This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

Edited by Stephanie Osborn

Cover by Mihaela Voicu

Published by

Dan Willis

Spanish Fork, Utah.

The sign on the frosted glass panel read Lockerby Investigations in gold painted letters. The image of a hexagon with an inverted triangle inside it and an inkwell inside that occupied the bottom right corner of the glass, indicating that runewright services were also offered within. Alexander Lockerby turned the handle smartly and walked in. His office occupied a two-room space on the fourth floor of a modest building in Manhattan’s mid-ring. Close enough to Empire Tower to have uninterrupted power, but far enough away to keep the rent low. He’d moved into these offices in the spring of 1931 and now, two years later, it felt like home. It wasn’t much, but it was his.

Beyond the door with its frosted glass panel was his waiting room, with two sofas, a row of filing cabinets, and a second door marked Private. A large window dominated the back wall, illuminating a paper-strewn desk. Atop the desk, long legs crossed and the receiver of a telephone pressed to her ear, was Leslie Tompkins, Alex’s secretary.

Leslie was in her early forties but you’d never guess it to look at her. She had long, toned legs, a slim waist, generous bust, and strawberry blonde hair that hung about her shoulders in loose rings. She’d moved to New York from Iowa where she’d been a beauty queen, married a successful salesman, then lost him in the Great War. After that, Leslie’s life became a series of jobs that she never held for more than a year. Everywhere she worked, they treated her like an ornament or a wanton. No one could look past her beautiful exterior to see the mind inside.

No one but Alex.

She’d come to work for him two years ago and had absolutely revolutionized his business. People just liked her, and that translated into work. Better still, Leslie was sharp. With a little training, she became a better interrogator than Alex, able to worm information out of virtually anyone over a simple cup of coffee.

“Okay, Dan,” she said into the mouthpiece. “I’ll send him over as soon as he gets in.” She replaced the receiver in the cradle and returned the phone to her desk.

Alex shut the door and Leslie looked up, flashing a million-dollar smile framed by deep red lipstick. She hopped off the desk and stood as Alex approached. Leslie always stood perfectly straight, a result of the beauty queen training, no doubt. With her shoulders back and a pair of high heels, Leslie turned heads wherever she went, and with the top two buttons of her blouse undone, she could make it hard to keep eye contact… if she wanted.

“Detective Pak wants you to look at a body,” she said, tearing a paper containing a mid-ring address from a notepad.

Daniel Pak was a detective with the New York Central office of the city Police. Danny and Alex had been friends ever since Alex helped him crack the case that made him a detective. Now Danny brought Alex in as a consultant whenever he could get away with it.

“Well,” Alex said, looking at the address. “If Danny wants me to have a look, it must be particularly gruesome. I’ll get my kit.”

Leslie made a face but didn’t move out of his way. “And how did the other case go?” she asked. Her tone clearly indicated that she expected Alex to have a specific answer and that she wouldn’t be happy if he didn’t.

“You mean the case of the missing wedding ring?” he asked, a disgusted look crawling across his own face. Leslie’s face grew cross.

“It’s work,” she said. “And if we don’t get more of it real soon, you’re going to have to limit our eating to once a day.”

Alex raised an eyebrow.

“It’s not that bad, is it?”

“That depends,” Leslie said. “Did your Finding Rune work?”

“Nope,” Alex admitted. He sat on the desk corner where Leslie had been before and dropped his hat onto the desk. Leslie squeezed her eyes shut and put a hand on her forehead.

“How is that even possible?” she asked, cool anger in her voice. “’Your Finding Rune is better than anyone else’s in the city.” Her hazel eyes flashed as she locked them on his. “There’s nothing lost you can’t find with that rune! Hell, if you put your mind to it, you could probably find my virginity.”

She took a breath to go on, but Alex put up a hand to silence her.

“The rune didn’t work because I didn’t have to cast it,” he said. Leslie’s hand went back to her forehead and she grimaced as if in physical pain.

“What happened?” she said with a sigh.

“When I got there, Mrs. Lola Davis showed me a picture of the missing ring,” Alex explained. “Just as I was getting ready to make with the magic, her husband Burt shows up, and he’s not happy to see me.”

Leslie shook her head.

“Don’t tell me,” she said. “He lost it in a poker game.”

That was why Alex worked so well with Leslie; nothing got by her. If she had any magical talent, Alex figured he’d be working for her, sooner or later. Deep down, he wondered if he wasn’t already.

“Close,” he said. “When I shook his hand he winced, so I slapped him on the back. You know, friendly like.”

“And?” Leslie said, clearly impatient for this story to be over.

“And he damn near passed out. Somebody worked him over good. A pro who knew not to leave bruises on his face or arms.”

“What did his wife think happened?”

“He told her he fell down the stairs,” Alex said, shrugging. “She bought it, too.”

“It was awful nice of those stairs not to mess up his face,” Leslie pointed out.

“Give the girl a break,” Alex said, offering Leslie a cigarette. “Anyway, I had the story out of Burt in two seconds. He’d been running a tab with his bookie.”

“Slow ponies?” Leslie said, taking the cigarette between her ruby lips and lighting it with the touch-tip on the desk.

“Worse. He’s a Washington Senators fan.”

Leslie dropped the metal match back in the lighter and smirked.

“Ouch,” she said. She’d put the match away before Alex could light his own cigarette, so he leaned close and pressed the tip of his cigarette to Leslie’s. Her perfume washed over him, lavender and amber oil. He was suddenly very aware of her, and he pulled away. It would have been easy to fall for her, despite her being almost ten years his senior, and that would be bad for business.

“Anyway, Burt hocked the ring to pay off the bookie,” Alex finished the story.

“How did the wife take it?” Leslie asked. “More importantly, did you get paid?”

“Wife took it bad,” Alex said. “It was her grandmother’s ring.”

“That bastard.” Leslie looked shocked.

“Anyway, he’d cleaned them out, even the cash she had stashed away.”

Leslie groaned and put her head in her hand again.

“So no money?” She looked up sharply when Alex crinkled two crisp bills, a twenty and a five, under her nose. “How?” she gasped, snatching the money and holding it up to the light.

“Lola didn’t want to stay with her husband anymore, so I took her over to her mother’s place. She lives in the inner-ring, right up against the core.”

“Ooh,” Leslie purred. “Fancy.”

“Apparently mother dear had been trying to convince Lola that Burt was a bum for years. She was overjoyed to have her back. Paid my fee and the cab fare.”

Leslie smiled and nodded at Alex.

“You did good, kid,” she said. “I’m so happy that I’m not even going to ask you where you got the cigarettes.”

“Oh, those were Burt’s,” Alex said with a grin. She took a puff, then held out the cigarette at arm’s length.

“Thanks, Burt,” she said with mock sincerity. “Now, let’s take care of this.” Circling the desk, she opened the bottom drawer and pulled out a heavy steel box, dropping it on the table with a clank. The top of the box was plain, with the exception of an engraving depicting an elaborate geometric shape.

“It’s me,” she said, leaning close to the lid. “Open up.”

The rune on the lid glowed with a purple light and an audible click sounded from inside. Alex watched as the rune’s light faded. The edges of the engraving were already getting fuzzy and indistinct. Runes were a temporary form of magic, after all. Most disappeared immediately after being used. A talented runewright could make them last longer by using more expensive materials when making the rune, and even engraving it into something. Eventually, though, the rune would lose its magic and disappear, needing to be rewritten by the runewright.

This was what made runewrights the poor cousins of magic. Sorcerers could cast real spells, laying powerful and near-permanent enchantments on whatever they chose. They were rare, of course. Only big cities would have a sorcerer, and most were required by law to serve their governments. America, however, gave sorcerers the same rights as anyone else, so there were more sorcerers in the US than anywhere else. New York had six, each soaring high above the city in their flying castles. If Alex had been born a sorcerer instead of a runewright, he’d never have wanted for cash.

The other branch of magic was alchemy. Alchemists brewed their magic slowly into potions and elixirs. Sorcerers and runewrights mostly dealt with enchantments, making objects magical. Alchemists dealt with people, with their bodies and health. A good alchemist always had work, customers with ready money who needed remedies for everything from gout to baldness. Like runewrights, alchemists kept their recipes secret, passing them from master to apprentice. That meant that some alchemists were quacks and frauds, possessing only a few weak recipes, while others could brew miracle cures in a bottle.

This was the same reason Alex’s Finding Rune was so much better than anyone else’s. His book of runes had come to him from his father and his grandfather and his great-grandfather. When his father died, Alex’s training had been picked up by a British Doctor, Ignatius Bell. Between his family book and the doctor’s training, Alex knew some very good runes.

The lid of the strongbox popped open and Leslie inserted the bills in a small stack of cash, in proper numerical order of course. She counted them twice, then made a note of the amount on a pad in the bottom of the box.

“That’s rent and my salary for this month,” she said with a satisfied grin.

“Wait. What about me?” Alex protested with only the trace of a grin. Leslie picked up the paper that Alex had set aside on her desk and handed it back to him.

“You have a date with the Police and a dead guy. Do a good job and maybe you can buy your own cigarettes.”

Alex took the paper and sighed. The police didn’t like consultants, and they especially didn’t like paying them. They almost never allowed him to cast an expensive rune and he had to give them a hefty discount on his hourly rate if he wanted to work with them at all. Leslie scowled at him when he looked up from the paper, daring him to complain, so he put on a smile.

“It’s better than looking for lost wedding rings, I suppose,” he said. He turned toward his office, but Leslie put her hand on his shoulder in a firm grip.

“Don’t worry, kid,” she said, her hard shell melting away into one of her rare, genuine smiles. “We’ll catch a break one of these days.”

“I know,” Alex said, and sighed. “One big case would do it. Get my name in the papers and then real clients would start piling up.”

“So many that we’ll have to start turning them away,” Leslie agreed, her smile somehow managing to show more teeth. Then her face became serious. “It’ll happen,” she said. “I believe in you.”

“Thanks, doll.” Alex smiled back at her. “And thanks for keeping this place in the black. Even if it is with lost dog jobs.”

Her face slid back into the sardonic smile he knew so well. The mask that hid the real her from the world. “Work is work,” she said.

“Work is work,” he agreed.

Alex made his way to his office while Leslie returned the strong box to its drawer.

The inner office was just a smaller version of the outer. Alex’s desk sat across from the door, facing it, with a large window behind. A row of filing cabinets stood against the right wall, leaving the opposite wall bare, and two overstuffed chairs sat facing the desk. The chalk outline of a door, complete with a keyhole, adorned the blank wall, exactly in the center.

Alex pulled a pasteboard notebook with a red cover from his jacket pocket and began flipping through the pages. The paper was thin and fine, like tissue paper, so he had to be careful. Each page had a rune carefully inscribed on it. Some were simple, only a few lines drawn in pencil. Other were intricate, delicate even, their lines glistening in inks infused with gold, silver, or powdered gemstones. Some had taken Alex a few minutes, while others took days of careful work. All had been infused with magic, waiting patiently for him to release it.

He found the rune he wanted, a triangle with a circle on each point, drawn in silver ink, and tore it from the book. Alex unceremoniously licked the back of the paper and stuck it on the wall in the middle of the chalk door. He touched the paper with the glowing tip of his cigarette and it erupted in flame, vanishing almost instantly. The rune hung in the air, gleaming silver now that the paper was gone, then vanished as well, melting into the wall. As soon as it was gone, a door of polished metal appeared where the chalk outline had been. No hinges were visible, just a brass plate with a keyhole in its exact center.

Alex produced an ornate steel skeleton key from a ring that also held his apartment key and the one to his office. Sliding it in the keyhole, he turned it smartly and pushed the door open. There wasn’t anything particularly special beyond Alex’s wall, just the neighboring office. But beyond the door was a good-sized room with workbenches, cabinets, shelves, and all manner of glassware and equipment. This was Alex’s vault, an extra-dimensional workspace he could summon whenever and wherever he needed it. The rune to make a vault wasn’t that complex but a runewright could only have one vault at a time. If he made a new one, the old one and all its contents would vanish. Such was the nature of magic.

Alex flipped a switch on the wall and magelights throughout the space warmed up to a bright light.

Leaving the door open, Alex crossed to a large secretary cabinet. He could shut and bar the vault door if he wanted, but if it were locked from the outside, he’d be trapped in the vault forever. Only the runewright who created a vault could open it from the outside.

He pulled the secretary cabinet’s foldaway table down, then opened the upper doors. Inside were a row of three leather bags resembling a doctor’s valise, and rows and rows of stoppered bottles above them, containing every imaginable substance. Below the bags were pigeonholes filled with stacks of varying papers, and drawers that held pens and pencils. These were the tools of his trade.

Without a pause, Alex pulled down a battered, brown valise. The top opened down the middle and had a hinge so it would fold out ninety degrees. Under one side, his oculus and breathing mask were held in place by elastic straps. The other side held smaller versions of the stoppered bottles, just not so many. In the bottom of the case were his multi-lamp, pencil box, a tube with a selection of papers, a few other odds and ends, and a Colt 1911 semi-automatic pistol in a shoulder holster. He stripped off his jacket and slung the holster in place, settling the weight of the gun just under his left arm, and checked the magazine.

Full.

He put on his jacket again, making sure it hung so that the bulge underneath his left arm could not be seen, then picked up the bag and exited the vault.

“See ya,” he said to Leslie as he put on his hat and headed for the door.

“Try to talk them into letting you use an expensive rune or two,” she called after him. “I need a new pair of stockings.”

Alex rode the elevator down to the street. A steady rain fell and it seemed dark, even though it was only early afternoon. The glow of neon signs in storefronts cast halos of color through the downpour.

Tearing another page from his rune book, Alex stuck it to the brim of his hat, then lit it with his cigarette. A tingly sensation washed over him from his head to his feet and then he stepped out into the rain. The drops bent and danced as they reached him, moved aside by the magic. The barrier rune would only last an hour, but that was more than enough time for him to catch a cab to the south side mid-ring.

The rings provided power to the entire island of Manhattan, from the south side docks all the way up to the Bronx. The rings were physically centered on Empire Tower, the former Empire State Building. These days Empire Tower held a magical capacitor, created by Andrew Barton, one of New York’s resident sorcerers. Once charged, the Tower radiated power over the entire island. Since the Tower was so far south on the island, the field wasn’t round, but oval, putting the actual center of the power projection somewhere over Central Park. The farther you were away from the center, the worse your power reception got. This inspired the wealthier of New York’s citizens to build luxury buildings all around the Tower in an area known as the Core. Those closest to the Core were in the inner-ring, the high rent district. Mid-ring were businesses and middle-class folk, and everyone else was in the outer-ring.

The south side was actually pretty close to Empire Tower as the crow flew, but since the center was shifted north, the bands were thinner at that end. Most of the harbor and its environs were decidedly outer-ring, but just a few blocks away were nicer, mid-ring apartments.

Alex exited his cab thirty-five minutes later and made his way toward the cluster of police cars parked in front of a neat, three-story brick building. He got a few curious glances when people on the street realized the rain was avoiding him, but he was used to that.

“What do you want?” the officer at the door said in his best “go away” voice. He had a pug nose, close-set eyes and a scar on his cheek that made him look all business. Definitely the right man to put on the door.

“I’m Alex Lockerby,” Alex said, handing the officer a business card. “Detective Pak is expecting me.”

A surge of emotions warred across the cop’s face. He’d seen that Alex was a private investigator from his card, and Pak was the only Japanese on the force. Most Americans didn’t think much of Asians, but Pak had proved himself a good detective, and that made him family to the NYPD. Finally the cop decided that his dislike of private dicks and foreigners was less than his respect for his job and fellow officers.

“Third floor on the right,” he said, handing back the card. “Room 323.”

When Alex reached the room, he knew immediately why Pak had called him. The charred remains of a man lay in a recliner. The easy chair was blackened and burned, revealing the wire frame that supported it, but the walls and floor were fine, apart from some smoke damage. A round side table stood next to the chair containing a pulp novel, an empty shot glass, a pack of cigarettes, and a book of matches.

“Alex,” Detective Pak said, noticing his arrival. Danny was about five-foot-ten, three inches shorter than Alex himself, and wore a brown suit with suede patches on the elbows and a gold shield attached to the breast pocket of his suit coat. He had brownish skin, short hair the color of midnight, and dark, almond shaped eyes. An infectious grin spread across his face as he shook Alex’s hand. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said.

“Good to see you too,” Alex said, returning the handshake. “I was wondering why you called me,” he said, nodding at the charred corpse.

“I know it looks like an open and shut case,” Pak said, “but something’s wrong.”

“I’ll say. Whoever this guy was, he was murdered.”

Detective Pak opened his mouth and closed it again. “What?” he finally managed. “I just wanted to know why the fire went out?”

“I’d have to look around a bit before I could tell you that.” Alex shrugged.

“But you just got here… and you know he was murdered?”

“Of course he does,” a new voice interjected. Alex turned to face the sneering face of Lieutenant Francis Callahan. “Lockerby here is always looking to pad out his bill with wild theories and guesswork, that means he’ll have to break out his expensive magic.”

Callahan was everything an Academy recruitment poster could have wanted — tall, square-jawed, with wavy brown hair, blue eyes, and perfect teeth. Worse than that, he’d made Lieutenant the hard way, by being good at his job. Every cop on the force liked and respected Frank Callahan — and Frank thought Alex was a waste of skin.

“Shouldn’t you be out finding someone’s dog?” Callahan asked.

Alex felt his face begin to flush and quickly willed that away. Callahan could get under his skin, but only if he let him.

“Of course any client that comes to you has probably lost their marbles,” Callahan went on. “So you should probably find those first.”

“I don’t think you’ve lost your marbles, Lieutenant,” Alex said, smiling warmly. “But since you did hire me, I’ll be happy to look for your dog. Assuming he’s missing.”

A chuckle ran around the room and Danny covered his mouth with his note pad. Callahan’s face reddened, but he regained control quickly.

“That wasn’t my idea,” he said. “You can thank your friend here for that.” He thumped Pak on the chest. “But since you are here, what makes you think this is murder, and not another poor shlub who fell asleep while he was smoking?”

Alex turned and pointed to the round table next to the ruins of the chair.

“What’s missing?” he asked.

“Decent booze,” Callahan said.

“Good literature?” Danny wondered.

“Ashtray,” Alex supplied. “There’s no ashtray here, and there isn’t one in the kitchen either. Not on the table or by the sink.”

“So it was in his lap when he burned,” Callahan said. “The coroner will find it — eventually.”

“How many ashtrays do you have in your house, Lieutenant?”

Callahan nodded, understanding blooming in his eyes.

“Right,” he said, then he turned to one of the uniform officers in the room. “Check the bathroom and the bedroom,” he said. “Let me know if you find any ashtrays.” He turned back to Alex. “Anything else?”

Alex walked over to the round table and picked up the open pack of cigarettes.

“There are three cigarettes missing from this pack,” he said. “What do you do with your old pack when you open a new one?”

“Check the trash,” Callahan told one of the other officers, then turned back to Alex. “He still could have thrown it away before he got home.”

“It’s possible.” Alex nodded.

“What about the fire?” Danny asked. “It seems to me that it shouldn’t have burned out so quickly.”

“You’d like it better if it burned down this whole building?” Callahan said with a raised eyebrow. “Seems to me we got lucky.”

“Fires from people smoking in bed usually do more damage, Lieutenant.” Danny shrugged. “Especially when they char the body like that.”

The recliner and a small writing table occupied most of the space to the right of the door. To the left were a couch and two chairs surrounding a coffee table, with a cabinet radio in the corner. The kitchen was just beyond with a sink, counter, and icebox behind a small table and single chair. Alex set down his bag on the coffee table and opened it up.

“If there’s anything weird about the fire, I’ll know in a minute,” he sad, taking his oculus out of the bag.

“Not just yet,” Callahan said. “I want to make sure there’s something here before I put you on the department’s dime.”

A moment later the officers sent to check for ashtrays and empty cigarette packs reported finding none and Callahan sighed.

“All right, scribbler,” he agreed. “Go to work.”

Alex strapped his oculus to his head and began adjusting its various lenses. The oculus looked like a short telescope attached to a leather pad that covered Alex’s right eye. The tube had several focusing rings running around it, like a camera, and half a dozen colored lenses could be moved in and out of the field of view. All of this made it possible for Alex to see into differing spectrums of light.

None of this was very useful on its own, but with the right light source…

He reached into his bag and pulled out his multi-lamp. This looked like a small, ornate version of the kind of lantern train switchmen used in rail yards. It had an egg-shaped body with four crystal lenses set in it at regular intervals. Three of the crystals were covered with leather caps so the light within could only shine out of the one, uncovered lens.

Opening the front of the lamp revealed a frame with metal clamps affixed to the bottom. Alex selected a burner from the valise with the word silver written on it. The burner was basically a reservoir that held a very specific kind of oil, with a wick attached to the top. Clipping it into place in the lamp, he lit the wick with a match and it began to glow with a bright, white light. He felt the runes in the lantern as they activated, like the one on the strongbox in his office.

Alex closed the lamp, adjusted his oculus, then began sweeping the room with the lantern. Silverlight was made by mixing an alchemical compound of colloidal silver with various accelerants and then burning it. The rune-inscribed lens in the lamp focused the light and the ones in the oculus made it visible, revealing the little apartment in black and white, like a photographic negative.

The real magic of Silverlight, was that it revealed otherwise hard to see things, like fingerprints, blood, sweat, and other biological fluids. These lit up like neon when exposed to Silverlight.

Alex swept the lantern over the corpse in the chair. There wasn’t much to see since most of the evidence had been burned away, but he liked to be thorough. He shifted his gaze to the floor, then moved around the room, away from the corpse in widening circles. Once he checked the entire room, he moved to the bedroom, then switched the burner in the lamp to Ghostlight. Ghostlight burned a bright green and revealed magical residue and anything supernatural. Finally, Alex put out his lamp and returned it to the case, then stripped off the oculus.

“Well, I know why the fire died out early,” he said to Danny. “Whoever killed him used the booze to get the fire going, but didn’t use enough. It burned too quickly and the fire didn’t have enough heat built up to keep going.” Alex stepped over to the recliner and squatted down, pointing at the carpet. “They were messy when they doused him. You can smell some of the alcohol right here.”

“Mark that,” Callahan said to Danny, who tore a page from his notebook and set it on the rug.

“Then there’s some blood spatter here,” Alex said, chalking a circle on the floor near the middle of the room.

“Speak English, scribbler,” one of the uniforms growled as Alex shooed him away from the spot he was chalking. He had a sour face and the look of a man who’d rather be somewhere else.

Alex rolled his eyes and Danny grinned. Danny had asked this question before and already knew the answer.

“Have you ever seen someone flick a brush full of paint?” Danny asked the officer.

“Sure.”

“Well it’s like that. When blood falls on something, it forms dots, but when it’s thrown, the dots form little streaks.”

“So, what does that mean?” the sour-faced officer asked.

“It means,” Callahan interjected, “that someone was hit hard enough to bleed, and the blood spattered.”

Alex nodded. “My guess? It was whomever was tied to that chair.” He indicated the lone chair at the kitchen table. “There are scratches on the floor here,” he pointed to the barely distinguishable marks. “They should fit the pattern of the legs.”

“So you’re thinking Mr. Pemberton here was tied up and beaten before he was set on fire,” Danny said.

Alex nodded.

“Or,” Callahan said, “he might have cut himself any number of ways and put that chair there to change the light bulb in the ceiling. If you’re right, the question is why someone would do this to him?” He turned to one of the uniforms. “What did your canvass turn up on our victim?”

The officer flipped through his book and read. “Jerry Pemberton, age forty-two, lived alone, regular habits.”

“Did he smoke?” the Lieutenant asked, looking meaningfully at Alex.

“Don’t know,” the officer said. “And no one seems to know what he did for a living.”

“He was a customs inspector for the port authority,” Alex supplied. “He worked in a secure warehouse down at the Aerodrome.”

Callahan looked confused and Danny’s mouth dropped open like a fish.

“How?” he said. Alex pointed to a wooden plaque hanging above the ruin of the recliner.

“It’s an award for ten years of service.”

“You sure this guy was roughed up before he was killed?” Callahan’s face had gone from mild disgust to intense concentration, and his voice was hard and flat. Alex shrugged.

“Pretty sure, though there is one way to be certain.”

“Let me guess, one of your expensive runes?” The Lieutenant’s lip curled into a sneer.

Alex flipped through is book and opened it so Callahan could see an immensely complex design, rendered in gold and sparkling red lines. It looked like a stained glass window in a cathedral.

“The red lines are made with powdered rubies,” he explained.

“How much?” Callahan asked.

“What does it do?” Danny said at the same time.

“This is a Temporal Restoration Rune,” Alex said. “No, it’s not like those runes people use to reattach handles to teacups or mend broken mops. This will restore Mr. Pemberton’s body to the way it was at the moment he died.”

“How much?” Callahan asked again.

Alex looked at him for a long minute before answering, letting the tension build.

“Normally I charge a C-note,” he said. Danny whistled and there was a murmur from the assembled officers. “But for you, Lieutenant, I’ll cut you a break, sixty.”

Callahan’s brow wrinkled up as he weighed his options. Alex just watched. His cost to make the Rune was only about thirty-five bucks — powdered ruby was expensive by the pound, but very little was actually required for the rune. Still, it did take several days to create and Leslie had been right, they needed the money.

“Do it,” Callahan said at last.

Alex tore the page out of his rune book and stepped up to the blackened corpse. He’d been a private eye long enough to get used to the sight of dead men. That made him wonder just how jaded he’d become.

“I need all you fellas who had lunch in the last hour to leave the room,” he said, then turned to Danny. “Be sure to take good notes — this will only last about ten minutes. When you monkey with time there are…repercussions. As soon as the spell breaks, the body will rapidly decompose.”

“Why do I have to leave?” one of the uniforms grumbled.

“Because I don’t want to have to clean your puke off my jacket,” Alex said.

“Is it that bad?” Danny asked.

Alex nodded, then licked the back of the page and stuck it to the dead man’s chest — what was left of it. Taking a match from his pocket, he lit it and touched the paper. The rune exploded with light, burning red and gold and white. It pulsed once, then twice, then faster and faster before it detonated into a shower of sparks like a skyrocket. When the embers touched the body, it began to roil and churn.

Alex was tempted to look away at this point — he could take blood and death, but the sight of a dead man’s guts wiggling like they were live snakes turned his stomach. He kept his eyes fixed on the corpse, however, knowing that Callahan would never let him live it down if he didn’t.

Tissue foamed up and the blackness seemed to contract, leaving pink skin behind. In the head, white blobs became eyes in the skull and teeth leapt up from the ruin of the chair and popped themselves back into the jaw. Muscle and then skin crawled across the face, running like wax until at last the body was whole again.

If whole was the right word.

“Good God,” Danny said as the remains of Jerry Pemberton were finally revealed. Deep purple bruises covered most of his body and his eyes were both swollen shut. Whoever had worked him over had given him one hell of a beating.

“Get pictures,” Callahan said, breaking the spell that held everyone enthralled. He looked pale; most of them did, but he kept his focus. All business.

Officers moved in with cameras and began snapping away while Danny scribbled as fast as he could on his pad.

While they worked, Alex went over to a little writing table in the back of the room. There were lots of fingerprints on it when he scanned it earlier with the oculus. Without any suspects, fingerprints weren’t very useful to the police, but that wasn’t what interested him. Inside the desk’s single drawer was a blank pad of paper. He hadn’t paid much attention to it before, but something about it bothered him. He wanted a closer look.

Taking the pad across to the coffee table, Alex removed a vial of black powder from his kit. He tore a very simple rune out of his book and stuck it to the pad, then carefully poured a few grains of the black powder onto the rune. Striking a match from the book in his pocket, he lit the rune paper and it vanished in a puff that catapulted the black powder up into the air. After a long moment, it began to settle on the notepad, first in random, haphazard dots, but gradually forming lines. In a few seconds the lines revealed the impressions left on the paper from whatever had been written on the missing sheet above. It was a crudely done drawing of a building, showing the points of entry and what looked like locked doors. The words Secure Area had been written in a shaky hand on one side.

“Danny,” he said, motioning for the detective to join him. “I think I know what this is all about,” he said in a low voice. He showed the pad to Danny, and, after a moment, the detective began to nod.

“Lieutenant,” he said. “I think Alex has got something here.”

Callahan made a noise in his throat that clearly indicated that he doubted that, but crossed to where they stood.

“It looks like someone wanted to rob the customs warehouse,” Danny said pointing to the drawing.

“Where’d you get this?” the Lieutenant asked Alex.

“I used a rune to reveal what Pemberton wrote on the page just above this one before it was torn off.”

“What makes you think this is the warehouse where he works?” Callahan said. “It could be a map of his mom’s kitchen and this is where she hides the brownies.”

“Lieutenant!” Danny protested, but Callahan waived him silent.

“I’m not saying you’re wrong, but I want to be sure you’re right before we go off half-cocked. How do we know Pemberton drew this for the people that killed him?”

“Look at his fingernails,” Alex said, walking back over to the body. Three of the nails on his right hand had been torn off. Danny looked confused but Callahan sighed and nodded his head.

“They stopped when he gave them what they wanted,” he said. “Otherwise they would have torn off all his fingernails.”

“Whoever killed Jerry Pemberton wanted to know how to get into the customs warehouse at the aerodrome,” Alex said. “If Pemberton was killed last night, there’s a good chance your killers will show up there tonight.”

“Unless they’ve already been and gone,” Callahan said.

“No,” Danny said, shaking his head. “If they went straight to the warehouse, there wouldn’t be any reason to cover up Pemberton’s murder. By the time we got here and figured it out, they’d already be gone.”

“He’s right, Lieutenant,” Alex said. “All you have to do is lie in wait and Pemberton’s murderers will come straight to you.”

“Pretty neat,” he said. “All right, finish up here, detective. I’ll go over to the precinct and put together a squad to stake out the warehouse.” He put on his overcoat and hat and headed for the door. “Nice job, scribbler,” he said to Alex. “Maybe you aren’t useless after all.”

Danny grinned at Alex as the lieutenant left. “I think he’s beginning to like you,” he said with a smirk.

“As long as he pays me,” Alex said with a shrug. He was used to not being liked by cops as well as his fellow runewrights for being a private detective.

“I’ll make sure they cut you a check,” Danny said. “It’ll probably take a couple days though.”

“No problem,” Alex said. “I know you’re good for it.”

He felt a magical tremor hit him, just a tiny brush against his senses, but he felt it.

“Are your boys about done with that corpse?” he asked. “Cause your ten minutes are almost up.”

“What happens then?”

“It crumbles into dust,” Alex said.

Danny made sure the photographers had taken all the pictures they wanted, then had everyone step back. Alex felt the pulses of the decaying magic coming faster and faster until, at last, the earthly remains of Jerry Pemberton disintegrated into a pile of fine, white ash.

“You need me for anything else?” Alex asked, packing away his oculus and the multi-lamp. Danny looked around and shook his head.

“Thanks,” he said. “You really helped us out.”

“Just keep your head down when they bring these bastards in.” Alex patted him on the shoulder. “I wouldn’t put it past them to be packing.”

“I’ll be careful,” he said.

Alex put on his hat and picked up his bag. The pad with the drawing of the warehouse was on the coffee table so he picked it up too.

“Say hi to Amy for me,” he said, passing the notepad to detective Pak. Danny’s face grew stern but he wore a smile with it.

“You stay away from my sister,” he said as Alex stepped out into the hall.

Alex was in such a good mood that he took the stairs rather than taking the self-service elevator. Working with the police could be tense and uncomfortable, but it paid well. Leslie would be thrilled. For the first time in half a year they’d be ahead on the bills instead of desperately behind, racing to catch up. It felt good.

Something bothered him though — a thought in the back of his mind. Something to do with the notepad he handed to Danny. He thought about it for a moment, but it continued to elude him. Shrugging, he decided not to let doubts ruin his good mood, so he pushed the thought from his mind and whistled as he made his way back out onto the rain-swept street.

Alex didn’t bother with a barrier rune this time. There was a five-and-dime just across from Pemberton’s building and he wanted to tell Leslie the good news. He held his hat down and sprinted across the road.

The rain was coming down harder than he’d thought and he was soaked by the time he reached the store. He muttered a curse and pulled out his rune book before the dampness could soak through his jacket and ruin the pages. They were made of flash paper, the kind bookies used. It was nothing more than paper soaked in sodium nitrate then allowed to dry. The benefits were that if you set the paper on fire it would burn away to ash in less than a second, great for bookies who didn’t want to get caught with evidence and runewrights who wanted to create their runes ahead of time and use them later. The downside of flash paper was that it had to be very thin, so when it got wet, it turned into pulp.

Alex stepped inside the store and a bell rang as soon as the door opened. A girl in a floral print blouse, a white apron, and a paper hat leaned on a lunch counter lined with stools. She had brown hair and eyes, with freckles on her nose and a bored expression on her face. She brightened noticeably when Alex came in.

“Really starting to come down out there,” she said as Alex brushed the rain from his coat and shook out his hat.

“You said it,” he answered with a smile.

The girl reached below the counter and offered him a clean hand towel.

Alex set aside his rune book and wiped his hands until they were completely dry.

“Got a match?” he asked, tearing a moderately complex rune from his book. The girl pulled a box of stick matches from the front pocket of her apron and offered it to Alex. He stuck the rune to his already-wet hat, put the hat on his head, then set it alight. The paper disappeared in a flash and instantly Alex felt the clammy cold of wearing a wet hat disappear.

“Oh!” the girl said, her eyes growing wide.

Steam began to roll off of Alex as the rune’s magic dried out his clothes. This was one of his emergency runes, the ones that cost too much to use on a normal day but were worth having if the need arose. One of the few benefits of being a runewright was being able to have runes written in advance, ready when you needed them.

“That’s pretty impressive,” the girl said. “I wish I’d known you when I got caught in the rain in my silk blouse.” She signed. “Now it’s all full of water spots. I hate it every time I see it but the thing cost me a week’s salary, so I don’t have the heart to throw it out.”

Alex flipped to the back of his rune book. Here were a few blank pages, ready for whatever he needed. He pulled a pencil from his trouser pocket and drew a square. Flash paper tore easily, so he went slowly and used a pencil with soft lead.

“What’s that?” the girl asked.

Alex shushed her and focused on the symbol. Inside the square, he drew a circle, then a magical symbol that looked like a lighthouse being attacked by a steam shovel. As he drew, he felt power being drawn through him from whatever place magic occupied in the universe, through his pencil, and onto the paper.

“There,” he said, tearing out the page and handing it to the girl in the paper hat. “Put that on your silk blouse, carefully light just the paper on fire, and it’ll be good as new.”

The girl’s eyes lit up. They were very pretty eyes. “Really?” she said, her voice raising about an octave.

“Cross my heart,” Alex said with a smile. She clutched the delicate paper as if it were gold foil, then a sly look came over her.

“Can you make one that’ll fix the runs in my stockings?”

“Sure,” Alex grinned. “Trade me for some poached eggs on buttered toast?”

“Hard or soft?”

“Soft.”

“Deal,” she said. She returned his grin.

“I’m Alex,” he said sticking out his hand.

“Mary,” she said, taking it. “One Adam and Eve on a raft with axle grease coming up.”

“You got a phone in here, Mary?” Alex asked as he began drawing another Minor Restoration Rune.

“In back,” Mary said, pointing, as she set a pan of water on to boil.

He handed her the rune and made his way to the phone booth. Closing the door, he dropped a dime in the slot and dialed the number of his office.

“Lockerby Investigations,” Leslie’s voice came across the line, sounding tinny and flat.

“It’s me,” Alex said. “I just got done with the police job.”

“Any luck?”

“Yeah, they hired me. I even used a Temporal Restoration Rune, but I only charged them sixty for it. Be a doll and get a bill over to Police Headquarters right away, my usual fee plus the rune.”

“I’m already writing it up,” she said. “Do you have anything else on the docket or are you coming straight back?”

“I thought I’d have lunch first.”

“You know it’s two-thirty, right?”

“I haven’t had lunch,” he explained.

“Well,” Leslie said, that business tone coming back into her voice. “Father Clementine wants to see you.”

Alex swore. “Is his roof leaking again?”

“Yep,” Leslie said. “And it’s coming down pretty hard here. I didn’t want to tell you if you had work to do.”

“I always have time for the Father,” Alex said, irritation creeping into his voice. “You know that.”

“What I know,” Leslie replied, her voice going hard as well, “is that you spend a lot of time and resources helping the Father when you should be making money.”

“Give it a rest, Leslie,” Alex said. “I owe the Father plenty. Call him and tell him I’ll be over as soon as I can.”

Leslie promised that she would and Alex hung up.

Father Harrison Clementine ran the Brotherhood of Hope Mission out of an old ramshackle church smack in the middle of the west side’s outer-ring. In former days it had been a dance hall. Now it was a large open building with a three-story dormitory attached. Alex had spent five years living in that dormitory, between the ages of twelve and seventeen. His father had been a professional runewright, scribbling away minor restoration runes, like the ones Alex had just given to Mary, for a nickel apiece. The Lore Book that he inherited had some good runes in them, but Alex’s dad just didn’t have the talent to write them. He believed that if he only worked harder and longer than all the other runewrights, scribbling away for nickels, that somehow he wouldn’t be dirt poor. The only thing he got from all that scribbling in their cold apartment was pneumonia and an early grave. Alex’s mother had split the moment it became clear dad was never going to amount to anything, so that left Alex a twelve-year-old orphan.

Some suit from city hall wanted to put Alex in one of the city’s orphanages, but those places were hellholes. Kids as young as toddlers were crammed in with kids all the way up to seventeen, and they all were run by sadists who were in it for their government check. Alex saw enough of that right after his father’s death not to want any more. That was where Father Harry came in. Harrison Clementine had been their pastor for years and when Alex’s father died, he demanded that Alex be placed in his care at the mission. When the state said that only a licensed orphanage could apply to take Alex, Father Harry got the license. In the end, Father Harry put a roof over Alex’s head and food in his belly until Alex was old enough to do it himself. The Father also encouraged Alex to study his dad’s Lore Book and learn to write runes. If it wasn’t for the Father, Alex had no idea where he would have ended up, but it probably wouldn’t have been anywhere good.

He owed the Father more than he could ever repay, so if Father Harry needed new runes to keep the mission roof from leaking, Alex was happy to do it. Leslie didn’t understand, she couldn’t understand, and he didn’t blame her for that. She was right, helping the Father and his Mission was a drain on the business, but Alex simply didn’t care. Family was family, and Father Harry was family.

“Gonna have to take a rain check,” he said to Mary as he made his way back to the lunch counter.

“You sure?” she asked, her lips in an adorable pout. “It’ll only be another minute and a half.” As if to punctuate her words, the toast popped up from the toaster. The aroma of perfectly browned bread made his stomach growl.

He hesitated. Every minute he sat here was another minute water was pouring into the Mission’s great hall. On the other hand, it would take him at least thirty minutes to get there on the crawler and anything already wet wasn’t going to get any wetter if he took five minutes to eat.

“All right,” he said, sitting down. It didn’t hurt, of course, that Mary was such agreeable company.

Almost exactly a minute and a half later, she presented him with a plate of perfectly poached eggs on generously buttered toast.

“What did you call these?” he asked through a mouthful.

“That’s Adam and Eve on a raft with axle grease,” she said with a giggle.

Alex had heard this before, of course; waitresses and cooks in diners were always yelling such unintelligible nonsense around.

“You worked in a diner?”

“I love to cook, so I moved to the big city to try my hand here,” she said. Her voice had a lilting, far-away quality to it as she spoke. “Then, when I got here, I found out that being a cook anywhere is a serious boy’s club. The only jobs a woman can get cooking is places like this where you have to look good. No one ever wonders what the cook looks like in a diner, or a five-star restaurant for that matter.”

“Well, these eggs are perfect,” Alex said. He liked them soft, with the yokes hot but runny and the whites cooked hard, something an inexplicable number of cooks couldn’t seem to master.

“Thank you, Alex,” she said, beaming. When she smiled like that, Mary was really quite attractive.

Alex wolfed down his food and gave Mary a dime tip.

“Are you really a good cook?” he asked. She raised an eyebrow and leaned across the counter at him.

“Come back sometime,” she said. “Try me.”

Alex pulled out his pocket notepad and scribbled an address on it.

“There’s this place a few blocks from the park called The Lunch Box,” he said, tearing out the paper and handing it to her. “It’s a bit of a dog-wagon, but I know the owner. Ask for Max and tell him Alex Lockerby said you need to cook for him. He’ll give you a fair shot.”

“Hasn’t he got a cook?”

“Yeah,” he said. “But he stinks. The old cook retired and Max brought this new kid. He’s terrible. I hate to eat there anymore.”

“Why go?” Mary asked.

“It’s the only place near my apartment.”

“Thanks, Alex,” Mary said, tucking the paper into the pocket of her apron. “Will I see you again?”

“Sure,” Alex said. “I expect you to start cooking at my favorite place. You’ll see a lot of me then.”

“I think I’d like that,” Mary said with a very agreeable smile.

Alex doffed his hat, then took out one of Burt’s cigarettes and lit it. He tore a Minor Barrier Rune out of his book and cast it on himself.

“See you soon, Mary,” he said, then stepped out into the downpour.

The promise of paying work for the police let Alex justify the taxi ride over to Danny’s crime scene, but helping out Father Harry meant taking the crawler. Most big cities had a streetcar service, but New York’s was unlike anything in the world. The Crawler was one of J.D. Rockefeller’s inventions. Most sorcerers got rich marketing various enchanted materials, like Barton with his power capacitor in the Empire Tower, or Sorsha Kincaid, the Ice Queen who enchanted the metal disks used to keep iceboxes cold. Rockefeller was a whole different kind of sorcerer; when he put his power to work, he made tens of millions. When he first showed off the crawler, people said he’d finally gone insane.

Alex rounded the corner and made his way down the block to the crawler station. A half-dozen people were crowded under a metal awning that covered a single bench. As Alex approached, they all looked down the block expectantly, so he quickened his pace. The crawler swept into view, two blocks away, but it still made it to the station before Alex. It looked like a normal two-decker streetcar from the wheel carriages up, but it crawled along the ground on dozens of legs made of blue energy. It looked more like a giant, glowing centipede than a streetcar.

The crawler skittered to a stop and Alex jogged the last few feet to board. As he stepped up, he felt his weight cause the streetcar to shift a bit, then its legs adjusted and leveled it. The car was crammed with passengers, all huddling away from the doors to stay out of the wet and cold. Alex’s barrier would work for at least another half hour so he sat in one of the front stairwells and watched the city go by. The big advantage of crawlers was that they could go much faster than an electric or cable-driven streetcar, and they rode a lot smoother. They seemed to flow over even the roughest ground as if it were still water. For a dime, it was quite a ride.

Alex got off a few blocks from the Brotherhood of Hope Mission. Crawlers needed reliable power for their energy legs, so they never ventured too far into the outer ring. As he walked, Alex could feel his barrier rune beginning to fade and he quickened his pace. By the time he reached the mission, he was just beginning to get damp.

His knock at the door was answered by an old black nun who looked a hundred if she was a day. Despite her frail appearance, she let out a whoop of joy at the sight of Alex and hugged the stuffing out of him.

“How are you, boy?” she said when he’d finally disentangled himself from her. “Why haven’t you been around more lately?”

“I’m sorry, Sister Gwen,” he said. Alex blushed and didn’t hide it. “Things have been busy at work.”

Sister Gwen grunted, a sound that clearly indicated she thought this was a poor excuse.

“I hear the roof is leaking again,” he prompted, changing the subject. The old nun nodded and turned away, motioning for him to follow.

“Father Clementine’s been expecting you.”

She led him down familiar paths, past the dormitories and the kitchen and into the main hall. It was vast and open, like a warehouse, and Alex could see several unbroken streams of water falling down into strategically placed buckets. As he watched, two men in cassocks pulled a full bucket out from under one of the streams while an older man in a simple robe replaced it with an empty one.

“Be careful dumping that,” the man in the robe said. “I don’t want to have to mop the vestibule again.”

Alex gave Sister Gwen a parting hug and stepped up beside the older man. He was tall and worn with a craggy complexion and an enormous nose in the middle of his face. A thick crop of unkempt hair adorned his head, still jet black despite his being at least seventy. His hands were rough, calloused, and big, like boxers’ hands. As far as Alex knew, however, those hands had never been used in anger.

“I think two grown men can handle a bucket full of water,” Alex said.

“Alex,” the big man said, tuning to envelop Alex’s right hand in his. “How are you, son?” Before Alex could answer, he went on. “Sorry to bring you down here again, but…well, you see.” He waved at the leaks, as if somehow Alex might have missed them.

“No problem, Father,” Alex said. “Always happy to help out. In fact, I should have come down sooner to check on the runes.”

“You’re always welcome, Alex, you know that, but you’ve got your own life to lead.” He put his huge hand on Alex’s shoulder.

“Thanks to you,” Alex said, and meant it. “Now, do you have those roof tiles I need?”

Father Harry pointed over to a corner of the hall where the roof still seemed to be in good shape. “Brother Thomas has them on a table over by the good light.” He led Alex over to the table that stood under a shaft of bright light. “This corner is closer to Empire Tower,” Father Harry said. “This light never goes out.”

Alex laughed, setting his bag down next to a stack of fired clay roof tiles.

“I remember,” he said. He took a sharp metal stylus and a hard pencil from his bag, then added a jar of grayish paste and a small putty knife.

“I appreciate this, Alex,” Father Harry said. “I hate having to interrupt you at work.”

“It’s really no trouble, Father,” Alex said, tracing a modified Barrier Rune on the first tile. Once he carved it into the tile with the stylus and filled the cut with the wax solution of camphor oil and coal dust, the rune would cause all the nearby tiles to repel the rain.

Father Harry drew up a chair as if he intended to watch. From experience, Alex knew that he really wanted to talk. Alex had only lived here five years, but Father Harry had been like a real dad to him. He’d never admit it, but Alex looked forward to these talks.

“Maybe you should make the cuts deeper this time,” Father Harry said. “So they last longer.”

“You know it doesn’t work that way,” Alex said, smiling at the suggestion. “Runes wear out — that’s just what they do. If you want this roof to not leak permanently, you need to hire a sorcerer … or a roofer.”

Father Harry chuckled and sighed. “Too expensive. Thank God I’ve got you.”

“You do good work here, Father,” Alex said. “I enjoy helping. After all you did for me, it’s the least I could do. How’s the mission going these days?”

Father Harry’s countenance brightened.

“We’ve got two dozen people living in the guest wing, and we feed over a hundred every night.”

“Sister Morgan still do the cooking?”

“No,” Father Harry said. “She got too old. Asked to be transferred to a convent in Arizona. We’ve got a whole crop of new Brothers and Sisters now.” He looked sad for a moment as the years seemed to weigh on him. “The work goes on, though. There are always the poor and the forgotten to be cared for.” His countenance brightened after a moment. “So, how are things with you?”

Alex sighed.

“That bad?” Father Harry said, concern on his face. When Alex just shrugged, he grabbed Alex by the chin and pulled his face around so they were eye to eye. “You listen to me, boy. You’re a good detective and a fine runewright, God will give you a break one of these days.”

“God sure is taking his time about that,” Alex said, trying not to sound resentful.

“In the sweat of thy face shall thou eat bread,” Father Harry quoted.

“Genesis, chapter three, verse nineteen,” Alex recited. Father Harry had drilled the scriptures into his head while he lived at the mission.

“You know where it’s found but you don’t know what it means,” he said. “God doesn’t just give us the things we want, he expects us to work for them. To earn them.”

Alex flashed back to the lessons he’d had in this very hall. “The Lord helps those who help themselves,” he said.

“So you were listening,” Father Harry said, and smiled. “But did you learn the lesson?”

“If I keep working, the good Lord will bless me,” Alex said.

“In his good time,” the Father said with a compassionate smile and a nod. “We all must be patient.”

Alex looked up from his work and met the old man’s eyes.

“Thanks, Father,” he said. “I’ve been so busy, I must have forgotten.” He meant every word. It was impossible to let the world get the better of you when Father Harry spoke. He carried the light of his faith around like a torch that drove back the darkness. Alex wondered why he didn’t come back to the mission more often.

“So,” Father Harry said, a sly look crossing his face. “Have you found a nice girl yet?”

“Didn’t you just give me a lesson about patience and the Lord’s good time?” Alex asked, remembering why he didn’t come back very often.

Before the Father could rally, a Sister Alex didn’t know came hurrying across the floor.

“Father Clementine,” she said. “Sister Catherine can’t get the stove lit again.”

“Sorry, Alex,” Father Harry said, rising to his feet. “Duty calls.”

Saved by the bell, Alex thought.

Alex continued casting runes until the stack of tiles dwindled to nothing. As he finished each one, a Brother in a black cassock would take it up to a walkway that ran around the upper level, fitting it into a slot Alex had cut for them years ago. As each one went into place, the nearby leaks abruptly stopped.

As he worked, a thousand things came back to Alex. The time he scuffed up the floor with a pair of dime store roller skates. Sister Gwen had stayed up all night watching as Alex polished out the marks on his hands and knees. When Father Harry caught him smoking and made him eat the whole pack of cigarettes. He hadn’t touched another until he was out on his own. It wasn’t the plaza, but there were far worse places to grow up.

Somewhere in the middle of the stack, Father Harry came back and they spent the rest of the time catching up. It was one of the more pleasant evenings Alex had spent in a long time. Eventually, the smell of potato soup began to percolate through the hall. Based on the smell, a local butcher was giving the Mission his fresh scraps to add to the pot. Every little bit helped.

By the time Alex finished casting his runes on the roof tiles, the Brothers and Sisters of the Mission were setting out the evening meal to feed the poor. Alex couldn’t see it, but he knew that a line of ragged, downtrodden people had formed in the rain outside.

“Stay and eat with us,” Father Harry said, as Alex closed up his runewright kit and pulled on his suit jacket. Alex shook his head.

“Looks like you’ve got plenty of mouths to feed without mine. Call me when the roof leaks again.”

Father Harry put his hand on Alex’s shoulder and leaned close, as if he didn’t wish to be overheard.

“Can you come back on Saturday?” he asked quietly.

Alex thought about it, then shook his head. Saturdays were busy days in the detective business and he needed to be at the office. “I can’t on Saturday, but how about next week? I’ll come by and take you to lunch.”

Father Harry looked as if he would object, but then nodded.

“That sounds good,” he said, shaking Alex’s hand. “There’s a matter I need to discuss with you. In private.”

Alex was about to ask why the Father was acting so secretive, but his hand came away from the handshake with a five spot tucked inside.

“You know I can’t accept this,” he said, holding the bill up. Father Harry put one of his massive hands over Alex’s, closing it around the bill.

“Nonsense,” he said. “You really helped us out.”

“I can’t have you robbing the poor box to pay me,” Alex said.

Father Harry didn’t loosen his grip.

“I get a stipend from the church,” he said. “I put most of it into running this place, but I keep some back for my own use.” He looked Alex right in the eye, something he’d done often when Alex was growing up. Father Harry had a way of looking right into your soul with that gaze. “Let me do this,” he said. “The laborer is worthy of his hire.”

Alex smiled and nodded. For a moment, he was back in the mission school with the other neighborhood kids.

“First Timothy,” Alex said. “Chapter five, verse … twenty?”

“Eighteen,” Father Harry corrected. His craggy face wore a look of pride but there was sadness in his eyes.

“I’ll come by on Saturday,” Alex said. “Around noon.” His business would suffer for it, but he didn’t care. If the Father needed him, he would be there. It was as simple as that.

“Thank you, Alex,” he said. “Now get going. I’ve got work to do.”

