Sano felt a spring of gladness at having new evidence against Liu Yun, who might also have murdered Peony and left the fake suicide note. Yet he couldn’t allow Hirata’s continued presence in Nagasaki, especially if his own suspicions about the lights proved true. “No arguments, Hirata-san,” he said. “You leave for Edo tomor …”

His voice trailed off as, across the water, lights blinked purple, white, green.

“Get out of here, Hirata!” Sano rasped.

“No!”

The lights drifted toward Deshima, growing larger and brighter. Sano resigned himself to Hirata’s company. To send him away now might attract the notice of the culprits—or provoke an attack by the archer who’d wounded Sano last night. The lights drew nearer to shore, smoke wafting from them. A breeze carried a harsh, burnt odor toward Sano. Now he saw a dark shape beneath the lights, and behind it, a wake that gleamed in the moonlight.

“A boat?” whispered Hirata.

They watched the lights draw up to the Deshima water gates. In the colored flashes, they saw the gates open and dark figures descend the steps to the water.

“The Dutch?” Hirata guessed.

“Or the guards.” Sano noticed that the barge he’d seen earlier had vanished.

Then the lights went out. Darkness enfolded the island. Sano cursed. “Let’s get over there.”

He cut the boat’s mooring lines. Hirata stood in the stern, lifted the oar, and began to row. The boat sped across the moon-dappled black water. The wind blew chill and moist, but anticipation warmed Sano. He knew with certainty that he was on the path to Jan Spaen’s killer. Then the lights reappeared, flashing upon the water south of the island, moving out toward the harbor channel. Hirata matched their speed to the lights’ rapid pace. The tall, black forms of anchored ships rose around them, decks unmanned while the foreign crews slept—or hid from the ghosts.

“Take us closer,” Sano told Hirata, softly so his voice wouldn’t carry across the water.

Panting, Hirata labored to reduce the distance between their boat and the lights. Sano peered ahead. Did he see a boat under the lights, with an oarsman in the stern and a passenger in the bow? Were they human? Sano shivered involuntarily as his disbelief in ghosts wavered and his faith in his theory weakened.

“Maybe it’s Urabe,” he whispered, telling Hirata about his interviews with the merchant and Kiyoshi, and his ideas about Peony’s murder.

The harbor channel narrowed. They headed seaward between wooded bluffs that sloped up to terraced fields. The lights angled right.

“They’re going ashore.” Sano’s excitement grew. “Speed up, we’ll catch them there.”

Hirata turned their boat, but the lights suddenly disappeared, as if extinguished by the night that lay heavily upon the landscape. Only the faint smell of smoke remained.

“Row along the coast,” Sano ordered.