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Back The Ninth Daughter
Chapters (37)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. Six
  10. Seven
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Sixteen
  20. Seventeen
  21. Eighteen
  22. Nineteen
  23. Twenty
  24. Twenty-one
  25. Twenty-two
  26. Twenty-three
  27. Twenty-four
  28. Twenty-five
  29. Twenty-six
  30. Twenty-seven
  31. Twenty-eight
  32. Twenty-nine
  33. Thirty
  34. Thirty-one
  35. Thirty-two
  36. Thirty-three
  37. Thirty-four

“Yes, m’am.” The boy nodded again. “If they get word of someone asking, they’ll move what they’re doing away from there, won’t they? Like if they’re meeting with Tory agents, or sending out signals to the British . . . And then you won’t know where to start looking again. Is that it?”

“Something like that,” said Abigail. “But it isn’t Tory agents or signals to the British. And you mustn’t say that, or anything else, to anyone. If I’m wrong, you know how terribly gossip can hurt someone, even if the gossip isn’t true.”

The boy’s face changed again, anger this time, and hurt. “I know that, m’am,” he said quietly. “Ma had a hired girl, and she was not doing anything wrong, but the mother of one of the young men on our street took against her, and started stories—it was terrible, m’am. The old witch! And everyone in the church believed her, just ’cause she was the pastor’s wife! It got so bad, our girl had to go away.”

“Well, I don’t know if what I think is going on is really true or not. That’s why I need someone trustworthy to find out for me. So you must speak of this only to me. Furthermore, I don’t know who’s behind all this, so I don’t know who’s likely to tell on you—and me—if anyone suspects they’re being asked about.”

“Would they kill us?” He could not have been more thrilled had she told him he was in line for the crown of Great Britain.

“They would get you turned out of your apprenticeship without a character,” said Abigail severely, and picked up her market basket again, with its brimming load of turnips and fish. “In which case your father would kill you—and me as well.” She hesitated, not wanting to add to the drama of the occasion but unable to put from her mind the smell of the blood in Rebecca Malvern’s kitchen, or the sight of a small black cat cleaning itself with the stump of a cut-off paw. “The fact is, Shim—the person who’s behind this . . . I don’t know what he’s likely to do, to protect himself. So I want you to be very careful. Don’t take any chances. All right?”

“All right, m’am.” Had it been evening, he would have glowed in the dark.

“Cross your heart?”

“Cross my heart.” The boy did. “I’m true-blue, and will never stain.”

“I would not have asked you”—Abigail smiled, handing him a halfpenny she had saved from her grocery money—“if I thought you were anything else.”