Alex cast another Minor Barrier Rune and walked out into the rain, past the line of poor bedraggled men and women waiting for a simple meal. He made a mental note to tell Leslie about his Saturday appointment first thing tomorrow morning. She wouldn’t like it, but Alex didn’t care. If it hadn’t been for Father Harry, he might be standing in that line, soaked to the bone and waiting for the one decent meal he’d have all day.

It was late and Alex felt the strain of the last hours he spent scribing and casting runes. Magic taxed the body and mind as much as any physical work. He lit another of Burt’s cigarettes, then turned up his collar and headed for home in the flickering glow of the streetlights.

Alex caught a westbound crawler, getting off a few blocks short of the park, then took another southbound one until he saw The Lunch Box. He thought about stopping in to tell Max, the owner, about Mary, but decided against it. She’d do all right without his help and Max could go on for hours about any subject. All Alex wanted right now was a cold beer and a warm fire.

He lived in a four-story brownstone just six blocks from Central Park. The house belonged to his mentor, a retired British doctor, one Ignatius Bell, late of His Majesty’s Navy. Bell had retired to New York to live with his son, Kingsley, who already lived there, but before Ignatius’ boat arrived, Kingsley succumbed to pneumonia and died. Bell arrived to nothing more than a grave marker, the brownstone, and enough money to live comfortably for the remaining years of his life.

The British navy used runewrights as their doctors. As Bell put it, Any fool can shove a healing draught down someone’s throat, but only a runewright can cast a Mending Rune and properly fix a broken leg.

Doctor Bell was full of sayings like that.

After living in New York in his son’s home for a few months, Bell decided he needed to pass his Lore on. Kingsley had been a banker and Bell had no other children, so he’d searched for a suitable apprentice. Eventually he found Alex hawking what simple runes he knew on a street corner. Now Alex lived with Bell and learned from him. It was Bell who convinced Alex to become a detective. Your skills are too great to peddle Restoration Runes in a shop or Barrier Runes on the street corner when it rains, he had said. You’ve a keen mind, use it.

Learning the Lore that Bell had collected over the years was hard. Some of his Runes were more complex than anything Alex had ever seen, certainly more than anything in his father’s meager Lore Book. As hard as they were, however, Bell’s lessons on how to be a detective were worse. He’d started Alex on the stories of Sherlock Holmes, showing him how the skills of observation and deduction could be employed to determine things like motive, and to reconstruct the events of a crime from the evidence left behind.

From fictional crimes, they graduated to real ones. As a Doctor with Rune Lore, Bell had offered his skill to the city medical examiner. Most Doctors these days weren’t runewrights, at least in America, so the M.E. was grateful for the help. With access to real cases and real case files, Bell taught Alex how to look for evidence, how to spot errors in witness testimony, and how to use his Lore to find things no cop ever could.

After two grueling years of that, Bell had pronounced Alex ready, and Lockerby Investigations had been born. At first, Bell went with him on every case, watching and correcting when necessary. After a year of that, Bell stopped going along, and only heard a report from Alex each night over dinner. These days Bell hardly asked at all. Instead Alex found himself eager to share the particulars of his cases with the old doctor. Lockerby Investigations had been open five years now, and the nightly report had become a fixed routine.

Alex checked his watch as he mounted the stairs to the door. Bell liked to retire early and it was almost nine. It was possible he’d already gone to bed. Checking his watch served a dual purpose. Powerful runes covered the door to the brownstone. Invisible to the naked eye, Alex could still feel them as he drew closer. Inside his watch, runes etched around the inside of the cover and behind the crystal began to glow. As he touched the door, he felt the magical protections that kept it shut roll away from the presence of the watch. He reached out and opened the door, stepping quickly through, then shut it gently behind him.

He didn’t know what runes guarded the door, nor which ones shielded the house itself. Bell cast those and maintained them. They were a part of his Lore Book that he had yet to share with Alex. All Alex really knew about those runes was that the beams in the attic were covered with them, and that without his watch to serve as a key, the wooden front door with its stained glass window would withstand the force of a battering ram.

It gave Alex a chill just thinking about it.

Someday Bell would teach him those runes. That would be an interesting day.

The front door led to an entryway with pegs for hats and coats, an umbrella stand, and a bench with storage for boots and galoshes. An inner glass door separated the entry from the tiny foyer and Alex tried to be quiet as he opened it and stepped inside. The interior of the brownstone had been done over in an art deco style with wainscoting and molding bearing polygonal shapes and angular designs. For a runewright of the geometric style, it was entirely appropriate.

Alex turned right, into the library. An enormous hearth occupied the far wall, with marble columns and a massive cherry-wood mantle. To either side, bookshelves reached up to the fifteen-foot ceiling. The bookcases had been ordered by Kingsley, before his death, and they matched the molding and trim. Now the cases were stuffed with books of all shapes and descriptions. Most were works on medicine and rune lore, but Bell had an entire section dedicated to classical literature, and even a chest where he kept select pulp fiction books that tickled his fancy. The only furniture in the room were two overstuffed arm chairs that faced the fire, each with an ottoman in front of it. A small, round occasional table stood between them, supporting a mahogany cigar box, two ash trays, and a stained glass lamp to provide light for reading after dark.

A modest coal fire had been laid in the iron grate of the hearth, filling the room with invigorating warmth, and pungent cigar smoke swirled around the furthest chair.

“Here you are at last, dear boy,” Doctor Ignatius Bell said, shutting the flimsy paperback book he’d been reading. “I was beginning to think I’d have to send out a search party.”

Alex laughed and sat down in the chair next to Bell, setting his hat on the ottoman.

“Not to worry, Iggy,” Alex said with a grin. “I had to make a stop at the Mission.” Alex had dubbed Bell “Iggy” during their first year together and the name just stuck. Bell didn’t particularly like it, but he seemed to take it as a sign of affection from Alex, so he tolerated it.

“Yes, your secretary informed me thus when I called.”

There was a note of irritation in Iggy’s voice and Alex flinched.

“I should have called,” he admitted, taking out another of Burt’s cigarettes and lighting it. “Did I ruin dinner?”

Ever since Iggy let Alex run his own cases, Alex had been paying rent to bunk at the brownstone. Iggy hadn’t insisted, but Alex needed to pay his way. He did, however, let Iggy cook for the both of them. Iggy had learned to cook in the navy and it had become a serious hobby for him ever since.

“I made a quiche,” Iggy said, puffing on his cigar. “It was delicate, light as air, and delicious.”

“What’s a quiche?”

Iggy sighed and put his hand to his forehead as if it suddenly hurt.

“I think your fellow uncultured Americans would call it a bacon pie.”

Alex perked up at that. He hadn’t eaten anything since the poached eggs Mary cooked him.

“I left you some on the table under a cover,” Iggy said.

Alex put his hands on the chair’s arms but before he could rise, Iggy spoke again.

“How did it go today?” he said, opening his book again. “It must have gone well if you can afford cigarettes again.”

Alex stifled a sigh and leaned back in his chair. Apparently Iggy wanted his pound of flesh for Alex’s lack of judgment. The Brits really loved their social rules.

“Funny story about the cigarettes,” he said, then launched into a detailed description of his day. For the most part, Iggy just listened quietly, commenting when he wanted clarification on any certain point.

“So,” he said when Alex finished. “Father Harry wants to see you in private on Saturday.” He puffed his cigar for a moment before adding, “Ominous.”

Alex laughed. Father Harry was many things, but mysterious wasn’t one of them. The man was an open book.

“He probably just wants me to do some rune work for him and doesn’t want to talk about it in front of the sisters. You know what a gossip Sister Gwen is.”

Iggy nodded, staring into the fire.

“I’m sure you’re right,” he said, though he didn’t sound convinced. “In any case, I’ll wager you’re hungry.”

Alex stood and picked up his hat.

“Oh, Father Harry even paid me for my work.” Alex fished the five-dollar bill out of his pocket and held it up.

“You should probably put that in the safe,” Iggy said before returning to his book.

Turning toward the hearth, Alex approached the bookcase on the left. About six feet off the floor, just high enough that Alex had to reach up to get it, stood a thick book bound in green leather. Unlike the other books on the shelf, this one tried very hard not to be noticed. The rune that shielded it was so powerful that it bled over onto the books on either side, a volume of Shakespeare’s poetry on the right and a large, thin book bound in red leather on the left.

Alex took down the green book and opened it. The center of each page had been painstakingly cut out with a razor blade, then painted with varnish to make them all one solid piece. From the outside, the book appeared perfectly normal, but once opened, it had a hollow well inside, large enough to hide three of Iggy’s pulp novels. Alex withdrew a small stack of cash held together by a paper clip. He added the fiver to it, then retuned the clip and re-shelved the book. This was Alex’s emergency stash, money that not even Leslie knew about. Any time he had off-the-books cash, it went into the safe. Iggy said it was an important habit to develop.

Iggy had lived through the big war and several bank runs in his home country. Alex never doubted that the man mistrusted banks. He was also sure that Iggy had his own safe somewhere in the house, under the floorboards in his room, or maybe behind some loose bricks in the basement. It never tempted him. Alex made his own way in the world and he never took what wasn’t his just because he could. Still, the idea of it made him want to go looking, just to see if he could find his way through the runes that kept it hidden.

Of course, it was more likely that it was here in the library, in a book or a series of them, just like Alex’s.

Always hide things in plain sight, Iggy told him. No one thinks to look there; they always think you’re trying to be clever.

“Good night, Iggy,” Alex said but the doctor had bent over his novel again and seemed oblivious.

Alex ate his bacon pie in the kitchen. For something with a girly name like quiche, it was really quite good. After he finished, he washed his plate, fork, and glass in the sink, then set them aside to dry. He thought about opening his magic vault and replenishing his rune book, but he just didn’t have the energy. He was tired. He’d had a full day, but it wasn’t full the way he wanted it to be. The police job had started out great, but now Danny and Callahan would lie in wait and catch the murderers red-handed. It was open and shut with nothing more for him to do but pick up his check. Not that he minded that part, but he wanted to feel more useful. He wanted a case that would be hard to solve, one he could make his name with. If Leslie got him one more job finding a lost dog or a cheating husband, he’d pack it in and hawk Barrier Runes on rainy street corners.

Not really, of course, but it had been a long day and Alex wanted to indulge in a few minutes of self-pity.

His room was on the third floor, above Iggy’s. It was small and modest with just the bare essentials; a bed, a desk, a wing-back chair, a nightstand, and a dresser. A narrow door led to a tiny bathroom with a toilet, sink, and stand-up shower. A telephone and a bottle of bourbon with a glass stood on the nightstand, and Alex poured himself a slug, then stripped down. He hung up his jacket and threw his trousers over the back of the wing-back chair. His barrier rune only kept falling rain from hitting him. It did nothing about puddles, so his shoes were soaked. He’d have to oil the leather to keep it supple. He poured himself a second slug of the bourbon and set to work.

When he finally got to bed, the clock on the nightstand read eleven twenty-five.

It felt like Alex’s head had just hit the pillow when he was startled awake by the telephone. At whatever ungodly hour of the morning it was, the sound grated on his nerves like a rasp. He felt an instant headache form somewhere behind his left eye. Reaching out in the dark he managed to find the phone and fumbled the receiver to his ear.

“Yeah?” he mumbled.

“Alex?” a desperate voice came across the wire. He knew it sounded familiar, someone he knew, but his brain wasn’t fully awake yet. It was a woman, he recognized that, and she was just short of hysterical. “Alex!” the voice said again, more urgent than before. “Are you there?”

“Sister Gwen?” he asked, the connections in his mind putting a name to the voice. “What’s—”

“You have to come down to the Mission, Alex,” Sister Gwen said. Her usually calm voice broke. Alex had never heard her anything but calm and in control, but now she was neither. The relief of reaching him warred with some unknown panic and she sobbed. “You have to come now. Hurry!”

She was weeping and her voice betrayed a fragile state of mind.

“Of course,” Alex said, sitting up. “Of course. I’ll come down right now.”

He hoped this would calm her and she seemed to relax a bit. She drew several ragged breaths and her voice came over the wire in a tense whisper. “They’re dead, Alex.”

Alex’s mind snapped into full wakefulness.

“Who?” he demanded. “Who’s dead?”

“Everybody.”

Alex fumbled at the buttons of his shirt as he jumped down the stairs, two at a time. When he reached the second floor landing, he stopped long enough to tuck in his shirt and buckle his belt, then he headed for the foyer.

“What’s going on?” Iggy’s voice came out of the darkness at him. It was a little after three in the morning and there weren’t any lights burning. Alex could see Iggy’s shadow in the open doorway to his bedroom. “Alex,” he said again. “What’s happened?”

“I don’t know,” Alex said, heading for the stairs. “Sister Gwen called from the Mission. She said someone’s dead. Maybe more than one, she wasn’t very specific.”

“Call a cab,” Iggy said, ducking back into his room. “I’ll get my bag and join you.”

Alex didn’t want to think, he wanted to run, but Iggy’s words penetrated the fog of his tired mind. He steadied himself, then walked down the stairs to the kitchen where the downstairs phone was mounted to the wall. He picked up the receiver and gave the operator the number of a cab company. A few moments later, he hung up and headed back up to his room to retrieve his kit.

“They said five minutes,” he called as he passed Iggy’s room.

Five minutes later Alex and Iggy stood on the sidewalk outside the brownstone, Alex with his kit and Iggy with his medical bag. Ten minutes after that, the cab pulled up in front of the Brotherhood of Hope Mission. It reminded Alex of the scene outside of Jerry Pemberton’s apartment, but with more squad cars.

Lots more.

“Steady,” Iggy said, putting a restraining hand on Alex’s arm. He paid the cabby and the pair of them got out.

“What are you doing here?” the cop at the door asked. Alex recognized him, the scarface cop from Chester Pemberton’s building, but he didn’t know his name.

“Sister Gwen … I mean Sister Harris called me,” Alex said. “Told me to come right away. She’s expecting me.”

The cop gave Alex and Iggy the once-over, then made up his mind.

“Wait here,” he said. The cop withdrew back to the open doors of the mission and spoke animatedly with someone Alex could not see. After a moment, he waived Alex and Iggy forward.

The foyer of the mission was relatively empty considering the number of patrol cars outside. Black and white tiles covered the floor, giving it the distinct look of a hospital. An oak reception desk, stained black with years of use, stood just inside the door with a long row of pegs for hats and coats on the opposite wall. Next to the pegs were the heavy oak doors that led to the great hall. These were open and a uniformed officer stood by them. The door to the kitchens was just across from the entrance and it stood open as well, but the room beyond looked empty. Lastly, behind the reception desk were the stairs that led up to the dormitories. Two people sat on the stairs — one was a raven-haired policewoman in the blue uniform of an officer, and the other was Sister Gwen.

Alex’s breath caught in his throat when he saw her. She had always been old and frail, for as long as he’d known her, but now she seemed to shrink in on herself as if an enormous weight pressed down upon her.

“Alex!” she cried on catching sight of him. She stood and lurched across the entryway to him, throwing herself into his arms. “Oh, Alex, thank God you’re here! I don’t know what to do.” She squeezed Alex around the middle so tightly he had trouble breathing. “What are we going to do?” she whispered. Alex put his hand on her trembling shoulder.

“Sister Gwen?” he said, but the elderly nun just buried her face in his side.

“She’s in shock,” Iggy said, putting his bag on the reception desk. He pulled a handmade tea packet from a jar in his doctor’s bag. “Where’s the kitchen?” he asked Alex.

Alex nodded at the open door across the hall.

“Take Sister Gwen in the kitchen and have her sit down,” he told the policewoman, handing her the tea packet. “Make her some tea with this and make sure she drinks all of it.”

The policewoman nodded and managed to pull Sister Gwen free of Alex.

“Don’t worry,” Alex told Sister Gwen. “I’ll take care of everything. I promise.”

Iggy put his hand on Alex’s shoulder as the policewoman led Sister Gwen away.

“You want me to have a look first?” he said. Alex shook his head.

“Come on,” he said, picking up his bag from where he’d dropped it when Sister Gwen had hugged him. He took a deep breath, then crossed to the open doors of the Great Hall. Inside, a dozen policemen were taking pictures or moving around the floor with notebooks. Two-dozen bodies lay on the floor; some were sprawled as if they’d fallen down, while others were lying in repose, with their hands folded atop their bodies. Still others were up on the long tables that served as a dining area, covered with blankets. A pair of policemen with bandannas tied over their faces were pulling the sprawled corpses from the floor and moving them to a neat line off to one side.

Alex saw people he recognized among the bodies, the Brothers in their black cassocks and the new nuns. The rest were vagrants, mostly men, but a few women, all dressed in shabby, threadbare clothes. At the end of the neat row the policemen had made, lay Father Harry.

Alex’s breath seemed to freeze in his lungs and his heart beat wildly. The big man lay on his side with his arm outstretched as if he’d simply gotten tired and laid down on the floor to rest. But he was dead. Alex struggled to believe it. He’d spoken to the man, sat at his side less than twelve hours ago. How could he be dead? How could God have allowed such a saintly man to die?

He felt his right hand clench into a fist and his left squeezed the handle of the old doctor’s bag that held his kit. Burning with righteous anger and indignation, Alex started forward into the room.

“That’s far enough,” a uniformed policeman said, holding out his hand to block Alex’s progress.

Alex turned and started to raise his fist, determined to strike the man down for daring to block his path to the Father. Iggy quickly seized Alex’s hand and stepped between them.

“The sister called for you and you talked to her, but this is a police matter,” the cop continued, seemingly oblivious to Alex’s rage. He was short and a little chubby, with plump cheeks and dark eyebrows but his uniform was clean and neatly pressed. This one would be a stickler for the rules.

Alex’s mind went instantly to the half dozen runes he could use to render the officious cop inert, but before he could settle on one, Iggy spoke.

“Where is your coroner, young man?” Iggy asked.

“Not here yet,” the officer said. Iggy handed him his card.

“I’m Doctor Bell. I consult for the coroner’s office. Since he isn’t here, I’m offering my services. Who’s in charge?”

The chubby policeman scrutinized the card, then nodded toward the back where a group of detectives stood.

“They grabbed whoever they could for this one,” he said. “I don’t know the Lieutenant in charge, but he’s back there.”

“Thank you,” Bell said, sweeping past the man. “Come along, Alex.”

Alex followed along, finally managing to control his anger.

“Thanks,” he whispered.

“Think nothing of it,” Iggy said “But get hold of yourself for now. There’ll be time for grief later.”

Alex wasn’t sure he agreed with that, but he knew Iggy was right about one thing, if he let his emotions get the better of him now, the cops would throw him out on his ear. As they crossed the hall, Alex noticed the bodies on the floor. Each was pale, with red lesions on their exposed flesh.

“Should we be wearing our masks?” he whispered to Iggy. The old doctor shook his head.

“Whatever killed these people did it in a matter of a few hours,” he said. “The police have been here long enough that if it were contagious, they’d already be showing signs.”

Alex didn’t think that conclusion was wrong, but it felt like they were betting their lives on it. Still, Iggy was almost never wrong.

Almost.

“Who’s the Lieutenant?” Iggy asked, as they reached the knot of suit-clad detectives.

“Callahan,” Alex said, recognizing the big man. “I thought they’d have you down at the warehouse.”

Frank Callahan looked at Alex and a sour look passed his face. “I was,” he said. “I was there all damn day and when they finally let me go home, I get sent here. What brings you around?”

“I know…I knew the priest here.” Alex turned and nodded toward Father Harry’s body. The pain of seeing the great man lying on the floor like yesterday’s garbage pierced him again, but much of its power was gone.

“So you’re the one the nun called?” he asked.

“Yes,” Alex said. “I lived here for five years after my dad died. Father Harry took me in.”

Callahan’s features softened. “I’m sorry,” he said. He opened up a spiral notebook and flipped to a new page. “What did you say the priest’s name was?”

“Harrison Arthur Clementine,” Alex said.

“The nun said you were here last night,” one of the other detectives said. Alex nodded.

“I’m a runewright. I was repairing the runes that keep out the rain. The roof’s leaked for years.”

“You see anything out of the ordinary?” Callahan asked.

“No. I got here around three and worked till just before eight — that’s when they start dinner.”

“All right,” Callahan said, flipping his notebook closed. “If you think of anything else, call me at the precinct. For now, go home.”

“No,” Alex growled, his hands balling into fists. “You need my help.”

One of the detectives casually slipped his hand inside his jacket, others wore scowls, but Callahan’s face remained calm.

“You’re too close to this, Lockerby,” he said. “You know it and I know it. Now go home.”

“He is, indeed, very close to this,” Iggy said, stepping up in front of Callahan. “But he’s also quite correct, you need his help. His and mine.”

“And who are you, Jeeves?” Callahan said, his gruff manner squarely back in place.

“I’m Doctor Ignatius Bell. I’m here to offer my medical services in lieu of your absent coroner.”

Callahan turned to one of the other detectives. “When’s the coroner supposed to arrive?”

“Just as soon as they sober him up,” a sardonic voice replied.

Callahan mulled it over for a long minute, looking back and forth from Iggy to Alex.

“Fine,” he said at last. “I want to get home before sun-up.”

“I very much doubt that will happen,” Iggy said. “You and all your men need to clear this room immediately.”

Callahan rolled his eyes and sighed.

“Why?” he asked in a tone of voice that clearly indicated that he didn’t want to know. Iggy pointed to one of the corpses, sprawled across a table as if he’d collapsed while eating.

“What do those lesions on his skin look like to you?”

Callahan shrugged and shook his head.

“Boils?”

“It looks like smallpox to me,” Iggy said. A murmur swept the assembled detectives.

“Are you saying that smallpox did this?” one of the detectives said.

“I doubt it,” Iggy said. “Smallpox takes days to incubate and a week or more to kill. Whatever happened here happened fast. My point is that we don’t know what we’re dealing with, and until we do, I suggest we limit possible exposure.”

“My boys have been in here for almost an hour,” Callahan said.

“And they’re probably fine, but let’s move everyone out of this room until I can run some tests.”

“All right,” Callahan agreed, then he shouted for everyone to stop what they were doing and go. “Don’t be too long, Doc,” he said once his men were gone. “I’m sure the Chief has heard about this by now and he’s going to want a report…soon.”

“We’ll be as fast as we can,” Iggy said and Callahan withdrew.

“You said you didn’t think it’s contagious,” Alex said once Callahan was out of earshot.

“I just wanted him and his men away from this room,” Iggy said. “It’s going to be hard enough to figure out what happened here without the police stomping all over everything.”

“How do we even begin?” Alex asked, looking around at the room full of corpses.

“Is this everyone from the mission?”

Alex looked around and nodded.

“There are four rooms in the sister’s dormitory and four in the brother’s. I see three sisters here and three brothers, plus … plus Father Harry.”

“With Sister Gwen outside, that’s everyone,” Iggy said. “I’ll get a photographer and someone to help out from the Lieutenant. Then we’ll see if we can identify any of the others.”

“I’ll see to Father Harry,” Alex said, turning.

Iggy reached out and caught him by the arm.

“We don’t have much time,” he said. “I know it’s bloody awful, but we’ll have time for grieving later.”

“He’s on the floor,” Alex growled through clenched teeth.

Iggy looked at him steadily. His look was determined, but there was compassion in his eyes.

“You know we have to investigate before we can move him,” he said. “The sooner that’s done, the sooner we can do right by the Father.”

Alex clenched his fists, then closed his eyes and sighed. Iggy was right. The only thing Alex could do for Father Harry was to catch whoever did this. If he wanted to do that, he had to find clues — evidence, and his chance was rapidly slipping away. Callahan and the policemen wouldn’t stay out forever. Alex met Iggy’s gaze and nodded, stuffing his feelings down deep.

“I’ll have a look around with the oculus,” Alex said. “Maybe there’s something here to be seen by ghostlight.”

“You think whatever happened here was magical,” Iggy said, nodding his head approvingly. “Good. Once you’ve done that, go find out what Sister Gwen knows. She’ll be calm enough to talk to by then.”

Alex set down his kit as Iggy moved off to have a word with Lieutenant Callahan. A moment later, he returned, followed by two officers.

If Iggy was right and whatever had killed Father Harry had done so in just a matter of hours, it had to be magical. Even the black plague took time to kill its victims. With that thought in mind, Alex strapped on his oculus and adjusted the lenses to reveal energy fields. Then he clipped a ghostlight burner into his multi-lamp and lit it.

Ghostly green light filtered out of the lantern’s lens, bathing the room in its glow. To normal eyes, it looked dim and indistinct, but through the oculus, the room became flooded with light, and the dark benches and tables stood out in stark contrast. As his eye swept the room, he could see pulses of energy crisscrossing in the open space, like ripples from rocks thrown simultaneously into a pond. The lines bounced off each other and rebounded, forming new patterns.

Alex followed each pulse to its source, but each one ended at one of the stones he’d inscribed with a barrier rune earlier. Each of them was functioning perfectly, radiating out its magic and keeping the rain at bay. Other than that, however, there was no other magic in the room.

What else can kill quickly? Poison?

Alex went back to his kit and took out a ring made of jade. This wasn’t the pale green, Asian jade, but rather a dark, forest green stone that came from Alaska, sometimes called nephrite. The stone had runes carved all around its circumference on each side and it hung suspended from a leather cord that had been cut from the belt of a poisoned man.

Taking the purity stone, Alex made his way to the table at the back where the big pot of soup sat. It was mostly empty, meaning that whatever happened here, it hadn’t started in earnest until the assembled vagrants had come back for seconds. About an inch remained in the bottom, cold and congealed.

More than enough.

Alex lowered the purity stone into the soup and counted to ten before withdrawing it. If the soup had been poisoned, the ring would have glowed a bright, sickly yellow, but when he pulled it free of the thick mass, it remained deep green.

For good measure, Alex tested all the bowls that still had soup in them. None of them had been poisoned either.

Dejected, Alex cleaned off the purity stone and returned it to his kit. Putting on the oculus once more, he removed the ghostlight burner and replaced it with the silverlight. This time the room lit up and glowed so brightly it took Alex’s eye a moment to get used to it. There were handprints, vomit, and urine everywhere. The leaky roof ensured that any old evidence had been washed away, so this was all new.

From the look of it, there had been chaos in the room at some point. Handprints showed where people had crawled and eventually collapsed as they succumbed to the strange illness. It looked like there had been a fight of some kind as Alex found traces of blood on the floor and even a tooth.

The greatest concentration of hand and finger prints were around and on the heavy oak doors that separated the Great Hall from the foyer and the dormitories. From the look of it, the doors had been locked, trapping everyone inside. That didn’t make any sense, though. Father Harry carried a key to this door in his pocket. He couldn’t have been locked in.

All of this was interesting, but after examining every trace, Alex was no closer to learning what happened than when he started.

Time to talk to Sister Gwen.

He returned his oculus and lamp to his kit and made his way to the kitchen.

“Learn anything?” Callahan asked when he emerged into the foyer.

“Not very much,” Alex admitted. “I’m going to talk to Sister Gwen.”

Callahan turned and followed him into the kitchen, opening up his notebook. Sister Gwen was sitting at the little table where the brothers and sisters of the mission took their meals, wrapped in a blanket. She still had the mug of tea in her hands and her trembling had subsided.

“Alex,” she said when she saw him. “You have to help us.” Her voice was distant but firm.

“I will, Sister,” he said, sitting down next to her. “Tell me what happened after I left last night.”

She took a slow breath and looked up into Alex’s eyes. He saw fear there, and pain — two things of which he thought the old nun incapable.

“We just opened the doors for dinner,” she said in a small voice. “I get tired helping with the cooking, so Father … Father Clementine lets me take a nap in my room until nine, when he holds the evening service for the poor. The bells wake me up, but…” Tears welled up in her eyes and she squeezed them shut, sending the water trailing down her cheeks. “But there weren’t any bells. I didn’t wake up till after two in the morning.”

“Then what happened?” Alex coaxed her.

“I went downstairs to make sure the front door was locked, but it was wide open. There wasn’t anyone at the desk, so I went to see Father Clementine, but his room was empty. I looked, but no one was in their rooms. I came back down here to check the Great Hall but the doors were locked.”

“Is that unusual?” Callahan asked.

“No.” Sister Gwen shook her head. “Anyone who needs a place to sleep can stay here, but we lock them in.”

“A few years ago, one of the vagrants got up in the middle of the night and attacked a nun,” Alex explained. “They lock the doors ever since.”

“Since I couldn’t find Father Clementine, I went and got the spare key from his office. When I came down and opened the door…” She shook her head as if trying to find the words. “Everyone was in the Great Hall.” She looked pleadingly up into Alex’s eyes. “They were all dead. “ She looked down at the mug in her hands. “All dead.”

Alex clenched his fists, feeling the nails digging into his palms. He’d always seen Sister Gwen as a paragon of strength and faith. To see her like this made him want to beat someone soundly.

“I promise you, Sister Gwen,” Alex said, managing to hide the rage in his voice. “I’m going to find out what happened here, and if someone did this, I’m gong to make them suffer for it.”

She looked up at him, her eyes suddenly clear, her old strength suddenly back. “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord,” she said, her voice full of its old power. “If someone did this, you prove it, and you give them to the police, you understand?”

“I do,” Alex lied with a nod, and he could feel the weight of the semi-automatic pistol under his jacket. He would find whoever did this, and when he did, he wouldn’t bother the police.

He looked up to find Callahan watching him intently. It was obvious from his face that he knew what Alex had been thinking.

“What now?” he said.

“I have to check something,” Alex said, more to himself. “Take care of her,” he told the policewoman.

Alex left the kitchen and went to the big doors that separated the Great Hall from the foyer. He turned his back to the door and walked across the narrow foyer to the cast iron radiator on the opposite wall. A boiler in the basement heated the building and the radiator. It had been modified to use enchanted boiler stones to heat the water, but the rest of the system still worked normally. Being careful not to burn his hand, Alex felt around under the hot iron fixture, until he found what he sought.

“You find something?” the lieutenant asked.

“Father Harry’s key,” he said, holding the old-fashioned iron skeleton key up so that Callahan could see it.

“What does that mean?”

“It means I know what happened here, at the end anyway,” Alex said, standing. “Now let’s see if Doctor Bell can tell us how it began.”

“It’s a disease of some kind,” Iggy said once Alex and Lieutenant Callahan caught up with him. “It looks like smallpox but it’s not. Some of these people look sicker than the others — they have more spots and they’re larger, but I can’t tell you why.”

“What can you tell us?” Callahan said. “At this point I’d take anything.”

“It’s not magical,” Alex said. “And it’s not a poison. I checked the soup, the bread, and the water in all the pitchers.”

“How is that possible?” Callahan said. “That means these people all came here, contracted some disease no one’s ever heard of, and died in a matter of hours?”

Iggy nodded gravely.

“It’s time we brought in some professionals,” he said to Callahan. “Call over to the University, and wake up whoever you have to. Find out who is running their viral pathology program and get them over here as soon as possible.”

“Viral—?” Callahan started, then stopped. “What’s that now?”

“It’s the study of diseases. Now hurry.”

Iggy watched Callahan turn and head off toward a telephone, then turned to Alex.

“Anything else?”

“Father Harry must have realized what was happening.” Alex held up the key. “He locked everyone in here, then slid the key under the door.”

“He probably stopped whatever this is from killing a lot more people,” Iggy said. “I wish I had more data. Who was the first person to be sick? How long did it take for symptoms to show?”

“It took less than an hour for symptoms,” Alex said. “Sister Gwen said she didn’t wake up till two in the morning because no one rang the bells for the service. The bell rope is in the choir loft, and you can only get there from a stair behind the kitchen. That means the door was locked before nine o’clock.”

Iggy began stroking his mustache, something he did when thinking.

“We’ve got to find out how this plague came to be here,” he said. “Is there anyone new to the mission?”

Alex shook his head. “Father Harry said that the Brothers and Sisters were new, except Sister Gwen. But it looked like they’d been here a while at least.”

“What about the vagrants?”

“No way to tell,” Alex said. “Most are probably regulars but there’s bound to be a few new faces.”

Alex swept his gaze over the hall. Nothing about the staff stood out and the patrons were all the same with their shabby clothes, unkempt appearance, and worn out shoes.

All except one.

“Hey,” Alex said, pointing at a man under a blanket. He had been laid on an out-of-the-way table toward the rear of the hall. When whoever covered him pulled the blanket over his head, they exposed his shoes. His shiny, new-heeled shoes.

“Those aren’t the shoes of a vagrant,” Iggy said, seeing what Alex meant immediately. Alex nodded.

“That’s a man who doesn’t belong.”

When they reached the table, Iggy pulled the blanket off without hesitation or ceremony. The man beneath it was in his thirties with slicked back hair, a pencil mustache, and a Roman nose. He was dressed in a pair of well-made trousers with a white button-up shirt sans necktie, and his collar was undone.

“Maybe he has an identity card,” Alex said, checking the man’s pockets. He found them all empty. “No smokes, no coins, no keys,” he reported.

“I’m more interested in his condition,” Iggy said. “These boils on his skin are bigger than anyone else’s, and there are more of them. I think this man was the first person to be sick. He certainly has the worst case.”

“So who is he and what was he doing here?” Alex asked.

Iggy shrugged, his hand wandering to his mustache again.

“What does the body tell us?”

Alex felt like he was back in detective school again with professor Bell giving lessons. He ran a practiced eye over the corpse, noting every detail and trying to fit them together into a picture.

“He’s well-to-do,” Alex began. “His clothes are well made, tailored.”

“So he’s wealthy?” Iggy prodded.

“No. He’s got money, but he’s not rich. His shoes have been resoled at least twice and those are new heels.”

“Maybe he’s thrifty.”

Again Alex shook his head. “Wing tips are all the rage with the upper crust these days,” he said. “If he traveled in moneyed circles, he’d have a pair.”

“What else?”

Alex picked up the man’s arm, bending it at the elbow.

“Look at his hands.” He indicated a row of calluses along the pads where the fingers joined the hand. “Whatever he does for a living is hard on his hands. I’d say he’s some kind of skilled tradesman, a sculptor, or maybe a carpenter.”

“Not enough cuts on his hands for a carpenter,” Iggy said. “When you work with wood you get splinters. I think you’re right about him being well off, though. Whatever he does — did — it provided him a good living.”

“That means he doesn’t live around here,” Alex said. “So what was he doing here?”

“Maybe we’re assuming something we shouldn’t,” Iggy said. “Maybe he’s not out of place here. Father Harry got donations from many sources; maybe he’s a patron.”

“In which case Sister Gwen might know him.” Alex turned but stopped. Sister Gwen had seen far more than a saintly old woman should. How could he, in good conscience, subject her to more of this nightmare?

“I’ll make sure all the brothers and sisters are covered,” Iggy said, reading Alex’s hesitation. “As long as they’re not visible, she should be strong enough.”

“She’s strong,” Alex said. “I’ve never met anyone with more grit. It just isn’t fair to make her relive what happened when she opened those locked doors.”

“She wants to know what happened here as badly as we do,” Iggy said, and put his hand on Alex’s shoulder. He wasn’t wrong, but that didn’t make Alex like it any better. He started off toward the kitchen and Iggy left to cover as many bodies as he could.

Five minutes later, Alex led Sister Gwen through the Great Hall’s open doors and across the stone floor to the table in the back. Her steps were steady and purposeful, but she clung to Alex’s arm like she was walking the edge of a cliff with certain death awaiting a misstep.

“I know him,” she said after she’d stared at his face for a few moments. “He’d come in here every Sunday for Mass.”

“Do you know his name?” Alex prompted.

“Charles Beaumont,” Sister Gwen said. “I remember him because he used to ask Father Clementine to bless him every week.”

“How did Mr. Beaumont know the Father?” Iggy asked. Sister Gwen sighed and shook her head.

“I don’t know.”

“Do you know anything else about him?” Alex asked.

The old nun hesitated as sadness washed across her features. “I probably shouldn’t say.” She looked up at Alex and her dark eyes bored into him like they had done so many times in his youth.

“It’s all right,” he said. “We just want to get to the truth. For Father Harry and for you.”

She nodded and patted Alex on the cheek with her worn, gnarled hand.

“The Father once told me that Mr. Beaumont was a thief,” she said.

Alex hadn’t been expecting that. He looked to Callahan, who had just returned, and the big Lieutenant leaned over the dead man.

“Nobody I know,” he said. “I’ll have the local boys take a look.”

“Thank you, Sister Gwen,” Alex said, taking her hands in his. He had a momentary flash of all the times she had held his hands and comforted him as a boy. Now it was his turn.

The policewoman led Sister Gwen back out of the Great Hall and a fresh wave of anger washed over Alex as he saw how stooped and tired she looked.

“What now?” he asked, turning back to the body of Charles Beaumont.

“Here,” Iggy said, pressing two dollars into his hand.

“What’s this for?”

“Cab,” Iggy said. “Go home. Get some sleep.”

Alex opened his mouth to protest, but Iggy cut him off. “You’ve done all you can here. I still have to draw blood samples from half a dozen more victims and I need to brief the University people when they get here, otherwise I’d be going with you.”

“There must be something else we can try.”

“Like what?” Iggy said. “You’ve been over the whole room with your lantern, twice. You’ve interviewed the only witness, and now we know the name and possible occupation of the only person in the room who looks like he doesn’t belong. And he looks like the first one infected. At least here.”

“But—”

“Until something else comes up, we’re stuck. Now, you have a business to run, and Leslie will expect you in the office tomorrow bright and early. Go home.”

Alex knew he was right, but his mind railed against it anyway. He was a detective, damn it, there ought to be something he could do.

But there wasn’t.

“All right,” he said, tucking the bills in his pocket. “But if something comes up, you call me.”

“Of course, old boy,” Iggy said, then pushed Alex toward the door.

As he passed the sheet-draped body of Father Harry, Alex stopped. Iggy had rolled him on his back and composed his hands on his chest before covering him. Reverently, Alex knelt down and pulled the sheet back from the old man’s face. It looked exactly as it had the previous afternoon except for a few angry-looking boils. He looked like he was just asleep, calm and peaceful.

But he wasn’t.

Alex had faced death before, but never like this. Father Harry hadn’t died in his sleep or from some horrible accident. Someone had done this to him. This was murder.

“I’m sorry, Father,” Alex said, his voice horse and raw. “I should have stayed. I should have been here. Maybe I could have stopped this.”

He looked down into the serene face but received no answer.

Alex had been angry before in his life, but what he felt in that moment was a white-hot boiling mass that seemed to crawl out of his chest and down his arms to his fists. Blood oozed form where his nails dug into the heels of his hands.

“I know you wouldn’t approve,” he whispered. “But I’m going to find whoever did this. And I’m going to make sure they die slowly.”

The look on the old man’s face didn’t change, it couldn’t change, but Alex fancied that he saw a bit of disappointment in it now.

The anger that threatened to spontaneously combust inside his ribcage vanished and an unbearable weariness pressed down on Alex.

“Goodbye, Harrison,” he said, calling the Father by his proper name for the first and last time. “If I make it to heaven, I’ll see you there.”

Alex replaced the sheet over Father Harry’s face and then strode out into the rain.

The cab ride home seemed to take a long time. Alex kept reviewing what he’d seen and done at the mission over and over in his mind. Iggy had been right: they’d covered everything they could. The next step would be to figure out where Beaumont lived, what he did for a living — assuming he wasn’t a professional thief — and most importantly, where he came from before arriving at the mission.

Try as he might, Alex’s exhausted brain simply couldn’t figure any way to do that. A man dressed like Beaumont wouldn’t be living anywhere near the mission, so where would the police start a canvass? They could have men out for months and not find anything.

He balled up his fists until his knuckles were white, but it didn’t help. The only thing left to do was sleep on it and hope his reenergized brain would have better ideas in the morning.

By the time Alex had showered and dressed the following morning, it was pushing noon. He didn’t think he would sleep at all when he got home in the wee small hours, but exhaustion and a few shots of Scotch had worked wonders. His stomach growled as he rode the crawler downtown to his office, but if he stopped for a bite anywhere, it would be lunchtime before he got to work. Leslie was going to have his hide as it was, and she was not a woman to keep waiting any longer than he already had.

When he finally did arrive, he found his secretary sitting behind her desk, buffing her nails with an air of calm detachment. Yelling was to be expected, but when Leslie went quiet, things were really bad.

“Morning,” Alex said as if his arrival a mere twenty minutes before noon were completely ordinary.

“And where have you been?”

The tone in her voice could have kept his icebox cold for a month. He was about to answer, but she nodded toward his office.

“You’ve got a client waiting,” she said. “Been here over an hour, insisted she’d wait.”

“She?” Alex’s face brightened but Leslie fixed him with a deadly stare.

“All I can say is you’re damn lucky she didn’t leave after twenty minutes. I already lost another client who called in and wanted you to find their missing car. While I waited for you, the police managed to find it.”

“Sorry, doll,” Alex said. “It was a rough one last night.”

Leslie looked like she wanted to make a rude comment, no doubt about his bringing a tramp home and neglecting his business, and by extension, her. Something in his eyes stopped her, and her expression softened.

“We need this one,” she said, the fire gone out of her voice. “I don’t care if she wants you to follow her cheating husband or find her lost dog, don’t blow it.”

“I’m all over it, sweetheart,” he said. Alex gave her a mock salute and turned to his office.

“You’d better be,” Leslie muttered.

Alex resolved to take her somewhere for lunch as a peace offering, assuming he wasn’t out looking for a dog.

Beyond the door sat a young woman in a bright blue sundress. She had curly black hair that fell just past her shoulders and large blue eyes that seemed to match her dress. She was pretty with a delicate nose, pink cheeks, and lips that looked like they wanted to pout without actually doing the deed. She had on simple black flats, a wide black belt that circled her narrow waist, and she sat up straight in her chair with her legs demurely crossed.

“Excuse me,” Alex said, pulling the door shut behind him. “I was up late working with the police last night. I only just got in.”

“Are you Mr. Lockerby?” she asked. Her voice had a slight, lilting drawl in it. Not enough for her to be from the deep South, but maybe Virginia or Maryland.

“I am,” Alex said, offering her his hand. If she felt awkward about shaking hands, she didn’t show it. “I hope you haven’t been waiting too long.”

“No,” she said, and Alex knew it for the polite lie that it was. “It doesn’t matter, Mr. Lockerby—”

“Call me Alex, Miss…?”

“Rockwell, Evelyn Rockwell.”

Alex seated himself behind his desk and pulled a notepad and pen from a drawer. “Go on, Miss Rockwell.”

“Evelyn, and I’m in desperate need of your help, Alex,” she said. “You see, my brother is missing and I need you to find him. His name is Thomas Rockwell.”

As she spoke, Alex made notes about her manner and her voice. She was clearly distraught, but there was something she didn’t want to say. He wrote hiding something with a question mark after it.

“Thomas disappeared yesterday,” Evelyn went on. “We were supposed to have dinner, but he never came. I just know something bad has happened.” She was trembling now.

“Have you been to the police?” Alex asked, pulling a pair of tumblers and a bottle of bourbon out of his bottom desk drawer. He poured two fingers in one glass and passed it to Evelyn. She accepted the glass and took a sip before shaking her head.

“I had to come to you, only you.”

“Why only me? There are some very good policemen in this town.”

“None of them are runewrights.”

“Why do you need a runewright?”

“Thomas was a runewright,’ Evelyn explained. “He’s been researching something for weeks now.”

“A new rune?”

She shook her head.

“I don’t know. But he’d been withdrawn and moody. I could barely get him to talk to me. Then he called me two days ago. He was happy and excited, like he used to be.”

“That’s when you agreed to meet for dinner?” Alex asked.

“Yes, and then he didn’t come. I waited and waited, and finally I went to his apartment, but he wasn’t there either.”

“Is there somewhere he would go? A friend maybe?”

Evelyn shook her head. Tears were standing out in her eyes now and Alex offered her his handkerchief.

“When I went to his apartment, it was all torn up. Like there had been a fight. I’m so terribly worried, Mr. Lockerby.”

“Alex,” he corrected. “This rune he was working on, do you know what it is?”

“No.”

“Does anyone else know about it?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “All I know is that my brother is missing. Will you find him for me, Alex? Please?”

“Do you have the key to his apartment?” Alex asked.

She reached into her purse and pulled out a small brass key on a ring.

“I charge twenty-five dollars a day, plus expenses,” Alex said, accepting the key. “I have a very good finding rune but I’ll need to go to his apartment to cast it. I charge ten dollars for the rune.”

She reached into her purse again and pulled out several folded bills, peeling one away from the others. “Will one hundred dollars be enough of a retainer?”

“That will be fine.” Alex tried not to accept the bill too hastily. “I have a lunch appointment, but as soon as I’m done, I’ll go over to your brother’s apartment and cast the rune. Is there a phone number where I can reach you?”

She took his pencil and wrote out a phone number and an address in the north side mid-ring.

Alex stood and showed Evelyn out.

“She didn’t look happy,” Leslie said once they heard the elevator door in the hall close.

“Her brother is missing,” Alex said, holding up the c-note. Leslie snatched it and held it up to the light, looking for print errors.

“It’s genuine,” she said.

“I told her I’d get on it right after lunch,” he told her. Leslie fixed a level gaze on him. He shrugged. “I figured I owed you.”

Her smile lit up the room and she picked up her handbag.

“None of your crummy dog-wagons,” she said, putting on her jacket. “I pick the place.”

“Deal.”

It was nearly two o’clock when Alex trudged up in front of a red brick apartment building right against the border between the north side, middle and outer ring. Despite being this close to the low rent district, the building was clean and well maintained, and there wasn’t any trash on the sidewalk. The key Evelyn Rockwell had given him had 5C stamped on it and Alex looked up at the five-story building wearily. It was a cinch that a building this far out wouldn’t have an elevator.

His lunch with Leslie had gone well; she’d chosen to eat at the Imperial Table, a Chinese joint with linen napkins and china plates that were actually from China. Alex used to dislike foreign foods, but living with Iggy had broadened his palate a bit.

He waited until they’d finished their chop suey to tell Leslie about the mission and Father Harry. She hadn’t much liked Father Harry, but the news still hit her hard. It’s a strange thing how someone you know can be alive one minute and dead the next, but you don’t feel it. You don’t know until someone tells you, and only then do you understand the things they did that you’ll never experience again. Alex found himself talking to Leslie about his youth in the mission and what Father Harry had done for him. With the Father gone, he wanted someone else to know just how great a man had passed.

Alex pushed thoughts of lunch and of Father Harry out of his mind as he ascended the stairs of Thomas Rockwell’s building. There would be time to reminisce later, with a bottle of bourbon.

Preferably two.

The door to Thomas’ apartment was shut and locked securely. There weren’t any scratches or tool marks that would indicate that the lock had been picked, so Alex inserted the key and turned it. The lock yielded smoothly and he pushed the door open.

Beyond the door was a large room that had once been well appointed. Evelyn had been right, however — the room looked like the scene of a barroom brawl. Furniture had been turned over, lamps smashed, and the contents of every drawer littered the floor.

Someone had been looking for something. Something they wanted very badly.

The fabric covers on the sofa had been slashed open and every pillow was cut. The doors and drawers of a standing secretary cabinet were open and their contents spilled on the floor. Every cupboard in the tiny kitchen stood open, even the door to the range. No stone seemed to have gone unturned.

“All right,” he said to the empty room. “Let’s get to work.”

A sweep with his lantern revealed fingerprints all over, but not as many as he’d expected. Whoever tossed Thomas’ place must have worn gloves. He did, however, find an excessive amount of bodily fluids in the bedroom. Thomas might have been a bachelor, but he wasn’t spending all his nights alone, that much was clear.

Maybe his exercise partner can tell me what he was working on. On the other hand, if he has a girlfriend, why hasn’t she reported him missing?

After the silverlight, Alex used the ghostlight to look for magic. Being that Thomas was a runewright, it wasn’t surprising that his apartment lit up like a neon sign. There were protection runes on the door and runes of silence on the walls, ceiling, and floor to keep out noise from his neighbors. A few runes written on flash paper littered the floor, but these were all basic. The interesting runes were written on Thomas Rockwell’s kitchen table. A large central rune decorated the tabletop with at least four nodes, and six other runes wound around it. Alex knew most of the runes, but he’d never seen a casting this complex before. The big rune was for concealment — it was almost exactly like the one Alex had put on his book safe in Iggy’s library. The others all dealt with either privacy or finding.

Alex took out a pad of paper from his kit and meticulously copied the construct. It looked like something to prevent people spying on Thomas, magically or otherwise.

Something a man working on a revolutionary new rune might do.

Alex wondered why it was so intricate. There were better runes Thomas could have used that would make the construct simpler and more effective. Rune casting was always a balance between simplicity and power. Adding nodes to a central rune could make it more specific and therefore more powerful, but the more complicated a rune got, the more a runewright ran the risk of conflicts and backlash.

Satisfied that no out-of-place magic was operating in Thomas’ apartment, Alex packed away the ghostlight burner and turned to the mess on the floor. Clearly whoever got here ahead of him had decided that those things weren’t worth keeping, so it was likely they wouldn’t be of use to him either. Still, he had to check. Anything he could learn about Thomas’ life leading up to his disappearance would help when he cast his own finding rune.

Alex pulled the dining table to the center of the room, then put his multi-lamp on top of it. From his kit, he extracted another burner and clipped it in place, then lit it. He took the covers off the other three faces of the lamp, letting the amberlight inside fill the whole room. Amberlight looked just like its name implied, a ruddy reddish-yellow glow. Everywhere the light touched, rusty-brown shapes began to appear in the air. Iggy called amberlight, Newton’s first law of motion applied to time. If you shone amberlight on a chair, it would create an image of that chair in the place where it usually stood.

An object under amberlight showed where it was usually at rest.

As the light filtered out of the lantern and filled the room, Alex took a pair of yellow spectacles from his kit and clipped them to his nose. The amberlight after-images snapped into sharp focus, and Alex could see the room as it had been before it had been wrecked. The sofa had stood against the back wall opposite a bookcase that now lay in the center of the room, next to the open secretary cabinet. Alex returned them to their places, allowing the light to shine where they had been. A shower of book images rose up from the floor and flowed up onto the bookcase, each coming to rest where it had been. Several flickered, more indistinct than the others — these were books Thomas moved regularly, and Alex traced each one down where they lay on the floor and set them aside.

Moving around the room, Alex rearranged the furniture and picked up anything that looked important or often used. It took over an hour but when he finally blew out the amberlight burner he had a stack of books, papers, and curios to examine.

An hour later, he had to admit defeat. There was plenty of information on Thomas’ activities as a bookkeeper, all of it boring and ordinary, but nothing on his activities as a runewright. The only thing he could find that gave any idea at all about Thomas Rockwell was an old picture of the man himself, standing in front of the doors of Empire Tower. He was a lean and lanky man in his mid-twenties when the photograph was taken, with light hair and a bushy, unkempt mustache. Despite that, Thomas had a debonair air about him; he wore a bowler hat at a jaunty angle and had a genuine, friendly smile. It spoke well of him as a person, but it gave Alex no real insight into the man behind the ratty ‘stache.

“Damn it,” Alex swore, getting up and pacing the apartment. He wanted more information to use in his finding rune. The more he knew about Thomas and what might have made him disappear, the more powerful his casting would be.

Now he had to do it the old-fashioned way.

Alex went back to Thomas’ bedroom and into the bathroom. Despite Thomas’ having a regular visitor, there was only one toothbrush. Alex picked it up and started to turn when he caught sight of himself in the mirror over the sink. He remembered seeing fingerprints on the bottom of the mirror when he swept the room with silverlight. Fingerprints on a bathroom mirror weren’t exactly uncommon, but only on the bottom?

