Mister Slaughter (Matthew Corbett #3)

Mister Slaughter (Matthew Corbett #3) Page 30

The door opened. The two killers descended the stairs, lady first.

In the darkness beneath them, Matthew was already on his knees on the dirt floor. He dared to peer out from his hiding-place, but not far enough that the lantern's light might catch him. Mrs. Sutch, wearing an austere gray gown and with a black netting over her leonine hair, went to the cupboard, drew a latch and opened the doors. Slaughter's boots clomped down the steps, the gentleman dressed in a black suit. Obviously he'd either found a tailor to do a quick job, as Matthew had, or more likely some victim had died for his clothes. It pleased Matthew no end that Slaughter's face was less ruddy and more the shade of Mrs. Sutch's gown, and that he held a mottled blue rag pressed to his scalp stitches.

"Now that's what I'm talking about!" Slaughter said, in admiration for what was contained within the cupboard.

Light glinted and gleamed off a variety of weapons held on hooks. Matthew saw three pistols, four knives of various lengths and shapes, two pairs of brass knuckles, one of which was studded with small blades, and two black cords used for the strangler's art. an empty space above the cords indicated that some implement of murder had recently been removed.

Tools of the trade, Matthew thought.

Mrs. Sutch reached deeper into the cupboard and slid out a shelf. On it was the fifth thief trap Quisenhunt had made. She opened it so quickly Matthew couldn't see if she'd turned the latches horizontally or vertically. She lifted the lid, as Slaughter plucked one of the knives from its hook and examined the blade with the air of an artist considering a new brush.

Papers crackled within the box. Mrs. Sutch brought out a small brown ledger book and opened it, positioning herself beneath the nearest lantern in order to better read what was written there. "as of the last posting, there are two in Boston," she said. "One in albany. That would be an easy job for you. a retired judge, fifty-eight years of age. Crippled in a riding accident last year. Received his card in London, March of 1697. Oh here. This one would please the professor." She tapped the page. "are you up to a tripi"

"I can travel."

"This would be to the Carolina colony. Twelve days or so, depending on how hard you want to ride. But he's not going anywhere. In the summer he left New York, where he was a magistrate. Settled now as manager on Lord Peter Kent's tobacco plantation, just west of the town of Kingswood. His name is-"

Matthew almost spoke it, if speaking wouldn't have gotten him killed.

"-Nathaniel Powers," she continued. "a friend of Herrald's, by the way. Received his card in London, July of 1694. Sailed from Portsmouth to New York with his family in September of 1694. Obviously he has a healthy respect for the professor's determination. It's time his card was called to count."

"absolutely time," Slaughter agreed, and seemed to be admiring his reflection in the knife's shine.

"Take what you please."

"I've come upon a bounty of blades just recently. I have a sufficient pistol, as well." He put the knife back upon its hook. "But tell me, what's missing right therei" He touched the empty space above the cords.

"a new item, brought from South america. a blowpipe. It uses a dart tipped with frog venom that causes "

"Instant deathi" The way Slaughter said that, it was religious.

"The muscles to stiffen and the throat to constrict," she corrected. "Within seconds, the victim cannot move. It's being experimented with."

"Who has that jobi"

"We have new blood among the brethren, since you've been gone."

"It's gratifying to know our profession shall not die for want of youth," Slaughter said, and then he, the lady and Matthew all looked across the cellar as Noggin came out of the passageway lugging a damp and dripping Mrs. Sutch burlap bag that appeared to be heavy with contents. Noggin carried it out the cellar door, bound for some destination Matthew didn't wish to think about.

"Can you trust himi" Slaughter asked, as Mrs. Sutch closed the box and slid the shelf back.

"He does what I tell him, when I tell him. He's dull, but smart enough to ask no questions." She shut the cupboard and pushed the latch home. "From time to time, I let him have one of the girls at Paradise."

The fate of Kitt, Matthew thought. and of how many othersi

"You amaze me." Slaughter had turned toward Mrs. Sutch. He lowered the cloth from his head, and Matthew could see that the hair had been shaved away from the vivid red gash and its ugly stitches. "always the spirit of industry. You can work any ten people into the ground."

"You know where I came from. What I went through, and what I saw. Poverty and misery have always been the greatest of incentives. Besides," she said with a faint smile, "I'm making a fortune for both myself and the professor."

"as if he needs more."

"He always needs more. and so do I."

They stared at each other for a moment. Then Slaughter reached out to touch Mrs. Sutch's cheek. She pulled away, her face grim. Slaughter let his arm drop.

