"Can we go in?"
She looked nervous. "I'd rather not? I spent one night there, the first night, hoping he'd come back. But then I couldn't stand it. I was too frightened."
"Are you collecting his mail?"
"No? I suppose it still comes."
"Let me get it, then. Do you have a key?"
She didn't want me to; I could see that. But I just stood there, and after a moment she fished a key out of her purse and I crossed the road. The gate opened with a squeak and I went up a stone walk to the door. This was large, glossy black, and bore a knocker appropriate to a fur dealer a brass snowshoe rapped a fox on the nose. I fitted the key. It worked a dead-bolt lock; that is, you had to use the key to lock the door as well as open it. Conceivably this explained why the door had been found standing open on the night Brightman had disappeared: if he'd been in a hurry and slammed the door behind him, the bolt would have struck the doorframe, forcing the door to bounce back. Now I pushed it inward, plowing a fair heap of mail ahead of me into the entranceway. Then I stood a moment, inhaling that special smell of rich house: waxed wood, polish, wool carpet, cleanliness. I couldn't find a light switch, but after a moment my eyes adjusted to the gloom and I picked up his mail and stepped into a foyer. The hall ran straight on, with stairs to one side of it; two rooms, with sliding doors, led off to my immediate left and right. The doors on my left were partly open, so I stuck my head in, peering across a shadowy vista of furniture toward the dark glitter of glass-fronted cabinets. I stepped back. The kitchen, I guessed, was straight ahead, down the hall. It was very dark. The eerie stillness that settles in abandoned rooms had fallen over the place? and all at once something became real to me: Brightman was missing. I felt ahead to the stairs. There was a lamp on the newel post and I pulled it on, then started up, the banister guiding my hand, ankle-deep carpet cushioning each step. The landing was dark, the second-floor landing pitch black. But I groped ahead and almost immediately felt a doorframe. The door was open. I stepped into the room and punched on a light.
I had found my way to Brightman's library.
Or I suppose that's what he called it. It was very large, with a peculiar quality; heavy, old-fashioned, not quite North American. Dark oak paneling came up to your waist, the walls and ceiling were joined by elaborate moldings, and in the center was a large plaster medallion from which a chandelier hung. Despite its size, the room felt cramped, for it was jammed with books, cabinets, display cases, and the furniture was heavy: an elaborate desk stood just inside the door; oak chairs, covered in brocade, were grouped round the fireplace; and then a sofa and more chairs were ranged near the display cases at the back of the room. It was like a museum a room belonging to one of those nineteenth-century gentleman collectors with an interest in "natural history." The display cases, in fact, were filled with stuffed animals, each caught in a natural pose (a beaver, up on its hind legs, was chewing a twig gripped in its paws; a lynx padded furtively over a log), and this made the glassy glitter of their eyes all the more gruesome though I suppose such a collection was reasonable given Brightman's business. And yet this collection, I realized, was only an afterthought compared with the framed prints and engravings that occupied one whole side of the room. There were five rows of them, running from the wainscoting almost to the ceiling? they were filed on that wall, not displayed, and didn't invite you to look at them so much as count them? which I did: the total was 228 woodcuts, wood engravings, linocuts, lithographs, and monotypes. I don't know much about art, and I know virtually nothing about graphic art, but as I went down that wall I managed to recognize a few of the names: Kathe Kollwitz, Gaudier-Brzeska (three linocuts), Gertrude Hermes, Robert Gibbings, Rockwell Kent? All of them were modern, or at least of this century; all were black-and-white; and many had that heavy, dramatic quality you find in the propaganda art of the thirties: crude social symbolism, poverty, subjects taken from industry pitheads, gasworks, the complex of lines and shapes formed by cranes at a dockside. One, I saw, was by the Russian artist Vladimir Favorsky: cossacks, workers, soldiers, Lenin and Trotsky, their figures all pulled and stretched into a map of Russia during the Civil War of the twenties. Presumably, Brightman had picked it up while he was over there, but when I took it off the wall, I saw that it was from the 18th Venice Internationale in 1930. I replaced it and stepped back. And wondered.
In the restaurant, I'd had a first glimmer of interest in Brightman himself; now he seemed as fascinating a father as any orphan could wish for.
I stared about me. In the hall, I'd felt his absence; here, his presence pressed in from every direction. Almost in a trance, I made a second circuit of the room, ending by his desk, just inside the door. Though ornately carved, its top was scarred and it was clear that Brightman had actually worked here? there was a mug of pencils and pens, a stapler, a roll of tape, envelopes, bills. And there was also a photograph. It was small, four by six, in a plain wooden frame. Brightman. And my imaginings hadn't been so far wrong. He was a big man, heavy-set, with a broad chest sloping into a heavy belly. His face was broad and genial, his hair thick, though receding slightly from a high forehead. The photo had been taken outdoors: he was wearing a lumberjack shirt and his hands were thrust into tweed trousers. It struck me as a little peculiar, having a photograph of yourself on your desk, but when I picked it up, I saw its real value. On the back, penciled in a clumsy hand, were the words: Harry Brightman, taken by May Brightman with her own Brownie, Georgian Bay, Aug. 1, 1949.
I set the photograph back in its place. Harry Brightman, as May had seen him. But who was he? What sort of man had lived and breathed in this room? And why had he left it? For the first time, it occurred to me that the answer to this question might be more interesting than I'd assumed. But I wasn't going to answer it now, and May, I suspected, had started to worry. Taking a last glance over my shoulder, I pressed the wall switch, stepped into the doorway? and froze.
I stood utterly still. Before me, the hall was pitch black. But I knew I wasn't alone.
Steps, soft as breaths, were coming along the corridor. Toward me. Right past me. And then, for an instant, I saw a face?a face, a glint of red hair and with a wild glance that face looked right into my eyes: a face as thin as a weasel's and very pale.
And then it was gone.
My heart thumped thumped so hard it was all I could hear. I could scarcely breathe. I strained to listen. The carpet on the stairs was very thick, but I made out quick, padding steps? I waited for the sound of the door. But heard only silence?
A minute passed. He must have been on the third floor all the time. Not Brightman. Definitely not. But someone?
Cautiously, I edged into the hall. The stairway was black as a well, but then I reached the landing and the newel-post light glimmered up from below.
A step at a time, I went down. Then, three from the bottom, I stopped and listened again. Nothing. He must have gone? but if he hadn't, if he was waiting along the hall leading to the back of the house, I would be completely visible the moment I stepped off the staircase.
Gripping the banister, leaning forward, I pulled the chain switch on the newel post.
Red spots danced in front of my eyes. I waited, letting them fade, then stepped silently down the last couple of stairs, into the hall. Nothing moved. It took all my nerve, but I felt my way along, toward the back. There was a little light here, gray and filmy as fog, and after a moment a door loomed up in front of me. Beyond it lay the chill gloom of the kitchen. I waited, listening. The fridge coming on nearly made me jump out of my skin, but there was no one here, and when I checked the back door it seemed firmly locked. Quickly, I made my way back to the front. He'd either gone out this way or through the basement. I opened the door, stepped into the night?