By the time he reached Madame Sarah’s he was sweating, despite the sudden gusts of wind that had propelled him along. He let himself in as furtively as he could, and crept up the stairs. Only when the door of his room was locked behind him did he sink down to catch his breath, and allow himself to look closer at the suitcase.

It sat on the floor in front of him, real and aged and impossible. He stared, fearing he’d made a mistake, that in the strange, dim atmosphere of the storeroom he’d misread the initials. But there they were, in the same faded gold as the writing case.

A. L.

A corresponding leather cloakroom tag hung from the handle, looped on by someone who would never have dreamed that, half a century later, it would still be there, curled and crusted with salt-damp.

Sam reached for the writing case, for the key that was inside, before stopping. He couldn’t just go rushing into this; he had to document every moment, every detail. He rolled a cigarette, making a bad job of it, before taking out a sheet of paper. Scrappily, he wrote down everything that had happened that evening: talking with Bet at The Hold, running through the casbah chased by the wind, the smell of the Hotel Continental, a piece of luggage that had lain forgotten for fifty long years …

His eyes drifted to the suitcase. Its presence filled the room. He could feel it, even smell it beneath the pungent smoke of his cigarette, burning down in the ashtray. Finally, he let the pencil drop, and reached for the small silver key. Please work, he asked silently, as he fitted it to the lock, and closed his eyes.

It grated, before turning with a gentle thunk. He held his breath and, slowly, lifted the lid.

Decay, that was what he smelled. Dank and oddly organic, as if the objects inside – glass and paper and fabrics – had reverted back to bone and sand and flesh. He peered down. The inside of the case looked orderly, despite his run from the hotel. Clothes, neatly folded, small glass bottles clipped in place by leather straps. He leaned in closer and the stink of age seemed to lessen, giving way to other scents: a faint trace of sandalwood and something he wanted to call ambergris without any idea of what ambergris might be. He let his fingers trail over the bottles, before reaching in, and lifting out the top layer of cloth.

It was a jacket, a man’s suit jacket, which clung to its folds. It was made of linen, fawn brown, tailored for another era. Mould bloomed in its creases. Gingerly, he checked the pockets, but found nothing.