"When you do the job," she told him, "come back here. Send Noggin for me. at that point, we'll consider what the next step ought to be. I'm not promising anything."

"I understand." Slaughter was all business now as well; the sparkle had gone out of his eyes.

"Do you have moneyi"

"Enough, yes."

"Then I want you out of here now," she said, and she went up the stairs. Slaughter followed her without a word, his face lowered and shrouded with shadows.

The door closed.

Matthew heard footsteps creak the boards. They were moving toward the front of the house. He was lightheaded, because he'd been breathing so shallowly. He drew a long breath and kept watching the cellar doorway, expecting Noggin to return at any minute. He didn't think any of the pistols in the cupboard would be loaded or he would have been up and at them already, if he could coax his legs into moving. Slaughter was on his way to kill Nathaniel Powers in the Carolina colony. Mrs. Sutch was in charge of the blood cards, and of arranging the murders on behalf of Professor Fell. His own name was on that list, of course, and he wondered what Slaughter's reaction would have been to hear it. How did Mrs. Sutch manage the jobi Did she get some kind of message from Professor Fell, or from one of his associates, directing whose name should be added to the listi Did she then make the blood card herei Using blood from either the hogs or-more of a macabre touch-the gutted guests of Paradisei He wondered if his own card had been daubed from the blood of Mr. White. a bizarre riddle occurred to him: what color was White on whitei

Did Noggin deliver the cardsi Maybe by packet boat from Philadelphiai Or did someone else carry the cards outi So many unanswered questions, and so little time.

But Matthew kept staring at the cupboard. In there was Quisenhunt's fifth thief trap, and within it was a book with the names of Fell's murder list. What else might be in that book, and what other papers in the boxi

"Noggin! Noggin!" Mrs. Sutch was outside, calling for her handyman. Slaughter must have already ridden away. It sounded as if Mrs. Sutch was moving toward the rear of the place, back toward the pens or the utility building.

There indeed wasn't much time. Matthew stood up, went to the cupboard and found the latch. He put aside his mallet, opened the cupboard, slid out the shelf and looked at the thief trap.

"Noggin!" Mrs. Sutch shouted, still at the back of the house.

Matthew now faced a question regarding the box. Was it an armed thief trap, or simply a locked keyless safei He ran his fingers over the latches. One was nearly horizontal, the other just to the right of vertical. If he turned the latches the wrong way, would smoke and sparks explode from the keyholei What if the powder charge was not set, but the hammer mechanism was armedi Either way, the noise would bring Mrs. Sutch running. He could take the whole box, he decided. That would be the safest thing. Just take the whole box and get out of here. But he needed the lamplight to see what he was doing. In the dark, it would be impossible to line the latches up either perfectly vertically or horizontally. and which version of the two might this bei

He could take the box and a lantern. He reached up, lifted a lamp from its hook and then set the lamp atop the box. He picked the box up with both arms. It was heavy, but not unmanageable.

He turned toward the cellar door, took a single step and stopped as if he'd been slapped in the face.

He was no longer alone.

Standing in his way was Mrs. Sutch.

She smiled tightly; in the lamplight her eyes seemed to possess glowing centers of red.

"Good evening, Mr. Shayne," she said in a quiet, strained voice.

With an effort, Matthew answered, "Hello, Mrs. Sutch."

They stared at each other, the lioness and her prey.

The moment hung, both Matthew and Mrs. Sutch standing motionless as paintings.

Mrs. Sutch suddenly lifted her arm, not without a certain feminine grace. The axe she'd picked up at the back of the house emerged from behind her gray gown. She had come prepared to do her share of the night's work. Her smile crumpled. She showed her teeth.

"Noggin!" she screamed, her face contorting into a picture from Hell, and Matthew thought she might well be announcing her target because she gripped the axe's handle in both hands and, rushing forward, brought it down for his head.

He lifted the box. The axeblade crashed into it and knocked it and the lantern from his hands to the floor. He spun around to get at the weapons in the cupboard, but he heard the whisper of the axe coming at him again. as he threw himself to the left the blade whacked into the cupboard. The guns, knives, and all the rest of the deadly collection jumped off their hooks.

The woman was on him before he had time to right himself. The axe was flying at his face, and as Matthew tumbled backward the blade hissed past, nearly rendering him noseless. Before she could bring the axe back for another blow, Matthew reached for the stack of burlap bags, picked one up and whipped it into her eyes. a second whip of the bag sent her reeling, and then Matthew leaped forward and hit her, female or not, smack in the forehead with his fist.

