The top of the stairs loomed above me like the peak of the Matterhorn. My lungs burned and sweat prickled my brow, but I clamped my mouth shut, refusing to gasp for air. Six more steps and I gained the summit.

Solicitous as always, Rachel looped her arm through mine.

Her brow furrowed. She asked me a question, but her words sounded muffled in my ears. I made a noise in reply.

Thoughts flashed through my mind; my vision blurred as my heart tripped at the base of my throat.

Surely, I was wrong — surely, it could not have been Rachel!

But there was no mistaking her voice. Like her father's, it came through so clearly I thought she'd spoken aloud, just as at the auction dinner.

I had overheard two thoughts that night, though. If the threat against Henri had come from her as well, why had I not recognized it then?

The answer unveiled itself like a slipped shroud.

Because I had not wanted to; because it was too monstrous.

I fought to catch my breath as the others proceeded down the hall. Electric lamplight blazed from sconces; footsteps fell softly on the carpeted floor; men's and women's voices mingled. Gradually, my vision cleared. The darkness lifted. My heart quieted enough that I no longer heard it rushing in my ears like the ocean in a shell.

Discreetly, Henri caught my eye. As imperceptibly, I shook my head. Now was not the time for distractions. I buried the Rachel problem at the back of my mind, at the bottom of my heart. The séance would reveal what it would.

The group came to a halt, ranged along the corridor: Rachel and I, the three dealers, Harold and Lucy, Miss Lancaster, and Henri. Paul stood at the front like a tour guide at a museum.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I present for your consideration this evening the works of the Unknown Master, a Northern Renaissance mystery."

Attention shifted; murmurs of interest increased.

"I won't pollute your minds with suggestion," Paul continued. "Examine the art for yourselves. Draw your own conclusions. Gather your facts. Then we shall let the artist speak."

He nodded toward me. In the lamplight's gleam, I caught the flash of his eyes, blue as hell-flame.

"Mr. Alec Monroe, my dear friend and the most gifted medium I know, has — as he puts it — a deep spiritual connection with the author of these works."

Paul gestured at the walls. My eyes tracked the motion, and despite having expected it, the sight struck me as a blow.

Spaced evenly and carefully framed, Thomas's works hung along both sides of the hall.

I remembered watching him paint some of them; remembered the way his dark brows twisted with concentration as he sat in the light before the windows. I remembered his wild hair, always a little too long, curled in loose rings around his ears; the flash of fond annoyance when I interrupted him; his one snaggle tooth when he smiled.

The dealers moved among the frames, their polite murmurs escalating in volume. Harold and Lucy, Rachel and Miss Lancaster — even Henri — did likewise until it was impossible to tell who expressed genuine interest and who merely played a part.

I stood like a stone amid the incoming tide, watching from a place slightly outside myself as I smiled and made conversation with those I meant to undeceive. As much as I hated the circumstances, a small part of me warmed at the sight of Thomas getting due appreciation.

Making his way among his guests, Paul arrived at my side.

"Which one?" he asked under his breath.

I knew what he meant, and nodded towards a beautifully complex hunting scene in the style of Bruegel the Elder.

He took it down and tucked it under his arm.

After a suitable interlude — long enough for the dealers to notice all the genius of Thomas's forgeries and none of his tells — Paul recaptured our attention and led us on into the drawing room.

The room was as I had left it: the round table ringed with chairs, the curtains drawn, the lights low, not a trace of a trick to be seen.

As Paul set the painting on the table, I took the seat he had designated as mine — a high-backed Victorian antique with curled armrests in the shape of lions' paws.

A shape with lion body and the head of a man...

The sweat on the back of my neck had turned cold. The others found their places and attention gathered on me, each pair of eyes an added weight.

I took a slow, deep inhalation and looked around the room at each face in turn.

"Tonight, we will speak with the dead," I said. "It is important that we give them patience, and give them space. Some spirits are timid; some struggle to reach across the veil. If you have attended other séances, with other mediums who produce such things as ectoplasm, spirit horns, and the like, forget such expectations here. Here, we are as that first use of the telephone between Bell and Watson, a brittle connection across a great distance, bringing what is far near. I am the device, you all are the receiver, and the spirits speak. Do you understand?"

A ring of heads nodded almost in unison.

"Good."

I leaned forward, extracted a single match from a carved wooden box, and struck the phosphorous tip against a disk of black stone. As Eddie had preached, all it took to make a ritual authentic was belief.

With the candles and incense lit, I shut my eyes and extended my hands.

"If someone could turn out the lights, please join hands and close your eyes."

The room went dark except for the beeswax tapers' golden glow. The scent of sandalwood and amber infused the air. In the semi-darkness, I listened with satisfaction as nine rhythms of breath gradually became one.

I waited until I knew everyone had become very conscious of another's hand in their own and heard the ticking of the clock in their ears as the only sound in the room.

Then, with another deep breath, as if I drew the spirits within myself, tilted my head back, and spoke.

"We call upon the spirit of the artist who created this work. We call upon him to come forward and speak to us now."

Silence persisted. The clock ticked. Breaths whispered in and out.

"Spirit, if you can hear us, please give us a sign."

Someone shifted in their chair, furniture creaking, fabric rustling. The moment had almost, but not quite arrived.

I let a hint of desperation thread through my voice, a quaver that could be interpreted however the hearer chose. "Spirit! Come forth! Let us hear your voice!"

Someone coughed; someone giggled.

I smiled.

"Spirit—"

The table jumped an inch off the ground. Several people gasped. Miss Lancaster screamed.

