Edgar took a sip of his scalding hot coffee and began methodically noting down every item from Nancy's Bell's bright blue bag. He had sent Fay to research the ownership of the Riddle House. He wanted to confirm that the present owner had no knowledge that anyone was using it. She had complained about doing the boring dirty work, but Edgar had other things to worry about. There was a departmental meeting with all the Inspectors and the Super and he was concerned that Masters would decide to shut the inquiry down as fruitless.

He had written up the request for a second tox screening on Nancy Bell. He and Fay had worked on it late into the night; wanting to make it strong enough to pass muster. It wasn't all that common for post-autopsy tests to be repeated. There were just too many cases and only so many forensic specialists to go around. But he felt, and Fay had agreed, it was essential to rule out any possibility of poison or drugs. Edgar was quite sure there would be none. In fact, he was quite certain he knew what the cause of death was. It was just a matter of who had done it.

Unfortunately, there was the secondary problem after that of whether he would be able to gather sufficient evidence to prove it and after that, whether he would even dare consider reporting the whole truth to his superiors. They were bound to think he was mad. And then there was the problem of actually arresting the killer or killers and managing to keep them in jail long enough to actually tried them.

The bright blue bag contained several A Level prep books, a spiral notebook with notes and exercises, also for the A Levels, a paperback edition of an old Georgette Heyer novel, a small diary and the CD player. Edgar entered the list of items in his evidence record book and turned the bag upside down to make sure he hadn't missed anything. A pen and a couple of shillings fell out, but nothing else.

He flipped through the prep books and spiral notebook to make sure there were no papers or notes that were more personal. There were none. He did the same with the paperback. There were no little notes in it, no coded messages, nothing at all out of the ordinary. He tapped his fingers on his desk in annoyance and reached for the diary at the same time as he was taking another sip of the scalding coffee. The diary fell on the floor and a small slim object that looked like an eraser fell out. Edgar scooped them up quickly. He opened the diary, and was dismayed to see that the pages were altogether blank. He flipped through them and prodded the leather binding. With a racing heart, he noticed a piece of creamy colored paper curled up in the space between the back of the book and the inside pages. He noted that down on the sheet, found a pair of tweezers in his desk drawer and gently extracted the small roll of paper, parchment, from the spine of the book.

The small paper had a letter dated in June, only a month ago. It read,

Lots of love,
Your cuz, Katie

Edgar felt the drumroll in his chest increase. He thought, surely they can hear it from out in the hall. And how, how was he going to explain what this letter meant to the case? Was it possible? And last, he thought, let there be a natural cause. Let them find something in the tox screen. I'm not strong enough to handle this. And if I try, HE'll kill me this time. And maybe Fay, if I let her in on this. He rolled the parchment back up and taped it to the inside of the drawer of his desk. No one would find it there unless they knew where to look. And no one would think of looking at all so long as he had control of this case.

The morning sun shining on his face woke Harry from an exhausted sleep. His scar was still buzzing slightly and his stomach was eating a hole in him that might have been hunger or might have been nausea. He rubbed his eyes and checked to make sure he had his wand on him. He ached all over, especially his bruised face and his ribs. He saw that the others were all still sleeping and none of them appeared to have moved since he had woken in the night. The enormous open room was even more bare and dusty and depressing than it had seemed yesterday. He wished desperately that he were back at Hogwarts with nothing more challenging to do than practice quidditch or study for a test or visit Hagrid with Ron and Hermione. He would even take O.W.L.s over this. He dragged himself up and washed while the others were still sleeping and found himself more depressed than ever when he tried to find something to wear. He salvaged another pair of jeans-- too loose and too short--and was looking for a T-shirt that didn't have too many holes when Annie's voice made him jump.

"Bloody hell!" she said. "You are a right mess. Your ribs aren't..." Harry pulled a T-shirt over his head in a hurry and tried to hide his embarrassed flush.

"I'm fine," he said shortly. He said quickly, "Is there anything to eat?"

Harry thought gloomily that being liked by Black Jack Crowly might not be the kind of recommendation she thought it was. He felt as lost as he had ever been in his life. He had been expelled from the wizard world without a hearing, without a note even, his friends hadn't replied, Dumbledore hadn't replied, and yet Voldemort was still out there. It wouldn't matter to Voldemort if he never waved his wand again. It wouldn't matter to Voldemort if he pretended to be a Muggle and never attempted to do magic again. He knew with absolute certainty that Voldemort was still going to try to kill him. And without more training at Hogwarts, Harry wouldn't stand a chance.