Alex set down the toothbrush and carefully felt the bottom edge of the glass. Using his fingernail, he was able to pull it away from the wall and swing it upward on a hidden hinge at the top. Behind the mirror was a small space cut out of the wall. Inside were a book bound in blue leather, a gold pocket watch, and a roll of bills with a rubber band around it. Alex took the book and carefully lowered the mirror back down over the secret space. He cursed himself for not looking for this kind of hidey-hole first, but most runewrights would have extra-dimensional vaults. If Thomas had a vault, anything in it would be gone forever.

Alex picked up the toothbrush and went back to the front room. He still needed to cast his finding rune. Without a better connection to Thomas, it wouldn’t be very powerful, but he could at least get direction and distance from the toothbrush. The book would give him a better insight into Thomas the runewright, but it would take hours, maybe days of study, and he needed answers now. Evelyn needed them.

Alex set the book aside and removed an inkwell and pen set from his kit. He followed them with a piece of chalk, a vial of green powder, a small leather tool case, and a red beeswax candle. He took off his jacket, picked up the chalk, and drew an octagonal shape on the floor by the table. Around the octagon, at each point, he drew different geometric shapes; circles, triangles, squares, and trapezoids. Once that was done, he took the pen and carefully dipped it in the inkwell. The ink was a solution of several substances, most of them expensive, so he was careful not to spill any. In each of the eight small shapes around the octagon, he drew a rune. The order he wrote them and the shape they occupied were all part of the magic. When he finished, he moved to the center of the octagon and drew an elaborate rune. This was the finding rune base, the rune that tied the whole pattern together. It always reminded Alex of a dragon sitting on a fainting couch.

His writing done, Alex put away the pen and inkwell. He lit the candle, then while it burned, he took out the tool case and vial of green powder. The powder was emerald dust and very expensive, but fortunately Alex needed only the tiniest bit for the finding rune. He took out a metal spatula, that looked for all the world like a miniature shovel, and coaxed a few precious grains of the emerald onto it. Moving with exaggerated care, he tapped the grains off into the still-wet ink of the reclining dragon symbol and the ink promptly turned a deep green. Lastly, Alex took the candle and dripped eight drops of wax on the points of the chalk octagon. When the last drop hit, the entire geometric shape and all its sub-shapes turned red, and the finding rune glowed with power.

Alex put his hand on the rune and felt the power of the universe flow through him. Calling the photograph of Thomas into his mind, Alex spoke.

“I seek to find one Thomas Rockwell,” he pronounced in a loud, clear voice. “Bookkeeper and runewright. Brother of Evelyn. I seek him here, in the heart of his domicile. Show him to me.”

Usually the incantation that released the rune’s magic took longer, but usually Alex had a better idea of who he sought. He’d worked with less, but he didn’t like it.

Normally the rune would come back with something almost instantly. It could be a sound or smell, or even just an impression of which direction to seek the target. The better Alex’s link to the person or object, the more details he’d receive. Sometimes he could even see them and their surroundings if the bond was strong enough.

This time he felt nothing.

That could only mean one thing. It meant that Thomas was dead.

Alex kept his hand on the rune and reached out with his senses nonetheless. He’d never received a response that took longer than a few seconds, but it didn’t hurt to try. After a full minute, he gave up.

“I’m sorry, Evelyn,” he said out loud.

Casting a finding rune used a tremendous amount of energy and Alex felt weariness pushing down on him. He dragged himself up into a chair and sat staring at Thomas’ little blue book. It had the runewright emblem stamped into the cover and it was stained dark from repeated handling.

Has to be his Lore book, he thought.

If Evelyn was right, something in Thomas’ book might have gotten him killed. Alex hadn’t been paid to find a killer, but turning the book over to the police would be a waste of time. Only a fellow runewright would know what to look for in a book full of runes.

Alex picked it up and opened it. He smiled as he saw the first, most basic runes in the front. Each page was covered with annotations and drawings. It reminded him very much of his father’s lore book that he’d inherited. Flipping through the pages revealed Thomas’ training. As the pages progressed, his notes became more specific and more detailed as he learned to draw more utility from a single rune. All of it was familiar to Alex — he had these runes and many more in his own lore book.

When he reached the end, however, everything changed. The last dozen pages were filled with six of the most complex runes Alex had ever seen. One looked very much like his own finding rune, but heavily modified. Another resembled a life rune, magic that would allow a runewright to power his constructs with his own life force. Another looked familiar, but Alex couldn’t place it. The other three were alien to him. He’d have to study them intensely to figure out what they were for.

He whistled as he paged back and forth, looking at these last pages. They were orders of magnitude more complex than anything else in Thomas’ book. They were certainly something that might have cost him his life. New runes were a rare thing and, depending on what these particular runes did, they could be worth a fortune.

“Well, somebody wanted something here,” Alex said, looking down at the mess. It was likely that whoever tossed Thomas’ place didn’t find what they were looking for. Only a desperate searcher cuts open the couch.

Alex suddenly felt very self-conscious with the book. He’d been in Thomas’ apartment for hours. What if a neighbor had been paid to watch it? He could very well find himself running into a welcoming committee out in the hall.

He quickly put away his gear, except for his chalk, and then drew a door on one of the walls. Activating a rune from his book, Alex opened his vault. He placed the book inside along with his kit, then slipped a rune-covered pair of brass knuckles into the outside pocket of his jacket.

It never hurt to be prepared.

Satisfied, Alex closed the door, and scrubbed the chalk outline from the wall with his handkerchief.

He needn’t have bothered. No one lurked in the hall or the stairwell waiting to pounce. There wasn’t anyone strange at the crawler station either, let alone as a crawler passenger, while Alex rode back to the brownstone.

It was well after six when Alex got home, and he wanted nothing more than to tramp upstairs to his bed.

“In here,” Iggy’s voice came from the kitchen.

Alex sighed and turned away from the stairs and his inviting bedroom. He expected to find Iggy working his culinary magic over a hot stove, but was surprised to see the balding man sitting at the table with nothing but a cup of tea and a lit pipe. He looked old. Alex knew that Iggy was in his seventies, but he’d never seen the man look old. Iggy was usually bursting with energy and enthusiasm for life. Now he appeared drained, hollow even.

“What is it?” Alex asked. “This is about Father Harry, I can see it in your face. What’s happened?”

Iggy’s brown eyes moved up to meet Alex’s.

“Are you sure you want to know?” he asked. “I don’t recommend it.”

Alex sat down across the table, all traces of his weariness evaporating.

“Tell me.” he insisted.

“Doctor Halverson is the man at the University who studies diseases,” Iggy began. “I’ve been up with him since last night at his laboratory. Thanks to those blood samples I collected, Halverson was able to grow samples of the virus and stain them.”

“Isn’t that a good thing?” Alex asked. “I thought the whole point of staining was that you could see whatever made people sick and then stop it.”

“Yes and no, in this case.” Iggy nodded. He puffed on his pipe as if searching for the right words to continue. “We got a good look at the little devils, clear as spring well water.”

“And?”

“And there’s nothing natural about that damn disease,” Iggy said, shivering as if taken by a chill. “It’s too perfect. It was designed. Engineered by someone.”

Alex could feel the blood draining from his face as the implications of that statement took hold of his mind.

“This is terrifying,” Iggy said. His pipe had gone out, but he continued to puff at it anyway. “Man shouldn’t have this kind of power. I wish I didn’t know about it.”

“I’m glad you do,” Alex said after a long silence.

“What do you mean, boy?” Iggy said, aghast. Alex shrugged.

“Someone has to pay for Father Harry,” he said. “Someone has to pay for all the people at the mission.” He reached into his coat and pulled his Colt 1911 from its holster, placing it on the table. “I don’t know how to kill a virus,” he said. “But I know how to kill a man.”

Alex spent most of the night replenishing his rune book, taking apart the hinges that kept it together and replacing the torn out pages with new ones. Work was still the best way he knew to burn through anger, and he was angry. Somewhere in New York lurked the person responsible for the death of Father Harrison Arthur Clementine. The thought made his fingers itch. As soon as the sun was up, he would start chasing down the identity of Charles Beaumont, possible thief. He had no magic to aid him this time, so he’d have to do it the old fashioned way, but someone out there knew something about Beaumont. Sooner or later Alex would find him.

His anger kept him working until well after two in the morning. He hadn’t had anything to drink during his long night, so when a pounding in his head woke him less than six hours later, he couldn’t figure out what it was. Finally the sound resolved itself into a pounding on the door.

“Wha’sit?” Alex managed as he rolled out of bed onto the floor.

“Are you alive in there?” Iggy’s voice came through the door.

Alex didn’t reply, dragging himself to his feet instead and shuffling to the door.

“All right,” he said, releasing the bolt and pulling the door open. Outside in the hall, Iggy stood dressed in a very British tweed suit with a book under one arm. “What is it?” Alex demanded.

“Cops are here for you,” Iggy said, nodding toward the stairs. “They’re not very polite, so I left them waiting in the vestibule.” His mustache turned up into a grin.

The brownstone’s vestibule was a space between the front door and the house proper where visitors could remove their hats and coats in inclement weather. It had a tiled floor with a mosaic of Manhattan Island on the floor. A glass door set into a glass wall were all that separated the vestibule from the house proper, but the runes on the glass made it virtually unbreakable. If Iggy had locked the door before coming up, then no one but he or Alex could unlock it again.

“What do they want?” Alex asked, vigorously rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

“For you to come with them to police headquarters,” Iggy said. “They’re most insistent. Should I keep them waiting?”

Alex rubbed his face and felt his unshaven scruff. “No,” he said. “Tell them I’ll be down in a minute.”

Iggy shrugged and headed back downstairs at a leisurely pace. Alex grinned at that. He suspected Iggy had been a private detective himself at some point; he certainly had the skills down pat. He also possessed a healthy dislike of run-of-the-mill uniformed policemen.

There wasn’t time to shower or shave, so Alex ran a comb through his hair and put on a clean shirt. His shoulder holster hung over the back of his overstuffed chair, but he passed it by. The police seemed upset about something and he had no desire to antagonize them. He did want access to the weapon, so once he was fully dressed, he opened his vault and left it inside.

There were three policemen waiting in the vestibule for Alex. Two were uniformed officers, while the other was a detective Alex didn’t know. The uniforms were a mismatched pair, one tall and lanky, the other built like a fireplug. The detective was middle-aged and paunchy with a permanent sneer on his face. All of them seemed sullen and angry. Alex stifled a grin. They’d wanted to roust him out of bed personally and yell at him to hurry up dressing before hauling him off to the station. It was a common enough intimidation tactic, though Alex had no idea why they’d want to use it on him.

“Hello boys,” Alex said, unlocking the vestibule and opening the door. “What’s the good news?”

One of the uniforms reached out to grab him, but jerked his hand back with a curse when it crossed the threshold of the door. Alex grinned openly this time. He stepped into the vestibule and shut the door behind him. This time the officers each grabbed one of his arms.

“Think you’re cute?” the detective sneered.

“My mother always thought so,” Alex said. He wasn’t sure what this was about, but he wasn’t going to let this little puke of a detective think he was in charge. At six foot one, Alex was taller than all of them.

“Well your mother ain’t here,” the detective said. “Captain Rooney wants a word with you down at Central.”

With that he turned and reached out to open the front door, but stopped. He remembered what happened to the squat officer when he’d reached for Alex.

“I’ll get it,” Alex said, tearing his arm free of the tall officer and opening the door. They needn’t have worried. There weren’t any runes keeping people from leaving the house, only from entering.

The officers bundled Alex in the back of a cruiser with the fireplug on one side and the detective on the other while beanpole drove. The car had an antenna on the roof that collected power from Empire Tower to run its electric motor. The sorcerer William Todd had given the New York police over one hundred of these cars as a goodwill gesture. That, and to annoy Rockefeller, who was trying to make his crawler magic work in smaller vehicles like cars. The two had been feuding for years and the police had benefited from it. Todd had even given the department a small number of experimental flying units he called Floaters, but despite their obvious advantages, they were slow and difficult to maneuver, so the police didn’t use them much.

The central station for the Manhattan office of the New York police department was located halfway between Empire Tower and the park. It stood ten stories high and housed most of the Island’s officers, detectives, and facilities. The office of Captain Patrick Rooney was on the tenth floor. Rooney was responsible for all the detectives on the island and had a dozen lieutenants under him, each responsible for a section of territory. Unlike Lieutenant Callahan, Rooney had gotten his job the really old-fashioned way — he was the son of a senator. Like most political appointees, Captain Rooney didn’t care about the actual police work, so long as nothing made him look bad.

As far as Alex knew, he hadn’t done anything high profile enough to get on Rooney’s hit list. Still, whatever the Captain wanted to see him about must be bad or he wouldn’t have sent his personal goon squad to bring Alex in. They escorted him up to the tenth floor and then to the back of the building where the Captain’s office was.

Rooney was a big man with big hands, big feet, a big nose and a big opinion of his own importance. He stood six feet three with broad shoulders, pale skin and red hair that he kept close-cut. When the sneering detective opened the door, Rooney’s face was already red as a beet. There were half a dozen people in the room, including Callahan and Danny Pak.

“It’s about time,” Rooney roared. “What kept you?”

“A septuagenarian doctor,” Alex said with a completely straight face.

“Did you search him?” Rooney asked with a gleam in his eye.

The detective patted Alex down and reluctantly reported that he had no weapons. The crestfallen look on Rooney’s face gave Alex pause. He hadn’t looked around at the others in the room when he’d been brought in, but a quick look told him that they were all trying very hard not to be noticed, even Danny. Whatever got Rooney all steamed up, it was bad.

“So,” the Captain said, focusing his attention on Alex. “What do you have to say for yourself?

“Well, I’m a Sagittarius, an above average poker player, and a fine judge of liquor and women.”

A chuckle ran around the room and Rooney swelled up like he would burst, then mastered himself and sat down behind his desk. Whatever he was mad about must be serious for him to exercise such self-control. Alex had probably made it worse with his wisecrack, but at least now he knew the waters in which he was swimming.

“You’re a funny man, Lockerby,” Rooney said, his voice quiet and even. If anything it was more disturbing than his yelling. “I wonder how funny you’ll find it when I charge you with obstruction, interfering with a police investigation, destroying evidence, and anything else I can think of?”

Alex had long ago mastered his poker face, so he just smiled, but his mind reeled at Rooney’s declaration. If the Chief could make any of those charges stick, true or not, Alex would lose his investigator’s license at best, or at worst, go to jail.

“Now why would you want to charge a nice guy like me with anything like that, Captain?” Alex said. “You know I stay out of your investigations unless you invite me in.”

“I never invited you anywhere, you charlatan,” Rooney growled, his temper edging back. “That was your friend over there.”’ He nodded in Danny’s direction. “If he wasn’t a damn good detective, he’d be directing traffic by the park right now.”

So whatever this was about, Danny had brought Alex into it. The only job they’d done recently was the murdered customs agent, Jerry Pemberton.

“I take it you didn’t catch Mr. Pemberton’s murderer at the customs warehouse?”

Rooney’s fists clenched so tightly that his fingers turned white. He had been enjoying Alex’s bewilderment and now his toy had been taken away.

“No, we didn’t catch him,” Rooney said. “And you knew that all along, didn’t you?”

Now Alex really was confused.

“I didn’t tell him how to evade your men, Captain,” Alex said. “If he got away, I’m sorry, but I had nothing to do with it.”

“You knew no one was coming,” Rooney roared.

Alex looked at Danny and the detective shrugged and shook his head.

“Don’t look at him,” Rooney said. “He’s in enough trouble because of you. You sent us to that warehouse on a guess and it turned into a wild goose chase. Do you have any idea how much it cost to put men on that building for the last thirty-six hours? I had to get special permission from the Mayor, and the Governor, because foreign governments have shipments in there.”

So that was it. Staking out the customs warehouse required the Feds’ involvement. Rooney and the Mayor stuck their necks out because catching someone breaking into such a secure and important location would make them look good. When no one came, Rooney had egg on his face.

Damn political appointees.

“Maybe they’ll come tonight or tomorrow.” Alex said.

Rooney’s face screwed itself up into an ugly smile. “Everything in that warehouse has been picked up by the rightful owners,” he said. “The entire layout has changed from that drawing Pemberton made. No one’s coming.”

Alex felt the first pangs of real fear. Rooney’s neck was on the block and he was looking hard for a patsy. A smart-mouthed, consulting runewright detective was the perfect target. Still, he wasn’t in handcuffs, so Rooney must have something else in mind.

“Get to the bad news,” Alex said.

“You really are too smart for your own good, Lockerby,” he said. “The bad news is that the Chief of Police wants to see me in his office at ten o’clock, Monday morning. He’s given me until then to justify the warehouse stakeout by finding Pemberton’s murderer. If I go into that meeting without the guilty party and an ironclad case, I’m giving the Chief you, Lockerby. And not just you,” he said, looking at Danny. “Understand?”

Alex understood. He had four days to solve a case where he must have missed something. And, if he failed, he’d take Danny down with him.

“In that case,” Alex said, putting his hat back on. “I’d better get to work.”

“The rest of you get out, too,” Rooney said.

Alex left the office first, but lingered by the elevators. The other detectives and the two officers gave him dirty looks as most of them headed for the stairs, but Callahan marched right for him with Danny Pak in tow.

“We need to talk, Lockerby,” he growled under his breath. He pushed the elevator button and a moment later the three of them were descending toward the first floor. As soon as the doors closed, Callahan rounded on Alex.

“I don’t know how this case went sideways, scribbler, but you’re about to cost me one of my best detectives.”

“This isn’t Alex’s fault, Lieutenant,” Danny said.

“It doesn’t matter whose fault it is, Detective. The Mayor is howling for someone’s head, and if you’re not careful, it’s going to be yours.”

“Relax, Callahan,” Alex said with a confidence he didn’t feel. “Danny and I will find your killer.”

“Who said you get to appropriate my Detective?” Callahan said with a sneer. “You’ve already done enough damage.”

“Danny’s head’s on the block just like mine, Lieutenant,” Alex said. “If you really want to keep him, you’d better give me all the help you can.”

Callahan’s jaw tightened at that, but he nodded. “Go with Lockerby,” he said to Pak as the elevator doors opened.

Danny followed Alex out.

“One more thing, Lieutenant,” Alex said, catching the grate as Callahan tried to close it. “Did you ever find out anything about Charles Beaumont?”

“You’ve already got a case to solve,” Callahan said, pulling the grate closed. “No,” he said before pulling the lever to ascend. “We’ve checked pawn shops up and down the east side and no one knows him. It’s a dead end. Now get to work.”

Alex and Danny watched the elevator rise up out of sight, then turned toward the front doors of the building.

“Where do we start?” Danny asked, following Alex out.

“Breakfast. Your friends dragged me out of my bed this morning.”

Alex and Danny took a crawler all the way back to the stop near the brownstone.

“You brought me all the way over here for this?” Danny said when they stopped in front of The Lunch Box. “Alex, this place is a dive. Trust me, I’m a cop, I know a dive when I see one.”

The diner was made from a converted trolley car that sat on an empty corner just a few blocks from the brownstone. It had been painted red some time ago, but now the paint and the lettering above the door were faded and peeling. Inside, a long counter ran almost the entire length of the building with a row of booths up against the outside wall. Alex slapped Danny on the back and led him inside.

“Trust me,” he said. “I hear they just got a really good cook.”

Behind the counter sat a bored-looking woman at least fifty years old. Her shirt was stained from years of working the counter and her hair was done up in a messy bun. A faded nameplate pinned to her shirt read Doris.

“Hey Sugar,” she said in a bored voice when they entered.

“Doris, it’s been a while, how’s that husband of yours?” Alex asked.

“Still a cheating bastard,” Doris reported. “The usual?”

“Did Mary get a job here?” he asked.

“You mean the new cook?” Doris shrugged. “Yeah, she’s in back. She does look like your type. You want me to get her?”

“Please,” Alex said, then he led Danny down the bar and took a stool near the middle.

“Poached eggs,” Mary said, coming out of the back. “Can you believe it? Max gave me the job.”

“I’m sure you earned it,” Alex said. “This is my best friend, Danny Pak.” He pointed to the detective. “This is Mary. She makes a mean poached egg.”

Danny’s eyes lit up at the sight of Mary, and he stood.

“Charmed,” he said, taking her hand.

“What’ll you have, handsome?” she asked Danny.

“I hear the poached eggs are good,” he said. “I’ll have that with some sausage and hash browns.”

“Adam and Eve on a log and spike the oval,” Mary said. “Got it.”

“I just want pancakes,” Alex said, not bothering to repress a grin and Danny’s reaction. Mary really was quite pretty.

“And one short stack,” she said. “By the way, thanks for the rune,” she said over her shoulder as she headed back to the kitchen. “My stockings have never been better.”

“Hey,” Danny said, elbowing Alex. “How come you never give me useful runes?”

“When you get a run in your stockings, let me know,” Alex said. Danny laughed but then his face turned serious.

“What are we going to do about Rooney?”

“Is it possible the thieves saw your stake-out and bolted?”

“Not a chance.” Danny shook his head.

“Then I must have missed something back at Pemberton’s apartment.”

“We must have.”

“I was so sure.” Alex chewed his lip.

“Me too. Why else would Pemberton draw that map of the warehouse? A place where he worked every day.”

“Excuse me,” a well-dressed businessman at the end of the bar interjected. “Could you pass the ketchup?”

“Sure,” Danny said, sliding the bottle down the bar to him.

“Thanks,” he said, then poured some on his plate of scrambled eggs.

“Ugh,” Alex said suppressing a shudder. He’d seen too many crime scenes to ever use ketchup again. It reminded him too much of… “Blood,” he said.

“What about it?” Danny asked, adding milk to the coffee Doris brought them. “Most of it vanished with Pemberton’s body.”

“Not on the body,” Alex said. “On the paper. I’m so stupid! How did I miss that?”

Danny was staring at him, coffee forgotten.

“What blood on the paper?” he asked. “You mean the map? That was clean.”

“That’s my point,” Alex said. “They tore off three of the fingernails on Pemberton’s right hand. If he’d drawn that map for them, there’d be blood on the paper, enough to soak through to the second sheet.”

“Unless he’s left-handed,” Danny said. Alex shook his head.

“Remember the body? Pemberton parted his hair on the left. Most people part their hair on the opposite side from their dominant hand.”

Danny was nodding now.

“If you’re right, Pemberton drew that map before his killer showed up.”

“But why?” Alex asked. “You said it yourself, he worked there every day. There’s no reason for him to need a map.”

“Unless,” Danny said with a sly grin. “What if he was the one robbing the warehouse?” Alex gave him a blank look, trying to catch up. “Think about it,” Danny continued. “Pemberton knew what was coming in, from where, and when it would be in the warehouse. He was in the perfect position to rob the place.”

Alex nodded, thinking it through.

“Probably got tired of putting in all that service just to get a plaque as a thank you.”

“All he’d need,” Danny said, “is an accomplice. He picks out what to steal, then the accomplice uses the map to break in and make off with the stuff while Pemberton goes somewhere public to establish an alibi.”

Alex liked this idea. It explained why Pemberton had drawn a map of his own workplace, and why someone had later beaten the truth out of him.

“So the people that killed him are the ones he robbed,” Alex said. “And they stopped tearing off fingernails when he gave up his partner and the loot.”

“I like it,” Danny said.

“Yes, but our customers don’t,” Mary said, putting full plates down in front of them. “You’ve scared off two of them already. If you want to talk shop, lower your voices.” Her words were admonishing, but she still wore her charming half smile when she said it.

Danny apologized profusely and promised that they’d be quieter. Alex just smiled.

“So, what do we do now?” Danny asked once Mary had gone.

“Personally, I think you should ask her for her number,” Alex said, pouring syrup on his pancakes.

“I mean about Pemberton’s killer,” Danny said.

“We need to find out who had goods in that warehouse the night before Pemberton was killed.”

“Why the night before?”

“Because,” Alex said. “Whoever got robbed had to have time to discover the theft and then figure Pemberton was involved. That would put the robbery the night before. You need to ask the customs people for the warehouse manifest for that night.”

“Why me?” Danny asked through a mouthful of hash browns.

“Well they’re not going to tell me, are they?” Alex said. He finished his pancakes and stood.

“Where are you going?” Danny asked, barely halfway through his breakfast.

“I’ve got to go give a lovely young woman some bad news.”

“Are you finally spoken for?” Danny asked with a smirk.

“No, this is the really bad news.” Alex explained about Thomas Rockwell and his sister.

“Oh,” Danny said. “Couldn’t find him with your fancy rune?”

Alex shook his head and Danny put his hand on Alex’s shoulder.

“You know your rune isn’t infallible, right?” he said. “The guy might be underground, or magically shielded, or maybe he just left Manhattan. That much flowing water would block even your runes.”

“I know,” Alex said with a sigh. “But I found a stash behind his bathroom mirror with his Lore book inside right next to a roll of cash. Had to be three hundred.”

“So he didn’t leave on his own,” Danny said, nodding. “He’d never leave those behind. Maybe someone grabbed him?”

“Unlikely,” Alex said. “His place was tossed. If whoever did that had my missing man, they’d just beat the location of whatever they were looking for out of him, like Pemberton.”

Danny whistled. “Sorry,” he said.

“I’ll manage,” Alex said, putting on his hat. “As soon as you get that manifest, call Leslie and give her the list, then I’ll check them out. Once we find out who got robbed, we’ll know the identity of our killer.”

“It occurs to me that if they killed Pemberton to get their property back, they aren’t likely to admit being robbed.”

“Don’t you worry about that,” Alex said. “If they’ve got something to hide, I’ll sniff them out. You just make sure you get that manifest.”

“Will do,” Danny said, then turned back to his breakfast.

It was such a nice day that Alex decided he would walk all the way to his office. The fact that when he got there, he needed to tell the lovely and worried Evelyn Rockwell that her brother was, in all likelihood, dead, had nothing to do with it whatever. Danny had been right, of course — there was still a very slim chance that Thomas was alive, but that felt like false hope.

He had to tell Evelyn the truth.

Alex stuck out his arm to hail a cab, but the park was only a block away and that gave him an idea. Right by the entrance to the park stood a public phone booth, so he crossed the street to it and dialed Evelyn’s number.

“Hello,” she said after four rings.

“Evelyn, this is Alex Lockerby. I have some information about your brother. How soon can you meet me by the carousel in Central Park?”

“Um. About twenty minutes, I guess.”

“Fine. I’ll wait for you there.”

Evelyn promised to hurry and hung up. Alex strolled across the park to where the carousel stood. He bought a bag of hot peanuts from a vendor, then picked a bench a little way away. The ride was noisy enough that anyone walking by wouldn’t be able to overhear them.

Alex took out the pack of Bert’s cigarettes and checked them. Only five left. With a sigh, he lit one, then amused himself, pitching an occasional peanut to the squirrels while he waited. He had just got down to the bottom of the bag when Evelyn hurried up. She was dressed in a dark green skirt and matching jacket over a white blouse, and her makeup was perfect. She flashed him an earnest smile that made him a little lightheaded.

“I came as soon as I could,” she said, sitting down next to him. “What news do you have?”

Alex’s good mood evaporated and he wadded up what remained of the bag of nuts.

“I’m sorry, Evelyn,” he said in the gentlest voice he could muster. “I believe that Thomas is dead.”

He was expecting hysterics, but Evelyn simply pulled an embroidered handkerchief from her clutch and dabbed at her eyes.

“I knew it might be something like that,” she said, her voice full of emotion. Alex offered her a precious cigarette from Burt’s dwindling pack and she took one. Her hand trembled as she lit it. “Can you tell me what happened?” she asked, her voice weak.

“I don’t know,” Alex said. “My finding rune couldn’t locate him. Now that could just mean that he’s left the city. On the other hand, it’s clear that someone wanted something from him, that’s why they tore up his apartment. I think they were looking for this,” he said, taking the blue leather book out of his jacket pocket.

“What’s this?” Evelyn asked, taking the book and flipping through its pages.

“This is a runewright’s Lore book,” Alex explained. “If your brother had gone on the run, he’d have taken this with him.”

“I don’t understand,” Evelyn said, her voice breaking. “Why would anyone kill Thomas for this?”

Alex took the book back and flipped through to the six special runes in the back.

“Have you ever seen anything like these before?” he asked. Evelyn looked at the pages as Alex turned them, then shook her head.

“Is this what Thomas was working on?”

“I think so,” Alex said. “These rune constructs are more complex than anything I’ve ever seen.”

“What are they? Are they valuable? Is that why someone wants them? Is that why Thomas…” Her voice trailed off and she suppressed a sob.

“They might be extremely valuable to the right person,” he said, and shrugged. “We runewrights usually keep our constructs secret, but Thomas may have discovered something that would be more valuable if he sold it.” He paged to the finding rune. “This is the one he spent the most time working on. It’s a finding rune. I have one that looks very similar, but I’ve never seen one laid out this way.”

“What was Thomas looking for?”

“I don’t know.” Alex shook his head.

“What about these others?” she said, flipping the pages. “What are they for? Is it possible they go together?”

Alex furrowed his brow. He hadn’t thought of that. He wondered why Evelyn had.

“I just want to know what happened to my brother,” she said in response to his questioning look.

Alex pointed to the page where she had turned. “This is some variant of a life rune,” he said. “Runewrights power our constructs when we write them. The longer we spend making the rune, the more power it has. With this,” he indicated the rune, “we can power our constructs instantly with our own life energy. It can make even a simple rune incredibly powerful. It can also shave years off your life in a matter of seconds.”

“Do you do that?” she asked, her eyes full of concern.

“No,” he said. “It’s extremely dangerous.”

“What about this one?” Evelyn said, turning another page.

“I don’t know,” Alex said, flipping through them. “I’ve never see that one, or this, or this.” He turned to a construct that looked like a roadmap of some crooked European city. “I think this one is a protection rune, but I have no idea what it protects from.”

Evelyn stared at the book, turning the pages back and forth until she lowered her head and pushed the cover closed.

“I don’t know what any of this means, Alex,” she said. “All I know is that my brother is gone, most likely dead.”

“I am sorry,” Alex said. “If you come with me to my office, I’ll refund the rest of your money since I only needed the one day and the finding rune.”

“No.” She looked up with intensity in her eyes. “I want to know what happened to my brother. I want you to find the person who killed him. If they killed him for these drawings, you need to figure them out, Alex.” She shoved the book back into his hands. “You need to find whoever did this and give my brother and me some peace.”

Tears were streaming down her face now, ruining her makeup. Alex had an overwhelming urge to put his arm around her and hold her close, to tell her it would be okay.

“You sure you want that?” he said instead. “I might spend a lot of time spinning my wheels and not find anything.”

“I’ve got some money my parents left me,” she said. “This is what I want.”

Alex couldn’t really blame her. Her brother was all the family she had, and someone had taken him away. Just like Father Harry.

“All right,” Alex said, looking her square in the eyes. “I’ll find out what I can, but no promises.”

“That’s good enough,” Evelyn said.

He waited while she fixed her makeup with the aid of a tiny mirror from her purse, then walked her out of the park to get a cab. He pulled the blue book out of his pocket as she rode away, wondering how he would find out who killed Thomas. Runewrights were secretive about their runes, especially new ones. It was unlikely that Thomas mentioned it casually to a friend.

Maybe he had a partner, someone who worked on developing these constructs with him? But a partner would already know the runes, he wouldn’t have to search for them in Thomas’ apartment.

Alex shook his head and put the book back in his pocket. He’d have to spend some time studying it later. Right now he had other things to worry about. As soon as Danny got him the warehouse manifest, he’d be traipsing all over town looking for Pemberton’s murderer. Until then, however, he had time to call in a few favors and hopefully find out something about the elusive Charles Beaumont.

He thought about that on the crawler ride to his office. If Sister Gwen had been right that Beaumont was a thief, he couldn’t be the kind of penny-ante thief that would sell pocket watches to a hock-shop. His clothes were too good for that. Beaumont was a man of means. Not rich, or maybe rich and frugal, but either way it made him an entirely different class of thief than some pickpocket or street thug. Alex was looking for a man who stole from rich people and that made him either a stockbroker or a cat burglar.

If he actually is a thief.

Alex pushed that thought aside. If Beaumont was a cat burglar, that made him one of the rarest types of thieves. Few people plied that trade — the stakes were too high. Rich people had safes and guard dogs and, on occasion, armed security. Beaumont’s thefts might be easy to find, but anything about him personally would be rare as hen’s teeth.

He’d look into it, but first he had to see if Danny had any word on the warehouse manifest. As much as Alex wanted to find Beaumont and track Father Harry’s killer, his first loyalty had to be to Danny, not to mention keeping himself out of jail.

“Morning, Leslie,” he said, entering his office. She sat behind her desk reading the paper. He expected a sardonic comment from her on his lateness but instead her face was serious. She nodded toward the inner office and mouthed the word Feds.

Alex groaned. He pulled Thomas’ Lore book out of his pocket and placed it on her desk with a nod. She immediately picked it up and put it in her lap.

“Any messages?” Alex said, more loudly than usual.

“Nothing,” Leslie said, just as loud. “There are some gentlemen in your office.”

“Okay, I’m expecting a call from Danny. Just take a message.”

Alex straightened his jacket and took a deep breath. Feds in his office were never a good thing. At best they mucked about with his investigations and at worst they kept trying to put him in jail for getting in their way. Of course they never told him that he’d gotten in their way until after the fact. He plastered a smile on his face and opened the door.

Two men waited for him, and neither of them could rightly be called gentlemen. The elder of the two looked like a G.I. recruitment poster, square jaw, flat nose, blue eyes, and perfectly slicked dark hair. He wore a blue wool suit with a gray vest, and his shoes were well-polished. He sat in one of the chairs in front of Alex’s desk with a fedora in his lap that exactly matched his suit and a leather briefcase on the floor by his side.

The younger man stood behind Alex’s desk, looking through the appointment book. He was average in height with wavy blond hair and blue eyes in a handsome face. His suit was gray but not so well-tailored. Alex could see the bulge of his pistol under his right arm.

Lefty.

“Something I can help you find?” Alex asked the younger man. He favored Alex with a sneer and moved around to stand behind the dark-haired man.

“Mr. Lockerby,” the other man said, standing. “I’m Agent Davis.” He stuck out his hand and Alex shook it. “This is my nosy partner, Agent Warner.” Alex nodded at the younger man, but didn’t offer his hand.

“What can I do for you, Agent Davis?” he said, sitting behind his desk. “May I ask what agency you’re actually with?”

Davis reached into his jacket and produced a large wallet containing a badge with the letters FBI clearly printed on it.

“We’re here for your help, Mr. Lockerby,” Davis said, returning his badge to his pocket. “We need your expertise. One of our investigations came across some rune lore that, well, we’ve just never seen before. We were hoping you could identify them, maybe tell us if anyone you know uses them?”

“I can take a look, sure,” Alex said, shrugging. “But I can’t help you with who might use them.”

The young Agent curled his lip, but Davis was unfazed.

“I understand your reluctance to involve a fellow runewright in an FBI matter, Mr. Lockerby, but I assure you, this is very serious.”

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t help you, Agent Davis,” Alex said. “I said I couldn’t. Runewrights are a secretive lot. We don’t share our Lore with each other.”

Davis seemed to consider that for a moment, then he nodded.

“All right.” He reached into the briefcase at his feet and pulled out a manila folder, tossing it onto the desk. “Anything you can tell us about these would be greatly appreciated.”

Alex opened the folder and felt his blood freeze. Years of poker had conditioned him to keep emotions off his face so he just stared at the six photographs the folder contained. Each picture was of a complex rune, drawn on a single sheet of plain paper. Alex didn’t have to examine them closely — he already knew them. All of them appeared in the last pages of Thomas Rockwell’s Lore book. He paged through the pictures slowly, giving himself time to think. Each rune was exactly the same as it appeared in the blue book. There was no way that was a coincidence. What was Thomas mixed up in that brought out the Feds?

“I recognize three of these,” he said, being careful not to tell an outright lie. He put down three of the pictures so Davis could see them. “This is some kind of finding rune, this is a heavily modified life rune, and this one is some kind of protection rune. They’re more complex than anything I’ve ever seen before. I’d have to study them to tell you more.”

“You sure there’s nothing else you can tell us?” Warner said, speaking for the first time. He had a midwestern accent, Iowa or Illinois. Alex smiled.

“I didn’t say that. Let’s take a closer look.” He rose and went to the filing cabinet behind his desk. He pulled out a multi-lamp like the one in his kit and clipped a ghostlight burner into it.

“What’s that?” Davis asked, a note of suspicion in his voice.

“Well,” Alex said, igniting the burner with the touch tip lighter on his desk. “These are just photographs of runes,” he said, indicating the six pictures. “I can’t really judge how the magic was laid down without seeing the originals.” He pulled a set of mustard-yellow spectacles from a case in the file cabinet and clipped them onto his nose. “This light will let me see if the camera picked up anything.” Davis and Warner exchanged nervous glances at that, but Alex continued as if he didn’t notice. “It’s a long shot, I know, but I wouldn’t want you boys to think I didn’t do a good job.”

Alex sat back down and held each picture in the light, scrutinizing it as carefully as he dared. The lines that made up the runes had been written in magical ink, so they glowed brightly, but they were the same lines visible under normal light. He hadn’t been lying about this being a long shot; magic auras like the ones these runes possessed required special cameras and special film to capture. Still, it made him look thorough.

As he paged through them, he noticed a small line of script on the bottom right of the pages the runes had been drawn on. Pulling out a magnifier from his desk, he scrutinized each one. All of them seemed to be written in some foreign language until he recognized a number at the end of one line. It was the number seven, but written backwards. The text wasn’t foreign, it had been written on the back side of each page. Whoever drew the runes had made the notes with the same pen and magical ink.

Wasteful.

Reading minuscule text backwards was hard, but after a few minutes of paging back and forth, he got it. Each note said the same thing followed by a page number.

Curiosity piqued, Alex decided to see if he could sneak some more information out of Davis and Warner. He laid the pictures out on his desk, then folded his hands in front of him.

“Agent Davis,” he asked. “What is the Archimedean Monograph?”

Davis about fell out of the chair and Warner looked like he wanted to go for his gun.

“Where did you hear that name?” Davis demanded, his calm, genial voice gone. Alex took off the spectacles and handed them to the FBI man.

“Right here,” he said, pointing to the photograph. He couldn’t see the writing without the spectacles, but Davis could, and he swore.

“How did you know to look for that?” Davis demanded.

“You asked me to,” Alex said, which was absolutely true.

“I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, scribbler,” Warner began, reaching into his coat. Alex tensed but didn’t drop his smile. He didn’t think Warner would shoot him right here in his own office, but the young man looked angry enough not to be rational.

“Warner!” a woman’s voice came from beyond the office door. It was cold and harsh and Warner froze with a guilty look on his face. “That will be quite enough,” the voice said, and the door opened. Agent Davis had regained his composure and he stood, making the chair available.

“Sorry, ma’am,” he said.

Alex didn’t know what to expect. From his position behind the desk, he couldn’t see the person standing just beyond the door. Then his breath froze in his chest as the most dangerous woman in New York walked into his office.

Women tended not to be sorcerers. For whatever cosmic twist of fate, only one in every twenty or so who had the power was female. Suffragettes complained about it endlessly for a while, but since there just wasn’t anything anyone could do about it, they eventually gave up. Of the six sorcerers in New York, only one was a woman. Nicknamed the Ice Queen, she made her fortune enchanting metal rods so they would remain bitter cold for over a year. Once these were cut into thin disks and put into iceboxes and room coolers, the Ice Queen made millions.

The Ice Queen’s real name was Sorsha Kincaid and, if rumor was to be believed, her personality matched her nickname. Nothing in the Ice Queen’s appearance dispelled that rumor when she entered Alex’s office. She looked to be in her late twenties, but magic tended to retard aging, and Sorsha had come into her power quite young. Alex had heard that she was closer to forty. She was dressed in a white, button-up blouse with an azure blue vest and dark slacks. Her only concessions to her femininity were her high heels and the design of her vest, which cut under her small breasts, emphasizing them.

If the purpose of Sorsha’s clothing was to minimize her sex, it was sorely inadequate. Her face was stunningly beautiful, skin like marble, with high cheekbones, full lips, and eyes of pale blue. They reminded Alex of the way the sun looked, shining through an icicle. Her hair was the palest platinum blonde he’d ever seen, almost white, and it fell down on either side of her face in a short bob. She used makeup to darken her eyebrows, giving her a stern look, and Alex knew it had been done for just such an effect.

Her eyes were hard and fixed on Warner as she entered, and the young man leaned back against the wall as if he wished it would give way and let him escape. She held that gaze for a long moment, then turned to Alex and smiled. The smile was warm enough, but Alex felt a chill go down his back. Sorcerers were immensely powerful and equally dangerous. Most people would take a poke at you if you insulted them, but a sorcerer could turn you into a toad for any perceived offense — and there wasn’t much the law would do if you were a nobody. New York was full of nobodies, more than they could ever use, but sorcerers were rare and valuable commodities. Only an especially egregious breach of the law would bring one to account. Alex resolved to choose his words very carefully.

“I must admit, Mr. Lockerby, I’m impressed.” Sorsha sat down in the chair in front of his desk and crossed her legs. If she’d been wearing a skirt, that movement would have been quite sensual, but with the Ice Queen, she wore pants and there wasn’t any flirting involved. “I had supposed that a runewright who became a private detective must not have been a very good runewright. Seems I was wrong.”

Alex inclined his head in her direction. ‘I appreciate the compliment,” he said. “But you still haven’t answered my question. What is the Archimedean Monograph?”

The Ice Queen smiled. Her lips were demurely together, but Alex could have sworn he saw teeth.

“I’m afraid that’s a government secret, Mr. Lockerby.”

“Alex.”

“What I need to know, Mr. Lockerby, is what you know about these runes,” she indicated the photos on his desk. Alex sat back in his chair.

“I know who these boys are, Miss Kincaid,” he said, indicating Davis and Warner. “But I don’t remember hearing that you joined the FBI.”

Sorsha smiled. Not the cold, mocking smile she’d worn earlier but a warm smile of amusement.

God, she’s gorgeous.

“I help the FBI as a consultant,” she said. “Much the same way as you do the New York police department, though the FBI actually wants my help.”

Alex let the dig go by, but the fact that she knew about his rocky past with the police meant that she’d done some homework about him.

“Now,” she said, getting back to the topic at hand. “Tell me what you know about these pictures. Please,” she added.

“I’ve already told your agents what I know about them, Miss Kincaid,” he said sweeping them back into the manila folder and holding it out to her. “So, if that’s everything…”

“Why were you at Thomas Rockwell’s apartment yesterday?”

Alex smiled. He’d been right to have Leslie hide Thomas’ Lore book.

“So that’s what all this is about,” he said.

Sorsha reached into thin air and pulled a small flip notebook into her hand. It was such a casual display of magic that it appeared ordinary, but Alex couldn’t do anything like that on his best day. He didn’t want to be impressed, but he couldn’t help it. She flipped a few pages and began reading.

“You were seen entering Mr. Rockwell’s building yesterday afternoon around two and you didn’t leave until after five. You appear to have combed through the apartment very thoroughly, despite its being in a disheveled state, and the only thing you removed was Mr. Rockwell’s blue Lore book.”

“I wondered why I kept feeling as though I was being watched,” Alex said. The thought that Sorsha could have been actually watching him while he worked was disturbing. He made a mental note to add a short-term privacy rune to his little book and use it when he did his investigations.

“You’re in a lot of trouble, Mr. Lockerby,” Sorsha said, the cold smile returning to her lovely face. “We’ve got you on breaking and entering and theft. Now I’m perfectly willing to forget that, provided you tell me what brought you to Thomas Rockwell’s apartment.”

Alex tried to keep the relief off his face. Sorsha Kincaid, New York’s most dangerous woman, would have to do better than that if she wanted to put the arm on him. Also, her threats meant that she hadn’t been watching him with magic, some Fed had been staking out the building and had seen Alex go in. If she’d been watching him, she’d already know what he was there for. The finding rune was a dead giveaway.

“Someone reported Thomas missing,” he said. “They asked me to look into it, find him if I could.”

“Why didn’t they just go to the police?” Warner asked. Alex laughed.

“The police don’t have time to track down missing people unless some crime is involved,” he said. “They usually send these exact cases to me.”

“Who hired you?” Agent Davis asked. Alex put on his most charming smile.

“Agent Davis,” he said, in a wounded voice. “You know I can’t divulge the names of my clients. Not without a warrant.”

“I can get one in an hour,” he said, his tone hard and flat.

“Of course you can,” Alex said. “You’ve got New York’s celebrity Sorceress working for you, no judge in the city will turn you down.”

“Then why not save us all some trouble and tell us who hired you?” Sorsha asked.

“Some of the people who hire me can’t go to the regular police, Miss Kincaid,” Alex said, his voice serious.

“Because they’re criminals,” Warner said with a sneer.

“Sometimes,” Alex admitted. “Or they’ve had bad run-ins with the cops, or they’re embarrassed about the reason they’re seeing me and don’t want it on any official record. Whatever the reason, what do you think would happen to my business if word got out that I gave up a client just because some Feds said pretty please?”

“I don’t give a rats ass—”

Sorsha cut Davis off with an upraised hand, then lowered it back to her lap.

“The simple fact is that we have you over a barrel, Mr. Lockerby,” she said. “Give us a name or I’ll have Agent Warner place you under arrest.”

Alex smiled and played his trump card. He tossed the key to Thomas Rockwell’s apartment onto his desk.

“What’s that supposed to be?” Warner asked, already reaching for his cuffs.

“The key to Rockwell’s apartment,” he said. “Feel free to check it out. Since you obviously inventoried his apartment before I arrived, you know I didn’t get it from there. He gave that key to someone he trusted, and that person gave the key to me when they asked me to find him. So no breaking and entering.” Warner’s sneer evaporated and it was Alex’s turn to smile. “Furthermore, the only person who can complain that I took the Lore book is Thomas Rockwell, and I seriously doubt he’ll be pressing charges.”

Agent Davis had gone red in the face and Warner had gone absolutely purple. Sorsha just sat with her hands in her lap, glaring at Alex. He wiped the smile from his face. There was no sense in poking a bear.

“Now, I’m perfectly willing to give you whatever help I can with this,” he said, pointing to the manila folder. “But I need to know what this is all about first. Those are my terms.”

Sorsha leapt to her feet and slammed her hand down on Alex’s desk. Instantly a coating of frost spread across the top.

“How dare you dictate terms to me?” she said. Her voice was calm but there was fire behind those pale eyes.

Davis had a look of terror on his face but Warner leered with eager delight. He couldn’t wait for the Ice Queen to take this insolent PI apart. Alex pulled his hands off the desk as the frost spread. He hadn’t intended to provoke the Sorceress — he hadn’t even been pushing hard. Clearly Alex had hit her hot button and now he had to deal with a furious Sorceress.

Goosebumps spread across his arms and his left hand instinctively tapped his right forearm. If things went pear-shaped, his last play was the rune he’d had tattooed there a year ago.

Sorsha saw the move and it seemed to shake her out of her anger. She pulled her hands off the table, rubbing them together as if they hurt. The frost began to disappear in a cloud of fog.

“Agent Davis, Agent Warner,” she said in a trembling voice. “Please wait for me outside.”

“But ma’am—” Davis protested.

“Now, please,” Sorsha said, now in full control of her voice. “I’ll be quite all right, I assure you.”

Warner looked disappointed as he shuffled off after Davis and pulled the door closed behind him.

Sorsha sat, slowly, holding Alex’s eyes the whole time. Alex didn’t know what to make of the Sorceress. She’d been angry enough to freeze him solid a moment ago, but that emotion had passed.

“I’m sorry, Mister…Alex,” she said with obvious effort. “You made me lose my temper. Did you do it on purpose? I’d just like to know.”

“I didn’t think I was pushing that hard,” he said, and shrugged. “But I was pushing.”

Sorsha closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“You play dangerous games, Alex. What would have happened if you used your escape rune?”

Now it was Alex’s turn to be stunned.

“How did you know about that?” he said, easing his hand away from his right forearm. She fixed him with an amused look and raised one of her darkened eyebrows.

“The FBI consults with me because I know things,” she said. “May I see it?”

Alex stood and took off his jacket. He rolled up his sleeve, exposing the intricate tattoo, and held out his arm for Sorsha to see. Escape runes were just what their name implied, last-ditch magic that could transport a runewright out of danger. If they worked. Alex’s rune was trapezoidal in shape with four nodes, and each of those nodes had a node of its own. He’d had to touch the tattoo needle the whole time the artist worked, and supply him with component-infused inks he made especially for that purpose. The end result looked like a picture of the view through a kaleidoscope with six colors and multiple, interlocking patterns.

“It’s beautiful,” Sorsha said, taking his forearm and turning it to get a better look. Despite her icy reputation, Sorsha’s hand was warm and soft. Alex almost forgot she was a Sorceress who’d threatened to freeze him to his chair a moment ago.

Almost.

“Where would you have gone if you’d activated it?” she asked.

“It’s where we would have gone,” Alex said. “Assuming it actually worked, this rune will transport everyone within ten feet to a spot over the north Atlantic about a mile off the coast of Greenland. We’d appear a hundred feet in the air, then the magic would teleport me back to a secure location.”

Sorsha’s eyebrows rose and she let out a soft whistle.

“I was right to have Davis and Warner leave the room.” She released Alex’s arm and sat back. “Of course, I’d have been very angry once I teleported home.”

Alex put on his most charming smile.

“If you teleported home,” he said. “Falling one hundred feet into freezing water is disorienting, and the temperature would send you into shock in under a minute. After four minutes your body shuts down and you drown. The Titanic disaster taught us important lessons.”

“You are not at all what I expected, Mr. Lockerby.” Sorsha looked at him hard, as if trying to look through him. “How did you power it? It must have taken years to prepare.”

“It uses a life rune,” Alex admitted. “I figure if I ever have to use it, I’d rather part with a year of my life than all of it.”

If Sorsha judged him for this line of thought, she gave no indication.

“Perhaps you can be some use to me after all,” she said, taking the folder off the desk and pulling out the photographs of the runes. “These runes are pictures of original drawings that came into the possession of the British government during the World War.” She began putting the pictures back out on the desk as she spoke. “No one knows where they came from, but they relate to a story about a Lore book called the Archimedean Monograph, supposedly written by Archimedes of Syracuse.”

“The guy who ran naked in the streets when his tub overflowed,” Alex said. Sorsha smirked.

“Something like that. He was reputed to be a runewright of incredible skill. According to the story, he wrote down his most powerful runes on sheets of vellum. When he died, those runes were passed around among lesser runewrights who didn’t know what they had until eventually they came into the possession of Leonardo DaVinci. He collected Archimedes’ pages together into a book and began studying them intently. There are supposed to be DaVinci’s handwritten notes all through the book.”

Alex whistled. Everybody knew DaVinci’s work as a runewright; he was one of the great masters. Just to be able to read his notes on Archimedes’ runes would be incredible.

“From DaVinci, the book went through the hands of many great runewrights; Rene Descartes, Sir Francis Bacon, Benjamin Franklin and others. Each man added notes to the pages. Somewhere along the way, it began to be called the Archimedean Monograph, and a powerful protection rune was put on the book so that only a worthy runewright would be able to possess it.”

Alex had to hold his hands to keep them from shaking. The knowledge in that book could be life-changing. A Lore book that had come down through the greatest minds in history, what secrets would that hold?

“What happened to it?” he asked, a little too eagerly. Sorsha shook her head, her platinum hair flying in front of her eyes.

“No one knows, but many have tried to find it.”

Alex picked up the picture of the finding rune.

“Is that what this is?” he asked. “Some kind of treasure map with the book at its end.”

“That’s what we believe,” Sorsha said. “A man named Quinton Sanders believed it, too.”

“Who’s he?”

