Freedom of the Mask Read online

  “Nothing else,” Hudson said.

  “Good day, then,” she told him. He reasoned that even the hint of concern for Matthew’s welfare from her was beyond the pale.

  He nodded and started to turn away, and she was in the process of closing the door when she paused and said, in the same frosty tone, “When you find Mr. Corbett, you may tell him that Ashton and I are discussing marriage.”

  “Fine,” Hudson answered, turning again to give her the full view of an expression that looked as if he’d been chewing lemons. “I’m sure you’ll be very happy, living up there amid all those—”

  The door closed, firmly.

  “—skeletons,” Hudson finished.

  Surely, he thought as he strode back toward the Trot Then Gallop to wait for its owner, Felix Sudbury, to show up for the morning sweep, that girl would not be happy married to the coroner. Why Matthew had let her get away, he had no clue. Of course, in Matthew’s line of work…there was much danger, particularly with this business of Professor Fell. And there the blade of truth pierced his heart afresh, because he had pushed Matthew into this damned trip. It came to him that Sally Almond’s would be opening sooner with its breakfast offerings, so that might be a place first to ask if anyone had heard from Matthew and also to feed his own appetite; a pity the kitchen couldn’t get anymore of Mrs. Sutch’s spicy sausages, but the only constant in this world was change.

  Now, on this August morning in Charles Town, Hudson advanced along Front Street to where the crushed oyster-shells underfoot gave way to a more civilized pattern of white-and-gray stones, indicating a city that intended to improve its position among the colonies. Palm trees and palmetto bushes as well as trimmed hedges stood about, casting welcome shade. Carriages were on the roll, and as yet the horse-droppings on the street were not too bad. Hudson saw that some of the shops were already open, though it was yet early, and well-dressed figures of men and women under their parasols strolled along the sidewalk.

  The Carringtons’ inn was a two-storied house, very neatly kept and painted white with a dark green trim. Hudson entered through the front gate and went up three steps into the house, where he found both the man and his wife drinking tea in a parlor while they went over figures in a logbook.

  To the question from the bewigged and nattily-dressed Mr. Carrington about how their new arrival could be helped, Hudson said, “I’m looking for a friend of mine. His name is Matthew Corbett. He might have stayed here—”

  “Oh yes,” said Mrs. Carrington, who turned a few pages back in the hide-bound book and showed Matthew’s familiar signature to Hudson. “He did stay here, in late June. He attended the Sword Of Damocles Ball. You say…he was a friend of yours?”

  “Yes.” Hudson did not like the sound of that word was.

  “A pity, then,” said Mr. Carrington. “To perish at such a young age.”

  “Perish,” Hudson repeated, and suddenly felt very cold on this nearly tropical day. “Trace back a ways,” he said, his voice tight. “What happened to him?”

  “He became involved in the murder of Mr. Kincannon’s daughter Sarah,” said the woman. “At the Green Sea plantation. Oh, that was a terrible thing. People so loved Sarah.”

  “Matthew is also held in high regard in New York. Please…about Matthew…go on.”

  “Oh, yes. Well…sorry to say, the young man lost his life in the swamp up the Solstice River. But justice was done, I can tell you that. Your young friend discovered Sarah’s proper killer and pursued him—I should say, pursued the both of those villains—though he paid for that the ultimate price.”

  Somehow, Hudson found himself sitting in an overstuffed chair though he had no recollection of doing so. Through a window he could see the ships in the harbor, and in this unobstructed view he made out a group of hagglers at the dock trying to coax money from the well-to-do with a monkey that was turning flips.

  “Would you like half of a griddle cake?” Mrs. Carrington offered. “I fear it’s all we have left this morning. We’ve had a full house these last few days.”

  “No,” said Hudson, who felt a weariness crash upon him as if he had been hit by the most vicious wave of the sea. “Thank you,” he added. He thought he might sit here until the next call for breakfast, but the idea of spending a night in the inn that was Matthew’s last residence on this earth…no. Think! he told himself. I’m missing something! Think, for God’s sake! His brain, alas, was a pit of sludge. But then he got his mind and his mouth working together, somewhat, and he asked quietly, “Where is he buried?”

