He walked to the firetongs and picked them up. The business end of the tongs had been thinned by some scraping instrument or grinding wheel, it appeared. “What’s this for?”
Kippering took the tongs, turned away, and reached up to a top shelf to grasp a packet of papers, which he brought down trailing dust. He waved the papers in front of Matthew’s face before returning them to where they’d been likely situated for years.
Matthew sniffed, holding back a sneeze, and rubbed his nose.
“Want a drink?” Kippering asked. “I’ve got that half-bottle of brandy left. You can help me celebrate the fact that I only lost five shillings and eight pence at gambling tonight, and that I overpaid by twice for a cheap bottle of wine at Madam Blossom’s.”
“No,” Matthew said, already feeling thoroughly debilitated. “Thank you.”
“Then may I give you some free legal advice?” Kippering waited for Matthew to give him his full attention. “I would refrain from mentioning to anyone that you discovered Ausley’s body. That is, if you wish to remain free to walk around town.”
“Pardon?”
“You were nearly first on the scene with Mr. Deverick, weren’t you? And now first to find Ausley? I’d hate to think what Lillehorne might do with that, since he seems to consider you such an outspoken boon to his authority.”
“I didn’t murder anyone. Why should I not tell Lillehorne?”
“Because,” Kippering said, “the high constable will find your presence at both murders so interesting that he will wish to know what you were doing out tonight. And even though you and I may believe that Lillehorne is not entirely up to the job, he is relentless when it suits him to be. Thus he will wish to know in exacting detail your progress through this night, and he may well feel you are best questioned behind the security of iron bars. He will ask questions here and there and there and here, and sooner or later he’ll find out that you and the future husband of our good reverend’s daughter were meeting at a rather dismal little drinking and gambling establishment festooned with whores. For privacy, did you say? Do you see my direction?”
Matthew did, but he remained sullenly silent.
“Of course you do,” Kippering went on. “Now I don’t know what you and Mr. Five were talking about in that back room, but you can be sure Lillehorne will find out.”
“That has nothing to do with the Masker. It’s private business.”
“Yes, you keep using that word, and that will only feed Lillehorne’s desire to root out whatever secret you have.” He paused to let Matthew feel the sting of that particular fish-hook. “Now in a few minutes I’m going to put on my official lawyer’s face, straighten my suit and comb my hair, and walk out to stand alongside Ausley’s corpse until the body-cart pulls up. I suggest you go home, go to bed, and in the morning you are as surprised to hear of Eben Ausley’s death as anyone in New York. How does that settle with you?”
Matthew thought about it, though there wasn’t a lot of thinking to be done. It wouldn’t do for questions to be asked about Matthew’s jaunts this night, not with Reverend Wade’s problem still unknown. He said quietly, “It settles.”
“Good. Incidentally, I’m sure Giles will carry that information about the blood smear straight to Lillehorne, in case you’re thinking this is an attempt to keep you from telling anyone. I assure you I couldn’t care less, just so long as he doesn’t come up behind me on a dark night.” Kippering motioned Matthew toward the stairs.
At the front, Matthew hesitated in the doorway before Kippering could shut him out. He gazed up at the candle-illuminated window. “Tell me, if you will,” he said, “why you’re at work so late.”
Kippering kept the faint smile on his face. “I don’t sleep very well. Never have. Goodnight. Oh…two last things: I should avoid the crowd up there on Barrack, and I should beware not the Masker but some frightened rabbit with a blunderbuss.” So saying, he pushed the door shut and Matthew heard the latch fall.
Matthew looked toward City Hall and saw the wash of candlelight in two of the attic’s small square windows. He’d never been up there before, as access to that area was by invitation only; that portion was the office and also the living quarters of Ashton McCaggers, whose abilities as coroner more than made up for his eccentricities. It appeared McCaggers was awake and preparing for another session in the cold room.
Zed would be hauling the body-cart past here soon. It was time to go.
Matthew crossed Broad Street to Princes Street, intending to go back up Smith and then to the Broad Way and home, thus bypassing that noisy rabble gathered around the corpse of Eben Ausley. As he made his way past the late-flickering lamps on their cornerposts, the warm breeze moving about him with its leathery smells of dockside tar and sewer ditch, he knew he would find sleep a troubling companion this night. There would be many echoes in his mind calling for recognition or resolve, and many that might never be resolved. In truth, he felt fortunate to have survived not only a gunshot and dog attack but the Masker himself, who might easily have turned on him and cut him to pieces with a hooked blade.
As for Ausley, he felt…nothing.
No anger, no sadness, no loss, no gain, no sense of justice, no exultation at the death of a wicked man.
He felt as if a slate within him upon which he’d marked balances for such a very long time had been wiped clean. Just that.
When he reached the safety of the pottery, he left the walking-stick on the ground alongside the building. He intended to rise with the sun, take the stick out to the East River, and consign it to dark water, where it might vanish in time from sight and memory like its late owner.
Matthew went up to bed, remembering to wash his hands.
Seventeen
Because at breakfast the Stokelys had not yet heard about the murder of Eben Ausley, Matthew’s first real test of monitoring his mouth came when he took his clothes to his laundress, the widow Sherwyn, as was his habit every Friday.
She was a big, robust, white-haired woman who’d outlived two husbands, owned a little stone house and attached laundry shop on Queen Street, and who collected gossips and town-tales as someone else might pin butterflies onto black velvet. Furthermore, she was an excellent laundress and very fair in her prices, so even at this early morning hour she’d already had half-a-dozen customers bringing in not only stained gowns and dirtied shirts but all the news of the night. It was for no little reason that Marmaduke Grigsby brought his clothes here and lingered over apple cider and gingerbread to trade topics, as when he left here he had enough bustarole to fill a month of Earwigs though if he printed most of it he’d have been either shot or hanged.
“Baaaaad night,” said Widow Sherwyn as Matthew entered the shop with his bundle. It was said with grim foreboding, yet the color in her cheeks was as merry as a three-penny play. “But I suppose you’ve already heard?”
“Pardon?” was all he could say.
“Another murder,” she explained. “Happened on Barrack Street, around midnight I hear. And guess who’s the dead gent?”
“Um…I’m not good at guessing, madam. You’ll have to tell me.”
She waved a hand at him to say he was no fun. “Eben Ausley. The headmaster at the orphanage. Well, you ought to look more shocked than that! Didn’t you say you grew up in that wretched place?”
“It wasn’t so wretched…” He almost said before Ausley got there. “…when I was growing up,” he finished. “I regret Ausley’s death, of course. I have four shirts and three pair of breeches today.” The shirt that had been bloodied by Phillip Covey was not among them, as it was now only suited for rags.
“What about that shirt you’re wearing? Right wicked stain on the front.”
Courtesy of Joplin Pollard’s tipsy hand, Matthew thought. He’d put water on it when he’d gotten home, but too late. Actually he counted himself lucky the Thorn Bush ale hadn’t burned a hole in it. “My last shirt,” he said. “Have to do.”
“Liquor stain?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. “You out and about last night?”
“Yes and yes.”
“I can smell the pipe smoke. Gentlemen’s habits, indeed! You fellows mess up, we women clean up. All right then, I’ll have these ready for you on Monday. Tuesday if I fall behind. Hey.” She beckoned him closer with a
