Page 5

“It’s human nature,” said Harison equably.

“Of the basest sort.”

“It makes a compelling story,” said Harison thoughtfully. “Perhaps because it’s such a familiar one. The girl lured . . . seduced . . . discarded. And she’s a Quaker, to boot. You haven’t read of it in the papers?”

Alexander had been avoiding the papers because the papers refused to avoid him. He’d promised Eliza he’d hold his fire, but it was hard when Republican scandal sheets slandered him and his fingers itched to take up his pen and defend himself.

Like last time. And they all knew how that had gone.

Mercifully, Harison was still going on about the girl in the well. “It’s the talk of the town. There are already tales of hauntings. The girl’s tormented soul begging justice, all that sort of nonsense. People half expect to see the sheeted dead squeaking and gibbering in the street. You’d know nothing about that.”

Harison looked pointedly at Alexander, who had gotten in trouble, last year, over a prank involving a supposed ghost.

More fodder for the papers. A man couldn’t arrange a joke with his family without being splattered with ink.

“Have they arrested anyone for the crime?” Alexander asked abruptly.

“Levi Weeks. He’s a young carpenter who boarded in the same house. They’re saying he got her with child and killed her to keep from marrying her. You’ll have heard of his brother—Ezra. He laid the pipes for the Manhattan Well.”

That well, that blasted well again. Alexander seethed at the thought of it. Burr had hoodwinked him; he’d hoodwinked all of them. And the worst of it? He’d had Alexander fighting for his Manhattan Company, supposedly formed for the purpose of digging that well, among others. A well to bring clean water to the city, to fight the dreaded scourge of yellow fever. What civic-minded soul wouldn’t support that project? Alexander had drafted the proposal, crafted the clauses, sweated ink and effort over it. Not a party matter, Burr had promised him, and offered him seats on the board for Federalists, including one for Alexander’s brother-in-law John Church, proof that this was an undertaking meant to benefit the whole.

Except it wasn’t.

The well was only a ruse. In the last hours before the bill went up for vote, Burr had inserted another clause, one setting up a financial institution. It wasn’t a well he was proposing but a bank, a bank to rival Alexander’s own Bank of the United States.

And he’d done it. With Alexander’s support.

How Burr must have laughed at him in his mansion, Richmond Hill. How all the Republicans must have chortled to see Hamilton throw his support behind a measure designed to unman him.

Alexander burned at the very thought of it, but there was nothing he could do now. The bill to establish the Manhattan Company had passed—thanks to Alexander’s efforts. The Manhattan Company was at this very moment amassing funds and extending credit, a monstrous instrument that pretended to the public good while serving private gain.

For Burr, all for Burr. And the Republican Party.

Harison was still talking. “Young Colden will prosecute, of course. Weeks has retained Brockholst Livingston for his brother’s defense. And Colonel Burr.”

“They’ve hired Burr for the defense?” How Burr would enjoy that, posturing in the courtroom in his sleek black frock coat.

He’d have Livingston do the work while he took all the credit. It would play directly to his claim to be the champion of the working man, a vivid image for voters to take with them to the polls: Burr using his eloquence to save a lowly carpenter from the gallows.

Unless . . . A germ of an idea began to form. “What evidence is there against the young man?”

“Precious little, as yet. Rumor and hearsay—the sentiment of the street. They’ve been baying for his blood. Someone’s been handing out broadsides, riling them up. The mob’s convinced he did it. They’ll settle for nothing less than his neck in a noose.”

“That’s not justice. That’s lynch law.” Charles Lynch and the men like him who took it upon themselves to enact vengeance on those they’d condemned without process of law were anathema to everything Alexander stood for. That wasn’t the sort of polity he’d fought for, with the sword and with the pen. “What makes them think it was this young man?”

“The family claim he was walking out with her—they’ve been quite voluble about it.”

“Did anyone else confirm that? Were they seen together? Is there any evidence the girl was with child?”

“You sound as though you’re taking down the points of the case.” When Alexander didn’t reply, his friend looked at him sharply. “You’re not, are you? Weeks is well defended—”

“By Livingston?”

“He’s a very able lawyer in the criminal sphere.”

“He’ll acquit young Weeks on a technicality and leave his reputation in tatters. In a case such as this, a case that touches on a man’s honor, it isn’t enough to create a doubt; one must leave no doubt.” As Alexander knew, all too well.

Harison looked sideways at him. “And then there’s Colonel Burr. . . . That’s the matter of it, isn’t it?”