“If you need company tonight, old boy—someone to help you eat some of those blinis—but say the word.”

Zivon smiled. “Thank you. Perhaps later this evening? A few hours of solitude first would not be ill-placed, I think.”

Clarke nodded. “I’ll call around eight. How’s that?”

“Perfect.”

He breathed a sigh of relief when he entered his building and wasn’t immediately swarmed by well-meaning women eager to talk about their daughters. The Smirnovs had done him a service indeed. Surrounded only by quiet, he would perhaps take a bath. Read. Pray. He’d been asking the Lord to help him forgive those who caused him such harm, but it was not a quick process, it seemed.

He turned his key in his lock, let himself in, and froze.

Something was wrong. Out of place.

Many somethings. A strange fragrance lingered in the air—soap, but not his. The tassels on the rug were flipped up, though he was always careful to put them down. The pillow on the chair wasn’t in the right place.

He moved to the doorway of his bedroom, checked the drawer where he stored his petty cash—still there—then walked back out to the living room.

Sunlight from the window lit seams of fire on the photo from Lily. Seams where there shouldn’t have been, in a distinct web pattern. Breath hissing out, he moved closer, until he could see the broken glass, still held in the frame but fractured to the point where the image was distorted behind it.

His gaze dropped to the floor. There was only one other thing he had in his possession that mattered. He couldn’t imagine why anyone else would want it, but even so, he dropped to his knees and pried up the board.

Gone. It was gone. But why? Who could possibly want the picture-less remains of Evgeni’s passport? He sank back on his haunches, board still in his hands. At least he’d taken out the photo of the two of them. It was safe with Lily. That was something. To know that the last existing image of the two of them together hadn’t been taken.

But his hopes for a quiet evening evaporated. It seemed he, too, would have to pay a visit to Admiral Hall.

TUESDAY, 2 JULY 1918

The empty chair at the breakfast table screamed at Lily the moment she stepped inside. Mama was always the first one up, eager to catch the morning light for her work. She was always in here, enjoying a cup of tea and some toast, when Lily came down. Always. She could count on one hand the times she hadn’t been over the years.

Her gaze flew to her father even as her stomach churned. “Daddy? Where’s Mama?”