"All true, unfortunately," he says, and though there's not as much hollow finality in that, Darlington can detect a whisper of it, an echo to the brief moment of bleakness that colored much of what Palamedes had said. The things that happen to him in the Rosenfeld basement aren't the same as a death; he can't think of it that way, as some kind of appointment at St. Elmo's, especially when all he knows is colored by Alex's own guilt. They get him back. Wherever he's gone, he trusts Sandow and the rest to fetch him home again.

"Whatever you have planned for today," he says, unlocking the front door and pushing it open, "isn't going to be quite that challenging to test, I'm guessing."