The Minstrel and the Masquerade

by Lila K Bell

  Safely.

  From a distance.

  But first I needed to form the list.

  After I finished lunch with Lucy, I drove to Stonegate and parked outside the house I’d long dreamed of owning.

  It was just as beautiful as I remembered it. Mid-autumn as it was, the garden was still awash with earthy colours. The vines around the gazebo had been cut back, revealing the comfortable patio furniture within. I’d always pictured myself sitting out there with a stack of books and letting the lazy summer days pass by without a care in the world.

  The windows stared down at me with a blankness that made my hair curl, but I blamed it on my suspicions about Joseph Marley and shook my uneasiness away.

  I reached into the back seat for my bag and pulled out the photos I’d printed off. Flipping through them, I selected three that were particularly flattering to Marley’s costume and slid the others back into my bag.

  Armed with my reason for being here, I got out of the car and started toward the house. I didn’t have to go far before I spotted Joseph Marley himself kneeling in the garden by the front door. Despite the cool air, he was dressed in khaki shorts and a navy blue polo shirt. Not what I would call the ideal gardening uniform, but when you can afford a house like this, it isn’t an issue to wear brand names while digging in the dirt.

  “Excuse me,” I said. “Joseph Marley?”

  “I don’t buy anything at the door, I’m sorry,” he said without turning around.

  Fair.

  “My name is Fiona Gates. You were at my party the other night.”

  The muscles around his spine tightened, and he slowly turned to face me.

  I still didn’t recognize him. He looked to be in his mid-fifties, though his hair was still dark, either naturally or with a little help. His skin suggested someone who passed a great deal of time outdoors, weathered and creased with the sun, though I doubted he spent that time doing manual labour. By the way his paunch stuck out over the waistline of his shorts, I guessed his garden was the closest he came to stocking his grocery stores himself.

  Though to be fair, the garden was gorgeous, and he’d obviously spent his time well. Purples and oranges spilled across the leafy beds, flowers I wouldn’t know the name of to save my life. I’d never had much of a green thumb. Plants in my possession had a bad habit of shrivelling up and dying within a week.

  “Miss Gates,” he said. “Of course. I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you without your Alice costume.”

  I smiled and extended a hand to help him to his feet. His knees cracked as he stood, and he shook out his legs to work the feeling back into them.

  “What brings you here?” he asked.

  “My schedule was open, so I thought I’d go around to some of the guests to say thank you in person for coming and to see how everyone was doing after the tragedy. In a strange way, I feel kind of responsible that everyone had to suffer so much shock on my behalf.”

  Marley pulled a handkerchief out of his back pocket and mopped his brow. He managed to clear the sweat, but the dirt remained.

  “We’re getting by, thank you.”

  I noted the plural, but didn’t push on it. I’d come here to be charitable. It wouldn’t do to prove how ignorant I was of the people who’d been invited to bring me gifts and share my champagne.

  “I had also planned to send these out to people, so figured I’d deliver them in person while I was making the rounds.” I handed him the photographs. “Mementos of the evening.”

  He accepted the photos, but barely glanced at them before letting them dangle by his side. “I don’t know how much of that evening I want to remember. No offense to you — it was beautifully organized. I just…”

  “I understand,” I said. “I didn’t realize you knew Margery so well.”

  I thought of the photos still waiting in the car, showing the devolution of their conversation from intimate exchange to outright yelling match covered by the band.

  Was his grief because he knew her or because he’d killed her?

  “She’s my sister-in-law,” he said, and it was all I could do to keep my mouth closed.

  “I had no idea,” I said. “I’m sorry. You must think me so insensitive coming here and giving out reminders of what must have been a horrible night.”

  My regret was sincere — I wished I’d asked Lucy if he had any known connection to Margery before I’d stopped by — but I couldn’t let the opportunity slide.

  “You’re married to Kelly?” I asked, thinking about the other photograph in my bag. The one I had far less of a claim to than the unframed prints in Joseph’s hand.

  He nodded. “Fifteen years.”

  “Was she there that night?” I tried to think if anyone’s reaction had been more overt than anyone else’s, but the entire evening was rapidly fading into a blur. There had been too much going on for any one detail to stand out.

  “No, thank goodness,” he said. “She wasn’t feeling well that evening, so I went without her.” Marley released a breath and rubbed the back of his neck. “It was horrible coming home, having to wake her up and tell her the news. She and Margery were always close. She hasn’t been able to leave her bed since.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. It was trite, but I honestly didn’t know what else to say.

  He glanced toward the house. “Speaking of, I should go see if she needs anything. I want to let her sleep, but don’t like leaving her alone for long.”

  “Of course,” I said. “Again, my condolences.”

  Marley offered me a sad smile, then escaped inside. I stared up at the windows on the second floor where I suspected the master bedroom to be. Was grief the reason for the oppressive atmosphere around the house?

  There was still the matter of the argument to address, but for now I would let it go. Curiosity was not a good enough excuse to barge in on someone’s sorrow. Not yet, anyway.

  I got back in the car and drove home to find Sybil sitting on the front step. I checked my watch. Two-fifteen.

