The winds blew high over Jersey, clearing the sky for the stars to glimmer down on the island below.

Somewhere in the morass of receipts, bills, bonds, affidavits and orders of acquisition which lay strewn about the room, there was a pattern. Somewhere within the pages of handwritten accounts, diaries, letters and notes ran a thread. But he could not find it. A single memorandum, a scrawl on a dog-eared endpaper might supply the link, the key to the pattern. It was here, buried here somewhere. Perhaps he had already seen it and missed its significance.

What began as a simple list of persons, places and events had grown strangely, with odd nodules and tendrils sprouting in all directions and linking up with each other to form loops and lattices, the whole thing wriggling under his nib like a mess of worms on a pin.... The dictionary had become its own beast ...Reappearances by major and minor characters folded the story back on itself, places recurred, accruing and expending significance, events paralleled one another. It was a serpentine thing, hardly a list at all.

What began as a simple list of persons, places and events had grown strangely, with odd nodules and tendrils sprouting in all directions and linking up with each other to form loops and lattices, the whole thing wriggling under his nib like a mess of worms on a pin.