“Sanders was a research assistant at the government’s runic studies facility,” Sorsha said. Alex didn’t know that the government even had a research facility for runes. “The facility has an archive with many Lore books in it. During the war, the United States acquired the originals in these pictures from the British Government.”

Alex didn’t ask if acquired meant stole.

“Since they were supposed to be from the Monograph, the government put their top people to work deciphering the runes. We think we know what most of them are, but all work was stopped in 1926.”

“Why?” Alex couldn’t imagine being ordered to stop working on something so interesting. Sorsha fixed him with a hard look before responding.

“Because, of the thirteen runewrights they had working on the project, twelve of them went mysteriously missing.”

Alex felt a cold chill run down his back that hat nothing to do with the Ice Queen.

“So how does Quinton Sanders fit into this story?” he wondered.

“Two months ago, a magical alarm was triggered when someone opened the file on the Monograph. Quinton Sanders was the only person in the office that day who had the proper keys to get into the secure archive.”

“Let me guess,” Alex said. “He went missing.”

Sorsha shook her head. “No, we traced him here, to New York. Since we have pictures of the original pages, I cast a scrying spell to alert me any time any of these runes are cast. So far, this one’s been cast twice,” she indicated the elaborate finding rune. “I couldn’t track the first one, but the second led us to Thomas Rockwell’s building.”

“And now he’s missing,” Alex said. “Did Rockwell know Quinton Sanders?”

“Not that we know of,” Sorsha said. “That’s why we need your help. Clearly Thomas saw the original runes and copied them into his book. We think Quinton is trying to find a runewright with enough skill to help him decipher the finding rune so he can locate the Archimedean Monograph.”

“What if the Monograph doesn’t exist?” Alex asked.

“That’s not a chance the government is willing to take,” Sorsha said. “Now I’ve put my cards on the table, Alex; it’s time you did the same. Who is your client?”

Alex hesitated. He didn’t want to out Evelyn to the Feds, but he couldn’t see how she could be involved. So far nothing he’d discovered pointed to Quinton Sanders or anyone else.

“Rockwell’s sister hired me,” he said at last. “She was supposed to have dinner with Thomas and he never showed. All she knows is that he kept talking about making some big discovery.”

“I need to talk to her.”

“Sorry,” Alex said. “If I think she can help you, I’ll arrange a meeting.”

Sorsha glared at him with a look that explained how she got the title Ice Queen.

“I wasn’t lying about my reputation,” Alex said. “You need to let me handle this. If I run across anything about Quinton Sanders or the Monograph, I’ll call you right away.”

“Fine,” she said, producing a card with her name and number on it from the pocket of her vest. Alex took the card but Sorsha didn’t release it. “But I want Thomas Rockwell’s rune book,” she said. “Right now.”

“I can study the runes for you,” Alex said, still holding the card. “Maybe give you a clue to what Sanders and Rockwell were up to.”

The Ice Queen sighed and for a moment she looked tired. “You seem like a decent person, Mr. Lockerby,” she said. “People who investigate these runes are never seen again. You may be irritating and arrogant, but I don’t want your death on my conscience.” She released the card. “Now, if you don’t mind,” she said. “I’ll take Thomas Rockwell’s Lore book.”

Alex hesitated. He really didn’t want to turn over the book. He’d copied the runes last night of course — it was the first thing he did after getting home with the book, but he promised Evelyn he’d find her brother’s killer and he might need Thomas’ book to do that. That said, turning over the book looked like the only way to keep Evelyn out of whatever Thomas had gotten himself into. In the end he really didn’t have any choice.

He pushed the key on the intercom on his desk. A moment later Leslie answered.

“Would you bring that blue book in here, Miss. Tompkins?”

A moment later, Leslie entered with the book. She handed it to Alex and withdrew. Once the door was shut, Alex offered it to Sorsha.

“I give you the book, you leave my client out of this. Deal?” he said.

“Unless she has information about the Monograph,” Sorsha said, taking the book. “Deal.”

Alex started to stand, but Sorsha flicked her hand and suddenly he couldn’t move. He strained against the invisible bonds, but it was as if he’d been imprisoned in amber like some unfortunate insect. He couldn’t move or even blink. Sorsha put the blue book and the folder of pictures into the briefcase Agent Davis left beside the chair, then she stood and walked around the desk.

“If I find out you’re hiding something from me,” she whispered into Alex’s ear, so close he could feel her breath, “I’ll make certain you regret it, and I won’t bother the FBI about it. Understood?”

Her spell ended and Alex gasped, slumping against his desk. He wanted to say something glib about how she didn’t intimidate him, but he was busy suppressing the tremors that threatened to break out all over his body. When he finally mastered himself, he stood and tucked her card into his pocket.

“Understood,” he said.

Sorsha favored him with her cold smile, picked up the briefcase, and walked out.

Alex waited until he heard the Sorceress and her FBI escort leave the outer office before he slumped down, into his chair. So far today, a police captain had threatened to put him in jail, and a sorceress had threatened to do worse. And it wasn’t even lunch yet.

“You seem a little rattled.”

Leslie’s voice startled Alex and he sat up in his chair. His receptionist stood at the open door to his office holding a cup of coffee in each hand. She stepped to his desk and set one down, then sat down in the chair Sorsha had occupied only moments before.

“Was that…?” Leslie nodded toward the door. Alex opened his bottom desk drawer and pulled out a half-empty bottle of Scotch.

“Yep,” he said, pouring some in his coffee. “Irish?” he said, offering the bottle to Leslie. She smiled and shrugged, holding out her cup so he could add some of the amber liquid to it. Leslie sipped at her coffee.

“What did they want, besides that book?”

“It looks like Thomas Rockwell may have been involved in the theft of government secrets,” Alex said.

“Must be a big deal if they got the Ice Queen down from her floating castle to chase leads.”

“It’s powerful magic.” Alex nodded. “So powerful everyone who meddles with it disappears without a trace.”

“Like Thomas Rockwell.” Leslie sipped her coffee. “What are you going to tell the skirt?”

Alex thought about it for a long moment. Sorsha Kincaid was probably right about her thief reaching out to runewrights for help. It was possible that Thomas didn’t know where the runes came from, but it was equally possible that he was in on the theft. Either way, it was probably best if Evelyn stopped looking into her brother’s disappearance.

“I’ll tell her the truth.”

“That her brother might be a thief?” Leslie asked with a raised eyebrow. Alex chuckled.

“Well, maybe not that much truth,” he said. “I can tell her that her brother got mixed up in something that likely got him killed and that the Feds took his book.”

“Think she’ll leave it there?”

“I wouldn’t,” Alex said.

“Neither would I.” Leslie stood and headed for the door. “While you were meeting with the frosty blonde, Danny called.”

“Does he have that list yet?”

Leslie didn’t answer, but returned a moment later with a pad of paper. “The customs people wouldn’t give him the names of the foreign governments who use the warehouse, but here’s everyone else.” She handed Alex the pad.

Alex scanned over the list. There were a dozen companies, everything from a furniture maker to banks to tool & die companies to jewelry stores. All of them were businesses who would have reported a theft to their insurance companies and moved on. Whatever was stolen, it had to be something priceless. One of a kind. That might mean it was smuggled in. Insurance companies didn’t pay for their client’s smuggling losses, so the owner would have to take steps personally to recover his property.

“So what are you going to do?” Leslie asked, still sipping her coffee.

Alex wanted to follow up on Beaumont. If he really was a high-end thief, he’d have left a trail. A trail that would go colder while Alex chased all over the city trying to find out who killed Jerry Pemberton. He owed it to Father Harry to find out who was responsible for his death, but the more rational part of Alex’s brain pointed out that he wouldn’t be finding anyone from behind bars. He drained his coffee cup and set it on his desk.

“I’d better get going,” he said, tearing off the top sheet from the pad of paper. “It’ll take me at least two days to run through all of this and I’ve only got three. Everything else can wait.”

Leslie nodded as if that were the answer she expected.

“Anything you want me to do?”

“Stay by the phone,” Alex said, pulling on his jacket. “I may need you. If Evelyn Rockwell calls, put her off. I’ll settle things with her when this is all over.”

“And if the Ice Queen calls?”

“Take a message.”

Alex put on his hat, folded up the list and slipped it into his pocket, then walked out.

He took a crawler to the first address on his list, a company that made grand pianos. They’d been expecting a shipment of ivory to make keys. The owner was genuinely surprised by Alex’s presence and his line of questioning. He clearly thought that a Police Consultant was some kind of actual policeman and Alex didn’t bother to disabuse him of that notion. Eventually, the owner took Alex into the workshop in back and showed him a bin full of elephant tusks and the craftsmen in the process of cutting and shaping them into the smooth rectangles that would cover piano keys. It was fascinating, but ultimately fruitless. The business owner simply wasn’t a good enough liar to be hiding anything. After a wasted hour and a half, Alex thanked the man and left.

Before he caught the next crawler, he stopped at a drug store to call the office. With any luck Leslie would have some news for him.

“Sorry, kid,” her voice flowed over the wire to him. “Danny just called to see if you were having any luck. He hasn’t found anything.”

Alex swore. “If he calls back, tell him I could use some help following up with the list. At the rate I’m going, he’s going to be looking for a new job soon.”

“When was the last time you ate?” Leslie asked.

“Breakfast with Danny.”

“Stop by the Automat and get a sandwich on your way to your next interview,” she said. “You’re getting grouchy.”

Alex was about to tell Leslie where she could stick a sandwich, but that made him see her point. She always looked out for him.

“Thanks, doll,” he told her.

One crawler ride and two Automat ham-and-cheese sandwiches later, Alex stood in front of the Garland Bank, a private bank that lent exclusively to businesses. Once he explained to the manager that someone had been robbed at the customs warehouse and that there was a murder involved, the man couldn’t wait to help. He showed Alex the gold bullion that had been brought in, along with his bills of lading, which matched the information on the warehouse manifest exactly. It only took an hour this time, but Alex was able to cross another name off his list.

By the end of the day, Alex felt as if he’d walked all the way from Brooklyn to the south-side waterfront. He’d crossed six more names off his list, but that still left five to go and he wasn’t any closer to finding out who killed Jerry Pemberton, or why. His pocket watch told him it was six-thirty. He wanted to stop at the public library and look into Charles Beaumont, alleged thief, but he desperately needed some food and a soft chair. Not necessarily in that order. Between crawler rides, breakfast with Danny, and the Automat, he was down to his last fifteen cents, so he hopped a crawler and headed for the brownstone.

“There you are, my boy,” Iggy called when Alex finally staggered in through the vestibule. “I was hoping I hadn’t missed a call from you needing me to bail you out.”

He found Iggy out behind the kitchen in the attached greenhouse. The brownstone had a very small, walled back yard that opened onto an alley. When Iggy had first moved in, he’d taken up half the space with a glass greenhouse where he grew orchids. Due to the labor-intensive nature of cultivating orchids, Iggy spent many hours a day in his greenhouse. He even had a wicker reading chair in one corner in case he just wanted to enjoy the fruits of his labor.

“Is there anything to eat?” Alex asked, sliding down into one of the carved wooden chairs that surrounded the heavy dining table. Iggy chuckled, pulling the greenhouse’s insulated door closed as he exited.

“Is that all I’m good for anymore?” he asked with a grin. “To be your butler and bring you food?”

“Don’t forget putting a roof over my head,” Alex said. He reached into his pocket for Bert’s pack of smokes, but found it empty. He’d smoked the remaining ones during his steeplechase around the city. He wanted to curse, but Iggy didn’t allow it in his home, so Alex bit back the profanity and wadded up the empty pack, dropping it on the table.

Iggy removed the crumpled pack and replaced it with a bowl of orange soup. Alex was hungry enough that he didn’t ask, he just spooned it into his mouth.

And nearly choked.

“It’s cold,” he said once he got the first mouthful down.

“In the kitchen, as in the field, one must anticipate one’s adversary,” Iggy said.

“Meaning?” Alex was too tired for riddles.

“Meaning if you expect your flat mate to be late, prepare something that’s meant to be eaten cold. That’s gazpacho, you eat it cold.”

It took a minute for Alex to process, but then he just shrugged his shoulders and started eating again.

Iggy sad down beside him at the table and let Alex get halfway through the bowl before interrupting. “Since you seem determined to make me ask, how did it go with the police?”

“Captain Rooney stuck his neck out trying to catch the thief at the customs warehouse,” Alex said, between spoonfuls of the cold vegetable soup. “Now he needs a scapegoat, and if I don’t figure out who killed Jerry Pemberton by Monday morning, he’s going to make it me.”

“That’s dirty pool,” Iggy said.

“You said it,” Alex agreed, even though he had no idea what Iggy meant. “Worse, he’s going to take Danny down with me, so that’s priority number one.”

Alex then told Iggy about his day, searching for whomever had their goods purloined at the warehouse.

“So far everyone seems to be telling the truth,” he said as Iggy set a plate with a slab of cold ham on it in front of him.

“You’re sure one of them is guilty?” Iggy asked.

Alex nodded, slicing the meat into bite-sized chunks. “All the government pouches were sealed and accounted for. That just leaves the businesses.”

“Well,” Iggy said, picking up the newspaper. “It sounds like you had an eventful day.”

“That’s not the half of it,” Alex said, finishing the second bowl and pushing it away. “The Feds came to see me this morning.”

Iggy lowered the paper so he could peer over it. “What did you do to draw their attention?”

“Client of mine’s brother disappeared,” Alex said. “Feds think he was involved in a theft at a government research facility.”

“Was he?”

“I don’t know,” Alex admitted. “He’s an accountant by trade and a runewright on the side. Nothing about him says criminal mastermind.”

Iggy raised the paper back up and continued reading. Alex stood and picked up his bowl and spoon, intending to take it to the sink.

“Hey Iggy,” he said. “You’ve been around a while. Have you ever heard of something called the Archimedean Monograph?”

Iggy nearly ripped the paper in half as he jerked out of his seat. His eyes were as big as saucers, and the color had drained from his face. He recovered quickly, but Alex had been looking right at him and had seen his reaction.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he said, going to the icebox for two cold beers. He opened them with a church key, then put one in front of Iggy, who had retaken his seat, the torn newspaper forgotten in one hand.

“Where did you hear that name?” he asked, his voice nothing more than a whisper.

“From Sorsha Kincaid. She’s consulting with the FBI on the theft. Six runes were stolen from the government, and all six are supposed to be from the Monograph. Why don’t you start by telling me what it is?”

Iggy put his hand on Alex’s, and it was trembling badly.

“No,” he said, his voice a gasp. “You can’t go looking for it, Alex. You mustn’t.”

Alex put his other hand atop Iggy’s.

“I’m not looking for it, Iggy. I swear. But my client’s brother may have had a part in stealing six pages from it that the government had. I need to know what it is, so I can figure out why he disappeared.”

Iggy took a shuddering breath and leaned back in his chair.

“All right,” he said. He rose and beckoned Alex to follow him. “This is a story that needs a fire, a cigar, and some cognac.” He led Alex into the library and opened the liquor cabinet on the back wall. “Make up a good fire, please,” he said. “I feel a chill.”

Alex poured coal in the grate, then tore out a fire rune from his rune book and lit it over the pile. In a few seconds the coal caught and warmth began to fill the room. Iggy poured a dark brown liquor into two large snifters, then set them in angled holders that tipped them on a forty-five degree angle. Just below the wooden holders were two small tea candles whose flames touched the glass, warming the cognac.

While the candles did their work, Iggy trimmed two cigars and handed one to Alex. Once each man had lit his cigar, they removed the snifters from the warmers and blew out the candles. Alex sipped the cognac and felt a warm glow spread through his body.

“You need to understand something, Alex,” Iggy began. “I’ve only shared this story with one other person in my entire life. There’s a reason I don’t share it.”

“Who did you share it with?”

“My best friend. His name was Felix Tafford.”

Alex caught the slight emphasis on the word was. “What happened to him?”

“All in good time,” Iggy said. “I suppose this story starts when I was in my third year at the University of Edinburgh Medical School. I had it in me to join His Majesty’s Navy and become a ship’s doctor. For a young man with my background, that was a big step up. Problem was, in order to join the Royal Navy and become an officer, I needed someone to sponsor my commission.”

He paused and took a long drink from the snifter, then sat back and puffed on the cigar. To Alex it looked as if the old man were steeling himself for the memories that would come.

“That’s where Felix Tafford came in,” Iggy continued. “He and I were pals at school, only his father was a Captain of the Line. With his connections, Felix could choose any post he wanted.”

“So he used his family connections to get you a commission.” Alex guessed. Iggy nodded.

“Just so. The only condition was that I had to meet Felix’s father and impress him, something that was rumored to be very difficult. I realized that if I was to have any chance at all, I had to present myself to Captain Tafford in person. So, I left school just as our Christmas holidays were starting and traveled south to the naval station on Gibraltar, where Captain Tafford was stationed. As it turned out, I impressed the Captain quite easily. He had picked up a case of the clap and didn’t want that on his service record.”

“Or getting back to his wife,” Alex said with a grin.

“Precisely,” Iggy said with a nod. “I wrote him up a cleansing rune that had him right as rain in a few days and he signed my commission papers right off.” Iggy chuckled at the memory, then his face turned serious again.

“I was waiting for my return ship to England when a strange thing happened. A ship was brought into port having been found adrift at sea with no one on board. This was no little sailboat, mind you, but an American brig, just drifting in the north Atlantic. Her stores were intact, so it was no act of piracy, and the ship was in good order, considering that she drifted over a month. The crew was just … gone.”

Alex sipped his cognac as he listened. Iggy’s voice was as powerful a weaver of magic as his hands.

“It made all the papers,” he said. “It was a sensation. All kinds of theories were offered as to what had happened, but there just weren’t enough facts to come to any conclusion. The admiralty put out a call for help to anyone with scientific, magical, or medical knowledge. Captain Tafford recommended me and I found myself on the deck of the Mary Celeste. That was her name.”

Something stirred in Alex’s memory. “Didn’t Arthur Conan Doyle write a story about that?” he asked. “You had me read it along with his other works.”

“Doyle changed her name to the Marie Celeste, but it’s the same ship.” Iggy nodded. “As I said, everyone had their theories. Anyway, I had just refined my first ghostlight formula, so I searched the ship for any signs of magic.”

He paused, staring into the fire, which was burning brightly now, filling the room with a ruddy warmth. Of course, that might also be the cognac.

“I take it you found some,” Alex said.

“In the captain’s cabin,” he said, his expression sad. “I was excited at first. In the middle of the floor, I found the rune. The finding rune.”

“The one from the Monograph,” Alex said. “The one that’s supposed to lead to it.”

“Yes.” Iggy leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “I wish I’d never found it, or that I’d destroyed it, but I was young and ambitious. And foolish. I copied it down for the Admiralty. They were all very excited; my commission was assured. It was only after they left that I saw the shadows.”

“Shadows?”

Iggy trembled as if a cold wind had blown across him.

“There were ten crew aboard when the Mary Celeste left New York, including the Captain and his wife and daughter. They were all there, in the cabin, or rather what remained of them was. I didn’t see them until I was done with the rune. I looked up and there they all were. Ten shadows on the wall, each contorted as if they had been blinded by a bright light. It was all that remained of them when the rune exploded.”

Alex had seen runes explode before; they tended to do significant damage to the surfaces they were inscribed on. “How could you have found the rune’s residue if it exploded?” he asked. “Wouldn’t it have left a hole in the deck?”

“It wasn’t a physical explosion,” Iggy said. “It was pure magic. It had no effect on the wood of the ship, but it disintegrated the fragile bodies gathered around it. All that was left were their terrified shadows on the wall.”

“Did you tell anyone?”

“No one would listen. You see, the captain of the Mary Celeste left a Lore book behind that detailed his search for the Monograph. Once the admiralty understood what it was, they wanted the Monograph for England. Unfortunately, many in the admiralty couldn’t keep their mouths shut. Stories began to circulate about the Monograph and the rune that would lead the worthy to it. The government hushed it up, of course, but enough people knew that it began to be fashionable for runewrights to search for the book.”

“Is that what happened to your friend?”

“I should have destroyed my notes,” Iggy said, sadness in his voice. “Eventually I broke the finding rune down into a more basic version.”

“That’s why I knew what it was,” Alex said. “The finding rune you taught me is made from the one in the Monograph.”

“Yes. I made the mistake of showing my finding rune to Felix. We had developed many of our runes together and he knew the limit of my abilities. From the moment he saw it, Felix knew I hadn’t come up with it on my own. He pestered me until I told him the whole story. From that day on, he was a changed man. He abandoned his commission and chased any mention of the Monograph all over Europe. We lost track of each other, but I heard rumors that Felix found other runes from the Monograph, but never the book itself.”

“Is he the one who gave the runes to the British?”

“Probably,” Iggy said. “Then one day he called me. Out of the blue. He said he’d figured it out, the finding rune, and that soon the Monograph would be his. He wanted me to come to his house. He wanted to share the book with me.”

“Sounds like a good friend.”

Iggy nodded and puffed his cigar.

“The best,” he agreed.

“Did you go?” Alex asked, afraid he already knew the answer.

“When I got there, Felix was gone.” A tear trickled down Iggy’s face and into his prodigious mustache. “I wanted to run, to just leave his flat and never return. But I … I had to know. I lit the ghostlight and there, on the wall, was Felix’s shadow, arms held over its head as though trying to block out the sun.”

Alex stood and poured more cognac into Iggy’s empty snifter.

“I’m sorry about your friend,” he said.

“It isn’t just Felix,” Iggy said. “In the years since the rune leaked out, hundreds of runewrights have disappeared, their invisible shadows burned into the walls of their flats and workshops.”

Alex remembered what the Sorceress told him.

“Sorsha said the government stopped researching the Monograph because twelve of their brightest minds went missing,” he said. “I take it their shadows ended up on walls somewhere too?”

After a long pause Iggy nodded.

“You see why I must insist, Alex,” Iggy said, grabbing his wrist. “You must forget about the Archimedean Monograph. Everyone who pursues it thinks they’ve broken the code and they all end up dead. Promise me.” He gripped Alex’s arm with more force than Alex would have given him credit for having. “Promise me that you will tear up whatever copies you’ve made of these runes. Promise me you’ll leave it alone.”

There was pain in the old man’s voice, but more than pain, there was panic. The idea that Alex would pursue the Monograph and its killer finding rune literally terrified Iggy. Alex knelt down by the old man’s chair and looked him square in the eyes.

“I promise you, Iggy,” he said. “I have no interest in becoming a shadow on the wall. I won’t go chasing after this book. Not now, or ever.”

Iggy closed his eyes and released Alex’s hand. Relief washed over his face and he leaned back in his chair and sighed.

“Good lad,” he said, patting Alex’s shoulder. “Thank you, Alex.”

Alex grinned and helped him up. Iggy had done so much for him, taking him in and training him to be a detective and a powerful runewright. To Alex, Iggy was a second father, well, third after Father Harry.

He really hated lying to the old man.

Iggy had been so upset by discussion of the Archimedean Monograph that he retired to his bed shortly after he finished his cigar. Alex sat and stared at the fire for a long time after he had gone. Both Iggy and Sorsha seemed to believe that the Monograph was dangerous, perhaps one of the most dangerous bits of rune magic in existence. Alex could see their point, but he also felt drawn to the killer finding rune. He felt certain that if he just took his time, studied it thoroughly, he could crack the code and find the Monograph. He was already beginning to remember some of the flaws in the rune’s design.

“I’ll bet that’s what Quinton Sanderson and Thomas Rockwell thought,” he said to the glowing embers of the fire. “Even money says they’re both invisible shadows on a wall somewhere.”

Sighing with resignation, Alex set the metal ember screen in front of the fire and went upstairs. He had more important things to do than trying to get himself killed over a mythical book that might not even exist. Besides, if he didn’t find out who killed Pemberton and why, he would be spending the foreseeable future in prison.

He intended to go straight to bed, but when he reached his room he fished out the brass key to his vault. Sacrificing a page from his rune book, Alex opened the door into his extra-dimensional space. This close to Empire Tower, the magelights in the space winked on and burned brightly, illuminating the gray walls, the workbenches, and the shelves full of ingredient vials. Alex went to an angled drafting table in front of a high stool. He’d gotten this table from a client in trade for his services and it was a much more comfortable position for creating runes and constructs. Switching on the magelight that hung directly above the table, Alex opened a drawer and pulled out a sketch pad of high quality paper. The first six pages of this pad were occupied by the runes he’d copied from Thomas’ lore book when he first got it.

One by one, he tore each page free from the pad and stuck them to a cork row on the top of the board with thumbtacks. All except the finding rune. That one he put in the center of the table, holding it down with a round magnet. He sat staring at it for a long time, then took out a legal pad and began filling it with notes. It was well after midnight when he finally went to bed.

His alarm clock jolted him awake at seven and he reluctantly relinquished the warmth of his bed for the chill of his room. He had two days left to find out what had been stolen from the customs warehouse, who had stolen it, and why. The sooner he started, the better. Iggy was still in his room when Alex came downstairs, so he decided to let Mary make him breakfast. After replenishing his pocket money from his safe in the library, he walked the two blocks to the diner.

Word had gotten out about the new cook at The Lunch Box and Alex had to wait a few minutes for a seat at the counter. Mary was so busy she didn’t have time to talk, so he gave her a wave on his way out.

He caught the crawler across town to his first stop, Anderson Tool and Die, which had received a shipment of machine parts from the French company that manufactured their lathes. It was to be their last shipment, since the owner had found a local company that could manufacture the parts for him. Another dead end.

From there, Alex went to a furniture importer who received several crates full of lacquered furniture from Japan. Next was a glazier who made stained glass windows. He’d received a shipment of pigments used in making the colored glass. Some of the pigments were rare and valuable, but he ordered in advance of his need and had only opened the crate to confirm its contents. Everything was accounted-for.

By four o’clock, Alex still had two names on his list. It was starting to feel like this was a dead end. That didn’t bode well for him…or for Danny. If it didn’t work out, Alex would have to try something desperate, something that might ruin his friendship with Danny at best… or get him killed at worst.

He pushed that thought from his mind as he entered Van der Waller’s Fine Jewelry. As soon as he entered, Alex could tell that this business had seen better days. A long row of glass cases filled one wall, but the rings, bracelets, and necklaces in them were spread out in an attempt to make the space look full. The cases had been polished and scrubbed so there wasn’t a fingerprint on them, and the dark green carpet had been vacuumed, but there was no sign anyone had been in today.

“Can I help you?” a short, balding man in a pinstriped suit said, coming in through a curtain that covered the back room. He wore a pleasant smile, but there were dark circles under his eyes. He wasn’t sleeping well.

“You the proprietor?” Alex asked.

“James Van der Waller,” the man said, sticking out his hand.

Alex shook his hand, noticing the tiny gold and silver filings that clung to the cuff of the man’s shirt.

“You do your own work here,” Alex said.

“We do, yes,” Van der Waller said.

“What’s wrong then? Most people like custom rings rather than that pre-pressed stuff.”

Van der Waller blushed a bit. “I’m afraid I’m a bit old-fashioned in my tastes. The things I like are just out of fashion,” he admitted. Then he seemed to remember himself. “I have hired Melissa Calomey, the famous designer. She’s created a whole new line of amazing pieces. I think it will do very well once we get started.”

“Well, since you’re polishing the settings, I’m guessing you’re waiting for the stones.”

Van der Waller looked shocked, but his smile returned quickly to his face.

“Yes, I ordered specially-cut stones for the settings, very good.”

“Are you making do with the stones you have?” Alex pointed at the display cases. “Is that why you’re so low on stock out here?”

“Who are you?” Van der Waller asked, irritation now plain on his face.

“I’m Alex Lockerby. I’m a consultant for the New York Police Department and I’m here to talk about the robbery.”

Van der Waller’s eyes rolled back in his head and he groaned, then fell face forward onto his immaculately clean carpet. Alex hadn’t been expecting that, and he just stood there looking at the unconscious jewelry store owner for a long moment.

“Come on, Mr. Van der Waller,” Alex said, rolling the man over and patting his face until his eyes fluttered open. He helped Van der Waller up and steadied him.

“I knew this would happen,” he said, his voice faint. “I told them.”

“Told who?” Alex pressed.

“My insurance company,” Van der Waller said. “They told me not to go to the police. Said they would catch the thief when he tried to fence the stones.”

That didn’t sound right. “They probably just wanted to stiff you,” Alex said. “If they drag your claim out long enough, you won’t be able to prove you had anything stolen.”

“But I reported the theft to them,” Van der Waller said, his face going even more pale.

“And if they lose the paperwork, it’s your word against theirs,” Alex said. He was sure Van der Waller’s panic was real. He’d found the robbery victim, but not the man who beat the truth out of Jerry Pemberton. That was starting to look like Van der Waller’s crooked insurance company. After all, if Van der Waller had the stones back, he wouldn’t be cannibalizing his own stock to make the new pieces.

“Oh dear God,” Van der Waller groaned. “What should I do?”

Alex put his hand on the little man’s shoulder to keep him from falling again.

“Don’t worry,” Alex said. “First, who is your insurance company?”

“Callahan Brothers Property,” he said. “And second?”

Alex pulled out his note pad and wrote Danny Pak’s name and the number to the homicide division.

“Call this detective and report the theft. Give him all the information you have.”

“But what about my insurance?” Van der Waller grabbed Alex’s coat, hanging on as if he needed an anchor. “What if they don’t pay? I’ll be ruined.”

“Don’t worry,” Alex said again, gently extracting himself from Van der Waller’s grip. “Once you report the theft, they’ll pay your claim or you can take them to court.”

Van der Waller sagged against the counter, pulling a handkerchief from his pocked to mop his brow.

“I can’t afford a lawyer,” he moaned. “Everything I had is tied up in those stones.” The man looked like he might faint again.

“I have to go see your insurance company anyway,” Alex said. “I’ll see what I can do to get them to pay your claim.”

“Thank you,” he said in a small voice. “If you do that, I’ll owe you.”

Alex chuckled. “You can thank me with something that isn’t selling,” he said. Van der Waller straightened up and looked Alex in the eye.

“I will not,” he declared. “I’ll make sure it’s something amazing, from my new line.” Van der Waller might not be the heartiest soul around but he had his pride.

“It’s a deal,” Alex said. “Now where can I find Callahan Brothers Property?”

Van der Waller went in the back, then emerged a moment later with a west side address written on a scrap of paper. Alex took the page and nodded, then Van der Waller stuck out his hand.

“Good luck.”

The crawler station was only a block away and there weren’t any dime stores or druggists along the way. As soon as he could find a phone, he’d call Danny, have him dig up whatever he could on Callahan Brothers Property. Maybe there were complaints against them, something he could leverage. He ran for the crawler and caught it just as its myriad of energy legs began to churn, carrying it away. The address Van der Waller had given him was far enough away that his pocket watch told him he’d never make it before they closed. He’d have to go in the morning. That was pushing things, but at least he could spend the rest of the night at the public library.

But first he had to call Danny.

Alex called from a public booth in the library’s foyer.

“I found our victim,” Danny’s excited voice came over the wire once the call connected.

“Let me guess,” Alex cut him off. “Is it a man by the name of James Van der Waller?”

There was a stunned silence, then Danny came back on the line. “How do you do that?” he asked, his voice sullen. Alex related his conversation with Van der Waller and his suspicions about his insurance company.

“You sure Van der Waller’s clean?” Danny asked.

“Pretty sure.”

“All right. I’ll see what I can dig up on Callahan Brothers Property.”

“Hey, did you get Mary’s number yesterday?” Alex changed the subject.

“No.” Danny said. Alex was stunned. Danny had a bit of a rep as a ladies man.

“I thought she was your type,” he said. “You know, breathing.”

“She’s too much my type,” Danny said, and laughed. “The kind I could fall for.”

“Would that be so bad?” Alex asked. “Not all of us are confirmed bachelors.”

“Do you have any idea what my father would do if I brought home a white girl?” Danny asked.

Alex hadn’t thought about that. A bachelor he might be, but that didn’t mean he didn’t like women, and he took them however they came. He’d seen enough guts and brains at murder scenes to know that people were all the same inside so it always surprised him when someone thought what was outside mattered. Still, Alex knew Danny’s father, and he was someone you didn’t want to disappoint.

“Tough luck,” Alex said. “Maybe I’ll get her number.”

Danny didn’t take the bait. “Call me in the morning and I’ll give you whatever I find on the insurance company.”

Alex promised that he would and hung up.

He spent the rest of the evening at the library poring over old newspapers, looking for any signs of Charles Beaumont. Burglaries were rare. It took him three hours just to find one. In all of the previous year, only six burglaries of rich homes had been reported. Of those, the same man committed at least two of the burglaries, but he was caught and jailed. The other four remained a mystery.

Alex read each article about the four robberies several times and took meticulous notes, but there just weren’t any details that stood out in any of the crimes. The homes were in different parts of the city. One victim had paintings taken, another jewelry, yet another antique silverware and vintage wines. The only thing that connected the robberies was the thief’s obvious knowledge of high end merchandise. Knowledge that anyone who traveled in those circles would have.

With nothing to connect the robberies, Alex began scanning the police report for each day, hoping to catch a break. He did find a follow-up report on one of the burglaries that he’d missed. It summed up that the police had no suspects and no leads, but took issue with an opinion piece that had been written about the police department’s handling of the case. Without any real leads to follow, Alex located the issue with the offending commentary in it and read the short article by an editorial columnist named Walter Nash. In the article, Nash claimed that the police were lax in their pursuit of the obvious suspect in this case, the famous cat burglar known only as the Spook.

Alex had never heard of anyone the police had dubbed the Spook. He soon realized why — Walter Nash had invented the Spook to describe any robbery where the perpetrator got in and out of the dwelling unseen, even the ones where the home’s owners were not at home at the time. Alex flipped through the papers reading Nash’s weekly columns. It was mostly sensational drivel, but he seemed to pay particular attention to the robberies, detailing the facts and sensationalizing their mythical perpetrator.

Alex wanted to believe that Beaumont was the Spook, but even if he had been, knowing the name a hack reporter gave him wouldn’t get Alex any closer to finding the man.

On the other hand, all Alex had to do was follow Nash’s columns to learn when a spectacular, unsolved burglary had been committed. That would be a lot faster than going through the papers week by week.

By the time the librarian came by to throw him out, and glare at him for the mess he made, Alex had identified twelve high-end burglaries over the last three years. Each had the same characteristics: the only things taken were valuable and easy to carry, and there was no sign anyone had been in the house.

No wonder Nash dubbed this guy the Spook.

By the time Alex got home, Iggy was already in bed and the house was silent. Alex reviewed his notes at the kitchen table while he ate a hastily constructed liverwurst sandwich. He still didn’t have much. Nothing tied Beaumont to the Spook, but he had, at least, found a pattern. That was enough for one night.

Exhausted, he dragged himself to his room and stripped to his boxers. He pulled back the covers to crawl into bed, but a sudden thought made him stop. He picked up his discarded trousers and fished out his vault key. He hadn’t given the Archimedean Monograph any thought since last night, but a possible fix for the finding rune had just come to him and it wouldn’t hurt to make a few notes.

Just a few.

“Well you look like hell,” Iggy observed as Alex dragged himself downstairs the next morning. Alex grunted at him and poured himself a large cup of coffee.

“Doctor Halverson called me yesterday,” Iggy said.

“Who?”

Iggy sighed and waited for Alex to take a few slugs from his coffee mug. “Doctor Halverson called,” he said again.

“Oh. The researcher from the University,” Alex said, his sleep-deprived brain finally making the connection.

“He said they’ve identified three separate strains of the pathogen.” Iggy paused as if what he had said were self-evident. When Alex failed to do anything but stare at him blankly, he continued. “It appears the disease gets weaker with every generation.”

“So it isn’t perfect after all?”

“It’s still not natural,” Iggy said. “No disease in recorded history is fatal after just two hours.”

Alex shrugged. He wanted to do right by Father Harry, but it was Friday and if he didn’t talk to James Van der Waller’s insurance company today, he’d have to wait till Monday. Since Captain Rooney’s meeting with the Chief was at ten o’clock Monday morning, he didn’t have that kind of time.

“I’ve got a full day,” he said. “But if Halverson finds anything that can help me track down Charles Beaumont, or whoever’s behind this, call Leslie.”

Iggy promised that he would, and Alex reached for the phone on the kitchen wall.

“It’s about time you called,” Danny said once the police operator put the call through to him. “You know we’ve only got today left to save my job, right?”

“Sorry, Danny,” Alex said, feeling like a heel for spending time on the Monograph. “What have you got on Callahan Brothers Property?”

“Not much,” Danny said. “A couple of court cases where they were sued for not paying claims, but they won all of those. The rest are cases where they went after people who tried to cheat their clients. It’s all pretty regular.”

“That’s it?” Alex was astounded.

“I asked the boys over in fraud,” Danny said. “They said that Callahan Brothers recover stolen property fairly regularly. Much more often than their competitors.”

“Like maybe they’ve got a goon squad who leans on people till they talk?” Alex asked.

“Nobody knows,” Danny said. “Or if they do, they aren’t talking. I suggest you quit wasting time and get your butt over there and ask them.”

“Yes, boss,” Alex said and hung up.

The offices of Callahan Brothers Property were on the top floor of an elegant brick building that had once been an upscale hotel. The lobby alone looked like it had been built by John Astor; it was elegant and stately with marble floors, carved Art Nouveau rails and moldings. The building’s elevator had an operator, an elderly gentleman in a red velvet waistcoat who directed the car with smooth efficiency. Callahan Brothers occupied the entire top floor of the building, and the elevator let Alex off right in front of a large desk manned by a receptionist. She was young, maybe nineteen, with plump cheeks and dark hair, which hung around her face in ringlets. Her lips were red and thin, her eyes were blue and there were freckles on her nose.

“Can I help you?” she asked as Alex approached.

“I’m Alex Lockerby. I’m here regarding James Van der Waller’s claim,” Alex said, handing her his card. “I need to see whoever is handling his case.”

The girl’s face changed from the pleasant smile to a sour frown as she passed the card back.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “We don’t discuss matters relating to clients without the client present. I’ll have to ask you to leave.”

Alex didn’t move to take the card.

“Listen sweetheart, if you want me to go, I’ll go. But first I suggest you take that card and give it to the man in charge of Van der Waller’s claim. It’d be a mistake if you didn’t.”

The girl’s expression wavered between confidence and doubt. In the end doubt won.

“All right,” she said, standing up. “Please wait here. I’ll be right back.”

She stepped around her desk and made her way to a set of elaborate double doors on one side of the foyer. A moment later she was back with a blocky man of medium height. He had a square jaw with close-set eyes and a Roman nose, not at all what Alex pictured when he thought of an insurance agent. He looked more like a bouncer.

Alex kept his smile pasted to his face. If this was an attempt to intimidate him, he intended to show them it failed.

“I’m Arthur Wilks,” the blocky man said as the girl took her seat behind the receptionist desk once more. He handed Alex’s card back. “I wanted to tell you in person that I have no intention of discussing my clients with you. If you insist on bothering Miss Harding, I’ll have to call the police. Now please leave.”

Alex took the card and tucked it in his shirt pocket, removing his note pad as he did so. He flipped the top few pages while Wilks glared at him, then started writing. “How do you spell Wilks?” he asked. “I’m sure the police will want to get it right when they arrest you for impeding a police investigation.”

Alex expected Wilks to protest but instead, he just glared at Alex for a long moment, then sighed. “All right,” he said. “There’s no need for that. Follow me.”

Wilks turned back toward the double doors. After a moment, Alex followed. He hadn’t strapped on his 1911 in a few days and his rune-covered brass knuckles were in his room at the brownstone. It occurred to him that if Wilks wished him ill, he might have a nasty surprise waiting for him behind those doors.

Alex breathed a sigh of relief when the doors led to a wide hallway with offices on either side. Inside each office, well-dressed men and women were busily working, filling out forms or making phone calls. Everyone seemed to be in a hurry. Wilks’ office was at the end of one row in the corner, with big windows all around giving him a wonderful view of the city core and Empire Tower. Along the inside walls were dozens of plaques, awards, and framed newspaper clippings. Most dealt with the recovery of missing or stolen property. The blocky man was clearly an important man at Callahan Brothers Property.

“All right,” Wilks said once he’d shut his door. “What do you want?”

There was a distinct trace of Brooklyn in his voice that hadn’t been there before.

“You used to be on the job,” Alex said, seating himself before Wilks’ large mahogany desk. Wilks looked startled, then nodded.

“Fifteen years,” he said. “How did you know?”

Alex pointed to a framed newspaper article hanging more or less in the center of the wall of awards. Unlike the others, this one was yellow with age.

“The headline says that a police detective was responsible for finding a stolen thoroughbred horse,” he said. “Was that when the Callahan Brothers noticed you?”

Wilks raised an eyebrow, then nodded.

“I see you’re pretty good yourself,” he said. “Now what’s all this got to do with James?”

Alex crossed his legs and leaned back, still holding his notepad.

“Why did you tell Mr. Van der Waller not to report his theft to the police?”

Wilks took a deep breath, then pointed to the wall of awards behind Alex. “You see them?” he said. “I got them for recovering property. I was a robbery detective, Mr. Lockerby. And I learned that people who steal things, do it for one of two reasons. Either they want whatever it is for themselves, in which case they have to stash it somewhere. If you look long and hard enough, you usually find it. Or,” he continued, “they steal stuff to sell it for money. In that case they have to have someone to sell it to. Now in the case of art, you know, paintings, statues, that kind of thing, sometimes the thief has a buyer lined up before the theft. With loose jewels,” he shrugged, “those, they have to fence.” He pointed out the window in the general direction of the diamond district. “Sure, there’s plenty of guys in the jewelry business who don’t really care where their stones come from, as long as the paperwork is right. Provenance, we call it in the trade. Now, since the thief doesn’t have any paper trail, he’s got to sell the stones to someone who can forge one. That gives the stones provenance.”

“Very interesting,” Alex said. “But you haven’t answered my question.”

Wilks smiled. “There’s only a handful of fences in the New York area that can move high end stones, and I know them all,” he said. “I told James to hold off because I was sure I could get his property back.”

“You reached out to these fences and told them to call you if they came across Van der Waller’s property?” Alex guessed. “What makes you think they would?”

Wilks laughed an ugly laugh and jerked his thumb at a filing cabinet behind his door.

“I got enough on each of them to put them away for twenty years,” he said. “But I’m not a cop anymore. It ain’t my job to catch crooks.”

“So when you have a case, you lean on your network,” Alex said. “The rest of the time you leave them alone. No wonder your record of recovering property is so good.”

“I know all the good fences,” Wilks said; he smiled and thumped himself on the chest. “And the cops know the rest. If one of my clients has something go missing, I know just who to squeeze.”

Alex pictured Jerry Pemberton, beaten and missing fingernails.

“Who did you squeeze about Van der Waller’s missing stones?”

“That’s a trade secret,” Wilks said. “I’m sure a runewright understands that.”

Alex did. Wilks didn’t have to tell him anything and he had no leverage with the man. As a former cop, he knew that P.I.s had little to no pull with the real police.

“When do you expect to have the stones back?” Alex said. Wilks’ grim smile turned sour and he didn’t answer.

“What happened to Jerry Pemberton?” Alex asked, quietly.

“Who?” he asked. For the first time, Wilks looked surprised.

“The customs agent who was in on the robbery with the thief. Someone beat his partner’s name out of him, then set him on fire.”

Wilks’ face flushed and he jumped to his feet.

“Get out,” he roared. “I don’t have to listen to this from you.”

Alex didn’t move.

“But you will have to listen to the police,” he said. “Right now they don’t know that you told Van der Waller not to call them. I’m sure they’d find that fact interesting enough to come down here and talk to you.”

Wilks turned a greenish color and he sat down.

“I didn’t have anything to do with any beating,” he said. “I already told you how I work. I don’t go after the thieves, I let them come to my contacts.”

“Maybe you got tired of waiting.”

“I never heard of any Jerry Penballer—”

“Pemberton.”

“Whoever,” Wilks barked. “I never heard of him, and I certainly didn’t kill him.”

Alex hated to admit it, but he believed Wilks. Firstly, Wilks would have waited a few days, at least, for his fences to hear something. Killing Pemberton had been an act of desperation, perpetrated by someone motivated to get their hands on the missing stones. Wilks, on the other hand, was like a spider in a web, just waiting for the thieves to come to him.

“All right,” Alex said, flipping his notebook closed. “I take it, you haven’t heard anything from your people about the stones?”

“No,” Wilks said. He opened his desk drawer and pulled out an oblong book, opening the cover and turning it around so Alex could read it. It was a checkbook with a draft written out to James Van der Waller in the amount of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It was dated yesterday.

“If I haven’t heard anything by the end of today, I’ll take this check over to James myself.” He fixed Alex with a hard stare. “I may be a bit rough around the edges compared to the rest of the stiffs who work here, but I’m legit.” He closed the book and put it away. “Callahan Brothers Property always pay our claims.”

Alex stood up, putting his notebook away.

“Good to know,” he said. “Thank you for your time.”

“I’m sure you can find your way out,” Wilks sneered, not rising from his desk.

It was a long elevator ride back to the ground floor. Everything seemed to point to Callahan Brothers, but now Alex wanted them to be his insurance company. Not that Wilks would take his business.

A row of phone booths encased in polished wood lined the wall in the building’s elaborate lobby. Alex should have called Danny, but he wasn’t ready to admit he had nothing, so he dialed his office number instead. Leslie picked up after the third ring and she sounded harried.

“There you are,” she said when she heard his voice. “Everyone’s called for you this morning. It’s like Grand Central in here.”

“What have you got?” Alex sighed.

“Danny called twice wanting to know how you made out at the insurance company. Then Doctor Bell called, said he’s over at the University and wanted you to join him. He said to follow the police cars and you’d find him.”

That didn’t sound good.

“Lastly Miss Rockwell called, wanting to know if you’d made any progress finding out what happened to her brother. She, at least, was polite.”

Alex closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “All right,” he said. “Sounds like I’d better go see what Iggy wants.”

Leslie snorted. She didn’t approve of Alex calling a septuagenarian doctor Iggy.

“If Danny or Evelyn call back, tell them I’ll call them as soon as I can.”

Leslie promised that she would and wished him luck.

The university was south, past the core, near Washington Square Park. It would take close to half an hour to get there by crawler and he hadn’t eaten all day. His stomach growled at him, but Iggy’s mention of police cars meant something important was happening. He pushed his hunger aside and headed south.

The campus of New York University covered a few city blocks, but Alex had no trouble figuring out which building he needed to visit. As Iggy had predicted, half a dozen police cruisers were parked along the street beside a four-story building made of yellow brick. All sorts of horrors paraded through his mind as he approached. Maybe Dr. Halverson had accidentally infected someone in the lab and now they were all dead. Maybe Iggy had been there.

No. Leslie had just talked to Iggy, and he told her about the police cars. Alex took a deep breath and tried to focus. What he needed was a sandwich and a cigarette.

When he reached the entrance, there was no uniformed officer there, another good sign, but his gut was telling him something was wrong. It wasn’t until he saw the tall, blond man in the gray pinstriped suit loitering in the hall that Alex realized what form the danger had taken. He plastered a smile on his face and kept his pace steady.

“Agent Warner,” he said, when he reached the young FBI man. “If you’re looking for old books, I hear the University’s library has a few.”

Warner’s eyes narrowed at the sight of Alex.

“Shouldn’t you be helping some little girl find her lost balloon?”

Alex chuckled and clapped Warner on the shoulder. “That’s what I love about you FBI types,” Alex said. “You’re all so witty.”

Warner snarled and batted Alex’s hand away.

“You’d better mind your manners, scribbler,” he snarled. “The boss lady may want to handle you with kid gloves, but that doesn’t mean I have to.”

“I think,” a new voice cut in, “that what Agent Warner meant to ask is, what are you doing here, Mr. Lockerby?”

Alex turned to find Agent Davis emerging from a door with the word Pathology panted on it.

“I’m here to see Dr. Halverson,” Alex said, putting on an easy smile.

Davis’s smile looked just as insincere as Alex’s. “What business do you have with the Doc?” he asked.

Alex took a deep breath and kept his smile in place. These two were really beginning to get on his nerves, which, when he thought about it, was probably just what they were trying to do. If he gave them any excuse, they’d arrest him and throw him in a holding cell for as long as they could get away with. Some other time it might have been fun to force their hand, but not today.

Too many people were depending on him today.

“Doctor Bell called me,” he said. “Asked me to come down right away, so here I am.”

“Who’s Bell?” Warner asked Davis. The elder FBI man checked his notes.

“The consultant,” he said after a moment. The two of them exchanged a long look, then Davis stepped away from the door so Alex could enter.

The room beyond was crammed with lab equipment, workbenches, burners, and beakers of every description — and policemen. Alex saw Lieutenant Callahan standing next to a gray-bearded man with immensely thick spectacles who wore a white lab coat. Alex ventured a guess that he was the famous Dr. Halverson. He seemed to be explaining something highly technical, since Callahan and his detectives kept stopping him every few seconds to write in their notebooks.

“Well, well,” a honeyed female voice washed over him. “You do turn up in the strangest places, Mr. Lockerby.”

Alex looked toward the back of the room and found Sorsha Kincaid leaning against a lab table with the air of someone who was waiting for something to happen. Unlike when she came to his office, she wore a dress with a white jacket over the top. The dress was pale blue to match her eyes, and it clung to her slender form in a very appealing manner. To Alex’s surprise, Iggy stood next to her with a warm smile on his face.

“Why, Miss Kincaid,” Alex said, slapping his poker face back in place. “What an unexpected pleasure.”

She smiled a warm, genuine smile and shook her head.

“Not for me,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for you for some time. It was very rude of you to keep me waiting.”

Alex had no idea what she was talking about and he had to keep reminding himself that the dazzling smile she kept flashing him was probably the one a shark shows just before it makes you its lunch.

“I’m terribly sorry,” he said, with a mock bow. “I wasn’t aware you were expecting me.”

Sorsha turned to Iggy and looped her arm in his. “Doctor Bell here simply wouldn’t explain Dr. Halverson’s results to me until you got here,” she said.

“And I stand by it,” Iggy said. “I hate having to explain things more than once.”

“You could have just asked Halverson,” Alex said. Sorsha frowned.

“No,” she said then, replacing the frown with a knowing smile. “I’m afraid that Halverson is far too brilliant to be clearly understood. Whereas Dr. Bell is so very eloquent.”

Iggy actually blushed.

“Well now that I’m here,” Alex said. “I guess Dr. Bell can explain.”

“Not quite yet,” Sorsha said. Alex felt the temperature in the room go down several degrees, figuratively at least. “This is the second time this week I find you tangled up in my investigation, Mr. Lockerby. I’d like to know why you are here.”

“You think this has something to do with your missing book?” Alex said. He hadn’t actually considered that this might be the work of some deranged runewright, but Iggy had said the disease was man-made. Could something in the Archimedean Monograph be that dangerous? Sorsha smiled but her ice blue eyes were hard.

“The incident at the mission was unnatural,” she said. “Doesn’t that suggest magic to you, Mr. Lockerby?” She tisked at him and Alex caught himself blushing. “I though you were smarter than that. Now, why are you here?”

“Father Harry was a friend of mine,” he said.

“Who?” Sorsha asked. Alex strangled the urge to yell.

“The priest who ran the mission,” he said. “I’m here to make sure that the person who killed him,” Alex chose his next words carefully, “sees justice.”

Sorsha looked at him for a long moment, then shrugged. “All right. But if I find out you’ve lied to me—”

“I know, I know.” Alex held up his hand. “You’ll have me drawn and quartered.”

“Something like that.” A cold, deadly smile crawled up Sorsha’s lips.

