altogether."

"You decided Rachel was perfect witch material. You knew, as everyone knows, what occurred at Salem. But you, with your sterling abilities to manipulate an audience, realized how such mass fear might be scripted, act upon act. The only problem is that you, sir, are a man who has the command of a crowd's mind, yet you needed a man with the command of the individual mind. The point being to seed this terror in Fount Royal by using selected persons, and thus to ruin the town and cause it to be abandoned. After which you—and Lancaster, or so he believed—might remove the riches."

Johnstone lifted a hand and touched his forehead. He rocked slightly back and forth in his chair.

"As to the murder of Daniel Howarth, " Matthew said, "I suspect you lured him out of the house that night to a prearranged meeting? Something he would not have mentioned to Rachel? She told me that the night of his murder he asked her if she loved him. She said it was rare for him to be so... well... needful. He already had fears that Nicholas Paine was interested in Rachel. Did you fan those flames, by intimating that Rachel might also have feelings for Paine? Did you promise to meet him in a private place, to exchange information that should not be overheard? Of course he wouldn't have known what you were planning. I'm sure your power of persuasion might have directed Daniel to any place you chose, at any time. Who cut his throat, then? You or Lancaster?"

When Johnstone didn't answer, Matthew said, "You, I think. I presume you then applied the five-bladed device to Daniel's dead or dying body? I'm sure Lancaster never would have imagined he'd meet his end the same way. He panicked when he learned he'd been discovered, didn't he? Did he want to leave?" Matthew smiled grimly. "But no, you couldn't have that, could you? You couldn't let him leave, knowing what he knew. Had you always planned to murder him, after he'd helped you remove the treasure and Fount Royal was your own private fortress?"

"Damn you, " Bidwell said to Johnstone, his face reddening. "Damn your eyes, and heart, and soul. Damn you to a slow death, as you would have made me a murderer too!"

"Calm yourself, " Matthew advised. "He shall be damned, as I understand the colonial prison is one step above a hellhole and dungheap. Which is where he shall spend some days before he hangs, if I have anything to do with it."

"That, " Johnstone said wanly, "may be true." Matthew sensed the man was now willing to speak. "But, " Johnstone continued, "I have survived Newgate itself, and so I doubt I shall be much inconvenienced."

"Ahhhhh!" Matthew nodded. He leaned against the wall opposite the man. "A graduate not of Oxford, but of Newgate prison! How did your attendance in such a school come about?"

"Debts. Political associations. And friends, " he said, staring at the floor, "with knives. My career was ruined. And I did have a good career. Oh... not that I was ever a major lamp, but I did have aspirations. I hoped... at some point... to have enough money to invest in a theater troupe of my own." He sighed heavily. "My candle was extinguished by jealous colleagues. But was I not... credible in my performance?" He lifted his sweat-slick face to Matthew, and offered a faint smile.

"You are deserving of applause. From the hangman, at least."

"I take that as a backhanded compliment. Allow me to deliver one of my own: you have a fair to middling mind. With some work, you might become a thinker."

"I shall take such into consideration."

"This beast." Johnstone put his hand on the convexity on his leg. "It does pain me. I am glad, in that regard, to get it off once and for all." He unbuttoned the breeches at the knee, rolled down the stocking, and began to unstrap the leather brace. All present could see that the kneecap was perfectly formed. "You're correct. It was candle wax. I spent a whole night shaping it before I was satisfied with the damn thing. Here: a trophy." He tossed the brace to the floor at Matthew's feet.

Matthew couldn't help but think it was much more palatable than the trophy of a carved-out, horrible-smelling bear's head he'd been presented with at the celebration last night. Also a much more satisfying one.

Johnstone winced as he stretched the leg out straight and briskly massaged the knee. "I was suffering a muscle cramp the other night that near put me on the floor. Had to wear a similar apparatus for a role I played... oh... ten years ago. One of my last roles, with the Paradigm Players. A comedy, actually. Unfortunately there was nothing funny about it, if you discount the humor of having the audience pelt you with tomatoes and horse-shit."

"By God, I ought to strangle you myself!" Bidwell raged. "I ought to save the hangman a penny rope!"

Johnstone said, "Strangle yourself while you're at it. You were the one in such a rush to burn the woman." This statement, delivered so offhandedly, was the straw that broke Bidwell's back. The master of dead Fount Royal gave a shouted oath and lunged from his chair at Johnstone, seizing the actor's throat with both hands.

They went to the floor in a tangle and crash. At once Matthew and Winston rushed forward to disengage them, as Green looked on from his position guarding the door and Shields clung to his chair. Bidwell was pulled away from Johnstone, but not before delivering two blows that bloodied the actor's nostrils.

"Sit down, " Matthew told Bidwell, who angrily jerked out of his grasp. Winston righted Johnstone's chair and helped him into it, then immediately retreated to a corner of the library as if he feared contamination from having touched the man. Johnstone wiped his bleeding nose with his sleeve and picked up his cane, which had also fallen to the floor.

"I ought to kill you!" Bidwell shouted, the veins standing out in his neck. "Tear you to pieces myself, for what you've done!"

"The law will take care of him, sir, " Matthew said. "Now please... sit down and keep your dignity."

Reluctantly, Bidwell returned to his chair and thumped down into it. He glowered straight ahead, ideas of vengeance still crackling like flames in his mind.

"Well, you should feel very pleased with yourself, " Johnstone said to Matthew. He leaned his head back and sniffled. "The hero of the day, and all that. Am I your stepping-stone to the judicial robes?"

Matthew realized Johnstone the manipulator was yet at work, trying to move him into a defensive position. "The treasure, " he said, ignoring the man's remark. "How come you to know about it?"

"I believe my nose is broken."

"The treasure, " Matthew insisted. "Now is not the time to play games."

"Ah, the treasure! Yes, that." He closed his eyes and sniffled blood again. "Tell me, Matthew, have you ever set foot inside Newgate prison?"

"No."

"Pray to God you never do." Johnstone's eyes opened. "I was there for one year, three months, and twenty-eight days, serving restitution for my debts. The prisoners have the run of the place. There are guards, yes, but they withdraw for their own throats. Everyone—debtors, thieves, drunks and lunatics, murderers, child fuckers and mother rapers... they're all thrown together, like animals in a pit, and... believe me... you do what you must to survive. You know why?"

He brought his head forward and grinned at Matthew, and when he did fresh crimson oozed from both nostrils. "Because no one... no one... cares whether you live or die but yourself. Yourself, " he hissed, and again that vulpine, cruel shadow passed quickly across his face. He nodded, his tongue flicking out and tasting the blood that glistened in the candlelight. "When they come at you—three or four at a time—and hold you down, it is not because they wish you well. I have seen men killed in such a fashion, battered until they are mortally torn inside. And still they go on, as the corpse is not yet cold. Still they go on. And you must—you must—sink to their level and join them if you wish to live another day. You must shout and shriek and howl like a beast, and strike and thrust... and want to kill... for if you show any weakness at all, they will turn upon you and it will be your broken corpse being thrown upon the garbage pile at first light."

The fox leaned toward his captor, heedless now of his bleeding nose. "Sewage runs right along the floor there. We knew it had rained outside, and how hard, when the sewage rose to our ankles. I saw two men fight to the death over a pack of playing cards. The fight ended when one drowned the other in that indescribable filth. Wouldn't that be a lovely way to end your life, Matthew? Drowned in human shit?"

"Is there a point to this recitation, sir?"

"Oh, indeed there is!" Johnstone grinned broadly, blood on his lips and the shine of his eyes verging on madness. "No words are vile enough, nor do they carry enough weight of bestiality, to describe Newgate prison, but I wished you to know the circumstances in which I found myself. The days were sufficiently horri-ble... but then came the nights! Oh, the joyous bliss of the darkness! I can feel it even now! Listen!" he whispered. "Hear them? Starting to stir? Starting to crawl from their mattresses and stalk the night fantastic? Hear them? The creak of a bed-frame here—and one over there, as well! Oh, listen... someone weeps! Someone calls out for God... but it is always the Devil who answers." Johnstone's savage grin faltered and slipped away.

"Even if it was so terrible a place, " Matthew said, "you still survived it."

"Did I?" Johnstone asked, and let the question hang. He stood up, wincing as he put weight on his unbraced knee. He supported himself with his cane. "I pay for wearing that damn brace, you may be sure. Yes, I did live through Newgate prison, as I realized I might offer the assembled animals something to entertain them besides carnage. I might offer them plays. Or, rather, scenes from plays. I did all the parts, in different voices and dialects. What I didn't know I made up. They never knew the difference, nor did they care. They were particularly pleased at any scene that involved the disgrace or degradation of court officials, and as there are a pittance of those in our catalogue, I found myself concocting the scenes as I played them out. Suddenly I was a very popular man. A celebrity, among the rabble."

