“I’m still not sold on this, Hattie,” David said, shaking his head as we approached Cressida’s holding cell. “What could Cressida possibly know that we don’t already?”
“No harm in asking, David,” I said, “Maybe she found out something during one of her escapes“ I suggested. Nobody knew how she did it, but Cressida had escaped from Midnight Hill at least ten times in the last year. The Asylum itself was locked-down with all manner of protection and security wards, and yet the old witch still managed to slip through the magic.
I’d planned to leave the kitties at home, but, Fraidy and Eclipse cajoled me, last minute, into bringing them along. My timid cat shivered as he eyed the locks on the cell doors with evident suspicion. “How secure are these locks, I wonder?”
“Extremely,” David said, shifting to his most soothing voice. “There’ve only been a few escapees from here in the last—“
“Yeah and Cressida was one of those escapees, right? How do we know that she isn’t about to make another break for it?” My timid cat gulped. “And, that she won’t kill everyone who gets in her way in the process?”
My own unease leaked into my voice as I snapped, “Fraidy! These people are more of a danger to themselves than they ever have been to others. So quit treating this place like it’s Arkham Asylum.”
“Besides,” Eclipse added, keeping his own careful watch on the cells. “If anything gets out of hand, I can always memory-wipe the would-be attacker before they can do any harm.”
Fraidy seemed to relax a little, confident in his brother’s ability to make a killer forget they were about to kill. ‘Clipsy’s Obliviscatur charm was one hundred percent effective, one hundred percent of the time.
Two chairs had been set up for us in front of Cressida’s cell. We sat down at the same time Cressida, in a trance-like state, stared vacantly at us. The tiny television in the corner of her cell blared a cheery Mainland game show in the background. Looking at Cressida’s slack face, I remembered her more beautiful twin, the late Nebula Dreddock. Nebula had been Cressida’s obsession. Cressida had wanted to be her sister so completely that she tried to replace her soul with her own. I waved a hand in front of the glass to get the old witch’s attention. She shifted in her chair.
“How WONDERFUL to see you both!” She blurted. Cressida spotted Fraidy and Eclipse. “You brought your adorable kitties too!” Whether it was the drool flying from Cressida’s mouth, or her make-up blackened eyes, Fraidy was having none of this introduction. He darted for his hiding spot behind my left calf. Eclipse dipped his head at Cressida in polite and subtle respect.
David pulled out his usual notepad and pen. “So, Cressida can we start with a simple question? Great. Care to explain how you managed to get Hattie’s private cell phone number?”
Cressida held up a finger. “It’ll be easier to show rather than to tell, CPI Trew. If you will indulge me just one minute…”
David glanced at me. I shrugged. Millie had a good handle on the shop in my absence, so there was no rush. It didn’t quite take a minute for something to buzz through the TV speakers. Coming out of the screen was a little electric man. He made a heroic jump from the TV and onto Cressida’s shoulder, making sparking noises along the way. Cressida turned her head to kiss the homunculus, prompting more of the same noises as before.
I saw Eclipse’s eyes widen in recognition. “An electro-gnome…I thought those little guys were extinct.” His pupils dilated to black saucers. “I bet Midnight doesn’t even know these guys are still around,”
“Almost dead, but not quite,” Cressida said, taking on a hushed tone. “This little guy found me here about…what would you say, Sparky? A month ago?”
While the electric flea replied in his own language, Fraidy popped his head out from behind my leg. “Sparky? Really?”
Our ‘hostess’ sighed and offered a dismissive wave. “Oh, I know, I know; about as original as some of Nebula’s first films. Still, I didn’t know what else to call him, and he seems to like it. We’ve become such good friends,” she said looking at the electro-sprite fondly.
Cressida’s eyes suddenly lit up. “Oh, silly me. I never did tell you how Sparky did it. He’s got a knack for running around and rewiring electrical devices. As a matter of fact, he just took out the camera in my cell so he could be seen by both of you.”
