We reached the top of the tower and the smell assaulted us. The stench I remembered from the other visits. “Mr. Schumann?” I called out.

Metal scraped on stone. A voice growled. Leizel Schumann shoved her way to the front, standing on her toes to peer in the barred window. “Otto. Otto!” She turned to us. “The keys, give me keys!”

A roughly shod man, one I’d seen about the asylum, stepped forward and unbolted the six latches all the way down the door and flung it open, flattening a handkerchief against his nose and mouth.

“Madame, is this your missing husband?”

The little woman burst into the chamber and threw herself upon the man in chains. With a groan he melted around her, swallowing her small form with his giant one and raining down kisses upon her head, her face. She burst into sobs and buried her face into his chest, heedless of the grime and odor.

Somehow a pleasant sweetness came over us all as we looked on. The prisoner continued to fold his wife close, hands making gentle paths over her back as if to ensure she was real, every inch of her. Words filled the chamber, clipped German speech, impassioned statements and questions pouring over one another and alternating back and forth in a most lovely duet.

I blinked as my eyes warmed, tears pricking the corners.

Then a door banged. Boots clomped up the stairs. I backed against the wall, watching. Listening.

Thornhill appeared, bursting upon the scene with all the rage of a bear. “What is the meaning of this? Who let you in here?”

“You said to show it to ’em.” The scruffy asylum man stood back, dark anger over his unshaven face.

“The outside. I said the outside.”

One of the men in suits crossed his arms over his chest. “You’ve likely already surmised that we’ve found the nonexistent Mr. Schumann.”

The burliest gentleman grasped Thornhill’s arm. “Let’s continue this talk in your office, shall we? Perhaps have a look at the records for the rest of these patients.”

His face went red. A vein rose on his neck. “I’ll do no such thing. This is none of your concern.”

Another man took Thornhill’s other arm. “Just a talk, Dr. Thornhill. For now, just a talk.”

Several of the men moved down the stairs with Thornhill while two others stood across Otto Schumann’s doorway, watching the scene unfold. “We’ll have this sorted out, Mrs. Schumann. I’d expect your husband to be released into your care, unless my suspicions on the situation are wrong.”

“What I’d like to know is where this Turner character is. He’s signed off on most of the patients in this place, but he’s nowhere to be found.”

“Dr. Turner?” I asked. “He’s head of the chronic ward.”

“You wouldn’t happen to know what’s become of the man then, would you?”