The Minstrel and the Masquerade

by Lila K Bell

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  THANK YOU FOR READING

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  COMING SOON

  The Minstrel

  &

  The Masquerade

  The Midnight Minstrel Mysteries Book 2

  By

  Lila K. Bell

  All Rights Reserved

  This edition published in 2019 by Raven’s Quill Press

  This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this work are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity is purely coincidental.

  Cover art: Christopher Reddie

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication maybe reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission of the publisher. The rights of the authors of this work has been asserted by him/ her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  This book is dedicated to my Dad, who first introduced me to Nancy Drew and my love of mystery

  1

  It’s amazing how a few weeks can feel like a lifetime.

  I just couldn’t decide whether I felt immortal or as decrepit as a mummy unearthed from a tomb.

  It had been three weeks since I’d discovered Barnaby Coleman’s body on his kitchen floor, stabbed with a pair of scissors. Three weeks since I’d taken it on myself to find out who had killed him in order to protect my own butt from being suspected. Three weeks since I’d succeeded and endured more than one lecture by Brookside’s police detective, Angela Curtis, about leaving police work to the police.

  Three weeks since Gramps and I had adopted Barnaby Coleman’s beagle, Charles, or as Gramps calls him, Charlie. My mother’s cries of horror when I’d walked Charlie into the living room still rang in my ears. The protestations — the refusals — the final resignation when I showed her all his paperwork as evidence that, with his pedigree, he was not a dog to turn her nose up at. She still refused to touch him and shied away every time he came close, but as long as Gramps and I kept him fed, walked, and quiet, she tolerated him.

  Three weeks since I’d stolen my last book.

  I couldn’t remember the last time I’d gone three weeks without a little nighttime villainy. Maybe in high school when I’d developed pneumonia during a camping trip and was laid up in bed for a month. Even then, I think I only made it one week before I pickpocketed the home nurse my parents brought in.

  That’s me, Fiona Gates, known to the local papers as The Midnight Minstrel. The Stealer of Stories in their view—the Protector of the Prose in mine. The book in Coleman’s house, the reason I’d been there to begin with, would have been book one hundred and one. One-oh-one. A satisfying number that, in a way, would have brought me back to the basics.

  And here I was, stuck for three weeks at the still-impressive but overly round one hundred.

  Yet despite my impromptu hiatus, I didn’t feel the itch like I might have expected to. It used to be I could barely make it through a two-week period before I was scratching at the walls to sneak out of my bedroom window and lay my next claim. At the very least, I would have been pacing my bedroom right now, staring longingly at the library hidden behind my bookcase.

  But I wasn’t.

  It was weird. Very weird.

  Especially weird was that while I still felt like something was missing from my life — some purpose — I didn’t think another stolen book would fill the void.

  At least for now I had another distraction to keep me from doing anything foolhardy. Something fun to fill my time and keep me well out of trouble.

  I was turning twenty-five.

  Okay, the getting older part wasn’t exciting, but the party… it was better than chocolate.

  After months in the planning, it was finally happening. Here we were, at Brookside’s beautiful and historic Empire Hotel, in a ballroom awash with colour and music, laughter and tinkling crystal.

  If I were the sort of person who believed in magic, I would have to say it was present here tonight.

  The fact that both me and my mother were still alive, let alone speaking to each other, was in itself a birthday miracle.

  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not usually a birthday person. Give me a cake the size of my head, a fork, and maybe a few people I cared enough about to share it with and I’d be as happy as a duck in water, but this was different.

  This was an Alice in Wonderland-themed masquerade ball. And I was Alice.

  Juvenile, maybe, but also a dream come true for thirteen-year-old Fiona Gates.

  I’d gone for the classic Disney look, the one even the most Disney-lacking person would recognize if I were standing on the street. A longer blonde wig sat atop my chin-length blonde waves, with the black bow tied neatly on top. White pinafore and blue smock, with white stockings and black T-straps shoes, though I’d gone for a bit more of a heel than Alice might have. I was my favourite character all grown up, mentally trapped at the age when she’d fallen down the rabbit hole and explored a magical, topsy-turvy world. I’d spent years imagining how her life would have turned out after she returned home and woken up. Younger me had believed she carried on with her life with a bit more open-eyed wonder than everyone else. Now that I was older I accepted that she likely would have lost her mind. No one could experience so much madness without going a bit mad herself.

  That touch of insanity was why I still connected with Alice after so many years. A touch of madness made life interesting.

  With my little vial of champagne in hand, the necessary “Drink Me” label hanging on a ribbon off the side, I navigated my way through the two hundred people in attendance. The guest list had been Mother’s purview. For any other me-related event, I would have fought against her detailed planning every step of the way, but for once I had put my wishes aside and couldn’t deny the results were spectacular.

