I can’t say I was surprised when Officer Frank McAllister found me at the Mermaid Inn. The scar on my cheek still burned, but I kept both hands around my cup and did not drink.

There would be time enough for that later.

This was the third time this week someone had come asking the wrong kinds of questions.

“James Marshall?”

“Jimmy.”

His partner, William McCoy, glanced at the empty tables. “The only boy to walk away from the Rye shore massacre.”

I looked down. Avoiding eye contact made things easier.

A week ago, twelve Hawkhurst men had swaggered in with pistols and cutlasses laid across their table: Old Joll, Toll, the Miller, Yorkshire George, Nasty Face, Towzer. Groombridge-bound, they said. Celebratin’, they said. Then I asked after their lugger, and one of them called me pup and cut open my cheek.

Now their bodies lay scattered along the beach.

Parts of them, anyway.

McAllister leaned close. “You expect us to believe one boy killed twelve armed smugglers?”

“No.”

“Then who did?”

Outside, gulls screamed over the harbor. Through the doorway, the sea glittered too brightly.

I let my hands tremble around the cup. “They heard singing.”

McCoy snorted. “Singing?”

“From the water.” I swallowed. “Out past the rocks. She called to them. Hair long as a hangman’s rope. Voice sweet enough to forgive any sin.”

McAllister’s smile faded.

“She asked their names,” I whispered. “One by one. Each man answered.”

The tide knocked softly under the pier.

McAllister stood. “You’re taking us there.”

“No.”

He drew his pistol.

I raised my hands and did my best to look frightened.

That helped too.

From the empty hearth, someone began to sing.

McCoy turned first.

That was how she liked them: curious.

By dawn, their badges would wash in with the shells.

I finished my drink.

I really needed another line of work.