Quicksilver

NINE

Owen returned to Garnet Lane that evening in an anonymous hired carriage. Virginia was waiting for him. She wore a hooded cloak against the chill of the night. He sensed the mix of excitement and foreboding that animated her. When he took her gloved hand to assist her into the carriage he could have sworn that electricity sparked between them. The hair stirred on the nape of his neck.

They spoke little on the drive to the quiet street where Mrs. Ratford had rented a small house, but Owen was intensely conscious of Virginia’s nearness the entire time. He would have given a great deal to know if she felt the same sense of awareness.

When they reached their destination he sent the carriage on its way. There would be other cabs about later, when they left the scene of the murder.

There was an empty, shuttered feeling about the house where Mrs. Ratford had died. The curtains were drawn closed across the windows.

“You’re certain there is no one home?” Virginia asked.

“I checked again earlier today. The house is still vacant. The rumors concerning the former occupant’s death have probably made it difficult to attract new tenants. Prospective renters are no doubt reluctant to move into a house in which the previous resident may have been dispatched by spirits from the Other Side.”

Virginia looked at him. A gas lamp burned close by in the mist, but he could not see her face clearly. Her features were shadowed by the hood of her cloak.

“There are always rumors about those of us who read mirrors,” she said. “Many people are convinced that we see ghosts and spirits. They do not understand that what we perceive are simply afterimages caught in the glass. Mirrors are nothing more than paranormal cameras that capture some of the energy given off at the time of death or near death.”

“I understand.”

They went down the alley behind Number Fourteen. Owen opened the gate that guarded the tiny garden. They went up the back steps. Owen inserted the lock pick into the kitchen door. The lock gave way immediately.

“May I ask where one buys that sort of tool?” Virginia asked.

He smiled a little at the bright curiosity in her voice.

“This particular pick was crafted by one of my uncles. He has a knack for that sort of thing.”

“Yours is an interesting family, sir.”

“That is certainly one way to describe my relatives.” He opened the door and listened for a moment with all of his senses. “Still vacant.”

Virginia moved past him to enter the house. He heard the soft, sultry swish of the ruffles at the hem of her gown as they brushed across the toe of his boot. Her scent briefly clouded his mind. He was aroused not just by the anticipation of the hunt but by the woman who shared it with him tonight.

He followed her into the narrow hall, closed the door and turned up the lantern he had brought along. The light did little to alleviate the heavy gloom.

“Death always affects a house, doesn’t it?” Virginia looked around. “One can sense it in the atmosphere.”

“Yes. Which is why so many people find it easy to believe in ghosts.”

“What, exactly, are we looking for?” she asked.

“Something, anything, that will give us a clue to how Mrs. Ratford was killed. I went through this house, and Mrs. Hackett’s as well, shortly after I accepted the case. I am certain that both deaths were caused by paranormal means, but I do not think the killer was present at the time of the actual murders. He has come and gone on several occasions since the murders, however.”

“You can detect those sorts of details so plainly?”

“It is the nature of my talent, Virginia,” he said, willing her to understand and accept the compulsion that drove him.

Virginia said nothing. She halted in the doorway of the small parlor. “There is a mirror over the fireplace. I may be able to discern something in the glass.”

Owen stood behind her and waited. The light of the lantern flashed on the mirror, casting ominous shadows around the room.

Virginia walked forward and stopped in front of the fireplace. Her eyes met his in the darkly silvered glass. He felt the atmosphere heat and knew that she had raised her talent.

She turned her full attention on the mirror, gazing into it as though into another dimension. She concentrated intently, not speaking for a time.

A moment later she lowered her talent and turned to face him with eyes that were still filled with mysteries.

“The mirror has been hanging above the fireplace for a very long time,” she said. “There are certainly shadows in it but nothing distinct. Certainly nothing of violent death.”

“That makes sense. The body was found upstairs in a bedroom. There is a mirror on the dressing table.”

They went back out into the hall and up the narrow staircase.

“I noticed that the mirror over your own mantel is new,” he said.

“I purchased it when I rented the house. There was an old one in that room and another in the front hall. I removed both of them.”

“You do not like old mirrors?”

“Looking glasses absorb energy over the years. The old ones hold a lot of shadows. I find them disturbing.”

“Yet Mrs. Ratford kept the old one in this house.”

“Perhaps she could not afford to replace it. It is also possible that it did not bother her greatly. She had some talent, but she was not a very strong glass-reader. Only powerful glasslight-talents find old mirrors disturbing.”

At the top of the stairs they paused. The light of the lantern revealed three doors. Two stood open. The one at the far end of the hall was closed.

“That is the room where she died,” Owen said.

They both heard the muffled scraping, clanking noise at the same time. It came from the nearest open doorway.

“What in the name of heaven?” Virginia whispered.

Owen angled the lantern for a closer look. An elegantly made mechanical dragon appeared from the darkened room. The clockwork device was the size of a small dog. Its segmented tail, set with crystals, snaked from side to side. Long, gilded claws rasped on the floor. The glass eyes radiated a cold, compelling paranormal fire.

“Another one of those damned weapons,” Owen said. “Where the hell did that come from? It wasn’t here the last time I visited this house.”

He seized Virginia’s arm and started to haul her back toward the staircase.

She moved willingly and with some speed, but it was too late.

A dark fog descended. The nightmare exploded around him, inundating the hall with hellish visions from a madman’s fevered dreams. The dead and the dying descended on him, mouths open in silent screams.