Johnstone stood with the cane on the floor and both hands on the cane, and Matthew realized he had—as was his nature— again taken center stage before his audience. "I came into the favor of a very large and very mean individual we called the Meatgrinder, as he... um... had used such a device to dispose of his wife's body. But—lo and behold!—he was a fan of the stagelamps! I was elevated to the prospect of command performances, and also found myself protected from the threat of harm."

As Matthew had known he sooner or later would, Johnstone now swivelled his body so as to have a view of the other men in the room. Or rather, so they would have a full view of the thes-pian's expressions. "Near the end of my term, " Johnstone went on, "I came into the acquaintance of a certain man. He was my age or therebouts, but looked very much older. He was sick, too. Coughing up blood. Well, needless to say a sick man in Newgate prison is like a warm piece of liver to wolves. It's an interesting thing to behold, actually. They beat him because he was an easy target, and also because they wanted him to go ahead and die lest they fall sick themselves. I tell you, you can learn quite a lot about the human condition at Newgate; you ought to put yourself there for a night and make a study of it."

"I'm sure there are less dangerous universities, " Matthew said.

"Yes, but none teaches as quickly as Newgate." Johnstone flashed a sharp smile. "And the lessons are very well learned. But: this man I was telling you about. He realized the Meatgrinder's power in our little community, yet the Meatgrinder was... well, he'd rather kill a man than smell his breath, shall we say. Therefore this sick and beaten individual asked me to intercede on his behalf, as a gentleman. He actually was quite educated himself. Had once been a dealer in antiques, in London. He asked me to intercede to save him further beatings or other indignities... in exchange for some very interesting information concerning a wa-terhole across the Atlantic."

"Ah, " Matthew said. "He knew of the treasure."

"Not only knew, he helped place the fortune there. He was a member of the crew. Oh, he told me all about it, in fascinating detail. Told me he'd never revealed it to a soul, because he was going to go back for it someday. Someday, he said. And I might be his partner and share it with him, if I would protect his life. Told me that the spring was forty feet deep, told me that the treasure had been lowered in wicker baskets and burlap bags... told enough to put a sea voyage in the mind of a poor starving ex-thespian who had no prospects, no family, and absolutely no belief in that straw poppet you call God." Again, Johnstone displayed a knife-edged smile. "This man... this crewman... said there'd been a storm at sea. The ship had been wrecked. He and five or six others survived, and reached an island. Pirates being as they are, I suppose stones and coconuts did the job of knives and pistols. At last, one man survived to light a fire for a passing English frigate." Johnstone shrugged. "What did I have to lose to at least come look for myself? Oh... he had an inscribed gold pocket watch hidden in his mattress that he also gave to me. You see, that man's name was Alan Johnstone."

"What's your name, then?" Bidwell asked.

"Julius Caesar. William Shakespeare. Lord Bott Fucking Tott. Take your pick, what does it matter?"

"And what happened to the real Alan Johnstone?" Matthew inquired, though he already had an idea. It had dawned on him, as well, that the turtles—reed-eaters by nature—had probably loved feasting on all those baskets and bags.

"The beatings ceased. I had to prove my worth to him. He survived for a time. Then he grew very, very ill. Sick unto death, really. I was able to get the coordinates of the waterhole's latitude and longitude from him... something I'd been trying to do for a month or more without seeming overly demanding. Then someone told the Meatgrinder that very night... someone... a little shadow of a someone... that the sick man coughing up all that blood over there in the corner... well, it was dangerous to everyone. Such disease might wipe out our little community, and we were so fond of it. By morning, alas, my partner had set off on his final voyage, alone and unlamented."

"By Christ, " Matthew said softly, his guts twisting. "Little wonder you decided to invent the witchcraft scheme. You're on regular speaking terms with Satan, aren't you?"

Johnstone—for want of a better name—laughed quietly. He threw his head back, his eyes gleaming, and laughed louder.

There was a faintly audible click.

And suddenly, moving with a speed that belied his stiff leg, Johnstone lunged forward. He pressed against Matthew's throat the pointed edge of a five-inch blade that had been concealed within the cane's shaft.

"Be still!" Johnstone hissed, his eyes boring into Matthew's. Bidwell had stood up, and now Winston and Dr. Shields rose to their feet. "Everyone, be still!"

Green crossed the threshold, pistol in hand. Johnstone reached out, grasped Matthew's shirt, and turned him so the thespian's back was to the wall and Matthew's back was in danger of a pistol ball should Green lose his head. "No, no!" Johnstone said, as if scolding a wayward pupil. "Green, stand where you are."

The red-bearded giant halted. The blade pressed perilously near entering the flesh. Though he was quaking inside, Matthew was able to keep a calm mask. "This will do you no good."

"It will do me less good to be sent to prison and have my neck stretched!" Johnstone's face was damp, a pulse beating rapidly at his temple. Blood still stained his nostrils and upper lip. "No, I can't bear that. Not prison." He shook his head with finality. "One season in Hell is enough for any man."

"You have no choice, sir. As I said, this will do you no—"

"Bidwell!" Johnstone snapped. "Get a wagon ready! Now! Green, take the pistol by the barrel. Come over here... slowly... and give it to me."

"Gentlemen, " Matthew said, "I would suggest doing neither."

"I have a knife at your throat. Do you feel it?" He gave a little jab. "There? Would you like a sharper taste?"

"Mr. Green, " Matthew said, staring into the wild eyes of the fox. "Take a position, please, and aim your pistol at Mr. Johnstone's head."

"Christ, boy!" Bidwell shouted. "No! Green, he's crazy!"

"No further play at heroics, " Johnstone said tightly. "You've strutted your feathers, you've shown your cock, and you have blasted me with a cannon. So spare yourself, because I'm going out that door! No power on earth will ever send me back to a goddamned prison!"

"I understand your rush to avoid judgment, sir. But there are the two men with axes waiting just outside the front door."

"What two men? You're lying!"

'You see the lantern on the windowsill? Mr. Bidwell placed it there as a signal to tell the two men to take their positions."

"Name them!"

"Hiram Abercrombie is one, " Bidwell answered. "Malcolm Jennings is the other."

"Well, neither of those fools could hit a horse in the head with an axe! Green, I said give me the pistol!"

"Stay where you are, Mr. Green, " Matthew said.

"Matthew!" Winston spoke up. "Don't be foolish!"

"A pistol in this man's hand will mean someone's death." Matthew kept his eyes directed into Johnstone's. Bloodhound and fox were now locked together in a duel of wills. "One bullet, one death, I assure you."

"The pistol! I won't ask again before I start cutting!"

"Oh, is this the instrument?" Matthew asked. "The very one? Something you bought in Charles Town, I presume?"

"Damn you, you talk too fucking much!" Johnstone pushed the blade's tip into the side of Matthew's neck. The pain almost sent Matthew to his knees, and it did bring tears to his eyes and make him clench his teeth. In fact, his whole body clenched. But he was damned if he'd cry out or otherwise display agony. The blade had entered only a fraction of an inch, deep enough to cause warm blood to well out and trickle down his neck, but it had not nicked an artery. Matthew knew Johnstone was simply raising the stakes in their game.

"Would you like a little more of it?" Johnstone asked.

Bidwell had positioned himself to one side of the men, and therefore saw the blood. "For God's sake!" he brayed. "Green! Give him the pistol!"

Before Matthew could protest, he heard Green's clumping boots behind him and the pistol's grip was offered to Johnstone. The weapon was instantly snatched into Johnstone's hand, but the blade remained exactly where it was, blood-deep and drinking.

"The wagon, Bidwell!" Johnstone demanded, now aiming the pistol at Matthew's midsection. "Get it ready!"

"Yes, do get it ready." Matthew was speaking with an effort. It wasn't every day he talked with a knife blade in his neck. "And while you're at it, fix the wheels so they'll fall off two hours or so down the road. Why don't you take a single horse, Johnstone? That way it can step into a rut in the dark, throw you, and break your neck and be done with it. Oh... wait! Why don't you simply go through the swamp? I know some lovely suckpits that would be glad to take your boots."

"Shut up! I want a wagon! I want a wagon, because you're going with me!"

"Oh ho!" With an even greater effort, Matthew forced himself to grin. "Sir, you're an excellent comedian after all!"

"You think this is funny?" Johnstone's face was contorted with rage. He blew spittle. "Shall you laugh harder through the slit in your throat or the hole in your gut?"

"The real question is: shall you laugh, when your intended hostage is on the floor and your pistol is empty?"

Johnstone's mouth opened. No sound emerged, but a silver thread of saliva broke over his lower lip and fell like the undoing of a spider's web.