  “A thousand pardons, as we’re a Christian town, and also our deepest sympathies,” said the man of the mansion. “Mr. Corbett was not buried, as his body unfortunately was never recovered.”

  “Never recovered?” Hudson sat up a little straighter in his chair. “Then how are you sure he’s dead?”

  “Well sir, he did not return from the Solstice River swamp. He did not bring his rented horse back to the stable, nor did he settle his bill with us. Those particulars were taken care of by Mr. Magnus Muldoon. It was from him we learned of the young man’s regrettable passing.”

  Hudson stood up; he no longer had need for a chair when there was urgent travelling to be done. “This Muldoon fellow. Where can I find him?”

  So it was that Hudson’s large, scuffed boots took him nearly the length of Front Street, to a small shop with a front window adorned by the declaration Items Of Interest, Magnus Muldoon, Glassblower. In that window was a display of several cunningly-shaped, multi-colored bottles, along with what appeared to be small glass figures—a horse and rider, an intricate sailing ship, a tree stylized to appear blown by a restless wind. Hudson wasn’t particularly impressed by so-called artistic talent, believing such to be an outlet only for a weak mind. He saw no one in the shop through the window, and he imagined this Muldoon person to be a prancer. He was about to turn the knob of the shop’s door when he heard whisperings behind him and he looked around to see two very lovely young creatures, one in pink and the other in violet, standing under their lacy parasols. Miss Pink was whispering behind her hand to Miss Violet, who was staring with excited eyes in Hudson’s direction.

  Even on so terrible a day as this a little of the bawdy cocksman awakened, and though Hudson had no time for these playthings it was a gratitude to know he was still—

  But the two young women came nearer, and they peered through the window as if the Great One was himself made of glass yet inconsequential to their attentions, and Miss Violet said to Miss Pink, “Do you see him? Is he there?”

  “No,” said Miss Pink, “I don’t see him. I can’t bear to go in, I’d be all nervous shakes. Let’s try later, Fran.” And without giving the visitor from New York a second—or even a first—glance the chattering pair of Charles Town daisies moved on with a wiggle and a giggle and left Hudson thinking how shallow was this new generation of female, and thank God he was long past their like.

  Hudson entered the shop, causing a bell to ring over the door. It wasn’t a high-pitched little feminine ring, either; the bell that hung above his head was nearly the size of his head, and let out a coppery clang that he figured told the Carringtons at the other end of the street he’d arrived at his destination.

  It wasn’t ten seconds before a pair of curtains behind the counter parted to give way to a man who Hudson realized was certainly larger than himself, not in terms of bulk but in terms of height, shoulder-size, and—damn!—the prancer was a giant. He had a thick but neatly-combed mane of black hair, a sharp nose and a square chin that looked as sturdy as a warship’s prow. Hudson figured him to be twenty-five or twenty-six years of age, surely this side of thirty. He was a handsome specimen, to be sure, and he was dressed simply in a plain white shirt and dark blue breeches.

  “Help you?” The deep and rather rough-edged voice was polite but matter-of-fact.

  “Muldoon?”

  “Yep.” The man’s iron-gray eyes took on a glint of curiosity. “And who be you?”
r />   “My name is Hudson Greathouse. I was…am a friend of Matthew Corbett.” He saw Muldoon’s expression darken, and it appeared the glassblower had flinched just a fraction when that name was mentioned. Hudson braced himself for trouble, already trying to determine where to hit the man to put him down, if need be. Not that chin, unless he craved a broken fist. “I’ve come from New York and I’m not leaving here until I hear every word about what happened…and you’d better make it good.”

  Muldoon didn’t answer for a few seconds. He stared into Hudson’s eyes, as if gauging the other man, and then looked at his own hands that gripped the counter’s edge. “Ah,” he said at last, in a quiet tone. “Figured it was a matter of time ’fore somebody came lookin’ for him.” He lifted his gaze to meet Hudson’s. “Who sent you here? The stablemaster or the Carringtons?”

  “The Carringtons.”

  “Yep, I settled Matthew’s account with ’em. You in the same line of work as he was?”