While Annie was busy dressing behind the plastic curtain and the others still slept, Harry slipped the ten pound note Black Jack had handed him inside his trunk and wrapped it up in his invisibility cloak. He would make one more effort to go back. He would take his trunk and go to Kings Cross on the first of September and see if he could get through the barrier to Platform 9 and 3/4.

Harry wandered restlessly over to the tiny kitchenette. There was nothing in the small fridge, not a thing. The two burner cooktop looked as though it hadn't been cleaned or used in years and when he turned the water on in the sink, it ran rusty red for a good two minutes before water came out that looked remotely clear and drinkable. After fifteen years with Petunia Dursley, he couldn't help being reflexively utterly appalled.

"Don't you ever go to the market or cook at all?" he asked, trying to be very careful not to let his reaction show. He was actually a bit ashamed of it and thought Dave would have good reason to say he thought himself too good for them. Annie didn't seem offended though.

"Oh, no, dearie. We just get something from the takeout and Dave and Nora bring in stuff for the afternoons."

Harry asked hestitantly, "Do they ever bring in anything but fruit and soda?" His stomach was growling insistently now and he tried, nonchalantly, to pretend it belonged to someone else.

Annie laughed, a rich chuckle that made him smile back, and said, "Ta. Really, what are we going to do, make bacon and eggs and kippered salmon? This way, there's no mess to clean up and no arguments over who's to do the cleaning. Besides," she added, "I don't even know if either of the two of them can cook, and I've never managed to make anything without burning it." She must have noticed his face fall though, because she said, "C'mon. Let's get down to Covent Garden. Maybe we can pick up some change early today." She went over to Nora's canvas sack and rooted through it coming up with the bottle of make-up.

Harry said, "Erm, won't Nora be upset you've gone in her bag?"

Annie advanced on him with the bottle and said, "Oh, not at all. She's the one that said you should cover that mess up." She looked critically at his face and said, "I think that bruise is about passed the worst. It should start fading away soon." She frowned and said, "All the rest, too. Except the memories. They don't ever fade entirely."

Harry didn't feel at all comfortable asking what memories she might have wanted to forget. He flinched only a little when she patted the stuff on his bruised cheek and then busily tried to hide his scar as well.

She made a sound of annoyance and said; "You'd think I hadn't put anything on it at all." She tipped her head and said, "'Course, if you were singing in a band like Davey's, a scar like that would be an advantage. Some of that lot would think it's attractive. Romantic like."

Harry couldn't hide his disgust at that. He couldn't imagine anyone finding a curse scar romantic. He automatically flattened his fringe down over his forehead, and followed Annie out of the loft and down the four flights of stairs.

Annie made him start this time with Greensleeves, and though they got a fair number of coins tossed in, nobody tossed in a five-pound note. They also stopped sooner. A Constable came by and watched for a song or two and then started asking questions.

"You're a new one," he said to Harry. He swallowed down his fear and nodded.

Annie said, "He's my cousin, come to visit for the summer hols before school starts, the Conservatory, you know."

The constable looked disbelieving and said, "It's funny how many students from the Conservatory never go to class." He turned to Harry and said, "What's your name son, and how old are you?"

Harry remembered more quickly to say, "James Black, sir. And I'm eighteen."

The Constable gave him a closer look and said, "Well, I could almost believe you go there. I'll let it go by this time, but you know you're supposed to have a permit to be doing street performing, don't you?"

Annie answered quickly, "We have got one. I just left it behind. Took my guitar case and forgot my bag." She smiled winsomely at the Constable and said, "You don't mind if we do one last song, do you." The Constable seemed to find her thousand-watt smile as appealing as Harry did and he waved his hand. Annie struck up the chords of Greensleeves again, and this time they sang it in harmony. An old lady in a tweed suit walking an even older poodle--it's snout had grey and white hair mixed in with the original black--dropped a couple of pound notes in and sang the end chorus in a mournful croak along with them.

Annie handed him the guitar case to carry and said, "That was a close one."

Harry said, "Do you really have a permit?"

She looked at him and said, "Course I don't have one. They cost money, which is really unfair. I mean, the people that need to play in the street are the ones that don't have the money in the first place. But don't worry, duckie, I'll chat up that Constable next time and he'll forget to ask us because he'll know our names. Names, you know are power. See, once a person knows your name, he thinks he knows you, when he might not know what you really are at all."

