Nack chose that moment to make a rumbling in his throat that Lillehorne took as mocking humor, and when Lillehorne darted his own black eyes of brooding at Nack, the other man quickly pretended to be examining some small clean spot on his fingernails.

“Mind yourself,” Lillehorne ordered, and then he returned to the last paragraph of this distasteful open letter: “Therefore this publication no longer aspires to encourage these absent lawmen to action, but instead aspires to encourage the average hardworking and lawful citizens of this great city to action, by storming the Old Bailey by force if need be to jolt these mindless sops from their paid sleep. We suggest that citizens band together to demand that justice be done, or else that our Parliament clean out every existing so-called officer of the law from their nooks, crannies, caves and hammocks and send them to the mattresses they may occupy in the quiet confines of their homes, where they will no longer be bothered by the demands of an occupation and no longer be rewarded with public funds for a job undone. Signed yours sincerely, Lord Puffery.”

“How about that?” said a heavy-set gent at the next table, who had been leaning in Lillehorne’s direction to overhear and whose own copy of the Pin was spread out before him. “Strong words, eh? And it’s about time, I’d say! What’s your opinion?”

Lillehorne’s face quivered as if he’d been slapped. His teeth were clenched. He felt Nack watching him like a dirty cat watching a writhing mouse.

Lillehorne unclenched his teeth. “My opinion is … it’s about time,” he replied, and the man nodded, thumped a fist upon his Pin as if to drive the point even further home and returned to his coffee and the conversation he’d been having with his tablemate.

“Don’t speak,” Lillehorne said to Nack, before the other could get that mouth working. Nack consented to draw at his coffee, making a noise like the dragging of a chain across a wet stone floor.

“Well,” Lillehorne went on, with a carefully lowered voice, after a pause in which he squared his shoulders and jutted his chin toward the ceiling, “now I know why Master Constable Patterson was in such a black mood this afternoon. He must’ve gotten hold of a Pin earlier on and been pricked by it. But the constables can’t be everywhere! Anyway … they’re hated in Whitechapel! The last one assigned there was found beaten to death and stuffed in a rain barrel, so what do the people expect? There can be no law when the people of a district don’t wish it and actually fight against it! All right … yes, that gang massacre was a gruesome thing … those eyeballs gouged out, and put into a bottle … and the Devil’s Cross carved into the foreheads … yes, one might say it was demonically-inspired, but we as men of the law don’t fear grappling with these criminals! It is a matter of rooting them out of their holes! No, we don’t fear them … not a bit, and it is unfair of Lord Puffery to make that false assertion!” His next swallow of coffee drained the cup. “False!” he hissed at Nack across the table. “Do you hear? Utterly false!”