Smoke in Mirrors

instead.
    There was something odd about it.
    He went closer and saw that it was draped in black velvet. He could see that there was an object under the velvet.
    The whisper of unease that drifted through him was as inexplicable and primordial as the feeling of sexual possessiveness he had experienced when he walked into the coffeehouse and found Rhodes trying to charm Leonora. Not quite civilized.

    “Nothing unusual in the bathroom,” Leonora said behind him. “Find anything out here?”
    “Maybe.”
    “Black velvet?” She came quickly forward to join him. “ Without a picture of Elvis painted on it. This doesn’t look good, does it?”
    “Looks damn weird, is how it looks.”
    He reached down, grasped a fistful of black velvet and lifted it away from the table.
    A circular mirror, its reflective surface darkened with age and surrounded by an elaborately worked and heavily tarnished metal frame, glittered in the shadows.
    The mirror was not a single, flat plate. It was composed, instead, of what appeared at first glance to be several concentric circles of glass bubbles. Each bubble produced a tiny, slightly distorted, independent reflection. The result was a myriad of miniature fun-house images that had a disturbing effect on the eye.
    “Uh oh,” Leonora said. “This is definitely strange.”
    “Couldn’t have put it more pithily, myself. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
    “I have—in one of the books in the library at Mirror House.”
    She leaned down to take a closer look. There was just enough light left in the room to reveal a small image of her face reflected in each of the bubbles. Some of the reflections made her look larger. Others made her look minuscule. An eerie feeling swept through him. It was as if there were a hundred little Leonoras trapped inside the bubbles.
    Without thinking, he reached out and pulled her upright and away from the mirror so that the distorted reflections disappeared.
    She was startled by his sudden movement but she did not resist.

    “What’s wrong?” she asked.
    “Nothing,” he said, lying through his teeth. “I just want to check something out.” He reached down to grasp the edge of the mirror and lifted it partway off the table. It was surprisingly heavy.
    He looked at the faded number written on the back.
    “It’s from the Mirror House collection. There’s an old inventory number on the reverse.” He lowered the looking glass back down onto the table. “Rhodes must have stolen it.”
    Leonora watched him arrange the black velvet cloth over the mirror and table.
    “Each one of those little bubbles is a tiny convex or concave mirror,” she said. “I’m no expert, but I’ve been doing a lot of heavy research lately. My guess is that it dates from the early nineteenth century. According to what I’ve read, the technology required to produce that kind of unusual mirror plate wasn’t widely available until the end of the eighteenth century. I suspect it’s very valuable.”
    “Probably.” He contemplated the black velvet that covered the mirror. “The question is, why did Rhodes take it and what the hell is he doing with it?”
    Leonora gave a small shudder. “Playing games with his clients?”
    He could feel the hair stirring on the nape of his neck. Adrenaline pumped through him. Time to get the hell out of Dodge.
    “Come on.” He grasped Leonora’s arm and hauled her toward the back door. “We’ve seen enough. Let’s get out of here.”
    She offered no protest. In fact, judging by her willingness to move quickly, he got the impression that she was as eager to leave as he was.

    He heard the footsteps on the front porch just as he opened the back door.
    Rhodes was back from his run.
    He sensed rather than saw the flutter of fear that went through Leonora. He bundled her through the open door and motioned her to head for the fog-bound trees. She whirled and disappeared quickly, almost instantly, into the fog.
    Now you see her, now you don’t.
    He suddenly understood why Rhodes had returned unexpectedly early from his run. The fog had grown much heavier while he and Leonora had been inside the cabin. When the last of the light vanished it would be impossible to see your hand in front of your face out here.
    Rhodes’s keys jangled in the lock.
    Thomas heard the front door open just as he carefully shut the back door.
    Bending low he made for the cover of fog and trees.
    “Over here,” Leonora whispered.
    He saw movement in the