Harry said thoughtfully, "That is a really brilliant thing you just said." He wondered if that was why no one dared say Voldemort's name. He had an inkling, though, that what they really feared was bringing Voldemort's attention on them, as if merely saying his name was like calling him on the phone, or summoning him somehow.

Annie handed him the two pound notes and pointed him over to a food cart and said,

"You can get us each a sausage and a soda with that. I'm just going to say hi to Kim that runs the fruit stand over there." She took the guitar back from and sauntered over to a tiny market with a green striped awning shading a small stand of fresh fruits and vegetables.

Harry crossed the street to where the food cart was and gave the vendor, a very tall man with a mass of braids down to his waist, the two pounds for two sausage rolls, a soda for Annie, and lemonade for him.

Annie came hurrying back and said, "There's a bench over there where we can eat. I'm starving, aren't you?" Harry was too busy drinking his lemonade and eating his sausage roll to answer.

Annie stopped him on the way up the stairs to loft and said, "Listen, Jamey. Don't say anything to Davey about those sausage rolls, okay? He might get a bit narked if he knew we held out a bit on him, so it's just between us."

Harry was surprised at that, but he nodded anyway. He wasn't at all sure whether he liked Dave or not. And he did not want to be on the wrong side of a guy who had no problem pulling pointing a gun at someone's head. He said quickly, before they continued on up, "Annie, erm...do you think they'll mind if I stay in tonight. I mean, you don't go the Black Jack every night, do you?"

Annie said, "I dunno. I think you'd better. Black Jack said he liked you and you don't want to get on his wrong side, like. Anyway," she added, "we get all the free drinks and crisps you could want, so it's all to the good, isn't it?"

When they went in, Harry saw with relief that Dave and Nora were out again. He assumed they must have gone to the market though, because there was a mound of fruits piled on the table, and another line up of sodas and beer bottles. Annie had opened her guitar case, and she was counting their takings for the day.

"Seven pounds six shillings," she said, "not bad when you think we had to stop early on account of that Constable." She also pulled a couple of ripe peaches from her pockets and threw one to Harry. "There. Nice dessert, I don't think."

He smiled as he caught it and said, "Thanks." It was ripe and sweet and after, he felt almost happy for the first time in days.

The first thing Dave said when he returned was, "How much?" and then, "That's all? That's ruddy poor. Not even enough for pizza for all of us." He glowered at Harry and Annie and said, "You need to do a bit better than that."

Annie immediately answered, "Yeah, wel we couldn't help it. The foot Constable decided to ask if we had a permit, and I had to charm him a bit to get out of it."

Dave looked sharply at her and then at Harry. "Well, maybe he thought Prince James over here looked too young." His eyes lingered on Harry's too short jeans and the faded T-shirt.

Harry flushed with annoyance. It wasn't like Dave's clothes were much better. Admittedly, they did actually fit him, but that was about all you could say for them. The jeans were nearly as worn as the ones Harry was wearing, and he had on another of those T-shirts, the ones that said Death Masters on them. Maybe that was why Harry was having trouble liking him. It reminded him again of Voldemort.

He said instead, "So why don't you go out with Annie and sing? You are in a band, aren't you?"

Dave said, "I don't have to sing on the street. I do my bit working at the Black Jack. That gives me this place, which I so generously share with the rest of you, and don't you forget that."

"Oh," was all Harry could think of to say. The cloud of depression that had hung over him since Sirius' death settled back in. He felt wrapped up in a gray mist, one that seemed to grow tentacles to suffocate him, squeezing his heart in a vise of grief and anger. He wrapped his own arms around himself, as if that could ease the bitter burden of responsibility. If he had known, if he had thought, Sirius might be alive right now.

Nora said, "Don't be so hard on him Davey. He helped yesterday and today. Annie never did so good on her own." She looked at Harry and said, "Here, now. What you want is some exercise. Boys always need occupation. My brother, he always used to run around till my Mum had fits with him."

Harry asked, "So where are they now? Your Mum and your brother?"

"Oh," Nora said sadly, "Mum died of the cancer when I was sixteen. She always was smoking ciggies. That's when I quit eating meat and started only eating fruits and veg, you see."

"That's sad," Harry said.

Nora said, "Yeah, it was. I've been on my own ever since." She unfolded her long legs and said, "This is what you have to do when you feel sad like. You have to get out all the negativity." She sat down on the floor and crossed her legs, one over the other in another impossible pretzel shape and said, "Here, try it."

