I’d barely put in my order and settled at a window table when Ellie blew through like a summer typhoon. My friend was a little intense when she had projects on the brain. Ellie went straight to the counter, put in her own order for food, then blazed toward me, green eyes alight with an almost unholy fervor. “How is it? Did it work?”
“Did fifty miles an hour for ten minutes without straining the engine,” I reported with immense satisfaction.
Ellie threw up a fist, punching the air in victory. She dropped into the chair so heavily that even with her petite build, she almost sent it crashing down. Was that a streak of oil against her fair skin? Ha, it sure was. And she had no less than three drafting pencils stuck in her messy red hair, caging it in a loose bun. Caught her mid-project, did I? “Yes! Why did you stop there?”
“Couple of problems.” I ticked them off on my fingers. “Road was too slick from the recent rain. I wasn’t getting enough traction; the tires couldn’t handle it. Suspension wasn’t up to the task either, so we got jostled pretty badly. And third, Henri was in the car.”
She snorted at that last point. “That man has no sense of adventure.”
“Tell me about it.”
“But suspension and tires…” she trailed off, eyes narrowed. “I think we can do something about those. You mentioned before the tires on Earth are wider.”
“Much wider. A good six inches wider, in fact.”
“Hmm. I can see how that would help with traction and stability. You have time to today?”
That was Ellie code speak for: You have time to invent with me today? “Sure. Actually, come to that, Ellie. There’s something I want you to build for me.”
Her expression lit up hopefully. “Yes?”
“You know that thing I mentioned before, the motorcycle?”
“Oh, yes, yes, is it time to tinker with that? Please tell me it is, I keep thinking of different designs, but you barely gave me a basic description.”
“I want the option of going somewhere without taking all year to get there, so yes, definitely time to build it.”
She chortled like a demented dragon with the promise of gold. This woman, I swear. Talk about a one-track mind.
“I’ve only got today and tomorrow to help you with the initial design,” I warned her. “We’re not done with the case yet.”
Ellie blinked at me in surprise. “I assumed since you were back, you’d solved it.”
I groaned, head hanging for a moment. “I wish. We’re basically stalled at this point. It’s a locked-room murder mystery. We can’t figure out how the murderer got in or out, since the wards are still intact and the keys in the house. We have a timeline of that morning, and it’s unbelievably tight, but no one saw anyone suspicious. We’ve barely figured out how Burtchell was killed—even that wasn’t conventional. I have literally never seen a case so strange.”
“And that’s saying something,” she remarked. We both paused as our food arrived, set in front of us by a smiling waitress. After she retreated, Ellie continued, “But really? You have both RM Seaton and Henri, and they can’t figure out how an intruder slipped through the wards?”
“Trust me, it’s driving them up the wall. I’m actually glad I had an excuse to drag them away from it for two days. They keep banging their heads against that particular problem.”
“What was your excuse?”
“Burtchell’s funeral is on Gather Day. We all needed fresh clothes and a day off, so we came back in.”
“Ah.” She dipped into her lunch with a moan of bliss. “I do love this bakery.”
“Tell me about it.” I ate mine with similar gusto, more than a little hungry.
We fell to discussing motorcycles, and tires, and suspensions. I’d worked summers at my uncle’s garage growing up, and while I didn’t know everything about cars, I knew a bit more than the average Joe. I could at least describe the basics of the parts, what they looked like and how they generally functioned. It kept Ellie from shooting blindly into the dark.
After lunch, we retreated to her place and put designs onto paper. I lost all sense of time as we worked. That was often the case. Ellie was the type who was so enthusiastic about a project, her attitude swept you along with her. It felt much like being caught in a riptide sometimes.
And look at me, making sea analogies. I’d turn native yet.
With the hope of a motorcycle in my near future, I had a spring in my step as I walked back to the apartment. Clint lounged on the front stoop, clearly waiting for me, his ears flicking back and forth idly as he picked up and dismissed the ambient sounds around him. I leaned down and scooped him up, cradling the warm weight of him against my chest. “And did you find Mrs. Hudson’s naughty mouse?”
