“No, sir,” he said. “It’s about Madame Iritosky. In unpacking her things, sir, I found some extremely troubling items.”

“I thought Madame Iritosky had said she’d unpack her own things.”

“A lady never does her own unpacking,” he said. “When I opened her trunks, I found a number of unfortunate items: reaching rods, trumpets, bells, slates, an accordion with a self-playing mechanism, wires, several yards each of black cloth and veiling, and a book of conjuring tricks. And this!” He handed me a small bottle.

I read the label aloud. “Balmain’s Luminous Paint.”

“I’m afraid Madame Iritosky is not a true medium, but a fraud,” he said.

“It would seem so,” I said, opening the bottle. It held a greenish-white liquid.

“I fear that her intentions and those of Count de Vecchio toward the Merings are dishonorable,” he said. “I have taken the precaution of removing Mrs. Mering’s jewels for safekeeping.”

“Excellent idea,” I said.

“But it is Madame Iritosky’s influence over Miss Mering that I am most concerned about. I fear she may fall prey to some nefarious scheme of Madame Iritosky’s and the Count’s.” He spoke passionately and with real concern. “While they were at tea, Madame Iritosky read Miss Mering’s palm. She told her she saw marriage in her future. Marriage to a foreigner. Miss Mering is an impressionable young girl,” he said earnestly. “She has not been trained to think scientifically or to examine her feelings logically. I fear she may do something foolish.”

“You truly care about her, don’t you?” I said, surprised.

His neck reddened. “She has many faults. She is vain and foolish and silly, but those qualities are due to her poor upbringing. She has been spoilt and pampered, but at heart she is sound.” He looked embarrassed. “But she has little knowledge of the world. That is why I came to you.”

“Miss Brown and I have been concerned as well,” I said. “We are planning to attempt to persuade Miss Mering to accompany us on an excursion to Coventry tomorrow to get her away from the Count and Madame Iritosky.”

“Oh,” he said, looking relieved. “That is an excellent plan. If there is anything I can do to help—”

“You’d best put this back before Madame Iritosky finds it missing,” I said, handing the bottle of Balmain’s Luminous Paint back regretfully. It would have been perfect for writing “Coventry” on the séance table.

“Yes, sir,” he said, taking the bottle.

“And it might be a good idea to lock up the silver.”

“I have already done so, sir. Thank you, sir.” He started for the door.

“Baine,” I said. “There is something you can do. I’m convinced de Vecchio’s not an authentic count. I believe there’s a possibility he’s travelling under an alias. When you unpack his things, if there are any papers or correspondence…”

“I understand, sir,” he said. “And if there is anything else I can do, sir, please let me know.” He paused. “I have only Miss Mering’s best interests at heart.”

“I know,” I said, and went down to the kitchen to look for some strong, thin wire.

“Wire?” Jane said, wiping her hands on her apron. “What for, sorr?”

“To tie up my portmanteau,” I said. “The clasp is broken.”

“Baine’ll fix it for you,” she said. “Will they be having a séance tonight, now that this madam person’s come?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Will they have trumpets, do you think? My sister Sharon, she’s in service in London, her mistress had a séance, and a trumpet floated right over the table and played ‘Shades of Night Are Falling’!”

“I don’t know if there will be trumpets,” I said. “Baine’s busy with Count de Vecchio’s luggage, and I don’t want to bother him. I need two lengths of wire about a foot and a half long.”

“I can be giving you a piece of twine,” she said. “Will that do?”

“No,” I said, wishing I had simply told Baine to steal some out of Madame Iritosky’s trunk. “It has to be wire.”

She opened a drawer and began rummaging through it. “I’ve got the second sight, you know. Me mother had it, too.”

“Umm,” I said, looking into the drawer at a great assortment of unidentifiable utensils. But no wire.

“When Sean got his collar broke that time, I sorr it all in a dream. I get a funny feeling in the pit of me stomach whenever anything bad’s goin’ to happen.”

Like this séance? I thought.

“Last night I dreamed I sorr a great ship. Mark my words, I told Cook this morning, somebody in this house will be going on a journey. And then this afternoon if this madam person didn’t show up, and they’d come by train! Do you think they’ll be having a manifestation tonight?”

I sincerely hope not, I thought, though there was no telling with Verity. “What exactly do you have planned?” I asked her when she got back just before dinner. “You’re not going to dress up in veils or anything, are you?”

“No,” she whispered, sounding regretful. We were standing outside the French doors to the parlor, waiting to go into dinner. On the sofa, Mrs. Mering was rehashing the sounds of Cyril’s nocturnal breathings with Tossie — “The cry of a soul in hideous torment!” — and Professor Peddick and the Colonel were holding Terence captive with fishing stories in the corner by the hearth, so we had to talk softly. Neither Madame Iritosky nor the Count were down yet and were presumably still “resting.” I hoped they hadn’t caught Baine red-handed.

“I think the best thing to do is to keep it simple,” Verity said. “Did you get the wires?”

“Yes,” I said, taking them out of my jacket. “After an hour and a half of Jane’s second-sight experiences. What are they for?”

“The table-tipping,” she said, moving slightly so we couldn’t be seen from inside. “Bend a hook in one end of each of them,” she said, “and then, before the séance, put one wire up each sleeve. When the lights go out, you pull them down till they extend past your wrists and hook them under the edge of the table. That way you can lift the table and still be holding on to your partners’ hands.”

“Lift the table?” I said, putting them back inside my jacket. “What table? That massive rosewood thing in the parlor? No wire’s going to lift that thing.”

“Yes, it will,” she said. “It works on a principle of leverage.”

“How do you know?”

“I read it in a mystery novel.”

Of course. “What if someone catches me in the act?”

“They won’t. It’ll be dark.”

“What if someone says they want the lights on?”

“Light prevents the spirit forms from materializing.”

“Convenient,” I said.

“Extremely. They can’t appear if there’s an unbeliever present either. Or if anyone tries to interfere with the medium or with anyone in the circle. So no one will catch you when you lift the table.”

“If I can tip it. That table weighs a ton.”

“Miss Climpson did it. In Strong Poison. She had to. Lord Peter was running out of time. And so are we.”

“You talked to Finch?” I said.

“Yes. Finally. I had to walk all the way over to Bakers’ farm, where he’d gone to buy asparagus. What is he up to?”

“And the figure was definitely a five?”

“It wasn’t a figure. It was written out. And there’s no other number with two ‘f’s and two ‘e’s. It was definitely the fifteenth of June.”

“The fifteenth of June,” Professor Peddick said from the hearth. “The eve of the Battle of Quatre Bras and the fateful mistakes that led to the disaster of Waterloo. It was on that day that Napoleon made the error of trusting the taking of Quatre Bras to General Ney. A fateful day.”

“It’ll be a fateful day, all right, if we don’t get Tossie up to Coventry,” Verity murmured. “Here’s what we’ll do. You’ll tip the table once or twice, then Madame Iritosky will ask if there’s a spirit present, and I’ll rap once for yes. And then she’ll ask me if I have a message for someone, and I’ll spell it out.”

“Spell it out?”