Harry stared at her doubtfully. He was certain he couldn't fit himself in that position if he tried.

She said, "Never mind, just sit quiet and do this. You close your eyes and you focus on a single word and try to clear your mind. Then you say the word over and over again to yourself very softly and only think about the one word."

Dave was grinning. He patted Nora on the shoulder and said, "I don't know why you want to teach him yoga, Nora. He's too young to have negative thoughts to block out anyway."

Harry said nothing. But Nora said, "I dunno Davey. He's really terrible sad if you look at him. Shows in his eyes. And he didn't get that bruise on his face playing cricket."

Harry wondered how it was she could see his feelings just by looking in his eyes. He wished now he had practiced Occlumency better. He wished he had blocked every dream, every thought out of his mind.

He said abruptly, "Why not?" He looked at Nora, and said, "What word do you use?"

She said, "Oh, you just have to choose one that has meaning for you. But it has to be something that makes you feels calm. I just focus on the word happy. But some people use like god or good or love or friend or even a nonsense word that has no meaning at all. Like this." She closed her eyes and said softly, "Happy, happy, happy, happy, happy, happy, happy, happy..."

Harry couldn't think what word would make him feel calm. He thought that this was rather like doing the Patronus spell or the one for defending against boggarts. He closed his eyes and tried to find a word that made him calm and happy. He settled on friends. That had worked for him last year, the thought of his friends, when he had fought off the dementors in Little Whinging. He thought in his mind, "Friends, friends, friends, friends..." but it was no good this time. Ron's face swam in front of him saying, "Why'd you desert us, Harry? Hermione's face flashed by saying, "Why? Why?" and Ginny and Neville and even Luna's protuberant eyes accused him. He got up as if he could run, hide. But there was nowhere he could hide from his feelings and memories, and sooner or later...his mind shied away from that thought.

Edgar tucked the small leather diary and the sliver of eraser in his inside jacket pocket for later perusal. He tucked thoughts of the past firmly back into a dark hidden corner of his mind, and put on his most professional, most logical, most rational demeanor. He took the stairs up to the next floor for the meeting with Superintendent Masters and the other Inspectors. He kept the veneer of cool calm firmly in place as he listened to the others report on their various cases.

The bloody riot in Brixton that had left on old woman dead was open and shut. The only problem was finding one person who wasn't too intimidated to actually testify. The execution style shooting in a club in Haymarket was going badly. They knew they had a new leader, someone who was fusing a number of smaller crime groups into one larger network. That was bad news and the only thing known about him was that he went by the dreadful moniker the Death Lord and that every small time criminal who had come near his path was terrified out of his mind to talk. There were two new domestics, one probable drunken hit and run and three unidentifieds, John and Jane Doe drug deaths that might never be solved. Masters called on Edgar last.

Edgar reported the finding of the blue bag in the Riddle House. The strange coincidence of the victim's mother's disappearance from the same place sixteen years ago. The deaths of the Riddles and Frank Bryce and the discovery of the knife and the rope in the cemetary. One of the older Inspectors, Graves, said, "That sounds like a bleeding fairy tale. Or some ridiculous whodunnit. What, are you going to write a novel when you're done with this?"

Masters gave him a cold look and said, "More to the point, what have you found out that actually relates to whether the girl was murdered?"

Edgar said, "I'm not sure, sir. What I know, is that the girl went out for a stroll and a picnic lunch. Her dead body was found on the riverbank, but her bag was found in the house where four people have died under mysterious circumstances and an old woman claims to have seen three of them murdered fifty years ago. The girl never ate her picnic lunch as her autopsy showed she had last eaten at breakfast, and the father confirmed the stomach contents matched what she ate. There were the remains of the same food she had taken, bread and cheese, left half-eaten in one of the third floor rooms in the Riddle House. But we know she didn't eat them. So someone else was there around the same time. I'm thinking she may have died in that house and been moved afterward."

Masters said, "Look, Bones. It's all very odd. But you're no nearer to a cause of death than you were before."

Edgar said quickly, "Yes, sir. That's why I want the tox screening re-done. And I want permission to talk to the people in City of London and up in York to see if there are any similarities or connections."

Masters steepled his fingers together as he did when he was most likely to say no. Edgar felt almost a sense of relief, except that it was mixed with guilt. He hadn't done his best by Nancy Bell. Not at all.

So he was surprised when Masters said, "Very well. Check out both York and City of London. It'll give me a comment for the press. That interview with the examiner in York was a disaster."