Mrs. Sutch fell across a coil of rope, but she did not relinquish her hold on the axe. all Matthew wanted to do was get out, devil take the box and everything in it; he found this intent denied, however, as Mrs. Sutch heaved herself up from the ground and stood between him and the cellar door, her teeth gritted and the axe upraised.

"Noggin!" she shouted, loud enough to wake the widow Ford. "Come here!"

Matthew knew he was finished when Noggin came. He bent to pick up a length of chain, but the woman charged him once more. The axe flashed with lamplight. Matthew jerked his head back, and the blade thunked into the wall. Then Matthew grabbed hold of the axe and they fought for it, spinning each other around and around, banging into barrels and staggering back and forth across the cellar. Everything was blurred and chaotic, a mad nightmare, Mrs. Sutch kicking at his legs, spitting in his eyes and biting at his hands, he trying to pull the axe out of her iron grip.

Suddenly she shoved him hard against a wall. a knee came up and caught him square in the groin. Pain stole his breath and nearly crippled him. His legs sagged and he slid down. She stepped back to give herself room to bash his brains out, but before she could steady her legs to deliver the blow Matthew had scrambled away from her, almost on hands and knees. He found himself in the passageway that Noggin had come out of, and desperate to buy some time and find a weapon he half-ran, half-stumbled toward the lamplit room that had thrown such hideous shadows.

"Noggin!" she screamed, her throat shredding.

Matthew knew she'd be after him, Noggin or not. He flung himself into the chamber, fell onto his knees, and there through his pain-hazed vision saw the depth of Mrs. Sutch's pleasure.

Hanging from the ceiling beams in this dirt-walled room, along with a few blood-spattered lanterns, were a half-dozen chains each ending in a sharp iron hook about five feet off the floor. Items impaled on some of these hooks looked at first to be nothing more than marine creatures from the deep brought up in a fisherman's net: here twisted blue coils like an aquatic worm, there a gleaming mass like a crimson skate, here a grayish-purple fist-sized lump with cords dangling down like the tendrils of a jellyfish. Two buckets full of blood stood beneath a wooden trough, within which lay a ferrago of gore and matter that was best not too closely examined. The chamber's smell was also nautical, of sea brine and low tide. On the floor very near Matthew were, oddly enough, a pair of bare feet chopped off at the ankles, a pair of wrinkled hands and beside them the white-haired decapitated head of an elderly mermaid, her eyes half-open as if groggily awakening from sleep and her gray lips pressed tight to keep a secret.

The widow Ford had come to pieces in here. an extra bit of spice, to be added to the next batch of sausage.

Matthew stared at the hanging internals, which were swinging ever so slightly. He thought it was very economical that Mrs. Sutch used all the body as she did. all the organs, as well as the meat. Bone marrow too, most likely. Didn't want to get the nails into the mix, though. Or the teeth. The head was probably due to be cracked last, for the brains. Then everything into the pot along with the pork, and after the sausages were shaped and cased they went into the smokehouse. Very economical of her, very efficient.

He thought he could lose his mind, kneeling here before this altar of evil.

With a shriek of rage Mrs. Sutch hurtled into the room. She lifted her axe, and when it fell it cleaved deep into Matthew's head.

Or, rather, the head he'd picked up from the floor, which had belonged to the widow Ford and which Matthew had thrust up in front of his own to take the blow.

Mrs. Sutch saw she'd chopped the wrong head and began to try to fling it off the axeblade, but it was stuck tight. She beat the head against the floor, to no avail. Then she gave a scream of frustration, put her foot upon it and pushed, adding indignity to the sorry fate of the widow Ford. as Mrs. Sutch was so occupied, Matthew crawled to one of the buckets of blood and took hold of it. He struggled to his feet against the ache of his bruised stones and threw the gore full into her face.

Spitting blood that was not her own, her face, hair and the front of her gown streaming crimson, Mrs. Sutch dropped the axe and the head it was buried in. She staggered back into the passageway, her hands up to clear her eyes. For good measure Matthew flung the bucket at her, but she was already moving and the bucket only crashed into the wall where she'd been.

Matthew knew she wasn't done. He knew also that she'd gone to find something else to kill him with. He looked around and saw a second axe leaning against the trough, this one with a bloody blade. The handyman's tool. But where the hell was Noggini Matthew heard Mrs. Sutch shout for him again, her ragged voice carrying the high note of desperation. She knew, as well as Matthew did, that if Noggin wasn't here by now he wasn't coming.

Matthew picked up the axe. He turned to face the doorway, the pain at his groin forcing him into a crouch.

