Ghosts of Karnak by George Mann

gilt-framed mirrors and portraits dressed the papered walls. It might have been the interior of a top-end hotel, rather than the communal deck of a steam liner. Little expense had been spared.
    He could imagine the sort of conversations that had passed here, at the foot of these stairs—the same sort that he heard at his Long Island parties, night after night—vacant of all real meaning, just the petty chit-chat of self-obsessed elitists massaging one another’s egos. He couldn’t see Ginny fitting in here. She’d probably spent most of the journey up on the deck, taking in the view, or else locked away in her cabin with her books.
    Now that he was here, he wasn’t entirely sure what he was looking for. There was no point searching for the manifest—Donovan had answered that question. What he needed was some sort of proof that she’d really been here, on the ship, and not just a logged entry in a book.
    Donovan had said she’d been registered in cabin thirty-five. That seemed the logical place to start. He’d have to make his way down through the First Class decks until he found it.
    Moving swiftly, he crossed the foyer, skirting the lounge and passing through a set of double doors into a lobby area. There were elevators here, but he decided not to risk using them, preferring to seek out the stairs. There was less chance of anyone noticing him if he kept to himself and didn’t make use of any of the facilities—lights included.
    Three decks further down, a sign directed him through another door to a passageway leading to cabins twenty-nine through thirty-nine. He took it, noting how the furnishings down here were still reminiscent of a New York hotel, with rich carpets and brass fittings on all the doors. He couldn’t conceive of how much the whole thing had cost to build, and, likewise, to maintain; there had to be a veritable army of staff and servants onboard when she was at sea.
    He found cabin thirty-five within minutes, and this time, was surprised to discover the door was unlocked. It was pitch black inside the room, but his goggles compensated, and he slipped inside, pulling the door shut behind him.
    It was a small space for a First Class cabin, despite its evident luxury; a chaise longue, a fireplace, a small vanity table and a plush double bed, draped in silk sheets. A smaller antechamber proved to house a small bathroom and toilet, now devoid of any toiletries, and twin wardrobes which were equally empty of any effects. A maid had evidently prepared the room for the next guest: the sheets had been changed, the bed made, the carpets brushed. There was nothing of Ginny’s here, no hairbrush, no clothes, no evidence she had been here at all. Even the scent of her had been polished out of the woodwork with a liberal application of beeswax.
    He checked beneath the bed, just in case; opened the drawers in the vanity unit. There was nothing at all.
    He noted that a small door led to the adjoining cabin. It was bolted shut from this side, so he slid the bolt and crept through. The room mirrored cabin thirty-five in nearly every way, clearly built to the same schematic, only reversed. Here, the same was true as in Ginny’s room; the maids had done a thorough job erasing all evidence of the previous passenger. All save for a small white patch on the carpet.
    Interested, the Ghost dropped to his haunches, removing his glove and pinching some of the powdery substance between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. It was dry and crumbly. He raised it to his nose and cautiously sniffed, surprised to discover that it wasn’t, as he imagined, a trace of some illicit narcotic, but simple white chalk. He ran his fingers through the carpet, causing tiny plumes of dust to form in their wake. It seemed the maids hadn’t been quite as thorough as they should have been; there was evidence here that someone had been using the chalk to draw outlines on the carpet. Whatever shape it had been was now long gone, but the