He purred in smug satisfaction. “Mouse gone.”
“What a good kitty you are. Want some clean water?”
“Mrs. Hudson give some.”
“Of course she did.” I shook my head in amusement as I carried him up. “Clint, did you like going with me to work the case?”
He brightened, practically bristling. “Yes. Go again?”
“About that; would you like to? You were very helpful, reaching areas that were hard for me to go. Henri said if we train you right, he’d think you can help on some of the cases.”
Clint nodded like a puppet with its string cut. “Yes, yes, train. Go.”
And that answered that question. “After this case, we’ll think of all you can do, okay?”
“Okay, okay.”
I’d heard of field dogs, but field cats? This had to be one for the records.
I pattered around my apartment, getting ready to turn in for the night. It was late enough that I didn’t sing in the shower, as I was wont to do, not wanting to disturb my neighbors. I hummed a variety of songs instead, whatever suited my mood. Clint was passed out on the bed by the time I climbed into PJ’s, and I just rolled him over so I had room to get in. I snuggled into my pillow and sighed with contentment. It didn’t matter how comfortable a hotel might be, you always missed your own bed.
It had been a full day, so I dropped to sleep fairly quickly. I fell into dreamland, in a deep sleep, utterly relaxed and happy to be there.
The next thing I knew, I bolted upright, the thought clamoring through my head like a fire station’s alarm.
I knew how he’d gotten in.
Swearing, I threw back the covers, jostling Clint in the process. He gave a sleepy growl at me, but I didn’t pause. Throwing on a robe and slippers, I sprinted down the stairs like a madwoman for the floor right below mine. Some part of my brain cautioned me to be quiet—it was birds’ hours of the morning—but I could barely restrain myself, I was so excited. It was a miracle I kept my knock on Henri’s door down to a polite rap of the knuckles. I wanted to throw the door open like some dojo challenger.
I could hear him grumble and fuss as he got up, the heavy pad of his feet as he stumbled to the door. He jerked it open with one eye shut, the other barely focused, his dark curls in a snarl from his pillow, and the crease of sleep against one cheek. He would’ve looked adorable if he hadn’t had the attitude of a wounded grizzly. “Wha?”
I shoved past him, closing the door behind me, still vibrating. “Henri. I know how he did it. I know how the murderer got in and out of the house.”
He went from sleepy to alert in two seconds. “How?!”
“Think about it. What was the one section of the house no one was in, for a whole half hour of time?”
His brows compressed but he wasn’t awake enough to really think. Or he was still stuck on the wards, either way. The answer wasn’t coming, even with that hint.
Taking pity, I started at the beginning. “I don’t think the murderer had to take down the wards, or duplicate a key, or any of the complex situations we considered. I think it was timing and stealth on his part. Think about the timeline. The postman and milkman both said the front doors were open when they made their deliveries. Villarreal was talking to Burtch
ell in the study when the postman was there. As much activity as the front door was getting, no one really entered the house. I think the killer snuck in between those deliveries, while Burtchell was visiting with his friend. He went straight up the stairs to lie in wait until everyone was gone. It was safe to do that—no one had gone upstairs all morning, not until the constables arrived and searched the house.”
Now Henri was awake. He finished the thought in growing excitement. “He waits, Villarreal leaves, he comes down. Kills Burtchell. Can’t find the key so goes back upstairs. The housekeeper comes in not ten minutes later, finds her dead employer, runs out of the house to fetch help. All he has to do is leave. She didn’t lock the doors behind her.”
I beamed at him, still bouncing on my toes. “See? It’s not a locked room mystery at all! It just looked that way on the surface.”
“Oh, this man is very clever.” Henri rubbed his hands together absently, a light in his eye that promised retribution. He got like that when he finally caught a criminal’s scent. He was part bloodhound, I swear. “How long did he watch Burtchell to get his routine down like this? Or did he just see an opportunity to slip through the defenses and took it?”
