“He was taken upstairs. I believe they’ve given him the room next to the doctor. Locked him in, of course.”

“Of course,” Matthew said. He frowned. “So … why are you here? Why didn’t one of the guards bring that?”

“I wished to speak with you.” She held the tray down at her side. Matthew tensed, thinking she could probably cut his throat with its narrow edge if she liked.

“Well, I do like speaking better than killing.” He took a sip of the Armagnac, found it good and strong and just what he needed for a shot of extra courage. Still, he kept retreating until his back was nearly wedged into a corner. “Speak,” he said. “I seem to be at your disposal.” Instantly he thought that was a very poor choice of words.

She nodded, and for a silent moment she just stared at him with the soft brown eyes that had so recently appeared intoxicated with murder.

“You,” she said, “are a total fool.”

“I bow before your appraisal.”

“I’m serious. Do you know how many men I have killed—slaughtered—in that pit?”

“I don’t wish to know, thank you.”

“You would have been number eight.”

“Must be my lucky number,” Matthew said. His next drink almost sapped the glass. He realized that if he pushed himself into the corner any further he would be stuck until the New Year.

“It comes upon me,” she continued. “I have to have it, as other woman must have … well, whatever they must have. I live in a different world, Matthew. My world … few would understand it.”

“Fine. As you say.” He wondered about the use of his name. She seemed awfully familiar to have been gutting two men and then climbing up his own body not too long ago.

“I was jarred out of my state tonight,” Elizabeth said. “My state, being my condition. I was jarred out of it, and I had to think of something to save your life … from myself … and from Samson and that thing who calls himself a cardinal.”

Matthew was taken aback. All he could think to say was, “Huh?”

She came toward him. Did he cringe? Probably so, but she came on anyway. And when she was almost in his face she peeled off the glove from her right hand and showed him the tattoo of a stylized eye within a black circle embossed between the thumb and the forefinger.

“When I climbed up on you,” Elizabeth said, “I saw the tattoo on your hand. You’re a Black-Eyed Broodie, the same as me.”

If God had not fixed Matthew’s teeth to the gums they might have fallen from his mouth at that instant, or his mouth opened in amazement so wide an army of flies might have gotten in, set up camp, and buzzed happily for the space of time it took Matthew to recover from this shock.