Matthew Corbett 03 - Mister Slaughter

'May I?' Matthew made a motion of entrance.

There was an uncomfortable moment where the master of the house looked to his wife to see if she approved letting such a ragamuffin into their domain, whether he was a law man, an Indian scout, or chief of the street beggars. But then she nodded graciously at Matthew, retreated a step, and asked if he might like a nice cup of lemon water.

Quisenhunt took Matthew along a hallway and through the door to his workshop, and there Matthew saw how much a man could love his calling.

Three days ago, in the weak light of early morning, Matthew had stumbled down out of the forest into the village below the watermill. He didn't get very far before a man wearing a brown woolen cap, a gray coat and carrying a torch came out between two houses and hollered, 'Who goes there?' Matthew thought it was wise he answer, because the man was also aiming a blunderbuss at him.

Indian trouble, the watchman had told him as they went to see the town's constable, by name Josaphat Newkirk. The town's name was not Caulder's Crossing but Hoornbeck, and according to the watchman was situated on the Philadelphia Pike about four miles away from the city. The Indians have got their warpaint on, the watchman told him as they walked. Matthew still had a pounding headache and his vision blurred in and out, but he could function, more or less. Hey! Did they jump you too?

Who? Matthew had asked.

The Indians, man! They're crawlin' all around here!

Hoornbeck, a small town that overlooked a picturesque lake, was in a state of high alert. Men with guns were everywhere, leading skittish horses. Women stood in groups holding babies or comforting frightened children. By the time Matthew was escorted to the constable's office in the white-washed town hall, a clerk reported that Constable Newkirk had gone out on his rounds to check with the other watchmen. Matthew had no time to waste; he asked to be taken to the town's doctor, so in a few minutes he was at the door of a white house with dark green shutters on the edge of the lake.

Dr. Martin Lowe, a big bearish man with close-cropped brown hair, a brown beard streaked with gray and brown eyes behind his spectacles, took a look at him, rushed him in and put him on a table with three candles on either side of Matthew's head. He began to examine the injuries while his wife boiled water for tea and hot towels.

'Lucky here,' said the doctor, in a bass rumble that Matthew could feel in his chest. He touched the sore, blood-crusted area below Matthew's left eye. Matthew hadn't realized before now that Slaughter's fingernails had worked their magic. 'You might have lost that eye if those claws had caught you any higher. And that was a bad blow to your head, from the size of the bruise. Very dangerous. How many fingers am I holding up?'

'Three,' Matthew said, when he concentrated and half of the man's six fingers disappeared like wisps of smoke.

'Mouth open. Did you swallow any teeth?'

'Sir please listen I'm not here about myself. I'm looking for a man who probably came in ' What day was this? 'Yesterday.' Slaughter was simple enough to describe. 'He would have had an arrow in his upper right arm.'

'You mean Lord Shelby's land speculator, Sir Edmond Grudge. Constable Newkirk brought him in.'

'Sir Edmund Grudge?'

'He had a terrible time of it. Indians ambushed his party. Wiped 'em out, not five miles from town. I sewed up that gash in his head, took the arrowhead out of his arm and did what I could. Gave him a bottle of brandy to ease his pain.'

'And where is he now?'

'I said he ought to stay here and let me watch him overnight, but he wanted to get a room at the tavern. The Peartree Inn, alongside the Pike. Damned if he's not a strong-willed man.'

'I've got to go.' Matthew had started to get off the table, but suddenly there were two bearish, brown- bearded doctors in the room holding him down.

'Not so fast, now. Sir Grudge is due back by ten o'clock, which is a little more than two hours. I'm to check his stitches again. In the meantime, let me work on you, and tell me what the hell happened.'

Within five minutes, Lowe was out the door like a shot to track down Constable Newkirk.

It was awhile before they returned, because to add to the confusion of the day Matthew later learned that Newkirk had been out talking to a watchman whose eyes were evidently not so watchful, for his horse had been untied and stolen from a hitching-post on Main Street hardly an hour before. Then Newkirk, a lean gray-haired man with the sad face of a dog that just wants to sleep in peace, listened intently to Matthew's tale, which made him look even sadder. He lit his pipe, blew smoke, and said, 'All right, then,' with a sigh as if that explained everything. 'Let me get some men together, and we'll go pay a visit to Sir Grudge. Whatever his damned name is.'

When Matthew heard about the stolen horse, he'd figured of course Slaughter had taken the beast and pounded away the last few miles to Philadelphia. But the constable had a different story for Matthew when he returned from The Peartree Inn.

'Seems your Mr. Slaughter had himself a good meal last night,' Newkirk said as he puffed his pipe and Lowe applied the plaster to Matthew's wound. 'Everybody wanted to hear about the Indians and pay his bill. He told some big ones. Fooled me, he did. Except the last trouble we had with the red men was more than six, seven years ago. You recall, Martin. They burned down Keltey's barn, set fire to his haystacks.'

'I recall.'

'Ran around hollerin' a little while, shot some arrows into the roof and then they went.' Newkirk whistled and made a motion with his hand to represent how fast they had gone. 'Back into the woods. Their kingdom. Well, he fooled me.'

'He stole the horse,' Matthew said. 'Is that right?'

'The horse? Oh, Ben Witt's horse? No, I don't think so. Unless he was in two places at once. Your Mr. Slaughter'-Matthew wished he would stop saying that-'took up with a tradesman last night at the inn. Peddler told Daisy-that would be Daisy Fisk, my daughter-in-law-that he was headin' to Philadelphia. Had all his wares in a wagon. Well, your Mr. Slaughter left with the tradesman before somebody stole Ben's horse.'

Having delivered that unwelcome news, Newkirk just stood there puffing.

'Constable?' Matthew waved smoke away from his face. 'Why don't you send out some fast riders? Maybe they can catch him before-'

'Already in the big town by now,' Newkirk replied. 'Their problem, now.' He scratched his pate and gazed out the window at the lake as if he would give up everything he owned for a morning of fishing. 'At last,' he said. 'You say there're some bodies out in the woods?'

'This young man can't go anywhere for a while,' the doctor said. 'I'm surprised he can walk.'

'The bodies can wait, then,' Newkirk decided. 'Funny thing, though.'

'What's funny?'

'Your Mr. Slaughter. Such a killer and all, you say. Left with a tradesman.' Newkirk gave a dry little chuckle. 'Fella was sellin' knives.'

Matthew stood on the threshold of Oliver Quisenhunt's workshop, three days since his visit to Hoornbeck. He looked into an untidy mess: stacks of books and papers upon the floor, shelves full of strangely-shaped metal pieces and tools, a filing cabinet with more papers spilling out, a desk covered with small brass and wooden gearwheels and more tools, and at the center of the hurrah-rah a chalkboard on wheels. The chalkboard was covered side to side and top to bottom with diagrams of what appeared to be different-shaped hinges and pegs, gearwheels, drillbits and mechanisms he had never seen before. Some of them might very well have come from a distant planet, like the thing that looked like half of a spoked wagon wheel and had two batlike wings extended on either side.

Of course I know Oliver Quisenhunt, High Constable Farraday had told Matthew this morning. He's the crazy clockmaker. Well I say that with all respect. He's actually a very talented inventor. Designed the safebox especially for us. Now, Mr. Corbett tell me again how you let Tyranthus Slaughter get away?