“Why do you have this?” Pin’s voice came out as a whisper, then a shout. “Why do you have this?”

“Give me that!” Henry tried to snatch it from her. “It’s mine, you thieving bastard!”

“Why do you have this? Tell me!” People turned to stare, and she lowered her voice. “This is—”

She stopped before she said, This is my sister. “This is someone you don’t even know. What are you—”

He grabbed the paper. It tore in two as Henry burst into a string of violent epithets. She punched his arm, hissing, “Shut up!”

To her relief he did. His hands shook as he fumbled with the scrap, trying to stuff it back into the wallet. When he started to walk away, Pin grabbed him.

“Why do you have that? Do you know something? Did you hurt her?”

“No!” Henry shouted, and more people stopped to stare.

Pin fought to keep her voice low as again she hissed, “Shut up!” She kept hold of Henry’s arm, and after a few seconds the rubberneckers moved on. “I could go back to the police,” she continued. “They asked me about you, I—”

He yanked his arm free, his eyes wild. “She was very brave, all of the girl rebels are brave! They fight tirelessly—I have seen them!”

“Abriana—have you seen her?”

His face twisted with fury but also terror. “No! Only Annie Aronburg. And Elsie,” he babbled. “But no, not Elsie!”

“What are you talking about? Elsie? Do you mean Elsie Paroubek? Did you know her?”

“Elsie?” He blinked, staring at Pin, and his face crumpled. “We were great friends, you know,” he whispered. “Very great friends. We fought together against the generals.”

“What generals?”

He didn’t answer, and Pin’s neck prickled. She’d been almost ten when Elsie Paroubek had gone missing, but she remembered the photo that accompanied endless articles about the five-year-old girl in her coat with the fur collar.

The little girl is described as having long curly golden hair, blue eyes and pink chubby cheeks, with a prominent dimple in each. At the time she disappeared she wore a red hat, a red dress, black stockings and high top black boots.

She stared at Henry, sweat trickling into her eyes.

He knew something. He’d done something—that’s why he watched children all the time, why he had pictures of little girls stuffed in his pocket. Abriana, Elsie Paroubek—the realization that she’d been talking to the man who might have murdered her sister made her stomach turn. She clapped a hand to her mouth, trying not to be sick, breathed deeply through her nose until she felt calmer.

It might not be true. If he had killed the girl in Hell Gate, would he have had time to run from there, then find her? She didn’t think so.

Yet why would he even want to find Pin?