A Curious Beginning

There is a stillness to empty houses, and this house was quieter still. It was as if nothing had ever moved there, no one had ever walked its echoing passages. Stoker had dropped my hand when we entered the basement, but as we crept upstairs to the main floor, I reached for his, suddenly very much in need of his warmth. The curtains had been drawn in the front of the house, but not the rear, and the shadows shifted as we walked, as though our very presence stirred something that had been resting only lightly.

“Do you think the baron haunts it?” I whispered.

He whirled on me, nearly upsetting an elephant’s foot stuffed with an assortment of walking sticks. “Haunts? Don’t be daft.”

“It isn’t daft. Some of the greatest scientific minds of our time believe in ghosts.”

He squeezed my hand with a trifle more pressure than necessary. “This is no time to debate the mental shortcomings of Alfred Russel Wallace,” he said in an acid tone. His hand was suddenly cold, and I realized that for him, the notion of the baron’s ghost might not be entirely academic. If the old fellow haunted the place, the appearance of his specter would be far more upsetting for Stoker than for me. I returned the squeeze and drew him back a little.

“What are you doing?”

“I am going into the study first. If he is haunting the place, you shan’t want to see that. I shall get rid of him.”

“How? By menacing him with your hatpin?”

“You needn’t resort to sarcasm, Stoker. I am certain I will think of something. In the meantime, behind me, if you please.”

He muttered something profane but did as I bade him. I opened the door he indicated, pausing a moment to register my impressions.

“Well?” he asked nastily. “Any lingering ectoplasm, or are we free to proceed?”

I stepped forward. “Quite free,” I replied, my tone distracted. Quick to sense a change in mood, Stoker put a hand to my shoulder.

“What is it?”

I sniffed. “I don’t know. There is something here. I cannot place it. It certainly is no ghost. Do you think we might risk a light?”

He drifted away for a moment and I heard the creak of shutters being folded into place. After that there was the sharp rasp of a match, and then a little bud of light blossomed. He lit a candle. “We dare not light more than this. The window overlooks a small garden with a high wall. We should be safe enough.”

He took a breath, steeling himself, I thought, then moved to the desk.

“What are you looking for?”

He frowned at the piles of papers and books, the upset inkstand, the scattered pens. “Anything amiss. The trouble is, Max was as tidy as they come. All of this is amiss.”

I left him to it and wandered the room, hunting for the elusive scent that had tickled my nose when I had first opened the sealed room. I sniffed the chairs and the rugs, much to Stoker’s amusement.

“You look like a demented bloodhound. What on earth are you doing?” he demanded, his brow furrowed as he moved to the baron’s bookshelf.

I ignored him for a moment, putting my nose so near to the rug that the silk nub brushed the tip of my nose. Eureka! I peered into the pile of the rug and saw it—a tiny seed, greenish brown in color, and lightly curved. It appeared to be striped, but as I held it to the light of our solitary candle, I saw that it was actually ridged. I gave another sniff and detected a strong odor reminiscent of aniseed.

“Stoker, was the baron in the habit of chewing caraway seeds?”

“Caraway? No. He loathed the stuff.”

“How do you know?”

He said nothing for a long moment as he traced a row of books, his fingers trailing along the spines. I waited, and finally he answered, his hand resting on a thick volume bound in green kid.

“He hated seedcake. Why?”

I withdrew a handkerchief and wrapped the seed carefully before returning it to my pocket.

“I think it might be a clue.”

He snorted. “A caraway seed? Well, perhaps. But I doubt it is as good as this,” he said, tapping the wide green book.

“What have you there?”

He slid it carefully from the shelf. “The only book in the entire study written in Italian.”

“And is that significant?” I asked, coming to peer around his shoulder as he carried it to the desk.

“Only if you know that Max did not read Italian.” He opened the book carefully, and for the first few pages, it seemed we were doomed to disappointment. It was some sort of treatise with colored plates upon the subject of mollusks, boring in the extreme, but Stoker riffled through the pages, and the secret of the book was revealed—a hollow space, neatly cleared out of the big book to leave just enough room for a packet of papers folded and bound with a violet silk ribbon.

I reached for it with greedy fingers, but before I could touch it, there was the sound of breaking glass.

Instantly, Stoker doused the candle with his bare fingers while I scooped the packet out of the book and shoved it into my pocket. Stoker’s lips brushed my ear. “That came from the kitchen. Someone’s had the same idea we did, only without a key.”

“Housebreaker?” I whispered.

I felt his head give a shake in the negative under my mouth. “Housebreaker wouldn’t make noise. He will be on his way here.”