The Halloran rooming house is still smoking when Investigator Edda Voss arrives at dawn. Eight survivors sit on the curb under scratchy blankets, faces black with soot. The landlord's ledger lists nine tenants, nine rent stubs, nine keys collected every New Year. Edda counts the survivors twice. Eight. So where is the ninth tenant, and which clue does she chase first?

Edda goes straight to the ledger. The landlord, old Mr. Halloran, hands it over with shaking hands. Nine names, nine signatures. But the ninth name, in room 9, is smudged, like someone wiped a wet thumb across it on purpose. She can't read it.

Mr. Halloran suddenly snatches the ledger back. 'There were only ever eight,' he says, too fast. 'I miscounted the keys one year, that's all.' But his thumb is stained with the same blue ink that smudged the ninth name. He did it. The question is why.

Edda grabs the landlord's wrist and shows him the ink. 'You smudged her name this morning, while the house was still burning. Why?' Halloran crumples. 'Because if anyone found out she was never really gone, they'd dig her up. And I couldn't let them.'

Edda has the cellar dug up that afternoon. Under the dirt floor they find Dahlia, wrapped in a quilt, a brass key clutched in her bones, the ninth key. Halloran weeps. 'She was my daughter. The fall was an accident. I just wanted her to stay home.' Case closed, and broken.