Carefully, Matthew took a backward step. The blade's tip slid from his neck. "Your problem, sir, " he said as he pressed his fingers to the small wound, "is that your friends and associates seem to have short spans of life. If I were to accompany you in a wagon, my own life span would be dramatically reduced. So: I dislike the idea of dying—greatly dislike it—but since I shall certainly die somewhere if I follow your wishes, it would be better to die here. That way, at least, the sterling gentlemen in this room may rush you and end this hopeless fantasy of escape you have seized upon. But actually, I don't think anyone would mind if you were to run for it.

Just go. Out the front door. I swear I'll be silent. Of course, Mr. Bidwell, Mr. Green—or even Mrs. Nettles, whom I see there in the doorway—might shout a warning to the axemen. Let me think." He frowned. "Two axes, versus a knife and one bullet. Yes, you might get past them. Then you could go to... well, where would you go, Mr. Johnstone? You see, that's the thorny part: where would you go?"

Johnstone said nothing. He still pointed both the pistol and knife, but his eyes had blurred like a frost on the fount in midwinter.

"Oh!" Matthew nodded for emphasis. "Through the forest, why don't you? The Indians will grant you safe passage, I'm sure. But you see my condition? I unfortunately met a bear and was nearly killed. Then again, you do have a knife and a single bullet. But... oh... what shall you do for food? Well, you have the knife and bullet. Best take matches, and a lamp. Best go to your house and pack for your trip, and we'll be waiting at the gate to give you a fine farewell. Run along, now!"

Johnstone did not move.

"Oh, my, " Matthew said quietly. He looked from the pistol to the blade and back again. "All dressed up, and nowhere to go."

"I'm... not... "Johnstone shook his head from side to side, in the manner of a gravely wounded animal. "I'm not... done. Not done."

"Hm, " Matthew said. "Picture the theatre, sir. The applause has been given, the bows taken. The audience has gone home. The stagelamps are ever so slowly extinguished. They gave a beautiful dream of light, didn't they? The sets are dismantled, the costumes folded and retired. Someone comes to sweep the stage, and even yesterday's dust is carried away." He listened to the harsh rising and falling of Johnstone's chest.

"The play, " Matthew said, "is over." An anxious silence reigned, and none dared challenge it.

At last Matthew decided a move had to be made. He had seen that the knife's cutting edge had small teeth, which would have severed arteries and vocal cords with one or two swift, unexpected slashes. Especially if one came up behind the victim, clasped a hand over the mouth, and pulled the head back to better offer the throat. Perhaps this wasn't the original cane Johnstone had first brought with him to Fount Royal, but one he'd had made in either Charles Town or England after he'd determined how the murders were to be done.

Matthew held out his hand, risking a blade stab. "Would you give me the pistol, please?" Johnstone's face looked soft and swollen by raging inner pressures. He seemed not to realize Matthew had spoken, but was simply staring into space.

"Sir?" Matthew prompted. "You won't be needing the pistol."

"Uh, " Johnstone said. "Uh." His mouth opened, closed, and opened again. The gasping of an air-drowning fish. Then, in a heartbeat, the consciousness and fury leapt into Johnstone's eyes once more and he backed away two steps, nearly meeting the wall. Behind him was the fanciful map of Fount Royal, with its elegant streets and rows of houses, quiltwork farms, immense orchards, precise naval yard and piers, and at the town's center the life-giving spring.

Johnstone said, "No. I shall not."

"Listen to me!" Bidwell urged. "There's no point to this! Matthew's right, there's nowhere for you to go!"

"I shall not, " Johnstone repeated. "Shall not. Return to prison. No. Never."

"Unfortunately, " Matthew said, "you have no choice in the matter."

"Finally!" Johnstone smiled, but it was a terrible, skull-like grimace. "Finally, you speak a misstatement! So you're not as smart as you think, are you?"

"Pardon me?"

"A misstatement, " he repeated, his voice thickened. "Tell me: though I... know my script was flawed... did I at least play an adequate role?"

"You did, sir. Especially the night the schoolhouse burned. I was taken with your grief."

Johnstone gave a deep, bitter chuckling that might have briefly wandered into the territory of tears. "That was the only time I wasn't acting, boy! It killed my soul to see the schoolhouse burn!"

"What? It really mattered so much to you?"

"You don't know. You see... I actually enjoyed being a teacher. It was like acting, in a way. But... there was greater worth in it, and the audience was always appreciative, I told myself... if I couldn't find any more of the treasure than what I'd discovered... I could stay here, and I could be Alan Johnstone the schoolmaster. For the rest of my days." He stared at the pistol in his hand. "Not long after that, I brought the ruby ring up. And it set me aflame again... about why I was really here." He lifted his face and looked at Matthew. He stared at Winston, Dr. Shields, and Bidwell all in turn.

"Please put aside the pistol, " Matthew said. "I think it's time."

"Time. Yes, " Johnstone repeated, nodding. "It is time. I can't go back to prison. Do you understand that?"

"Sir?" Matthew now realized with a surge of alarm what the man intended. "There's no need!"

"My need." Johnstone dropped the knife to the floor and put his foot on it. "You were correct about something, Matthew: if I was given the pistol..." He paused, beginning to waver on his feet as if he might pass out. "Someone had to die."

Suddenly Johnstone turned the weapon toward his face, which brought a gasp of shock from Bidwell. "I do have a choice, you see, " Johnstone said, the sweat glistening on his cheeks in the red-cast candlelight. "And damn you all to Hell, where I shall be waiting with eager arms.

"And now, " he said, with a slight tilting forward of his head, "exit the actor."

He opened his mouth, slid the pistol's barrel into it, squeezed his eyes tightly shut, and pulled the trigger.

There was a loud metallic clack as the wheel-lock mechanism was engaged. A shower of sparks flew, hissing like little comets, into Johnstone's face.

The pistol, however, failed to fire.

Johnstone opened his eyes, displaying an expression of such terror that Matthew hoped never to witness its like again. He withdrew the gun from his mouth. Something inside the weapon was making a chirrupy cricket sound. Tendrils of blue smoke spun through the air around Johnstone's face, as he looked into the gun's barrel. Another spark jumped, bright as a gold coin.

Crack! went the pistol, like a mallet striking a board.

Johnstone's head rocked back. The eyes were wide open, wet, and brimming with shock. Matthew saw blood and reddish-gray clumps of matter clinging to the wall behind Johnstone's skull. The map of Bidwell's Fount Royal had in an instant become gore-drenched and brain-spattered.

Johnstone fell, his knees folding. At the end, an instant before he hit the floor, he might have been giving a final, arrogant bow.

And then his head hit the planks, and from that gruesome hole in the back of it, directly opposite the only slightly tidier hole in his forehead, streamed the physical matter of the thes-pian's memories, schemes, acting ability, intelligence, pride, fear of prison, desires, evil, and...

Yes, even his affinity for teaching. Even that, now only so much liquid.

forty-three

IN THE DISTANCE a dog barked. It was a forlorn, searching sound. Matthew looked over the darkened town from the window of the magistrate's room, thinking that even the dogs knew Fount Royal was lost.

Five hours had passed since the suicide of Alan Johnstone. Matthew had spent most of that time right here, sitting in a chair by Woodward's bed and reading the Bible in a solemn circle of lamplight. Not any particular chapter, just bits and pieces of comforting wisdom. Actually, he read most of the passages without seeing them, and had to read them again to glean their illumination. It was a sturdy book, and it felt good between his hands.

The magistrate was dying. Shields had said the man might not last until morning, so it was best that Matthew stay close. Bidwell and Winston were in the parlor, talking over the recent events like survivors of a soul-shaping battle. The doctor himself was sleeping in Matthew's room, and Mrs. Nettles was up at this midnight hour making tea, polishing silver, and doing odds and ends in the kitchen. She had told Matthew she ought to do some small labors she'd been putting off for a while, but Matthew knew she was standing the deathwatch too. Little wonder Mrs.

Nettles couldn't sleep, though, as it had been her task to mop up all the blood in the library, though Mr. Green had volunteered to put the brains and skull pieces in a burlap bag and dispose of them.

Rachel was downstairs, sleeping—he supposed—in Mrs. Nettles's room. She had come to the library after the sound of the shot, and had asked to see the face of the man who'd murdered Daniel. It was not Matthew's place to deny her. Though Matthew had previously explained to her how the murders were done, by whom, for what reason, and all the rest of it, Rachel yet had to see Johnstone for herself.

She had walked past Winston, Dr. Shields, and Bidwell without a glance. She had ignored Hiram Abercrombie and Malcolm Jennings, who'd rushed in at the shot, armed with their axes. Certainly she'd passed Green as if the red-bearded, gap-toothed giant was invisible. She had stood over the dead man, staring down into his open, sightless eyes. Matthew had watched her as she contemplated Johnstone's departure. At last, she had said very quietly, "I suppose... I should rant and rave that I spent so many days in a cell... and he has fled. But..." She had looked into Matthew's face, tears in her eyes now that it was over and she could allow them. "Someone that evil... that wretched... was locked in a cage of his own making, every day of his life, wasn't he?"

