“Everyone find a spot,” Pix said. “Make yourself comfortable. We’re going to be here for a while.”

Everyone began to pick through the pile of random bedding. There were enough blankets for everyone to have two each, but two wasn’t going to cut it, especially sleeping on the floor.

“Funnnnn,” Nate said in a low voice, picking up a pillow. “This is like being on one of those trips to Mount Everest. You know, the ones with the ten percent death rate and half the landmarks are frozen bodies.”

“There’s Wi-Fi,” Vi said. “That’s something.”

“Is it?” Nate asked.

David grabbed a blanket and set himself up on two chairs, pulled his blankets over himself, and kept reading. It wasn’t as dickish as taking the sofa. And yet, somehow, taking the slightly less dickish path felt even more dickish. Janelle and Vi once again looked at each other, then looked away, each setting up their nests in a different little nook around the low, ornamental tables full of Ellingham brochures.

“What is going on with those two?” Pix asked Stevie in a low voice.

“Nothing,” Stevie said. “I don’t know.”

Stevie opted for the floor behind the sofa. There was carpet there, and the sofa felt like a windbreak. Nate curled up in the corner. Hunter was left with the sofa, as being on the cold, hard floor would have been difficult on him.

Once the blankets were down, the room quickly divided into two camps: the people with the tablets and the people without them. Vi, Hunter, and David sat in proximity to each other and read, occasionally comparing notes. On the other side of the room, Stevie, Janelle, and Nate sat together and separate, each zoning into their own world. Janelle had her headphones on and was listening to something loud enough that the sound was seeping out. She was reading a book with a lot of mechanical diagrams in it. Everything in her manner said she was trying to block out what Vi was doing. Nate flicked between his book and his computer. Stevie even thought she saw him open up a file that looked like his book. She saw the word chapter at the top of a few pages as he scrolled down. Since Nate only wrote when forced to, this indicated pretty clearly what he thought of the situation.

Stevie was left to marinate in confusion and a light, undefined panic. If she could, she would have done nothing but stare at David. Her fingertips could still feel his hair, the muscles in his shoulders. Her lips remembered all the kisses. And the warmth—being next to someone like that.

He might as well have been across the ocean, not ten or fifteen feet away, behind a gilt-legged table and a rose-colored sofa.

As for working on the situation at hand, well, she had no privacy, and she needed privacy to think. She needed to pace and put stickies on walls and mumble to herself.

Maybe nothing was going on. Maybe Hayes and Ellie and Fenton had died in exactly the ways that everyone else thought. Accidents do happen, especially if you take bad chances. They were living proof of it right now. They had gambled with the weather and broken the rules, and now they were trapped here together.

She had to move around. The bathroom. She could go there.

Stevie got up, grabbed her backpack, and headed out into the hall. The bathrooms were behind the stairs, past the ballroom and Albert Ellingham’s office. Both of those grand doors were closed. She killed time brushing her teeth and washing her face, staring at herself in the mirror—her blond hair was overgrown now. The brown roots were showing. Her skin was chapped from the cold, and her lips were dry. She leaned into the sink, the same sink where the glitterati had come to touch up their lipstick and dry-heave all those years ago.

Maybe it was over. She had solved the case—in her mind—but her evidence was thin. She could go home, write it all up. Maybe post it online, see if it got traction on the boards. Show her work.

And it would all be over. What then?

She blew out a long exhale, picked up her things, and went back out.

David was waiting for her, sitting on one of the leather chairs out in the hall.

“Remember that favor I did for you?” he said. “I have something, if you want to see it.”

He held up his phone.

TO: [email protected]

Today at 9:18 a.m.

FROM: [email protected]

CC: [email protected]

Mr. Malloy,

I don’t see how that document is any of the senator’s business.

Regards,

Dr. J. Quinn

“She shut that down,” David said. “It’s kind of hot.”

