So there he was, short and plump, with a dimple in one of his chins and a pugnaciously pendant lower lip, as if daring you to smack him or kiss him. His fair hair was well-receded, although somewhat babyish about the ears. He had hardly any eyebrows to speak of, and the eyes themselves were half-closed, slitty even. Both of these features made him seem weak and inconstant, in a Nero-like sort of way. Possibly he was neither of these two things, although the strong smell of cologne that surrounded him, his self-satisfied air, and his slightly theatrical way of speaking, did nothing to correct my first impression of him. My line of work has made me a rapid and fairly accurate judge of character, and five minutes’ conversation with Lange were enough to convince me that I had not been wrong about him. The man was a worthless little queer.

I excused myself and went to the lavatory I had seen beyond the cloakroom. I had already decided to return to Weisthor’s house after the seance and see if the other rooms were any more interesting than the one we were in. There didn’t appear to be a dog about the place, so it seemed that all I had to do was prepare my entry. I bolted the door behind me and set about releasing the window-catch. It was stiff and I had just managed to get it open when there was a knock at the door. It was Rahn.

‘Herr Steininger? Are you in there?’

‘I won’t be a moment.’

‘We’ll be starting in a moment or two.’

‘I’ll be right there,’ I said, and, leaving the window a couple of centimetres open, I flushed the toilet and went back to rejoin the rest of the guests.

Another man had come into the room, and I realized that this must be Weisthor. Aged about sixty-five, he wore a three-piece suit of light-brown flannel and carried an ornate, ivory-handled stick with strange carvings on its shaft, some of which matched his ring. Physically he resembled an older version of Himmler, with his small smudge of a moustache, hamster-like cheeks, dyspeptic mouth and receding chin; but he was stouter, and whereas the Reichsführer reminded you of a myopic rat, Weisthor had more of the beaver about his features, an effect that was accentuated by the gap between his two front teeth.