Rutledge opened the gate and stepped into a front garden of pink geraniums and warmly scented lavender, with white stock and taller white delphiniums behind them. He climbed the two steps to the small porch, but a maid answered the door before he could ring the bell.

She said in some distress, “If you’ve come about them shelves that’s fallen down, Mr. Wyatt is over in the new wing.”

Rutledge followed her pointing finger and took the brick path to the second door of the house, which led into the newest part. Someone shouted, “Come in!” to his knock, and he entered a scene of chaos.

There were boxes strewn about the floor like snowdrifts, and glass-fronted cases filled with the most exotic collection of statuary and weaponry and musical instruments that he’d seen in some time. Eastern, most of them, as far as he could tell. Exotic dancers stood on shelves beside squat gods and animal masks, while daggers and swords were displayed in fans, their points gleaming in the sunlight Tiered parasols in red, yellow, black, and white were fringed in what appeared to be gold bullion, and there were what looked like parts of doorways or windows, heavy with carved scenes. Garish puppets elbowed each other, some of them three dimensional while others were flat, painted on hide. Below, on another shelf, were fantastic butterflies pinned in tidy rows, like enameled brooches in every color of the rainbow. Nothing in England was that spectacular. Hamish was absorbing the scene with Presbyterian horror, pointing out that these items were pagan and therefore suspect.

Before Rutledge could answer him, a man’s voice called, “Well? What are you doing, loitering out there? Come look at this disaster!”

Rutledge went through a doorway to find a man on his knees collecting shells that had tumbled from a tall bookcase, its shelves haphazard and half out of their moorings.

“You’re damned lucky they didn’t shatter! You swore they’d support—” He was halfway through the sentence when he saw his visitor and realized it wasn’t the carpenter he’d sent for. “Who the hell are you?”

It was the fair-skinned man he’d seen yesterday, carrying the front end of a ladder. “Mr. Wyatt? I’m Inspector Rutledge, from Scotland Yard. I’ve come to speak to you—”

“Not now, man! Can’t you see what’s happened here? I’m expecting Baldridge or one of his minions, and he’s got some explaining to do! I told him a dozen times if I told him once that these shelves had to be well anchored against the weight, or they’d be over before we knew where we were! And I was right.”