When Mrs. Sutch returned, her face a dripping bloodmask, she was gripping in each hand a knife from her collection.

"I don't want to kill you," Matthew said. He held the axe up.

If she feared the blade, she gave no sign of it. She feinted once, trying to get him to commit, but he stood his ground. "You're in your grave," she whispered, as her knives carved the air between them. "In your grave. Oh yes, in your grave." Her eyes were fixed upon his, both daring and taunting him. She shifted two steps to the left and then came back to the right. "In your grave," she repeated. "Yes, you are. In your-"

She leaped at him, the knives flashing.

Matthew had no time to think, only to react. Neither did he have time to aim. He just struck out with the axe, as Mrs. Sutch slashed at his face with one knife and at his throat with the other.

Before she could get to him, there was a crunching sound. Mrs. Sutch gave an animalish grunt and was flung away. She fell down in the wet red dirt. She blinked, her eyes wide with shock and perhaps more than a touch of madness. Then she began to try to get up once more, but her left arm was no longer a working part of her body.

"Stay down," he told her.

She was on her knees. She stared at the knife in her right hand, as if drawing strength from it. Then, shaking with either rage or pain, she got up on her feet.

"Don't," Matthew said, the axe ready again.

But he knew she was coming. She had passed beyond the human state, into a creature that must kill to survive. at that moment Matthew thought of the monster's tooth in McCaggers' attic. a supreme carnivore, McCaggers had said. Formed for the function of both destruction and survival.

Both she and Slaughter were of the same breed, Matthew thought. Formed for the same function. Kill or be killed.

He watched as she came toward him, but slowly now, with a terrible silence. The blade was thrust forward; the monster's tooth was seeking flesh. He retreated, brushing past the chains with their hanging pieces of meat.

She was now the full creation not of God, but of Professor Fell. Whatever the professor was, he had the power to take the raw clay of humanity and mold it into something monstrous.

The monster's tooth. Evidence of what God had told Job, about the behemoth and the leviathan.

God spoke to Job from the whirlwind, McCaggers had said. He told Job to gird up his loins like a man, and face what was to come.

I will demand of thee, He said.

Mrs. Sutch attacked with a sudden burst of speed and ferocity, her teeth gritted, her eyes wild in the bloody face, the knife seeking Matthew's heart.

Matthew swung the axe. Even as the blade tore into flesh and broke bone, Matthew was aware that the knife had pierced his waistcoat and shirt because he felt the point of the monster's tooth pressed against his skin, felt it poised to bite into his guts but quite suddenly its power was gone.

Mrs. Sutch had lost the knife, and she was falling backward. all of her head was no longer there. She fell into the chains and staggered against the trough and then slid down to the floor, where her body quivered and her legs shook in a hideous palsied dance.

Incredibly, she put her remaining good hand to the floor and looked to be trying to get up again, and she lifted her misshapen head toward him and gripped her fingers into the dirt in an attempt to crawl. The expression of pure, cold hatred on her face riveted Matthew.

It said, Don't think you've won, little man. Oh no for I am the least of what is ahead for you

She drew a terrible, shuddering breath, and then he saw her eyes cloud over and her face freeze. Her head pitched forward but her fingers dug deeper into the dirt-once, twice, and a third time-before they stilled. Her hand stayed twisted into a claw.

For a long time, Matthew could not move. Then, at last, the full impact that he had killed another person hit him, and he hobbled out of the cellar next to Noggin's wagon and threw up until he was just heaving and gasping, but never in all this distress did he let go of the axe.

Matthew unbuttoned his waistcoat and opened his shirt. The blade had given him a shallow bite across his ribs about two inches long, but it wasn't so bad. Not as bad as Mrs. Sutch had intended. His groin, though, was a more painful subject. He would think himself lucky if he could walk tomorrow.

But Slaughter was on his way to kill Nathaniel Powers. To settle an account for Professor Fell. Matthew thought he might have trouble walking tomorrow or the next day, but somehow he was going to have to gird up his loins enough to climb on his horse and ride to Nicholsburg, to find some help. It would be an unlucky farmer who answered his door tonight. First, though, there was a box in the cellar that needed to be opened.

after this mess was sorted out, he was going to have to ride south, to the Carolina colony, and get to Nathaniel Powers before Slaughter did.

Matthew leaned against the wagon, waiting for his head to clear and his nerves to settle. That might take a while. He looked at the empty coffin, and at the shovel lying there in the back.

Something was missing, he realized.

It was the damnedest thing.

Where was the pickaxei