"He was, " Matthew had said. "Even when he knew he'd found the key to escape it, all he did was move to a deeper dungeon."

Green had retrieved the pistol, which had belonged to Nicholas Paine. It occurred to Matthew that all the men he and the magistrate had met that first night of their arrival were accounted for in this room. "Thank you for your help, Mr. Green, " Matthew had said. "You were invaluable."

"My pleasure, sir. Anythin' to help you." Green had taken to fawning at Matthew, as if the clerk had a giant's stature. "I still can't believe such a blow as you gave me!" He'd massaged his jaw at the memory of it. "I saw you cock the fist back, and then... my Lord, the stars!" He'd grunted and looked at Rachel. "It took a right champion to lay me out, I'll swear it did!"

"Um... yes." Matthew cast a quick glance at Mrs. Nettles, who stood nearby listening to this exchange, her face an unreveal-ing sculpture of granite. "Well, one never knows from where one will draw the necessary strength. Does one?"

Matthew had watched as Jennings and Abercrombie had lifted the corpse, placed it facedown on a ladder to prevent any further leakage, and then covered a sheet over the deceased. Its destination, Bidwell told Matthew, was the barn down in the slave quarters. Tomorrow, Bidwell said, the corpse—"foul bastard" were the exact words he used—would be taken into the swamp and dumped in a mudhole where the crows and vultures might applaud his performance.

To end up, Matthew realized, like the dead men in the muck at Shawcombe's tavern. Well: dust to dust, ashes to ashes, and mud to mud.

It was now the impending fact of another death that concerned him. Matthew had learned from Dr. Shields that the stimulating potion had finally reached the limit of its usefulness. Woodward's body had simply given out, and nothing could reverse the process. Matthew didn't beat a grudge against the doctor; Shields had done the best he could do, given the limited medicines at hand. Perhaps the bleeding had been excessive, or perhaps it had been a grievous error to make the magistrate attend his duties while so sick, or perhaps something else was done or not done... but today Matthew had come to accept the hard, cold truth.

Just as seasons and centuries must turn, so too must men— the bad and the good, equal in their frailty of flesh—pass away from this earth.

He heard a nightbird singing.

Out there. Out in one of the trees that stood around the pond. It was a noontime song, and presently it was joined by a second. For their kind, Matthew mused, night was not a time of sad longing, loneliness, and fear. For them the night was but a further opportunity to sing.

And such a sweetness in it, to hear these notes trilled as the land slept, as the stars hummed in the immense velvet black. Such a sweetness, to realize that even at this darkest hour there was yet joy to be known.

"Matthew."

He heard the feeble gasp and immediately turned toward the bed.

It was very hard now to look upon the magistrate. To know what he had been, and to see what he had become in the space of six days. Time could be a ruthless and hungry beast. It had consumed the magistrate down to bones and angles.

"Yes, sir, I'm here." Matthew pulled his chair nearer the bed, and also moved the lantern closer. He sat down, leaning toward the skeletal figure. "I'm right here."

"Ah. Yes. I see you." Woodward's eyes had shrunken and retreated. They had changed from their once energetic shade of ice-blue to a dull yellowish gray, the color of the fog and rain he had journeyed through to reach this town. Indeed, the only color about the magistrate that was not a shade of gray was the ruddy hue of the splotches on his scalp. Those jealous imperfections had maintained their dignity, even as the rest of Woodward's body had fallen to ruin.

"Would you... hold my hand?" the magistrate asked, and he reached out in search of comfort. Matthew took the hand. It was fragile and trembling, and hot with merciless fever. "I heard it, " Woodward whispered, his head on the pillow. "Thunder. Does it rain?"

"No, sir." Perhaps it had been the shot he'd heard, Matthew thought. "Not yet."

"Ah. Well, then." He said nothing more, but stared past Matthew toward the lamp.

This was the first time the magistrate had surfaced from the waters of sleep since Matthew had been in the room. Matthew had come in several times during the day, but except for a few brief murmurs or a pained swallow the magistrate had been unresponsive.

"It's dark out, " Woodward said.

"Yes, sir."

He nodded. Around his nose glistened the pine-oil—based liniment Shields had smeared there to clear his air passages. On his thin and sunken chest was a plaster, also soaked in the liniment. If Woodward noticed the clay dressing on Matthew's arm and the bandage—of cloth, which Dr. Shields had applied after Johnstone's departure—on his clerk's forever-to-be-scarred forehead, he made no mention of it. Matthew doubted the magistrate could see his face as anything but a blur, as the fever had almost destroyed the man's vision.

Woodward's fingers tightened. "She's gone, then."

"Sir?"

"The witch. Gone."

"Yes, sir, " Matthew said, and didn't think he was telling an untruth. "The witch is gone."

Woodward sighed, his eyelids fluttering. "I... am glad... I didn't witness it. I might have to... pass the sentence... but... don't have to watch it... carried out. Ohhhhh, my throat! My throat! It closes up!"

"I'll get Dr. Shields." Matthew attempted to stand, but Woodward steadfastly refused to release him.

"No!" he said, tears of pain streaking his cheeks. "Stay seated. Just... listen."

"Don't try to talk, sir. You shouldn't—"

"I shouldn't!" Woodward blustered. "I shouldn't... I can't... mustn't! Those are the words that... that put you... six feet under!"

Matthew settled into his chair again, his hand still grasping the magistrate's. "You should refrain from speaking."

A grim smile moved quickly across Woodward's mouth and then was gone. "I shall have. Plenty of time... to refrain. When my... mouth is full of dirt."

"Don't say such as that!"

"Why not? It's true... isn't it? Matthew, what a short rope... I have been given!" He closed his eyes, breathing fitfully. Matthew would have thought he'd drifted to sleep again, but the pressure on his hand had not relaxed. Then Woodward spoke again with his eyes still closed. "The witch, " he whispered. "The case... pains me. Still pains me." His fog-colored eyes opened. "Was I right, Matthew? Tell me. Was I right?"

Matthew answered, "You were correct."

"Ahhhhh, " he said, like an exhalation of relief. "Thank you. I needed... to heat that, from you." He squeezed Matthew's hand more firmly. "Listen, now. My hourglass... is broken. All my sand is running out. I will die soon."

"Nonsense, sir!" Matthew's voice cracked and betrayed him. "You're just tired, that's all!"

"Yes. And I shall... soon sleep... for a very long time. Please... I may be dying, but I have not... become stupid. Now... just hush... and listen to me." He tried to sit up but his body had shut that particular door to him. "In Manhattan, " he said. "Go see... Magistrate Powers. Nathaniel Powers. A very... very good man. He knows me. You tell him. He will find a place for you."

"Please, sir. Don't do this."

"I fear... I have no choice. The judgment has been... has been passed down... from a much higher court. Than ever I presided over. Magistrate Nathaniel Powers. In Manhattan. Yes?" Matthew was silent, the blood thrumming through his veins. "This will be... my final command to you, " Woodward said. "Say yes."

Matthew looked into the near-sightless eyes. Into the face that seemed to be aging and crumbling even as he regarded it.

Seasons, and centuries, and men. The bad and the good. Frailty of flesh.

Must pass away. Must.

A nightbird, singing outside. In the dark. Singing as at full sunlit noon.

This one word, so simple, was almost impossible to speak.

But the magistrate was waiting, and the word must be spoken. "Yes." His own throat felt near closing up. "Sir."

"That's my boy, " Woodward whispered. His fingers released Matthew's hand. He lay staring up toward the ceiling, a half-smile playing around the corners of his mouth. "I remember... my own father, " he said after a moment of reflection. "He liked to dance. I can see them... in the house... dancing before the fire. No music. But my father... humming a tune. He picked my mother up. Twirled her... and she laughed. So... there was music... after all."

Matthew heard the nightbird, whose soft song may have reawakened this memory.

"My father, " the magistrate said. "Grew sick. I watched him... in bed, like this. Watched him fade. One day... I asked my mother... why Papa didn't stand up. Get out of bed. And dance a jig... to make himself feel better. I always said... always to myself... that when I was old... very old... and I lay dying. I would stand up. Dance a jig, so that... I might feel better. Matthew?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Would it... sound very strange to you... if... I said I was ready to dance?"

"No, sir, it would not."

"I am. Ready. I am."

"Sir?" Matthew said. "I have something for you." He reached down to the floor beside the bed and picked up the package he had put there this afternoon. Mrs. Nettles had found some brown wrapping paper, and decorated it with yellow twine. "Here, sir." He put the package into the magistrate's hands. "Can you open it?"

"I shall try." After a moment of struggling, however, he could not succeed in tearing the paper. "Well, " he frowned, "I am... lower on sand... than I thought."