  “What work would that be?”

  Muldoon’s mouth crooked just a bit in a smile. “Stickin’ your nose in where it don’t belong. Oh, I ain’t down on that, mister. I know Matthew came to that ball with Pandora Almighty Prisskitt on account of me. But then…he come to see me, to make me—can you bear this?—into a gentleman. Like he was, and indeed he was quite the gentleman. Well, I’ve got a ways to go but he started me off.” Muldoon cast an appreciative eye around the shop with its colorful items of interest. “Makin’ some good money now. My Pap would never have believed such a thing possible, not in this town.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” said Hudson, “but I figure you’re going to sooner or later get to what happened to Matthew. I’m ready to hear that now.”

  The giant nodded. His smile was gone, and his eyes were sad. “All right, then. Pull up a chair.” He motioned toward one on the other side of the counter. “It’ll take me a spell to tell it. How Matthew died, I mean.”

  Hudson considered standing, but he realized that he would probably need to sit to hear this tragedy, lest he fall upon the telling of it. He drew the chair over and sat down, and with a heavy heart and an ache somewhere south of his conscience he waited for Muldoon to lay out the wretched tale. If the man was lying for any reason he would soon know it, and giant or not there would be some shattered glass and broken bones in this damned place today.

  “It started with a duel at the ball,” Muldoon began, “and it ended in a boat in the Solstice River swamp. ’Twixt those two things…that’s the hell of it.”

  Hudson said nothing; he had decided to let the man take his own time in recalling this descent into the underworld…or perhaps, he wished to delay as long as possible the details—which he had to know—about the death of a young man who he would have been proud, in some other time and place, to have called his son.

  Two

  I STILL can’t believe,” Hudson said as he brushed a swirl of mosquitoes away from his face, “that you didn’t go into her house. How could you put faith in a demented girl?”

  “Like I said five or six times now,” Muldoon retorted, with a definite air of irritation, “she invited me in but I reckoned it best to let her grieve in private. I had no reason to think that Matthew was in there. Why should I? And if he was inside, why would he stay? If she invited me in, she wasn’t tryin’ to hide nothin’. That makes not a shillin’ of sense.”

  Hudson grunted and concentrated on guiding his stable-rented horse, Helios, along this rough track that served as a road edging the Solstice River swamp. He would not add fuel to a slow-burning fire by pointing out that the difference between a glassblower and a professional problem-solver was just this: the glass-blower might make pretty bottles and have empty-headed little pipsqueaks peeking in his window, but the professional looked at a problem from all angles and considered that what made not a shilling of sense to some was the first sensible thing to have done. This insane girl, Quinn Tate by name, who lived in the swamptown of Rotbottom was, according to Muldoon, the last person to see Matthew alive. She fancied in her madness that Matthew was the second-life of her dead husband Daniel, this according to the young giant as well. It didn’t take the intellect of a giant to suspect that something might be amiss…to hell with the idea of Matthew falling into the river and being torn to pieces by alligators. To hell with it!

  Then again…Muldoon had a point. If Matthew was indeed in Quinn Tate’s house, then why had he stayed there?

  Well…they’d soon find out.

  The afternoon’s heat had finally reached full sweltering blast. Before they’d started out from Charles Town on a trip that had necessitated crossing the Solstice by ferryboat to reach this backwoods road, Hudson had had the presence of mind to buy a broad-brimmed straw hat similar to the one Muldoon wore to save his brains from being boiled. He could smell the fetid, green and nostril-assaulting odor of the swamp, and how anyone could live out here nose-to-arse with this huge steaming pile of God’s torment he had no earthly idea. Then again, he recalled those wretches—“opportunistic individuals”, Matthew might have corrected him—selling their alligator hides at the harbor, and someone had to be out here catching the beasts to make a paltry profit. No alligator had yet lumbered across the track, but Hudson had seen a number of brown and black snakes hanging from tree branches or curled up on rocks to heat their blood, and he had decided that when he found the boy some punishment was in order for making him pass this way. Taking care of his laundry for a month might do it…yes, that would serve the purpose…clean laundry in exchange for this dirty job of extricating Matthew from whatever hole he’d gotten himself down.

