Unmasked

Juniper Pell made every mask for the Ashcombe House masquerade: forty of them in black and gold and oxblood silk, boxed in tissue and driven up the hill to a mansion that has been dark for thirty years. She made one more that nobody ordered. It was cut to the measurements she took of the host's face in the library, with her hands not quite steady.

Desmond Achebe noticed her hands. He notices everything. He is the patient, dark-bearded man who brought the old ballroom back to life, and he wat...