"Allow me." Matthew leaned toward the bed, tore the paper with his good hand, and drew what was inside out into the lamplight. The gold threads caught that light, and shone their illumination in stripes across the magistrate's face.

His hands closed into the cloth that was as brown as rich French chocolate, and he drew the waistcoat to him even as the tears ran from his dying eyes.

It was, indeed, a gift of fantastic worth.

"Where?" the magistrate whispered. "How?"

"Shawcombe was found, " Matthew said, and saw no need to elaborate.

Woodward pressed the waistcoat against his face, as if trying to inhale from it the fragrance of a past life. Matthew saw the magistrate smile. Who was to say that Woodward did not smell the sun shining in a garden graced by a fountain of green Italian tiles? Who was to say he did not see the candlelight that glowed golden on the face of a beautiful young woman named Ann, or hear her soprano voice on a warm Sunday afternoon? Who was to say he did not feel the small hand of his son, clutching to that of a good father?

Matthew believed he did.

"I have always been proud of you, " Woodward said. "Always. I knew from the first. When I saw you... at the almshouse. The way you carried yourself. Something... different... and indefinable. But special. You will make your mark. Somewhere. You will make... a profound difference to someone... just by being alive."

"Thank you, sir, " Matthew answered, as best he could. "I... also... thank you for the care you have shown to me. You have ... always been temperate and fair."

"I'm supposed to be, " Woodward said, and managed a frail smile though his eyes were wet. "I am a judge." He reached out for Matthew and the boy took his hand. They sat together in silence, as beyond the window the nightbird spoke of joy seized from despair, of a new beginning reached only at an ending.

Dawn had begun to light the sky when the magistrate's body became rigid, after a difficult final hour of suffering.

"He's going, " Dr. Shields said, the lamplight aglow in the lenses of his spectacles. Bidwell stood at the foot of the bed, and Winston just within the door. Matthew still sat holding Woodward's hand, his head bowed and the Bible in his lap.

The magistrate's speech on this last portion of his journey had become barely intelligible, when he could speak through the pain. It had been mostly murmurs of torment, as his earthly clay transfigured itself. But now, as the silence lingered, the dying man seemed to stretch his body toward some unknown portal, the golden stripes of the waistcoat he wore shining on his chest. His head pressed back against the pillow, and he spoke three unmistakable words.

"Why? Why?" he whispered, the second fainter than the first.

And the last and most faint, barely the cloud of a breath:

"Why?"

A great question had been asked, Matthew thought. The ultimate question, which might be asked only by explorers who would not return to share their knowledge of a new world.

The magistrate's body poised on the point of tension… paused... paused... and then, at last, it appeared to Matthew that an answer had been given.

And understood.

There was a soft, all but imperceptible exhalation. A sigh, perhaps, of rest.

Woodward's empty clay settled. His hand relaxed. The night was over.

forty-four

AS SOON AS MATTHEW KNOCKED on the study's door, Bid-well said, "Come in!"

Matthew opened the door and saw Bidwell seated at his massive mahogany desk, with Winston sitting in a chair before it. The window's shutters were open, allowing in the warm breeze and early afternoon sun. "Mrs. Nettles told me you wanted to see me."

"Exactly. Come in, please! Draw up a chair." He motioned toward another that was in the room. Matthew sat down, not failing to notice the empty space on the wall where the map of the Florida country had been displayed.

"We are taking account of things. Edward and I, " Bidwell said. He was dressed in a cardinal-red suit with a ruffled shirt, but he had fotgone the wearing of his lavish wigs. On the desktop was a rectangular wooden box about nine inches long and seven inches wide. "I've been trying to locate you. Were you out for a walk?"

"Yes. Just walking and thinking."

"Well, it's a pleasant day for such." Bidwell folded his hands before him and regarded Matthew with an expression of genuine concern. "Are you all right?"

"I am. Or... I shall be presently."

"Good. You're a young man, strong and fit. And I have to say, you have the most determined constitution of any man I've ever met. How are your injuries?"

"My ribs still ache, but I can endure it. My arm is... deceased, I think. Dr. Shields says I may regain some feeling in it, but the outlook is uncertain." Matthew shrugged one shoulder. "He says he knows a doctor in New York who is doing amazing things for damaged limbs with a new surgical technique, so... who can say?"

"Yes, I hear those New York doctors are quite... um... radical. And they charge wholly radical prices, as well. What of your head wound?"

Matthew touched the fresh dressing Shields had applied just that morning. In the course of treatment, the doctor had been appalled at the Indians' method of tobacco-leaf and herb-potion healing, but also intrigued by the positive progress. "My scar, unfortunately, will be a subject of discussion for the rest of my life."

"That may be so." Bidwell leaned back in his chair. "Ah, but women love a dashing scar! And I daresay so will the grandchildren."

Matthew had to give a guarded smile at this flattery. "You leap ahead more years than I care to lose."

"Speaking of your years ahead, " Winston said, "what are your immediate plans?"

"I haven't given them much thought, " Matthew had to admit. "Other than returning to Charles Town. The magistrate gave me the name of a colleague in Manhattan, and said I would find a position with him, but... I really haven't decided."

Bidwell nodded. "That's understandable, with so much on your mind. Tell me: do you approve of where I placed Isaac's grave?"

"I do, sir. As a matter of fact, I just came from there. It's a very lovely, shaded spot."

"Good. And you don't think he would mind that he... uh... sleeps apart from the others in the cemetery?"

"Not at all. He always enjoyed his privacy."

"I shall endeavor, at some point in the future, to erect a picket fence around it and a suitable marker for his excellent service to Fount Royal."

Matthew was taken aback. "Wait, " he said. "You mean... you're staying here?"

"I am. Winston will be returning to England, to work in the offices there, and I'll be going back and forth as the situation warrants, but I plan on reviving Fount Royal and making it just as grand—no, thrice as grand—as ever I'd planned before."

"But... the town is dead. There's hardly twenty people here!"

"Twenty citizens!" Bidwell thumped the desktop, his eyes bright with renewed purpose. "Then it's not dead, is it?"

"Perhaps not in fact, but it seems to me that—"

"If not in fact, then not at all!" Bidwell interrupted, displaying some of his old brusque self. He was aware of his slippage, and so immediately sought to soothe the friction burns. "What I mean is, I will not give up on Fount Royal. Not when I have invested so heavily in the venture, and particularly as I still fervently believe a southernmost naval station is not only practical, but essential for the future of these colonies."

"How will you go about reviving the town, then?"

"The same as I originally began it. With having advertising placards placed in Charles Town and other cities up the seaboard. I shall also advertise in London. And I am getting to it sooner than later, as I understand I will be having competition from my own family!"

"Competition? How so?" Matthew asked.

"My youngest sister! Who was sick all the time, and for whom I bought medicine!" Bidwell scowled. "When Winston and I went to Charles Town to find the maskers, we also looked in on the supply situation at the harbor. Come to find out there was a whole load of supplies there those dogs had hidden from me! Luckily, Mr. Winston convinced a watchman to unlock a certain door—and imagine how I near fell to the ground to see all those crates with my name on them! Anyway, we also procured a packet of mail." He made a queasy face. "Tell him, Edward! I can't bear to think of it!"

"Mr. Bidwell's sister married a land speculator, " Winston said. "In the letter she wrote, she indicated he has purchased a sizeable amount of territory between here and the Florida country, and has hopes to begin a port settlement of his own."

"You don't say!" Matthew said.

"Yes, it's damnably true!" Bidwell started to hammer his fist on the desk, and then decided it was not proper for his new age of enlightment. "It'll never work, of course. That swampland down there makes ours look like a manicured showpark. And do you really think the Spanish are just going to sit still and let a half-pint, weasly milksop of a land speculator threaten their Florida country? No! He has no business sense! I told Savannah when she married that man she'd weep a tear for every pearl on her dress!" He stabbed a finger in the air like a rapier's thrust. "Mark my words, she'll regret such a folly as she's about to enter into!"

"Uh... shall I get you something to drink?" Winston asked. "To calm your nerves?" To Matthew, he confided, "Mr. Bidwell's sister never fails. To antagonize, I mean."

"No, no! I'm all right. Just let me get my breath. Oh, my heart gallops like a wild horse." Bidwell spent a moment in an exercise of slow and steady deep breathing, and gradually the red whorls that had surfaced on his cheeks faded away. "The point of my asking you here, Matthew, " he said, "is to offer you a position with my company."

Matthew didn't respond; in truth, he was too shocked to speak.

"A position of not small responsibility, " Bidwell went on. "I need a good, trustworthy man in Charles Town. Someone to make sure the supplies keep flowing, and to make certain such dirtiness as has been done to me in the past is not repeated. A... uh... a private investigator, you might say. Does that sound at all of interest to you?"

It took a little while longer for Matthew to find his voice. "I do appreciate your offer, sir. I do. But, to be petfectly honest, you and I would eventually come to blows and our fight might knock the earth off its tilt. Therefore I must decline, as I would hate to be responsible for the death of mankind."

