The note arrived the day after Mr. van Kirk’s death. Jane brought me the folded ivory paper with my name written in large, loopy handwriting. The note requested that I accompany the sender to town on the morrow, per Mr. van Kirk’s orders prior to his death. The sender apologized for asking something of me so soon, and when I peered closer, I saw Williams’s signature at the very bottom.
I passed the note back to Jane. “Do you think this unusual?”
She scanned the note, her head shaking infinitesimally. She returned it to me and said that she’d seen Williams clutching a letter with the hunched red raven in his hand earlier that day.
“Is that so?”
“Yes, Miss Charlotte,” she nodded. “But I know nothing of its contents. Most of us have not recovered from the shock of the master’s death. Thou