  Mother had assigned everyone a costume in their invitations, so as I moved through the crowd, I was surrounded by a few decks of cards, a bouquet of smug little flowers, a colony of shining oysters, a full set of chess pieces, a walrus, a carpenter, and more varieties of bird than I could name. And those were just the minor characters. She’d reserved the named players for the people who counted highest, in her opinion. In that, though, we’d suffered more than a couple head-butts, because I’d argued for a few.

  “Sam!” I called to the March Hare coming toward me.

  Sam Robinson looked out of place and uncomfortable among the affluent members of Brookside society he’d worked so hard to escape, but he’d gone all out with the costume and looked fantastic. It was certainly a break away from his usual police officer’s uniform.

  He finally reached me, leading a bored-looking dormouse with a heavy camera around its neck along with him.

  “Hey, Sybil,” I greeted, doing my best to sound pleased to see her.

  It may have been three weeks since I’d committed any felonies, but it had also been three weeks since Sam had asked me to take his sixteen-year-old sister under my wing and broaden her horizons. So far, those experiences had involved a lot of us sitting around, w
ith her scrolling through her phone and me eventually giving up and grabbing a book to make the most of her silence. But I felt we were warming up. Last time she was over, she pulled a book up on her phone and we read together. Progress.

  “Hey,” she said now. We hadn’t yet moved on to more than one-syllable replies on a regular basis. That would be my next challenge.

  “Are you guys having fun?” I asked.

  “It’s amazing,” said Sam. He turned to put his back to the wall so he could stare out over the masses. “How did you organize everything this quickly?” He eyed a tray of hors d’oeuvres as they passed by, tiny puff pastries stuffed with spinach and ricotta and shaped into tiny Cheshire cats. A bit of extra cheese made up the wide grin.

  “My mother is the best event planner this side of Toronto,” I said. “She prides herself on it. If tonight were anything less than the smashiest of smash hits of the year, she’d lose her bragging rights, and that would be a travesty.”

  Sam nodded toward a woman on the stairs wearing a dark black wig pulled into a tight knot at the back of her neck and a narrow crown topped with a ruby heart. Knowing this crowd, it was likely a real ruby. Her dress was a wide-hooped skirt and gathered bodice, covered in black and red hearts. “Is that your mother?”

  “No, that’s Margery Brooks. She’s a friend of my father’s. Surprisingly, Mother preferred to keep her roll out of the spotlight tonight. She’s the one dressed as Alice’s older sister.” I jerked my head toward the laughing woman wearing a simple pink dress and white headband in a wig of blonde hair.

  Sam cast me a look, and I acknowledged his silent commentary with a waggle of my eyebrows. Trust my mother to deny her role as parent and regress to younger woman when the opportunity presented itself. Fortunately for her, she was still able to pull it off. That’s what weekly visits at the swankiest spa in town will get you in this day and age.

  When he thought I wasn’t looking, Sam nudged Sybil’s ribs with his elbow, drawing a grunt. She glared at him, and he rolled his eyes toward me. I pretended not to see any of it. Finally, Sybil heaved a sigh.

  “Thanks for the invitation,” she said.

  Although she sounded as grateful as a person who’d just been served a single pea for dinner, I’d noticed her taking photos throughout the evening and guessed she wasn’t having as miserable a time as she appeared to be.

  Responding as though she’d spoken with bright enthusiasm, I gave her a wide smile. “It was my pleasure. Honestly. I don’t even know half the people Mother invited, and most of the ones I do, I don’t like. I wanted at least a handful of people here who actually wanted to celebrate with me.”

  “What are you kids doing hiding over here?” the Mad Hatter asked behind a plate heaped with snacks from the buffet table. The little sandwiches had “Eat Me” written on them, and the cakes were formed into white hearts, messily smeared with red icing. My stomach grumbled at the sight of them, though I hadn’t been holding back over the course of the evening.

  “Hey, Gramps,” I said. “We were just taking a breather and admiring the view.”

  “Well, you’d better head over to Rosie right quick. She’s starting to get impatient that she can’t find you. It’s time to cut the cake.”

  “Not even my birthday can go by my schedule, can it?” I said, only half-serious.

  “You should know better than that,” said Gramps. He shoved a cheese-covered cracker between my lips to prevent any further retort. “Come on. The sooner I eat cake, the sooner I can get back to my crossword puzzles. It has been a lovely evening, and you look absolutely beautiful, chickadee, but my feet hurt and it’s way past my bedtime.”

  I glanced at the clock on the wall. “It’s only eight-thirty.”

  “And if this were a Cinderella-themed party, my carriage would have turned into a pumpkin at eight.”

  He offered me his arm, and I happily accepted.

  “Have a great rest of the evening,” I said to Sam and Sybil. “I’ll try to find you again before the end of the night, but make sure to grab some cake. It’s some kind of…chocolate lavender concoction.” Sybil gave me a look, and I shrugged. “Sounded good at the time.”

