At a special dinner held at Telegraph Station, Ernie is seated at a table with S. F. Majors. He thanks her for inviting him to the festival. Her initial reaction is odd, but then she chuckles and tells him that she thinks the festival is a disaster. Ernie asks her about the profile of a stalker, as he thinks that Brooke, whom he has cast as a stalker, might have been upset with McTavish if he refused to write any more Morbund books. Ernie asks Majors whether the 2003 Edinburgh Festival influenced her choice to invite Fulton and McTavish to this festival, and she tells him that this is a disrespectful time to discuss it. When Ernie asks directly why she invited him, Majors says that she didn’t, and he’s left wondering who issued his invitation. He asks whether McTavish stole the plot of Off the Rails from her, but she deflects by sharing some information about Royce: He was never really a forensic pathologist. Royce did work in a forensics lab in some junior capacity, but he has no actual qualifications.

Ernie next runs into Douglas, who is inebriated. Douglas thanks Ernie—for what, Ernie doesn’t understand. Douglas tells Ernie that he lived in this area 32 years ago but left after his partner, Noah, was killed.