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my
questions.  The business at hand, she said, was to secure an undertaker in town. 
Since t he
dread surrounding the estate was anathema to something as useful as a young boy
to run a message, this duty fell to me.
    I
came back to a cold dinner and a housekeeper immersed in spurious activity.
    “How
clean must the house be for a dead master?” I did not ask.  The long walk had
at least been productive.  It is no great task to secure opiates in a place the
size of Arkham, and after taking precautions regarding their storage, I passed the
day in my chamber in a heavily medicated funk.  Georgine did not reappear.  
    The
following morning I was dressed and sitting comfortably in the parlour when Mrs.
Caddock, bag in hand, passed me on the way to the front door, apparently ready
for another day out.  Her hand stopped on the knob as I cleared my throat, a
look of guilt flashing on her face like the spot of a lighthouse’s lamp.
    “A
moment please, Mrs. Caddock,” I said.  “Before he died, Uncle Eamon mentioned a
friend of his, a bo’sun named Longbottom.  I don’t suppose you have an address
for him.”
    “No,
I don’t know any Longbottom,” she said.  “What is a bo’sun?”
    “A
boatswain is a sailor,” I said with authority, “on a ship.  Uncle Eamon served
with this man Longbottom for several years.  I’d like to get in touch with him.”
    “Served? 
Like on a boat you mean? ”  She looked at me suspiciously, as if she
may have to call for assistance.  “Your uncle’s never been to sea.  He’s always
lived right here in Arkham.  I know he loved to fill your head with stories,
but you, a grown man– You don’t think they were anything but stories, do you?”
    I
wished to argue with her, from spite as much as anything else, but remained
mute.  She had introduced a doubt not easily refuted.
    “Honestly,”
she said on her way out the door, “I wonder which one of you was the more addled. 
No wonder you got on so well.”
    * * *
    The
funeral was a lonely, rain swept affair.  Having been too distracted by grief (and
also my other problem) to be of assistance, I had left everything to Mrs.
Caddock, who spared all expense.  Other than the minister, the event was
attended by the housekeeper, the groundskeeper, and myself.  Georgine hadn’t been
seen since the evening of Uncles’ death.  I presumed she been run off by Mrs.
Caddock and had a vague impulse to do something about it, but to actually take
action seemed an insurmountable riddle.  Afterwards, I retreated to my uncle’s
study to sit brooding alone, a pastime that would in the days that followed become
my second most consuming habit.
    A
shriek, fortuitously dulled by both opium and disinterest, sounded from somewhere
else in the house.  When Mrs. Caddock’s wide, colourless frame materialized
stage left, rivulets of tears were streaming down its homely face.  I couldn’t
have been more surprised if the painting of my great aunt had begun weeping.
    “I
found out what the master’s ward has been up to, Mr. Sloan.  She’s run off with
our good silver service:  the table settings, the teapot, the whole thing.  Can
you believe it?”  Her hands anticipating her words, she said, “If I see her
again, I'll wring her pretty little neck!”
    Judging
it to be the most aggravating possible response, I smiled dazedly up at her,
and otherwise did not move at all.  The old washerwoman herself was most likely
responsible for the silver taking its leave, but absent Georgine I could see no
point in accusing her.
    Scorning
the rules governing time and its passage, the hours of that day stretched improbably. 
I lurched to and fro among my scattered memories, grasping for a purpose, but always
ending by staring into my empty hands.  The slack-springed hall clock was, twenty
minutes late, chiming the last hour of evening when my mind wandered around to
the incident of my burned arm.  I remembered the pain so intense I wished