“Who is it?” I asked.

“E.P.,” said a voice. He was speaking softly, loud enough for me to hear, but not so loud as to be forceful. He pronounced his words carefully, like a schoolmarm was listening. “Evis Prestley. I believe you are expecting me.”

I rose. “It isn’t locked.” Not much use locking doors against vampires who could haul them right out of their frames with two fingers. “Come on in.”

He did.

He was halfdead.

I fought to keep my smile. He glided inside, closed the door gently behind him, took a single step away from it, and then came to parade rest, his gloved hands clasped behind him at the small of his back.

I nodded toward the client’s chair. “Won’t you have a seat?” My voice didn’t shake. Much.

He nodded, moved and sat. He hadn’t spoken, and I gathered he was refraining from speaking largely to avoid showing me a jawful of fangs.

As I understand matters, that gesture passes for rare high regard among the halfdead. I made myself take a breath, and I sat as well.

We just looked at each other, engulfed in an awkward silence. I took him in as quickly as I could. He was short, a full head shorter than myself, and thinner. Neat short black hair combed up and back from a widow’s peak. Skin the color of new dough. Small thin nose, as white as a fresh-peeled potato. Eyes that had been blue while he lived and were still blue but obscured by a white glaze that made them look like dirty marbles.

He wore rich man’s black-black pants, black shirt, black vest, knee-length black coat, all tailor-made and custom cut. A pin shone on his lapel-the crossed swords, in silver, of House Avalante. His collar was high, black gloves covered his hands-he’d taken pains, I gathered, to conceal as much of his dead pale skin as possible.

“Evis Prestley,” I said. “You sent the list of names.”

“I did,” he replied. His mouth, when he opened it, was white, and his teeth were wet and sharp. “And in doing so I fear I caused you insult. Mr. Sacks was told to deliver it to your office and return to the House. He was not instructed to follow you. The House offers its apologies, as does Mr. Sacks.”

“Accepted. And by the way-if Ronnie is the best tail you’ve got, you’d better get out of the business.”

He smiled with his mouth firmly closed. “We at Avalante value initiative. Mr. Sacks was attempting to impress us. A pity he didn’t choose a venue more suited to his talents.”

I nodded. I was breathing a little easier. If he was going to bite, I figure he’d have done so by now. Maybe it was his voice, too-nothing weak about it, but I kept expecting him to start lecturing me in the finer points of antebellum architectural history.

I noticed him squinting, decided I could show off my manners too.

“I can turn down the lamps, if you want. I didn’t think of it earlier.”

Evis shook his head no, reached into his jacket and pulled a pair of dark-lensed spectacles out of his breast pocket. “No need.” He brought the glasses up to his nose, peeped over them with his dead man’s eyes. “If you don’t mind?”

“Not at all,” I said. He put his glasses on. I was glad his eyes were covered, and he probably knew it.

“I didn’t come here to talk about the bumbling antics of Mr. Sacks. We share a common goal, Mr. Markhat. We’re both looking for Martha Hoobin.”

I frowned. “I thought as much. Mind telling me why House Avalante cares what happened to the Velvet’s star seamstress?”

He sighed. “All I can tell you, Mr. Markhat, is that the House wants to see Martha Hoobin returned to her family, safe and sound and soon.”

I nodded. “Ah, yes. The renowned altruism of the Great Houses. What’s next, Mr. Prestley? Going to ask to buy my office so House Avalante can build an orphanage on this very spot?”

He laughed. I hadn’t expected that.

“Good one.” He tilted his head down, looked at me over the tops of his shaded spectacles. “What would you say if I told you that the House is motivated purely by self-interest-but that even in that light, we want to see Martha Hoobin returned to her home?”

“I’d say I might believe that. But I’m still curious, Mr. Prestley. What does a seamstress from the wrong side of the Brown have to do with your House?”

“Nothing at all,” he said. “Directly. But indirectly-before I say more, Mr. Markhat, I’ll need to hire you. And as part of that arrangement, I’ll need to bind you to secrecy.”

“I have a client. Ethel Hoobin.”

“Take a new client. House Avalante has deeper pockets.”

I pushed back my chair. “That won’t do. It’s time for you to go.”

“Wait a moment. Are you telling me you’re refusing my offer?”

“I’m telling you that. Now beat it.”

He didn’t rise. “You’re as stubborn as I’d heard,” he said. “I don’t suppose a fat bag of coin would change your mind.”

“I’m about to lose my temper,” I said.

He smiled, remembered who he was with, covered his mouth with his hand, like I’d do if I yawned before a lady.

“Sit back down. Please.”

“I asked you to leave.”

“And I shall,” he replied. “You may throw me out or hear me out. Which will it be?”

I pondered that, shrugged and sat. He looked on, bemused behind his glasses.

“My superiors have a somewhat simplistic view of mankind. They believe all men can be bought. They sent me here with twenty thousand crowns and instructions to enlist your services in our search for Martha Hoobin.” He leaned forward, elbows on my desk. “I know something of you, finder. I told them that you couldn’t be bought. They laughed. I shall be quite pleased to tell them they were wrong.”

“Twenty thousand crowns?”

“Twenty thousand,” he repeated. “All yours, if you would agree to accept it as a retainer with the agreement that we would obtain your services, and your secrecy, as a finder in the search for Martha Hoobin.”

“I’m going to ask this again, Mr. Prestley. Answer, or get out. What does House Avalante want with Martha Hoobin?”

Evis was silent. I felt his eyes upon me, felt a shiver go down my spine.

“We want nothing with Martha Hoobin. What we want are the people behind her disappearance.”

“And who are they?”

He shook his head. “If we knew that, Mr. Markhat, I assure you that members of the House gardening staff would be dumping their dismembered corpses in the River about now.”

“You think I know?”

He shrugged. “Not yet. That’s the problem, Mr. Markhat. We’re running out of time, you and I. If one of us hasn’t found Martha Hoobin in the next four days, stop looking. She’ll be dead. Just like all the others.”

I looked down at the list. “They’re dead.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“By whose hand?”

He shook his head. “I do not know.”

“Why four days? What happens then?”

The muscles around his jaw began to move beneath his cold pale skin. “I cannot say,” he said.

“What can you say?”

“I can tell you about the other names. Prostitutes, all. From houses less prestigious than the Velvet. One has vanished each month, for the last eleven months.”

“How-”

“I cannot say,” he said. “No one looked, when they vanished. They had no family. Few had close friends.”

“Then how do you know so much?”

“The House has many interests,” he said. “We’ve been following this one for some time. With, I fear, little success.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“We both want the same thing.” He sounded tired. “If anything I tell you helps you find Martha Hoobin, you’re welcome to it. Maybe you’ll remember that we did try to help.”

I wrestled with the concept of helpful vampires for a moment. Then I pulled open a drawer, found Martha’s silver comb, held it up.

“Ever seen this before?”

He lowered his shaded glasses, inspected the comb and handed it back to me. Then he reached back inside his coat-and withdrew an identical silver swan-comb.