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"Very well, then" Matthew folded his hands before hi his tricorn on a hook and sat down ahis breakfast of eight eggs, four oily and glistening sausages, and six corncakes on a huge dark red platter to have paid him much attention "What&039;s the storyi"

Greathouse paused in his feasting to sip from his cup of tea, which was as hot and as black as could be coaxed from the kitchen of Sally almond&039;s tavern on Nassau Street

There could be no starker contrast between this esteemed establishht Whereas City Hall used to be the center of town, onewith a gray slate roof overhung by a huge oak tree-now clairow northward The tavern ar spices, smoked meats and freshly-baked pies The floorboards were kept meticulously swept, vases of fresh flowers stood about, and the large fieldstone fireplace was put to good use at the first autumn chill For breakfast, the midday meal and supper, Sally al locals and travelers alike, in soa gittern and singing in a light, airy and extreht, but had ceased near dawn Through a largethat overlooked the pedestrians, the passing wagons, carts and livestock on Nassau Street could be seen bea the clouds Directly across the street was the yellow brick boarding house of Mary Belovaire, where Greathouse was presently living until he found, as he put it, " was that Mada of a kind spirit, ont to o so far as to suggest they regularly attend church services, refrain froenerally coards the opposite sex all of which put Greathouse&039;s large white teeth on the grind The latest was that Mada to matchmake him with a nu, which in Greathouse&039;s opinionas a bowlful of calf&039;s-foot jelly So it was no wonder that Greathouse had taken to spending so at Nu on a cot up there in the company of a brandy bottle

But not to say either of them had been bored in the last feeeks Far fro such publicity in the Earwig, there&039;d been no lack of letters and visitors presenting proble irl and wished to prove himself worthy before her father, the chief; there&039;d been the bizarre and disturbing night ride, in which Matthew had determined that not all the creatures on God&039;s earth had been created by the hand of God; and there&039;d been the incident of the gaambler who&039;d had his prized horse cheated away fro of cutthroats For Greathouse&039;s part, there&039;d been his ordeal at the House at the Edge of the World that had so nearly cost him his life, and the eerie matter of the last will and testament of Dr Coffin

as Mrs Herrald had told Matthew at dinner one night, back in midsummer when she&039;d offered hiency her husband Richard had founded in London, You can be sure, Matthew, that the crireater Europe is looking in this direction, and has already seen the potential Whatever it ery, public and private theft, murder for hire Doain illicit profit I could give you a list of the names of individual criminals ill most likely be lured here at sos who concern round, that pulls the roup ofat dinner just as we are, but they hold carving knives over a map of the neorld and their appetites are ravenous

So true, Matthew thought He&039;d already coest knife, and soainst his neck

Greathouse put his cup down He said, "Zed is a ga"

Mattheas sure he hadn&039;t heard correctly "a gai"

"a ga," Greathouse answered His gaze ticked to one side "Here&039;s Evelyn"

Evelyn Shelton, one of the tavern&039;s taitresses, was approaching their table She had sparkling green eyes and blonde hair like a co instructress she was quite ni crowd Ivory and copper bracelets clicked and jingled on her wrists "Matthew!" she said with a wide sht, as he still couldn&039;t coa" was "Oh, I don&039;t know Do you have cracknel todayi"

"Fresh baked"

"You ed as he chewed into another of the links "Tell hih was like the ascending peal of glass bells "Oh, they&039;re spicy all right! But they go down the gullet so fast we can&039;t keep &039;em in stock! Only have &039;em a few days a et your order in!"

"I&039;ll leave the fiery spice to Mr Greathouse," Matthew decided "I&039;ll have the cracknel, a small bowl of rockahominy, some bacon and cider, thank you" He returned his attention across the table when the waitress had gone "What exactly is a gai"

"The Ga tribe Whew, this is hot!" He had to blot his forehead with his napkin "Dah Zed is a ht he ht be, when you first described to iven to soe Those deter as warriors" He drankfor he started iain "When I saw the scars for ht I think he handled the situation very competently, don&039;t youi"

"I think you could have been responsible for his death," Matthew said grimly "and ours, as well"

"Shothe finest hand-to-hand fighters in the world also, they have a reputation for being fearless If anything, Zed held hiht He could&039;ve broken the neck of every man in there and never raised a sweat"

"If that&039;s so," Matthew said, "then why is he a slavei I&039;d think such a fearless warrior would have resisted the slaver&039;s rope just a little bit"

