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The Luminaries Part 5, Chapter 7 Summary

Tar (12 May 1865)

  • After blackmailing Lauderback successfully, Carver headed over to Lydia's house to tell her the good news.
  • She then informed Carver that, in a stroke of "luck," Crosbie had taken up with Anna. This meant she could get them easily out of the way that evening, as she had sent up a decanter of liquor to them that was laced (ostensibly with laudanum).
  • Francis said he was going to go up. It seems he planned to spirit the presumably drugged out Crosbie away from there and "tap him on the head."
  • He snuck upstairs and tried to do just that, but when he entered, Crosbie (who wasn't drugged) bashed him over the head.
  • He asked Carver who he was, and Carver said he was Crosbie Wells. When Crosbie asked where his gold was, Carver explained that "Crosbie" himself had shipped it offshore.
  • Crosbie then knocked him out cold and used a knife to carve a long C-shaped wound into his face.
  • He then told Anna to drink up from the decanter so she could claim she had slept through the whole thing. She went and got a gold nugget he had given her when they first met—to help her get away from Lydia—and gave it to him to help him get away.