At the bottom of the service shaft the unloading corridor was empty. Holmes stopped and turned the torn grey glove under the lantern. "The red lead is still wet—he has only just left the scene-shop, and he means to open Scene Five."
The theatre's back door stood ajar. A single prompt-light burned. Mrs Crane stood at the chalk line of the stage mouth, the unfinished half-ticket in one hand, a freshly opened letter shaking in the other: "Deliver the living man to the stage mouth before dawn—or the obituary becomes final." The hand was the same that had written in pen on the desk in three-twelve.
Watson asked softly where the living man was. Holmes looked toward the barge on the river, then at the empty upper box. "He is still in our keeping. What this man wants is not a death notice—it is that she hand her husband over herself, before the river and the empty seats." From deep in the wings, bergamot rose again.
❦ To be continued.
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