Das Gespenst looked to the window again. The purple had come. Not long now. “A little town called Bamberg.”

“What’s it like?”

“Beautiful. It is in Bavaria, and its architecture is unparalleled.”

Dorothea studied him. Calm now. No shaking. Only her hair, tumbling about her shoulders half out of its pins, told the tale of her graceless arrival in this burned-out attic. “Are you going to kill me?”

“Me? No.” He glanced up at the sky. It was clear. That could change in an instant here in England, he knew, but for now it boded well. The Luftstreitkräfte needed to be able to reach them. Zeppelins or Gothas. Either would do, and he didn’t know which they would send. Perhaps both.

“Why not? You tried last night.”

“I was not going to kill you.” He looked back, met her gaze. “I am sorry, Dorothea. I have no argument with you, but you have unfortunate alliances. It is because of them that you must die, and I do regret that. You are a pleasant young woman.”

Her nostrils flared, and there was the brief trembling of her jaw, but she fought for composure, and she found it. “You just said you wouldn’t kill me.”

“I will not. But you will not live to see your wedding to the impressively loyal Mr. Holmes. I apologize for that. Every girl should live to see her wedding, and you have been twice robbed.” Mother would cluck at him, if she knew.

Until she realized it was necessary, that is. For Heinrich.

“Then let me go. Just . . . let me go. I’ll not tell what you’ve done. I’ll not—”

“It is too late for that.” Poor girl. As if she really thought bargaining would save her now.

Her whimper sounded of a cry that was caught, muffled, swallowed. “My brother will find you.”

He smiled into the window. “I am counting on it, Fräulein.”

“He’ll kill you.”

“Ah. That is the thing.” He lifted a brow her direction. And smiled. “He cannot kill a ghost.” And that was all he’d been for far too long. Before Heinrich’s death. Before the Boynton. It’s what he’d become when he first gave up his own name and took another for the sake of his country. He was naught but a specter, like Yūrei had said. That was what war made them all. A generation of ghosts.

Yūrei. Le fantôme. El fantasma.

Das Gespenst.