“Could be a mix of both. I’d think, though, if he were that determined to kill a royal mage, he’d spend at least some time planning and watching him to figure out how to get to him.”
“It makes sense to me as well.” Henri stepped in, put both arms around my waist and hugged me tightly.
I was so surprised by this I nearly didn’t hug him back. He was usually so uptight with his rules about proper conduct I could never really get a proper hug out of him. This problem must have been really stressing him out.
“Thank you, bless your brain,” he said against my temple. “I’m so glad you figured this out. I was about to lose what’s left of my sanity.”
“You’re welcome.” I grinned against his ear.
Pulling free, he retreated two steps. “Let’s call Seaton.”
“At this hour of the morning?” I objected.
He gave me a baleful glare for some reason. “You have no issue with jerking me out of a peaceful slumber, but you don’t wish to awake him?”
I thought about that for a full microsecond. “You make a good point. You want to explain it, or do I?”
“Oh by all means, go right ahead. It’s your accomplishment, after all.”
I skipped over to where his telephone sat on its small little table, dialing in the number for Sherard’s upscale townhouse.
It rang for a solid two minutes before someone growled into the receiver, “Whoever this is, there better be an emergency. Interrupting a royal mage’s sleep is a corporal punishment.”
I’d forgotten. Sherard was not a morning person. Oh well. “Good morning, Sunshine!”
“Jamie.” A gusty sigh. “Are you ill?”
“I’m calling with good news, not bad.”
“Unless I’ve won the lottery, I don’t care. Leave me alone.”
Really not a morning person. “So you’re saying that how the murderer got in and out of the house isn’t important to you?”
There was a beat of silence. “Start talking.”
I grinned. That was more like it.
The funeral of a royal mage, even one retired, was quite the spectacle. I’d more or less expected as much and braced myself accordingly. Jamie, I believe, was not as well-prepared for the event. She kept looking about her with a bemused air and wide brown eyes.
It was a refreshing change to see her in a dress, even one the pure white of mourning. Actually, the brightness of it set off her golden skin and hair in a very flattering manner. With her hair done up in a proper updo, pearls dangling from her ears, she looked the part of a society lady instead of the woman famous for killing a rogue witch. It made me wish I could take her on a more social function, something without the solemn, depressed air that surrounded us now. It was an odd feeling. I disliked social events as a norm, but I knew she enjoyed them. And escorting her here depressed the spirits.
The coffin trundled past us on a flatbed wagon, pulled by a matching pair of white horses. A regiment of Kingsmen in full dress uniform followed in its wake. Every gentleman doffed his hat as the wagon passed by. The paved road to the cemetery was filled on both sides, several rows deep, but eerily silent considering the hundreds of people packed into the space. The younger onlookers seemed grim but there out of obligation, much as we were. The older generation had more than a few tears in their eyes. It only made sense. They were the ones who knew Burtchell best—he had been their royal mage, the one who’d served that generation.
I watched the crowd, thinking of what would happen if we didn’t solve this case, didn’t find the murderer. The public outcry would be ferocious. It gave me chills just envisioning it.
Seaton was further up in the crowd, at the royal family’s side during all this. McSparrin was supposedly here as well—she’d stated her intentions to attend—but I’d not yet spotted her. I might not have seen Jamie if we hadn’t come in the same cab. It was deucedly crowded anywhere near the graveyard.
Despite the casting of several voice amplification spells, I only caught part of the eulogy. The wind was strong enough that it caught and snatched the words, whisking them away from my ears. Queen Regina kept it brief, I think because she feared she’d keep us here for days otherwise, talking of the man. The Kingsmen set off a military salute, guns firing in unison seven times. Then Seaton and his royal mage counterparts stepped forward and lit up the cloudy summer day with a breathtaking display of fireworks that turned the sky alight like a second sun. I’d not seen anything in my life that could begin to compare to it.
