The Falcon Always Wings Twice

by Donna Andrews

  Chapter 41

  Sunday

  “Why didn’t you tell us you were planning a murder?” my brother, Rob, demanded. At least that’s what I think he said. His words were partially drowned out by the incessant jingling of the Morris-dancing bells he was wearing.

  “Nobody plans a murder.” I was leaning wearily against the fence surrounding the jousting field. “Except murderers, of course, but they don’t usually give out advance notice. And once it happened we were trying to keep it quiet to avoid too much negative publicity for the Faire.”

  “Are you implying that I can’t be trusted to keep my mouth shut?” At first I thought he was shouting at me, but then I realized he was only raising his voice so he could be heard above the blasted bells.

  “No, I’ll come right out and say it,” I replied. “If we wanted the whole world to know about something, we would definitely enlist you. You’re great at getting the word out. But keeping a secret? No. Discretion is not your forte.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  “And could you please take those bloody bells off!”

  “But we’re doing our first performance any minute now!” he protested.

  “In thirty-nine minutes to be precise.” I was so annoyed that instead of discreetly checking the time on my highly anachronistic iPhone I brandished it in his face. “At eleven o’clock I will come to your performance and applaud heartily. But I will not listen to thirty-nine minutes of random preliminary jingling. I didn’t get enough sleep and my head is starting to ache.”

  “Sorry. Maybe if I sit down.” He did so, hopping up on the top of the fence.

  “If you can keep from twitching,” I said.

  “I don’t twitch,” he protested.

  “You do,” I said. “You can’t help it. It’s an ADHD thing. See, you’re doing it now.”

  He was bouncing both legs up and down in a fashion that was perfect for setting off the bells, although from the surprised expression on his face it was obvious that he hadn’t realized he was doing it.

  “Oh, all right.” He hopped down, bent over, and unstrapped the bell pads attached to his shins. I breathed a sigh of relief when the second one landed on the ground. And then winced again when he used his foot to shove them aside.

  “Hey, Meg!” Greg Dorance strolled up. “Did you hear the good news?”

  “I guess you don’t mean the good news that Meg captured the killer last night,” Rob said. “Because yeah, she knows about that.”

  “And if I didn’t already say it, congratulations,” Greg said. “I meant the good news about Harry and Delilah. Your grandfather might be taking one or both off my hands.”

  “That is good news,” I said.

  “Not sure whether they’ll end up at the Caerphilly Zoo or at a wildlife sanctuary run by a friend of his.”

  “The Willner Wildlife Sanctuary?” I asked.

  Greg nodded.

  “They’ll be in good hands in either place,” I said. “Caroline Willner loves predators almost as much as Grandfather.”

  “Yeah—we’re going to go down tomorrow to meet her, and see how the birds take to the place,” Greg said. “And whether they’re at the zoo or the sanctuary, I can visit them. Unless your grandfather succeeds in teaching Harry how to hunt like a proper hawk, in which case I’d be happy to see him go back to the wild. And this means I’ll have a slot to take on a new, young hawk.” He beamed with delight.

  “Great news, then,” I said.

  “Gotta go.” He turned in the direction of Falconer’s Grove. “Or your Grandfather will start the next demonstration without me.”

  He ran off, nearly colliding with Mother. Who was walking. Slowly, leaning heavily on Grandfather’s raven-headed cane. But walking. And looking more cheerful than I’d seen her in weeks. She spotted us, waved regally, and continued on her way.

  “I guess Dad told her she’s ready to start a little light exercise,” Rob said. “So I hear Grandfather’s been down here all weekend. He and Cordelia must be getting along better.”

  “Not so you’d notice,” I said. “But he’s been making himself useful and staying out of her way. Plus he helped save me from the killer last night, so she’s giving him more slack than usual. And—”

  “Uncle Rob!” Josh and Jamie were running down the path to give their uncle big hugs.

  “I hear you guys had some excitement,” Rob said.

  “Mom caught a killer,” Josh exclaimed.

  “Grandpa helped,” Jamie added. “And Grand. But only a little. Mom had almost rescued herself by the time they got there anyway.”

  “It was a family effort,” I said.

  “Then why didn’t you call us?” Josh was still annoyed at being left out of the rescue.

  “She didn’t need us,” Jamie said.

  “She almost didn’t need us.” Chief Heedles strolled up, looking more cheerful than I’d seen her lately.

  “How are the two patients?” I asked.

  “Mr. Sims does have a broken wrist,” the chief said.

  “Go, Mom!” Jamie exclaimed.

  “But he was well enough to be discharged, and is now back in my jail, awaiting the arrival of his defense attorney. Mr. O’Malley has a concussion, but he’s expected to recover. The doctors at VCU Medical Center were quite complimentary about your father’s first aid efforts.”

  “Not surprising,” Rob said.

