"Is that blood?!"
"Oh — excuse me, I shouldn’t have left that lying around.”
Luck, straight faced, took the pen-knife from the stranger’s hands, and extracted a folded handkerchief from the top-drawer of his roll top desk. He wiped the blade without expression, folded it back against its wooden handle, and turned it in his fingers. The varnished glowed red as meat in the lamplight.
“Cherry wood. It was my grandfather’s favorite. He used it to whittle.” A thin sliver of teeth. “I wonder what he’d say if he knew his grandson was using it to open letters.” He was aware his smile was disarming. He used it rarely, as if to preserve the blade of a favorite knife. He used it now, turning his gaze on the blue-eyed stranger.
“What do you think? Maybe his ghost made my hand slip the other day.” He chuckled, tucked the knife into his breast pocket, and pressed his hand over it briefly. “Ah, now if you don’t mind, Mister Vigo will show you home. Mister Vigo — ?”
A large man appeared in the doorway. His face resembled a hat that had been sat on.
“See that Mister Bonnefoy makes it home. I don’t trust the hour.” Turning to the Frenchman, he offered one more customary smile. “Welcome to New York.” Then the canvas went blank.
For a while, he stood, blank eyes fixed on the door until the footsteps faded, until he heard the engine rasp to a start and purr into the distance. Then he reached into his pocket. The penknife listed in the palm of his hand.
He knocked on the wall. Another face appeared in the doorway, tawny.
“Remind Mister Tick to clean up his own toys,” said Luck. He dropped the knife into the man’s bear-trap hand. “I’m not running a maid service.”
