Silas scowled and gestured scornfully. “Do you see what I saved you from, Bennet?”

“Saved me?” His son opened his mouth as if laughing, but no sound came out. “Saved me how? By bringing me to this mausoleum? By putting me in the tender care of your bitch of a wife? A woman who must have felt the sting of her humiliation every single time she looked at me? By favoring me over Thomas so there was no way we would ever have a normal relationship?” Bennet was shouting hoarsely now. “By banishing Harry, my brother? God! Tell me, Father, how exactly have you saved me?”

“You walk out that door, boy, and I’ll never welcome you back, heir or no.” The pain in his chest was back again. Silas rubbed his breastbone. “You’ll get no more money, no more help from me. You’ll starve in a ditch.”

“Fine.” Bennet turned away. “Harry, Will is in the kitchen. I can have my bags packed in a half hour.”

His son walked away from him.

“I’ve killed for you, boy.” Damn it, he would not go groveling after his own son.

Bennet turned, a look of mingled horror and loathing on his face. “You what?”

“Murdered for you.” Silas thought he bellowed, but the words weren’t as loud as before.

“Jesus Christ. Did he say he murdered someone?” Bennet’s voice seemed to float around him.

The pain in his chest had spread and become a fire burning through to his back. Silas staggered. Tried to grab a chair and fell, toppling the chair next to him. He lay on his side and felt the flames licking hungrily down his arm and over his shoulder. He smelled ashes from his son’s body and piss from his own.

“Help me.” His voice was a thin trickle.

Someone stood over him. Boots filled his vision.

“Help me.”

Then Pye’s face was in front of his own. “You killed Mistress Pollard, didn’t you, Granville? That’s who you murdered. Janie Crumb never had the strength to feed another woman poison.”

“Oh, my God,” Bennet whispered in his ruined voice.

Bile suddenly filled Silas’s throat, and he heaved, choking on the contents of his own stomach. The carpet wool chafed his cheek as he convulsed.

Dimly, Silas saw Pye step aside, avoiding the pool of vomit.

Help me.

Harry Pye’s green eyes seemed to bore into him. “I never begged for mercy when you had me beaten. Do you know why?”

Silas shook his head.

“It wasn’t pride or bravery,” he heard Pye say.

The fire crawled up into his throat. The room was going dark.

“My da begged you for mercy when you had him horsewhipped. You ignored him. There is no mercy in you.”

Silas choked, coughing on hot coals.

“He’s dead,” someone said.

But by that time, the fire had reached Silas’s eyes and he no longer cared.