"Peace—please!" I urged in a whisper. "Don't alarm them."

In the darkness, I allowed myself a smile. As if the living might frighten the dead.

Whispers subsided. When I had their attention again, I continued.

"Thank you, spirit. We hear you. We receive you. We welcome your message."

Silence again.

I counted the ticks of the second hand. Little over a minute passed, but it felt like ten.

Harold Bowman cleared his throat. "I wonder if—"

The candles guttered. Someone hissed a warning. A soft breeze drifted through the room.

"He is here," I murmured. "The artist. He is in the room with us now."

"Who... Who is he?" This eager whisper came from one of the dealers — the bespectacled, O'Keeffe-loving fellow, if I wasn't wrong.

"Spirit, what is your name?"

"No...body."

The whisper came from everywhere and nowhere at once. Thomas loved the Odyssey, and no part more than when the hero got himself out of a bind by pretending to be "nobody."

"You have no body, I know," I returned with sympathy. "You are a spirit. We are here to listen to you. What have you to tell?"

The breeze came again — a light touch that made some shiver and others wonder if a window had been left open. The trick lay in the possibilities, as Eddie would say.

"Straw...berry." A sigh on the wind. "Bridge..."

Even with my eyes closed, I sensed Paul's attention shift. I would only get one shot, and everything depended on a single fact: that no matter who Paul had included in the inner workings of his scheme, he would not have dared tell any of them the whole truth about me.

They each held only fragments: broken shards of the stained-glass picture I meant to reconstruct.

"I am receiving a message," I whispered, letting my head fall further back on my neck and clasping the hands of those to my left and right more convulsively. "There is something... a name... is it... Honeycomb?"

Someone gasped.

Above my head, an image emerged from the darkness, the phosphorescent paint I'd used giving off its own eerie light. A nude male figure, seen from behind as if walking away, leading a horse. Both man and horse appeared young and promising, slender and strong. The horse had a light coat with a dark mane and tail; the man had loose curls that clung about the nape of his neck.

How charming those curls had been.

The pull of a string, and the image changed as one painting overlaid the other; the man looked back. His face — painted from my memory, but clear as any photograph — left no room for mistake.

Thomas, with all his lost years and stolen promise, in a painted gaze.

"Thomas... horses... bridge..." Without moving my lips, the whisper seemed to come from thin air.

Paul's chair rattled. "That's enough of this trickery."

Someone shushed him. Those who sat to his right and left, two of the dealers, refused to release his hands. He'd chosen them for their credulity, after all. Even so, I had mere seconds before he broke free.

I let my barriers drop and listened. Amid the chatter, a few bits stood out.

...hit his head...

...Christmas Eve...

...bridge was her idea...

A pale hand appeared from the gloom, one finger extended. It was only a glove with cotton stuffing and wires to make the fingers curl, but in the near darkness, imagination was enough to make it real.

"These paintings are forgeries," I murmured. "And the artist... died in this very house... at the hands of one seated here tonight."

There were gasps all around. Paul broke free and stood. The hand pointed at no one in particular, yet a guilty conscience always feels itself the target.

Harold Bowman's voice erupted from my left, strained with terror. "No! It was Barrington that struck him! I only suggested—"

Lucy smacked him. "Shut up, you fool!"

The candles went out. Someone screamed.

That was my signal.

I lurched to my feet and stumbled from the room under cover of darkness. Henri would handle the rest. I had only one last thing to do.

Footsteps muffled by the carpet, I ran down the hall, lightheaded with adrenaline, and through the library to Paul's study.

My painting hung where he had promised, directly opposite his desk. I shrugged out of my coat, took the painting down, and wrapped it carefully. With the precious bundle tucked beneath my arm, I turned to go, and found my way blocked by Paul.

His hair stood in disarray, and anger hardened his face.

"You've done it now, Monroe. Was it your aim to destroy yourself? You've succeeded wonderfully." He clapped his hands.

I shook my head. "Not myself. Your plans. I couldn't let you use Thomas that way."

He scoffed as he circled me slowly until we had traded places. I had the door at my back, and he stood behind his desk. He opened a drawer and took something out. When he raised his hand, it held a pistol. He aimed it at me.

"Give me back my property," he said. His hand shook.

"You won't kill me." I said this with more confidence than I felt, but Paul was a collector, and collectors did not ruin their prizes. "It would end you."

Paul's next words revealed the flaw in my logic.

"You're right. I can't destroy you without destroying myself as well. Perhaps that's how it will be." He walked towards me as he spoke, and I retreated through the door of his study and into the wider space of the library beyond. He followed steadily, still aiming for my heart. "You first, then me. It will be poetic, don't you think? Like Romeo and Juliet."

"More like Othello," I whispered. "Jealousy is not love."

His face contorted. The gun twitched in his hand. I held my breath. He lowered his aim.

The library doors flew open, and Henri burst through. He froze when he saw the gun and raised his hands, moving to my side. "Barrington, put the weapon away. Don't do something you can't undo."

Paul turned towards him with pure hatred in his eyes. "This is all your fault. You come into my house, take what is mine, threaten my future. Why shouldn't I act in self-defense?"

Henri shook his head. "It is over, Barrington. You have lost."

Those words, and the evidence behind them, were too much for Paul. The mask slipped; the leash of restraint snapped. He turned his aim on Henri without a shred of hesitation. "No, Deschamps. You have."

My body moved before the thought had fully formed; this time, my refusal held firm.

I stepped between them. Paul flinched as he fired. His hand jerked to the side, but not enough.

The bullet struck me, and I fell.