  I took Gramps’s plate so he could rest more weight on his cane as we crossed the floor toward the cake. Although I was inclined to mingle with anyone I recognized, my grandfather kept me moving before Mother had a fit, and a few minutes later, a trio of domino-clad caterers wheeled out a cart with the most incredible mushroom-shaped cake, complete with a blue caterpillar perched on top, real smoke billowing up from the hookah. Chocolate-lavender cake with fondant and ganache, and a cookie crumble crust to top it off. In a matter of minutes, half of the mushroom was missing, and I was certain most of us would be changing sizes any minute, though unfortunately in width rather than height.

  After a brief tour on the dance floor, Gramps wished me a good evening with a kiss on the cheek, and I went in search of someone else to spend my time with. It was too bad a good number of my friends couldn’t make it, not having been invited, but I’d made myself draw the line at Sam and Sybil. I probably would have pushed my mother into an early grave if I’d asked for any of my friends from my favourite underground bar, The Treasure Trove, to join us. Sex workers and bar rats — it would have been fun to watch half of Brookside’s elite panic over their secrets coming to light.

  For hours we all lost ourselves in the party, chatting with people we didn’t recognize through their masks. I was the only person whose face was left open, giving people a chance to wish me a happy birthday. The table of gifts was impressive. Five servers in tails and white dominoes sailed between empty spaces, offering champagne and snacks. The anonymity was just as thrilling as discovering the identities of the people who approached me.

  I caught up with a few friends I hadn’t seen in ages, but mostly I marvelled at the quality of the costumes. One of the perks to hosting such an event in Brookside, especially in my mother’s circles, was that the guests could all afford to make their outfits as elaborate as they wished. My father, the Cheshire Cat, might have walked off a movie set.

  My girlfriends, the ones my mother approved of, mauled me the second the cake was out of their hands. They were dressed as flowers, two roses — white and red — and a purple aster. All three looked beautiful and succeeded in making me feel under-dressed. But I suppose that was the role of the flowers.

  “What a fun evening,” Frances Wimbleton the White Rose said.

  “I love all the little details,” said Jeannie Melbourne the Red Rose, holding up the “Drink Me” vial. “Did you come up with all of it, or did you hire someone?”

  I knew a test question when I heard one. It didn’t matter that we’d all gone to high school together and been bosom buddies until graduation, then somehow managed to remain in contact. With these girls, it was always a competition. One flaw, one missed detail or hint of a cheaper option, and they would be spreading rumours and gossip throughout town that “At Fiona Gates’s twenty-fifth, they used second-shelf champagne!”

  I could not have cared less on my own behalf, but there was a sense of vindication that, knowing my mother, it would all be top shelf.

  “Thank Rose Gates,” I said, giving full credit where it was due. “This is her vision from top to bottom.”

  “I think it’s lovely,” said Lucy Hart the Purple Aster. Her smile was the most genuine of the three. “People will be talking about this for a long time to come.”

  I don’t think any of us knew then how right she was. I figured the party would go on for a few more hours, slowly thinning out until only the drunks or the truly dedicated remained, and then I would finally go home, shower, and crawl into bed with lines of “Jabberwocky” running through my head.

  Instead, a heavy weight dropped into the pit of my stomach when, just a few minutes later, a sharp, piercing scream cut through the noise of the crowd. The band music drooped to a halt, and for the first time in the evening, silence reigned.

  My
guests, previously so fluid in their dancing and discreet visits to the food tables, had solidified into statues that blocked my view of what had happened.

  Out of the silence came a few bursting gasps of horror that spread backward as explanations, offered in hushed whispers, travelled through the crowd, and my patience gave out. This was my party — I refused to stand alone in the dark while everyone else got to be in the know.

  Without much gentleness, I excuse-me’d my way through the mob, using elbows and shoulders where necessary. No one was willing to give up their place without a fight, but finally I reached the front of the crowd.

  Only to find the Queen of Hearts lying face-down on the stairs, the top of her head touching the floor. Her ruby-topped crown had tumbled from her now-lopsided wig and lay glinting on the polished marble tiles.

  It struck me as just the sort of absurd posture that would have been described in Alice in Wonderland, a result of one of the Cheshire Cat’s tricks. Except this wasn’t a trick and we weren’t in a book. This woman was actually here, and by the expression on Sam’s face beneath his March Hare mask, I guessed Margery Brooks was dead.

  2

  The minute it sank into people’s minds that our comedy had turned into a tragedy, the panic set in. Screams floated toward the crystal chandeliers, and my mother’s success threatened to devolve into pandemonium.

  But Rose Gates was not the sort of person to let control be stolen from her over something as inconvenient as death. Not while she still had breath in her body and a reputation to uphold.

  So while Sam called the police and secured the scene around the stairs, Mother herded everyone out of the ballroom into the bar, adding everyone’s drinks to the family’s tab. It would cost a small fortune, but my father could afford it and, in my mother’s eyes, it was an acceptable price to pay.

  Probably in Sam’s eyes, too, as it kept everyone out of his hair as he worked.