Husk: A Maresman Tale by D.P. Prior Page A

stubble on his chin.
    “Nice piece you got there,” he said in a grating voice that was a cross between a growl and a whisper. He let go Jeb’s arm and indicated the flintlock with a nod.
    Jeb’s covered it with his hand. “What’s it to you?”
    Rheumy eyes met his, blinked a couple of times, then roved about the room. “Nothing.”
    That’s where Jeb wanted to leave the conversation, so he turned back to the bar and called out for the wench to hurry it up with his whiskey.
    “Used to have one just like it,” the man said close to his ear. The stench of weedstick on his breath made Jeb angle his head away, and he fought down the impulse to cough. “Must be commoner than I thought.”
    “Must be,” Jeb said, accepting his drink and pushing past the man on his way to the card table.
    “It loaded?”
    Jeb stopped in his tracks. The number of people who would’ve recognized an artifact like that must’ve been countable on the fingers of one hand. With a half-turn, he gave a curt nod.
    “Careful you don’t shoot yourself in the foot.” The man hobbled up alongside him, left leg dragging, and pointed at his boot. “Reckon I learned the hard way.” He peered at the flintlock for a long moment, then let his eyes travel up to meet Jeb’s. There was steel behind the milky film, and a glint of something dangerous.
    “Sorry to hear that,” Jeb said. He held the man’s stare for a moment, then tugged down his hat and cut a path for Dame Consilia.
    “Don’t leave it loaded too long, mind,” the man said from behind him. “Powder’ll corrode the barrel.”
    The music stopped suddenly, punctuating that last word with silence. Must have been all of a second before someone coughed, and the hubbub of voices resumed. As the duo struck up a new song, Dame Consilia shooed away one of her stooges, the plump one—Malvin, Jeb thought it was—and patted his seat. Jeb lowered himself into it with a grunt. His ribs still felt sore from the beating, and a dull ache had started in his lower back.
    “You in pain, dear?” Dame Consilia asked. She rubbed his thigh soothingly under the table.
    “Nope.” Jeb knocked back his whiskey and wished he’d ordered another.
    Dame Consilia gave him a knowing look and snapped her fingers. “Malvin, darling, make yourself useful and get Mr. Skayne here another drink. Whiskey, is it?”
    Jeb nodded, then cast his eyes around the table. The thin stooge—Garth—on Dame Consilia’s left leaned in closer to her, apparently pleased his rival had been relegated to a dogsbody.
    The stoat-faced man from the Crawfish peeked from around a fan of cards and said, “You in?”
    Jeb nodded and looked to Farly for a reaction, but the old man’s face may as well have been cast from stone. There was a mustached man beside him in a threadbare tunic that would’ve once been considered finery. His slicked back gray hair had stray strands sticking up, and all the hallmarks of an unkempt muss being hurriedly made respectable for the purpose of appearances. He acknowledged Jeb with a bob of his head, and reached across the table to shake hands.
    “Sendal Slythe,” he said, taking in the state of Jeb’s bruised face with a wary look. There was a slight quiver to his chin when he spoke. His grip was limp, and when he withdrew his hand, it shook. Slythe seemed aware of it and clamped his other hand over the top and brought it to his lap.
    Dame Consilia’s lips brushed Jeb’s ear as she said, “Sendal used to be a senator.”
    Slythe bowed his head, and a flush hit his cheeks. “Thank goodness I didn’t have a lisp,” he said with a forced chuckle. “Can you imagine? Senator Sendal Slythe of the Senate of the City State of New Jerusalem.”
    Jeb could tell he told that joke all the time. Probably, it was the only one he knew. The lack of reaction at the table confirmed him in his theory, and he guessed it wasn’t the first instance of the lisping joke Slythe had told during the game in