  “Shouldn’t you be in school?” I greeted her as I got out of the car.

  She got her feet. “I have a spare period this time on Thursdays.” The satchel over her shoulder was weighed down with her school books and I wondered how she’d made her way across town to get here.

  “Shouldn’t you be studying or something?”

  Her gaze dropped to her feet and I kicked myself for being so dismissive.

  “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not upset to find you here. I just don’t want you getting into trouble with your brother. Or me into trouble, for that matter.”

  She peered up at me from under her long lashes. “Even if I found out something about the poison they used to kill Margery?”

  A hint of a smile tugged on the corners of her mouth as she struggled to maintain her stray-dog appearance.

  I pressed my lips together. I shouldn’t ask. That was information I shouldn’t have. She’d probably found out through Sam, and if he learned she’d passed it on to me, there was no way I’d ever hear the end of it.

  But if I found out how Margery had been killed, it could narrow down who had done it…

  With a groan, I threw my arm around Sybil’s shoulders and pulled her inside as her face broke into a grin. “You are a horrible influence.”

  9

  No one was home when we went inside, though Gramps had left a note for me on the kitchen table.

  Bea said I needed a drive. Think she got confused between me and Charlie. So we’re off to run errands. Can you let the dog out? Woof.

  I grinned as I slipped the note into my pocket. Considering they’d been out all morning, Gramps must be in quite a mood if she thought they better go out again. Likely he’d been talking her ear off about the shows he’d been binge watching. He did tend to get a little addicted to Supernatural and was under the impression that everyone wanted to know which Winchester brother had died this season. Unfortunately for him, the only one willing to listen was Charlie.


  Following Gramps’s orders, I let Charlie into the backyard and left the door open for him to come back in as I headed for the fridge.

  “Do you want something to drink?” I asked Sybil.

  She dumped her backpack on the dining table and slumped into a chair.

  “Got any pop?”

  I scanned the contents of the shelves without much hope. “My parents live wild. We have soda water. Lime flavour.”

  Sybil hesitated, readjusting the blue tuque she was wearing in spite of the comfortable temperature outside. “I’ll take it.”

  I poured two glasses, handed one to her, and sipped mine as I leaned against the counter.

  “So,” I said. “Spill. What have you learned in, I’m sure, a very subtle and sneaky way?”

  “Sam will tell me anything if I show an interest. Why do you think I look so bored all the time?”

  Sybil smiled, the corners of her heavily lined eyes creasing. With the change in her expression, her whole demeanor transformed in front of me. Gone was the sullen teen and in her place was a bright young woman with a unique style and a desire to do her own thing.

  The more I got to know her, the more I liked her.

  “That is sneaky.”

  I had to appreciate a solid long-con.

  “Anyway,” Sybil said, leaning forward on the table. “He let it slip that it was some kind of plant-based poison. Super deadly, but regularly planted in the Brookside Public Gardens. Something called aconite?”

  I frowned and moved to sit in the chair across from her. “Aconite? I’ve never heard of it. It’s fast-acting?”

  “I read up on it while I was waiting for you. It’s supposed to come from some plant called wolf’s bane. Used by people who know these things to treat… well, everything and anything according to some sites, but super easy to overdose on it. Depending by how much, it could take as much as an hour or as little as fifteen minutes to kill you. Apparently the blood on her face wasn’t thanks to the falling down the stairs, but a nosebleed caused by the poison.”

  At the wobble in her voice, my gaze jumped to her face, which had paled under her makeup. I wasn’t sure how to react. If it were me, I wouldn’t want my momentary weakness acknowledged at all. It would only make me feel worse about everything.

  And since Sybil reminded me of me in so many ways, I decided to remain quiet and give her a chance to pull herself together.

  She seemed to draw in on herself, returning to the teenager I had known for the past three weeks. Her gaze homed in on her glass, all eye contact withdrawn, and she pulled her knees to her chest, resting her feet on the edge of the chair.

  Mother would throw a temper tantrum if she saw her antique furniture being used in such a fashion, but I didn’t say anything. The poor girl had witnessed a murder and now she was learning the hard way that digging into what had happened wasn’t just music-accompanied montages and meaningless diagnostics on a screen.

  Real people meant real pain, and not everyone was up for dealing with it.

  I still wasn’t sure if I was.

  Charlie arrived just in time to save the day. I hadn’t even noticed him come inside until he nudged his nose under the crook of Sybil’s arm. His wagging tail thwacked against the side of the table, and Sybil couldn’t deny him the pets he so politely requested.

  I took the opportunity to close the back door to give her a moment alone to compose herself.

  A few ear strokes later, she steadied herself enough to come back to the conversation.

  “Anyway,” she said, speaking to her glass, “he says that because it’s such a readily accessible poison to anyone who knows how to pick up a book or has access to the public gardens, it likely won’t help narrow down who might have dosed her glass, so that sucks.” She took a sip of her water, and by the time she set it down she was ready to raise her brown eyes to meet mine. “But it did give me an idea.”

  I sipped my drink. “What kind of idea?”

  “Have you spoken to the servers yet?”