The takeout of the day was Indian, curried rice and chicken that burned his tongue and was made more palatable by the apple and pear he ate afterwards. By the end of the meal, once again, there was not a drop of food left for the next day. Harry wondered if he would ever get used to this strange, haphazard lifestyle. It wasn't that he had never gone hungry before. There had been plenty of times where the Dursleys had locked him in the cupboard under the stairs.

There had been the horrible summer when they had put bars on his window and a cat flap in his door to feed him through. There had been times he had gone hungry for days at a time. But this time, now, it was the fact that he felt he was truly on his own and that no one really cared one way or the other that bothered him. Not that that was really new. He had felt that way for ten whole years, the entire time he had lived at the Dursleys before his letter from Hogwarts had come, and Hagrid and Ron and Hermione and friends with it. Now he was cut off from all of it, and the isolation, the alienation were harder to bear because he had experienced something better.

The Black Jack was just as smoky and dim and nasty as he had thought. Black Jack was sitting at the end of the bar again and the girls in the leather skirts were back, this time wearing safety pins in their ears and bicycle chains around their waists. The only thing missing was Madam Blavtsky, but that was all right with Harry. Black Jack greeted them all with apparent geniality and motioned for Harry to come over and sit at the bar beside him. Reluctantly, Harry sat on the high stool and waited courteously for Black Jack to speak. The bar owner was dressed all in black again and his black fingernails looked newly polished. His black eyes were empty caverns and his pale face looked more sunken and gaunt than the night before. Harry was sharply reminded of Professor Snape, except that Snape seemed healthy and friendly by comparison.

"So, our fledgling with the clever eyes has returned," said the bar owner. He reached over and took one of Harry's hands and examined it from end to end, from front to back. It was all Harry could do not to pull his hand away and run howling out of the bar.

"You've got great hands," Black Jack said. "Big, with extra long fingers for quickness and dexterity." He released Harry's hand and said, "You'll train up very well, I think. You'll do."

Harry swallowed and didn't ask what it was that he would train for. He thought it would be bound to be something he had no wish to learn. Black Jack drew out a fresh pack of cards and shuffled them, once, twice, three times, in a whirr. Harry watched wordlessly.

Jack handed the cards to him and said, "Now, you."

Harry took the cards and shuffled them, nowhere near as deftly as Black Jack. Just what he needed, he thought, to learn how to cheat at cards. Gloomily, he thought that was a skill that was bound to help him fight Voldemort.

Jack said, "Not good. Haven't you ever palyed cards before laddie?"

Harry shrugged. He didn't think Exploding Snap counted. Shuffling wasn't important in that game anyway. He shuffled them again, trying for a smoother flow. He thought he'd better make some sort of effort and was rewarded with a slow cold smile from the card charp.

"Better," he said. "Better."

He shuffled cards for Black Jack for close to an hour, until the cards began to flow smoothly in his hands. Then he watched as Black Jack worked the cards in a silken flow that was as close to magic as any non-magic activity could be. After the second shuffle, Black Jack instructed him to see if he could spot when a card was pocketed or changed and if he could say what the card was. That part was easy as no matter what Black Jack did; it could never approach the speed of a flying Snitch.

He got that right every time and Black Jack said softly, "Ah, 'tis a fine thing, to be young and have eyes like those."

He signaled for Dave to bring over drinks and Dave slid a heavy crystal glass full of strong whiskey over to Black Jack and a tall draft of beer to Harry.

Harry looked at the beer with disgust and said, "Can I have soda or juice even?"

"Not man enough for a beer?" Dave said, but his tone wasn't as nasty as it might have been.

Black Jack smiled again and said, "It's a smart fledgling, too, to keep his head clear among us rogues."

Dave laughed, poured a soda for Harry, and drank the rejected beer himself. Harry drank the cold soda and tried to like the too sweet fizzy pop of it. He started to get down from the stool, but Black Jack put a hand on his arm to forestall him. Harry wanted to toss the rest of the soda in his face and run, but he didn't. He was certain the result would be very, very unpleasant.

Black Jack said, "Let's see if those gypsy eyes are as clever at other things as they are at cards."

Harry said, "I'm not a gypsy."

But Black Jack merely smiled and said, "Ah, but you've got the eyes, haven't you. Green as glass and they see things no one else does."

He led Harry over to the corner where Madam Blavatsky had sat the night before. She still hadn't appeared and there had been two people already who had asked after her while he had been shuffling cards for Black Jack.

Black Jack said to Dave, "Get the crystal, Davey."

