It looked to be a den or game room. A billiards table stood in one corner, but it was piled with mounds of colorful fabric. Overhead a dangerous-looking wrought-iron light fixture hung from the exposed roof beams. The walls were crowded with masks—ceremonial masks, Henry thought: horrible frowning mouths, furious eyes, wild tufts of hair. Some of them appeared to be Japanese, others from some kind of island culture—New Guinea, maybe. At the back were three large stained-glass windows with Gothic arches, and before these a low platform that looked to be a stage, at the back of which, propped between two of the windows, stood a long, stained-wood plank with strings stretched along the length of it, some kind of musical instrument. Along the front of the room, facing the street, was a row of glass doors that led out to the second-story porch, presumably; the blinds on them were shut, and tied up between each of them were heavy blue drapes. The furniture in the center of the room was leather, the lamp shades colorful glass. On the rug before the stage, pillows were scattered everywhere, strewn with colorful beads and shiny objects Henry couldn’t make sense of at a glance.

“They’re explorers,” Max said. “Anthropologists.”

“Traveling minstrels, maybe,” Effie said.

“It’s a gold mine,” Alma said.

Three different hallways led away from the den, and they went exploring, going their separate ways. Henry followed Alma, and when he looked behind him, expecting Effie to be there, he saw that he was alone with her. She pointed her flashlight ahead. The layout seemed needlessly complicated. There were half floors, doorways unevenly spaced apart, circular windows nestled into alcoves, a staircase that spiraled sharply up to a trapdoor. They looked into a lushly furnished bedroom, all of it decorated in various shades of rich blue. Across from it was a room crowded with bellhops’ carts full of costumes—old-fashioned ballroom dresses, hoop skirts, harlequin suits, a bear costume. Alma stopped short and he bumped into her and caught a whiff of unwashed hair. “This is so wild,” he said, because they had not said anything since separating from the others, but she didn’t seem to hear him.

She aimed her flashlight into the next room over, stepped inside, and found the light switch. It was completely empty. The closet door stood open. Silently they looked at it, Henry frozen at the entrance, trying to make sense of it, until they heard Clara’s voice from somewhere else in the house: “Hey, come look.”

They went down a connecting passageway and came to a lighted door, and inside stood Clara, staring at shelves upon shelves of faceless heads supporting wigs of every conceivable variety. “Just look at this,” she said.