  “Are you going to be able to charge him with anything?” I asked. “O’Malley, I mean. Although come to think of it, do you have any evidence against George, other than his confession?”

  “Well, with any luck the confession should be enough,” the chief said. “Considering that he persisted in confessing repeatedly all the way down to Richmond. If you recall, I could hardly get him to shut up long enough to read him the Miranda warning. He seems to feel that he was very badly treated and has grounds to support a plea of justifiable homicide.”

  “I’m sure he was badly treated by Terence.” I probably sounded a little cross. I was. “And we’d have done something about that if he’d let us. Instead of always saying ‘Oh, no. It’s okay. I don’t mind. It’s just Terence’s way. Isn’t he a card?’”

  “Pretty good imitation, Mom,” Jamie said. “You sound just like Sir George.”

  “B minus,” Josh said. “Not nearly whiny enough.”

  “As it happens, Horace was also developing some evidence that would eventually have pointed our investigation toward Mr. Sims,” the chief said. “The knife wound didn’t bleed very much, but we have every expectation that a minute amount of blood found on Mr. Sims’s wristwatch will turn out to be a DNA match for Mr. Cox. Ms. Willow … er, Dianne has identified the note found in Mr. Howe’s footlocker as one she received from Mr. Cox two weeks ago. And we expect to be able to prove that Mr. Sims had ready access to Mr. Howe’s keys, since they were in adjoining tents. So even if his defense attorney—”

  “Chief Heedles! Chief Heedles!” Dad was running toward us, waving something. “I’ve got it! I’ve got it!”

  “Got what, I wonder,” the chief said. But she turned to welcome Dad with an expression of pleasant expectation.

  “My cameras,” he said. “It’s been so crazy that I didn’t even remember that I set them out.”

  “Motion sensitive night-vision nature cameras,” I elaborated. “He’s been planning to set them up along all the promising wildlife trails in the nearby woods.”

  “I’ve only done two so far,” he said. “But one of them was near where I’d been hearing a lot of owl vocalizations, so it occurred to me to check the website—the cameras upload their videos to a website that my grandson Kevin set up—”

  “Did you catch anything on these cameras?” the chief asked.

  By way of an answer, Dad thrust his phone into her hand. And then, when it became obvious that she had no idea what he wanted her to do with it, he showed her how to access the uploaded video. We all clustered around to watch the little screen over
her shoulder. First a pair of deer walked down the path with almost liquid grace. The video came to an abrupt stop when the deer left the camera’s field of vision. A clock in the lower left-hand part of the screen showed the time as 11:33:01.

  “Very interesting,” the chief said.

  “I rewound it a little too far,” Dad said. “Here it comes.”

  The time jumped to 12:59:04. A stealthy figure crept past the camera. He paused for a moment to look over his shoulder, and the camera caught his face, for just a few frames. George. Then he continued off camera. Another time jump. 1:05:59. Terence sauntered past the camera and disappeared. 1:39:15. George again, going in the opposite direction.

  “That’s it,” Dad said. “No more sign of Terence.”

  “As I was saying, even if Mr. Sims’s defense attorney tries to have some of his confessions ruled inadmissible, I think we’ll have sufficient evidence to make the case. Dr. Langslow—since you showed me this on your phone, I gather the camera itself is still in place.”

  “Of course.”

  “Let’s find Horace and go with him to collect it as evidence.”

  “Good idea.”

  “And here I thought I’d be the one bringing you the key evidence,” I said.

  “Well, I may not be using the evidence from Mr. Cox’s phone,” the chief said, with a smile. “But my colleagues over in the Washington MPD are very appreciative. As is the management of Arena Stage. It looks as if Mr. O’Malley will not be directing any shows for them in the foreseeable future.”

  With that she and Dad hurried off to find Horace.

  “We don’t have a demo until noon,” Jamie said. “Can we go watch Grandpa and Chief Heedles retrieve Grandpa’s camera?”

  “As long as you don’t get in the way.”

  They dashed off.

  “I hope they come back in time to put the bells on,” Rob said.

  “You haven’t figured out how to put them on yourself?” I asked.

  “Not my bells—the ones for Spike. He’s going to be the world’s first Morris-dancing dog. If they don’t come back, do you suppose you could—”

  “No,” I said. “If you want to bell Spike, you’re on your own.”

  “Spoilsport.” He sulked for a moment, then cheered up. “Sounds as if you had a wild time yesterday. Dad said even Tad and Faulk were suspects for a while.”

  “Not very viable suspects, if you ask me,” I said. “They spent six or seven hours in the ER at the county hospital, so there was no way either of them could possibly have killed Terence. But initially the ER people lied about when they got there, to cover up the fact that for nearly four hours they pretty much neglected a man who might have been having a heart attack. The chief got to the bottom of it pretty quickly, but it was a little stressful until she did.”