The coffin was lowered into the ground as the fireworks raged on, and people were allowed to approach and throw in flowers, letters, or other tokens. The funeral was more or less over at that point. I turned to the woman at my side and asked softly, “Ices and an early lunch?”
“Heavens, yes.” Jamie accepted the elbow I extended, walking steadily at my side as we gently bullied our way free of the crowd. She leaned her head in to say quietly against my ear, “It’s such a sad thing, seeing this. He was very loved.”
The loss of any life was a sad thing to me. If nothing else, I mourned the loss of potential. Even with criminals, I could see the path they could have walked, the ones they chose to ignore. It was a different sort of sadness. This was possibly the worst display I’d seen yet of how much it affected everyone when a life was cut short. “I empathize completely. Even retired, he did much good in the world. Truly, he was a royal mage by heart and not just calling.”
“I keep thinking, the motive behind his murder must be the key. If we can just unlock that, we’d understand the whole picture. Right now we only have pieces, and they don’t fit well enough together for me to properly see what I’m looking for.” She sighed in frustration.
Finally passing the cemetery’s main gates, we found a little breathing room by ducking to the side, walking along the bordering sidewalk. A long line trailed in from the other side, preventing us from walking the direction we actually needed to go. We’d have to go up a block and around them.
As we walked, Jamie fell into a pensive silence. I let her stew for a moment, for I knew that look. I’d not been acquainted with her long before I’d learned to recognize it. When her eyes narrowed just so, her brows quirked together, she was thinking hard about something. It was the way she kept lifting her hand to her mouth, as if to bite at her thumbnail, only to pull it back down again that truly gave it away. I had the distinct impression she’d been a terrible nail biter in her youth. She’d broken the habit as an adult, but it took willpower on her end to remember to not indulge the bad habit.
We paused at a street corner, waiting for traffic to pass before stepping across. She must have sensed my regard as she stopped, thinking long enough to look at me askance. “What?”
“You tell me, you’re the one thinking so hard.”
Pulling a face, she admitted, “I just have this gut feeling I can’t explain away. Cop’s instincts, I guess. I think the motive behind Burtchell’s death is revenge.”
It was truly curious, the paths her mind took. “Why so?”
“Okay, hear me out. We know people loved and adored Burtchell—we’ve been hearing nothing else—but no one can be universally loved. He was getting some flack about not saving all those ships, right? Even though the people writing him recanted their first letters, you still had the angry ones. It proves my point, he couldn’t live as long as he did, as such a powerful man, without making a few enemies. We didn’t find anything in Sheffield, but he’d not lived there for long, either. A few years. Maybe this ties back to something he did while he was still in Kingston.”
I followed her train of thought well enough—or thought I did. “And the reason for the delay in killing Burtchell is because this person was incarcerated? Or somehow detained in a manner that kept him or her from reaching Burtchell until recently?”
“Maybe after Burtchell retired, the murderer wasn’t sure where he went.” Jamie shrugged, her free hand splayed. “It wasn’t like he was listed in any public phone book. Not that you people have many of those to begin with. It wasn’t until that bad storm, when he saved the ships, that he made national headlines.”
“Which would give his location away.” I had to admit, it made a certain amount of sense. “It gives us a wider suspect pool, to be sure. It’ll mean combing through his cases, whatever he worked on before he retired.”
Jamie deadpanned, “Yay, more archive digging.”
“Might I remind you this is your idea?”
“It doesn’t mean I have to be happy with my idea. Even if I think it’s the only path forward. You know we can’t leave this one unsolved. There will be a riot.”
“Yes, truly.” I saw a taxi pull to the curb with a vacant sign popped up on top of the roof and flagged it down. If I didn’t have to walk in this muggy, abominably hot weather, all the better. “Then I suppose after lunch we should change and get back to work. It’ll take the course of several days to research everything and track people down.”
Magic Outside the Box Page 13
