Free Bone Rattler by Eliot Pattison Page A

was meant for us?” Woolford’s voice had lost all its confidence. He leaned forward, suddenly and intensely interested.
    Arnold slowly turned to stare at Woolford, whose reaction seemed to have taken him by surprise.
    “How many in the Company have been in the New World before?” Duncan asked. Arnold pulled Duncan’s quill from his reach, as if reconsidering his offer.
    “Why?” the army officer asked.

    “The ritual. Some of it was from the Old World. Some of it, I believe, was not. How many, other than Adam Munroe?”
    Woolford studied Duncan intently, but did not reply.
    “Surely it would have occurred to you, Lieutenant,” Duncan continued, “that Adam Munroe’s death, Professor Evering’s death, the ritual, even the plunge of that poor girl into the sea, all of these events happened only after your trunk was looted. It became the Pandora’s box of the Company. What did it have in it from America?” Duncan saw not anger but deep surprise flash in Woolford’s eyes, quickly replaced by something that may have been worry. The officer stood, circled the table once, then gestured Duncan toward the ladder.
    Five minutes later they were in a forward hold, a dim narrow space where the dank air carried the pungent, almost overwhelming scents of bilge water, spices, mildew, pitch, and spoiling meat. Arnold and Woolford stood by with lanterns as three keepers, led by Lister, pulled a canvas sheet from a long wooden box, then pried up the nails that secured the top. They lifted away the top and then quickly retreated, casting suspicious glances toward Duncan as they disappeared. Only Lister remained in sight, lingering uneasily near the entrance.
    Professor Evering had been salted. His corpse had been cleaned before being laid in a bed of salt, his clothes neatly arranged, a worn silver timepiece added to his waistcoat. His flesh was drawn and puckered, his bloodless lips stretched in a grotesque grin. The professor’s eyes were covered with large penny coins.
    Arnold stepped forward and with his fingernails pushed the pennies away, letting them fall into the salt. “Pagans,” he muttered in a disdainful tone.
    “We always placed our cadavers in barrels of brine,” Duncan said in an absent tone as he studied the body, his medical training taking over. “Preserves them quite lifelike.”
    “So the cook suggested,” Woolford replied. “But a barrel of brine lowered into a grave somehow seemed less than heroic. And this way we avoid the risk that twelve stone of pickled pork gets buried
instead.” His words seemed to hint at amusement, but there was only challenge in his eyes when Duncan looked up.
    Duncan worked quickly, unbuttoning the collar of the dead man. Rigor mortis had long since left the body, and he pushed the head from side to side between his hands while Arnold stood back with disgust on his face. “The most valuable benefit of the office of hangman,” he explained as he worked, “is the privilege of selling his victims to the medical schools. I have examined over a score of men from the gibbet. Each one bore terrible contusions around the throat, because the rope always crushes the living tissue. See for yourself. The professor shows no such marks.” He pointed at the pale skin of the man’s neck.
    “Surely this is a job for a magistrate,” Arnold protested. “Some respect is due—”
    Arnold was cut off by Woolford’s raised hand. “There is no magistrate here,” the lieutenant interjected, “and soon the body will be on its way home. Surely we owe the esteemed Evering an opportunity to teach his successor.”
    Duncan glanced at the doorway, where Lister lingered, looking strangely pained, then proceeded to probe Evering’s remains, starting with his hands. They were soft, unblemished, showing no sign of a struggle. The professor’s right hand clutched the small Bible Duncan had sometimes seen him reading on deck.
    “I read from his own scripture at the service we held for him on