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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
  22. •   •   •
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  26. BE SURE YOUR SINS WILL FIND YOU OUT
  27. •   •   •
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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
  54. •   •   •
  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. •   •   •
  70. •   •   •
  71. Nance O’Neil
  72. •   •   •
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  84. Emma L. Borden
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  88. Owen Seabury, M.D.
  89. •   •   •
  90. •   •   •
  91. Lizzie Andrew Borden
  92. •   •   •
  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.
  106. •   •   •
  107. Physalia, Z. University I Was Not Now
  108. •   •   •
  109. DEPART, ALL ANIMALS WITHOUT BONES
  110. Emma L. Borden
  111. •   •   •
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  115. Owen Seabury, M.D.
  116. •   •   •
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  119. Lizzie Andrew Borden
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  130. Owen Seabury, M.D.
  131. Phillip Zollicoffer. Physalia Zollicoffris.
  132. •   •   •
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  137. Christoff Dane, M.D., Ph.D., University of Rhode Island, Kingston
  138. •   •   •
  139. Emma L. Borden
  140. •   •   •
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  144. Owen Seabury, M.D.
  145. •   •   •
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  150. Emma L. Borden
  151. •   •   •
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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.
  187. •   •   •
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  197. Lizzie Andrew Borden
  198. •   •   •
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  205. Inspector Simon Wolf
  206. •   •   •

I hauled myself to my feet, and I felt the flimsy banister crack beneath my weight. I pushed myself off from it, and caught myself on the corner of the nearest table. This was not the table I needed. I needed the next one back. That’s where Seabury’s gift awaited. That’s where he and Lizzie had been mixing up the treatments that did nothing to treat Nance.

(Or perhaps they did. Perhaps that’s why she woke up at all. Maybe it gave her just enough strength to open her eyes and not kill everyone in the house. I doubt I’ll ever know, and to be indelicate, I do not care.)

One more table back.

God, the whole room was full of them, a gauntlet of tables covered in delicate equipment. And there, in the middle of the floor, I spied the cooker. I’d never actually set eyes on it before, though obviously I knew its job and I knew about its installation. Lizzie had the whole thing brought in through the cellar entrance, so no one would see it. Even me.

(I know she did not mean to exclude me, but it’s difficult to keep from feeling excluded.)

The cooker was bigger than I’d guessed; it looked menacing and awful—open wide and faintly bubbling, its corrosive agents always working, always cooking . . . even when there was nothing fresh to feed it.

I tiptoed around it, and when I was past it, I paused to heave the cabinet door closed.

It winded me something awful, but I couldn’t chance leaving the thing opened like a trap—ready to swallow me up if I were frightened or careless.

More frightened than I was already, I mean.

I reached the satchel, and pulled it toward me by the strap—dragging it across the table and almost spilling the vials within it. (This was not careless. This was hasty by necessity, and those two things are not the same.) I sorted them quickly, for my knees were weak and I was horribly aware that they could fail me at any moment.

I did not know how long I had.

Globulin here, in these glass tubes—labeled on white paper with blue ink. Toxins here, in these tiny jars with the wax-sealed stoppers and warnings written in red ink. Simple enough.

There was less globulin to go around than toxins, for we’d been sampling those ourselves (and giving them to Nance), but it was too late for those anymore. If I was not immune by now, I never would be—and if those globulins had not been enough, more would be meaningless.

I had a theory. Or rather, Seabury had a theory.