Ezekiel is at least ostensibly a pawnbroker to trade, with a shop and residence above it near the docks on Boston’s Belcher’s Lane.

A small, wizened goblin of a man, he has the money to put on the costume, airs and graces of a gentleman but his general demeanor and his working-class diction reveal him as a child of the streets made good. He began as a deckhand on trading ships in his teens, and soon found he could supplement his income by a little smuggling. From there, he worked his way up to the shore end of smuggling rum, tobacco and anything else with a high duty and that eventually financed his pawnbrokers shop. That’s not to say he stopped smuggling, although it did mean he found a lucrative new niche as a fence.

His shop is run with the help of his two assistants – big, hulking men who are no strangers to violence – and his smuggling concern is run for him by other even less salubrious associates. However, if it’s happening on the docks of Boston, he almost certainly knows all about it. He pays a small army of urchins, beggars and poor sailors for information on sailings, cargoes, people and even rumors.

Ezekiel has a Y shaped scar on his cheek which runs down to his mouth. The muscles on that side are damaged, and he often drools out of that side of his mouth when excited. It’s best not to stare when he does so, or to mention you’ve noticed anything at all.

He carries a butcher’s cleaver in a vest scabbard, and has been known to chop the finger off someone who crosses or disappoints him as a first warning.