  Muldoon glanced back at Hudson, his own horse being a few strides ahead. “I did row out past Rotbottom a few times to try to find…” He paused, measuring his words. “Anythin’ that might remain,” he said. “I didn’t want to believe he was dead. Just like you’re not wantin’ to believe it now.”

  “Show me the body,” came the terse reply. “When I see that, I’ll know for sure.”

  “The ’gators grow big up in here. They don’t leave a lot to be—”

  “Just guide,” Hudson interrupted, and again he had to brush a maddening swarm of mosquitoes out of his face. God’s mercy that he wouldn’t be laid low with the fever after this. Maybe two months of laundry duty would be more equitable.

  The two riders passed on under the burning sun, each taken with their own thoughts. Another hour and more swarms of countless mosquitoes later, the first rude hovels of Rotbottom came into view; that and the odor of alligator hides drying in the heat wafted forth, which made Hudson appreciate the horse-fig-dappled streets of New York as being akin to the perfumed gardens of paradise.

  Magnus recalled which house belonged to Quinn Tate, and he aimed them in that direction. It was amid other small ramshackle wooden cabins of its like planted on the swampy earth, though he remembered that it did stand out for its relative cleanliness and order; the Tate girl might be addled, but it appeared she was proud of her home. As he and Hudson approached the house on their horses, they attracted the attention of a few raggedy residents who were repairing nets, chopping wood, cleaning fish and other chores of import. A wizened old white-haired woman who sat on her porch with a corncob pipe between her teeth and a little brown jug at hand hollered a greeting to them in a voice stolen from a bullfrog, and when Magnus nodded in response she lifted her jug and swilled from it as if she needed any further excuse to drink firewater on a day when the trees themselves might burst into flame.

  Dogs came up barking like little pistols going off and rattled the horses until a thin man with a gray beard down to his bellyhole ran the canines away with foul-yelled oaths and the thrusts of a wooden pitchfork. Hudson had seen poor villages before, but this place was the poorest. He thought that even the meager bits of paint that clung to the wooden walls looked sad, and the garments hanging from their lines to dry were more patches than clothing. A few horses drooped around, trying to find grass on the tr
ampled ground. Chickens roamed the yards, pigs lay in their stuporous slumbers, a couple of goats butted heads over some affront, and everywhere the smell of alligator carcasses freighted the air like heavy smoke. Hudson was beginning to grasp what Muldoon had been telling him; why in the world would Matthew stay in a place like this, if indeed he was still alive?

  It was a mystery, but he couldn’t allow himself to drift in that direction. If Quinn Tate was the last person to see Matthew alive, then she had questions to answer and Hudson by God was going to make sure no stone was left unturned, or in this case no rotten bottom left unexposed.

  A woman was sweeping the porch of the house they were approaching. Her back was to them as she labored, and she wore around her head a sweat-stained blue wrapping-cloth. She was a small woman, finely-boned, but she worked with fierce intensity as if she had until sundown to live. It was all Hudson could do not to call to her, to blurt out his question of Where is my friend Matthew. But suddenly she must have heard the crunch of horse hooves on the earth or sensed herself being examined, for she turned toward the two new arrivals and was content for the moment to lean on her broom and watch them coming.

  “That’s her?” Hudson asked.

  “No,” said Magnus, “it ain’t.” He was puzzled at this, and caught a new puzzlement: the one time he’d been out here, all the windows of the house were shuttered tight. Now they were not.

  A heavy-set man with a bald pate and a reddish-brown beard emerged from the house, either to speak to the woman or he’d seen the riders through a window. He planted his hands on his wide hips and said as the two men neared, “Afternoon! You lookin’ to buy skins? Got some fine-grained ones bein’ cured, make a few pairs of sturdy boots fit for gentlemen like y’selves.”

  “Not in the market for that,” said Hudson as he reined his horse in just short of the porch steps. He aimed his stare at the woman, who had a hatchet-blade chin and eyes that made him think of an angry dog tensing itself to leap, snapping, at a man’s throat. “I’m looking for Quinn Tate.”