I swallowed hard. “So he got into my cell phone?”
“No, no, no, dear,” Cressida said, looking genuinely distressed that I would think such a thing. “A device has to be plugged in for him to be able to give it a ‘lookover.’ He went to your shop phone. I was able to get the number for that out of the public telephone directory. Then I asked him which phone numbers called your shop the most. I got lucky on the fourth try.”
I found myself nodding in admiration. “That…actually is some pretty good detective work, Cressida.”
Cressida gave a girlish giggle. “Why, thank you, Hattie dear. There’s still an ‘operator’ in here somewhere,” she said while rather alarmingly clawing at her head.
“You do understand that we would prefer you never call Hattie’s number unless there is an urgent need, right?” David asked, his voice taking on a cop tone that skirted an edge between hard and conciliatory.
“Oh, absolutely, Chief Para Inspector. Indeed, if it weren’t for Morag’s murder, I wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble.”
She gave Sparky another kiss. “Better go, dear. I’ll see you tonight, okay?”
The electro-gnome gave her a jolt of energy dazzling enough to make her moan aloud. Okay, I did not need to see that.
The little guy jumped into the TV screen and vanished back into his own private underworld of digital signals.
David frowned, flipping to a blank page in his notebook. “And how do you know that Morag’s death wasn’t just an accident as reported?”
Cressida waggled her finger and made a tsk-tsk sound. “You’re familiar with the expression ‘crazy, not stupid’, CPI Trew? While I doubt that I am anywhere near Hattie’s investigative caliber, I can read between the lines well enough to figure out that she was murdered.”
“How did you know Morag?” I asked, leaning forward in my chair.
“Back when I was…well, during my ‘vacations’ from this place,” Cressida said, folding her fidgety hands in her lap as if she thought this action might still their flighty dance for a spell. “Morag helped me. I actually had her listed as my emergency contact, so they’d always call her when I was out.”
“How did she help you?” David asked.
Cressida shrugged. “A lot of big and little ways…made sure I had clean clothes, brought me edible food -- the slop they serve here is inhumane, offered a bed for the night. That kind of thing…”
“But how?” I asked in confusion. “She lived all the way over near Chalice. What did she have here that—“
“She had a lot of real estate she didn’t tell anybody about…well, except me,” Cressida answered, licking her lips, and smearing her lipstick (a ghastly shade of orange) further.
“One of Morag’s purchases was this abandoned cabin halfway between here and town. I think it was the house she grew up in. Spent a lot of nights there just…feeling like a normal person.”
That fit with Reverend Peacefield’s account of Morag once being a regular parishioner at Saint Pendragon’s. “Were you ever her client?”
“No, no, you’re getting it wrong, Hattie,” Cressida said with a sudden sharp tone.
“I’m sorry…I’m just trying to figure this out.”
Cressida smiled again. “Yeah…yeah, you’re right. I’m the one who should be sorry. It’s just…I knew Morag from before. We…we really hit it off in the old days. After all, both of us had twin sisters, you know? Not many twinsies in all the Coven Isles.”
“Infirma is Morag’s twin?” I was shocked. I knew they were sisters, but I had no idea they were twins. To me, Infirma looked to be at least twenty years older than her now deceased sibli
ng.
“So, you were close with Morag, back in the day,” David interjected. “Did this little ‘friend-huddle’ include Cressida and Infirma too?”
Cressida shook her head and started pacing. “No, worlds apart, those two. I always thought that was a shame. Maybe if Nebula had had as good a friend in Infirma as I had in Morag…”
She licked her lips again before jamming her fist in her mouth and rocking. Fraidy, who had boldly ventured out from behind my leg, immediately resumed his cover. We waited for Cressida’s fit to pass.
“You know, Morag actually talked me out of hurting myself a couple of times?” She said, pulling her fist from her face.
“When was this?” David asked, furiously jotting down details on his notepad.