"ah" Greathouse nodded and chewed "There you have a good point, which is exactly why I arranged with McCaggers to test hiers doesn&039;t knohat he&039;s got McCaggers wanted the biggest slave he could buy, to hting machine But I needed to know just what Zed could do, and it seemed to me that the Cock&039;a&039;tail was the place to do it in"

"and your reasoning why this fighting ht his way out of his predicamenti"

Greathouse ate a bite of corncake and tapped his fork quietly against the platter It was of interest to Matthew, as he waited for Greathouse to speak, that Sally alht all her plates and cups in that popular color called "Indian Blood" froun to experi his pottery shop Due to the ra twice the business it ever had

"What put him in his predicament, as you call it," Greathouse finally replied, "will probably always be unknown But I&039;d say that even one of the finest warriors in the world el, or trapped in a net and smothered down by six or seven men, or even have to ht escape the chains His people are fisherht have been caught on a boat, with nowhere to go I&039;d say he ive up the fight, and it was explained to him by some tender slaver that another body part would be the next sliced off all possibilities, but as I say we&039;ll likely never know"

"I&039;ers and run for it"

"Noould he want to do thati" Greathouse regarded Matthew as if he were looking at an ioi and ould the point bei Froers has been kind to hi his coiven the situation also, it shows that Zed is intelligent If he weren&039;t, I&039;d have no interest in him I wouldn&039;t have paid the money for Benjamin Owles to sew hi serious Greathouse had actually paid ers&039; slavei When he&039;d righted his senses, Matthew said, "Would you care to explain-as reasonably and rationally as possible-exactly why you have enough interest in Zed to entertain hiring hi that part of iti"

"No, you weren&039;t drea Here&039;s your breakfast"

Evelyn had arrived bearing a tray with Matthew&039;s food She also showed an ees and, below that, the legend &039;Sutch a Pleasure&039;, to the other patrons in the rooht a chorus of boos and jeers, though in good nature "We ought to be getting another shipment next month, which we&039;ll post on the board outside"

"a popular item," Matthew remarked as Evelyn put his platter down before hione until they see with their own eyes If this lady didn&039;t live so far away in Pennsylvania, I think Sally would go into business with her But, anyway," she shrugged, "it&039;s all in the spices anything else I can get for youi"

"No, this looks fine, thank you" When Evelyn retreated again and the hubbub died down, Matthew stared across the table into Greathouse&039;s eyes as the"You can&039;t actually be serious about hiring Zed"

"I&039;m absolutely serious and as I have the authority from Katherine to s into s into motioni What does that e, which he obviously intended to savor when he&039;d gone through his corncakes "First, the agency has to arrange to buy hiers"

"To buy himi"

"Yes, that&039;s what I said I swear, Matthew! aren&039;t you getting enough sleepi Don&039;t things get into your head the first tirin "Oh, ho! You&039;re up late tripping the hter, aren&039;t youi"

"absolutely not!"

"Well, you say one thing and your blush says another"

"Berry and I are friends," Matthew said, in what he realized was a very tight and careful voice "That&039;s all"

Greathouse grunted "I&039;d say two people running for their lives together across a vineyard either never want to see each other again or becoht her up"

"Mei I didn&039;t bring her up!" For emphasis, he crunched his teeth down on a piece of the cracknel

"She figures in ers, and I want to petition Lord Cornbury for a writ declaring Zed a freed man"

"a free-" Matthew stopped himself, for surely he did feel a bit thick-headed today "and I suppose McCaggers will gladly sell you the slave he depends upon to do such a vital worki"

"I haven&039;t yet approached McCaggers with this idea Now bear with ain he reached for the tea When that didn&039;t do the trick, he plucked up Matthew&039;s cider and drank half of it "That jingo business you went out on Walking into that den of thieves, and casting yourself as a foppish gah, but you really put yourself in danger there, Matthew, and don&039;t pretend you didn&039;t If I&039;d known you were accepting a task like that, I&039;d have gone with you"

"You were fully occupied elsewhere," Matthew said, referring to the problem of Dr Coffin that had taken Greathouse across the river to New Jersey "and as I interpret the scope of my profession, I am free to accept or reject clients without your approval"

"Exactly so Which is why you need soers a fee to allow Zed to dress up in the suit I bought for him and to come to the Cock&039;a&039;tail I told hier, which is true when you consider what he can do"

"But you didn&039;t knoas true He had yet to prove himself" Matthew returned to the state his cracknell "Souardi"