He looked at Harry and said, "Hmm...Haven't you any better clothes than these?"

Harry shrugged and shook his head. He thought that Black Jack might actually find his wizard robes quite interesting, but he wasn't about to wear those out in the Muggle world. He sat in the chair in the corner when Black Jack pointed him to it, and wondered what kind of trouble he was in for now. Black Jack came back with a fairly large crystal ball set on a brass pedestal. He also handed Harry a black satin shirt with pearl buttons and a ruffled collar and sleeves.

This time Harry balked. "You must be joking," he said, after a glance at the shirt. "I'm not putting that on."

Black Jack smiled minutely less and said, "Yes. You are."

Harry felt the hair on his neck lift and he took the shirt and put it on right over his T-shirt. It was only a little too big and the sleeves dangled past his wrists.

He said as coolly as he could, "Now what?"

Black Jack smiled and said as he had before, "Better. Now, you are Gypsy Jack Black, and you tell fortunes, read the crystal when Madam Blavatsky is out."

Before he could think better of it, Harry blurt out, "But I'm no good at that."

Black Jack said, "Well, try. Learn. Make it up, if you have to. And make the customers happy, because they always come back then. Make the customers happy and I'll give you a small cut of their fees."

Harry stared at the crystal ball, which was not a real magic crystal as it was clear inside and no foggy white mists were waiting to form a shape of any kind, and said, "Why not, if you pay me?"

Harry sat down behind the black lace covered table and looked at through the clear crystal to the black covering underneath. He wondered just how he had got himself into this. Once again, he reviewed his actions and they all looked perfectly dreadful, but he couldn't see what he might have done that was better. He hadn't started the fight with Dudley, but he had fought to defend himself once Piers had actually incited the attack. He had fobbed off the constable with the boxing story to stave off police attention and keep the Dursleys from blaming him, but that hadn't mattered.

He could, of course, have walked away from it when he saw them going after the little kid, Mark Evans. So maybe that had been stupid. But he still didn't feel bad about that. And it wasn't his fault that Dudley's gang had been shoplifting and brought the police in. It wasn't really his fault they had searched his room and his things looking for stolen goods. It was the Dursleys who had started the rumor that he went to a school for delinquents. And he had known, that they were going to throw him out, there was no other result likely, when the policeman had taken Dudley to the station. They would have come back and that would have been it. He blotted out the memory of knocking at the Leaky Cauldron, calling for entry with no answer.

The two leather skirt girls, as Harry thought of them, were standing in line to have their fortunes told. His conscience stabbed him. It was a cheap trick, he thought, to take their money and give them falsehoods. He felt as if the tin ceiling was pressing down lower and lower, and he was trapped in this place, a hiding place that had become a den of unarticulated dangers. He felt that there were two worlds, not just the wizard world and the Muggle world. No, there were worlds within worlds, and this one was a half-seen, murky, desperate place that the people in his Aunt's tidy suburb or the people in the shimmering skyrises he passed during the day could barely imagine.

With a sigh, Harry indicated with as courteous a gesture as he was able, for the girls, women, to be seated. They seemd like twins, identical down to the blood red fingernails and lips and tiny black rose tattoos on their cheeks.

They seemed to be waiting for him, so he said, "What are your names?" thinking that might give him something to go on. He had begun to think that everyone here had a false name just as he did.

The one to his right said, "I'm Emmeline and she's Evelyn." She added unnecessarily, "We're twins."

Harry said, "Pleased to meet you." He cleared his throat and said, "Who wants to go first?"

Emmeline said, "Me." Harry nodded and looked at her and then at the crystal. He thought of Professor Trelawney and her dramatic pronouncements, which had always brought him to the edge of laughter or to the edges of annoyance and almost fear.

There was no mist in the crystal. The black lace shining through the glass looked like the dark waters he had been swimming through in his dream.

He said, "There's something to do with water, like you're going to be near a lake or an ocean. There are stones, like jewels, but you have to be careful, because they're red, for danger. You should beware of false surfaces, glittering and attractive, that hide evil." The girl, Emmeline, was looking at him in shock, and the room was silent. He thought, now what did I do?

Emmeline stared at him and said, "Madam Blavatsky never told me anything like that!"

Harry tried to think how to salvage this. He said, "Let me think...she told, erm...that you were going to have a new life soon, and that you would have a wild passionate love with the wrong person, but that in the future you would find your perfect mate and settle down in peace and harmony and have lots of money."

