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Ruan grumbled out an agreement as he turned to the pallet laid out on the floor. He ran his hands over the fabric, looking for more clues.

Think, Ruby. Think. I struggled to quell the emotion roiling within me and moved to the leather bag tucked into a corner and opened it, pulling out even more paper. A set of correspondence bound in red string alongside a journal full of timelines and notes in the margins. The handwriting here was not Violet’s, assuming Violet was who’d been writing in red upon the walls. I sank to the dusty floor with a thump, my rear hitting the hard stone floor as I skimmed over the pages, trying to wrap my mind around it all.

I flipped to the most recent entry and began to read.

Made contact with the rusalka. He knows why I’m here. Must send for V. We need the daughter. We need help. This cannot continue.

November 13, 1922. Roughly the same time the imposter began trying to make contact with me through Hari. This was also about the same time as the first reporter was found dead in the village of Saint Oda.

“This must have belonged to the first reporter, whoever he was…” I riffled through the empty pages afterward. Had his note been written before or after his altercation with the American doctor, Dr. Peterson? Perhaps that was what the two men were quarreling over—the reporter must have contacted my mother, and then Peterson discovered it. Then Peterson or von Keller followed him here and killed him for it, disguising their crimes by placing him in the village green.

“I think Violet was telling the truth…” My voice trembled as I tried to place all the clues in order, but this case was too close. It all hurt far too much. My mother had spoken with the reporter, she must have told him what was happening in the hospital. The only problem was, I still did not know what she told him. What secrets she revealed.

Ruan didn’t answer, he was staring at a nail in the wall. I tucked the letters from the leather bag into my pocket and came to look at what he’d found. A bit of torn paper was still affixed to the small nail. Whatever page had been there had been ripped away. But the position indicated that whatever that piece of paper might have been, it served to bridge an article about the Rusalka, my mother, and Dinant. A line had been drawn across it. In red ink, interrupted. Violet had found something … a connection between the two.

I stared at the wall, struggling to understand what the two could possibly have in common. I knew my mother better than anyone and yet I came up short. I studied the ripped page. There wasn’t even an inch of paper left, but it was enough for me to recognize the familiar scrollwork at the edge. It too had been torn out of a book before being affixed to the wall to help Violet order her thoughts. The decorative linework was very similar to the baptismal record of Manon—the missing child. The peculiar red mark on the page made a great deal more sense now than it had when I first noticed it after pulling it from Narcisse’s throat.

“He was here…” I murmured half to myself. Narcisse must have found this place too and taken that page. The little girl at the children’s home believed Manon was with my mother. What if … what if she was? They’d disappeared around the same time. I’d seen the child alive and well. If Félix was to be trusted, my mother was too. I had to find them. I had to find them both.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIXA Second Try

WITH each step closer to town after leaving the powerhouse it grew ever clearer I had to learn more about the missing little girl, Manon. There were three people on that wall. The Child. My mother. Me. All I knew of the girl was that she’d been born at Saint Oda’s not long after the war broke out, only a handful of months after the horrors at Dinant.

Nearly nine years ago.

Anna Marchand, Manon’s mother, had been the first person to disappear from Saint Oda’s, around the same time as the first reporter was killed. Had Anna come here from Dinant? It was a plausible enough hypothesis. But it still did not explain the connection to my mother. Did Manon have more family—others who might be in danger, as her mother had been? The sisters at the children’s home would likely know. A group of starlings rose up high in the winter-blue sky, catching my attention. It wasn’t safe for any of us and I could not bear being responsible for any more death.

“Ruan—” I reached out for the sleeve of his dark green woolen jumper, tugging him back.

He stopped in his tracks, a silent question on his face as he turned.

“Please take Mr. Owen to Walcourt. Make sure he gets on the train.”

His nostrils flared slightly as he drew in a sharp breath. “You need me here.”

I did. There was no question about that, but I needed to make certain Mr. Owen remained safe even more. “Do not let him prevaricate. Do not let him convince you to let him stay. He will lie. He will do anything to stay behind—he’s a canny old thing. But you mustn’t let him win. You saw what was on the wall back there. Regardless of who the killer is, it’s plain as day what the old man is to me.”

Ruan raked a hand through his unruly dark curls, resting his fist atop his head. The afternoon sun caught on the occasional silver strand. “He’s not going to like it.”

“Of course he isn’t going to like it. He doesn’t like spinach either, but he’ll eat it because it’s good for him.”

“There is a small difference in that comparison.”

“If someone wants to hurt me—there are two ways they could go about the thing. Both are here in Saint Oda’s.” I held up two fingers to underscore the point. “Him and you. And as I don’t see you’re going to get on that train to go home, it’s best you make sure he is. I can only worry about myself and one other person. Take your pick on which of you it is.”

“Very well.” He gave me a curt nod, looking up at the looming dark walls of the hospital perched upon the high ground. “Don’t do anything foolish before I return.”

I brushed a kiss to his cheek, scraping myself on the silver-and-black shadow he’d not bothered shaving off this morning. “I am many things, Ruan Kivell, but I’m never foolish.”

He let out a huff of amusement, not bothering to argue. Foolish. Of course not. Reckless was another matter.

I lingered at the crossroads, watching Ruan disappear around the bend and into the village. I was in no danger from the sisters up at the priory, but I did worry about who would be next. Violet had been arguing with Dr. Peterson. Just as the previous reporter had before his death. I’d seen it with my own eyes. It was increasingly looking like the affable Dr. Peterson could be our killer—though I was still no closer to why. I might not like Violet Devereaux, but I didn’t wish her dead. Of course, the best way to prevent that from happening was to finish things here. I needed solid evidence of Dr. Peterson’s guilt. Something I could take to the gendarmerie to prove beyond a doubt he was our killer, and I needed to find it soon.

I followed the path as the Angelus bells rang out from the priory church. The low rhythm calling the faithful to prayer. I was halfway across the green when I came across the very same young nun who had turned me away from the children’s home this morning.

She was reedy and thin, with wisps of nut-brown hair slipping out from beneath her wimple and catching in the wind. She shifted the small child she carried to her other hip. “Can I help you?” she asked in French as I drew closer. The bottom of her vestments brushed the toes of the worn black shoes she wore. “I am Sister Agathe.”

I gave her a warm smile, one I did not feel after the morning’s discoveries. “I saw you earlier, when I called at the children’s home. I need to speak to Sister Marie-Thérèse.”