I slid off the bench and opened the door.

Izra stood outside hugging a basket to his chest, his bottom lip wobbling. “Biscuits for you, madam?”

Behind him, holding a ship’s lantern against the darkness, stood Tom Hackett.

I lurched back and shut the door. Hackett caught it and pushed it wider. “A word, if you please, Miss Coates.” He turned to Izra. “I owe the lady an apology myself, Izra, so you can go.” Izra stared up, terrified. “En’t nothing to be afeared of, boy. I en’t hurting her. Now go on, you little rat. Go.”

“Yes, sir.” Izra set the basket down and ran off.

Hackett bolted the door behind him and strode right at me. I scurried back, back, back, digging furiously for the letter opener. My hand found the broken watch instead—but Hackett walked past me. He set the lantern on the table and kept going, stopping before the little door.

“Lane?” He pounded on it. “Say something, Lane, and lemme hear you.”

“I’m here,” came the reply.

I’d been right earlier—someone was behind that door.

“Yes, you are,” said Hackett. “Now listen close and listen good, ’cause you’re about to hear some things you’re never to speak of. Never, you mark me?”

This was it—my worst fear. Hot saliva rushed into my mouth as I recalled Sewel’s strength the night I’d left West End. His weight and bruising hands.

“Hackett.” The cuddy door shook on its hinges. “On my soul, Hackett, if you—”

“I’ll say it once more, Lane, and once only. Shut your gan and keep it shut. Only way this worsens is if you cause it to.” Hackett listened a moment, nodding when he heard silence, then turned back to me. “Well, well. Here we are.” His eyes dropped to my hand. “What’s that, a letter slicer? We got no need for it. I can’t read.”

“It’s sharp.” My disused voice sounded high as a whistle. “Sharper than it looks.”

“So am I.” He grinned. “And how surprised I am to learn you en’t mute after all.”

Moonlight lit a dark bruise beneath his left eye and showed the swollen bridge of his nose. I remembered how savagely he’d fought. If Lane had barely fended him off, what chance did I have?

“What do you want from me?” I glanced at the cabin door.

“Now, now. Quick as you might be, you en’t quick enough. And I’ll get to what I want; that you can count on.” He moved to the window and crossed his arms, gazing outside. “You know, I thought it a miracle when I first heard it from the hands. Miss Coates—alive!” He shook his head. “Amazing. Just amazing. Then I see her drop on the main deck in the bosun’s chair and I says to myself, I says, what the devil? I seen Nathaniel Coates’s pretty daughter before and that en’t her. I nearly said something, but then I got wondering…who is that tiny little peck of salt?” He turned to me. “And why’s she pretending to be Miss Coates?”