“If you two are quite finished,” Iggy said, exasperation in his voice. He waited until they both turned to him before continuing. “I’m afraid you’re wrong about this being magical, Miss Kincaid,” he said. “At least not in the way you mean. If this had been some kind of curse or rune, there wouldn’t have been trace bacteria in the blood samples.”

Sorsha nodded, a look of irritation on her face.

“Magic wouldn’t leave normal, biological traces,” she agreed. “So what is it then?”

“I think it’s some form of Alchemy,” Iggy said. “This disease has three distinct stages. The first takes the longest to be fatal. The affected person doesn’t even look sick for the first hour. After that, however, they deteriorate rapidly and death occurs about three hours later.”

“How do you know this?” Alex asked.

“We’ve tested it on mice,” Iggy said. “Now, the first person sick becomes infectious as soon as they begin to show symptoms, but their bodies are already producing the second type of the infection.”

Sorsha’s face was a mask of concentration. “So only the first person has the original disease,” she said. “The next group gets the second type.”

“Just so,” Iggy said. “That type is fatal within two hours of being infected.”

“What about the third type?” Alex asked.

“People with the second type produce the infection in its third phase,” Iggy said. “The third phase is just as deadly as the second, but people with the third type of the illness can’t infect anyone else.”

“So the first person can infect people,” Sorsha said. “And those people can infect others, but after that the disease just stops.”

Iggy nodded, then turned to Alex. “Now do you see why I called you down here?”

“No idea,” Alex said.

“Think about it,” Iggy said. “A disease that only kills for a short time and then stops, leaving no chance of an outbreak. This disease is not some horrible accident or magic gone wrong, it was designed this way. It’s a weapon.”

Alex suppressed a laugh. “That plague at the mission, a weapon? A weapon against what?” he said. “Dinner parties?”

“Yes,” Sorsha said. “And any other place where people gather. Office buildings, race tracks, army barracks, Grand Central Station, or a Dodgers game. Whoever made this could target any group of people without risking letting loose a plague. It’s a work of genius.” She sounded impressed, but Alex detected a tremor of fear in her voice.

Iggy nodded.

“So why is it here?” Alex asked. “Whoever made this thing didn’t do it to target a mission full of vagrants.”

“It was probably a test,” Iggy said.

“Maybe to prove to a buyer that the weapon did what its creator claimed it did,” Sorsha said. “Or as a dry run.”

“Which would mean,” Alex said, “that our mad scientist already has a target in mind?”

“The conference,” Sorsha gasped. “There’s a conference, Monday, on the European problem. Dignitaries and military leaders will be there from all over the world.”

“A conference? What’s this conference for?” he asked. Alex hadn’t heard about it, but that wasn’t surprising; politics in any form bored him.

“Don’t you read the news?” Sorsha rolled her eyes.

“Just the funny papers,” he said.

“Germany is saber-rattling again,” she explained. “Hitler has promised that he has no military intentions, but Europe’s worried. This conference is an attempt to get everyone talking.” She motioned Agent Davis over to her and began issuing orders to contact Washington and alert them to the threat. When she finished, he scurried off, and she turned back to Iggy.

“This conference is being held in the grand ballroom of the Waldorf Hotel,” she said. “Can you give me an idea of how this weapon could be used against the attendees?”

Iggy stroked his mustache for a moment, pondering the matter.

“Well, it’s too fragile to remain airborne for any length of time. That means that the disease would have to be spread inside the hotel.”

“Why not infect someone before the event?” Alex asked. “Let them carry it inside.”

“Too many variables,” Sorsha said, shaking her head. “What if the infected person felt sick and went to a doctor, or decided to stop for breakfast? The only way to ensure the weapon hits its target is to release it inside.”

Alex hadn’t thought of that, but it made sense. Sorsha was pretty good at her consultant job.

“Correct,” Iggy confirmed. “Also, whoever is infected first will be someone who will circulate, giving them the best chance to spread the disease — so make it a waiter or a hostess.”

“Or security,” Sorsha said. “For an event like this, there’ll be over a dozen agents. It sounds like the best chance of catching our assassin is when he tries to bring the disease inside.” She pulled her notebook out of the air and flipped it open.

“It would be in a flask or vial, sealed with lead,” Iggy said. “Not very big, just an ounce or two. He’d have to sprinkle it somewhere the first victim would come in contact with it.”

“Like on a towel or in a drink?” Sorsha said.

“Anywhere would do,” Iggy said. “Even a doorknob.”

Sorsha jotted down Iggy’s words. “Good,” she said when she finished. “This should help us secure the conference.”

“If the conference is even a target,” Alex said. Sorsha shrugged.

“You could be right; this might have nothing to do with politics, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

At that moment, Agent Davis returned and motioned Sorsha over to the door.

“Thank you, Doctor Bell,” she said, shaking hands with Iggy, then she gave Alex a frosty look and left.

“I see why you like her,” Iggy said, watching the retreating figure of the Sorceress in her form-fitting dress.

“I don’t like her,” Alex said, watching too. Iggy grinned, and his mustache rose up to meet his nose.

“Sure you don’t.” Then his face turned serious. “Alex,” he said, his voice dropping. “You’ve got to find out who’s behind this. Whatever they’re after, they aren’t going to stop with the Brotherhood of Hope Mission. More people are going to die.”

“I know,” Alex said. “If I could just get a line on Charles Beaumont, maybe I could trace him back to where he got infected.” Alex recounted to Iggy his efforts to track the elusive burglar. While he spoke, Iggy stroked his mustache, deep in thought.

“So,” Iggy said once Alex finished. “If Beaumont was this Spook fellow, he’s not just any burglar.”

“Not by a long shot,” Alex agreed. “He knew exactly what to take; highly valuable, small and light.”

“Yes, but he didn’t take the kinds of things that would be easy to fence,” Iggy said. “You said he took a set of silverware that was once owned by Napoleon, and a painting by Renoir?”

Alex nodded; he’d been through the list of stolen property so many times he knew it by heart.

“What are you getting at, old man?” Alex asked when Iggy didn’t immediately respond.

“You can’t just sell a Renoir after you steal it,” Iggy said. “It’s too well known. The only reason to take it is if you’re sure you can move it.”

“You think Beaumont had a buyer already lined up for the painting? Alex said.

“Not just for the painting,” Iggy said. “I’d bet my mustache that he had buyers ready and waiting for everything he stole.”

“Sounds reasonable,” Alex said. “But how does this help us?”

“A thief, even a high end thief, usually doesn’t travel in the kinds of circles where you meet collectors of stolen paintings and hot wine.”

“No one likes hot wine,” Alex said with a grin. “Least of all a collector.”

“My point,” Iggy said, ignoring Alex’s attempt at humor, “is that rich people aren’t likely to know a burglar, so how do they hire one when they want something stolen?”

Alex smiled as the light went on. “They know someone who knows Beaumont,” he said. “A neutral third party who serves as the intermediary for larcenous socialites who want to hire a burglar.”

“Exactly,” Iggy said. “There can’t be many people in the city capable of doing that kind of work. It’d have to be someone with serious criminal connections who’s also a socialite.”

Alex thought about Arthur Wilks and his network of fences, but that wasn’t quite right. Whoever Beaumont’s fixer was, he was a member of high society, and Alex couldn’t imagine anyone on Wilks’ list fitting that bill. Besides, there was no way Wilks was going to share any names with a private detective.

Thinking about Wilks reminded Alex of the reason he’d gone to see the insurance agent in the first place. He had half a day left before the weekend, so he needed to find Jerry Pemberton’s murderer fast. Still, if Wilks and his network couldn’t track down the missing stones, what chance did he have? Whoever had them didn’t seem to be in a hurry to sell them, after all.

Or maybe they already had.

What if Pemberton had a buyer already, just like the Spook? Someone who wanted the stones ahead of time and approached Pemberton. Pemberton hires the thief and they do the job.

No, that wouldn’t work.

Even with Pemberton’s map, the thief would have to get in and out undetected. No mean feat. So it must have been the thief who approached Pemberton. But, how did the thief line up his buyer? He must have used an intermediary, too.

Alex told Iggy his idea, the words spilling out of him in his excitement.

“That would explain a lot,” Iggy said, nodding vigorously. “If Pemberton or the mystery thief held out for more money, that would have given the buyer incentive to torture the thief’s identity out of Pemberton.”

“It also explains why the stones aren’t being fenced.” Alex said.

“Good work,” Iggy said. “I think you’re on to something. The question is, how do you find the intermediary?”

Alex had an answer for that, but the thought of it made his stomach turn.

“If you want to find a high class crook,” he said, “you ask a high class crook.”

Twenty minutes later, Alex stood on an inner ring sidewalk a block from the Core. Across the street stood the Lucky Dragon restaurant. The Lucky Dragon was famous for its dumplings and about as Chinese as Grauman's Chinese Theatre. It was a trendy hot spot for the well-to-do and those who aspired to appear so. It was also a front for the Japanese mafia. Its owner was an older man named Chow Duk Sum. His real name was Shiro Takahashi, an American citizen raised in Brooklyn by Japanese parents.

What only a handful of people in the entire world knew, was that Shiro was also Danny Pak’s father.

Danny didn’t know that Alex knew about his familial relationships and Alex had never said anything. He’d found out when Iggy was teaching him how to track people through birth records. Alex had used his friend as a test and wound up learning way more than he ever wanted to know. Now he was about to put that knowledge to use in a way that might end his friendship with Danny forever.

It might also get him killed. Alex didn’t know much about the Japanese mafia, but if they were anything like the Italian one, just knowing who Chow Duk Sum really was could be enough to earn him a pair of cement shoes.

He took one of his cards out of his pocket, scribbled This is about Danny on the back, then crossed the street.

An attractive young hostess in a brightly colored robe greeted him when he entered. Her features were Asian, but her accent was cultured, with a hint of Great Britain.

“I’m sorry,” she said, when Alex asked to see the owner. “Mr. Chow is very busy right now. If you’re not here to eat, then I’ll have to ask you to leave.”

Alex handed his card to her, forcing his hand not to shake. “Have someone give him this,” he said. “If he still doesn’t want to see me, I’ll go.”

The girl hesitated, then she took the card over to a young Asian man in a silk suit sitting at a table in the corner. After a whispered conversation, she returned, and the young man disappeared into the back. He came back only a moment later.

“Mr. Chow will see you,” he said, simply. “Follow me.”

He led Alex back, through the kitchen, to a narrow set of stairs that went up to the second floor. At the top, a long hallway ran the length of the building with doors on the left side. The man stopped at the first one and opened it. Alex briefly saw runes glow along the frame. He wasn’t familiar with the angular, painted characters of the Kanji style of runes, but he could feel their power as he passed through the door.

The room beyond looked nothing like the somewhat-garishly decorated dining room. It appeared to be right out of the pages of a fashion magazine. Elegant furniture surrounded a low wooden table with Tiffany lamps in the corners.

“Please sit,” the young man said, then withdrew, shutting the door behind him. Alex sat on one of the long couches and waited, trying to convince his nervous body not to sweat. He wasn’t sure what to expect, but the aging Asian man in a black tuxedo who entered a moment later definitely wasn’t it.

Alex stood and bowed to him as he entered.

“Mr. Takahashi, I presume.”

The man looked startled, then he bowed in return. He was medium height and slim, with long hair that he tied behind his head in a ponytail. His face was crisscrossed with lines, but his dark eyes were bright. He looked like an older version of Danny.

“I figured I’d be seeing you sooner or later,” he said. “You’re Daniel’s detective friend.” He said all this in an easy, conversational manner, then sat across the table on the opposite couch. “You know my real name, so I’m going to assume you know who I am,” he said. “That means you understand the predicament you’ve put me in just by being here.”

“I apologize for any inconvenience,” Alex said. “I wouldn’t have come if it weren’t important.”

Shiro Takahashi looked him over for a long moment. “Then I guess you’d better tell me why you came.”

Alex explained what happened with Jerry Pemberton, the stakeout of the customs warehouse, and how that had made Captain Rooney look bad. While he talked, Shiro simply sat, unmoving, and listened.

“It seems you have gotten Daniel into quite a bit of trouble, Mr. Lockerby,” he said once Alex finished. His voice was soft and calm and far more intimidating than if he had shouted. “It took Daniel a long time to convince his fellow officers to take him seriously. Prejudice against Japanese is still strong here.” He looked around at the luxurious room. “It took me a long time to carve out a place for myself,” he said. “Daniel did it at a much younger age. I’m very proud of him.”

“I understand,” Alex said.

“Then you will understand that I will take it personally if you cost my son his job.”

It was said without anger or malice and Shiro’s tone was mild, congenial even, but the threat there sent chills down Alex’s back.

“I take it,” Shiro went on after a brief pause, “that your presence here means you believe I can help you with your investigation. Unfortunately, I’ve never heard of Jerry Pemberton.”

“Actually, I was hoping you could help me find someone else,” Alex said. He explained about the stones not being fenced and his theory that someone had commissioned the theft. “There can’t be that many people who can provide this kind of service,” Alex finished. “I just need to know who does. If I can find the man who arranged the theft, I can find his client, and that will be the person who murdered Jerry Pemberton.”

Shiro steepled his hands under his chin and sat, unmoving for a long moment.

“There is only one man in New York who handles this sort of work,” he said. “There are many lesser men, for lesser jobs, of course, but anyone making this kind of arrangement would require ten percent of the job up front. You said the insurance check was for one hundred and fifty large, that would be fifteen thousand down. Only high-end clients can pay that kind of fee, and only one man in New York takes that kind of action. His name is Jeremy Brewer, but everyone just calls him the Broker. You’ll find him in a Core nightclub called The Emerald Room. That’s where he conducts business.”

“Thank you, Mr. Takahashi,” Alex said, trying not to stand too quickly, but Shiro waved him back into his seat.

“I’ve enjoyed our talk, Mr. Lockerby,” he said. “You showed both respect and intellect, both in finding me and in knowing what question to ask me.”

Alex opened his mouth to respond, but Shiro kept speaking.

“Clearly you are a worthy friend for my son. That said, coming here could expose Daniel, and I won’t have that. If you come here again, for any reason other than to eat dumplings, I will take it as a sign of disrespect.”

Alex tried to control the shiver that ran across his shoulders but couldn’t.

“Furthermore,” Shiro said, “the Broker is a dangerous man. He won’t give up the information you want without…coercion.” Shiro raised his eyes and stared into Alex’s. “Under no circumstances is my name, or Daniel’s, to come to his attention. Am I clear?”

“Crystal,” Alex said. “And thank you.”

Shiro leaned forward and picked up a tiny silver bell from the coffee table. He rang it once and the young Asian in the silk suit reappeared.

“Please show our guest out,” he said. “And, Mr. Lockerby, good luck.”

The crawler flowed over the streets of Manhattan on its energy legs, far faster than any streetcar could move, but it still felt slow to Alex. He had to hurry back to the brownstone and see Iggy. Clubs like The Emerald Room wouldn’t let ordinary working schlubs in; you had to look the part.

He needed a tuxedo.

The only person he knew who might have one he could borrow was Iggy. The old man was a little shorter and heavier than Alex, but it was his only option.

When he reached the brownstone, Iggy laughed in his face.

“What would I need a tuxedo for?” he said. “What do you need it for?”

Alex explained about the Broker and where he could be found.

“So you want a tuxedo so you can what? Kidnap this guy, drag him out the back of a Core nightclub, and then beat the truth out of him somewhere quiet?”

Alex had been so focused on finding a tux that he hadn’t actually thought that far ahead. Shiro Takahashi had been right; the Broker wouldn’t give up client names without a fight.

“And what are you going to do when you’re done?” Iggy went on. “He’ll have seen your face. He won’t rest until he’s found you and put a bullet in you, so you’re going to have to kill him. Is that your plan?”

“What do you want me to do?” Alex yelled, whirling on him. He regretted it instantly, but the stress of the day was getting to him. “I’m sorry—” he began but Iggy put a hand on his shoulder.

“I want you to think,” he said. “And I want you to listen.”

Alex sighed, his temper back under control, and he nodded.

“All right,” Iggy said. “You need to get into that club and find this Broker all without anyone knowing who you are or questioning your right to be there.”

“If you’re suggesting a disguise rune,” Alex said, trying hard not to roll his eyes. “You know those never work, and even when they do, any magic at all disrupts them. I couldn’t even ride the crawler while using one.”

Iggy did roll his eyes — and shook his head.

“My dear boy,” he said in his most professorial tone. “You haven’t used one of my disguise runes yet. They’re as solid as Gibraltar.”

Alex’s jaw dropped open for a moment, then he snapped it closed so hard his teeth clacked.

“Why didn’t you teach me that?” he protested. “Do you know how useful that would have been whenever I was tailing someone, or doing something questionably legal?”

“That’s exactly why I didn’t teach it to you,” Iggy said. “It’s so useful, you’d justify using it all the time.”

Alex was beginning to see the problem. “How much does it cost to cast?” he asked.

“Forty dollars a rune,” Iggy said. “Lots of expensive materials.”

Alex whistled. He’d have burned through everything he had in less than a week. He might anyway, if he wanted to get into The Emerald Room.

“I figure you’ll need four separate runes,” Iggy said. “One for your clothes, one for your face, one for your money, and another one for your face when you leave.”

“Why don’t you do them all in one rune?” Alex asked, doing the math in his head and feeling his wallet groan.

“Illusions work best when you don’t ask them to do too much,” Iggy said.

“So why do I need a new face when I leave?”

“Because, if you’re seen leaving, you don’t want anyone to be able to identify you later.” He waved a hand at Alex. “Now go away,” he said. “It’ll take me close to ten hours to do all four castings, so you’ll have to go tomorrow night.”

“That doesn’t leave me much time,” Alex pointed out.

“Can’t be helped,” Iggy said. “On the bright side, it gives you time to figure out how you’re going to get the Broker fellow to talk. Now leave me be; I’m going to my workshop and don’t wish to be disturbed.”

The word workshop hit Alex like a runaway cab and he suddenly realized what he’d been missing.

“Thanks Iggy,” he yelled as he sprinted down the stairs and out into the street.

Ever since he’d searched Thomas Rockwell’s apartment, something had been bothering him. Runewrights like Iggy and Alex had their workshops inside their vaults, but now that Alex thought about it, Thomas didn’t have a vault rune in his lore book. That meant he had to have a workshop in the real world, somewhere he could keep his supplies, write his runes, and research his craft. Runewright work tended to involve toxic and caustic substances, something no landlord would allow in an apartment building, so runewrights usually did their work elsewhere.

All Alex had to do was find where Thomas did his work.

As he rode the crawler south, he wondered what he might find in Thomas’ workshop. Would Sorsha’s missing rune diagrams be there? Had he found the Archimedean Monograph and fled with it?

More likely the only thing there is Thomas’ shadow burned onto a wall.

That thought soured Alex’s mood. It was further soured when he exited the crawler a few blocks from Thomas’ building. The FBI still had the building under surveillance. He wondered what Sorsha and her goons would do if they heard he was back?

Pushing that thought aside, Alex entered the building and followed the signs downstairs to the basement where he found the apartment of the building superintendent.

“What can I do for ya?” he asked in a brogue that could only have come from Scotland. The super was a short, slight man of about fifty. He had a mop of graying blond hair that looked like it resisted any attempts he might have made to tame it, and bright blue eyes over an infectious smile.

“I’m a private detective.” Alex handed the man his card.

The super took out a pair of wire spectacles and scrutinized the card for a moment.

“Now how can I be helping a shamus?” he asked, handing the card back.

“I’m looking into the disappearance of one of your tenants, Thomas Rockwell.”

“Thomas is missing?” he said. The super’s smile evaporated.

“His sister said he’s been gone for almost a week.” Alex nodded. “Asked me to help find him.”

“That’s terrible.” The super’s voice dropped to a whisper.

“Did you know Thomas well, Mister…?”

“Flynn,” he said. “Michael Flynn. And yes, I knew him. He was a simple, kind man, kept his apartment clean, always paid his rent on time. I liked him. He even helped me with the accounts from time to time and didn’t ask a penny for it.”

“Did you know that Thomas was a runewright?”

“He had a rune that helped with my rheumatism.” Michael nodded. “I paid him for those, of course; I don’t take charity.”

“Do you know where he did his work? He would have had a workshop, probably nearby.”

“He had to fix up a rune for me one time,” he said, nodding. “He left and came back about an hour later.”

A rune to ease pain and improve joint mobility would take about half an hour, more or less. That meant Thomas’ workshop was close.

Unless he took a cab.

“Did you notice anything different about Thomas in the last few weeks?”

“Now that you mention it, he did seem a bit different,” Michael said, rubbing his stubble covered chin. “Happier maybe? Excited about something. Couldn’t tell you what, though.”

“Did he have a girlfriend?” Alex asked, remembering the state of Thomas’ bedroom under the glow of silverlight. Michael nodded.

“Betty something-or-other. Pretty enough as lasses go,” he said. “I only met her once.”

“Can you describe her?”

“Oh, a little taller than me, shapely, with long, auburn hair clear down her back. I’m sorry, that’s about the best I can do.”

Alex thanked him. “Is there anyone in the building Thomas was close to, who might know more about Betty or where Thomas had his workshop?”

Michael stroked his stubble again.

“The old battle-axe in 2F might know.”

“She friends with Thomas?”

“No,” Michael said with a chuckle. “She’s just the type who listens at keyholes, the old busybody. Her name is Hilda Jefferson.”

Alex laughed and thanked Michael. As he turned to leave, however, the little man grabbed his wrist.

“Saints be with you, young man,” he said, an earnest look on his face. “Bring Thomas home safe if you can.”

Alex didn’t have the heart to tell the old man that Thomas was probably dead, so he promised that he would do the best he could, and headed back upstairs. He now had a name and description of Thomas’ female companion, but he was still no closer to finding the workshop.

The door to Mrs. Jefferson’s apartment faced the stairwell and he heard her scurrying back as he approached.

“Mrs. Jefferson,” he called, knocking on the door. “Mr. Flynn downstairs said you might be able to help me.”

A much slower shuffle approached the door and it opened a crack. A woman’s eye appeared, covered by thick glasses that made it look comically large.

“Whatcho want?” she said, her voice like the creaking of a rusty gate.

“You know Thomas Rockwell in 5C?” He asked. “He’s missing and I’m trying to find him.”

“Don’t know you,” the woman said, starting to close the door. Alex jammed the toe of his shoe in the jamb to keep the door from closing.

“Please, Mrs. Jefferson,” Alex said in a mild voice. “His sister is very worried about him.”

“Hah,” the old woman cackled. “He’s been having a woman up to his apartment lately but if that’s his sister, I’m the Queen of Sheba.”

“You mean a pretty girl with long, auburn hair?”

“That’s her,” Mrs. Jefferson said. “Coming and going at all hours of the day and night, whispering her black magic in his ear. She’s a bad one, that.”

“That’s his girlfriend,” Alex said. “Name’s Becky. Thomas’ sister is named Evelyn.”

“That’s the only girl that visits Thomas,” the woman said, though Alex couldn’t see how she could know that.

“Did you ever hear Thomas say where he went to work on his runes?”

“No,” the old woman said, and laughed. “He never said, but he didn’t have to. I saw him out my window.”

Of course you did.

“Where did he go?”

“Building across the street,” she said. “Next to the five-and-dime there’s a door that leads to a stairway. He went up there whenever he left at night.”

“Did the auburn-haired girl ever go with him?”

Mrs. Jefferson shook her head. “He always went alone,” she said.

Alex stifled a laugh and thanked the old woman. He turned and went down the stairs but Mrs. Jefferson didn’t close her door until he was out of sight.

Thank God for nosy neighbors.

If Mrs. Jefferson hadn’t gone the extra mile and watched her departing neighbors out the window, Alex would have had to knock on every door in the building in the hopes someone else knew where Thomas went.

He’d gotten lucky.

The sun was just setting when he stepped out of Thomas’ apartment and into the cool New York night. He wanted to call Iggy, to get an update on the disguise runes, but Iggy was probably working, and even if he was taking a break he’d only yell at Alex for interrupting. On the bright side, he wouldn’t yell at Alex for staying out late. That gave him all night to go through Thomas’ workshop.

He pulled up his collar against the wind and set off toward the five-and-dime whistling a tune.

“Well you’re in a good mood,” Evelyn’s voice came from behind him. “Did you learn anything?”

Alex turned and found Thomas’ sister coming up the sidewalk behind him. Her dark curly hair blew sideways in the wind and she was trying valiantly to keep a broad-brimmed hat on her head. She wore a flowing white blouse with a tight, black skirt that went down to her knees.

“What are you doing here?” Alex asked, delighted to see her.

“Between you and the FBI, Thomas’ place is quite a mess,” she said. “If he’s… if he’s really dead, I want to collect his things. You know, family pictures, heirlooms, that sort of thing. It’s just junk, really, but it’s all I’ve got left.”

Alex felt like a heel. When he didn’t speak, Evelyn grinned sadly.

“It’s okay,” she said. “What are you doing here? Did you find something?”

“I did.” Alex turned and pointed to the five-and-dime. “Your brother had his rune workshop in the building next to that store. I’m on my way to see what’s there. Maybe I can find out something about his mysterious girlfriend.”

“Girlfriend?” Evelyn said, a look of interest crossing her face. “Thomas never said he had a girlfriend.”

“Her name’s Becky,” Alex said. “That’s all I know.”

“Could she be the reason he’s dead?” Evelyn’s voice trembled, and Alex put his hand on her shoulder.

“Right now I don’t even know her last name,” he said. “Let me look around Thomas’ workshop and I’ll let you know if I find anything.”

“No,” she said, and shook her head. “I’m coming with you.”

Alex thought about what his ghostlight might reveal — Thomas’ shadow on the wall. He didn’t want to hurt Evelyn any more that she had been. On the other hand, she deserved truth.

“All right,” he said. “But I go in first and you don’t follow until I call for you.”

She folded her arms across her chest and fixed him with a hard stare. When he didn’t relent, she said, “All right.”

The stairway next to the five-and-dime went up to a long, straight hallway on the second floor of a plain-looking building. Windows filled the left hand wall, showing a view of the five-and-dime’s roof and the street beyond. Doors were set along the opposite wall at regular intervals. Only one of them bore the triangle and eyeball symbol of a runewright, right above a sign that advertised office hours from seven to ten PM, Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday.

“It’s locked,” Evelyn said, trying the door.

Alex had been expecting that, so he pulled his rune book from his jacket pocket and flipped to the back. That was where he kept the rarer, more expensive runes. When he got to a triangular one with what looked like a deformed duck inside, he stopped and tore it out.

“What’s that?” Evelyn asked.

“Something I’m not supposed to know,” Alex said, licking the paper and sticking it to the doorknob. Lighting a match from the book in his pocket, he touched it to the paper. The rune glowed bright orange as it disappeared in fire and the door lock opened with an audible clack.

“That’s amazing,” Evelyn said as Alex opened the door. “You must be able to get in anywhere you want.”

“Not really,” Alex said, tucking his rune book back in his pocket. “That rune costs ten bucks to make. Not to mention that what I just did is breaking and entering.”

“Not with me here,” Evelyn said. “I’m the owner’s sister, after all.” She reached over and flicked a switch on the wall, filling the room with light from the magelight crystals hanging on wires from the ceiling. “See,” she said. “I’m helping already.”

Thomas’ workshop was a complete contrast from his apartment; of course, his apartment had been ransacked. The workshop looked like an advertisement for runewright shops. Three workbenches stood in the center of the space; the one on the right had a blotter pad on it. A freestanding set of drawers occupied one side, where pencils and penknives would be kept, with a wire rack on the other, filled with pot after pot of ink. Along the back were two stacks of trays that held paper.

The workbench on the left had a gas canister below it with a long rubber tube that ran up through holes in the tabletop to burners. A maze of glass tubes, distillers, evaporators, and extractors were set up and ready to brew the special inks Thomas used in his work. None of the glass was dirty or smudged.

The middle workbench was completely empty, but based on the scorch marks and scoring on the top, Alex guessed it was where Thomas tested his runes and refined them.

Along the walls stood orderly shelves holding neatly stacked containers, cabinets full of materials, and cases full of books. An industrial sink stuck out from the wall in the back, next to a door that Alex assumed went to a bathroom. In the far corner there was a small workbench up against the wall with a hot plate and a coffee pot on it and a set of cupboards overhead. A comfortable-looking reading chair and lamp stood to one side, with a neatly made bed on the other. Apparently Thomas was prepared if he had to work late. No sense waking Mrs. Jefferson up by coming in after midnight.

Now this is the workshop of a bookkeeper.

“Well, this is it, I guess,” Evelyn said. “What are we looking for?”

“First, I need to find what your brother was working on,” Alex said, approaching the middle workbench. Set into the bench’s top were four brass triangles that pointed out, like the corners of a square. Thomas would slip the corners of his drawing paper under those to keep it in place when he wrote or activated his runes.

Based on the position of the writing equipment on the end desk, Thomas was used to working on the opposite side of the workbench, so Alex circled around. On the back side, a drawer was set just beneath the top. Pulling it open, he found the large square drawing pad that fit the brass holders on the bench top, a box of matches, and a worn and dog-eared notebook.

He set the pad and the notebook on the workbench, then shut the drawer. He wanted to restore the last thing Thomas had drawn, like he’d done with the map in Jerry Pemberton’s apartment, but he’d need his kit for that, so he set it aside.

“What’s that?” Evelyn asked, peeking around his side to look at the book.

Alex opened it and found page after page of the finding rune from the Archimedean Monograph. Each one was slightly different with copious notes about the things Thomas had tried while attempting to unlock its secrets. Alex turned to the last written page.

“I’ve done it,” he read. “I’ve finally cracked the damn thing. For a while there, I thought it would drive me mad, but I won. The solution was staring me right in the face the whole time. I knew the rune was written out of phase, but it’s also upside down. Once I reversed it, everything made sense. I’m exhausted, so I don’t dare try writing it now; I’d probably make a mistake and blow myself up. I’ll go home and come back tomorrow. With any luck I’ll have the monograph when Becky comes to see me. Won’t she be surprised! This is the best day of my life!”

Alex closed the notebook and set it back down on the workbench.

“Is that it?” Evelyn asked. “What does it mean?”

“It means your brother is dead,” Alex said. “I’m sorry.”

Evelyn swayed and Alex had to grab her before she fell.

“I’m sorry,” she said, clinging to his shirt. Tears were rolling down her cheeks and she rubbed furiously at her eyes, smearing her mascara. “I knew he was gone, I…I just didn’t want to believe it.”

She stepped away from him, but her knees buckled, and Alex had to grab her again.

“You’d better lie down,” he said, leading her over to the neat bed in the corner. Once he had her situated, he went to the cupboard over the sink and searched until he found a clean washrag. After running some cold water on it, he wrung it out and folded it, placing it on Evelyn’s forehead.

“Now lie there until you feel better,” he said.

She thanked him and he returned to Thomas’ notebook. The next time Alex looked up, the clock on the wall told him it was eleven twenty-two. He’d been sitting on the stool behind the workbench reading, re-reading, and re-re-reading Thomas’ quest to solve the Archimedean Monograph’s finding rune. Alex could see what Thomas had been trying to do and scribbled copious notes under and around the ones Thomas had made. It seemed to Alex that Thomas had been on the right track, but just hadn’t possessed the knowledge or skill to fully unscramble the rune.

He checked on Evelyn and found her asleep on the bed. Taking the opportunity of not being watched, Alex chalked a door onto a bare patch of wall and opened his vault. Normally he’d never open his vault in front of someone other than Iggy or Leslie, but he wanted to get his kit and have a more thorough look around Thomas’ workshop. An hour later, Alex called it quits.

The lab was just as clean as it appeared in normal light. Silverlight revealed plenty of fingerprints and signs that the workshop was used regularly, but there was no sign of blood, and no indication that anything other than sleeping had ever happened in the bed. Some of the books were more used than others, but none of them contained hidden compartments or scraps of paper.

All was as it should be.

Finally Alex pulled out his ghostlight burner and lit it. He’d been avoiding this moment, but with Evelyn asleep he’d best do it now. The multi-lamp cast its greenish glow around the room until it fell on the back wall. There, reaching out from where Alex stood and running up the wall, was the shadow of a man. It ran over the bookshelf and the little kitchen counter with the hotplate. The form showed a man with his hands thrown up over his face, as if shielding his eyes from a flash bulb he hadn’t seen coming.

It was all that remained of Thomas Rockwell.

Alex put his hand on his forehead and pinched it. He’d been without food, liquor, or a cigarette in quite a while and it had given him a pounding headache. The beam of his lantern fell across Evelyn’s sleeping form as he lifted it to extinguish the ghostlight burner. She stirred and Alex quickly blew out the flame. The light no longer illuminated her, but he could still see her in his mind. Even disheveled, with her makeup a mess, she was beautiful.

He sighed and returned the gear to his bag. A small wooden box was tucked into one end of the bag and Alex withdrew it, setting it on the workbench quietly. Inside was a flask with a nice single malt scotch that he’d pilfered from Iggy’s liquor cabinet. Usually this was his reward for a case solved and a job well done, but in this case, he’d make an exception. Evelyn wanted her brother found, and he’d done that. She wanted to know who killed him, and he knew that now, too. Whoever the mysterious Becky was, she’d brought Thomas the Monograph pages. She set his feet on the path that ultimately lead to his death.

Removing the cup from the top, Alex opened the flask and poured out two fingers of the amber liquid.

Becky had torn Thomas’ place apart looking for his notebook. She wanted to see how he’d attempted to solve the rune, maybe use the notes to entice the next patsy she conned into looking for the Monograph. It was the only thing she could have been looking for. Thomas copied the original Monograph pages into his lore book, and they weren’t here in the workshop, so Becky must still have them.

“She’s miles away by now,” he said, draining the tiny tin cup and refilling it from the flask.

“Who?” Evelyn’s voice drifted to him out of the semi-darkness. He’d turned off some of the lights when he’d used his lamp in order to see better. Evelyn sat up on the bed and brushed her raven hair out of her face. She looked frightened for a moment, her tired mind not recognizing her surroundings for a moment, then she stood and walked to where Alex sat at the workbench.

“Can I have one of those?” she said, pointing at the tin cup.

Alex nodded and stood, offering her the stool. She sat and he went to the cupboards over the table that had the hot plate, returning a moment later with a glass. He set it next to his tin cup and poured whiskey in both.

Evelyn drained hers in one go, then tapped the glass with her finger. Alex refilled it and she drained it again.

“You’re behind,” she said, indicating the tin cup. Alex refilled her glass again, then raised his cup.

“To Thomas,” he said.

She smiled a grateful smile and they both drank.

“You’ve been wonderful,” she said, putting her glass back, upside-down. “Thank you.”

Alex poured himself another whisky and sipped at it, nursing it. “I still haven’t found the person responsible for Thomas’ death,” he said, picking up the notebook. “But this is what she wanted. I might be able to use it as bait to lure her out, but I suspect she’s headed for the hills.”

“You mean the girlfriend,” Evelyn said, and Alex nodded. She looked away. “If she wants the notebook so bad,” she said, her voice hard, “I want you to burn it.”

“If that’s what you want,” Alex said, finishing his drink. Evelyn wrapped her arms around herself and shivered.

“I just want all this to be over,” she said in a small voice. She wobbled on her feet and Alex put his arm around her waist to steady her. She buried her face in his chest.

She felt good in his arms.

He looked down at her and she raised up, pressing her lips to his. It wasn’t a chaste peck or a gesture of gratitude but a fiery, pulsating need. She needed to feel alive, needed to be held. Alex pulled her closer, pressing their bodies together. He didn’t know if he’d initiated the kiss or if she’d done it. All he knew was that it felt right and she tasted sweet. A minute later he bent down and picked her up, carrying her toward the bed. He was sure she’d tell him to stop before he reached it, but she didn’t.

Iggy was sitting in the kitchen with a coffee cup in one hand and the pot in the other when Alex got home. The old man looked exhausted, but at least he wasn’t coming in after sunup smelling of Scotch, silverlight oil, and perfume. When Iggy caught sight of him, he raised an eyebrow.

“And just where have you been?” he said. The eyebrows went up further when Alex got closer. “That’s a lovely shade of lipstick on your collar,” he added.

Alex said nothing.

“At least you don’t smell like a brothel; that’s expensive perfume. Did you keep the Sorceress company last night?”

“God, no,” Alex said, offended that his friend would even suspect such a thing. Sorsha was beautiful, no question, but she seemed to have a healthy dislike for him. “I don’t have a death wish,” he declared. “Can you imagine what that woman could do to a man who sent her packing? Or God forbid, broke her heart.”

“Planning on sending your companion of last night packing?” Iggy said. “You seem to think that’s where all relationships end up.”

Alex grimaced. He had his opinions about the entangling proprieties of relationships, and he didn’t like Iggy’s desire to discuss them.

“Just most,” Alex said. “Although I might make an exception for Evelyn.”

“The woman with the missing brother?”

Alex nodded.

“She must have made quite an impression on you.”

“She did,” Alex said. “Now, do you have my runes ready?”

Iggy sighed and rolled his eyes.

“There’s nothing better for a man than the companionship of a good woman.”

“How about not being thrown in jail where I’ll wait to be murdered by Danny’s father?”

“That’s good, too.” Iggy chuckled and shrugged. He reached into his vest pocket and pulled out four folded pieces of flash paper. “I’ve marked them, so you can’t get them mixed up,” he said. “Each rune will work for five hours or until you cancel them. Have you figured out how to get the truth out of the Broker?”

“I just need some rope and a couple of pulleys.” Alex nodded. “I’ll stop at Ralph’s place, then I’ll be all set.”

“Sounds messy,” Iggy said, yawning. “I thought you were going to avoid that kind of thing.”

“Don’t worry,” Alex said, and chuckled darkly.

Iggy raised his eyebrows as if weighing whether or not Alex was being straight with him.

“You’ll have to tell me about it,” he said finally. “I’m spent, I’m off to bed.” With that, he rose and went upstairs to his room.

Alex headed up to his room and showered, then changed into some work clothes. He had a pretty good idea how to make Jeremy Brewer, A.K.A. the Broker, talk without having to beat the truth out of him. Such tactics were time-consuming and messy. His idea involved using his vault to transport Mr. Brewer and then to force him to reveal who stole Van der Waller’s stones. And, if he had time, he’d ask where Charles Beaumont lived as well. If Beaumont was the Spook, the Broker should know him.

Alex hurried out to a building supply company run by an Italian named Ralph. His parents were very proud to be Americans. Alex had helped Ralph uncover a competitor who kept vandalizing his storefront, and now Ralph sold Alex anything he needed at a discount.

An hour later, Alex was back at the brownstone with fifty feet of heavy rope, a sturdy metal chair, two pulleys, and a thick gauge U-bolt. He installed the pulleys and the bolt in his vault in a matter of a few minutes. The walls of the extra-dimensional space were a flat, seamless gray and hard as stone. Since Alex had created the space, however, he could mold it like clay with just his hands. All he had to do was push the pulley’s anchor bolts into the material of the wall then let it harden around them. The U-bolt went in just as easily, right beside the door.

That done, he cut a thirty-foot length of rope, looped it through the pulleys on the back wall, and tied the ends to the sides of the metal chair.

“That ought to do it,” he said to the empty vault. He pulled his watch from his pocket and found that it wasn’t even noon yet. He wouldn’t be able to make his appearance at The Emerald Room until after seven.

He paced back and forth in his vault for almost a minute before he switched on the light over his work table. Opening his kit, he took out a worn, dog-eared notebook and thumbed through to the last few pages where the handwriting changed from Thomas Rockwell’s neat lettering to Alex’s more loose script. He scanned through the notes he’d been making last night before Evelyn—

Before Evelyn.

Alex shook his head like a dog.

No time for that.

He pulled out the copy he’d made of the Archimedean Monograph’s runes when he first found Thomas’ lore book. The original finding rune was very different from the one Thomas had unraveled just before he died. The man had been sure he’d figured it out, sure enough to bet his life on it. Alex had seen right away that the rune was far more complex. Thomas simply didn’t have the skill or the training necessary to decode it.

Alex brought out his own notebook and set to work.

Four hours later, he finished deciphering it.

The taxi let Alex off in front of an all-night drug store, three blocks from The Emerald Room. He decided to splurge and bought a pack of cigarettes before heading to the phone booth to call Iggy.

“I’m here,” he said when Iggy picked up. “If all goes well, I shouldn’t be in there for more than half an hour.”

“If I don’t hear from you in an hour, I’m calling Danny,” Iggy said.

“All right,” Alex said, checking the time on his watch; it showed a little past eight.

Iggy wished him good luck and hung up. Alex replaced the phone’s receiver, but lingered in the booth. He pulled out Iggy’s disguise runes and spread them out on the little shelf beneath the phone. Licking the one labeled Clothes, he stuck it to his jacket, then lit the paper with a match from his pocket. A tingling sensation ran up his spine and when he looked down, his worn gray suit had been transformed to a lustrous black tuxedo. The ebon pips in his shirt gleamed in the diffused light of the booth and the lapels of the jacket were glossy.

The rune labeled Face came next and Alex stuck it to his forehead before setting it alight. He worried that the flame might burn his eyebrows, but the flash paper was consumed so rapidly, he didn’t even feel its heat.

Wondering if the rune had done its work, he opened the folding door of the booth and caught his reflection in the glass. Instead of his ordinary, serviceable face he saw an elegant one with high cheekbones, a pencil mustache, and slicked-back hair. He looked like a thinner Clark Gable. He didn’t know whether to be flattered or offended. One thing was for sure, no one would recognize him.

The last rune for this part of the plan was labeled Money. Alex took a stack of six dollar-sized papers out of his wallet. Three of them had the number one-hundred written on them, two were labeled twenty, and the last had the number five scrawled on it. Alex licked each bill and stuck it to the rune paper, then lit it. When the flash dissipated, the paper looked for all the world like real bills. It wouldn’t last, of course, but it would be enough to get him through the evening. He had promised Iggy he wouldn’t spend any of it unless absolutely necessary.

He had a feeling that would be a difficult promise to keep.

Transformation complete, Alex checked the rest of his gear. He had two emergency runes in his right jacket pocket along with his rune-covered brass knuckles. The left pocket held the pack of smokes, a book of matches, and a card with the name Harold Troubridge, Antiquities printed on it.

He lit a cigarette to calm his nerves, then opened the phone booth and strode back out into the street. This was it. With any luck he was about to learn the name of the man who beat Jerry Pemberton to death. All he had to do was convince a vicious and well-connected criminal to tell him what he wanted to know.

Easy.

Outside the front door of The Emerald Room stood a man who had to be six-foot-four. He towered over people in the street and his thick neck seemed to strain the limits of the bow tie he had on. He wore the red jacket of a doorman, but Alex knew him for the bouncer he was. The man’s presence made a definite statement — unless you belong here, go away.

Alex took a long drag on his cigarette as he approached. The man mountain gave him an appraising look, up and down, but saw nothing amiss. He turned his attention back to the street as Alex walked right past him. Alex waited until he was inside before exhaling a cloud of white smoke.

The interior of The Emerald Room didn’t fail to impress. The floors were cherry wood, stained and polished to a red sheen. The walls were papered with a striped pattern, alternating green and white, and the lampshades were Tiffany, all made of green glass. A dance floor occupied the center of the club, with small and medium sized tables arranged around it in a semi-circular pattern. Every row of tables was mounted on a riser, each higher than the last in a stair-step pattern, so they looked down on the dance floor. The far side of the floor was occupied by a long bar made of some dark wood where three bartenders served patrons and the waitresses who took drinks to the semi-circle of tables. An orchestra played a swing tune and the whole club seemed full of the energy of the music. Running around the top of the ceiling were balconies that led to private rooms.

That was where Alex would find Jeremy Brewer, the infamous Broker.

Moving slowly but purposefully, Alex picked his way across the floor to the bar and ordered a drink. He felt the need to hurry but stifled it. Before he could go looking for the Broker, he’d need to do some reconnaissance.

The nearest bartender was a short, pudgy man with an elaborate mustache. He had the kind of face that encouraged men to tell him their troubles. An ideal bartender.

“Can I help you, sir?” the bartender asked with a smile. He had a slightly Midwestern accent along with the kind of physique people got from growing up on a farm.

Alex decided to splurge. He told himself it was to better establish his character, but he knew that the Broker wasn’t likely to ask the bartender for a reference.

“Your best single malt, please.”

“That would a Macallan 30-year-old,” the bartender said. “Will that do?”

“That sounds acceptable.”

“Very good, sir.”

A moment later he brought Alex a glass of very smooth whiskey. Alex pulled his fake money from his pocket and peeled off the five spot. When the man returned with his change, Alex tipped him outrageously, then turned and leaned against the bar, surveying the room while he slowly savored his drink.

He wasn’t much of a socialite, but he recognized a few Broadway stars and a textile millionaire in the crowd. As his gaze swept the room, he located the stairs going up to the private areas. There was no guard there, but the Broker would surely have someone watching his door.

Regretfully, Alex finished his drink, setting the glass on the bar, and headed back across the floor to where the band leader was conducting a slower number to give the dancers a rest. He got the man’s attention, then slipped him a twenty along with a note to play In the Mood. Alex needed something brassy and loud to cover any noise he might make, since the private rooms had open balconies.

Taking a deep breath, Alex lit another cigarette and climbed up the risers where the tables sat, then up the stairway at the back. A long hall ran along the back of the building with doors set in it where the private rooms were. At the far end was a door marked Exit that probably led to the fire stairs. It would also explain how the Broker and his clientele could come and go unseen. Alex knew that while the Broker’s clients came in through the front, most of his associates didn’t have that kind of clout.

At far end of the hall, nearest to the fire door, a man in a simple black suit stood next to the last door. He had a broad, flat face with a long nose that appeared to have been broken at least once and eyes that looked as if they were always squinting. His hair was slicked back and his shoes were shined, but something about his face told Alex that he was a plain thug. Maybe it was that nose.

“What do you want?” he asked, doing a fairly good job of hiding a Jersey accent.

Alex reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out the card with the name Harold Troubridge on it and held it out. “I’d like to speak with Mr. Brewer,” Alex said in his most aristocratic British accent.

The flat-faced man didn’t move or accept the card; he just looked Alex up and down, trying to take his measure. “Do you have an appointment?” he asked.

“Unfortunately no,” Alex said. “I just arrived in town and I shan’t be here long. Please give him my card and tell him I’m here regarding a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

The man gave Alex another penetrating look, but Iggy’s disguise runes were as solid as he claimed. “Wait here,” he said, taking the card.

Down below, the band was striking up In The Mood.

As soon as the guard was gone, Alex took out one of his rune papers and crumpled it up in his left hand, holding it in place with his thumb. He patted the weight of his brass knuckles in his jacket pocket and hoped he wouldn’t need them. And if he did need them, that they’d be enough.

When the door opened again, the flat-faced man stepped back, allowing Alex to enter. Inside, dim lamps illuminated two men sitting on velvet-lined couches around a small table. Along the back wall stood a well-stocked liquor cabinet with frosted glass panels and bright brass knobs. Chairs were set up along the balcony side so people could watch the band and the dancers below.

One of the men was large with big shoulders and hard, expressionless eyes. His features were sharp, even his beak-like nose, and he had bushy eyebrows that contrasted with his entirely bald head. He wore a loose white shirt and black trousers with a red silk sash around his waist for a belt. Sitting with his legs crossed and his arms over the back of the couch, he had an air of casual violence about him.

The other man was clad in a red smoking jacket, with a cigar in one hand and a snifter in the other. He had an infectious, crooked smile that showed off perfect, white teeth and his blue eyes were alive with curiosity. This was the man Alex was looking for, the elusive Broker.

“Mr. Troubridge,” the man in the smoking jacket said invitingly. “Come in. I do enjoy meeting new people.”

Alex relaxed a little, taking his cigarette between his right fingers. This was going better than he’d hoped.

Just as the thought crossed his mind, his arms were seized from behind by the flat-faced man and held tight.

“Of course I prefer to know people before I meet them,” the Broker said, putting aside his snifter and standing. “And I don’t know you.” He came close enough for Alex to smell the Cuban tobacco on his breath and studied Alex’s face. “No,” he said after a long moment. “I’ve never seen you before, so how is it you know my name?”

Alex began to turn the smoldering cigarette around in his fingers. He had to move slowly so as not to arouse the suspicions of the flat-faced man. He needed to stall, but only for a minute.

“I heard it from someone who wishes to remain anonymous.” Alex said. He didn’t even have to lie. Brewer’s face grew angry and he nodded to his bald-headed companion.

“Search him,” he said. The flat-faced goon pulled Alex’s arms in tighter as the big man began patting Alex down.

“What’s this?” he asked, pulling the brass knuckles out of Alex’s pocket. Alex smiled at him as his cigarette touched the flash paper in his left hand.

“Insurance,” he said.

The paper erupted in fire and light, but it didn’t stop. The light exploded into the room, flowing like water until it filled every crack. The second Alex felt the paper burn, he’d shut his eyes tight.

It didn’t help much.

The light from the flash rune burned brighter than staring at the sun, but only for an instant. He hoped the people in the club below would think the light was just one of the overhead magelights burning out.

The hands holding him let go and the three men not expecting the flash started to swear. When Alex opened his eyes, bright dots swam in his vision, but he had no time to worry about that. Bending over, he picked up the brass knuckles where the bald man had dropped them. Slipping them over his right fingers, he turned to find the flat-faced man and Brewer on the floor; the bald man, however, had pulled a snub-nosed .38 from his waistband. Alex strode over to him and unceremoniously punched him in the arm with the brass knuckles. The runes on the metal flared into sudden life and the man howled in pain, the gun falling from his nerveless fingers.

Alex grinned. The rune was one of his own invention. It delivered a shock that felt like a dozen bee stings and left the area numb.

Without stopping to admire his work, Alex pulled back and slugged the bald man in the gut, sending him down on the floor in a gasping heap. He only had another minute or so before they regained their vision, so he had to work fast. Dropping the brass knuckles in his pocket, he took out the piece of chalk and drew the door to his vault on the wall. Next he stuck the second piece of flash paper in his pocket to the wall and lit it, bringing his vault door from chalk to reality. Taking out his key and opening the door, Alex retrieved the bottle of chloroform and rag he’d left on the table just inside and set to work.

The Broker was shaking his head, trying to clear his vision, when Alex tackled him and jammed the chloroformed rag over his face. Once he stopped struggling, Alex stood and dragged him into the vault where he had a pair of handcuffs ready. The Broker thus secured, Alex closed the vault and the door disappeared, leaving only the chalk outline on the wall.

He turned in time to see the flat-faced man pull a pistol from a holster inside his jacket. It was clear he still couldn’t see, but that didn’t seem to stop him. He fired three shots before Alex punched him in the face with the brass knuckles. Flat-face went down hard.

“That was close,” he said, kicking the gun away from the unconscious man.

“Got you,” a snarling voice said, and the bald man drove his fist into Alex’s back.

Alex stumbled forward, losing the brass knuckles but catching himself on one of the couches. Turning just in time, he ducked an uppercut that would have laid him out and landed two hits to the bald man’s solar plexus. Baldy grunted but didn’t give ground, driving his fist into Alex’s jaw so hard he knocked out a tooth.

Alex staggered back, but the bald man still couldn’t see well and his next punch missed. He lunged forward, trying to tackle Alex to the ground where his lack of vision wouldn’t be a hindrance. Bringing up his foot, Alex managed to kick the man away, but both of them went down. As the bald man groped for him, Alex rolled out of his grip, his hand landing on the brass knuckles. He slipped them on and scrambled to his feet, intending to put the big man down for good. When he turned, Alex found that baldy had found a weapon too, the flat-faced man’s pistol.

The bald man brought the pistol up and fired. His vision must have gotten better because the bullet hit Alex in the side. Gasping in barely-controlled pain, Alex stepped forward before the other man could fire again and drove the brass knuckles into his jaw so hard he heard it crack.

