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Chapters (206)
  1. Praise for Maplecroft
  2. Title page
  3. Copyright page
  4. Contents
  5. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  6. THESE ARE THE THINGS AN EARTHQUAKE BRINGS
  7. •   •   •
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  12. A DOCTOR, A LAWYER, A MERCHANT, A CHIEF
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  20. Phillip Zollicoffer, Professor of Biology, Miskatonic University
  21. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  26. BE SURE YOUR SINS WILL FIND YOU OUT
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  29. I CROSS THE MAGPIE, THE MAGPIE CROSSES ME
  30. •   •   •
  31. Nance O’Neil
  32. THIS KNOT I KNIT, THIS KNOT I TIE
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  37. AND IF YOU HAVE A HORSE WITH ONE WHITE LEG . . .
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  43. THE WORST IS TO BE JUDGED WITHOUT HOPE
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  46. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  53. BUT NETTLE SHANT HAVE NOTHING
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  55. CUT THEM ON FRIDAY, YOU CUT THEM FOR SORROW
  56. Phillip Zollicoffer, Professor of Biology, Miskatonic University
  57. •   •   •
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  62. HAPPY IS THE CORPSE THAT THE RAIN SHINES ON
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  67. A DWELLING PLACE OF JACKALS, THE DESOLATION FOREVER
  68. Lizzie Andrew Borden
  69. •   •   •
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  71. Nance O’Neil
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  84. Emma L. Borden
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  88. Owen Seabury, M.D.
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  91. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  93. RIGHT CHEEK, LEFT CHEEK—WHY DO YOU BURN?
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  101. Aaron B. Stewart, Fire Chief, Farthington, Mass.
  102. Emma L. Borden
  103. •   •   •
  104. Gerald Macintyre, Telegraph Clerk, Western Union
  105. Owen Seabury, M.D.
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  107. Physalia, Z. University I Was Not Now
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  109. DEPART, ALL ANIMALS WITHOUT BONES
  110. Emma L. Borden
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  115. Owen Seabury, M.D.
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  119. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  130. Owen Seabury, M.D.
  131. Phillip Zollicoffer. Physalia Zollicoffris.
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  137. Christoff Dane, M.D., Ph.D., University of Rhode Island, Kingston
  138. •   •   •
  139. Emma L. Borden
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  144. Owen Seabury, M.D.
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  150. Emma L. Borden
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  153. FAMILY SLAIN IN MAYFIELD
  154. Owen Seabury, M.D.
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  165. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  176. Emma L. Borden
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  186. Owen Seabury, M.D.
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  197. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  205. Inspector Simon Wolf
  206. •   •   •

He shook his head, accepted a porcelain cup and a pitcher of cream, and offered his apologies. “I’m very sorry, though I know what you mean. There’s been some shift, hasn’t there been? And here, on the other side, it’s difficult to retain perspective. But no, let me assure you, there’s no madness or affliction to be found in me. Not yet.”

Until just then, I hadn’t noticed that he’d brought a satchel with him, but now he lifted it onto his lap and extricated a medical textbook, one which was intended as a basic introduction to common diseases and their causes. A freshman’s book, I should think. He flipped it open before I had a chance to note the title or author.

A page was dog-eared, and he turned to it swiftly. “I spent all of yesterday afternoon and evening mulling the question, staring at it from every possible direction, hoping to figure out what the pattern might be. Then this morning, I shot awake with an idea. This idea,” he told me, slapping his index finger onto a heading titled “Tetanus: Generalized, Local, and Other Manifestations.”

“Lockjaw?” He couldn’t be serious.

“The overlap is not one hundred percent, but I think you’ll agree there’s enough similarity that it warrants further investigation.”

I wasn’t prepared to agree to anything yet. “Convince me.”

Just the invitation he was looking for. His face was positively alight. “Very well. Here’s our list of symptoms, presented in and around Fall River—in various combinations and severities. Now watch the correlation: difficulty swallowing, resulting in excess salivation; fever, seizures, and spasms. All of it, right here. Symptomatic of tetanus.

“You mentioned seeing your stepmother’s body arching backward—there’s a term for that, you see? Opisthotonos. It’s every bit as violent as you reported, and often results in broken bones and muscle tears. The difficulty of controlling one’s body, see, it’s right here in black and white. Tetanus. And in the later stages, sufferers have terrible difficulty breathing, resulting in something like the rasping we heard the other night.”

“You think . . . you think the Bordens had somehow contracted tetanus?” My mind was prepared to reel, but it wasn’t spinning yet. He had drawn some interesting parallels, but it wasn’t enough to make me drop my wariness. It was too ordinary an explanation. It couldn’t be that simple. Not when monsters walked the grounds of Maplecroft.

No. It wasn’t that simple.

“I’m saying that what we’re dealing with, this Problem we have in Fall River . . .” I almost heard the capital letter he used to start the word “Problem.” “It shares some similarity in its presentation. There’s a pattern, Lizbeth. Not a perfect one, but if we stand far enough back . . .”