Play@YSDC

As the Duke and the other visitors leave, Edgar salute everyone politely and closes the shop door. Andrew and Archie stick around intending to follow Edgar as soon as he leaves. A few minutes later, Edgar quickly peeks throught the window glass to take a look to the empty street. He then opens the shop door, just to hang a small plaque: CLOSED. Then, he goes back inside and locks the door. A few minutes pass. Nobody leaves the house.

Archie found a strategic spot across the way that seemed to conceal him in the growing gloom.

Archie, who had never been on what will come to be called a "stake out" in a couple of decades, had no idea just how boring they could be. He didn't think about sticking a sack of jelly babies into his suit coat pocket or putting one of those new-fangled thermoses full of tea into a satchel. So when he saw the closed sign appear and no one immediately came out, he sighed softly. He saw a muddy, ripped newspaper that was a week or so old on the ground, and he tried to pick it up to practice his French, and it came apart immediately.

"Mon dieu..." he breathed to Andrew, as he wiped his muddy fingers on his handkerchief. "Sacre bleu..." He leaned back mouthing softly to Andrew, "I hope this doesn't take long."

Although Andrew usually leaves the grunt-work to others, he has some idea of how to conduct surveillance. When no one comes out of the property he says 'I'm going to look for a rear exit.'

Once passed the back fence, is a back door which opens onto a small yard with an incinerator. The ground floor includes a front room, a store room a study and a work room. The three rooms are empty and silent. The whole house is actually silent.

'Oh excellent,' Andrew grumbles to himself. 'Another suspiciously disappearing quarry. I hope this one doesn't kill anyone.' He takes the opportunity to look around the yard for any other routes Edgar might have used to leave without being seen. He peers into the incinerator then to discretely into the windows, looking for any sign of life, presuming both Edgar and William to still be inside unless he has missed them.

Archie waits impatiently in front of the store. He tries to stay out of sight of anyone peering out of the front door, still keeps a close eye on those who are passing the shop.

"I wonder if they are expecting any guests," he thinks silently to himself.

His willpower is not very strong, but he resists the urge to join his compatriot going down the side. He knows that someone should be watching the front, as well.

Taking a better look at the rooms on the lower floor, at one point Andrew notices a staircase that leads to an upper floor.
The upper floor has a kitchen and two bedrooms. The kitchen is a crowded room with a kitchen table and six chairs. Four of the chairs are piled with books, and are quickly cleared for visitors. One bedroom is plain with a bed and a bookshelf with a selection of well-read classics. Edgar´s brother, William, is sleeping on the bed. He has a fresh needle mark, one among many in the left arm.

The other bedroom, is narrow and has writing desk with a diary. Edgar lies in the bed of this room, asleep. There are some objects on the desk. An empty morphine bottle and below, an emptied syringe. Edgar’s diary is open on the desk. Close to the diary is a green bottle, mostly full, on which is a label, ‘Ishara’. The container is about the size of an ink bottle. The contents looks remarkably like muddy water. Holding it up to a strong light, the investigatiors can detect tiny silvery particles suspended in the dank fluid. A spoon, soiled with the liquid of the bottle, is also on the table.

Based on the smell and the appearence of the fluid, it looks like a narcotic, but the effect is unknown to Archie. The name Ishara does not ring any bell.

Much of the diary seem to chronicle the pain that Edgar felt in his everyday life. Most entries are short. If the investigators wants to read it all to see if they can get other information, it takes about an hour to read.

Archie thumbs through the diary as quietly as possible. He's not a thieving sort, but desperate times call for desperate measures. He slips the diary into a coat pocket before giving the green bottle a closer look. The label is unfamiliar to him, as are the contents of the bottle. He takes the empty syringe from the stand, fills the hypodermic with the strange liquid, replaces the bottle, and snaps off the needle so he won't accidentally stab himself with the sharp implement, and slips it into his other pocket.

Once he is sure that William is okay, he heads to the door and gestures to Andrew that he is ready.

Since he's gone to the trouble of letting himself into the house, Andrew takes the opportunity to look for any sign of the scroll Edgar was talking about, keeping a wary eye on the sleeping brothers.