Chang was not yet there—Svenson was not frankly sure where Chang slept, much less when he woke—and so the Doctor tracked down another fisherman, the one Sorge suggested might have cigarettes. After a minute or two of evasive haggling, the man showed Svenson a brick of waxed paper sealed with a dab of red wax marked with a two-headed bird.

“Danish,” the man explained.

“My habitual brand is Russian,” countered Svenson, doing his best to sound skeptical, when he was so hungry. “One can only acquire them through an agent in Riga—Latvia—as St. Petersburg is barred to Macklenburg merchants.”

The man nodded, as if this was of no interest but he was willing to assume some point lay beyond it.

“The tobacco is quite strong,” said Svenson. “Have you smoked a Russian cigarette?”

“I prefer to chew.” In proof of his claim the fisherman spat into a pewter cup Svenson had assumed to contain an especially bitter-looking coffee.

“Understandable—a sailing man can never depend on a flame. No matter. I will be happy to take them off your hands.”

He gathered up the parcel and placed the price they had agreed to on the table—outrageous by the village's standards, but nothing compared to what he might pay in town… or what the vile sticks were worth to his clear mind.

PUFFING AWAY with the intensity of a fox tearing into a slaughtered hare, Svenson returned to the fishing boat—waiting any longer for Chang's sullen appearance would cost the tide. It took half an hour to pass through the surf into the sea. The Doctor, while no real practical sailor, knew enough to pull on the proper ropes when the fisherman called them out. As they approached the most likely sandbar, Svenson lit up another smoke and did his best to relax in the fresh cold air. But even with the familiar nicotine spur in his lungs, he wondered that he could have surrendered to optimism—from such an unlikely and unlooked-for corner—so very easily.

The airship was not at that sandbar, nor any other, nor anyplace they could spy as they ran the length of the coastline. The fisherman explained the depth of the sea away from the bars, the action of the tide, the force of the storm. The craft must have been pulled from its fortunate perch and then rolled down—keeping together or tearing apart, depending on the strength of its construction and whether it smashed into any outcroppings of rock on its way—to the very deep bottom of the sea.

MISS TEMPLE'S condition did not change. Doctor Svenson had again been dragooned by Sorge, to give his precious medical opinion on a neighbor's afflicted swine, and once back had pounded willow bark at the table for a plaster. It was a task he had hoped to share with Elöise, but instead young (and well intentioned, and fat) Bette had expressed an interest, committing the Doctor to an hour of the girl's belabored enthusiasm. By the time Svenson finally left the table he could hear Elöise helping Lina with the laundry. One could no more speak around Lina than exchange pleasantries with a Jesuit. When he returned from administering the plaster to Miss Temple, none of the women were in the house. He stepped onto the porch and fumbled a cigarette from his restocked silver case. At the other end of the rail, like a statue in its customary spot, stood Chang.

“Have you seen Mrs. Dujong?” Svenson asked, rather casually. They had not spoken of the missed appointment with the fishing boat.

“I have not,” answered Chang.

The Doctor smoked the rest of his cigarette in silence, shivering at the evening chill, and ground the butt beneath his heel.

HE WOKE in near-darkness, on the floor next to Miss Temple's bed, covered with the peacoat. The tallow candle was close to guttering, and he'd no idea of the time. Had Miss Temple made a sound? He had been dreaming, and already the fragments faded—a tree, bright leaves, his own hands caked with ice. He inhaled deeply to push away his thickened thoughts, and shifted closer to the bed.

Miss Temple opened her eyes.

“Celeste?” he whispered.

“Mmmn,” she sighed, though it seemed no sort of reply.

“Can you hear me? How do you feel?”

She turned her head away with a whispered exhalation and said no more. Doctor Svenson tucked the blanket over her exposed shoulder, allowing—and quite viciously disapproving of the gesture the instant he performed it—the tips of his fingers to trace along her skin. He returned to his place on the floor and stared up at the single window, the candle reflected in its dark pool like a distant, dying sun.

HE TRIED again at breakfast, lingering at the table while Elöise piled the plates on a tray for Bette to scrub. The girl clomped outside with the tray, and Svenson, fingering a cigarette, spoke in as general a tone as possible before Elöise could leave the room.

“We must talk about our return. Sorge tells me a train may be caught in Karthe, a mining settlement in the hills, some day's ride away on good roads—though of course the roads are poor after the storm. The forest between has been flooded…”

She turned from the window to face him and he began to stammer.

“In, ah, any event, there is a score of questions about our enemies, about the law, we must also—each of us—because I am not… unmindful, and yet—”

The door opened and Chang stepped into the room.

“That child is an animal,” he snarled.

Svenson turned to him, his face a mask of frustration.

“Doctor Svenson has raised the very important question of our return, of what waits for us,” said Elöise.

Chang nodded, but said nothing.

“The state of our remaining enemies,” Elöise continued. “The law. What is known…”

Chang nodded again but did not speak.

Svenson sighed—it was not what he wanted to talk about at all— nor did he want to be talking to Chang—but he carried on, thoughts tumbling out of order, hoping to catch Elöise's eye. But even when he did, she showed nothing beyond attention to his words.

Then, with a sudden chill Doctor Svenson saw himself, standing in the kitchen. He saw these last days with a startling clarity, with foreboding—tending Miss Temple, desiring Elöise, their isolation—it was all vanity, distraction, a witch's illusion from a tale, a false offer of a life Svenson knew he could not have.

He had delayed. He had tried to turn away. He had dropped his guard.

He stopped talking. He left them standing there and walked into the dirty yard, looking up at the oppressive, heavy sky. Sorge called to him from the boat shed, waving both arms to penetrate the Doctor's thoughts.

THIS NEWEST errand had involved goats, but their owner occupied one of a small cluster of houses and so the appearance of the Doctor had become a social occasion for all of the neighbors. Into this knot of villagers came the news about dead men at the stable… and a rumor of wolves. At once children were bundled inside, livestock penned, and a party of men gathered to investigate. The nerves on the back of his neck tingling with dread, Svenson volunteered to go along and provide a medical opinion. Sorge looked at him strangely.

“But it is a wolf.”

“Perhaps there is more than one,” said Svenson quickly. “A proper examination of wounds, you see, can make such details clear.”

The men around them murmured approval—and approval of Doctor Svenson in general—but Sorge became noticeably less talkative. Before he could broach the news to Chang—whom he found, to his annoyance, standing with Elöise on the porch—Chang suggested they walk to the shore, so they might search more effectively for any flotsam. Svenson agreed to the obvious lie, and was soon presented with Chang's discovery of blue glass. While it did not prove anything either way, it increased his dread as the two men traveled with Sorge to the stable.

The dead grooms' wounds were vicious and savage enough for a wolf, but lacked teeth-marks. Indeed, the edges of the wounds were ragged, like a hank of bread torn from a loaf. He looked up for Chang, who was not there, and found himself forced to explain the sequence of death to his observers, all the time growing more convinced no animal was to blame at all. When Chang did return, subtly directing him to the privy and its indigo blue stench and finger-stains, the Doctor knew they were all in danger.