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You may come to regret this, later tonight when your schedule is even tighter than it already was ... but as you are utterly unable to shake the feeling that there is something suspicious about this room, you are going to take a closer look, with the advantage of light. You set the 'stick down on a corner of the table in the room, to free up a hand so you may light it - but before you even get the snap-sparker out of your bundle, you take a good long look at the stub of the candle first. Truly, stub might not be the right word at this point, as it is more drippings than shaft. But the wick is still free and clear, and what remains of the shaft is tall enough that you'd judge there to be about an hours worth of light left in this candle before it gutters out for the last time. Forget the room, that should be enough time to search the basement several times over - Hell, more than several times.
It takes three or four kisses with the snap-sparker, but you are able to get the wick to take light without too much delay or effort. The amount of light that it puts off is impressive - though that might have a bit to do with just how dark the basement is here. Still, you aren't able to feel pleased with yourself for getting the wick lit. It is true that there is nothing to indicate that there is anyone else down here with you in the basement ... but there has also been nothing to rule out the possibility. And as a nude flame like this puts off light in all directions, there are no two ways about this - you are taking a real risk by doing this. By keeping the light as close to you as you dare, you are able to throttle it a bit, but even with these precautions, you have to imagine that the light can still be seen from other rooms.
You do what you can to push that from your mind, for the sake of your search … but even with the Shielding offered by the False Silverware, your stomach has resumed inventing new knots with itself. But you grit your teeth and get on with it – starting with the table and the glassware, as the light is already there. This leg of the search goes by quickly, considering that there aren't too many things to go through, and the little there is happens to be transparent. Unfortunately, your pace slows down once you switch to searching through the racks and shelves of the pickled and preserved. Nothing jumps out at you … but at the same time, nothing is labeled, much of the glassware is at least partially obscured by racks or by other pieces – and there are so many of them! The only way you would be completely certain that nothing was hidden in any of them would be to dump them all out – which obviously is not an option. You just have to content yourself with looking for anything obvious … but after having spent more time on this leg of your search, you have to accept that there is nothing <span class="mu-i">obvious</span>.
Which leaves just the sausage on the ceiling.