“Years ago, I don’t know how many. All I know is that she stopped me both times. She wrestled the knife out of my hand the first time. The second time…she yanked me away from the cliff. She was…crying, begging me never to do that again. If I ever wanted to get better, she argued, Midnight Hill was the only place it was going to happen.”
The tears she’d been holding back finally emerged in silent trickles down her worn-out face. “Poor Morag…she deserved so much better.”
With the increasing number of stories about Morag’s ‘kindness,’ I started to once more doubt Morag’s character.
“But Morag needed help every once in awhile too,” Cressida croaked, swiping at her tears.
“Help? From you ?” David couldn’t hide his disbelief. “I mean, what sort of help did you give?”
“Oh, nothing major,” Cressida replied, leaning back in her chair to gaze at her ceiling. “She just needed a sounding board once in awhile. I guess she saw me as a ‘safe bet’ in terms of keeping her secrets.” She cleared her throat with a high-pitched grunt. “Being crazy, and locked in here and all.”
“What kind of ‘sounds’ did Morag make?” I asked, leaning forward in my chair. Cressida looked at me, her stare intent. “She loved Infirma with all her heart, of course, but her sister’s relentless ill health was never far from Morag’s mind. It stressed her out terribly, what with the mounting debt from her rambling estate and what not. Morag claimed that none of her co-workers were what she would call ‘friends.’” Instead of using fingers of both hands to display the recognized signal for air quotes, Cressida emphasized the word ‘friends’ using a forward flapping movement with both of her arms. She looked like a pterodactyl about to launch into flight. I felt Fraidy push closer into my calf.
“Was there any one problem in particular that Morag needed to vent about? Anything that stood out from the regular ‘life’ stresses.
“Oh yes, yes,” Cressida said, her face becoming animated. “Barnabus was often a thorn in her side. His name came up along with Gideon’s quite frequently.”
“As in, Barnabus Kramp and Gideon Shields?” I asked in disbelief.
“Both and the same, Hattie. I actually used to know this pair of powerhouse’s myself quite well. Nebula and I went out with Barnabus and Gideon on double dates back in the days of our carefree youth. Nebula, of course, paired herself with the handsome Gideon. I got Barny.”
“What?” I asked. “How come this is the first time we’re hearing about this?”
Cressida fluttered her hands like startled sparrows, her lipstick-smeared lips working at speed, “This was long before Nebula became famous. It’s all ancient history now, so I’m not surprised in the least you haven’t heard this previously.”
“So I guess this foursome didn’t last?” David said.
“It’s as you see, Chief Para Inspector,” Cressida said, waving her hands over her body. She paused, and her eyes showed a faraway look. “Back then, Nebula and I were pretty equal, you know? Different, too—we were twins, not clones—“
David laughed, which made Cressida smile too. “But we were equals in every way that counted. You could tell Gideon and Barnabus were close too, but it was…out of balance.”
“How exactly?” I asked with interest.
“Well…Gideon was the one in charge, and Barnabus followed his lead like a little puppy dog. Far as I could tell, Barnabus never had an idea in his life. All of his thinking seemed to be drip-fed down from Shields. It wasn’t hard to spot that it was the latter who ran the show.” Cressida sighed. “I wanted much more from a man, so I broke up with him.”
“What about Nebula and Shields?” David asked.
“Neb had the opposite problem. Gideon thought he should be in charge of everything and everyone around him; including her. You can imagine how well THAT went down with her.”
Given that Nebula had turned into a haughty, imperious and overbearing drama queen by the end of her life, it took very little imagination to get the picture.
“So…did Morag ever visit you while you were here?” I asked.
“After I stopped breaking out, yes,” Cressida confirmed. “She had to pull a few strings through the Cathedral government—and I’m not going to name names, so don’t ask, CPI Trew—but she came by here, yes.” Nebula’s twin’s eyes rolled up into her head, and she cackled loudly. This time Fraidy stuck his claws into my calf, holding on for dear life, evidently.
