Run: 2026-02-20-01KHY8DKV8T2YQEFNRRKCZ3QK2

**The rain hammered against the windowpanes as Inspector Harlow lit his pipe, its amber glow cutting through the dim lamplight.** **Outside, the cobblestones glistened like black glass under the flickering gas lamps, reflecting the shadow of a figure darting away.** **The letter on his desk bore no stamp, only a single word scrawled in jagged ink: *"Midnight at the Black Swan."* **Harlow’s fingers trembled slightly as he traced the edges of the envelope, wondering who had left it there before the body was found.** **Across the room, the telephone sat silent, its cord tangled like a noose around some forgotten crime’s last breath.** **A knock at the door made him start—too sharp, too deliberate, as if the killer had already chosen his next victim.** **The air smelled of damp wool and something metallic, the scent of blood lingering just beneath the surface of every ordinary thing.** **Harlow exhaled smoke toward the ceiling, where the ghost of a murdered man might still be watching, waiting for justice to catch up.**