Prologue

The Man Who Kept a Room
Thomas Vale heard the horse before he heard the bell.

One animal, walking slowly.

The sound came through the front wall of North Lantern House, past the shutter he had nailed closed the previous winter. Hooves struck the road with an uneven rhythm. A loose shoe, perhaps, or a rider too tired to keep the animal moving straight.

Thomas set down his pen.

Across the desk, the house ledger lay open to a page he had not written.

A room number.

A date.

No name.

He had found the entry that morning, pressed between his ordinary accounts of lamp oil and firewood. He had drawn a line beneath it, closed the book, and gone upstairs to inspect the room.

The bed had been made.

The basin was dry.

On the windowsill lay a little red dust.

He had wiped it away with