Finally the bald man went down like a sack of flour. For his part, Alex just stood there gasping, as fire and pain spread through his torso. Grunting, he pressed his hand against his side and it came away soaked in blood.

“Good thing…” he gasped, “I live with a doctor.”

“Alex?” Iggy’s voice came over the phone before Alex could speak.

“Yeah,” he said, wheezing like a bellows. “It’s me.”

“Thank God. I’ve been worried.” The relief in the old man’s voice was palpable. Alex imagined he could hear Iggy’s muscles relaxing through the phone. “Everything go as planned?”

Alex started to laugh but the wound in his side flared into agony and he groaned.

“Not exactly,” he said, his voice a whisper. “One of the Broker’s men shot me.”

“Where?” Iggy said, a tone of the military doctor snapping instantly into his voice.

“Left side,” Alex said. “It’s painful to breathe.”

“Are you coughing up blood?”

“Don’t know; the guy knocked out one of my teeth too.”

“Can you get home on your own?” Iggy asked. “I’ll need to make sure my alchemical draughts are ready and prepare a restoration rune for your tooth.”

“I’ll manage,” Alex said. “See you soon.”

Iggy told him to be careful and hung up. Alex stumbled out of the phone booth, then straightened up and did his best to walk back out of the drug store without attracting attention. He hailed a cab, gave the driver the address of the brownstone, then fumbled with his wallet, pulling out one of the fake twenties.

“Fast as you can,” he said, shoving the bill in the driver’s hand.

He felt bad, giving the cabbie the funny money, but he didn’t have enough real money to cover the fare. He noted the driver’s name and promised himself he would make it up to him later. The rest of the cab ride was spent trying not to swear like a sailor every time the cab went over a bump.

“Thanks,” he gasped when the cab finally pulled up in front of the brownstone. He got out and staggered up the stairs, hoping he hadn’t left too much blood in the poor man’s cab.

Iggy opened the door as Alex fumbled for his pocket watch to deactivate the rune barriers. The old man’s face was the gray of old newspaper as he ushered Alex inside.

“Kitchen table,” he said, lifting Alex under the arm on his good side. As Iggy lifted, Alex’s vision seemed to dwindle down to a single point. “Stay with me,” Iggy said. “I’m not decrepit yet, but I don’t think I can carry you by myself.”

In the kitchen, Iggy had pulled all the chairs from their massive table, stacking them against the wall and pulled the table to the middle of the floor. A heavy canvas tarp covered the top along with a stack of clean, white towels. A large pot of water boiled on the stove, its steam rising in a thick mist over the unpleasant-looking handles of metal implements. On the counter next to the stove, a dozen vials with rubber stoppers had been laid out in a neat row, each containing a brightly colored liquid. At the end of the line of vials were three rune papers and a box of wooden matches.

“Looks like you’re all ready,” Alex said as they crossed the floor.

“Shut up,” Iggy said, helping him up onto the heavy wooden table. He carefully peeled Alex out of his ruined suit coat that still looked like a tux jacket. “Get out of your shirt, but don’t lie down yet,” Iggy said. “I’ve got to get that tooth growing back first. The rune’s only effective if administered within half an hour after losing it.”

Alex reached up to unbutton his shirt but stopped as a whole new world of pain washed over him. He could only move his right arm slowly and when he tried to move his left, he nearly blacked out. After a few deep breaths, he tried again, being more careful.

Iggy grabbed the rune paper on the end of the line and rolled it into a small tube. He pinched one end together and twisted it so the paper would not unroll. “Open up,” he said as Alex struggled to unbutton his shirt.

“Here I thought the bullet in my side would be first priority,” Alex said, grinning through the pain.

“If you were bleeding more, or weren’t able to make inane remarks, it would be,” Iggy said, retrieving a multi-lamp very similar to Alex’s. He lit it, producing a glow of ruddy light, then closed the focusing lens and directed the beam into Alex’s mouth. “That hooligan did quite a number on you,” Iggy said. “Hold still.”

Alex felt the paper jammed painfully into the empty socket where his tooth had been. A second later he heard Iggy strike a match and felt the instantaneous flash of heat given off by the rune paper as it burned. Normal people couldn’t feel the magic of an expended rune, but Alex felt it, probing into his upper jaw, burning its way into the roots of the socket where his tooth had been. A moment later he cursed as best he could with his mouth open. A sharp, throbbing pain gripped his jaw like a pair of pliers and wouldn’t let go.

“Don’t be a child,” Iggy said, shining the light into Alex’s mouth. “Growing a tooth in a few days’ time isn’t pleasant, but it’s vastly superior to the alternative. Now lie down and let’s see to the rest of you.”

Alex plucked ineffectually at his shirt, but Iggy produced an angled pair of scissors and simply cut it off him. “Now lie down,” he said.

Iggy took half the pile of clean towels and tucked them under Alex’s head, then he retrieved the first vial from the end of the line on the counter and pulled out the stopper, breaking the lead seal.

“Drink up,” he said, passing it to Alex.

Alex painfully raised the vial to his lips. He had to turn a little on his side so as not to spill the mustard-colored liquid. It tasted vile, as all alchemical potions did, but he choked it down, then lay back down with a groan.

“Now,” Iggy said, moving around the table to examine Alex’s left side. “Let’s have a look at your wound.” He touched the jagged hole and Alex flinched. “Easy now,” he said. He probed the wound with his fingers and Alex sucked air in a long hiss.

“I’ll give you something for the pain,” Iggy said.

“No,” Alex gasped. “I’ve got an appointment with the Broker. I can’t afford to sleep.”

“And I know that,” Iggy said, handing him a vial with a liquid somewhere between red and pink. “Bottoms up, lad.”

Alex drank that one and immediately felt his hands go numb. The sensation seemed to crawl up his extremities, starting at his fingers and toes and moving inward. In a moment he couldn’t feel or move. His brain seemed to go fuzzy as well. He knew that should bother him, that he needed to be alert, but he just didn’t seem to care.

Iggy moved in and out of his vision, as he lay looking up at the light fixture on the ceiling. It was old and fancy, like most of the house, made of iron with a complex pattern of vines and ivy clinging to a lattice. The magelights inside were made of some kind of quartz with a yellow tint that always made the kitchen seem sunny, even in the middle of the night.

He saw a flash of light as Iggy used a rune, and then another flash sometime later. Then he felt nothing.

“Rink iss,” a voice that sounded remarkably like Iggy’s came from somewhere very far away. Suddenly his perspective changed as he was pulled up into a sitting position.

“Drink this,” he heard more clearly as the end of a glass vial was shoved into his mouth. Reflexively, Alex gulped down the liquid and the world suddenly came crashing down on him. He doubled over, swearing, as the left side of his body felt like someone was twisting it in a vice.

“Getting shot hurt less than this,” he croaked.

Iggy put his hand on Alex’s right shoulder and helped to ease him back up.

“Just breathe,” he said. “The reason it hurts so much is because the bullet bounced off a rib and hit another. You’re very lucky.”

“Funny,” Alex said, his breathing so shallow that it sounded like a panting dog. “I don’t feel lucky.”

Iggy laughed. “Give it a few minutes,” he said. “And you’re lucky because that bullet nicked your spleen. Once I moved it, you started bleeding for real. It was touch and go there for a few minutes.”

The pain started to dull and Alex found he could take regular breaths again.

“I guess I am lucky then,” he said. “Lucky I know you. Thanks, old man.”

Iggy chuckled. “You won’t be good as new for a week or two,” he said. “But as long as you weren’t planning to beat the truth out of the Broker, you should be able to question him just fine.” He pressed a rune paper into Alex’s hands. “It’s the last disguise rune I gave you,” he said. “I modified it so you’ll look like you did before. Should help with your interrogation. I assume you’ve got something interesting planned?”

Alex chuckled and instantly regretted it. “You know that pulp book of yours that’s just a rip off of The Pit and the Pendulum?” he asked Iggy.

“I rather like that book,” Iggy said with an indignant look.

“Well it gave me an idea for getting the truth out of the Broker without laying a finger on him.”

Iggy’s eyebrows rose. “I didn’t know you read my books,” he said with a thinly veiled look of amusement.

“You said I’d be good as new in a week or two?” Alex said, changing the subject. “Why can’t American doctors heal people that fast?”

“Oh, they can,” Iggy said with a smile. “If you have the money. I used two major restoration runes on you along with tincture of purity, oil of regrowth, and a tonic of binding. You’d pay two thousand dollars for a doctor to give you that kind of treatment in an American hospital.”

“Two…” Alex couldn’t even finish naming the amount. “How am I going to pay you back for that?”

“There’s no need, lad,” he said. Iggy patted him on his good shoulder. “I’ve had most of that stuff since my navy days. I’m just glad it was still good all these years later.” Iggy walked away chuckling.

“You’re kidding about that stuff being expired, right?” Alex called after him, but Iggy just kept on going, right up the stairs to his room. Alex thought about going after him and getting a better answer, but one look around the room stopped him. Bloody medical instruments littered the counter by the stove where the still-steaming pot of water sat, cooling. Equally bloody towels littered the tile floor and the canvas on the table was wet with alchemical serums and blood. It had been close to nine when he’d arrived at the brownstone and the clock on the wall now showed just before eleven.

Alex had been on the table for almost two hours. As bad as that was for him, Iggy was in his seventies. The physical and mental strain of saving Alex’s life couldn’t have been easy to bear.

He slid gingerly down from the table and straightened up. Already the pain in his side was dwindling to a persistent, throbbing ache. Limping to the little table Iggy used to write his correspondence, Alex pulled out a pad of paper and left a note promising to clean up the kitchen as soon as he was done with the Broker. He hoped Iggy wouldn’t ignore it and do it himself. Alex owed him big.

With one last look at the kitchen-turned-operating-theater, Alex made his way slowly upstairs and stripped out of the rest of his ruined clothes. On top of everything, he would need a new suit. He only had two and this one was beyond saving.

Iggy had cut Alex’s shirt away to work on his side, but his left arm was now bound in a sling. He tried moving his left arm but that caused so much pain he almost blacked out. Working carefully with his right hand, he finally got it off so he could shower, holding his left arm rigid against his chest. Alex knew that the hole where the bullet had entered would be closed by now, so he suspected that showering would be okay. The alchemical potions that closed wounds were relatively cheap.

After a frustrating shower where he had to learn to scrub himself in whole new ways, Alex dressed in his remaining suit and fished his vault key out of his ruined slacks.

“All right, Mr. Brewer,” he said, putting on his hat. “It’s time you and I had a chat.”

Since it was after midnight, he had to walk the painful three blocks to Central Park to get a cab. The cabby wasn’t surprised that someone was out at this time of night — it was New York after all — but he did pause for a moment when Alex told him their destination.

“The Brooklyn Bridge?” he said. “You ain’t thinking about jumping or anything like that, are ya?”

Alex assured him that he had no such intentions, and then just sat back and enjoyed the ride. The driver let him off right as they reached the bridge and Alex waited for him to be on his way before pulling out his rune book. Alex had crossed the bridge many times and recently he’d seen work scaffolding on one of the pillars in the middle of the span. He walked out over the bridge, along the side of the road until he reached the area, then stepped past the construction barricade and onto the scaffolding.

His heart tried to crawl up into his throat when he looked down. The platform where he stood was only about two feet wide. The moon was up and Alex could see its light reflecting on the rolling water far below.

The scaffolding ran around the tower of brick, out over the water and around the back side. Wooden ladders connected each layer of scaffolding with one above as it went up to whatever the men were working on. Fortunately, Alex didn’t care about any of those upper levels — which was good, since he could never have climbed the ladders with his left arm in a sling.

Moving slowly and deliberately, Alex made his way along the scaffold and turned the corner to the outside edge of the pylon, onto the part that faced the river. He inched his way to the center of the big tower of brick, then turned to face the wall. Pulling a piece of chalk from his pocket, Alex chalked the outline of his vault door on the weathered brick. He only drew the door down to a space about a foot up from the scaffolding, but he still had to kneel down to reach it. The shock of his knee hitting the scaffold platform shot up into his shoulder and he gasped in pain, dropping his chalk. It fell, a white streak reflecting the light of a nearly full moon, like a shooting star, before disappearing among the winking reflections of the moon on the water far below.

Saying a silent prayer just in case God did watch over idiots and children, Alex fished a second piece of chalk from his coat and finished the door. He had to hold the rune paper in place to keep the wind from blowing it away, but he got it lit. Finally, with a twist of his key, he swung his vault door open and stepped up and inside. He’d never been so glad to be indoors.

“Who’s there?” the belligerent voice of Jeremy Brewer boomed out of the darkness. This far from the core, the magelights in Alex’s vault barely glowed enough to be seen in the dark space, but Alex had prepared for that. After all, his vault could be opened anywhere there was a wall.

“Relax, Mr. Brewer,” Alex said, affecting the British accent again. “I’ll be with you in a trice.”

Alex took out his matchbook and lit the oil lamps that hung from fixtures in the walls. As they began to throw their light into the space, they illuminated the Broker. Alex had left him handcuffed to a metal chair with a bag over his head and his legs tied to the legs of the chair.

Once the lamps were lit, Alex was almost ready. Trying not to grunt with the pain of physical exertion, he shoved Brewer’s chair over to the door and faced it outward, while Brewer spewed a string of colorful profanities. The chair was attached to the back wall by a rope that ran through the two pulleys he’d installed earlier. Now he tied his second rope to the first, between the pulleys, and pulled it tight through the anchor he’d put in the wall by the door. This created about six inches of play in the rope holding Brewer and the chair. Below the anchor sat a small table with a candle on it and a box of matches.

The stage was set.

“I don’t know who you are,” the Broker said with a snarl, all pretense of his high society manners gone. “But you’ll pay for this. I’ll make sure you die spitting blood with my name on your lips.”

Alex shoved the chair forward until the ropes stopped it. The front feet of the chair slipped off the edge where the vault door was, and it slammed down hard with the front legs resting on the brick wall outside the door.

“Jesus!” the Broker swore as the chair suddenly pitched forward, “what are you doing?”

Alex stuck the disguise rune to his forehead and lit it with his cigarette. Next, he pulled the bag off the head of Jeremy Brewer and the Broker got his first look at the empty nothing in front of him. He screamed. To his credit, however, he did not lose control of his bodily functions.

“What do you want, you crazy son-of-a-bitch?” he yelled.

“Now, that’s what I like to hear,” Alex said in his cultured British accent, loosely patterned on Iggy’s, of course. He leaned against the wall by the door so that Brewer could see him. “You see, if you’d just taken that attitude back at the club, we could have avoided all this unpleasantness.”

He looked up at Alex with a snarl.

“Who told you my name?” he demanded. Alex laughed.

“My employer, who, as I mentioned, wishes to remain anonymous. Privileged information, you understand.”

“And what does your employer want?”

“A name.”

“Whose?”

“Someone stole a shipment of uncut diamonds out of a customs warehouse at the New York Aerodrome,” Alex said. “Now, they’ve not been offered to the local fences, even the high-class ones, so that means the theft was pre-arranged. By you.”

“Well, maybe it was and maybe it wasn’t.” The Broker chuckled. Alex leaned down, close to Brewer’s face.

“You’d better hope it was, for your sake.” He nodded toward the open door. Brewer leaned out and looked down at the water far below.

“So if I don’t give up a name, you send me to sleep with the fishes, is that it?”

“Exactly that, Mr. Brewer,” Alex said.

“So what happens if I tell you?” he asked. “You just going to let me go?”

“You have my word.”

“I hope you’ll pardon me for being skeptical,” Brewer said, his manners returning. “But I’ve seen your face. If I decided to look for you, there’s nowhere in the city you could hide.”

“As you may have surmised, I’m from out of town,” Alex chuckled. “My employer brought me here to do a job and once it’s done, I’ll move on. I have no fear of your righteous vengeance, Mr. Brewer, because I will be far beyond your grasp.” He paused to take a puff on his cigarette. “Now, the name. If you don’t mind.”

Naked calculation ran across Brewer’s face like tape feeding out of a stock ticker. Alex knew he was weighing everything that was said, judging whether he thought Alex was bluffing. Ultimately, he decided that Alex was.

“Sorry, old man,” he said, mimicking Alex’s accent. “I’m afraid what you want is a trade secret. Privileged information, you understand.”

Alex laughed at the sound of his own words being thrown back at him.

“Yes,” he said, walking around behind Brewer, stepping over the ropes that held his chair in place. “I’m a very understanding person. Unfortunately,” he added, taking out a match and lighting it, “the laws of thermodynamics are much less understanding. They’re downright rigid.” He lit the candle on the little table and pushed it under the taut rope, tied to the anchor bolt. Immediately, the rope began to smoke as its trailing fibers were incinerated. “I’m afraid you don’t have very long to tell me what I want to know.”

“You’re bluffing,” Brewer said, craning his neck in an effort to see where the rope went.

Alex just smiled and puffed his cigarette while the rope began to burn. Brewer stared at him hard, looking to see if Alex had the eyes of a killer. He didn’t believe it.

His tune and his color changed, however, when the first large strand of the twisted rope snapped and he felt his chair tip forward a bit.

“All right,” he yelled. “The guys who set up the job had German accents, real heavy.”

“Who were they?” Alex pressed as the rope burned.

“I don’t know,” Brewer said. “They paid in cash, so I didn’t ask questions. They didn’t even tell me what was in the box they wanted.”

Alex ground his teeth. He hadn’t foreseen this problem. Still, whoever stole them would have had to deliver them, right?

“Who did the job?” he asked.

“A burglar I work with sometimes, a real pro.”

“What’s his name? Where can I find him?”

“I don’t know his real name,” Brewer said as a second strand snapped and the chair dipped some more. “I only know where he lives.”

Alex pulled the candle away and blew out the fire on the remaining strand.

“Where?” he said.

“The corner of twenty-eighth and Mercer,” Brewer said, his voice still trembling. “That’s all I know, I swear.”

“What name do you know him by?”

Brewer hesitated. Alex pushed the candle back under the rope and it caught fire instantly.

“What name does he go by?!” Alex yelled.

“Beaumont!” Brewer screamed. “Charles Beaumont!”

The rope snapped and the chair fell forward six inches until the slack was taken up, then it jerked to a stop. By that time, however, Jeremy Brewer had fainted.

In the main foyer of Dr. Bell’s brownstone stood a grandfather clock made of polished mahogany and burl wood. The face was over-large because it hid a mechanism that told the story of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol every twelve hours. On the hour of three, a diorama opened showing an intricately painted scene of Scrooge’ visit from Marley’s ghost. As the quarter hour progressed, the diorama turned to show the ghost of Christmas past. Similar dioramas opened on the sixth, ninth, and twelfth hours with the final scene being Scrooge dining with his nephew’s family. On each quarter hour, the clock played the first few bars of Greensleeves.

Alex always liked the clock. By the time he trudged wearily back up the steps to the brownstone, the diorama showing Marley’s Ghost, with his chains and cash boxes hovering over a terrified Scrooge, had just opened. Alex wanted nothing more than to keep right on going, upstairs to his room where his warm, comfortable bed awaited him, but there was a light still burning in the kitchen. He must have forgotten to switch it off. Thinking of that reminded him of his promise to Iggy, to clean the wreck of their kitchen. He didn’t have the strength, he knew he didn’t, but maybe he could just tidy up a bit and leave the serious work for tomorrow. He’d need a cup of coffee anyway, several in fact, for his day was far from over. Coffee and tidying could be done while he waited for Danny.

Of course, first he had to call Danny.

The aroma of freshly-brewed coffee washed over him as he passed through the library. When he reached the kitchen, he found it cleaned and scoured, with Iggy sitting at the table. He had a mug of coffee in one hand and a book in the other and dark circles under his eyes.

“You didn’t have to do this,” Alex said, shuffling to the coffee pot and pouring himself the biggest cup he could find.

“I couldn’t sleep with you out there, lad,” Iggy said. “I just laid awake for an hour and then I had to get up and do something. At least this gave me something to keep my mind occupied for a time.”

Alex downed as much of the hot liquid as he could take in one go, then refilled his cup.

“Well?” Iggy said, closing his book and setting it aside. “Are you going to tell me what happened?”

Alex drank, then poured one more time, before moving to the table next to Iggy and setting his cup down. “Give me a minute first,” he said. “I have to make a call.” He walked to where the telephone hung on the wall and gave the operator Danny Pak’s number. Six rings later, Danny’s groggy voice came at him down the wire.

“Yeah?” he said.

“Get your cop suit on,” Alex said. “I’ve got a lead on who killed Jerry Pemberton.”

“Alex?” Danny said. “You know I have a gun, right?”

“Wake up!” Alex shouted into the phone. “Get dressed and pick me up at the brownstone. We’re going to check out the apartment of the man who stole the gems out of the customs warehouse.”

Danny cursed at him. “Fine,” he said at last. “I’ll be there in half an hour.”

“So you know who killed Pemberton?” Iggy said once Alex hung up.

“No,” Alex said. “But I know who took the stones from the warehouse. Charles Beaumont.”

Iggy cocked his head to the side.

“The man who infected the Brotherhood of Hope Mission?” he asked. Alex nodded.

“I know where he lives now.”

“How did you find out?” Iggy asked.

Alex sat down, sipped his coffee, and told Iggy the whole story. The old man laughed when Alex told him about his trick with the ropes. Brewer had never been in any actual danger, of course. The rope Alex burned held about six inches of slack in the actual rope that held Brewer’s chair. Once it burned through, the chair dropped the six inches, then stopped. Brewer had believed it though, which was all that mattered.

“I left him, handcuffed to the chair, in the alley behind The Emerald Room,” Alex said.

The look of amusement on Iggy’s face evaporated to be replaced by one of alarm. “But, what if someone finds him?” he said, his voice urgent. “He knows you’re going to Beaumont’s apartment.”

“That’s why I’m taking Danny,” Alex said. “I’ll have him put a squad car on the street while we search the apartment. Since he doesn’t know my real face, he’ll probably think that the man who handcuffed him to a chair killed Beaumont and now the police are investigating.”

“Except you also have your arm in a sling,” Iggy said. “A man smart enough to run a criminal matching service for rich bastards might make the connection.”

Alex hadn’t thought about that, and Iggy had a point. Brewer wasn’t going to let this go, that much was for sure. Alex would have to be careful.

“I’ll have Danny drop me off behind the building,” he said. “I’ll just meet him inside.”

“Be careful,” Iggy said.

“Don’t worry,” Alex said, standing. He drew a chalk door on the wall for his vault, then opened it. The magelights inside bloomed into intense brightness. He went inside and took down his kit bag. It had been a while since he resupplied it, so he took his time doing that. His 1911 hung in its holster on a peg inside the cabinet where he kept his spare bags. He wouldn’t be able to put the holster on with his arm in the sling, so he pulled the pistol from its holster and slipped it inside a hidden pocket in his bag.

He had just finished when Danny rang the bell.

“I’ll get it,” Iggy said, while Alex closed his vault and scrubbed the chalk off the wall with a damp cloth.

“This had better be worth it,” Danny said, once Iggy led him into the kitchen. The detective looked weary and his eyelids were heavy, but his clothes were neat and his hair had been slicked back.

“It will be,” Alex said.

“What happened to you?” Danny asked, pointing at Alex’s arm in the sling.

“Bad guys,” Alex said. He and Danny had long ago established this explanation for things Alex shouldn’t tell his police detective friend for fear of putting him in an untenable position.

“Gotcha,” Danny said. “Now why did you drag me out of bed at this ungodly hour?”

“Remember the incident at the east side mission? Pemberton’s partner was one of the victims.”

“The first victim,” Iggy added.

It took Danny a moment to connect all the dots, but in his defense, he was not fully awake yet.

“Does that mean that whatever killed all those people could be waiting for us at the thief’s apartment?” Danny asked, availing himself of the coffee pot. “I’m not keen on catching whatever they had.”

“Shouldn’t be a problem,” Iggy said. “The disease can’t live more than a few minutes outside a sealed container. Or a host,” he added.

Danny finished his coffee and Alex picked up his kit, then they both turned for the door.

“I think I can get some sleep now,” Iggy said, showing them out. “Once you’re done, you need the same. Those ribs won’t heal if you keep pushing yourself.”

“I promise,” Alex said, then followed Danny down the steps to his car.

The apartment building of Charles Beaumont was a well-maintained structure of dull yellow brick right up against the outer border of the middle-ring. Its position ensured it had reliable power and cheap rent. Despite its being in a cheap neighborhood, the building showed no sign of neglect by its landlord. The windows were clean and the entryway swept; even the rear entrance, where the industrial garbage bins sat, was clear of trash.

All that being the case, however, it just didn’t seem like the kind of place where a notorious cat burglar would live. Based on Iggy’s pulp novels, Alex expected Beaumont to have a permanent room at the Ritz. He should have known better since Beaumont was a Sunday regular at Father Harry’s Mass at the Mission. From this apartment, the Mission was only six blocks away. Not close by any means, but not an insurmountable distance either.

Danny called for a squad car to make sure they weren’t disturbed inside and it was already out front. He dropped Alex off in back in case the Broker had a man watching the building. Alex hoped the back door wouldn’t be locked, but it had one of the new mechanisms that engaged automatically when the door closed. He didn’t want to use another expensive unlocking rune, so he waited for Danny to go around to the front, park, and then let him in.

“I’ll use a rune to get us into Beaumont’s place,” Alex said, once they were both inside. Danny snorted and rolled his eyes.

“You’re forgetting I’m a police detective. We’ll use my key.”

Alex followed Danny down to the basement where he pounded on the building superintendent’s door until it was opened by a severe-looking woman in a fuzzy pink bathrobe. Her brown hair was done up under a hair net and she wore thick, wire-rimmed glasses. Alex imagined that if she didn’t run this building, she would have made an excellent librarian.

“What’s the meaning of this?” she demanded in a tone that suggested she was used to being obeyed.

Danny flashed his badge and cited police business, and before Alex could say Jack Robinson, they were up on the fifth floor in front of apartment 57.

“Are you going to arrest Mr. Beaumont?” the woman asked with genuine concern in her voice.

“I’m sorry to tell you this, ma’am,” Danny said. “But Mr. Beaumont is dead. His apartment may very well be a crime scene.”

“Nonsense,” the woman scoffed. “Why I saw Mr. Beaumont a few days ago and he…”

Her voice trailed off as she tried to insert her key in the lock of Beaumont’s door. It wouldn’t fit and Alex could clearly see why. Someone had forced the lock with what looked like a heavy duty screwdriver.

“Step back,” Danny said to the superintendent, pulling his .38 police special from his shoulder holster. He eased the door open, then stepped quickly inside, sweeping the interior of the room with his weapon. The lights were on in the apartment, but only the papers strewn around the floor by the writing desk showed anything amiss. A meal of steak and broccoli with a few potatoes sat, uneaten, on a small, round table in the center of the room. Next to the meal, lay an overturned cup. The chair behind the table lay flat on its back as if whoever occupied it had stood up in a hurry. There were some dirty dishes in the sink and a pot on the stove, but everything else appeared orderly and immaculate. The smell of rancid food permeated the air, a mixture of rotten meat and sour milk.

“Stay here,” Danny said to Alex, as he moved toward the bedroom and bathroom beyond it. “No one’s here,” he announced a moment later when he returned.

Alex set his kit down on the counter next to the stove while Danny thanked the superintendent and shut the door.

“Now what?” he asked when he was sure the woman was gone.

Alex strapped on his oculus and took out his siverlight burner. “Now, you stand there until I can clear you a place to sit.” he said. “Before we invite the Captain and Lieutenant Callahan here, we have to be sure we know what happened, so let me work.”

Alex went over the tiny living room space at the front of the apartment. Once he’d inspected the couch and the coffee table, he invited Danny to sit.

“I feel pretty useless,” Danny said. “Isn’t there some way I can help?”

“You are helping,” Alex said, examining the table and the uneaten meal. “You’re watching my back while I search this place.”

Alex examined the residue left behind by whatever liquid had been in the overturned cup. Milk by the smell of it.

“Something’s been taken away from here,” Alex said, pointing to the table. He took off his oculus and passed it to Danny so he could look. On top of the table, the residue of the milk fluoresced brightly in the silverlight. In the middle of the splash mark, there were three round voids, as if three large glasses had stood there, side by side.

“Did Beaumont move them when he spilled his milk?” Danny asked.

“Too soon to guess,” Alex admitted. He took the oculus back and continued searching. He cleared the bedroom and the bathroom next. He found a loose floorboard under which Beaumont had stashed some very fence-able odds and ends, a few jeweled brooches, seven gold pocket watches, five strings of pearls, and a bag full of loose gemstones of all descriptions. The room showed no sign that anyone but Beaumont lived there.

“Okay,” he told Danny, coming back into the front room. “I can’t see anything suspicious back there. Why don’t you search it the old fashioned way while I go over the kitchen?” Danny smiled and moved past him. As Alex turned his attention to the stove, he heard Danny begin going through the drawers and the closet.

After checking every inch of the kitchen, Alex had to admit defeat. Nothing seemed out of place. He moved to the writing desk. It looked like it had been searched, but if so, it was the only thing. Maybe whoever searched it found what they were looking for.

None of the papers seemed important. A few letters, a job offer from someone writing in the kind of code you find in pulp mystery novels. Alex picked up the papers and stacked them on the writing desk. There wasn’t anything useful in them, but he couldn’t just throw them in the trash.

He paused. In his examination of the kitchen, he hadn’t looked at the contents of Charles Beaumont’s wastebasket. When he shone the silverlight into the little basket, hundreds of gleaming crystal shards glowed back at him. Someone had thrown away a broken jar, and not just thrown it away, but swept up the pieces too. Alex picked through the can carefully with a pencil, moving the glass shards around until he found what he sought. Reaching in gently, he pulled the round bottom of a glass jar from the wastebasket.

Most glass containers had thick, heavy bottoms, much thicker than the sides, which kept the center of gravity low and helped prevent tipping. When dropped, many would shatter but leave the bottom intact. Alex carried the broken base of the jar over to the table and placed it on one of the voids left in the milk splash. It fit perfectly.

He pulled out his rune book and tore a page containing an expensive restoration rune out of the back. Moving carefully, he placed the broken base of the jar on the counter and positioned the wastebasket on the floor below it. Sticking the rune paper to the base, he lit it and then stood back. The rune pulsed with power, not vanishing like most did. It hovered above the base, trembling and glowing with a violent burgundy light. A rustling sound emerged from the wastebasket and a tiny shard of broken glass leapt up and affixed itself to the broken base. The rustling continued and more and more of the glittering glass shards were pulled up, out of the can and onto the rapidly growing jar. In the burgundy light, it looked like blood dripping in reverse.

After a minute, the rune vanished, and the jar was more or less whole. There were dozens of tiny voids, places where the fragments were too far away from the rune to be drawn back to their original place. Thousands of cracks ran through the jar, making it look like crackle glass, but despite that, the jar was solid.

“Danny,” he called, picking up the jar with his handkerchief and placing it on the table. “I think I found one of the missing jars from the table.”

“Does it look like it will fit in here?” Danny asked, emerging from the bedroom. He carried a black shipping case a little larger than a standard briefcase. He held it open so Alex could see the padded inside. There were four divots, each big enough for a jar about six inches high and three around. Just like the one Alex had repaired.

“Where did you find that?” Alex asked.

“At the bottom of Beaumont’s laundry basket,” Danny said. “Though I’m more interested in where it came from.” He closed the case and Alex could see several official-looking labels covering its outside.

“That’s a standard small shipping case,” Alex said, the truth finally dawning on him.

“What does that mean?” Danny asked. Alex grinned at him.

“It means you get to keep your job,” he said. “It means we know who murdered Jerry Pemberton, and why.”

Alex waited an hour before making the phone calls. Danny called Lieutenant Callahan and Captain Rooney. Based on Danny’s reaction, the Captain wasn’t happy, but eventually Danny convinced him to come to Beaumont’s apartment. Once the police were on their way, Alex called Iggy. He hated waking the old man, but if he was going to save his skin, and Danny’s, he might need Iggy’s medical knowledge.

“That’s wonderful, lad,” Iggy said once Alex had told him what they found.

“I know you’re tired, but I might need you over here.”

“Say nothing of it,” he said, yawning. “I’ll throw on my clothes and be over as soon as I can.”

Alex thanked him and hung up. He wanted to stay on the line. Not because there was more he wanted to say to Iggy, but rather to avoid making the next call on his list. He took out his rune book and opened it to the back cover. Inside the cover was a pocket, sewn into the fabric. Alex kept loose papers there, notes and cards. He pulled out a simple white business card with a name and telephone number printed on it in blue ink. After a long moment, he sighed and dialed the phone.

“Hello?” a weary woman’s voice said. “Who is this?”

“Good morning, Sorceress,” he said in his most chipper voice.

“Mr. Lockerby,” Sorsha said, her voice dropping several degrees. “I trust you have a good reason for disturbing me at this hour.”

“You mean other than hearing your sparkling voice?”

There was a long pause and Alex could have sworn he felt the phone’s receiver getting cold. He really shouldn’t antagonize Sorsha, but she just made it so easy.

“Are you still interested in the disease that killed everyone at the Brotherhood of Hope?” he asked.

“Of course,” she said, her voice perking up.

“I can tell you who brought it there, and where it came from.”

‘Well?” she said after a long moment.

“Not now,” Alex said. “Put on your work clothes, grab your FBI lackeys, and meet me.”

“If you’re wasting my time, scribbler, I’ll…”

“No joke, Sorceress,” Alex said. “Got a pencil?” He gave her Beaumont’s address and hung up.

The first to arrive was Callahan; he came in with two of his detectives and two uniforms whom he left outside the door.

“What’s this about, Danny?” he asked, after having a quick look around.

“Give us a few minutes,” Danny said. “There’s a few more people coming.”

Callahan pressed his hand to his forehead. “Please tell me you didn’t call the Captain.”

“He didn’t,” Alex lied. “I did.”

“Jesus, Lockerby,” Callahan swore. “Why don’t you just get us all fired?”

“Don’t worry, Lieutenant,” Alex said. “He’ll be smiling from ear to ear when he hears what we have to say.”

“You should worry more about whether I’ll be smiling,” Sorsha said, pushing the door open. Agents Davis and Warner followed in her wake, each looking like they weren’t used to being rousted in the early hours of the morning. If getting up early or being rushed out of her boudoir affected Sorsha, it didn’t show. Her face was perfect, alabaster skin without a single flaw, as if she’d been carved of marble. The only appearance of makeup were a few precise strokes of eyeliner and bright red lipstick. Alex had heard that the subtler the makeup, the longer it took to apply; if this was what Sorsha could do with just a few minutes, he really wanted to see what she looked like on her way to a party.

Alex introduced Sorsha and the FBI men to Callahan, then directed the Sorceress to the couch to await the rest.

“You do like living dangerously,” Callahan said under his breath, once Sorsha had taken a seat.

The next to arrive was Iggy. Sorsha was delighted to see the doctor again and invited him to sit with her on the couch. Last of all was Captain Rooney. He arrived in a rumpled suit with his vest mis-buttoned and his tie showing from under the back of his collar. Callahan and his detectives looked tired, but their clothes were neat and professional, a sign that they were used to going to work whenever the job required it. Rooney, on the other hand, kept banker’s hours, and it showed.

He started to shout at Alex, Danny, and Callahan, but stopped when he saw Sorsha.

“I assume,” he said in a calmer voice, “that you dragged everyone out of bed for a good reason.”

“I did, Captain,” Alex said, taking the lead. “You challenged me to find out who killed Jerry Pemberton, and with Detective Pak’s help, I have.”

“If that’s all this is about,” Rooney said, his voice dropping low, “I’ll have your license pulled so quick.”

Alex put his hand on his heart and feigned a wounded expression. “Patience, Captain.” He took a step back and addressed the whole room. “I’d like to welcome everyone to the home of Charles Beaumont,” he said.

A murmur of recognition flared up briefly, but there were many bewildered looks.

“Before Detective Pak and I get to the reason we called this little clam bake, I need to bring everyone up to speed,” Alex added.

Of the people in the room, only he, Danny, Iggy, and Callahan were familiar with both the case of Jerry Pemberton and the incident at the Brotherhood of Hope Mission. Alex briefly related the facts of each case, then asked for questions.

“How does Charles Beaumont connect to Jerry Pemberton?” Callahan asked.

“Beaumont was Pemberton’s partner,” Danny said. “The people who killed Pemberton were looking for Beaumont.”

“Why?” Rooney growled.

“Because of this,” Alex said, holding up the glass container he’d reconstructed. “There were four of these, each full of an alchemical solution that causes the disease that killed Father Harrison Clementine and everyone at the Mission.”

“And how do you know this?” Sorsha said.

Alex took out his multi-lamp and snapped the silverlight burner in it. “You’ll need to wear this,” he said, holding out his oculus to the Sorceress.

She hesitated for a minute, then slipped the strap over her head. Alex lit the lamp and then pointed to the table.

“See here, how three round objects stood here.” He put the reconstructed jar on the table.

Sorsha closed her uncovered eye and looked. After a moment, she moved the jar slightly to the left, covering one of the voids.

“What made the circles?” she asked.

“Milk,” Danny said, pointing to the empty drinking glass still lying on its side by the plate. “The jars were there when the milk spilled and until after it dried, then someone removed them.”

“Who?” Rooney asked. Alex grinned.

“In a moment, Captain.”

“I only see three circles,” Sorsha said. “You said there were four jars of this plague.”

“And I will explain where the fourth one went in just a minute,” Alex said, “but first I want Lieutenant Callahan and the Captain to have a look.”

Sorsha removed the oculus and handed it to Callahan, who then inspected the table.

“Was there food on the plate when you got here?” he asked.

“Yes,” Danny said. “It was pretty rank after five days so we threw it out, but the plate is right where we found it.”

Alex was impressed. Not much got by Callahan. From the look the Lieutenant gave him as he passed the oculus to Rooney, he was already thinking along the same lines Alex and Danny had.

“Okay, so what does this tell us?” Rooney asked.

Alex switched out his silverlight burner for a ghostlight one, then adjusted a few of the lenses on the oculus.

“Now take a look at the floor,” he said.

Rooney knelt down and scanned the floor on the right side of the table, the same side as the spilled glass of milk.

“Something spilled here too,” he said. “It’s all over the place, and there’s a footprint here,” he indicated a spot between the table and the door.

Alex waited for Callahan and Sorsha to take their turn with the oculus.

“Why is this light different?” Sorsha wondered, looking at the table top. “I can’t see the milk circles anymore.”

“I call it ghostlight,” Alex said. “It reveals magical residue.”

Sorsha nodded, taking the oculus off and handing it back to Alex.

“So Mr. Beaumont sat here,” she indicated the overturned chair. “He put the jars of plague on the table and proceeded to eat dinner. At some point, he knocks one of the jars off the table.” She picked up the broken one. “This one. He has quick hands but when he tries to grab it, he knocks over the milk. The jar breaks and Beaumont runs out, trying to escape being infected.”

Alex smiled and Danny whistled.

“That’s about the way we figure it,” Danny said.

“Why would this idiot put jars of plague on his dinner table?” Rooney asked.

“They would have been completely harmless while sealed,” Iggy said. “He might have simply wanted to look at them. Many alchemical solutions have interesting color patters and some even glow.”

“So why and how did he end up at the Mission?” Callahan asked.

“I can answer that as well,” Iggy said. “Sister Jefferson told us that he was always asking Father Clementine for blessings and drinking water from their old well. He thought it had healing properties, or at least he hoped it did.”

“It still doesn’t explain what any of this has to do with Jerry Pemberton,” Callahan said.

“Or where Beaumont got the jars,” Sorsha said, setting the restored jar down on the table again.

Alex snapped his fingers, pretending he’d just remembered something.

“That’s right,” he said. “We forgot to tell them about the shipping case.”

Sorsha fixed him with a level gaze and Rooney looked like he might just spontaneously combust. Alex continued as if he hadn’t seen either.

“My associate, Detective Pak, during an exhaustive search of this apartment, found this.”

Danny held up the shipping case. “It has a receiving stamp on it from the New York Aerodrome.”

“Are you saying that Beaumont stole this from the customs warehouse?” Callahan asked. “Then who stole Van der Waller’s jewelry?”

“Beaumont,” Alex said. “My best guess is that he wanted to keep the theft of the plague a secret for as long as possible, so he grabbed a case with a similar shape and size and substituted it for the one he stole.”

“So whoever was supposed to get the plague jars got the diamonds instead? Rooney asked. “Why didn’t he report the theft?”

Sorsha smiled and raised an eyebrow.

“Would you report that your jars full of an alchemical plague had been stolen?” she asked.

“Wait,” Callahan said. “Aren’t things in the customs warehouse supposed to be inspected before they’re released? How would they explain these jars? They couldn’t let the inspector open one, after all.”

“A good question,” Sorsha added. “They would have given off a strong magical aura and customs inspectors have detectors for that.”

“There’s only one way this could have made it into the country,” Alex said. “It was part of a diplomatic pouch.”

“Anything a foreign government ships to one of their embassies in the U.S. isn’t subject to search,” Danny said.

“The question remains,” Callahan pointed out, “Whose pouch was it?”

“It arrived by airship,” Danny said. “I checked the passenger manifest and there were three German citizens on board. No other country with goods in the warehouse had citizens on the airship.” He consulted his notepad. “The passengers listed their names as Helge Rothenbaur, Greta Albrecht, and Dietrich Strand.”

“Not surprising,” Iggy said. “German alchemists are the best in the world. They could have created a disease like the one we saw.”

“So,” Alex said, “when the Germans discover they have a case full of uncut diamonds instead of their plague, they go looking for it. They beat Beaumont’s name out of Pemberton, then come here, breaking the lock on the door to get in.”

“But Beaumont isn’t here,” Sorsha said. “So they take the three unbroken jars and leave.”

“Almost,” Alex said. “They did stop long enough to pick up the broken glass pieces from this jar,” he held up the restored one. “They threw them in the wastebasket.” Alex tipped the jar up, revealing fingerprint dust stuck to a large, clear thumbprint on the bottom of the jar. “And one of them was kind enough to leave us his print.”

“That could be anyone’s,” the young Agent Warner piped up.

Alex shrugged.

“Possible,” he said. “But the angle is strange unless you’re picking up a broken piece. It’s likely this is the fingerprint of whoever murdered Mr. Pemberton.” Alex handed the jar to Lieutenant Callahan with an exaggerated gesture. “I’ll leave the rest to you, Lieutenant,” he said.

“That’s it?” Rooney asked, shaking his head. “I nearly got my head chewed off getting permission for us to stake out the customs warehouse and now you want me to tell the Chief and the Mayor some cockamamie story about Nazis trying to poison New York?”

“Don’t worry, Captain Rooney,” Sorsha said, standing. “I shall take care of that. This is a federal matter now. You and your men and your…consultant have done excellent work. I’ll make sure the Governor hears about it.”

Rooney smiled, ingratiating, but his face had the sickly look of someone who had lost a favorite plaything. “Thank you, Miss Kincaid,” he said, then he turned to Callahan. “Make sure the FBI has everything they need, then wrap it up here.”

Callahan said that he would, and Rooney left without another word.

“Pak,” Callahan said in a loud voice. “This is your crime scene. Make sure everything’s logged and turned over to Miss Kincaid.” He put on his hat and then turned to leave as well. “I’ll make sure your bill gets paid, Lockerby,” he said on the way out.

Danny began giving instructions to the two other detectives while Alex packed up his kit.

“That was a real cute performance,” Agent Warner said, coming up behind him. Alex looked up into his young face. His lip was drawn up in a sneer and his blue eyes were hard. “Thought you’d make the rest of us look like chumps while you suck up to our boss?”

Alex just shrugged.

“I guess I thought that a bunch of Germans running around the city with a plague was something everyone needed to know,” he said. “This was just the easiest way to do it.”

“And to blow your own horn,” Warner said, anger in his voice. “I saw guys like you when I was on the force in Chicago. FBI has a few of them too. It’s never about the job for them, they’ve always got to make a big show. Problem is, while they’re doing their song and dance for the cameras and the brass, the bad guys get away. Sometimes people die.”

Alex straightened up and faced Warner. He was over an inch taller than the young Agent and he stretched himself up to his full height. Something about this was personal for Warner, but Alex had no idea what.

“Don’t worry, Agent Warner,” he said. “I’m not doing this for fame. I’m a P.I. I’m in it for the money.”

For a brief second Warner looked like he might punch him, but he mastered himself and stormed away.

“You look dead on your feet,” Iggy said, stepping up next to him.

Alex nodded. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept.

“The Sorceress will take it from here,” Iggy continued. “Let’s go home.”

Alex rubbed his eyes. Now that he’d sounded the alarm bell to the people who needed most to hear it, and saved his and Danny’s skins in the process, his job was done.

Wasn’t it?

“There’s still three Germans running around New York with jars full of death,” he said. He indicated the detectives and the FBI with a sweep of his arm. “They needed my help to get this far.”

“Do you know anything you haven’t told them?” Iggy asked. Alex wearily shook his head.

“No,” he confessed.

“Then your part in this little play is done,” Iggy said forcefully. “It’s time you slept anyway; you’re no good to anyone in this condition.”

Alex picked up his kit and followed Iggy toward the door, but stopped when Sorsha stepped intro his path. She looked at him with her intense eyes, one eyebrow raised.

“That was very good work, Mr. Lockerby,” she said.

Alex wasn’t sure he’d heard her right, but he smiled and said, “Thanks,” all the same.

“I don’t give compliments lightly,” she said. “Or idly. You should come work for me.”

Alex smiled at the thought of being an FBI agent. It would never work out, of course. He cut too many corners and broke too many rules to be a legitimate law officer of any kind.

“If I decide to pack it in, you’ll be my first call,” he said. “For right now, just find those Germans.”

She seemed to have been waiting for a sarcastic answer, and his frankness surprised her. Before she could pursue any more discussion, however, Danny called her away.

Alex didn’t remember much about the cab ride home. Outside, the sun was beginning to paint the sky shades of pink and yellow, and the buildings went by in a smoky, gray blur. At some point he collapsed onto his bed, still in his clothes, and fell instantly asleep.

Alex’s bedroom had a window that faced the street. The brownstone sat on a pleasant lane, lined with birch trees on either side and cobbled with bricks. It ran east and west with Alex’s window facing south. When he’d collapsed into bed in the wee hours of the morning, the sun had been rising behind the house. The curtains over the large windows were open and Alex had been in no condition to close them.

Over the course of the day the sun marched its path across the sky and, just after noon, a bright ray crept in through the open curtains and shone on the floor. As the afternoon progressed, the shaft of sun and the bright pool of light crawled slowly, silently across the hardwood floor, then up the side of the bed, and then across the bedspread until it shone on Alex’s face.

He grunted, not wanting to return to wakefulness, and rolled over. An hour later, the light shone on his neck and he became too hot for sleep. When he finally sat up and swung his legs down to the floor, the alarm clock on his nightstand read eight forty-five. He picked it up and pressed it to his ear… only to hear silence. He hadn’t slept in his bed for over a day before arriving home, and he hadn’t thought to wind the clock that morning. It had stopped.

He stood and fished his pocket watch from his pants, then wound and set the alarm clock to four forty-five. Moving slowly, his muscles stiff and his arm still sore, he carefully undressed and hung his only suit on a hanger that then went behind the bathroom door. He took a long shower, letting the hot water steam the kinks out of his body and the wrinkles out of his suit. Danny was safe, and the Sorceress was hot on the trail of the Germans and their plague. He’d handled all that extremely well, he thought, but he didn’t feel the satisfaction of a job well done.

Because there was still one thing left to do.

He didn’t want to do it, not the way he would have to. But it had to be done, so he dried himself, dressed in his still-damp suit, and went downstairs. A note from Iggy hung on a cork board in the kitchen, saying he’d been called out to consult with Doctor Halverson at the university and didn’t know when he’d return. Not trusting his ability to cook anything one-handed, Alex left and walked to The Lunch Box.

“Hiya, handsome,” Mary said when she saw him come in. It was too early for the dinner rush and only a few customers occupied the booths. Alex sat at the counter. “What happened to you?” she asked, pointing at his arm in the sling.

“I had a disagreement with a taxi,” he lied. “Don’t worry, though. It’s not serious.”

He asked Mary how she liked being a full-fledged cook and her face lit up as she told him about her first week at The Lunch Box. Alex knew he should hurry, but he just didn’t want to. His heart wasn’t in it, but he had to know the truth. It was his one great flaw, an inexorable, rigid need to know the truth, and to see justice done.

Mary made him a pastrami sandwich and chattered away while he ate it. As he finished, patrons began to come in, just off work and seeking dinner, sending Mary back to the kitchen. With her gone and his plate clean, Alex had no excuses left.

Despite that, he went to the phone booth outside the diner and called his office.

“Finally,” Leslie barked when she heard his voice. “I didn’t know if you and Danny were okay, or if I should start scraping up bail money. Why didn’t you call me?”

“Sorry, doll,” Alex said with a pang of guilt. He didn’t like upsetting her. “I hadn’t slept in over a day, so once I was done, I went home.”

“Did the Captain go for it?” she asked, urgency in her voice. “Are you and Danny safe?”

“Better than that,” Alex said. “The feds took over the case and said they’d put in a good word to the Governor about how essential Rooney’s help was.”

“Thank God,” she whispered. “I was worried. So, are we going to get paid now?”

Alex laughed, which made his ribs hurt. “Don’t make me laugh,” he grunted. “And don’t worry. Lieutenant Callahan said he’d get us a check, so we’re good.”

“I’ve got some more work lined up,” she said. “I can go over it with you tonight if you’re coming in.”

“No,” Alex said. “I’ve got one more thing to do to wrap up the Thomas Rockwell case.”

“You going to give that girl her money back?” Leslie asked, a touch of sadness in her voice. “Or, have you figured out what happened to Thomas?”

“I don’t know,” Alex said. “I’m going to try something tonight to figure it out. Either way, I’ll be done by morning.”

“Sounds dangerous.” Concern filled her tone again. Alex shrugged, then realized she couldn’t see him.

“Could be,” he said. “I’ll talk to you about it in the morning.”

“Be careful,” she said.

Alex promised that he would and hung up.

He caught the crawler across town to the five and dime that stood on the opposite side of the street from Thomas Rockwell’s apartment. Climbing the stairs to the industrial building, he let himself into the dead man’s workshop and marveled again how neat and orderly it was. His eyes did try to avoid the table in the back with the hotplate, where Thomas’ shadow lay, permanent yet unseen.

Setting to work, Alex went around the room assembling a long line of jars, pens, and inks onto the center workbench. When all was in readiness, he tore a blank sheet from the large pad in the desk drawer and fitted it into the brass holders. It took him almost an hour to draw the finding rune. He checked and rechecked his notes, forming every line and curve precisely, making sure each one contained the proper inks and additives.

When he had about twenty minutes of work left, he stopped. He’d taken off his jacket, and his shirt was heavy with sweat from the exertion of channeling the power of the universe down into the rune. Patting himself dry with a towel, he went downstairs to the five-and-dime next door. He bought a cheap, brass ring from a case on the counter, then moved to the phone booth in the rear of the store.

“Evelyn,” he said once she picked up. “I’m over at Thomas’ workshop and I think I’ve figured out what Thomas was doing. Where he went wrong, I mean.” He paused as her breathless voice filled his ear. “No,” he said. “I don’t mind. Come on over.”

She made him promise to wait for her, then hung up.

Alex returned to the workshop and set the brass ring he’d purchased down on the left-hand workbench. He took out his rune book and tore out two pages he’d prepared especially for this evening. Folding the papers into quarters, lengthwise, he wrapped each one around the simple brass band, then lit them. The two runes had been written to join together when cast together and Alex could see their intricate forms wrapping around the band in colorful spirals. After a few seconds, they vanished, leaving the shiny band unadorned.

