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'Her body was found this morning, just after dawn. We can surmise that she died sometime before that.'

'And they're sure she didn't just pass away in her sleep? Of old age?'

The Doctor shook his head emphatically. 'No.'

'She had another one of those dragon tattoos on her forehead?'

'Yes,' said the Doctor. 'Although I'm not sure they're tattoos. In fact, I'm not at all sure what they are. Ah. Toast.'

'What?' said Zoe. But then a moment later she could smell it too. A warm aroma of freshly toasted bread, which stirred the digestive juices in an agreeable fashion. The Doctor had detected it while it was just the faintest stirring on the air currents. He had a very keen nose.

Carnacki came in, carrying a large silver toast rack containing half a dozen slices of golden brown bread. In the crook of his arm he awkwardly balanced a saucer of butter, a jar of thick red jam and a small pot of honey.

'Here let me help you,' said Zoe, moving to take something before he dropped everything. But Carnacki dodged around her. 'No,' he said, smiling. 'Let me wait on you.' He had been deferential to Zoe in an amused and mildly annoying avuncular fashion ever since she had delivered what he referred to as her 'suffragette's manifesto' in the billiard room. It seemed that Carnacki was a champion of women's rights, at least in an archaic, naive and offensively condescending fashion. Zoe cut him a little slack, though. After all, he was a creature of his time.

Carnacki put the toast and condiments down on the big oak slab of table and smiled at Zoe and the Doctor, taking a knife and spoon out of the pocket of his tweed jacket. Zoe made a mental note not to use that knife or spoon. 'So Celandine is improving?' said the Doctor. Carnacki paused, startled. 'How did you know that?' 'By your smile,' said Zoe.

Carnacki smiled bashfully and shrugged. 'I suppose I am one of those people whose soul can be read in his face.' 'There's nothing wrong with that,' said Zoe.

'Just don't try playing poker,' said the Doctor, reaching for the toast rack.

'In any case Celandine is still unconscious.' Carnacki buttered his toast. Zoe glanced quickly at the Doctor. Surely it was a bad sign for someone to remain unconscious for so long? The Doctor gave her a bland look and turned to Carnacki. 'How can we construe that as good news?'

'Because her colour is better, her breathing deeper and more regular, but most crucially she has begun to talk.' Carnacki picked up the jam jar and began spooning jam onto his toast. 'Or at least to mutter broken phrases. Nothing anybody can quite make out. But surely the ability to speak is a good thing in itself, indicating as it does a less profound coma or trance, a shallower state of unconsciousness.' The Doctor pursed his lips. 'I'd say so, yes.' Zoe poured the tea.

'So Doctor. What do we make of these killings?'

'I was just about to ask you the same thing,' the Doctor was suddenly serious. 'Considering that you're an expert in your field it would be foolish not to take advantage of your expertise.'

'Well, that's the question, isn't it?' Carnacki bit off a mouthful of toast, chewed politely and at maddening length and finally said, 'The question is whether these killings fall into what you call my "field". That is, the occult, the supernatural, the unexplained.' 'And do you think they do?' said the Doctor.

Carnacki gnawed away at his toast, nodding enthusiastically. 'I think one would have to be a pretty dull chap to be shown that unearthed and empty grave in the arboretum – exhumed by lightning! – and not combine it with the subsequent, or contemporaneous, murders.' He chewed and swallowed and smiled. 'Putting two and two together.'

The Doctor was looking across the table at Carnacki with fixed in

tensity. 'And coming to what result?'

'The revenant of Roderick Upcott himself . . . '

'The what?' said Zoe.

'Ghost,' said the Doctor.

'Or, at the very least, his reanimated cadaver,' added Carnacki, reaching for another piece of toast.