"Ah. Yes. Well spoken, that." Bidwell did appear much relieved. "I felt I should at least offer you a future, since my actions—-and stupidity—have so endangered your present."

"I have a future, " Matthew said firmly. "In New York, I believe. And thank you for helping me come to that conclusion."

"Now! That's out of the way!" Bidwell heaved a sigh. "I wanted you to see something." He pushed the wooden box across the desk toward Matthew. "We searched through the foul bastard's house, just as you suggested, and found all the items you said would be there. That five-bladed device was still nasty with dried blood. And we discovered the book on ancient Egypt, as well. This box was placed in the bottom of a trunk. Open it, if you please."

Matthew leaned forward and lifted the lid, which rose smoothly on a well-oiled hinge.

Within the box were three charcoal pencils, a writing tablet, a folded sheet of paper, a gum eraser... and...

"What he found in the spring, " Bidwell said.

Indeed. The sapphire brooch and ruby ring were there, along with a gold crucifix on a chain, seven gold doubloons, three silver coins, and a little black velvet bag.

"You will find the bag's contents of interest, " Bidwell promised.

Matthew took it out and emptied it on the desktop. In the sunlight that streamed through the window, the room was suddenly colored by the shine of four dark green emeralds, two deep purple amethysts, two pearls, and an amber stone. The jewels were raw and yet to be professionally polished, but even so were obviously of excellent quality. Matthew surmised they had been captured at sea from vessels shuttling between tropical mines and the marketplace.

"The folded paper is also worth a glance, " said Bidwell.

Matthew unfolded it. It was a drawing, in charcoal pencil, of a good-sized building. Some time had been spent in attending to the details. Present were bricks, windows, and a bell steeple.

"It appears, " Bidwell said, "the foul bastard... intended to build his next schoolhouse of a less flammable material."

"I see." Matthew gazed at the drawing—a sad sight, really—and then refolded the paper and returned it to the box.

Bidwell put the gemstones back into the bag. He removed from the box the pencils, the writing tablet, the eraser, and the drawing of the new schoolhouse.

"I own the spring, of course, " Bidwell said. "I own the water and the mud. By the rights of ownership—and the hell I have gone through—I also claim for myself these gems and jewelry, which came from that mud. Agreed?"

"It makes no matter to me, " Matthew answered. "Do with them as you please."

"I shall." Bidwell placed the little bag into the box, beside the coins, the brooch, the ring, and the crucifix and chain. He closed the lid.

Then he pushed the box toward Matthew. "It pleases me... for you to take this to the person who has suffered far more hell than I."

Matthew couldn't fathom what he'd just heard. "Pardon me?"

"You heard correctly. Take them to—" He interrupted himself as he snapped the first charcoal pencil between his hands. "—her. It is the very least I can do, and certainly it can't bring back her husband or those months spent in the gaol." In spite of his good intentions, he couldn't help but regard the box with a wanton eye. "Go ahead. Take it"—the second pencil was picked up and broken— "before I regain my senses."

"Why don't you take it to her yourself! It would mean much more."

"It would mean much less, " he corrected. "She hates me. I've tried to speak to her, tried to explain my position... but she turns away every time. Therefore you take the box." Snap, died the third pencil. "Tell her you found it."

Realizing that indeed Bidwell must be half-crazed with humanity to let such wealth slip through his fingers, Matthew picked up the box and held it to his chest. "I will take it to her directly. Do you know where she is?"

"I saw her an hour ago, " Winston said. "She was drawing water." Matthew nodded; he had an idea where she might be found.

"We must put ourselves back in business here." Bidwell picked up the drawing that Johnstone had done—the bad man's dream of an Oxford of his own—and began to methodically teat it to pieces. "Put ourselves back in order, and consign this disgraceful... insane... blot on my town to the trash heap. I can do nothing more for the woman than what I've done today. And neither can you. Therefore, I must ask: how much longer shall you grace us with your presence?"

"As a matter of fact, I have decided it's time to get on with my own life. I might leave in the morning, at first light."

"I'll have Green take you to Charles Town in a wagon. Will you be ready by six?"

"I shall be, " Matthew said. "But I'd prefer you give me a horse, a saddle and tack, and some food, and I'll get myself to Charles Town. I am not an invalid, and therefore I refuse to be carted about like one."

"Give you a horse?" Bidwell glowered at him. "Horses cost money, aren't you aware of that? And saddles don't grow on trees, either!"

"You might wish for saddle-trees, sir!" Matthew fired back at him. "As that might be the only crop your farmers can grow here!"

"You don't concern yourself with our crops, thank you! I'll have you know I'm bringing in a botanist—the finest money can buy—to set our growing affairs straight! So stick that in your damned theory hole and—"

"Excuse me, gentlemen!" Winston said calmly, and the wranglers fell quiet. "I shall be glad to pay for a horse and saddle for Mr. Corbett, though I think it unwise of you, Matthew, to travel unaccompanied. But I wish to offer my best regards and hope that you find much success in the future."

"Write him a love letter while you're at it!" Bidwell steamed.

"My thanks, sir, " Matthew said. "As for travelling alone, I feel confident I won't be in any danger." The demise of Shawcombe and Jack One Eye, he suspected, had made the backroads of the entire Southern colonies at least safer than Manhattan's harbor. "Oh. While I am thinking of it: Mr. Bidwell, there is one final rope that remains unknotted in this situation."

"You mean Dr. Shields?" Bidwell crumpled the torn pieces of Johnstone's drawing in his fist. "I haven't decided what to do with him yet. And don't rush me!"

"No, not Dr. Shields. The burning of the schoolhouse, and who was responsible for the other fires as well."

"What?" Winston blanched.

"Well, it wasn't Johnstone, obviously, " Matthew explained. "Even someone so preoccupied with his own affairs as Mr. Bidwell can understand that. And, in time, I'm sure Mr. Bidwell might begin to wonder, as well he should."

"You're right!" Bidwell agreed, his eyes narrowing. "What son of a bitch tried to burn down my town?"

"Early this morning I had a thought about this burning business, and I went to Lancaster's house. The place is still a wreck, as you're aware. Has anyone else been through it?"

"No one would go within a hundred yards of that damn murder house!"

"I thought not, though I did appreciate the fact that the corpse has been disposed of. Anyway, I decided to search a little more thoroughly... and I discovered a very strange bucket in the debris. Evidently it was something Johnstone didn't bother himself with, since it simply appears to be a regular bucket. Perhaps he thought it was full of rat bait or some such."

"Well, then? What was in it?"

"I'm not sure. It appears to be tar. It has a brimstone smell. I decided to leave it where I found it... as I didn't know if it might be flammable, or explode, or what might occur if it were jostled too severely."

"Tar? A brimstone smell?" Alarmed, Bidwell looked at Winston. "By God. I don't like the sound of that!"

"I'm sure it's worth going there to get, " Matthew continued. "Or Mr. Winston might want to go and look at it, and then... I don't know, bury it or something. Would you be able to tell what it was if you saw it, Mr. Winston?"

"Possibly, " Winston answered, his voice tight. "But I'll tell you right now... as you describe it, the stuff sounds like... possibly... infernal fire, Mr. Bidwell?"

"Infernal fire? My God!" Now Bidwell did hammer his desk. "So that's who was burning the houses! But where was he getting the stuff from?"

"He was a very capable man, " Matthew said. "Perhaps he had sulphur for his rat baits or candles or something. Perhaps he cooked some tar and mixed it himself. I have a feeling Lancaster was trying to hurry the process of emptying the town without telling his accomplice. Who knows why?" Matthew shrugged. "There is no honor among thieves, and even less among murderers."

"I'll be damned!" Bidwell looked as if he'd taken a punch to his ponderous gut. "Was there no end to their treacheries, even against each other?"

"It does appear a dangerous bucket, Mr. Winston, " Matthew said. "Very dangerous indeed. If it were up to me, I wouldn't dare bring it back to the mansion for fear of explosion. You might just want to bring a small sample to show Mr. Bidwell. Then by all means bury it and forget where you turned the shovel."

"Excellent advice." Winston gave a slight bow of his head. "I shall attend to it this afternoon. And I am very gratified, sir, that you did not leave this particular rope unknotted."

"Mr. Winston is a useful man, " Matthew said to Bidwell. "You should be pleased to have him in your employ."

Bidwell puffed his cheeks and blew out. "Whew! Don't I know it!"

As Matthew turned away and started out with the treasure box, the master of Fount Royal had to ask one last question: "Matthew?" he said. "Uh... is there any way... any possible way at all... that... the fortune might be recovered?"

Matthew made a display of thought. "As it has flowed along a river to the center of the earth, " he said, "I would think it extremely unlikely. But how long can you hold your breath?"

