“Anubis!” Jemima laughed, and at that a black hound taller than a man leapt onto her. The beast then started to lick her face profusely, to the evident pleasure of the small girl. Eventually she managed to wrestle him off, but the dog continued to bark and prance about her bed as if it hadn’t seen Jemima in years.

“You daft thing, I saw you an hour ago!” She giggled. “Why don’t we take a walk out in the garden, eh boy? I’m could’ve sworn I saw someone out there just a minute ago. And what’s more I didn’t recognize him.” Jemima recalled how a strange yelping sound disturbed her from her from her consuming work, and how she saw a rather disheveled figure dive into the hedge. Not being one to pass up an interesting encounter, (she was quite the extrovert) she leaped at the opportunity to confront the stranger and inquire his purpose for being in her front garden.

Jemima and the wolf-dog (who we shall start to call Anubis) raced each other down the stairs, Anubis leaping down ten steps at a time and the laughing girl zooming down the banister. Eventually, after numerous close calls with various fragile objects, Jemima flew off the rail and landed on the large Turkish carpet in the middle of the room. It is disputable who really would have won, because the dog seemed to courteously screech to a halt to let the girl pass him. Just as soon as she touched the ground, however, Jemima was flinging open the oaken double doors at the front of her house. The sun was doing her best work that brisk fall afternoon, but she didn’t disrupt her golden rays with hotness. The trees had not yet begun to show their true colors, but they seemed to call to the people, “Look at me! Climb my boughs! Look through my verdant stained-glass before it falls!” Birds were dizzy with activity, swooping and belting out impossible notes as if they were singing their last allegro concert. Jemima and Anubis reveled in these sort of days, climbing, running, doing whatever it is you do when you know that today was made for doing something worth doing.

Today was different for Jemima, for she had a suspect to catch. “It’s a kidnapper, I just know it, Anubis!” she squealed in delight. “Either that or a lonesome murderer seeking revenge for some past misfortune, blurred by the enmity driving his dark schemes. Oh, this is almost dreamy! Oh, don’t let’s go strait at him, or he’ll evade our capture for certain. Let’s go in the hedge so we might surprise him.” So then, as quietly as an ant in a pillow shop, they slid into the hallway-like space between the hedge and the east wall* of Saraphina Manor. It was quite cramped and prickly, and there was much “Oh come on you big sissy” and, “Ouch!” or, “Ooumphkghf!” so that Jemima was quite sure that whoever in Dickens name they were capturing would have been very alerted of their presence by now.

She was quite wrong.

Instead, they found a bottom. And not a small one at that. A big, bulging, pin-striped derriere stuck squarely in the hedge, complete with a pair of flailing legs to match. It was grunting, or at least it seemed so, for Jemima couldn’t quite make out if there was a top. “Um, excuse us, uh, sir, but are you a, um, murderer?” She said that last word so quietly that the bottom (and whoever it belonged to) couldn’t possibly make out what it was, which might have been optimal, considering that she was accusing it of killing someone.

“Eh? Whadya say?” said a very gruff and tired voice. “Who are you? Whaddaya want? Are you a murderer?” This last query visibly shocked Jemima, who’s eyebrows were now raised to the vanishing point.

“Um, no sir, not particularly. At least, I’ve never killed anyone that didn’t deserve it*. Actually, and this is quite funny, I was going to ask the same of you.” The head of the caboose, wherever it was, yelped. This may have been from the amount of absurd remarks made by the small girl, but it was most likely because Anubis was sniffing him with great vigor.

“Oh dear! Anubis! Stop that at once! (Terribly sorry sir) ANUBIS!” The dog, unsettled by the strange creature without a face, had bit the thing right between the legs. The bottom (who Anubis had conveniently determined to be a man) howled, and flailed about so hard that he popped right out of the hedge. The bottom, who was actually a complete person, was a rather sad looking man of about fifty. (Though he looked more in pain then sad at that moment.) He had a gray mustache that did a wonderful job of covering up the middle of his mouth, which would have been frozen into a frown if not howling in pain. He had a five o-clock shadow enveloping his pugnacious jowls, but it was so obviously ignored that looked more like a five o-clock gloom. His eyes, now filled with painful tears, were most interesting, one the murky brown of cowboy coffee and the other the green of a faded army hat*. He wore no coat, but he donned instead a gray felt waistcoat dotted with buttons and several pocket watches.

Oh, he was also missing a hand.

*Because Professor loved convenience, he made sure he got a house which the front faced north, the back faced south, ect.

*Jemima had killed quite a few goblins, red-caps, and trolls (among other dark beings) by the time this book takes place.

*This is called heterochromia.