Robert McCammon - Mister Slaughter

If, for instance, a servant-girl decided to ask for a little extra shine in her pay in order to keep the secret, a mallet might have to fall. Or the decision might be to go ahead and use the mallet early, because if that same servant-girl got in contact with one of the families of a deceased person and talked them into coming back and having a grave dug up

"Tonight," Opal said. "He'll be doin' it again, with the widow Ford."

Whatever Noggin was doing, Matthew knew it had to be nasty.

And Nasty seemed to be Tyranthus Slaughter's middle name.

Was there a connection? He had no idea. But he thought one slime trail might lead to another.

"I'd best get you back," Opal offered, suddenly sounding wan and older than her years. "Oh the man you're talkin' about? I ain't seen nobody like that."

Matthew didn't follow when she started back toward the cemetery, and she paused to wait for him. He asked, "What's your full name?"

"Opal Delilah Blackerby."

"All right, Opal Delilah Blackerby. I want you to have this." He reached into the pocket of his dark green waistcoat, felt for what he knew to be there, and brought it out. "Here. Come take it."

She came forward, slowly, and when she took what he was holding she blinked first at it, then at him, then at it again. "Is this is this real?"

"It is." The ring was real gold, of course. Was the red stone a ruby? He would leave it for her to find out. Never let it be said that Slaughter's treasure hadn't offered a chance for escape to someone. "I wouldn't show that to anyone else. And I wouldn't care to stay around here very much longer either."

"Why are you givin' me this?"

"Because I like you," he answered, in all truth. "I think you'd make a good detective." "A what?"

"Never mind. If you ever get to New York, come to Number Seven Stone Street. Can you remember that?"

"Remember it? Hell's bleedin' bells, I'll never forget it!"

"I can find my way back," he said. "Just be careful, do you hear me?"

"I will," she promised. He started to go back along the path, leaving her staring at the gold ring with its small red-ruby?-stone, and then suddenly she caught at his sleeve and she asked, "Can I kiss you?"

Matthew said yes, it would be fine, and Opal gave him a sedate but heartfelt kiss on the cheek. A far cry from doing it behind the church, he thought, but maybe at its essence a little bit of warm.

He returned to Mrs. Lovejoy's house. Another servant-girl answered his knock at the door. No, sir, Mrs. Lovejoy has gone out, she said. Mrs. Lovejoy has asked me to tell you that urgent personal business has called her away, but she will be glad to finish the arrangements if you would come back tomorrow or the following day.

"Thank you," Matthew replied. "Tell her "

Tell her I'll be back tonight , he thoug ht.

"Tell Mrs. Lovejoy I shall look forward to her charming company," he said, and then he walked to his horse at the hitching-post.

Crouched in the woods that faced Paradise's cemetery, Matthew didn't have long to wait before Noggin came calling.

It was a hazy blue twilight. Matthew had left his horse hitched among the trees at the edge of a meadow about two hundred yards away, back toward the Paradise sign. He had been waiting little more than ten minutes, and here came Noggin's wagon along the road to the church.

Noggin pulled his team up in front of the church, set the brake and climbed down. He lit the two lanterns and set them in back of the wagon. He put on his gloves, took his pickaxe and shovel to the cemetery, came back for the lanterns, stripped off his cloak and then set to work digging a grave with what appeared to be formidable strength.

Matthew settled back. From where he was positioned, he could see Noggin working if not speedily, at least steadily. The digging was not what particularly interested him; it was what happened to the coffin and the corpse afterward.

He'd spent some time this afternoon visiting the village of Red Oak, which was about two miles away from Paradise and the nearest community. It was ringed by farms and lush pastures where cattle grazed in the golden light. Red Oak itself had a busy farmers' market, a main street of craft shops, three taverns, two stables, and between thirty and forty houses separated by gardens, picket fences and fieldstone walls. Matthew had received a few curious looks as he walked from place to place, being a stranger, but for the most part he was taken as having business there and left alone. His business was to stroll into some of the shops and inquire about a handyman from the area called Noggin. The closest he got to an affirmative answer was from the blacksmith, who said he thought he knew a young man named Noggin who lived in Chester, but then again now that he remembered it the man's name was Knocker. Matthew had thanked him kindly and moved on.

The patrons of the taverns had been equally unhelpful. Matthew had gotten back on his horse and ridden another few miles to Chester, where a further unprofitable hour was spent. Then, as the afternoon was growing late, he'd returned along the road toward Paradise, and had decided to stop for a meal and drink at the Speed The Plow.

"Noggin?" The beak-nosed tavernkeeper had shaken his own bald nog. "Never heard the name, sorry."

Matthew had eaten a humble pie and nursed a mug of ale, waiting for the twilight to gather. Several people came and went, a rather raucous drunk had to be swept out with a broom to the backside, and Matthew must have looked a little forlorn at his table because the tavernkeeper called out, "Hey, Jackson! You know a fella by the name of Noggin?"

Jackson, a black-garbed stout who wore a powdered wig and resembled for all the world either a hellfire preacher or a hanging judge, looked up from his second mug of ale and said in a gravel-scrape voice, "Not recallin'," which put paid to that particular bill.

"I know the name," said a younger but equally stout gent sitting at a table just beyond Jackson. "Fella named Noggin did some work for me last summer. Who's askin'?"

Matthew watched Noggin dig, as the darkness began to come on. According to the farmer who lived just outside a village called Nicholsburg, the handyman called Noggin could patch a barn roof like nobody's business. Could chop wood like there was no tomorrow. Could slap on paint as sure as the day was long. And had told the farmer in his garbled voice that he was just trying to make some extra money because his regular employer was a tightfisted

"Bitch, was the word he used," the farmer had related, over the mug of ale that Matthew had bought him.

"I'm sorry to hear him speak of the lady in that way," Matthew had said.

"Oh?" The farmer's thick brown eyebrows had gone up. "Do you know Mrs. Sutch?"

It had taken Matthew a moment to digest that. "Mrs. Sutch?"

"That's who he said he worked for. Owns a hog farm up north of Nicholsburg. She makes sausages." "Ah," Matthew had said, brushing some invisible dust from the front of his waistcoat. "Sausages." "Big taste for 'em in Philadelphia, I hear. Too damn expensive for the home folk, though." Matthew listened to the wind moving through the trees. He heard Noggin's shovel stop scraping dirt. In another moment he heard the dirt start going back into the grave.

The farmer couldn't describe Mrs. Sutch. He'd never seen her. A private type of lady, he thought. Had heard tell of Mrs. Lovejoy, but had never seen her either. She was probably private, too.

Nicholsburg was about seven miles up the road, the farmer said. He didn't get down this way often, but this morning he'd gone nearly to Philadelphia to a cattle sale. "What was it you were wantin' Noggin about?"

"Oh," Matthew had said, "I'd heard he was a good worker. Just trying to find him."