“Of course. If you can find anything in them to help, you are welcome.” Outside the thick, uneven glass of the ill-leaded window a horse and wagon could be discerned, drawing up in the yard. A moment later a boy and a young man strode in, halted uncertainly when they saw Abigail, then went to the cold corner of the big room where all this time the youthful Goodwife Moore had been chopping and mixing the meat and fat of what was clearly a recently slaughtered pig for sausage. The murmur of their voices joined the whirr of the spinning wheel, the drifting smell of sage, as a sort of background scrim, a reminder to Abigail of her own duties and children neglected at home while she wandered to and fro in the world. Now she is without, now in the streets . . . Catherine took up her sewing again.

“Did she ever write to you about politics? About her political friends?”

“Not in so many words, no.” Catherine’s breath went out of her in a sigh. “I knew—Well, you know what a poison that was, between Mr. Malvern and her. Myself . . .” She shrugged. “I’m as loyal as the next woman, I suppose, but it strikes me as only reasonable, that the King nor Parliament neither can understand what goes on here, and what we need. But that’s a matter of men of education, men who’re trained to it, not for a plain woman—and not meaning disrespect, not for a lady who’s trying to get on with her husband, and build a home for him and his children. But she never would see it that way. And as time went on, and Miss Tamar told lies about her to divide her from her husband, it was a refuge to her, though it only made the situation worse.”

Sadly, she shook her head, and Abigail pursed her lips and reminded herself that an indignant demand about whether men who made their money out of Crown offices were more to be trusted in government than the plain men and plain women whose pockets were picked by those trained and educated gentlemen, would only lead the discussion far astray. She asked instead, “Did she speak about the Sons of Liberty?”

“I knew she was thick with them.” The maidservant sounded grieved. “I feared . . . But surely,” she said, looking up from her needle, “surely not one of them would have caused her harm, no matter how heated this politics got. ’Tis only politics, when all’s said.”

No, Abigail thought. It isn’t politics. She recalled things Rebecca had told her, things Cousin Sam had said. A man probably wouldn’t kill over politics, but he would kill to protect himself, if there were treason in the wind.

A reasonable man, she corrected herself. The man who wielded that knife was no reasonable man.