“What do you remember about her last visit?” David asked, unfazed by Cressida’s most recent lunatic outburst.
The inmate stood up and pressed her forehead to the glass, raising her hands to the side of her head and tapping her long fingernails against the transparent barrier. “It was about…a week ago? A week and a half, maybe? Time isn’t a central theme when you’re incarcerated twenty-four hours a day, and you live under lights that never go off.”
David nodded, “Understood. What did Morag want to talk about?”
Cressida stepped up the rhythm of her drumming fingers. “That was the thing…she wasn’t making a lot of sense. And, yes, I do have the faculty to determine whether people are either rambling or compos mentis. Anyway, Morag kept going on and on about how she’d been a part of something ‘bad.’ for a long time now. She hinted that her participation in this ‘badness' was now catching up with her.”
“Sounds like Morag was riddled with guilt,” I noted. “Did she say what bad stuff she’d been up to?”
“She never directly confessed to what trouble she was in. She just kept saying that she had to hide something. She even asked if it might be safe to leave ‘it’ here.” Cressida’s face cracked into a crafty smile. “But, of course, my cell is thoroughly searched these days. The orderly’s are convinced I’m hiding tools for my next escape.”
“So, Morag was distressed on her last visit?” I pressed.
“No, dear,” Cressida said shaking her head and removing her fingers from the windowpane. “There’s upset, there’s distraught, there’s completely freaked out, and then there is the state Morag was in. I was afraid she was going to wind up in an adjoining cell to be entirely honest.”
“Was there anything coherent in her…ramblings?” David asked.
“Just what I’ve already told you: How she was desperate to hide ‘the thing.’ Oh, and she mentioned that if anything ‘happened’ to her, then she wanted me to know how much our friendship meant to her.”
“And then something did happen to her…which is why you got to thinking her death was a murder.”
Cressida hung her head and sighed. But then she followed it up with a definitive nod.
I stood, throwing Clipsy to the floor in the process. Walking up to the glass was probably going to strain Fraidy’s nerves, and not just because his cover had deserted him. But I knew I was in no danger from Cressida.
The latter pressed her head against the glass once more, pushing the palm of her left hand against the barrier.
“Whoever did this to Morag, find them.” She whispered.
From the side of his mouth, Carbon whispered, “Oh, we will, Dr. Lecter. We will.”
CHAPTER 10
“You can go right in, Inspector,” the governor’s assistant said after David sho
wed his badge. “You’re expected.”
Then she noticed me. “And, of course, your secretary is welcome to—“
“Consultant,” I corrected her while puffing out my chest and lengthening my spine. I hoped my face looked hard enough to convey the importance of my position.
The receptionist glared at me, and then turning back to David, she smiled sweetly and said, “He’s just through this door here. Can I get you anything? Tea? Coffee?” David politely declined, took me by the wrist and steered me into the Cathedral governor’s office. The receptionist was apparently so distracted by David’s good looks that she didn’t notice Midnight and Shade slipping right in behind us.
Bookshelves, top to bottom, lined the walls of Shields’ inner sanctum. It looked as if there might be enough volumes to stock the Keziah Mason Library. A great window dominated the back wall -- the only wall to not host a bookshelf -- offering a breathtaking view of Chalice and its glittering Black Diamond Cathedral. The view was money. Piles of it.
“Did I not say now? Okay, good. So, please see to it. And see to it NOW,” Shields rich voice oozed into the receiver of his land-line phone. He hung up on the chastised caller and rose from his desk. The face of a grinning shark on impossibly strong legs strode toward us in greeting. Did he just lick his lips? Ew. I shuddered. I nearly went on a date with this guy, and I’ll admit I had thought of ‘doing’ other things with him too. I grimaced despite myself, because the guy was a God, no doubt about it. Gideon Shields was smothered in a cheeky, boyish-good-looks patina. His caramel curls fell in playful layers around his chiseled features, enhancing the sheen of his almost amber colored eyes.
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