Emmeleine and Evelyn both gawped at him. The other one, Evelyn, said, "How do you know that?"

Harry said, "That's what she told me when I came yesterday. She tells a version of that to everyone. And it's not far from the truth either, because everybody wants a change in their life from time to time, and everybody, most people, fall in love with the wrong person from time to time, and most people, eventually, find some kind of acceptance with their lot. So it's not wrong, it's just, not particluar to you."

Emmeline bit her lip and said, "So what you said, that was particular to me?"

Harry cringed inside and he said, "It is and it's also true in a way for many. It's easy," he said as gently as he could, and from bitter experience, "it's easy to be deceived by people. It's easy to be distracted by false lures into going the wrong way and doing the wrong things. You should listen to your heart and never ignore it when it warns you something is wrong."

Emmeline said, "I think he's the real thing. You do see things, don't you? It must be your eyes. They are so unusual, the color."

The twin, Evelyn, said, "Now, me, please. I want to know if mine is different." Harry looked at her and said, "It's partly the same. She's your twin and you do almost everything together." He made a show of looking in the crystal again, but all he could see was Sirius as the great black dog in the black depths of the crystal and Mrs. Weasley and Ron and Hermione all dressed in black and standing over his own corpse as he had seen it when Mrs. Weasley had fought the boggart last year.

He said, "When was the last time you went home and saw your Mum?"

Both girls stared at him, almost in fear. Evelyn licked her lips and said, "Three months. We had a fight like, and we left because she didn't like Emmy's boyfriend and wouldn't let him in the house."

Harry nodded and said, "Go home, both of you, She wants you. She weeps everyday because you left when all she wanted to do was protect you. Go home and the danger will be averted. Then you'll both have your foolish romances like Madam Blavatsky said and eventually you'll be happy."

In a high, shaking voice, Evelyn said, "Emmy, he's right. You know he's right." The other girl nodded, and they each kissed him on the cheek and walked out of the smoky pub, their arms around each other.

Black Jack said, "Begad, you're good. You're not nearly as young a fledgling as I thought." He stared at Harry out of cold, thoughtful eyes and said, "But just be careful. Don't make them so happy they never come back." He mumbled to himself, "Always make them pay first. Always make them pay first."

Harry thought that was almost like the mantra Nora had been using. He shivered and hoped that was the end of it. When he looked up, though, a middle aged lady he had never seen before was standing there waiting for her fortune to be told.

After the middle-aged lady, there were four more who showed up to have their fortunes told. Thinking he'd be safer by far with something known, he took to taking their hands and reading their palms as Professor Trelawny had taught them last year. This was a whole lot easier, but he kept seeing possible misfortunes and wondered if that was because Professor Trelawny had sent so much time telling them how each thing represented some dreadful tragedy. He told the middle-aged lady to watch her health and the sad looking man to find a new hobby to take his mind off his grief. He told the woman with the bruised arms and scared face to go to the police (which made Black Jack hiss in annoyance). And he told the tall man in the black leather jacket to get a new career, because his present one was going to include a lay-off.

At two in the morning, the main pub had long been closed and there was only Dave, Nora, Annie and Black Jack left in the pub. He hoped, wearily, that meant he could go back to the loft and fall into bed and sleep. Black Jack came down off his perch and walked over to the corner.

"Now," he said, "I'll be seeing if you have the talent or no." He added, "And no simple shilly-shallying with reading palms. I want the crystal read as well." Harry thought wearily, I'm toast.

He shook his head, but Black jack caught his hand and said, "Madam Blavatsky always refuses to read my fortune. But then, she hasn't any talent, really has she?" He looked hard at Harry and his eyes were stone pebbles, onyx or obsidian, that reflected light and obscured all.

The bar man said, "Let's see if you are brave enough to read my fortune, Gypsy Jack. Come along, and sing for your supper."

Harry said, "I can't see why you want your fortune read. You've already had your foolish passion, as Madam Blavatsky would say, but you've never accepted your lot and so happiness escapes you." The onyx eyes grew colder and more opaque.

"How is it you see so much, without even looking?" He held out his hand, a small hand for a man, covered with a web of blue veins and brown speckles, and said, "Tell me what you see when you really look."

Harry swallowed and took his hand. He turned it over to examine the long lifeline, the short, broken heart line, and the strange vertical lines that intersected head heart and lifelines all at once. He had no clue, really, how to read it, so he looked in the crystal through the clear black depths. The blackness was a cavern, a stone chamber with a glowing heart of fire. He was so tired and felt as though he was back inside his dream from last night. He tore his gaze away from the black depths of the crystal and the memory it evoked and looked instead into the obsidian eyes of the card sharp.

