The Forgotten Room Read Online Free PDF Page A

ran away from the mansion toward the sea. In the oak-paneled office, it was warm. Yet despite the warmth, Logan felt a shiver run through him.

6
    It was half past seven when Logan left his rooms, descended the sweeping central staircase, and entered the main dining room. Dark Gables, Lux’s home, had been the product of the febrile imagination of Edward Delaveaux. During its construction, the reclusive, bizarre millionaire had purchased an ancient French monastery, disassembled it stone by stone, and brought sections wholesale back to Rhode Island to incorporate into his mansion. The dining room had once been the monastery’s refectory. It was a large gothic space, with huge wooden beams forming a vaulted ceiling and decorative arches lining the tapestried walls. The only things breaking the illusion were the two opposing Solomonic, or barley-sugar, columns that—with their inlaid bands spiraling from bottom to top—matched those at the mansion’s main entrance.Such columns were the primary load-bearing supports of the building, and could be found, in varying sizes, throughout Lux.
    Logan paused just within the doorway a moment, looking around at the tables, the people dining at them, and the tuxedoed waiters hovering attentively here and there. There were several vaguely familiar faces, still more that he didn’t recognize. The tables were all identical: round, seating six, covered with crisp white linen tablecloths.
    One of the closest tables was almost empty. There were just two people seated at it, a man and a woman, and another place setting indicating that a third person had temporarily left the table. Logan recognized the seated man. He was Jonathan King, a specialist in game theory. While Logan hadn’t been close to King during his time at Lux, the man had always been friendly. He began walking toward the table. As he did so, he was aware of people doing double takes as he passed. He’d had his image on the cover of enough magazines that he was used to this.
    King looked up as Logan approached. He looked blank for a moment; then his face broke into a smile. “Jeremy!” he said, standing up and shaking Logan’s hand. “What a surprise. And a pleasure.”
    “Hi, Jonathan,” Logan replied. “May I join you?”
    “Of course.” King turned toward the woman who was seated beside him. She was perhaps thirty years of age, with black hair and bright, inquisitive eyes. “This is Zoe Dempster,” King said. “Joined Lux six months ago as a junior Fellow. She’s a specialist in limits and multivariable calculus.”
    Hearing this, Logan remembered how, at the think tank, people were automatically introduced not only with their name but their specialty. “Hello,” he said with a smile.
    “Hello.” Dempster frowned. “Have we met before?”
    “This is Jeremy Logan,” King said.
    The frown remained for a moment. Then a lightbulb went on over her head. “Oh. You’re the—” and she stopped suddenly.
    “That’s right,” Logan said. “The ghost detective.”
    Dempster laughed with something like relief. “You said it, not me.”
    Logan caught a glimpse of Olafson. He was seated at a table in the rear of the dining room, along with vice director Perry Maynard and several others. Looking up, the director noticed Logan’s glance and nodded.
    “Jeremy was in residence here for a time,” King said tactfully. “That was—How long ago was it, Jeremy?”
    “Almost ten years.”
    “Ten years. Hard to believe.” King shook his head. “Are you back here for more research?”
    Logan noticed the way the two were looking at him. He knew they were curious about his presence here, and he was considering the best way to answer, when somebody sat down at the third table setting: a man in his late fifties, with close-cropped black-and-silver hair and a beautifully trimmed beard that would have done Sigmund Freud proud. He set down a cup full of black coffee beside his plate, then looked over at Logan with an