Her entire body seemed to Matthew to have shrunken, to have withered, as if the Nashes in their will to fit Berry into the clothes and identity of their deceased daughter had actually done a witchcraft on her, reshaping her to suit a moldy mode. He could hardly stand to look at her; he felt the need to either strike at Nash or get out the door and vomit in the yard, but he did none of those things. He simply sat and endured the sight, as Firebaugh took from the pocket of his coat a small black leather pouch he’d procured from the hospital on Lionfish Street not far from Matthew’s house.

Firebaugh unbuttoned the pouch and out of it brought a small brown bottle and an eyedropper. He opened the bottle, as the false Mary Lynn Nash grinned at some errant thought slipping through the dazed mind and worked her fingers together, back and forth as if trying to solve some puzzle that had no solution. Firebaugh put the eyedropper in the bottle, drew out clear liquid, and said to the young woman in the effigy of a lost child, “Open your mouth, please.”

She just grinned and worked her fingers. The horrible dead eyes of the painted doll stared through him.

“Your mouth, please,” Firebaugh repeated. He tapped her chin. She reached up and tapped her own as if this were the grandest game on earth.

“Mary Lynn?” Nash’s voice might have issued from a tomb. “Open your mouth for the man.”

She blinked, opened her mouth … closed it … opened it again, and silver threads of saliva drooled out.

At that point Matthew had to lower his head.

“Tongue out,” said Firebaugh. When this was not obeyed, Firebaugh said, “Tell her, please,” to the mayor.

Nash did. Her tongue flicked out and in a few times. Firebaugh was able to put upon her tongue a few drops of the liquid. Then he sat back as the white-powdered face frowned and she said, “Nassssteeee” as someone with half a brain and tied to an iron bar in a madhouse might speak it.

“The cure?” Matthew asked.

“Not yet,” Firebaugh said. “A test to see what cure is needed. There are conflicting formulas in the book. I must be sure before we begin.”

In the tavern yesterday, as Matthew put down a meal of vegetable stew, fried corn, turnips and biscuits washed into his belly with good strong ale, Hudson had sat across from him at the table and said, “An interesting tattoo on your hand. I think I’ve missed a lot.”

“This tattoo saved my life. I’ll tell you about it when it’s no longer so pressing in my nightmares.” He had paused in his copious consumption. “I met someone who knows you, by the name of Gideon Lancer.”

“Giddy? You met him? Well, that’s a shot to the head! I understood he became the sheriff in some little hamlet.”