“But!” Stevie said, her face flushed with blood. “She said that document. Which means there is a document. There is a document.”

“Sounds like it,” he said.

“Which means we need to see it. We can reply. I mean, Jim can reply. Jim should reply.”

“Jim is busy,” David replied. “Jim isn’t here to do your bidding.”

“David,” she said, wheeling around in front of him. “Please. Look. I know. You’re pissed at me. But this is important.”

“Why?”

“Because if there is a codicil, it means there is a motive. It means there is money. I need to see it.”

“I mean, why is this important to me,” he clarified. “I know you said not everything is about me, but . . .”

“Seriously?” Stevie replied.

“And if I find something? What if I said I would do it for you if you left me alone?”

“What?”

“I’ll do what you want,” he said. “I’ll reply. I’ll help you get your information. But you and I, that’s it. We don’t talk anymore.”

“What kind of a weird request is that?” she said, her throat tightening.

“It’s not weird. It’s really straightforward. My dad gave you something you wanted in order for you to come back and watch over me. So I’m giving you something similar. I want to know which is more important. Me, or what I can do for you?”

It felt like the Great House was tilting to the side.

“Taking a long time to decide,” he said.

“I don’t think it’s fair.”

“Fair?” he replied.

“You’re saying this while you are, right now, having other people go through your dad’s stuff. Which you stole.”

“To stop him from getting more powerful.”

“And I’m trying to find out what happened to Hayes, to Ellie, to Fenton.”

“Is that what you’re doing?”

“Yes,” Stevie snapped. “It is.”

“Because it sort of looks like you want more dirt for your pet project.”

It was the words pet project that did it. A kind of blue-white rage came up behind her eyes.

“I want the information,” she said.

David smiled that long, slow smile—the smile that said, “I told you this is how the world works.”

“Okay,” he said chirpily. “Let’s write a nice note.”

The note poured forth with surprising speed. David spoke under his breath as he typed. Perhaps this was what it had been like when Francis and Eddie composed their Truly Devious note, head to head:

The senator regards anything involving his son as his business. This is why the senator donated a private security system to assist you after your recent issues. I need not remind you that two students have died at the school and the senator’s son ran off while under your supervision. The senator would like to know of any potential issues that may arise due to your negligence; this includes any publicity having to do with the historical issues of the school. We felt this was a polite way of getting information, but if you wish for us to take more legal action, we will do so.

Regards,

J. Malloy

“There,” he said. “I knew all the years I spent around these choads would pay off. Your note. And now, we’re done.”

He hit send, then he turned and walked back toward their camping room.

April 13, 1937

MONTGOMERY, THE BUTLER, PRESIDED OVER THE MORNING’S SIDEBOARD with his usual taciturn efficiency. The house still turned out a good and ample breakfast, with great lashings of the famous Vermont syrup gently warmed by a spirit lamp. There was enough food to feed twenty guests, but the four people at the table wanted very little of it. Flora Robinson sipped at a cup of coffee from the delicate fairy rose pattern that Iris had chosen. Robert Mackenzie was going through the morning mail. George Marsh hid behind a newspaper. Leonard Holmes Nair made a few stabs at his half of a grapefruit, none of them fatal.

“Do you think he’ll come down this morning?” he asked the group.

“I think so,” Flora replied. “We need to act as normal as possible.”

Leo was polite enough not to laugh at this suggestion.

It had been exactly one year since the kidnapping. One year of searching and waiting and pain . . . one year of denial, violence, and some acceptance. There was an unspoken agreement that the word anniversary would never be spoken.

The door to the breakfast room swung open, and Albert Ellingham came in, dressed in a light gray suit, looking strangely well rested.

“Good morning,” he said. “I apologize for my lateness. I was on the telephone. I thought we might . . .”

He eyed the breakfast suspiciously, as if he had forgotten what food was for. He often had to be reminded to eat.

“. . . I thought we might all go for a trip today.”