He had only to reach out to pull the opaque curtain aside and see the ancient sorrow no balm could ever heal, and the rage and hate still fresh and new, together with the constant need for vengeance that ate at the cold mind and tormented his soul. Harry let go of the man's hand with a gasp and said, "There is grief for the loss of your love, and hate for everyone who lives when she is dead, and the lust for vengeance which is never requited. And you'll never be happy until you accept that she is at peace, until you let go. Until you let go, you'll never have peace."

Black Jack slapped him hard across the face, knocking him off his chair into the wall. Harry crawled out from behind the table and picked up the fake crystal, hefted it as if to smash it.

Black Jack said, "Don't, laddie! I've a ferocious temper when I'm reminded of my pain. Easy now. Those Gypsy eyes of yours saw more than I bargained for. You've got to be forgiving when a man's made mad by his pain."

Harry set the crystal down with trembling hands and said, "I've a terrible temper myself when I'm provoked. And I don't like being hit. I don't like it at all."

The old man, and Harry saw now that he was old, passed a trembling hand over his face and said, "Here. There's money for your trouble and I promise I'll not ask you for a reading again myself. And I promise, and everyone will tell you, Black Jack keeps his promises, I give you my word that I'll not strike you again, nor let any other do so either."

Harry could not say why he believed the man, or maybe he knew. He had seen the man's pain and his inability to accept his loss, and it looked almost exactly like his own.

He nodded wordlessly and said, "I'm very tired. I'd like to go now."

He tucked the proffered money in his pocket without counting it and went straight out the back door into the clean night air, feeling as though he'd escaped from a prison cell that might have buried him forever.

When Fay walked into Edgar's office waving a sheaf of papers from Somerset House, Edgar grabbed her by the elbow and said, "Show me later. Masters gave us the go ahead to check out the York and City of London deaths, and he's passed on the request for the tox rescreening."

Fay said, "Well, if that's the case, why are you in such a hurry?"

Edgar said, "I think he'll change his mind if we give him an opportunity to think about it. Right now, all he wants to do is pacify the press and tell them we're on the case after that doctor opened his mouth up in York."

"So, what are we doing first?" Fay asked, "City of London?"

Edgar shook his head. "No," I want to go to York first. We want to shut that doctor up and find out what else there is to know before the information is leaked out or people have more of a chance to worry and clam up."

He was also concerned that Masters would change his mind again if they didn't find more information at City of London and the opportunity to get out to York would be lost. He could always check out City of London on his own time if Masters pulled them off the case. It struck him then, that he had committed in his own mind to solving this one, whether Masters backed him or not. On work time or his own, he was going to find out the killer or killers and find a way to make them pay. Maybe by doing that, he could make someone pay for his parents' deaths all those years ago.

Edgar waited impatiently while Fay stopped at her flat to throw together a weekend bag. He figured three days ought to be enough to get through all the pieces that were left. He glanced around at her flat, a tidy one room efficiency that probably cost more than his rambling little place out in Clapham.

Like Fay herself, the small area was far more than it seemed on the surface. The iron daybed that doubled as a sofa was a beautiful thing; it's scrolls and curves as elegant as Fay's slender legs. The seemingly no nonsense white and blue decor was made comfortable and luxurious by the textures used: silk emroidered coverlets, a faded French needlepoint rug, a spare open-sided bookcase with a jappaned frame and gilded feet, an old porcelain tea set, and several oil paintings with views of Venice and something more exotic, a tiger prowling through a jungle landscape. The tiger found its way into a pillow on the only other chair, a cushy round reading chair, covered in plain nubby white cotton.

Fay's amused, almost sarcastic voice broke into his reverie. "What evidence do you think you're going to find here, Inspector?"

Edgar jumped and said, "Sorry. Just habit, I suppose."

Fay responded with a delighted grin, "Habit, and an insatiable curiosity I should think." She added, "Not that I mind. I'm just the same. It's what makes us bloody good coppers, the need to know. I bet you can't stand to leave a puzzle undone either."

Edgar grinned back, "No more I can. The Sunday supplement never lasts long enough for me."

They drove to York in almost companionable silence. Edgar had put a tape on for background noise as he drove. It was one luxury he loved, the sound of music and the smooth whirr of the wheels as they ate up the distance on the road north.