  “No,” I said. “I figured the police would be making their rounds and didn’t want to get in the way. Did Sam say they’d learned something from them?”

  Sybil shook her head. “According to him it was a total dead end, but I think you should go talk to them.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Why me?”

  “Because I know two of them from high school. One’s in an older grade than I am, but Emily’s in a few of my classes. I think if I go with you, we might learn some things they wouldn’t have wanted to tell the cops.”

  The smugness on her face made me want to laugh. I recognized it all too well.

  “You are going to get me in so much trouble.”

  ***

  Trouble or not, I couldn’t say no to following up on another piece of the puzzle, especially when I had an unexpected advantage. We finished our drinks, locked up the house, and headed outside to Mercy.

  As Sybil got into the car, she paid more attention to her surroundings than she had the night of the party. No surprise that she’d been in too much shock after hanging around a dead woman to check out the ride taking her away from it.

  Today, she ran her fingers over the dashboard with all of its buttons and screens. I threw the car in reverse and the video came up of the street behind me, ensuring I didn’t hit Mrs. Hickson’s garbage cans or the Lawrences’ twenty cats.

  “Must be nice to have money of your own,” Sybil said, turning her head to look out the rear window and back to the screen, as though comparing the video to the real thing. “My parents are all ‘No, Syb, you have to wait to earn money until you’re out of high school. Whatever you want, we’ll get it for you.’ You know what my parents don’t want to buy me? Anything I want. They say it’s classless. I’d rather be you and just afford all my own stuff.”

  “It has its perks,” I said. “The unlimited books are a huge plus. But then you’d have to live with my mother, and I guarantee you’d rather stay where you are.”

  “You say you solve murders now because you’re bored. How can that be possible when you can afford anything you want?”

  I navigated our way through the residential streets toward downtown. “Think about it this way — what’s one thing you really wish you owned right now?”

  “A pony,” she said flatly.

  “Or?”

  She hmphed. “A new phone, I guess.”

  “How are you saving up for it?”

  “I got a part time job at the hardware store a few days a week after school, moving boxes and whatnot. It’s the best I could do without my parents finding out. Sam knows — he’s all for it. He actually got me the job. But it pays pennies.”

  “But you’re exerting energy to work toward something you want, which will give that thing you want more meaning when you actually get it, right?”

  Sybil shrugged. “I guess.”

  “That’s why I’m bored. I don’t need to work for anything if I don’t want to, which means anything I get has no meaning. It’s just more stuff. I’ve held a few jobs, but I’m… not good at taking orders.” It was a nice way of putting it. Authority and I didn’t get along very well at all. “Solving puzzles at least gives me something to fill my days.”

  She didn’t say anything, but the fact that she didn’t argue or make a snarky comment suggested that at least part of her understood.

  I could have gone into more detail. I could have explained that my parents never cared what I did, so I’d taken to stealing as a way to get their attention, and when that failed, I did it because it was fun and I was good at it. Chasing murderers just struck me as a good compromise between interest and my worry about Gramps finding out.

  Still, the Robinsons’ lac of interest in Sybil’s hobbies made it less of a surprise that she was here with me now. If they weren’t careful, they risked her followng more closely in my footsteps than they’d like.

  I pulled into the parking lot of the Empire Hotel, but it took me a moment to work up the
courage to get out of the car.

  “Feels funny being back here, doesn’t it?” I said.

  Sybil stared up at the building through the windshield. “It looks so… normal. Like nothing ever happened.”

  I agreed. I would have felt better if it was still blocked off by police tape, but they’d already released the crime scene. Obviously there hadn’t been much to find.

  “Do you think these friends of yours will be working today?” I asked. “Would their boss have given them a few days off to recover?”

  Sybil shook her head. “Emily was talking yesterday about how she couldn’t afford to take time off. Her parents are going to Mexico for the holidays, and she wants to make sure she has enough money to cover a few nights out on her own without her parents knowing about it.”

  “Sounds like a sweet kid.”

  “She’s a teenager,” said Sybil the Teenager. I let it be.

  We got out of the car and headed inside, bypassing the main desk to head toward the kitchens. Loud voices called from inside, and the clatter and bang of pots and pans being moved around created a comforting sense of busyness.

  A few servers pushed their way between the dining room and lounge, but we waited patiently for any familiar faces. It lucked out that we were right between the lunch and dinner rushes and neither eating area was particularly packed.

  A few minutes passed without catching sight of the people we were looking for, but finally Sybil spotted her friend coming out of the kitchen, accompanied by another girl that I thought I recognized from the party.

  “Hey, Em,” Sybil hailed her.

  Emily turned, her blonde ponytail swishing with the movement, and gave Sybil a bright smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. It was enough to make me think that the reason for Sybil’s attire and quiet demeanor had less to do with wanting to draw attention to herself and more to do with wanting to avoid it at school.

  “Hey, Sybil. I don’t really have time to talk right now. We’re working.”

  As though Sybil was something less because she wasn’t.

  I wanted to step in and say something to the snotty brat, but held my tongue and let Sybil make the introductions. “This will only take a minute. This is Fiona Gates. It was her party the other night. You know, when that woman died.”