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storage, I suppose, but I’m not sure Mom will want to.” Hannah wrinkled her nose and sneezed. “This dust’s getting to me. Let’s go down.”
    â€œWait a minute. There’s something here. . . .” Sam bent down and reached into the pile of timber. When he straightened up, she saw that he was holding a shallow wooden box.
    â€œWhat’s that?”
    â€œNot sure. Can’t see how it opens. Oh. I get it.” Applying slight pressure to the lid of the box, Sam slid it fractionally aside. “It’s stuck,” he muttered. “There are grooves on the inside for the lid to run on, but they’re clogged with dirt.”
    â€œCan’t you get it out?”
    â€œMaybe.” Grunting with the effort, he pushed hard on the lid, and it suddenly slid out of its grooves altogether, almost scattering about a dozen colored tablets. “What are they?” he asked, mystified. “Soap?”
    Hannah peered closely, running her finger over one of the tablets. “They’re paints! Watercolors. This box is wooden, though, not metal or plastic, so they must be old.”
    â€œThey’re also probably useless. Shall I leave it here?”
    â€œI suppose so.” But she continued to look at the little tablets thoughtfully. “That’s odd. Whoever used these paints must have had a liking for gloomy subjects.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause the bright colors haven’t been touched. But the dark blue, the black, and the indigo are almost completely used up.”
    Sam shrugged. “Since whoever used them probably died years ago, I don’t see it matters much.” He put the box down on the floor and moved toward the staircase. Hannah was about to follow, giving a final glance around the room, when she spotted something lying in the dust beneath the window.
    It was a very small hand. And it was attached to a very small body.
    For a moment she stood there, frozen in horror. She couldn’t even scream. Then, slowly, she breathed out, as she realized that what she was looking at wasn’t the mummified corpse of a baby, but a doll.

Chapter Five
    The Doll
    I T LAY FACEDOWN ON the floor as if someone had tossed it there casually. One arm was underneath it, the other outstretched, palm upward. It had long dark hair, stiff with dirt, a dress that had once been white, and the ragged remains of a blue ribbon round its waist. Hannah picked it up and it hung limply, the head and feet seeming too heavy for the soft cloth body.
    â€œPoor old thing,” she murmured. “I wonder how long you’ve been lying here, all forgotten.”
    â€œAs long as all the rest of this junk, by the look of it,” said Sam briskly. “Come on. Are you going to leave it there or bring it with you?”
    â€œI can’t just leave her here. Not after we’ve found her. Maybe I could clean her up somehow.”
    Back in the kitchen, Hannah laid the doll next to the sink and, moistening a paper towel under the tap, carefully rubbed at the sooty stains until a face emerged from the grime. A pale porcelain face with a chipped nose, a smiling rosebud of a mouth, and odd brown eyes that stared wildly, as if the owner were not quite sane. She stopped rubbing for a moment, her heart beating fast. Because, for some reason, that odd smile reminded her of something. Then she frowned and shook her head. It was just her imagination. Of course. It had to be.
    Even so, it occurred to her that, like the paint box, this doll was old. Very old.
    â€œI think I know who this might have belonged to,” she said suddenly.
    â€œWhat, you mean you can tell just by washing its face?” Sam looked disbelieving, as if she’d claimed to make a genie appear by rubbing a magic lamp.
    â€œI mean I found a book in my bedroom last night. A book of fairy tales. It had the owner’s name written inside—Maisie Holt, and the date. Christmas 1876. I think this