"Ha!" Bidwell smiled grimly, but there was some good humor in it. "Just because I build ships and I'm going to station a grand navy here... does not mean I can swim. Now go along with you, and if Edward thinks he's going to convince me to give you a free horse and saddle, he is a sadly mistaken duke!"

Matthew left the mansion and walked past the still waters of the spring on his way to the conjunction of streets. Before he reached the turn to Truth, however, he saw ahead of him the approach of a black-clad, black-tricorned, spidery, and wholly loathsome figure.

"Ho, there!" Exodus Jerusalem called, lifting a hand. On this deserted street, the sound fairly echoed. Matthew was sorely tempted to run, but the preacher picked up his pace and met him. Blocked his way, actually.

"What do you want?" Matthew asked.

"A truce, please." Jerusalem showed both palms, and Matthew unconsciously held more securely to the treasure box. "We are packed and ready to leave, and I am on my way to give my regards to Mr. Bidwell."

"Art thou?" Matthew lifted his eyebrows. "Thy speech has suddenly become more common, Preacher. Why is that?"

"My speech? Oh... that!" Jerusalem grinned broadly, his face seamed with wrinkles in the sunlight. "It's an effort to keep that up. Too many thees and thous in one day and my lips near fall off."

"It's part of your performance, you mean?"

"No, it's real enough. My father spoke such, and his father before him. And my son—if I ever have a son—shall as well. Also, however, the widow Lassiter detests it. Gently, of course. She is a very gentle, very warm, very giving woman."

"The widow Lassiter? Your latest conquest?"

"My latest convert, " he corrected. "There is quite a difference. Ah yes, she's a wonderfully warm woman. She ought to be warm, since she weighs almost two hundred pounds. But she has a lovely face and she can surely mend a shirt!" He leaned in a little closer, his grin lecherous. "And she has quite the toll in her skirt, if you catch my meaning!"

"I would prefer not to, thank you."

"Well, as my father always said, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The one-eyed, stiff beholder, I mean."

"You are a piece of work, aren't you?" Matthew said, amazed at such audacity. "Do you do all your thinking with your private parts?"

"Let us be friends. Brothers under the warming sun. I have heard all about your triumph. I don't fully understand how such a thing was done—the Satan play, I mean—but I am gratified to know that a righteous and innocent woman has been cleared, and that you are also found guiltless. Besides, it would be a damn sin for a looker like that to bum, eh?"

"Excuse me, " Matthew said. "And farewell to you."

"Ah, you may say farewell, but not goodbye, young man! Perchance we'll meet again, further along life's twisting road."

"We might meet again, at that. Except I might be a judge and you might be at the end of a twisting rope."

"Ha, ha! An excellent joke!" Now, however, a serious cast came over the wizened face. "Your magistrate. I—honestly—am very sorry. He fought death to the end, I understand."

"No, " Matthew said. "In the end he accepted it. As I did."

"Yes, of course. That, too. But he did seem a decent man. Too bad he died in a hole like this."

Matthew stared at the ground, a muscle working in his jaw.

"If you like, before I leave I might go to his grave and speak a few words for his eternal soul."

"Preacher, " Matthew said in a strained voice, "all is well with his eternal soul. I suggest you go give your regards to Mr. Bidwell, get in your wagon with your witless brood, and go to—wherever you choose to go. Just leave my sight." He lifted his fierce gaze to the man, and saw the preacher flinch. "And let me tell you that if I but see you walking in the direction of Magistrate Woodward's grave, I will forget the laws of God and man and do my damnedest to put my boot so far up your ass I will kick your teeth out from the inner side. Do you understand me?"

Jerusalem backed away a few steps. "It was only a thought!"

"Good day, goodbye, and good riddance." Matthew sidestepped him and continued on his way.

"Ohhhhh, not goodbye!" Jerusalem called. "Farewell, perhaps! But not goodbye! I have a feeling thou shalt lay eyes on me at some future unknown date, as I travel this ungodly, debased, and corrupted land in the continual—continual, I say—battle against the foul seed of Satan! So I say to thee, brother Matthew, farewell... but never goodbye!"

The voice—which Matthew thought could strip paint off wood if Jerusalem really let it bray—was fading behind him as he turned onto Truth Street. He dared not look back, for he didn't care to become a pillar of salt today.

He passed the gaol. He did not give the odious place a single glance, though his gut tightened as he stepped on its shadow.

And then he came to her house.

Rachel had been busy. She had pulled into the yard much of the furniture, and a washtub of soapy water stood at the ready. Also brought into the cleansing sun were clothes, bedsheets, a mattress, kettles and skillets, shoes, and just about everything else a household contained.

The door was wide open, as were all the shutters. Airing the place out, he thought. Intending to move in again, and make it a home. Indeed, Rachel was more like Bidwell in her tenacity—one might say foolhearted stubbornness—than ever he'd imagined. Still, if elbow grease alone could transform that rat-whiskered shack to a livable cottage again, she would have a mansion of her own.

He crossed the yard, winding between the accumulated belongings. Suddenly his progress was interrupted by a small chestnut-brown dog that sprang up from its drowsing posture beside the washtub, took a stance that threatened attack, and began to bark in a voice that surely rivalled the preacher's for sheer volume.

Rachel came to the threshold and saw who her visitor was. "Hush!" she commanded. "Hush!" She clapped her hands to get the mongrel's attention. The dog ceased its alarms and, with a quick wag of its tail and a wide-mouthed yawn, plopped itself down on the sun-warmed ground again.

"Well!" Matthew said. "It seems you have a sentinel."

"She took up with me this morning." Rachel wiped her dirty hands on an equally dirty rag. "I gave her one of the ham biscuits Mrs. Nettles made for me, and we are suddenly sisters."

Matthew looked around at the furniture and other items. "You have your labors ahead of you, I see."

"It won't be so bad, once I finish scrubbing the house."

"Rachel!" Matthew said. "You don't really plan on staying here, do you?"

"It's my home, " she answered, spearing him with those intense amber eyes. She wore a blue-printed scarf around her head, and her face was streaked with grime. The gray dress and white apron she wore were equally filthy. "Why should I leave it?"

"Because..." He hesitated, and showed her the box. "Because I have something for you. May I come in?"

"Yes. Mind the mess, though."

As Matthew approached the door, he heard a whuff of wind behind him and thought the mighty sentinel had decided to take a bite from his ankle. He turned in time to see the brown dog go tearing off across the field, where it seized one of two fleeing rats and shook the rodent between its jaws in a crushing deathgrip.

"She does like to chase them, " Rachel said.

Within the bare house, Matthew saw that Rachel had been scraping yellow lichens from the floorboards with an axeblade. The fungus and mildew that had spread across the walls had bloomed into strange purple and green hues only otherwise to be seen in fever dreams. However, Matthew saw that where the sunlight touched, the growths had turned ashen. A broom leaned against the wall, next to a pile of dust, dirt, rat pellets, and bones. Nearby was a bucket of more soapy water, in which a scrub brush was immersed.

"You know, there are plenty of houses available, " Matthew said. "If you really insist on staying here, you might move into one only recently abandoned and save yourself all this work. As a matter of fact, I know a very comfortable place, and the only labor involved would be clearing out a wasp's nest."

"This is my home, " she answered.

"Well... yes... but still, don't you think—"

She turned away from him and picked up a rolling pin that lay on the floor near the broom. Then she walked to a wall and put her ear against it. Following that, she whacked the boards three times and Matthew could hear the panicked squeaking and scurrying from within.

"Those defy me, " Rachel said. "I've tun out most of them, but those—right there—defy me. I swear I'll clean them out. Every last one of them."

And at that moment Matthew understood.

Rachel, he believed, was still in a state of shock. And who could fault her? The loss of her husband, the loss of her home, the loss of her freedom. Even—for a time at least, as she prepared herself for the fires—the loss of her will to live. And now, faced with the daunting—and perhaps impossible—task of rebuilding, she must concentrate on and conquer what she perceived as the last obstacle to a return to normality.

But who, having walked through such flames, could ever erase the memory of being singed?

"I regret I have nothing to offer you, " she said, and now that he was looking for it he could see a certain burnt blankness in her eyes. "It will be a time before my cupboard is restocked."

"Yes, " Matthew said. He gave her a sad but gentle smile. "I'm sure. But... nonetheless, it will be restocked, won't it?"

"You may put faith in it, " she answered, and then she pressed her ear to the wall again.

"Let me show you what I've brought." He approached her and offered the box. "Take it and look inside." Rachel laid down the rolling pin, accepted the box, and lifted its lid.

Matthew saw no reaction on her face, as she viewed the coins and the other items. "The little bag. Open that too." She shook the gems out into the box. Again, there was no reaction.

"Those were found in Johnstone's house." He had already decided to tell her the truth. "Mr. Bidwell asked me to give them to you."