Satisfied that everything was ready, he slipped the ring on his finger and put away his rune book.

It took Evelyn fifteen minutes to arrive, and when she did, the gray walls of the workshop seemed to brighten with her smile. She wore a simple shirt of deep burgundy that reminded Alex of the glittering shards of the plague jar as they reassembled themselves in the ruddy light of his restoration rune. Her skirt was beige and of the close-fitting pencil style that seemed to flow down from her trim waist, over the swell of her hips and then pull in to a tight circle at her knees. She wore white pumps with a matching cloche hat that let her black hair spill out the back in curls. Her face was tanned and smooth with bluish eye shadow and a dark red lipstick that matched her blouse.

“Alex,” she said, breathlessly, hurrying up to him. She threw her arms around him and planted a kiss on his lips. The kiss was hot and fiery, full of passion, and it brought back sweet memories of the night they’d spent in this very room. Alex wanted to dwell on those thoughts, but he pushed them away. They would be time for that later — unless there wasn’t.

“I’m sorry to get you out here,” he said when they broke apart.

“It’s all right,” she said, her smile turning sad. “I want to know what Thomas gave his life for. I want to know what he thought was worth that risk. Was it just some old book, or more than that?”

Alex sighed and led her to the workbench where he’d spent the last hour carefully laying out the finding rune.

“I thought this was right,” he said, showing it to her. He held up another paper for her inspection. “This is the one Thomas cast,” he said, indicating places where it differed from the rune he’d inscribed on the workbench. “He figured out that the original rune was drawn backwards, but he didn’t realize that the outer ring of runes isn’t aligned properly. See here.” He pointed to the inferior runes that ran around the central geometry, a complex dodecahedron.

“So, you figured it out?” Evelyn said, her brows drawn together in concentration.

“I thought so when I called you,” Alex said. “But now, I’m not sure. It just feels off to me.”

She looked over the two sets of drawings, then looked up with a helpless look on her face.

“What can I do?” she asked. Alex shook his head.

“I’m not sure. I’m going to have to go over this from start to finish. It’s going to take hours.” He looked at the papers, then back to her. “I’m sorry I brought you out here. You might as well go home. If I figure anything out, I’ll call you.” She looked disappointed, but then smiled.

“How about I go get us some dinner?”

“No thanks,” Alex said. “I actually just ate, and I need to work. I know I can get this if I just spend some more time. The only question is, how much?”

She put her hand on his cheek and he felt the warmth of her fingers.

“You look tired,” she said. “Maybe you should give it up…for the night.” She didn’t look at the neat little bed they had shared together but it was there in the tone of her voice. Alex chuckled.

“Then I definitely wouldn’t get anything done,” he said. “Go ahead,” he said, nodding toward the door. “All you’re going to do is distract me.”

“All right,” she said, taking a step away. “I see you can’t be dissuaded.” There was a strange note in her voice, but Alex felt a great swell of relief as she started toward the door. He’d pushed her pretty hard but she hadn’t done anything…

Evelyn turned after her third step. That particular step had taken her just outside the range of Alex’s reach. When she turned, there was a pistol in her hand.

“I’m sorry, Alex,” she said, leveling the gun at his chest. “I’m afraid I’m not to be dissuaded either.”

Alex put his free hand in the air. “What’s this?” he asked even though he already knew.

“You’re very eager to get me to leave,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with your rune. I think you just decided to cut me out.” She waved her gun, motioning Alex to step back, and he did. Once he was away from the table, she looked at his drawings again. “You don’t have any doubts,” she said. “This rune is perfect.”

“So, you’re a runewright,” Alex said. He’d guessed as much, but it was nice to have his suspicions confirmed.

“Yes,” Evelyn said. “I am. I may not have your skill, but I can understand what you’ve done here. You’ve finished deciphering it,” she indicated his notes. “You just haven’t finished writing it.” She looked up at him and smiled. “Fortunately, I can.”

“So,” Alex said. “What now?”

She motioned him over toward the metal bed, though he was sure she didn’t have anything so pleasant involved this time.

“Sit,” she said, then handed him a pair of handcuffs from her purse.

Alex took the cuffs and looped them around the metal bar that formed the bed’s footboard, locking the cuff first onto his bound-up left hand, then carefully onto his right. Once he was secured, Evelyn put the gun against his chest and tugged at the cuffs with her free hand.

“So,” Alex said, trying to remain calm. “You must be the person who enticed that government researcher…what was his name?”

“You mean dear Quinton Sanderson?” Evelyn said, slipping her gun back into her purse. “Yes. I got him to steal the original drawings of the Monograph runes. He was very eager to help me once I explained what they were.”

“Did you kill him?”

“Of course not,” she said, her voice indignant. “He disappeared, just like Thomas.”

“So, you’re not Thomas’ sister either.” He thought back to the bed in Thomas’ apartment and how obvious it was that he had a lover. Clearly Evelyn had seduced him to get his help. The thought made Alex uncomfortable, especially sitting on the bed where Evelyn had done the same to him.

“No,” she said, drawing the stool up to the workbench and leaning over Alex’s drawings. “I found Thomas and convinced him to help me find the Monograph after poor Quinton disappeared.”

“He didn’t disappear,” Alex corrected her. “Neither did Thomas. They died trying to find that book.”

“And now you have succeeded where they failed,” Evelyn said, selecting a pen and an ink pot.

“No,” Alex said. “I haven’t. If you finish that rune and cast it, you and I will be just as dead as Thomas and Quinton.”

She turned and smiled at him.

“Never try to con a con artist,” she said. “Even I can see that your construct is finished. It’s balanced and elegant, nothing like that convoluted mess it started out as.”

She began to draw, filling in the missing parts of the construct, line by line from Alex’s notes.

“How is it you even knew about the Archimedean Monograph?” Alex asked after a few minutes passed in silence. “I mean, I can see Quinton stumbling across it in his work, but you didn’t work there. If you had, you wouldn’t have needed him.”

“My mother was one of the original researchers the government had working on the Monograph runes. She used to tell me stories about it as she trained me in her craft. Then, one day, she didn’t come home for dinner. My father waited up all night, and in the morning, there were men in suits at our home.”

“She’d disappeared,” Alex guessed.

“After that, I studied everything she left behind, her notes, her Lore, everything. Of course the government men took most of it, but I saved some. Hid it under the floorboards in my room.”

“It wasn’t enough, though,” Alex observed. ‘Was it?”

She stopped her work for a moment and hung her head, the strands of her dark hair obscuring her face. “No,” she said. “I tried to get a job at the archives where my mother worked but…”

“But you didn’t have your mother’s talent,” Alex said. “If you did, you would never have needed Thomas to figure out the rune, you could have done it.”

“That’s why I need the Monograph,” she said, her voice full of passion. “Whoever reads it will be the greatest runewright in the world. Can you imagine what secrets it holds, Alex?”

“Maybe it doesn’t really exist,” Alex said. “Have you thought of that? Maybe that rune is just a trap. A way for some powerful, ancient runewright to kill off his competition.”

Evelyn laid aside the pen and stood up; she had finished writing the unscrambled finding rune.

“No,” she said. “I haven’t considered it. You saw those other runes, how complex they are, so much so that there are still two that the government hasn’t been able to identify. Those runes came from somewhere, Alex. The Archimedean Monograph is real and it’s time to find it.”

She began to clear away the inks and jars from the workbench, leaving only the paper with the rune on it. Alex had no doubt that she’d been able to copy what was left, no matter what her talent.

“I wasn’t lying, Evelyn,” he said as she worked. “That rune isn’t ready. If you activate it, it will kill you, just like Quinton, just like Thomas.”

“I don’t believe you,” she said, taking a match from the box on the table and striking it into flame.

“I knew you were Quinton’s partner before I called you over here,” he said. “I purposely didn’t finish the rune. Believe me when I tell you it won’t work.”

She dropped the match on the rune paper. Since it wasn’t flash paper it didn’t catch right away, and the fire spread over it slowly.

“You’re lying,” Evelyn said as the spell’s power began to build. “You couldn’t have known about me.”

“Thomas’ neighbors said he had a girl. One with long auburn hair down her back,” Alex said. “It was smart of you to cut it and dye it. I never would have suspected you, but the other night you very agreeably let me take off your clothes and I noticed that you didn’t dye all your hair.”

Evelyn’s look of triumph slipped, and she reflexively looked down. When she looked back up, there was terror in her eyes. She turned to stop the rune, but she was too late. It flashed into existence with a pulse of light brighter and hotter than the sun.

The instant the light flared, the runes on Alex’s new brass ring sprang to life. A spherical shield of pure, transparent energy enveloped Alex and inside that, a boiling dark vapor erupted. The rune that made the vapor was called the Rune of Inky Night and no light had ever penetrated it. Alex hoped it would be enough to keep the killing light of the finding rune from reaching him. In the fraction of a second before the runes had activated, the light had touched Alex’s exposed skin and he could still feel it burning, like he’d been in the sun too long.

Outside the darkness, Evelyn was screaming. It was not the scream of terror one might expect from someone who has come face to face with their doom, but rather a scream of mortal agony, as her flesh burned in the unforgiving light. Alex wished he’d added a silence rune to the ring as the scream grew higher and higher in pitch. A low, thrumming noise grew along with the screams. After what seemed like an eternity, the scream died down to a gargling gasp… and then nothing. The thrumming went on for another full minute, then it too died away, and the world outside Alex’s sphere of midnight fell silent.

Alex took a deep breath and let it out slowly, his hands trembling and making the handcuffs rattle against the metal bed frame. He had been right about Quinton Sanderson’s and Thomas Rockwell’s accomplice. Evelyn had used them all and she’d paid for her quest for power with her life.

“I’m so sorry, Evelyn,” he said, his voice hoarse in the stillness. “I tried to warn you.” A single tear rolled down his cheek, but he didn’t care. Inside the blackness of the darkness rune, no one could see him.

Sitting hunched over was really beginning to hurt Alex’s back. His shield and darkness runes had expended their energy and vanished over an hour ago and now he sat in the empty workshop, handcuffed to a bed. A metal bar curved in a downward facing U shape formed the footboard of the bed. It only rose about four inches above the mattress, forcing Alex to lean over so as not to pull his injured arm against it. He’d tried sitting on the floor, but that twisted his left side even more painfully.

When the FBI came bursting into the workshop with their guns drawn, he almost cheered.

“Agent Davis,” he said in his most cheerful voice. “What kept you?”

“It’s clear,” Davis yelled out into the hall. “No one here but Lockerby.”

“Is he alive?” the voice of Sorsha Kincaid drifted in from the hallway.

“Yes,” Agent Warner said, his voice thick with disappointment.

The Sorceress came around the corner, and all Alex could do was stare. The previous times he’d seen her, she’d been dressed for her work with the FBI, fashionable certainly, but with the air of a working professional. Tonight, however, Sorsha wore a long, form-fitting black evening dress that clung to her modest curves. The sleeves were transparent and shimmered as she moved, baring her slender, pale arms beneath and ending in what looked like the black cuff from a man’s shirt, complete with a large, pearl cufflink. A short, fox-fur stole covered her shoulders and hung down on either side of her slender neck, parting occasionally as she walked to reveal an open collar and a necklace of glossy black pearls against the alabaster of her skin. A close-fitting hat with a white feather and a veil made of the same shimmery stuff as the sleeves completed the outfit.

Wherever Sorsha Kincaid had been summoned from, it was not the kind of party that would have tolerated the likes of Alex. Her dress reminded Alex of some of the women he’d seen in The Emerald Room, though Sorsha wore it better. There was something in her slow, confident walk across the workshop floor that gave her elegance, or rather revealed it. The fact that her clothes were fine and that the room was just a simple workshop had no power to add or detract from the Sorceress’ inherent grace and femininity.

“I can’t say I’m surprised to find you here, Mr. Lockerby,” she said, standing over him as Davis and Warner searched the room. She pulled back the veil, revealing her ice blue eyes, and placed a cigarette between her dark red lips.

Absently, Alex noticed that she wore the same burgundy lipstick that Evelyn had worn.

“How goes the hunt for our missing Germans?” he asked as the Sorceress came to a stop, standing over him.

“It’s being handled,” she replied with a raised eyebrow. “At the moment, however, I’d rather talk about what you are doing here.”

Alex smiled his most sincere-looking fake smile. “Why, I’m helping you with your case, my lady,” he said in a gallant voice. “Have your boys look in the handbag on the center table,” Alex added, nodding at the purse Evelyn had brought with her. “I’m sure they’ll find those pesky drawings you’ve been looking for. Along with a pistol that is not mine,” he amended.

Davis and Warner paused in their search and looked at Sorsha. After a moment, she nodded. The FBI men converged on the table as Sorsha searched her own tiny handbag for a matchbook.

“I’d offer you one of mine,” Alex said, holding up his right hand as much as he could in the handcuffs. “But, unfortunately…”

“That’s all right,” Sorsha said, then she bent down and reached into Alex’s jacket pocket, extracting a cardboard matchbook.

“They’re here, all right,” Agent Davis said. “All six originals.”

“Now will you uncuff me?” Alex said as Sorsha lit her cigarette.

“Not yet,” she said, blowing smoke in his face. “I must confess I’m very curious about how you got those papers, and just who cast the finding rune here tonight. If we dust those originals, will we find your fingerprints, Mr. Lockerby?”

Alex grinned up at her as best his could from his hunched over position. “You won’t find my fingerprints,” he said. “And I didn’t cast the finding rune.” He nodded at the handcuffs.

“You could have put those on yourself once you were done,” Sorsha said.

Alex smiled wider. “You can tell that I didn’t cast that spell because there aren’t obfuscation wards and concealment runes on the walls. I knew you were tracking that spell; you told me so yourself. That’s how you found Thomas Rockwell in the first place. You didn’t know that Quinton Sanderson had a partner and that she came with him to New York. When Thomas cast the finding rune, you tracked it to this neighborhood and then looked for a runewright. That’s why you didn’t find this workshop. This is where he actually cast the rune.”

Sorsha’s face carried the look of someone who unknowingly drank sour milk.

“Well,” she said. “If you knew I was tracking any casting of that finding rune, why didn’t you shield this place? And who cast the rune?”

“I hoped you wouldn’t come into it at all,” Alex said, and sighed. “But I knew if you felt the rune being cast here, you’d come, and I needed you in case something bad happened.”

“What if I hadn’t found this workshop for a week?” she asked, arching an eyebrow. Alex chuckled.

“Well, I hoped your aim would be better if you were close to the place it was cast.”

“You still haven’t told me who did the casting.”

“She called herself Evelyn Rockwell,” Alex said. “At least to me. She seduced Quinton Sanderson and got him to steal the drawings from the Archimedean Monograph. Then when he disappeared, she moved here and found Thomas Rockwell.”

“And then you, when Rockwell disappeared,” Sorsha finished, a reproving look on her perfect face. Alex nodded.

“When I put two and two together, I enticed her here. I told her I’d figured it out but I wanted more time. I told her to go home and wait for me to call.”

“And,” Agent Davis said, stepping up beside Sorsha. He held Alex’s bag, casually in his right hand. “If she’d been innocent, she would have gone home.”

“That’s right,” Alex said, his voice suddenly raspy.

“But she wasn’t innocent,” Sorsha said. “She got the drop on you, locked you to this bed, and finished the rune herself.”

“Yes,” Alex said.

“What happened to her?”

“Uncuff me,” Alex said, “and I’ll show you.”

Sorsha looked at Davis and nodded toward Alex.

“Before we do that,” Davis said with a malicious smile, “you’d better have a look at this.” He opened the bag so that Sorsha could look inside. She smiled, showing a row of pearly white teeth any shark would be proud of, offset all the more by her burgundy lipstick.

“My, my,” she said reaching into the bag. “What have we here?” When her hand came out, she was holding Alex’s rune-covered Colt 1911.

“Nice,” Davis said. “I have one just like it, though mine isn’t as decorative.”

Sorsha turned it over in her hands, scrutinizing the runes on its surface. “There wouldn’t be a spell breaker rune on this gun, would there?”

Alex forced himself to relax. He had a permit for the gun, but adding runes to it was questionably legal. If Sorsha wanted to make trouble for him, she could, but not if all she cared about were spell breakers.

Spell breakers were just what they sounded like, runes that reacted with the kinds of magic sorcerers used. The runes weren’t too difficult to write and they could disrupt even complex magic, like the crawlers or the capacitors at Empire Tower. As a result, their use was highly illegal. Just possessing one could land a runewright in prison for twenty years.

“Spell breaker runes are illegal,” he said with a smile.

“But you do know how to make them,” she pressed. Alex shrugged.

“It’s in my Lore book,” he said. “I’ve heard you can buy the instructions on the black market for a C-note.”

Sorsha regarded him for a long moment, then dropped the pistol back into Alex’s bag.

“Unlock him,” she said.

Davis’s face fell for a moment, but then his smile returned. “Agent Warner went next door to call this in,” he said. “He’s got my key.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Sorsha said. She leaned down to the short length of chain that connected the handcuffs. As she did, the fox stole pressed against Alex’s face, filling his nostrils with her delicate floral perfume.

Sorsha grasped the chain between her thumb and forefinger. Alex heard a crackling sound as the link turned suddenly white, then, with a gesture of casual ease, the kind one might use to shoo an annoying fly, the Sorceress crushed the frozen link between her fingers.

Trying not to look impressed, Alex sat up straight, his back popping as he stretched it, then he stood.

“You wanted to know where Evelyn went?” he said, holding out his hand so that Agent Davis could hand over his kit. The FBI man reached in and removed the pistol before complying.

Alex took the bag and went to the workbench where the burned remnant of the rune paper still lay. He pulled out his lamp and his ghostlight burner, then shone the green light on the wall. It only took him a few seconds to locate Evelyn’s shadow. The shadow was visible under the green light, even without the oculus. She had turned, as if running for the back corner of the room.

The corner where Alex had been.

He chose to believe that in her last desperate moments she had wanted him to save her.

“Is this what happened to everyone who disappeared?” Sorsha asked, her voice husky and low with emotion.

“Yes,” Alex said. “If you ask me, this rune is some kind of trap designed to weed out anyone smart enough to be a threat to whoever made it.”

Sorsha smiled. “I assure you,” she said. “The Monograph is real.”

Alex shone his light on Thomas’ shadow.

“He believed that too.”

At that moment Agent Warner returned.

“The investigators are on the way,” he said. “They’ll go over this place with a fine-toothed comb.”

“Good,” Sorsha said. She turned to Agent Davis and nodded toward the door and without a word, he left, taking the young blond Agent Warner with him. Once they were gone, Sorsha fixed Alex with a hard stare.

“How did you know that rune would fail?” she asked.

“Because I didn’t finish unraveling it.”

“But how do you know?”

“Because I could see that there were parts that weren’t aligned yet.”

Sorsha smiled. It was not a reassuring look.

“So you admit you could have unraveled it,” she said. “Given enough time.”

Alex tried to look casual as he shrugged. “Assuming it could be unraveled at all,” he said. He didn’t want Sorsha telling her government friends that she found a patsy to take another run at the Archimedean Monograph.

Her eyes flashed suddenly, as if lit from inside her skull.

“I think you’re lying to me,” she said, but her voice was suddenly deep and the sound of it echoed, trailing off after her words until they became lost in a faint blur of noise. At the same time, the room seemed to dissolve around him, colors and shapes blending into a solid plane of gray.

Alex wanted to be alarmed, but felt calm and safe instead. As if this platinum-haired angel in front of him were the person he trusted most in all the world. The person who wanted nothing more than to help him.

Somewhere in the recesses of his mind he knew it was a truth spell. Like spell breakers, truth spells were also illegal, which is why Sorsha had sent the only witnesses out of the room before using it. Now, if Alex tried to make an issue out of it, it would be his word against the word of one of New York’s most prominent citizens.

“I have a few questions for you, Alex,” Sorsha said, her voice still unnaturally deep and echoing. “Does your version of the finding rune work?”

“No,” Alex said, feeling no compunction to lie.

“Did you find the Archimedean Monograph?”

“No,” Alex said.

“Are you going to continue to look for the Monograph?”

“No.”

She picked up the notebook where Alex had drawn the rune Evelyn used.

“You seem to have this mostly figured out,” she said. “Do you think you could finish it?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“That rune will never work,” he said.

The Sorceress swayed suddenly and leaned against the table. A moment later the room snapped back into focus. Alex shook his head and blinked his eyes a few times to clear them. When he could see properly again, he noticed that Sorsha was breathing hard and sweating through her satin dress. She looked like she’d run a marathon.

“You hexed me,” he said. It was not an accusation, just a statement of fact.

“I had to be sure,” Sorsha said between gasps. “I’m sorry.”

Alex just shrugged. He understood why she had done it.

“If you can just wink your eye and make men tell the truth, why don’t you? You don’t care about it being illegal, or you wouldn’t have used it on me.”

“As you can see,” she said, her breathing finally returning to normal, “it takes a great deal of focus and effort. Even then, it’s not always right. People who know it’s coming can sometimes shape their answers in such a way as to speak the truth… but still be deceptive.”

“And you figured I was just the kind of dim bulb it would work on?”

“On the contrary,” she said. “I knew I would have to surprise you to have any chance of success. You’re far too clever for me to have warned you in advance.”

“Carful, Sorceress, that sounded dangerously like a compliment.”

She blushed. Alex wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t been looking her straight in the face, but her perfect, alabaster cheeks turned a rosy shade of pink.

“The spell has a reverse effect for a few moments,” she said. Her face suddenly clouded over, her eyebrows dropping down over her eyes. Clearly she believed she’d revealed too much.

“So if I asked you a question right now, you’d have to answer truthfully?” A broad smile stretched across Alex’s face as he tried to think of the single most embarrassing thing he could ask. The look on Sorsha’s face, however, told him the moment had passed. Still, he filed that particular bit of information away for later use.

“I’m grateful to you for finding the missing Monograph pages,” she said, her voice stiff and formal. She spoke something in that deep, echoing voice and moved her hand down her dress. As her hand moved, the dark perspiration stains vanished, leaving the satin material unmarked and pristine.

“Is there a reward for finding them?” he asked. “Not that your gratitude isn’t appreciated.”

“I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “I’ll ask. Now, if you don’t mind, a team of FBI investigators will be here soon. I don’t want to have to explain your presence to them.”

“Can I have my notebook?” he asked.

Sorsha smiled and set the notebook aside on the workbench. “I’m afraid that’s evidence now.”

Alex collected his kit and his pistol, then made his way downstairs to the five and dime. He called home and Iggy picked up immediately.

“There you are, lad,” he said. “I was wondering when you’d be home.”

“I don’t want to go home,” he said.

“Rough evening?”

Evelyn’s long, tortured scream still lingered in his mind. He death had been of her own making, but that didn’t make it all right.

“You could say that.”

“I’ll tell you what,” Iggy said with an infectious energy. “How about a picture? There’s a Sherlock Holmes one over at Radio City starring Basil Rathbone. What say you meet me there and we’ll make an evening of it?”

Alex didn’t really feel like another mystery, but Iggy seemed excited. He loved movies, and Sherlock Holmes, so why not?

“Sounds great, Iggy,” he said.

“I’m closer than you are,” Iggy said. “You hop on the crawler and I’ll walk over and meet you there.”

“Just take a cab, Iggy,” Alex said. This was one of their usual arguments. Iggy simply refused to admit that he was over seventy.

“It’s not far,” Iggy said. “I like to walk, and I’ve got plenty of time. It’s not like I’m in a hurry.”

The words hit Alex like a runaway crawler.

“Iggy?” he said. “Why didn’t Charles Beaumont take a cab?”

“What?”

“Charles Beaumont,” Alex repeated. “He ran out of his apartment right after that plague jar broke. He must have known what was in it.”

There was a long pause, then Iggy answered. “I guess if you want a thief to steal a jar full of plague, you don’t want him opening it by accident, so yes, he probably knew.”

“So he knew he was sick,” Alex said. “So why didn’t he take a cab?”

“Who says he didn’t?”

“No,” Alex said. “If he’d taken a cab, we’d have a dead cabbie and dead fares all over the city.”

“You’re right,” Iggy said, sounding puzzled. “So why didn’t he take a cab? He knew he was dying and he believed the water from the Mission could heal him. Why wouldn’t he try to get there as fast as possible?”

“Maybe the Mission was his last resort,” Alex said. “Maybe he went somewhere else first.”

There was a long pause and Alex could almost hear Iggy stroking his mustache.

“If someone asked me to steal a jar full of plague for them,” Iggy said slowly, “I might assume they have an antidote.”

“It’s thin,” Alex said.

“And it still doesn’t tell us where Beaumont went,” Iggy said. “If he went anywhere at all.”

“I think we’re on to something here,” Alex said. “Get a cab—”

“I don’t need a cab,” Iggy interrupted.

“And meet me at the city morgue,” Alex finished.

“Why?”

“We’re going to walk a mile in Charles Beaumont’s shoes.”

“Why am I meeting you at the morgue on a Monday night?” Danny Pak asked as Alex arrived in the building’s lobby; Alex had called Danny right after he’d hung up with Iggy. “I just got out of trouble that was caused by you. Couldn’t this wait a couple of days?”

Alex grinned and slapped Danny on the shoulder.

“Sorry,” he said, looking around for Iggy and not finding him. “Let’s just say I need you for this one?”

The lobby of the city morgue looked like any office building lobby you might find. There was an aged couch along one wall, surrounded by a few chairs, with a bank of elevators against the back. A reception desk stood opposite the waiting area, manned by a doorman. The only indication that this was not a typical office complex was that the elevator doors were suspiciously large and the man behind the desk wore a police uniform.

Danny rolled his eyes at Alex. “You don’t need me,” he said. “The coroner likes you better than he likes me. Old coot,” he added.

“It doesn’t matter if he likes me,” Alex said in a low voice. “He’s not going to let me take some of Charles Beaumont’s property with me no matter how well he likes me.”

“Is that what this is about?” Danny said, exasperation in his voice. “First of all, Beaumont didn’t have anything on him when we found him. Second, if he had, it would be in a box under Lieutenant Callahan’s desk back at the Central Office. Third, there’s no way Callahan is going to let you take police evidence, whether I ask him or not.”

The door creaked as Iggy pulled it open and entered the building. He wore a tweed suit with a matching flat-cap, and had a pipe clenched in his teeth. Alex nodded to him, then turned back to Danny.

“True,” he said. “Beaumont didn’t have a pocket watch or a wallet or keys, but even if he had, I don’t need any of those.”

“Well what do you need?” Danny asked, a note of futility in his voice.

“One of the man’s shoes,” Iggy piped up.

“Really?” Danny said, his voice drifting from despair to sarcasm.

“Really,” Alex confirmed. “And that’s why I need you. Beaumont’s clothes are still here, and I need you to sign out a shoe for me.”

“Do you know how that’s going to look if Callahan ever sees the sign-out sheet?” Danny asked.

“He won’t have any reason to look at that,” Alex said, rubbing his hands together. “Especially if we learn something new about who paid for Beaumont to steal that case. Now come on.”

He waved at the officer behind the desk and walked to the elevator with Danny and Iggy in tow.

“Have I ever told you just how much I hate you?” Danny asked as they waited for the car.

Ten minutes later they were on their way back up to the main floor with Charles Beaumont’s left shoe. It was a quality brand, and the leather was well maintained and supple.

“So how is that going to tell us anything about who hired Beaumont?” Danny asked.

Iggy explained Alex’s theory that Beaumont had gone somewhere else before arriving at the Brotherhood of Hope Mission.

“Wouldn’t he have infected anyone he’d gone to see?” Danny asked.

“Probably,” Alex said.

“Alex, I would know if any more bodies had been found,” Danny said. “There weren’t any.”

“Whoever is behind this might have an antidote,” Iggy said. “If they were immune, there wouldn’t be any bodies.”

“They might not have been home,” Alex suggested. “Remember, someone took those jars from Beaumont’s place. We assumed it was the same people who killed Jerry Pemberton, but what if it wasn’t?”

“Then they would have searched Beaumont’s place after killing Pemberton,” Danny reminded him. “Since they didn’t, we know it was Pemberton’s killers who found the jars.”

Alex had to concede that Danny was right about that, but he still felt that the secret of where Beaumont had gone when he ran out of his apartment held some truth, some key that would make the whole sordid mess make sense.

“So where are we going?” Danny asked once they all reached the street.

“Beaumont’s place,” Alex said, spotting Danny’s car and heading for it. “We have to go back to where this chain of events started.”

Danny shook his head, but followed. Twenty minutes later they were parked on the street outside the modest building that was Charles Beaumont’s former residence. The police cars were gone, and no evidence remained on the street of the activity that had taken place the previous morning. Alex led them up to the fifth floor and found a man in a dark suit sitting on a chair in the hallway beside Beaumont’s door. Alex shot Danny a meaningful look and the detective stepped up to the fore of their group.

“You with the FBI?” he asked the man who’d been eyeing them since they exited the stairs.

“Beat it, newsie,” he growled in a basso voice. “There’s nothing to see here.”

Danny flashed his detective’s badge. “I’m with the police. My friends and I need access to Beaumont’s apartment for a few minutes.”

The man scrutinized the badge for a minute, then shrugged.

“I can’t help you, detective,” he said. “I have strict orders not to let anyone in.”

“Look, Agent…?”

“Meyers,” the man supplied.

“Agent Meyers,” Danny continued. “I promise not to touch anything. We just need to look at the table in the middle of the room. I’ll take the heat if anyone finds out.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying,” Meyers said, and chuckled. “The person who gave me those orders is way above your pay grade.”

Alex stepped up.

“About this high,” he said, holding up his hand. “Snappy dresser with platinum blond hair down to her shoulders?”

“How did …?” A look of disbelief crawled inexorably across Agent Meyers face.

“We’re acquainted,” Alex said. “Look, she already doesn’t like me, so if she gets mad, just tell her Alex Lockerby told you it was okay.”

“How does that make me look like anything but a dunce?” he asked with a laugh.

“Trust me, young man,” Iggy said. “The Sorceress is perfectly willing to believe the worst of my friend here.”

“All right,” Meyers said, standing up. “I’ll let you go in, but I have to watch you the whole time.” He took out a key and unlocked the door. “And don’t worry about touching anything. That won’t be a problem.”

He pushed the door open and turned on the light. The apartment was completely bare. Everything from the furniture to the carpets to the coffee pot was gone. The FBI had carted it all away, no doubt to some lab to go over every inch of it.

“Uh-oh,” Danny said, stepping in and looking around. “Is this a problem?”

Alex didn’t know, and he said so.

“I wanted to use the overturned chair as a starting point for a finding rune,” he said.

“If you can use a finding rune to track Beaumont’s movements,” Danny said, an incredulous look on his face, “why didn’t you do that yesterday?”

“The success of a finding rune depends on how much information the caster has,” Iggy said in the manner of a university professor lecturing to a class.

“The magic needs something to latch onto,” Alex continued. “I knew where Beaumont lived and what he did for a living, but I didn’t suspect he’d gone anywhere but the mission. A finding rune wouldn’t have shown me anything yesterday.”

“So,” Danny said. “The fact that you believe he went somewhere is going to make the rune work?”

“No,” Alex said, crouching down to stare at the floor. There was a faint outline of chalk where the plague jar’s contents had spilled, but the area of floor inside it was scratched and clouded. “We need something that will physically tie Beaumont to wherever he went.”

“That’s why you needed his shoe,” Danny said, putting it together. “Because wherever he went, his shoe was there too.”

“Very good, detective,” Iggy said. “Now all we have to do is tie that shoe to the place where Beaumont began his journey and the rune should lead us to where he went.”

“Didn’t you say he started this trip right here in this apartment?” Agent Meyers asked.

“Yes,” Alex said, moving a short distance from the chalk outline toward the door. “But the more precisely I can tie the shoe to Beaumont’s flight, the more accurately the finding rune can follow his trail.”

“So, what are you looking for?” Meyers asked, still standing in the doorway. Danny laughed and stepped forward to a spot about two feet from where Alex was scrutinizing the floor.

“This,” he said, pointing to a spot where the finish on the floor was scratched and discolored. “Beaumont stepped in some of the liquid from the jar on his way out the door, remember? It left a footprint here.”

“I remember,” Alex said, squinting at the spot. “How can you tell it’s there?”

“Because it’s been sanded,” Danny said. “Look at the spot where the jar spilled. The FBI didn’t want to risk leaving any residue for future tenants to discover.”

“How did I miss that?” Alex wondered, moving over to the spot. “Thanks.”

“Why not break out your ghostlight and be sure?” Iggy suggested. Alex showed him a sheepish grin.

“I’m out of fuel for the ghostlight burner,” he said. “I used it up on that business with Evelyn Rockwell.”

“You didn’t tell me what happened with that,” Iggy reminded him.

“Later.” Alex didn’t want to revive those events just now, and he pushed the memory of Evelyn’s tortured scream out of his mind.

He took out a piece of chalk and began drawing a complex, geometric figure on the floor. It didn’t have to be made of special inks or even particularly straight as it was just a physical link between the rune he’d drawn in his rune book and the floor.

“I think this is going a bit beyond not touching anything,” Agent Meyers said, concern in his voice.

“Don’t worry,” Iggy said, pulling out his folded handkerchief. “We’ll clean up after ourselves.”

When Alex finished, he dropped the chalk back into his pocket and then tore a finding rune out of his book. Placing the shoe in the exact center of the chalked figure, Alex tucked the rune into the shoe and then lit it. As the paper vanished, the energy of the rune filled his mind.

“Follow the path of Charles Beaumont,” he said, willing the magic into form.

A moment later the shoe began to shake. It spun around in a full circle, then snapped to a position with the toe pointing out the still-open door.

“It’s found it,” Danny said with a grin.

“I’ll be,” Meyers said, eyebrows flying upward.

Alex picked up the shoe while Danny scrubbed the chalk figure off the floor with Iggy’s handkerchief. It tugged in his grip, pulling him inexorably toward the door.

“Thank you, Agent Meyers,” he said, leading everyone back out into the hall. “You’ve been a great help.”

Alex followed the pull of the shoe along the hall to the stairs, then down to the street. The shoe led him around the building and into the outer ring, moving between two slum tenements.

“He turned right.”

“The mission is to the left,” Iggy said. “I guess you were correct.”

“Should I get the car?” Danny asked.

“No,” Alex said, moving off down the dark street. “It can’t have been far or he would never have made it all the way back to the mission.”

The tenements gave way to seedy shops, liquor stores, and the kind of nightclubs that were fronts for illegal gambling and prostitution. Alex didn’t have to worry about anyone bothering them. The organized criminal element kept the muggers and the bums out and away from their profit-making enterprises. Not to mention that on these kind of streets, people made an effort not to notice who their fellow travelers were.

Beyond the businesses, a row of shabby homes and apartments that were little more than flop houses sprang up. The shoe tugged Alex in the direction of a three-story apartment of the rent-by-the-week variety. It had a glass door that was so encrusted with dirt and grime that the lobby beyond was just a blur of faint light. When Alex pulled open the door, he found the dimness of the light had more to do with the single, naked bulb hanging from a wire than the thickness of the grime on the glass.

A shabbily dressed woman, whose stained blouse was opened low enough to give a good view of her bosom, looked up from a gossip magazine. When she saw Alex, she put on a smile that was more of a leer and leaned forward, showing even more of her breasts.

“What can I do for you, honey?” she said in a voice that indicated renting rooms wasn’t the only service she offered.

“You can tell us if anyone’s checked out of this dump in the last five days,” Danny said, flashing his badge. The woman’s face soured and she stood up straight.

“A couple of people,” she said with a shrug.

“Upstairs,” Alex reported, feeling the tug on the shoe. Danny looked at the woman, holding her eyes for a long moment.

“We’re going to go have a look around upstairs,” he said. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“Nope.” She shrugged.

“We should look at the registration first,” Iggy said. The woman laughed.

“The kind of folk who come through here are usually named Smith,” she said. “At least the ones that ain’t named Jones.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Danny said. “Let’s check the room first.” He shifted his gaze to the woman, who now wore a look of interest in what they were doing. “You stay here,” he said.

The interest faded from her eyes and she picked up her magazine.

The shoe led them up to the second floor, to a room in the back. When they reached it, the shoe turned to point at it. Alex released the spell and the shoe shuddered, the pull from it disappearing. He slipped it into his jacket pocket and left it there, sticking out. His hand was just about to knock when Iggy grabbed his arm.

“You smell that?” he asked.

Alex had been too excited to pay attention, but he was now. A sickly sweet odor was emanating faintly from the door.

“Ugh,” Alex said, recoiling. “What is that?”

“Putrefaction,” Danny said. “Something or someone is dead in there, and they’ve been dead a while.”

“Could they still be infected?” Alex asked Iggy. Iggy shook his head.

“Not after all this time. Remember the bodies at the Mission.”

Alex nodded and took hold of the handle.

“Here goes,” he said. The handle turned in his hand and the door opened. A wave of stench washed out into the hall and Alex recoiled, coughing and trying to keep from vomiting. Danny backed down the hallway, gagging. Only Iggy seemed unaffected, but he had taken the precaution of lighting his pipe.

“Dear God,” Alex gasped.

“Steady on, lad,” Iggy said. “You’ll get used to it in a minute or two. In the meantime, however, I’ll go in and open a window.”

“You all right?” Alex asked Danny, putting his handkerchief over his nose and mouth.

“Yeah,” Danny said. He didn’t look too bad. “I was on a stake-out down at the docks a couple of years ago. It was about the same.”

The two men took a deep breath and entered the apartment. Despite its seedy exterior, the room was neat and clean. There were no dishes in the sink, the ashtrays were mostly empty, and three portmanteau trunks sat in the front room, closed and secured. The only thing amiss were the three bodies.

One lay on the couch, her arms crossed across her chest as if she’d been laid out for burial. A man sat in one of the chairs, a book in his lap as if he’d just fallen asleep. A second man was slumped over the table, a pencil clutched in his lifeless hand. All of them were dressed far too nicely to be staying in this hotel.

Iggy came back into the room from the back; already air was beginning to move through the little space.

“So who are these three?” Danny asked.

Alex bent down and retrieved a book that had fallen to the floor beside the man at the table.

“I think these are our missing Germans,” he said, flipping through it. He held it open so Danny and Iggy could see the spidery script. “Anyone read German?”

“I do,” Iggy said, taking the book. He squinted at the text, the pulled his reading glasses from his coat pocket. “Give me a minute,” he said, running his finger along the text. “It’s been a long time.”

“If these are the Germans who came over with the plague, they’ll have their passports on them,” Danny said.

The man at the table had put his coat over the back of his chair before he died, so Alex checked its pockets and withdrew a small, leather-bound black book.

“Dietrich Strand,” he read, opening the front cover.

“This one is Greta Albrecht,” Danny said after going through the woman’s handbag. He pulled out his notebook and consulted it. “That would make this other guy,” he indicated the man with the book, “Helge Rothenbaur.”

Alex pulled the passport out of the dead man’s jacket pocket and opened it. “Sure enough. Helge Rothenbaur,” he read. Danny shook his head.

“What are these people doing here?” he said. “Didn’t they come to New York on the same airship as the plague jars?”

“Yes they did,” Alex said and nodded, “so why steal them once they get into a secure warehouse?”

“They couldn’t get to them on the airship,” Iggy said. He held up the journal. “Mr. Strand left us his confession. After declaring his love for Greta here,” Iggy nodded at the dead woman. “Strand says that the thief—”

“Beaumont,” Alex supplied.

Iggy gave him a withering look and Alex clammed up.

“—Beaumont told them to take this room and wait for him.”

“He must have used this place to preserve his anonymity,” Danny said. “Pretty smart.”

“Strand says that Beaumont came here claiming to have broken a jar and demanding an antidote. When he was told there was none, he fled before they could stop him.” Iggy looked around at the dead. “There are letters here from each of them to family members and loved ones,” he said. “They knew they were infected, that they’d have to stay here until they died.”

Alex looked around at the dead and shuddered. When his time came, he didn’t want to see it coming.

“Is there anything in there about why they wanted to steal the plague?” Danny asked. “They don’t sound like they intended to cause an outbreak.”

Iggy paged toward the front of the book. “It says here that these three were part of the team that developed the disease. They were told it was going to speed up disease research, cure things like polio and cancer.”

“What happened?” Danny asked.

Iggy paged back and ran his finger down the page until he found what he was looking for. “They overheard the project leader, an Alchemist named Josef Mengele, talking with a government official. Apparently the disease was meant to start a civil war here in America, giving Hitler and the Nazis free rein in Europe.”

“How are a couple of jars of a fast-acting plague going to start a civil war?” Alex asked. It didn’t make any sense. Worse, it looked like the European conference wasn’t the target after all.

“It goes on,” Iggy said, scanning the book. “The plague was supposed to be picked up in New York by spies operating in the city and then strike four specific targets.”

“Where?” Danny asked. Iggy shook his head and nodded at the dead man with the pencil.

“He didn’t know, but he thought it had something to do with New York’s sorcerers. Mengele was specific that the plague had to be resistant to magic.”

“So no one infected could use spells to purge the infection from their system,” Alex said.

“Probably,” Iggy agreed.

“It still doesn’t explain how four jars of instant plague could start any kind of war,” Danny pointed out.

“Four jars,” Alex said, the number tickling at something in his brain. There were six sorcerers, not four. He snapped his fingers as everything fell into place in his brain. “Where’s the phone?” he asked, looking around.

“There’s no phone here,” Iggy said. “If there were, these unfortunates could have called for help.”

“Why do you need a phone?” Danny asked.

“What would happen if four of New York’s sorcerers died from a mysterious magical plague?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Danny said. “I mean it would be a disaster for the New York economy, but we’d get through it.”

“What if the survivors were John D. Rockefeller and William Todd?” Alex grabbed the detective by the shoulders.

“Who cares who the survivors are?” Danny said.

“Everyone would,” Iggy gasped. “Rockefeller and Todd have been feuding for years.”

“And Todd is a paranoid hermit,” Alex said. “He’d accuse Rockefeller of starting the plague.”

Danny began to nod, a look of alarm on his face. “And Rockefeller wouldn’t take that lying down. It would start a war between them.”

“The New York Six are the most powerful and wealthy sorcerers in the world,” Alex pointed out. “With four of them gone, every other sorcerer in America would be lining up to support one faction or the other, hoping to move in once the dust settles. It would destabilize the whole country.”

“So, what do we do?” Danny said. “We don’t have any proof of this. You know Captain Rooney isn’t going to call anybody about this without ironclad evidence, especially not a sorcerer.”

Alex turned and ran out into the hallway. “You call Callahan and get someone over here to take charge of the bodies and the journal,” he called as he tore down the stairs.

“Where are you going?” Danny yelled after him.

Alex dashed downstairs and across the lobby, past the reception desk and the woman with the gossip magazine. Laying his good shoulder into the door, he stumbled out into the night, tearing off up the street toward the lights of the nightclubs. They might not serve any useful purpose, but you could always get a cab in front of one. He jumped in the first one he found.

“The Waldorf,” he said. “Quickly,” he added when the cabbie looked at him incredulously. Not many people went to the Waldorf from this neighborhood.

As the cab pulled away from the curb, Alex opened his kit and dropped Beaumont’s shoe inside, exchanging it for his 1911 which he slipped into his jacket pocket. Whoever had the plague jars had four targets, and one of them was Sorsha Kincaid. Thanks to Alex’s erroneous assumption that the Germans on the airship were the ones who owned the plague jars, she was right this very minute standing in a hotel ballroom at a conference of boring diplomats.

He might as well have put a bull’s-eye on her back.

To keep his mind off how long the cab took to reach the core and the Waldorf hotel, Alex paged through his rune book. He’d used a lot of his powerful runes in the last few days and there were precious little left. After flipping through it twice, he tucked it back in his pocket with a note of disgust. Unless he wanted to fix a run in the Sorceress’ stockings, there wasn’t much his rune book could contribute.

When the cab finally stopped in front of the Waldorf, Alex shoved all the money he had into the cabbie’s hand, hoping it would be enough, and ran to the enormous glass doors. Beyond them, inside the hotel’s vestibule, a security station had been set up. All the doors but one were blocked with potted plants, and two policemen stood on either side of the open door. Agent Davis stood in the doorway, clipboard in hand, and he looked up in shock as Alex came tearing through the door.

“Why are you here, Lockerby?” he asked, stepping in front of the open door. Alex stopped short to avoid running into the FBI man.

“Where’s Sorsha?” he demanded.

“Miss Kincaid is inside where she belongs,” Davis said. “Now why don’t you go back where you belong?”

“I need to speak to her! She’s in danger.”

Agent Davis laughed in his face. “She’s in the safest place in the city right now,” he said. “Those Germans aren’t going to get in here tonight or any other night.”

“You’re right,” Alex agreed. “Because they’re dead.”

Alex briefly relayed the story of finding the German alchemists and the details they had left behind.

“You have to let me talk to her,” he finished.

“Sorsha Kincaid knows how to take care of herself,” Agent Davis said.

“She doesn’t know this is coming,” Alex said. “She has to be warned.”

Davis vacillated for a long moment, indecision on his face.

“Fine,” he said at last. “She’s in the ballroom.” He stepped aside and let Alex through. “But don’t disturb the other guests.”

The ballroom of the Waldorf hotel was massive, three stories high with polished hardwood floors and arcades running along the side walls that housed recessed balconies. Carved columns ran up every wall to large painted cornices, and crystal chandeliers hung everywhere. The thick smoke of a hundred cigarettes hung in the room and a cacophony of voices filled the chamber with the incoherent buzz of conversation.

Alex stood paralyzed for a moment, scanning the crowd, but moments later a head of platinum hair in an A-line cut came into view. The Sorceress had taken off the hat with the veil and now her white-blonde hair shone like a beacon in the dimly lit room.

“Mr. Lockerby,” she said with an unamused smile when she caught sight of his approach. She quickly excused herself from the group she’d been conversing with and turned to meet him. “I used to like your penchant for showing up in the most unexpected places,” she said. “Now, I’m starting to tire of it.”

“Nice to see you too,” he said, taking her by the elbow and gently pulling her along in his wake. “We need to talk.”

She looked as if she were about to object, but something she saw in his face made her hesitate.

“This way, then,” she said, pulling free of his grasp and making her way toward the back of the room where a large stage and podium had been set up. She moved behind the podium and entered a small door so cleverly set into the wall that Alex didn’t even see it until Sorsha opened it. Inside the door was a hallway that ran behind the ballroom and enabled the hotel staff to deliver food or move furniture without being seen.

“Now,” she said, imperiously. “What is so important?”

“This convention isn’t the target for that plague,” he said. “You are.”

As quickly as he could, Alex recounted the story of finding the dead alchemists, Dietrich Strand’s journal, and his theory about how the plague could be used to start a civil war. Sorsha listened quietly with her arms crossed, absently tapping her arm with her fingernail.

“That does make some sense,” she grudgingly admitted when Alex had finished.

“The only thing I can’t figure is, why haven’t they acted yet?” Alex said. “I mean they’ve had their plague for almost a week now.”

“I can answer that,” Sorsha said. “As soon as I learned of this alchemical plague, I warned my fellow sorcerers. They’ve had round-the-clock protection since then. Whoever these agents are, they’re going to find it difficult to get up to one of our flying homes and carry out their attack. After all, there are more than policemen guarding those dwellings.”

“Policemen?” Alex asked. He’d naturally assumed a sorcerer would have living gargoyles or something like that to protect his house.

“The sorcerers contract with the New York Police for our protection,” Sorsha said.

“So what now?” Alex asked. “Whoever has that plague isn’t going to stop just because the job is hard.”

Sorsha turned and set off at a fast walk, moving along the hallway toward its end.

“I’ll need to speak to Captain Rooney,” she was saying. “If we organize it right, we might be able to create a weakness the German agents will believe they can exploit.”

“You want to set a trap?”

“Yes,” Sorsha sighed. “I want to set a trap.”

“Then why didn’t you just say that?” Alex asked, irritation in his voice.

“Mr. Lockerby,” Sorsha fumed. “I hardly need—”

“Sorsha, there you are,” a new voice boomed.

Alex’s hand dropped into his jacket pocket and curled around the grip of his pistol as he turned. The newcomer was a well-dressed man in an expensive dark suit. He still wore a turned-down fedora, so he’d only just arrived, having not had time to check his hat. He was tall with a mass of close-cut curly hair the same color as copper and bright, intelligent eyes. His smile was crooked and his jaw angled down from his sharp cheekbones to a cleft in his chin.

Alex decided he didn’t like the man.

“Director Stevens,” Sorsha said, a surprised look on her face. “I didn’t expect to see you here tonight.”

He took Sorsha’s hand and kissed it gently.

“How could I not come when you call for help?” he said, the crooked smile returning to his face. Sorsha, on the other hand looked confused. “Call for help?”

“I know you didn’t do that exactly,” Stevens said, and laughed. “But I think you were right to request more security. Who’s your friend?” he wondered, pointing to Alex.

“Uh,” Sorsha said, clearly thrown off balance. “Director Adam Stevens of the FBI’s New York field office, this is Alexander Lockerby, Private Investigator.”

“The one who found out where the plague came from,” Stevens said with raised eyebrows. He stuck out his hand and shook Alex’s. “I have to be frank,” he said. “I’ve never had much use for P.I.s, but that was some damn fine work, Mr. Lockerby.”

“Thanks,” Alex said.

Maybe this guy isn’t so bad.

“What did you mean about me requesting additional security here?” Sorsha said. She seemed confused.

“Not here,” Stevens said. “For the sorcerers.”

“What?” Alex and Sorsha said together. Now Stevens looked confused.

“Agent Warner called a few hours ago,” he said. “Told us to round up the agents that you wanted and send them up to flesh out the police details protecting the sorcerers.”

“Where are they now?” Sorsha demanded. Steven shrugged.

“I sent them over to Police Headquarters,” he said. “They’ll catch a floater there to take them up to their posts.”

Floaters were basically flying police cars invented by the sorcerer William Todd. They could fly, but they weren’t fast, and they could only hold about five people at a time, so the police didn’t use them often.

“They’re going to need more than one floater,” Alex said. “If I were the police dispatcher I’d probably send each group up in their own car.”

“Stevens,” Sorsha said, her tone one of a general commanding field troops. “Call whoever’s in charge at Manhattan Station and tell them to stop those floaters from leaving. All the FBI agents are to be detained and warn the police to be careful; some of them are German spies carrying the three remaining jars of plague.”

“You’re not serious,” Steven said, but the look on Sorsha’s face told him otherwise. “What if the floaters have already left?”

“I’ll call the sorcerers,” Sorsha said. “They’ll be able to capture anyone coming up in a floater as long as they know they’re coming. Now go.”

Stevens ran off toward the front desk and its telephone but Sorsha just reached into her handbag and pulled out what looked like a makeup mirror in a case. She opened it and set it on the floor facing her. Taking a few steps back, she uttered something in her deep, echo-y voice, and a moment later the image of a man in his late fifties with graying hair and a handlebar mustache appeared, floating above the mirror.

“Sorsha, my darling, you look radiant,” the man said in an easy voice. “To what do I owe the great pleasure of this call?”

Sorsha quickly outlined the German plot and its purpose.

“So,” the man said, twirling the ends of his mustache. “Hitler thinks he can put one over on us. I’ll show that Charlie Chaplin impersonator.”

“Focus, Andrew,” Sorsha said in a hard voice.

Alex was startled when he heard the name. Andrew Barton, the Lightning Lord, the man who provided power to all of Manhattan.

“Right now,” Sorsha was saying, “you are going to pass the word to everyone, and make sure they catch the men in those floaters.”

