The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters

alchemical compounds and elixirs. Past these was a long wooden table, nailed to the floor and fitted, she noted with a fearful shiver, with leather straps. She glanced back at the bed. Doctor Svenson was still bent over the mattress, and Chang was looking underneath it. She walked to the table. The surface was scored with burns and stains, as was—she noted when her foot snagged in an open tear—the carpet. In fact, the carpet was absolutely ruined with burns and stains along a small pathway running from the stove to the table, and then again from the stove to the basins, and then, finishing the triangle, from the basins to the table directly. She stepped to the stove, which was cold. Out of curiosity, she knelt in front of it and pried open the hatch. It was full of ash. She looked about her for some tongs, found them, and reached in, her tongue poking from her mouth in concentration as she sifted through the ashes. After a moment she stood up, wiped her hands, and turned quite happily to her companions, holding out a scrap of midnight blue fabric.
    “Something here, gentlemen. Unless I am mistaken it is
shantung
silk—is it possible this was the woman’s dress?”
    Chang crossed to her and took the piece of burnt cloth. He studied it a moment without speaking and handed it back. He called to Svenson, his voice a trifle brusque.
    “What can
you
tell us, Doctor?”
    Miss Temple did not think the Doctor noticed Chang’s tone, nor the distressed tapping of his fingertips against his thigh, for Svenson’s reply was unhurried, as if his mind was still occupied with solving this newest puzzle. “It is unclear to me…for, you see, the bloodstains
here
…which do, to my experience with the varied colors of drying blood, seem to be relatively recent…”
    He pointed to the center of the mattress, and Miss Temple found herself prodding Chang to join her nearer to the bed.
    “It seems a lot of blood, Doctor,” she said. “Does it not?”
    “Perhaps, but not if—if you will permit the indelicacy—if the blood is the result of a
natural
—ah, monthly—process. You will see the stain
is
in the center of the bed—where one would expect the pelvis—”
    “What about childbirth?” she asked. “Was the woman pregnant?”
    “She was not. There are of course other explanations—it could be another injury, there could be violence, or even some kind of poison—”
    “Could she have been raped?” asked Chang.
    Svenson did not immediately reply, his eyes flitting to Miss Temple. She bore no expression, and merely raised her eyebrows in encouragement of his answer. He turned back to Chang.
    “Obviously, yes—but the quantity of blood is prodigious. Such an assault would have had to be especially catastrophic, possibly mortal. I cannot say more. When I examined the woman, she was not so injured. Of course, that is no guarantee—”
    “What of the other stains? The blue and the orange?” asked Miss Temple, still aware of Chang’s restless tapping.
    “I cannot say. The blue…well, firstly, the
smell
is consistent with a strange odor I have smelt both in the Institute and on the body in Crabbé’s kitchen—mechanical, chemical. I can only hazard it is part of their glass-making. Perhaps it is a narcotic, or perhaps…I do not know, a preservative, a fixative—as it fixes memories into glass, perhaps there is some way in which d’Orkancz hoped to fix the woman into life. I am certain he sought to preserve her,” he added, looking up into Chang’s stern face. “As for the orange, well, it’s very queer. Orange—or an essence of orange peel—is sometimes used as an insecticide—there is an acidity that destroys the carapace. Such is the smell of this stain—a bitter concentrate derived by steam.”
    “But, Doctor,” asked Miss Temple, “do not the stains themselves suggest that the fluid has come—been expelled—
from
the woman? They are sprayed—spattered—”
    “Yes, they are—very astute!”
    “Do you suggest she was
infested
?”
    “No, I suggest nothing—but I do wonder about the effects of such a solvent with regard to the possible properties of the blue fluid, the glass, within the human body. Perhaps it was the Comte’s idea of a remedy.”
    “If it melts an insect’s shell, it might melt the glass in her lungs?”
    “Exactly—though, of course, we are ignorant of the exact ingredients of the glass, so I cannot say if it might have proven effective.”
    They said nothing