"Mr. Bidwell, " Rachel repeated, without emotion. She closed the lid and held the box out. "You take them. I have already received from Mr. Bidwell all the gifts that I can stand."

"Listen to me. Please. I know how you must feel, but—"

"No. You do not, nor can you ever."

"Of course you're right." He nodded. "But surely you must realize you're holding a true fortune. I daresay with the kind of money you could get in Charles Town from the sale of those jewels, you might live in Mr. Bidwell's style in some larger, more populous city."

"I see what his style is, " she countered, "and I detest it. Take the box."

"Rachel, let me point out something to you. Bidwell did not murder your husband. Nor did he create this scheme. I don't particularly care for his... um... motivations, either, but he was reacting to a crisis that he thought would destroy Fount Royal. In that regard, " Matthew said, "he acted properly. You know, he might have hanged you without waiting for the magistrate. I'm sure he could have somehow justified it."

"So you're justifying him, is that right?"

"Since he now faces a guilty verdict from you in a tragedy for which he was not wholly responsible, " Matthew said, "I am simply pleading his case."

Rachel stared at him in silence, still holding out the box to him. He made no move to accept it.

"Daniel is gone, " Matthew told het. "You know that. Gone, too, are the men who murdered him. But Fount Royal—such as it may be—is still here, and so is Bidwell. It appears he intends to do his best to rebuild the town. That is his main concern. It seems to be yours as well. Don't you think this common ground is larger than hatred?"

"I shall take this box, " Rachel said calmly, "and dump it into the spring if you refuse it."

"Then go ahead, " he answered, "because I do refuse it. Oh: except for one gold piece. The one that Johnstone stole from my room. Before you throw your fortune and future away to prove your devotion to Daniel in continued poverty and suffering, I will take the one gold piece." There was no response from her, though perhaps she did flinch just a little.

"I understand Bidwell's position, " Matthew said. "The evidence against you was overwhelming. I too might have pressed for your execution, if I believed firmly enough in witchcraft. And... if I hadn't fallen in love with you."

Now she did blink; her eyes, so powerful a second before, had become dazed.

"Of course you recognized it. You didn't want me to. In fact, you asked me to—as you put it—go on about my life. You said— there in the gaol, after I'd read the magistrate's decree—that the time had come to embrace reality." He disguised his melancholy with a faint smile. "That time has now come for both of us."

Rachel looked down at the floor. She had taken hold of the box with both hands, and Matthew saw an ocean's worth of conflicting tides move across her face.

He said, "I'm leaving in the morning. I will be in Charles Town for a few weeks. Then most likely I will be travelling to New York. At that time I can be reached through Magistrate Nathaniel Powers, if you ever have need of me."

She lifted her gaze to his, her eyes wet and glistening. "I can never repay you for my life, Matthew. How can I even begin?"

"Oh... one gold coin will do, I think."

She opened the box, and he took the coin. "Take another, " she offered. "Take as many as you like. And some of the jewels, too."

"One gold coin, " he said. "That's my due." He put the coin into his pocket, never to be spent. He looked around the house and sighed. He had the feeling that once the rats were run out and her home was truly hers again, she might embrace the reality of moving to a better abode—further away from that wretched gaol.

Rachel took a step toward him. "Do you believe me... when I say I'll remember you when I'm an old, old woman?"

"I do. And please remember me, if at that point you're seeking the excitement of a younger man."

She smiled, in spite of her sadness. Then she grasped his chin, leaned forward—and kissed him very softly on the forehead, below the bandage that covered what would be his grandchildren's favorite story.

Now was the moment, he realized. It was now or never.

To ask her. Had she actually entered that smoke-palled medicine lodge? Or had it been only his feverish—and wishful—fantasy?

Was he still a virgin, or not?

He made his decision, and he thought it was the right one.

"Why are you smiling that way?" Rachel asked.

"Oh... I am remembering a dream I think I had. One more thing: you said to me once that your heart was used up." Matthew looked into her dirt-streaked, determined face, forever-more locking her remarkable beauty of form and spirit in his memory vault. "I believe... it is a cupboard that only need be restocked." He leaned forward and kissed her cheek, and then he had to go.

Had to.

As Matthew left the house, Rachel followed him to the door.

She stood there, on the threshold of her home and her own new beginning. "Goodbye!" she called, and perhaps her voice was tremulous. "Goodbye!"

He glanced back. His eyes were stinging, and she was blurred to his sight. "Farewell!" he answered. And then he went on, as Rachel's sentinel sniffed his shoes and then returned to its rat-catching duties.

Matthew slept that night like a man who had rediscovered the meaning of peace.

At five-thirty, Mrs. Nettles came to awaken him as he'd asked, though the town's remaining roosters had already performed that function. Matthew shaved, washed his face, and dressed in a pair of cinnamon-colored breeches and a fresh white shirt with the left sleeve cut away. He pulled up his white stockings and slid his feet into the square-toed shoes. If Bidwell wanted back the clothes he had loaned, the man would have to rip them off himself.

Before he descended the stairs for the last time, Matthew went into the magistrate's room. No, that was wrong. The room was Bidwell's again, now. He stood there for a while, staring at the perfectly made bed. He looked at the candle stubs and the lantern. He looked at the clothes Woodward had worn, now draped over the back of a chair. All save the gold-striped waistcoat, which had gone with the magistrate to worlds unknown.

Yesterday, when he'd gone to the graveside, he'd had a difficult time until he'd realized the magistrate no longer suffered, either in body or mind. Perhaps, in some more perfect place, the just were richly rewarded for their tribulations. Perhaps, in that place, a father might find a lost son, both of them gone home to a garden.

Matthew lowered his head and wiped his eyes. Then he let his sadness go, like a nightbird. Downstairs, Mrs. Nettles had prepared him a breakfast that might have crippled the horse he was to ride. Bidwell was absent, obviously preferring to sleep late rather than share the clerk's meal. But with the final cup of tea, Mrs. Nettles brought Matthew an envelope, upon which was written Concerning the Character and Abilities of Master Matthew Corbett, Esq. Matthew turned it over and saw it was sealed with a red blob of wax in which was impressed an imperial B.

"He asked I give it to ye, " Mrs. Nettles explained. "For your future references, he said. I'd be might pleased, for compliments from Mr. Bidwell are as rare as snowballs in Hell. ''

"I am pleased, " Matthew said. "Tell him I thank him very much for his kindness."

The breakfast done, Mrs. Nettles walked outside with Matthew. The sun was well up, the sky blue, and a few lacy clouds drifting like the sailing ships Bidwell hoped to launch from this future port. John Goode had brought an excellent-looking roan horse with a saddle that might not raise too many sores between here and Charles Town. Mrs. Nettles opened the saddlebags to show him the food she'd packed for him, as well as a leather waterflask. It occurred to Matthew that, now that his usefulness was done to the master of Fount Royal, it was up to the servants to send him off.

Matthew shook Goode's hand, and Goode thanked him for coming to take that "bumb" out of his house. Matthew returned the thanks, for giving him the opportunity to taste some absolutely wonderful turtle soup.

Mrs. Nettles only had to help him a little to climb up on the horse. Then Matthew situated himself and grasped the reins. He was ready.

"Young sir?" Mrs. Nettles said. "May I give ye a word of advice?"

"Of course."

"Find y'self a good, strong Scottish lass." He smiled. "I shall certainly take it under consideration."

"Good luck to ye, " she said. "And a good life." Matthew guided his horse toward the gate and began his journey. He passed the spring, where a woman in a green bonnet was already drawing water for the day. He saw in a field a farmer, breaking earth with a wooden hoe. Another farmer was walking amid fresh furrows, tossing seeds from one side to the other.

Good luck, Fount Roy all Matthew thought. And good life to all those who lived here, both on this day and on the day tomorrow.

At the gate, Mr. Green was waiting to lift the locking timber. "Goodbye, sir!" he called, and displayed a gap-toothed grin.

Matthew rode through. He was not very far along the sunlit road when he reined the horse in and paused to look back. The gate was closing. Slowly, slowly... then shut. Over the singing of birds in the forest, Matthew heard the sound of the locking timber slide back into place.

He had a sure destination.

New York. But not just because Magistrate Nathaniel Powers was there. It was also because the almshouse was there, and Headmaster Eben Ausley. Matthew recalled what that insidious, child-brutalizing villain had said to him, five years ago: Consider that your education concerning the real world has been furthered. Be of excellent service to the magistrate, be of good cheer and good will, and live a long and happy life. And never—never—plot a war you have no hope of winning.

Well, Matthew mused, perhaps the boy of five years ago could neither plot a war nor win it. But the man of today might find a method to end Ausley's reign of terror.

It was worth putting one's thoughts to, wasn't it?

Matthew stared for a moment at the closed gate, beyond which lay both an ending and a beginning. Then he turned his mount, his face, and his mind toward the century of wonders.