Andrew cupped his hand and a ball of lighting appeared in it. “That won’t be a problem, my dear,” he said.

“None of that,” Sorsha barked at him. “Some of the men in those cars are ordinary policemen. I don’t have to remind you what might happen if you kill any of them.”

Apparently, Andrew didn’t have to be reminded, because he closed his fist and the ball of lightning vanished.

“You take the fun out of everything, my dear,” he said with a sigh. “Speaking of which, when are you going to finally come dine with me?”

Sorsha cocked an eyebrow at him. “If I want to be chased around a table by a dirty old man, I’ll go to a bawdy house,” she said. “Now get the word out before someone gets killed.”

She snapped her fingers and the image disappeared.

“I’m guessing,” Alex said as the Sorceress bent down to pick up her mirror and fold it into its case, “that since you didn’t give any orders for extra FBI personnel, that Agent Warner took it upon himself. How long has he been with you?”

“He’s new,” Sorsha said, marching off toward the front door. “He and about a dozen other agents arrived in the New York office at the same time.”

Alex thought back to his associations with the young, blonde agent. Warner didn’t like him, but that was not surprising from an FBI man.

“I don’t see him as a Nazi agent,” Alex said.

“Let’s find him first,” Sorsha said. “Then you can ask him. He’s working the front door with Agent Davis.”

“No, he’s not,” Alex said, pulling Sorsha to a stop. “When I came in, Davis was there alone. Where else would Warner be?”

Sorsha thought for a moment, then set off toward the elevator. “I have a suite that we’ve been using as an office,” she said.

“Must be nice,” Alex said as the elevator operator opened the door for them.

“Penthouse,” she said, and the man turned the lever that sent the car rising into the air.

A long minute later they reached the door to the east penthouse room. Alex pulled his pistol from his jacket pocket.

“I have a rune that will unlock the door,” he said, before realizing that with his pistol in hand, and his other arm in a sling, he couldn’t reach his rune book.

“Never mind that,” Sorsha said. “Turn your back.”

She didn’t wait for him to comply, she simply raised her arms and spoke a word and the door burst as if it had been stuffed with gunpowder. Alex barely averted his face before he was showered in splinters and sawdust.

Sorsha strode into the room as if she had just been announced at Buckingham Palace. Alex followed after her, brushing chips of wood from his suit jacket with his pistol. The room beyond was a parlor, with a sunken area lined with elegant couches and chaise longues. A long bar of some light-colored wood filled one entire wall, and several hallways led out of the room.

Sorsha turned left, so Alex went right. He pulled open the first door he came to and found a bathroom. At the end of the hall was a tiny sunroom with a writing desk, a small couch, and a telephone.

“Sorceress,” Alex called, tucking his gun back into his pocket. “I don’t think Agent Warner is your Nazi.”

“Why not?” Sorsha called from the parlor.

“Because he’s dead.”

Agent Warner lay slumped over the writing desk. Blood and brain matter covered the wall in front of him and he still had a service .38 clutched in his left hand.

“What to do you mean, he’s d—” Sorsha came through the door, but at the sight of the corpse, she turned her back. “Dear God,” she said, her voice heavy with the effort not to vomit. She took a few deep breaths, then turned back to the grisly scene.

“Did he shoot himself to keep from being caught?” she asked. “How did he know we were on to him?”

“Someone might have called him,” Alex said, indicating the phone where it had fallen on the floor, knocked off the table by Warner’s falling body. “But I don’t think that’s it. Especially since he didn’t kill himself.”

Sorsha looked up at him sharply.

“See how the blood is on the wall in front of him,” Alex explained. “He would have had to turn his head and tilt it up before pulling the trigger. That’s the kind of position he’d be in if he heard someone behind him and started to turn. If he’d shot himself while sitting normally, the blood should be here,” he said, indicating the window on Warner’s right side. “Also, that’s a lot of blood and brains for a .38. Looks like a bigger entry hole too. If I had to guess, it was a .45, like the one I carry.”

Sorsha raised one of her dark eyebrows.

“Are you trying to make me suspect you?” she asked. Alex shook his head and put his hand on Warner’s neck.

“No. This body is still warm,” he said. “This happened within the last twenty minutes, and since you and I were together for that time, I couldn’t have killed him. We do know someone else though, who uses the same kind of gun I do.”

“No.” Sorsha shook her head, a pleading, almost desperate look in her eyes. “It’s not possible.”

Alex pushed on unmercifully.

“Someone else who also had access to your suite.”

“He’s been part of my team for five years,” she said, still not willing to believe it.

“Where is Agent Davis?”

“You said he was at the front door,” Sorsha said, her voice distant.

“I’ll bet you a steak dinner he isn’t there now,” Alex said. “In fact, I’ll bet as soon as he let me in, he came up here and killed Warner.” A disturbing thought occurred to Alex and he stepped around Sorsha and into the hall. “If you’re his target, he might still be here.”

“No,” Sorsha said, confidently. “He knows me better than that. We worked together long enough that he’d know his only chance would be to surprise me.”

“So where would he go? He can’t do anything to help his confederates aboard the floaters, so what’s his play?”

“He’s probably fled,” Sorsha said. “He’d know that the first thing we’d do is lock down the building.”

“I don’t think so,” Alex said. “If he just wanted to escape, he wouldn’t need to kill Warner. He’s still in the hotel.”

Sorsha cocked her head to the side and her hair fell across half her face. She looked like she was about to disagree with him, but then her head came up, her eyes opened wide, and she gasped. Her hands gripped her gut and she doubled over in pain. Alex grabbed her arm, holding her steady as she swayed.

“What’s wrong?”

“He’s not in the hotel,” she gasped. “He’s in my home.”

She gasped again, pressing her hand to her stomach and Alex hooked his good arm under hers to keep her upright. Her breathing was coming in ragged gasps and her pale skin took on a yellowish tinge.

“Davis must have had Warner order a floater sent here,” Alex said, helping Sorsha back to the parlor and onto a chase longue. “That’s why he killed him, to give himself time to get up to your castle undetected.”

Sorsha began muttering in that deep, echo-y voice of her spell casting, while rubbing her stomach with her hand. A bright bluish light glowed from under the Sorceress’ palm and spread out over her body. After a few seconds, her breathing became regular and her skin tone returned to normal. She opened her eyes and looked up at Alex, standing over her.

“The kind of magic that protects my home is … intimate,” she explained. “It’s tied to me.”

“What happened?”

“Agent Davis has a spell breaker,” she said. “He just used it to break open my front door.”

“What does he want in your house?”

“He wants to start a war, remember,” she said, standing slowly. “If he drops my house on the city…”

“It would flatten a city block,” Alex said.

“More likely two,” Sorsha said, her composure fully returned. She spread her arms and shook out her hands like a weight lifter getting ready to set a record. “Now stand back. I’m going to go stop Agent Davis.”

Alex stepped close to her, looking her hard in the eyes.

“Not without me, you’re not.”

“This isn’t the time for heroics,” Sorsha said, trying and failing to push him out of the way. “I hardly need your help to subdue one intruder in my home.”

She raised her hands and Alex grabbed her left wrist.

“Yes, you do,” he said. “This isn’t some last act of desperation, Sorceress. Think about it. Davis had a floater brought here before I ever showed up. This was his plan all along. He’s thought it through. He knows he might have to face you to succeed. Whatever his plans are, they include taking you down.”

Sorsha’s face was grim but her cheeks pinked. Clearly she wasn’t used to being so completely wrong about someone, or so thoroughly out-maneuvered.

“I bet his plans don’t include you,” she said with a smile and a nod. “Put your arm around me and hold on.”

Alex slipped his right arm around her slim waist and pulled her against him. He was very aware of her, pressing against him, and he pushed the thought from his mind.

Sorsha raised her arms and spoke a long, complicated sentence in her Sorceress’ voice. The second the echoes of her words faded away, Alex heard a sound like a thousand nails being scraped across plate glass, and he felt his body being twisted like taffy in a puller. It didn’t hurt, but he wanted to vomit. Clinging to the Sorceress, he pressed his face down into her hair. She smelled like strawberries and cream, which he would have found intoxicating at any other moment.

Alex had the distinct impression that he’d been rolled flat in a clothes wringer and slipped under a door. Then, a tremendous light flashed before his eyes and he dropped to his knees on a hard stone surface, still holding on to the Sorceress.

He assumed that she traveled this way all the time, but when he finally looked up, panting and trying not to shake, he found Sorsha leaning against his chest with her eyes shut tight. After a long moment she opened them and gently pushed herself away.

“It will wear off after a moment,” she said, slumping down to sit on the stone in her slinky black dress.

Alex put his free hand on his knee to push himself upright, but a wave of nausea gripped him, and he stopped. When his stomach finally stopped vibrating, and his vision cleared, he tried again, levering himself up to a standing position. Once he was stable, he reached down and helped Sorsha to her feet.

They had landed on a stone balcony with a marble railing running around it. A comfortable-looking chaise longue sat under an elegant lamp next to a side table with a book sitting on it. Beyond the chaise stood a set of stained glass doors depicting a woodland scene with trees, shrubs, and wildlife.

“This is my private entrance, Lockerby,” Sorsha said, reaching out to open the doors.

If Alex hadn’t been looking at her slender hand on the door handle, he would have missed the brief spark of magic that leapt between the two when she turned it.

She pushed the doors open and stepped into a vaulted room with an enormous crystal chandelier hanging from the high ceiling. A large, four-poster bed stood on a raised dais along the right side of the room. Its posts were carved in keeping with the theme of the stained glass, with vines, leaves, and forest creatures spiraling around them, up to the canopy. Around the room stood intricately carved dressing tables, chests of drawers, wardrobes, and even a small breakfast table in a round nook with gigantic windows to let in the light.

As grand as the room was, it appeared to be in a state of disarray. Toiletries on the dressing table were left out, drawers were open in the chests, and a trail of the Sorceress’ unmentionables led from the bed to a door Alex could only assume was a bathroom. Alex noted that the pair of lace-trimmed underwear matched the brassiere and the garter belt — all were a light sky blue, like the Sorceress’ eyes. He assumed there were matching stockings, but thinking about that was extremely distracting with Sorsha a few feet in front of him. He reached into his coat pocket and took hold of his pistol, focusing his mind on the task at hand.

“This way,” Sorsha said, leading the way across her bedroom without comment.

She continued out onto a balcony above a foyer that could have fit Alex’s entire office inside it twice. The upper balcony ran around the room in a U shape with carved balusters supporting polished cherry-wood handrails. Thick Persian carpets covered the balcony’s hardwood floor, ending in a runner that descended the wide stair, flaring out at the bottom as the staircase did. The main floor was white marble and decorated with furniture from couch chairs to hall trees to elegant tables supporting Asian-looking vases. Only two things looked out of place in this ocean of elegance, the shattered and broken front door, and the figure of a man lying on the cold floor, a large red pool spreading out beneath him.

“Hitchens!” Sorsha screamed, then before Alex could stop her, she hurled herself over the banister. She spread out her arms and uttered a word and her fall arrested just as she reached the floor. She landed on the marble with a sharp clack from her high heels.

Alex tore off along the balcony and around to the stairs. By the time he reached the bottom, Sorsha had the man’s head in her lap. He looked to be in his late fifties with gray hair, a salt and pepper mustache, and a weathered face. A large purple bruise had spread across the side of his face and his white waistcoat was dark with blood.

“I’m sorry,” he was saying. “He had a spell breaker. When the enchantment on the door broke, it exploded. I tried to stop him but—” The man coughed and blood stained his mustache.

“Don’t talk,” Sorsha said. “I’m going to get you to the hospital. Where are the cook and the maids?”

“Sent them away in the floater,” he gasped.

“You should have gone with them,” Sorsha said, stroking his face.

He looked up at her, as if he were about to respond, but there was no life left in his eyes. Sorsha just sat there, weeping openly. Alex reached out and closed the old man’s eyes.

“Sorceress,” Alex said, trying to rouse her from her grief.

He didn’t have to say anything further because at that moment the entire floating castle trembled and shook. Alex stumbled to his feet and put out a hand for Sorsha, pulling the Sorceress up.

“Where are your spells that keep this place flying?” he asked as she stumbled against him.

“In a vault in the basement,” she said, pushing herself away from him and starting off toward the back of the grand staircase.

An elaborately carved door with painted panels hid a wrought-iron staircase that spiraled downward into the dark. Sorsha kicked off her high heels, then took the stairs two at a time. As she moved down, lights on the inner pole of the stairway lit up to guide her passage.

Alex plunged after her. At first the spiral stair was encased in a wall of rock all the way around, but after he’d gone down a story or two, the rock fell away and it seemed like the stairway floated over a vast, dark expanse.

When Sorsha hit the bottom, lights bloomed in a cavernous room that turned out to be Sorsha’s workshop. Large closed doors occupied one entire side of the room and a massive crane on a metal track sat just inside. Pallets of boxes lined one wall of the room with iron bar stock on the other. A long row of tables ran down the middle of the room with a line of bars, waiting for Sorsha to enchant them.

The Sorceress gave no heed to the workshop, turning and sprinting in her stocking feet to a simple door set in the far wall of stone. Beyond the door, a stone passage ran along straight and then curved to the right. Several doors were set in the wall at various points, but Sorsha ran by them without stopping. At the end of the corridor was a simple, square room with papered walls and walnut wainscoting. On the far wall hung an enormous vault door, at least six feet in diameter and two feet thick. It stood open, revealing a short hallway beyond that led to a wide room. The outer plating on the door had been blasted away and Alex could see the mechanisms that operated the lock.

The sharp sound of a crack, not unlike a gunshot, sounded from inside the vault and the castle shook so hard, Sorsha slipped. She almost fell, grabbing on to Alex’s left arm in an effort to stay upright.

Alex gasped and felt the blood drain from his face. His ribs were healing faster than normal thanks to Iggy, but they hadn’t healed completely. Pain sprouted from his side and spread through his body, making his fingers and toes tingle. He swore, and Sorsha realized what she had done.

“Sorry,” she said, releasing his arm. She moved forward, across the vault threshold. “Stay behind me,” she said.

Alex was about to protest, but Sorsha had already moved into the short hallway. Beyond the end of the hall, he could see the intricate patterns of dozens of spells, swirling slowly. Some were blue, while others were purple, green, orange, and occasionally white. Ethereal tendrils of energy emanated from some, reaching out to join them with others, forming a net of pulsing cobwebs overhead, like a dome. The floor was cut into broad steps, like an amphitheater with spells laid out on each level going up.

Sorsha reached the end of the hall, then stepped out into the main chamber. She raised her hands, and power crackled through her fingers.

“Davis,” she cried, lowering her hand and sending a bolt of greenish lighting off into the room. A sound like a hammer hitting shatterproof glass rang out and Sorsha raised her hand again. Before she could strike, two shots rang out. Alex saw the first shot hit an invisible shield around the Sorceress and it flashed with light at the impact. The second round hit the shield and shattered it. Alex flung his good arm up over his face and turned away as decaying fragments of the shield hit him. Most just slammed into his suit coat and vanished, but one sliced across his cheek, and he felt blood dripping down his face.

Sorsha cried out and Alex turned back in time to see her fall. He couldn’t tell if she’d been hit by the bullet or by shards of the decaying shield, but she clamped her hand to her hip. Another shot rang out as she fell, but it missed its target. Alex darted forward and grabbed Sorsha by the arm, pulling her back into the hallway. He stepped over her and pulled his pistol from his pocket, waiting for Davis to approach.

A booming impact followed by a sizzling sound like a broken electrical cable rang out and the castle shook again.

“Get back,” Sorsha gasped, her face a mask of pain.

“You hurt bad?” he asked, still covering the end of the hall. Sorsha forced herself into a sitting position, a grunt of pain escaping her lips.

“I’m not hurt good,” she gasped, once she was upright.

“Funny,” Alex said. “How bad is it?”

“My shield slowed it down some,” she said. “Got me in the hip. Doesn’t…doesn’t seem too bad. Hurts like crazy, though.”

“Stay put then,” Alex said, moving to the corner. “Where is he?”

“Don’t bother,” Sorsha said, her breathing shallow. “He’s got some kind of magical shield. A charm of some kind, powerful one too.”

“That means it won’t last long,” Alex said.

The ringing gong sound filled the air again and the castle shook.

“What’s he doing?” Alex asked.

“Hitting the central levitation spell with a crowbar,” Sorsha said. “Mus… must have a spell breaker rune on it.”

“Multiple ones,” Alex said with a nod. “Each time he hits a spell, the rune is spent. How much longer can your spell hold up?”

“Don’t know.” Sorsha shook her head.

Alex took off his hat and laid it on the floor, then inched up to the corner with his weapon at the ready.

“What are you going to do, Alex?” she whispered. “Please tell me you have a plan.”

Alex nodded but didn’t respond. A moment later the crowbar hit the spell again, ringing like crystal. This time the note wasn’t a pure ringing tone like it had been before; this time it sounded flat, sour. The moment the blow was struck, Alex leaned around the corner. Davis stood over a large purple incantation in the center of the room. He held a heavy crowbar of some greenish metal in his right hand with runes of fire running down its length. Alex could see the one on the end unraveling as it was discharged. Davis would only be able to use that spell breaker so long as he had runes to charge it, but with at least four charges left, he was likely to succeed in smashing the levitation spell. Already the spell was spinning slowly, like some immensely tiny galaxy, but with a wobble that made it look sickly.

The floor shook, and Davis held on to the next tiered level. Alex braced himself against the wall and brought his pistol up. Davis’s gun was tucked into his holster. He caught sight of Alex just as the room stopped shaking and dropped the spell breaker, going for his gun instead.

Alex fired.

The bullet slammed into the magical shield and it glowed bright yellow for a moment, a perfect sphere around the FBI man.

Alex fired again.

This time, when the sphere glowed, Alex could see cracks spreading out from the point of his bullet’s impact. Davis’s hand closed around his pistol and he jerked it free.

Alex fired.

Davis’s shield shattered with enough force to send the spell breaker spinning away from him and the bullet went through and struck him in the right side of his chest. Alex fired again, and the second bullet caught him in the stomach.

Despite being hit twice, Davis fired back. He wasn’t in much of a condition to aim and his shots went wide, but they did force Alex back into the cover of the hall.

“How?” Sorsha asked but Alex just grinned and shrugged. “You lying rat,” she grunted a moment later. “You told me there wasn’t a spell breaker rune on your gun.”

“There isn’t,” Alex said, picking up his hat. “The runes are on the bullets.”

He pushed his hat around the corner and Davis put a hole right through it.

“That’s pretty good shooting for a man as badly wounded as you are,” Alex called. “You know that belly wound has to be treated soon or you’ll die.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Davis gasped.

“Your plan’s a bust,” Alex said. “Miss Kincaid warned the other sorcerers. They’ll be waiting for those spies you sent up to them. No one is going to die. There’s not going to be a sorcerer war in America.”

“Oh, ye of… little… faith,” Davis grunted through the pain.

“Don’t pull my leg,” Alex said. “If you try crawling over to your spell breaker, I’ll have plenty of time to lean out and finish you off. Give up now and I’ll see you make it to the hospital alive.”

“So your sorcerers can strip my mind of all its secrets?” he said. “No, thank you. Besides, you’re wrong about my plans being done for. The spell holding this castle up is unraveling. It is drifting east and south right now.”

“Empire Tower,” Sorsha gasped.

“That’s right, Sorceress,” Davis said. “This levitation spell should last long enough for us to reach the core, and then…boom.”

“Is he right?” Alex looked at Sorsha.

“Imagine if all the stored energy in Empire Tower were released all at once,” she said through clenched teeth. “The impact of my house falling on the tower would shatter the spells that contain its power. The sudden release of all those forces at once would be like the Halifax disaster.”

“That left a crater over two miles wide,” Alex gasped.

“Think of that, scribbler,” Davis said, his voice weak. “Everyone in America will blame that… on the sorcerers. There will be a war, just of a different kind, as you drive your magic wielders out.”

Alex ducked his head around the corner and pulled back just as another shot rang out.

“All I have to do… is sit here and wait,” Davis said. “I may not have… much time left, but this spell has… even less.”

Alex looked back at Sorsha. “He’s hiding behind the big purple spell,” he said. “If I try to shoot him through it, my spell breakers could destroy it.”

“Why doesn’t he just shoot it?” Sorsha said. “Doesn’t he have a spell breaker rune on his gun?”

“He must have used them up,” Alex said. “Remember, runes disappear after they’re used.”

“I still have enough bullets to keep you at bay,” Davis said. “My only regret… is that I shall miss the glorious… rise of the Third Reich.”

Alex carefully pulled his left arm out of the sling, then struggled out of his suit jacket. He only had a few runes left in his book and one of them was something he hoped he’d never have to try. He’d give a significant amount of his own skin for a flash rune, but he simply didn’t have one, or the three hours and piles of equipment it would take to write one. Even if he had one, there was no guarantee that Sorsha could fix the damaged levitation spell in her condition.

“How on earth are you a Nazi spy, Davis?” Alex asked, gently rolling up his left shirt sleeve.

“I was sent here as a spy during the Great War,” he said. “By the time I’d established my cover… the war was over. I was ordered to stay… in case the day came that I was needed.”

“What are you doing?” Sorsha whispered as Alex exposed the escape rune tattooed into the flesh of his arm.

Alex winked at her. He wasn’t sure himself, and he didn’t have time for long explanations.

“Must have been quite a coup when you got into the FBI,” he said. Davis chuckled.

“You have no idea how happy my superiors in Berlin were.”

Alex paged through his book until he found the rune he sought. It had taken him five hours to write it, mostly with silver ink, and it glowed softly in the dim light.

“My real mission was to bring you back to the Fatherland, Sorsha,” Davis said. “What a boon your mind would have been… to the Fuhrer.”

“I don’t think I would have fit into your new Germany,” Sorsha said.

Alex found a blank paper and pulled a pencil from his shirt pocket. Most runes required time and exotic materials to write, but there were a few, like the minor restoration rune he’d drawn so Mary could mend her stockings, that could be done with just a pencil and a few moments. He laid the paper on the stone floor, then leaned over and began drawing a joining rune on the bit of flash paper.

“Of course you would fit in,” Davis said. “You are the perfect Aryan.”

Sorsha’s eyebrows dropped into a scowl. “So was Agent Warner,” she shot back. “I saw how much that counted for.”

“I am sorry about that,” Davis said. “But I couldn’t have you discovering my plans… until it was too late for you to stop me.”

As if on cue, the castle shook and dipped. It reminded Alex of being on the roller coaster at Coney Island. Sorsha cried out in pain as the castle stopped falling suddenly and her wounded hip slammed into the floor.

“It won’t… be long now,” Davis said, his voice thick with pain. “You’ve both been exceptional adversaries. Especially you, scribbler. My only regret is that you didn’t find the Archimedean Monograph for me. What a triumph… that would have been.”

Alex finished the joining rune, then licked it and stuck it to his arm. He lit a cigarette, then licked the silver rune and stuck it on top of the joining rune. Sorsha reached out and grabbed his leg.

“What are you doing?” she demanded. “I won’t leave while we still have a chance to save New York.”

A sound like glass breaking inside a bell suddenly filled the vault and the floor dropped out from under them.

“I win,” Davis shouted as the castle began to fall.

“Like hell you do,” Alex shouted back and touched the cigarette to the flash paper on his arm. Light blazed from the tattoo etched into his flesh and the world suddenly appeared transparent. He could see Davis suspended in the air over the failing levitation spell, and Sorsha clutching at his leg as the castle fell away from under her. Alex reached down and pulled her tightly to him, then everything collapsed inward, and he felt as if his body were made of rubber, being forced through a long tube.

A moment later he felt his body re-expand, but the castle was still falling, and he was falling with it.

The castle fell around Alex and Sorsha. He didn’t know how long he had until it ran out of sky, but it couldn’t be long.

“What have you done?” Sorsha screamed at him, but her words were cut off by another blinding flash of light.

Alex felt his body going shapeless again, then being rolled and folded in on himself while being pushed through another narrow tube. The sensation went on for what seemed like a long time, until finally he felt himself falling again. He landed heavily on a hard surface and felt the air crushed out of his lungs as Sorsha came down on top of him.

He hoped the scream he heard echoing off the walls was hers and not his, but all he could really be sure of were the purple dots swimming in his vision and incredible pain in his left side.

“What…what have…you done?” Sorsha gasped. Her face flickered in and out of his vision; it was contorted with pain and her mascara was running. “We’re still in New York…the castle.”

“Is at the bottom of the north Atlantic,” Alex managed. “Along with Davis.” He felt light-headed, and a pleasant numbness was spreading out from his chest, erasing his pain.

“You couldn’t have…have moved my castle a thousand miles,” Sorsha said with a groan. “Even I couldn’t have done that.”

“It’s not the distance,” Alex said, his voice taking on a dreamy lilt. “It’s the mass.”

“What the devil is going on here?”

It was Iggy’s voice. Alex’s enhanced escape spell had dropped them right where it was supposed to, in the library at the brownstone.

“Hi Iggy,” Alex said. He was starting to feel drunk.

“A German spy tried…” Sorsha groaned and rolled more onto her side to take the pressure off her hip. “Tried to drop my house on Empire Tower. Alex did something…something to his escape rune. Sent my castle to the coast of Greenland, then brought us… ngg…here.”

“Good God,” Iggy said, his face going whiter than Sorsha’s. “You’re shot.”

“Hip,” Sorsha gasped. “What about him?” She pointed at Alex. Iggy’s face grew stern and sour.

“He used his own life energy to power the escape rune. Traded years, probably decades of his life for the power to transport your castle.” He leaned down and grabbed Sorsha under her arms and knees. “Brace yourself,” he said. “This will hurt.”

To her credit, she didn’t scream when he picked her up, but from where he lay on the floor, Alex could see her biting her lip so hard that it bled.

“Don’t worry, Sorceress,” Iggy said. “I’ll fix you right up. I’m a doctor, remember?”

“What about Alex?” Sorsha gasped.

“If he still has some life energy left, he’ll be all right after a good long nap.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“Then the damn fool’s nap will be of a more permanent nature.”

That sounded ominous, but Alex’s mind was drifting now. He couldn’t seem to make the words and sounds he was hearing make any sense. The room began to recede, as if he were sinking into the floor, until all that was left was a tiny dot of light far, far away.

Then even that was gone.

A knock at his door woke Alex sometime later. The light of midday streamed through his window, and he winked against its brightness. He wanted to bid whoever had knocked to come in but when he opened his mouth, nothing came out.

Swinging his legs off the side, he tried to stand, but slumped to the floor instead. The door opened and Iggy came in, carrying a glass of water.

“Drink,” he said, kneeling down beside Alex and pushing the glass into his hand.

Alex had trouble raising the glass to his lips, and it took him a moment to remember how to drink. During that moment, water spilled down his front.

“How long?” he croaked once he’d got the water down. “How long have I been out?”

“Less than a day,” Iggy said. “You and your Sorceress girlfriend dropped in on me last night.”

Alex ignored the dig. “How is she?”

“No doubt resting comfortably in her suite at the Waldorf.”

Alex shivered, remembering Agent Warner’s corpse. There was no way Sorsha would go back there.

“Once I got the bullet out, she started regenerating quickly,” Iggy said. He offered Alex his hand and pulled the younger man to his feet.

“Regenerating?”

“Oh, yes,” Iggy said. “Why do you think sorcerers age so slowly? Their bodies are constantly regenerating.”

“It must not work if they’re in lot of pain,” Alex mused.

“I imagine they have to be in conscious connection with the source of their magic for it to work,” Iggy said. “Miss Kincaid’s level of trauma kept her from healing herself until I got the bullet out.”

Alex filed that particular bit of information away for a rainy day.

“I’m starved,” he said. “Is there any food in the house?”

“A bit of chicken from two nights ago,” Iggy said. “I’d make you something, but we don’t have too much time. The funeral for Father Clementine and the others from the Mission is this afternoon.”

“Right,” Alex said, and nodded soberly. “Let me take a shower and we’ll go down to The Lunch Box on the way. I’ll introduce you to Mary.”

“I’ve been there since she started working,” Iggy said. “Everyone knows her, including me.”

“All right,” Alex said, moving toward his little bathroom and its even smaller shower. “Give me a few minutes and I’ll meet you downstairs.”

“How many minutes have you got left?” Iggy said, his voice quiet.

“What do you mean?” Alex asked, stripping off his shirt.

“You know damn well what I mean!” Iggy shouted, making Alex jump. “The only way you could have transported that sorceress’ castle was to power the escape rune with your own life force. So how much did you spend? A decade? Two?”

Alex started to smile, to brush the old man’s concerns away, but as he met Iggy’s gaze, he saw tears in the old man’s eyes.

“Iggy,” he said, struggling to explain. “I…”

Iggy sat down on the bed, his eyes staring blankly at the wall. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” he asked, his voice almost gentle. Alex crossed to the bed and knelt down to look him in the face.

“You know what would have happened if that castle had landed anywhere near Empire Tower,” he pointed out. The old man was far too smart to have any doubts what the result of that catastrophe would be. “If I’d just used my escape rune, I’d have come right back here in time for an explosion more powerful than any in history to turn this house and you and me, Danny, Leslie, Mary, and everyone else into a fine powder.”

Iggy nodded his head, but words seemed to fail him. Alex knew he was living that long moment that Alex had faced in Sorsha’s vault. A moment that led to one, and only one, inescapable conclusion.

“Remember what you told me when I asked you why anyone would ever use a life rune?”

Iggy nodded. “I’d rather lose some of my life, than all of it,” he quoted himself. Alex smiled at him.

“I don’t know how much time I’ve got left,” he said. “But then nobody does really. I could get trampled by a crawler tomorrow. At least, if I do, everyone on that crawler will be alive because Sorsha’s castle didn’t fall on Empire Tower.”

Iggy put his hand on Alex’s good shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “You should never have had to be the hero.”

“Maybe they’ll throw me a parade,” Alex chuckled.

“The newspapers are claiming that Miss Kincaid moved her castle out to sea for repairs,” Iggy said. “Apparently the government is hushing the whole thing up.”

“That’s okay.” Alex chuckled again and regretted it instantly, as pain blossomed in his mending ribs. “I hate parades.”

Alex started to rise, but Iggy held on to his shoulder.

“You’re right,” he said. “None of us know what time is left to us. In the interest of that sentiment, there are some things I want you to know.” He paused and blinked, his eyes bright. “I’ve always thought of you like a son. The son I never had.”

“Iggy, you had a son,” Alex pointed out, a little embarrassed. “He paid for this house.”

“Don’t mistake me,” he said. “I loved my son. I couldn’t be prouder of him if I tried. But he didn’t have the gift. I always wanted a son I could share my trade with. Someone I could teach the things I’ve learned, the secrets I’ve discovered. When my son died, I was devastated. No father should ever have to outlive his child. After I came here, I didn’t know what to do with myself, but then I found you hawing runes on a street corner. It didn’t take long for me to know you were worthy to be my heir.”

Alex put his hand on Iggy’s shoulder.

“Thank you, Ignatius,” he murmured. That means a lot.”

“Don’t you see?” Iggy said. “I’ve already lost one son. How can I bear to lose another?”

Alex stood up and pulled the old man to his feet.

“You haven’t lost me yet,” he said. “So, if my time is short, let’s not waste it. Let’s go get something to eat and we’ll go see Father Harry off. Then, when we get back here, we can talk about the rest.”

Iggy hesitated, then he patted Alex’s arm and withdrew downstairs.

Watching him go, Alex felt a pang of guilt. He’d done what had to be done, there was no doubt about that. Hundreds of thousands of people would have died if he hadn’t used his escape rune. It had cost him a good chunk of his own life, but he didn’t regret that. If he hadn’t done it, he would have been dead anyway.

What he regretted, standing alone in his room, was that he had hurt Iggy.

Pushing that thought from his mind, Alex headed for the shower. When he caught sight of himself in the bathroom’s tiny mirror, he jumped. His hair had turned entirely white, like new-fallen snow. Whiter even than Sorsha’s platinum-blonde hair.

“Well,” he said tugging at it. “At least it’s still there.”

That would definitely take some getting used to.

In the shower, Alex examined the place where his escape rune had been tattooed. Only a fading burn mark was left. He’d wait for it to completely disappear before having it redone. That would give him time to design a new one.

Ten minutes later, Alex arrived downstairs, shaved and dressed. He’d had the presence of mind to hang on to his suit jacket when Sorsha’s castle went down, but his hat had been a loss.

“Here,” Iggy said, pulling a slightly old-fashioned fedora from the coat wardrobe by the vestibule.

“Thanks,” Alex said, putting it on and turning the brim down in front.

They made their way to The Lunch Box and then across town to a cemetery next to a little church on the far side of the Core. Only a few dozen people had turned out for the funeral of a clergyman of no great renown. As the Bishop of the Diocese droned on at the gravesite, Alex wondered if this were the kind of funeral Jesus himself received. It made him smile to think that Father Harry would have liked it. He was a simple man who went about doing what good he could, like his Master before him.

Iggy and Leslie, who had joined them at the cemetery, moved off with the other mourners after the service, but Alex lingered at the gravesite. Father Harry had been a literal father to him when no one else cared. He just wanted to stand before the open grave in the quiet of the little cemetery and pull his scattered memories back into the forefront of his mind. As the years turned back in his head, he fixed the images in his memory, so they would live on in Father Harry’s stead.

“How are you holding up?” a frail voice brought him out of his reverie. He turned to find Sister Gwen at his side, and he smiled.

“I’m doing all right,” he said, hugging her awkwardly, given his arm was still in the sling. “You?”

She nodded with a wistful smile but then frowned, looking up at him.

“What happened to your hair?” she asked.

“Slight disagreement with a spell.”

“It suits you.” Sister Gwen said with a determined nod.

“Is the Diocese going to reopen the mission?” Alex asked.

“No,” Sister Gwen said in a weary voice. “Too much is gone now. Father Clementine was the heart and soul of that place.”

“What will you do?” Alex put his arm around the frail nun and hugged her against his side.

“The Bishop is sending me to a convent in Miami,” she said. “I’ll be teaching new sisters and helping them learn their duties.”

“Sounds like he’s looking out for you,” Alex said with a grin.

Sister Gwen leaned close and whispered. “I asked him for the post,” she said. “I’m getting too old for these New York winters.” She hugged him again but didn’t let go. “Did you find out who killed Father Clementine?” she asked.

“I did,” he said, patting her on the back. “He fell to his death trying to hurt a lot more people.”

“Good boy,” she said fiercely, then let him go and stepped back. “Well, I’ve got a bus to catch, Alex. Be good, and God bless you.”

Alex promised that he would, and the old nun turned and walked away. “I’ll miss you, too,” he said after her.

He stood there for a long minute, then finally reached down and picked up a handful of dirt, tossing it onto the simple pine coffin at the bottom of the grave.

“You finished?” Leslie said, walking around the grave to stand beside him. “I didn’t want to interrupt.”

“I’m done,” Alex said, taking her arm and strolling off through the gravestones. “Iggy’s waiting for you out front,” she said. “So how does it feel?”

“I don’t even notice,” Alex said, running a self-conscious hand through his white hair.

“Not that.” Leslie elbowed him gently. “Solving your first big case.”

Alex hadn’t really thought about it, but he did save the city. All by himself. Of course no one would ever know what he did, since the government was hushing the whole thing up. Then there was Father Harry, and Evelyn. The price he’d paid solving this case was very high, and that had nothing to do with his lost years.

“Not like I thought it would,” he admitted.

“Don’t let it throw you, boss,” she said, squeezing his arm. “I like the hair; it makes you look distinguished.”

Alex laughed at that.

“It’ll be easier next time,” she said. “You’ll see.”

Alex failed to see how it could be worse.

“Did you get what I asked for?”

She reached into her handbag and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. “It took me most of yesterday and a good part of this morning to find this,” she said. “Can’t for the life of me figure out why you want it.”

“And yet you seem to be in a very good mood,” Alex noted, taking the paper and slipping it into his pocket. “I must send you to the dusty parts of the library more often.”

“Don’t you dare.” Her face soured. “Do you have any idea the kinds of deplorable old letches who inhabit the tables by the card catalog? They practically cheered every time I had to bend over to look in a lower drawer.”

“Well, all that attention must have done you good.”

“That and the thousand dollar check I found waiting for me at the office.”

Alex stopped short.

“A grand?” he asked. “Who’d send us that much dough?”

“Your sorceress friend.” Leslie nodded off to the far corner of the cemetery where several people stood for another service. Even at this distance, Alex had no trouble recognizing Sorsha’s platinum hair. “The note said it was your reward for finding and returning stolen government documents.”

Alex started to smile, but the memory of Evelyn’s demise wiped it from his face.

“Be sure to thank her,” Leslie said, disentangling her arm from his. “I’m on my way to the bank to put it in the account, then I’m taking the rest of the day off.”

Alex winked at her and smiled.

“You deserve it, doll,” he said. “Peel off a ten spot and have some fun.”

Leslie flashed him her most endearing smile and cocked her head.

“You’re the boss,” she said and turned away.

Alex turned toward the service at the far end of the cemetery. He stood well back and waited for the minister to leave the little group under the shade of an old oak tree before approaching.

“I didn’t expect to see you here,” Alex said, stepping up beside her.

Sorsha’s eyes and nose were red and her makeup had run down her cheeks. She did not look her usual perfect self. She wore a black mourning dress, a hat with a long black feather in it, and supported herself with a polished cane.

“Mr. Lockerby,” she said, quickly wiping her eyes with her handkerchief. “You do turn up in the strangest places.”

“The funeral for Father Harry just finished,” he said.

“The priest who helped raise you,” Sorsha said. She’d done her homework apparently.

“I take it this is the service for your man, Hitchens,” Alex said, noting that there wasn’t any grave dug, just a headstone. Sorsha nodded.

“He was with me since just after I came into my powers,” she said. “He was younger then. I knew him a long time. He was a genuinely good man.”

“I’m sorry,” Alex said.

“All things end, Alex,” she said, though she didn’t sound like she wanted to believe it.

“Thank you for the check,” he said, after a pause.

“You earned it.”

“Where are you staying?” He was just making conversation to fill the awkward silence, but she suddenly turned on him, her face full of anger. She slapped him hard across the face and Alex staggered back.

“What was that?” he demanded.

“Don’t you dare ask me that,” she hissed, limping up to him. “You dumped my home into the Atlantic. My home! Every precious memory I had, every letter, every memento is at the bottom of the ocean.”

Alex held up his good hand to ward off any more blows.

“Might I remind you that I didn’t drop your house out of the sky,” he said. “I just decided where it would land.”

“At no small expense to yourself, I hear,” she said, her voice seething.

Alex wasn’t sure, but he thought for a moment that this might be the real reason she had slapped him.

“I did what needed to be done,” he said.

“Yes,” she said, her voice cold. “All hail the savior of New York.” Her tone implied mockery, but there was no trace of levity in her eyes.

“That’s me,” Alex said with exaggerated false modesty.

“And yet only you and I and Doctor Bell will ever know that New York City almost died yesterday.”

“I didn’t do it for the glory,” Alex said.

“I know,” she said, then she smiled demurely. “You’re in it for the money.” Then she stepped forward and kissed him. She pressed against him, holding him by the back of the neck. When she finally let go, her cheeks were flushed and she looked a bit sheepish.

“Sorceress,” Alex said, a smile creeping onto his face. “I didn’t know—”

She put her finger on his lips to silence him.

“Don’t read too much into that,” she said. “You saved my life, and the life of everyone in the city. I don’t know the exact price you paid, but Doctor Bell seems to think you a great fool, so I can only guess it was high. Decades of your life?”

“Something like that,” he said.

The look she gave him swept up from his face to his snowy hair and then back down.

“I don’t want to see you again, Alex,” she said, her cold, officious voice returning. “Sorcerers live for hundreds of years, but I’m still very young as sorcerers go. I haven’t had to watch people I care about die.” She nodded toward the stone that marked Hitchens’ empty grave. “He’s the first.”

“And you don’t want me to be the second?”

“Something like that,” she sent his words back at him. “I wish you well, Alex,” she said, then limped away on her cane.

Alex watched her go until she reached the street, stepping into a long, sleek floater. He knew what her request not to see him meant, what feelings she was covering up. He knew all too well, which was why he didn’t run after her. She deserved someone who could be there for her. She deserved better than he could offer.

“So long, beautiful,” he said as the car lifted up into the air and climbed out of sight.

The sun was setting by the time Alex and Iggy got home. Neither felt much like eating, and Iggy looked tired and worn.

“Make up a fire,” he said. “Then I think we should talk.”

“Sounds good,” Alex said. He reached for the coal bucket and poured some on the grate.

While Alex worked, Iggy went upstairs. Alex knew from experience that the doc would get out of his suit coat and into his smoking jacket. He lit the fire, then selected a book from the shelf, and sat down in the chair nearest the wall.

It only took Iggy a few minutes to return.

“How about some…” he began, but his face went white when he saw Alex. “No!” he gasped. “You must not read that!”

His voice sounded desperate, like a man facing death while clinging to the last vestiges of life.

Alex sat in the soft, wing-back chair with his legs crossed. A thin book bound in red leather lay open on his lap, illuminated by the light of the table lamp. He had taken it from the space next to the hollowed-out book where he kept his money.

Hiding in plain sight.

“It’s a little late for that, Iggy,” Alex said, turning a page. “I read this book last week.”

“Alex,” Iggy told him. “You’re not ready.”

“For the truth?” Alex said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the paper Leslie had given him. The culmination of a mission he’d sent her on when he first found the red book. “You know,” he said, unfolding it, “I bet you could ask everyone in New York who wrote the Sherlock Holmes books and they’d say Arthur Conan Doyle. Every one of them.”

“Alex,” Iggy said, imploring him not to go on.

“I bet not a single one of them knows that his real name is Arthur Conan Ignatius Doyle, and that he faked his own death four years ago and came to America.”

Iggy sat down in the other chair and just stared at the fire.

“How did you figure it out?” he asked.

“You trained me to be a detective, Iggy. Or should I call you Arthur?”

“Iggy is fine,” he said. “You decrypted the finding rune.” It wasn’t a question, just a simple statement of fact.

“Last Saturday while you were making those disguise runes,” Alex said. “You can imagine how surprised I was to discover that the infamous Archimedean Monograph, the book so many people died trying to find, was sitting on our bookshelf right next to my book safe.”

Iggy nodded, shaking his head. “Once you knew I had the Monograph, you would have guessed that my name was an alias. Did you search the records of this house’s ownership?”

Alex nodded. “You bought the home in your son’s name, Kingsley Doyle. It took Leslie a long time, but she finally traced the name to a doctor in the British army. He was killed in the big war. The New York Times printed a story about it because of his famous father. The man who invented Sherlock Holmes.”

“You did do the thing properly, didn’t you?” Iggy chuckled darkly.

“I also know that Bell is the last name of your favorite professor from medical school, a man you once said was the inspiration for Holmes.”

“I was going to tell you,” he said. Iggy hung his head and cradled it in his hands.

“When?”

“When I absolutely had to and not a moment before,” he said, standing up and pacing to the fire. “You don’t know what you’ve done by reading the Monograph.” He paused, looking into the fire. “I wanted to spare you that. For as long as I could, anyway.”

Alex closed the book and set it aside on the table. “I get it,” he said, standing and moving to the fire. “There are some very dangerous runes in there. Things I don’t want to even think about. But you should have trusted me.”

Iggy put his hand on Alex’s shoulder.

“I do trust you, lad. But you don’t understand. Evelyn Rockwell isn’t the only person searching for that infernal book. There are others, many others. Most of them are incompetent dreamers, but some are talented — and dangerous. That’s why I had to leave my family. That’s why I faked my death and came here.”

Alex nodded, suddenly understanding. “The story you wrote,” he said. “About the Mary Celeste.”

“I wrote a fictional account of that ship, leaving out the finding rune in the captain’s cabin and the shadows on the wall,” Iggy said. “I wanted to point people in the wrong direction, erase any connection with the Monograph.”

“I take it that didn’t work,” Alex said. “What happened? Someone find out about your trip to Gibraltar?”

“Probably.” Iggy shrugged. “It doesn’t really matter. People began writing me, asking me thinly veiled questions about the runes in the Monograph. I never answered any, of course, but that only made them bolder. One night, a few years ago, I received a letter from a friend, begging me to come see him at his home. Luckily, I knew he had gone to the seaside for the winter. I contacted the police, and they caught five runewrights who were lying in wait for me. That was when I knew I had to disappear.”

“I don’t get it,” Alex said. “Why were they so convinced that you had the Monograph?”

“As you’ve seen, my lore book is full of unique and powerful runes,” Iggy said. “I developed most of them using concepts from the Monograph.” He sighed and looked into the fire. “But mostly it’s because of those runes Sorsha was looking for. Your government stole them from mine, but how do you think the Royal Army got them?”

“You gave them to the British? Why?”

“It was after my son died,” he said, his voice distant. “I wanted to do whatever I could to end the war. I thought the government runewrights could use those five to help. They already had the finding rune. It didn’t matter, though. I was wrong. As soon as they knew the Archimedean Monograph had been found, they wanted the rest. Luckily for me, I had taken the precaution of sending the runes to them anonymously.”

“What happened?”

“The military put out bulletins seeking runewrights of exceptional ability. They searched my home, and the homes of others, seeking the Monograph. When the war ended, they officially gave up, but the runewrights on the army payroll had seen enough of what the Monograph had to offer that they couldn’t let it go. They formed a secret society to search for it.”

“And you already had a target on your back.”

“And now, so do you,” Iggy said. “Don’t you see? Anyone who knows about the Monograph is a target. That’s what I wanted to spare you from. Just imagine what would happen if your friend Daniel suspected that you have the book? What if he were to mention those suspicions to his father in casual conversation?”

Alex developed a sudden chill. Danny wouldn’t care that Iggy had the Monograph, but his father wouldn’t be able to resist it. He’d try to bust down the door to the brownstone and take it.

“And what about Sorsha?” Iggy continued. “Why she’d…” Iggy stopped, a startled expression on his face. He slowly turned to Alex. “You said she used a truth spell on you at Thomas Rockwell’s workshop,” he said. “That was last night. After you discovered the book. Does she know?”

Alex laughed and shook his head. “You know she doesn’t,” he said. “You were just about to say what she’d do if she knew the book was here, and you’d have been right.”

“Then how…?”

“Truth spells aren’t illegal because they work,” Alex said. “They’re illegal because they’re unreliable. Remember the Lindberg case? By the time they got the truth out of the accomplice, the baby was already dead. All you have to do to beat a truth spell is have a better truth to tell.”

“I… don’t understand,” Iggy said. He still had a look of alarm on his face.

“Sorsha asked me if I could finish unraveling the rune Evelyn used,” Alex said, ticking it off on his finger. “I designed that rune so that it can’t be unraveled, not without going back to the original and starting over. I did that in case it fell into the wrong hands.”

“So when you said you couldn’t, you were telling the truth,” Iggy said. “Just not the whole truth.”

“Truth spells compel you to answer,” Alex said. “They don’t force you to elaborate. Next,” he said, ticking off another finger. “Sorsha asked me if I had found the Monograph.”

“But you had found it.”

Alex shook his head with a grin. “No, I just discovered it sitting on our bookshelf. You found it. You can only find things that are lost, and a book on a shelf in plain sight isn’t lost.”

Iggy looked incredulous.

“Isn’t that just your interpretation?”

“Of course,” Alex said. “But the spell was cast on me; its effect is limited to what I believe.”

“Was that it?”

“No, she asked me if I would ever search for the Monograph in the future. I could honestly tell her that I had no intention whatsoever of looking for the Monograph.”

Iggy chuckled, but then his face became serious again. “You got lucky,” he said. “If she’d asked better questions, I’d have had to disappear again. That’s why you need to forget what you’ve read in that book. If you start adding new and powerful runes to your repertoire, she’s going to figure it out. She isn’t stupid, you know.”

Alex shrugged. Iggy was right, of course. The Monograph was filled with amazing and powerful concepts, but he’d have to keep those out of his professional life.

Well, most of them.

Alex closed the Monograph and held it up.

“There are some very interesting things in here,” he said. “I’d love to hear your thoughts on them.”

Iggy laughed.

“There are notes in there from DaVinci and Ben Franklin,” he said. “I doubt I could add very much.”

“Not the way I see it,” Alex said. “You took these runes and made them part of your lore book. You had to make them powerful, but not so powerful or complex that people would wonder about their origin. I think you still have a lot to teach me.”

“But for how long?” Iggy whispered.

“Does that matter?” Alex said. “I did what you would have done in my shoes, what Sorsha would have done if she could have. Are you going to let that ruin our friendship?”

Iggy straightened up and took a deep breath. “No,” he declared at last. “But I’m still angry about the book.”

“I’m sorry,” Alex said. He didn’t know what else to say. He should have realized that Iggy would have a good reason for keeping those things from him. He should have trusted the man.

“I’m sorry too,” Iggy said, leaning heavily on the mantle. “The Monograph is a burden I would have spared you, but I am glad that you know the truth.”

“What now?” Alex asked after a long moment passed.

Iggy pushed away from the mantle and slipped the Archimedean Monograph back into its place on the bookshelf.

“Now, we carry on as if nothing has changed,” he said. “It’s our responsibility to keep the book out of the wrong hands.”

“But we study it,” Alex said. “There’s a lot in there I want to know.”

“Agreed,” Iggy said. “But I decide what we study. You’re not ready for all of it yet.”

“Agreed,” Alex said.

Iggy stuck out his hand and Alex shook it.

“I’m as hungry as a wolf,” he said, clearly feeling better than he had in days. “Let’s go get something to eat.”

Alex put the screen in front of the fire while Iggy changed back into his suit jacket. He didn’t feel any different, but he knew the ground had changed under his feet. The hat Iggy had loaned him hung on a peg in the hallway, and he slipped it on over his white hair before stepping outside onto the stoop. In the distance, Empire Tower reached up to the sky, glowing with the energy it contained. Occasionally a bolt of lightning would reach down from above and strike the spire on top.

“Ready?” Iggy asked, stepping out beside him.

Alex nodded, turning the brim down on the hat before following the old man to the sidewalk.

“After dinner we’ll look at the Monog—”

“We should probably call it the Textbook when we’re out in public,” Alex said.

“Good point. Well, when we get back, there are a few interesting things I want to show you in the Textbook.”

Iggy’s old enthusiasm seemed to be back, and Alex grinned as they made their way to The Lunch Box. He didn’t know how much of his life he had left, but he had a feeling none of it would be boring.

You made it. You got all the way to the end, thanks so much for reading my book. Since you’re so awesome, I’ve got a small request for you — and a free gift. If you would, please follow this LINK and leave me a quick review, I’d really appreciate it. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, just a quick note saying whether or not you liked the book. As an independent author, it really helps me out.

Thanks so much.

As I mentioned above, I’ve also got a free gift for you, just for being such an awesome reader. You can get the novella Dead Letter, the Prequel to this book by going HERE. It’s the story of the case where Alex and Danny met, along with a few other surprises. And, because you’re awesome, it’s absolutely free. A special thanks for reading In Plain Sight.

So take two minutes and leave me a review HERE, then come back and grab your free copy of Dead Letter HERE.

You rock!

Look for Ghost of a Chance, the next book in the Arcane Casebook series, coming in January 2019.

The Flux Engine

In a Steampunk Wild West, fifteen-year-old John Porter wants nothing more than to find his missing family. Unfortunately a legendary lawman, a talented thief, and a homicidal madman have other plans, and now John will need his wits, his pistol, and a lot of luck if he’s going to survive.

Dan Willis wrote for the long-running DragonLance series. He is the author of the Arcane Casebook series and the Dragons of the Confederacy series.

“Dan Willis is an awesome writer and you should buy this book!”

Larry Correia, NYT Bestselling Author