  “Yikes.” Rob shook his head. “Remind me not to get sick while I’m here.”

  “Or if you do, just call Dad,” I said. “If he can’t fix you, he’ll get you to a place that’s competent.”

  “But what was supposed to be their motive?” Rob asked. “Or did Chief Heedles suspect them just because they disappeared at the wrong time?”

  “Terence got Tad fired,” I explained. “Long story how—get Tad to tell you—but the heart thing they went down to the ER about needs expensive surgery to fix, so without health insurance—”

  “Back up a sec—Tad got fired? Does this mean he’s in the job market?”

  “He is,” I said. “And—”

  “Where is he? I need to find him before someone else snaps him up.”

  “He’s not looking for contract work, you know,” I pointed out. “He wants a full-time job with good benefits. Especially good health insurance. Faulk has been waiting far too long for his surgery already.”

  “Don’t ask me the details, but I’m pretty sure we have great health insurance,” Rob said. “My HR department is under orders to see to that. And not only because I’m stuck with whatever we offer. Skimping on benefits for the staff is a false economy. I need to have salaries and benefits that are good enough to drag the best people away from the big city to Caerphilly County—and good enough so they can focus on their work instead of worrying about whether they can afford to pay the doctor.”

  He sounded so indignant that I had to laugh.

  “Okay, go find Tad and see if you can recruit him,” I said. “And on your head be it if the Mutant Wizards health insurance plan doesn’t do right by Faulk.”

  “If it doesn’t, we’ll take care of Faulk and make some changes in the plan.”

  “Check the forge,” I said. “Tad’s probably hovering there, making sure Faulk doesn’t overdo it.”

  “Thanks!” He started to leave, then thought of something else. “I guess it’s pretty obvious none of you guys know much about how corporate health plans work. Even if Tad was fired, he should be able to keep on with his health plan through COBRA.”

  “Through what?”

  “COBRA.” Rob looked smug at knowing something I didn’t. “Federal program that lets you keep your health insurance for up to eighteen months after you’re fired. You have to pay the full cost of the premiums, but it’s still a good deal. I’ll have my benefits guy explain it all to Tad. Make sure they don’t have any gap in coverage.” With that he turned and ran off.

  “Thank you,” I muttered to his departing back. I made a mental note to go a little easier on Rob the next time he did something careless or annoying.

  “He forgot his bells.” I looked up to see Nigel strolling toward me.

  “Quick, maybe we can hide them before he comes back.”

  He laughed and leaned against the fence beside me.

  “You look pretty good for someone who spent the night in the clink,” I said.

  “Only half the night,” he said. “Could have been different without you and Michael. I appreciate it.”

  “We’re just glad you’re still with us,” I said. “Sorry about Hamlet, though.”

  “Sorry?” Nigel looked puzzled. “Why?”

  “Word is Arena’s firing O’Malley,” I told him. “So who knows if they’re still going to do Hamlet anymore. And even if they do it, they’ll almost certainly have another director, which means you’ll have to go through the whole audition process all over again.”

  For some reason Nigel seemed to find this amusing.

  “I guess you haven’t heard yet.” He was wearing the grin of a cat who has eaten a whole cage of canaries. “Oh, look—here comes Michael.”

  He scurried away, giggling.

  “There you are.” Michael strode up, looking curiously excited. “I just got the most peculiar phone call.”

  “Who from?”

  “Arena Stage. They’re wasting no time looking for someone to replace O’Malley. As in me.”

  “Seriously?”

  He nodded.

  “Apparently a couple of my former students are working there and have been talking me up to management.”

  I wasn’t at all sure how I felt about this. On the one hand, it would be nice to see Michael get more recognition for his talents as a director.

  But Arena Stage was in Washington, D.C., a couple of hours away from Caerphilly. How could he possibly juggle that and his career at the college? And did he really want to direct Hamlet if he’d be stuck with a temperamental former teen heartthrob in the lead?

  “I told them I couldn’t take the job unless I had control over casting, and they said fine. Apparently O’Malley hadn’t gotten around to giving out contracts to anyone.”

  “Including Zach Glass?”

  “Exactly what I asked. And yes, especially Zach Glass, who only had a handshake deal with O’Malley. A deal Arena feels no obligation to honor—the people I talked to made that clear and sounded remarkably cheerful about it. I suspect they’d figured out that Glass’s box-office draw wasn’t going to make up for the ridicule factor.”

  “Imagine that.”

  “So then I pointed ou
t that I had commitments in Caerphilly during the academic year that would probably interfere with the rehearsal schedule. And they said maybe we could work out a way to do the rehearsals down in Caerphilly and move the show to Arena a week or so before opening—which they could probably arrange to happen during the college’s spring break.”

  It sounded as if they were very keen on having Michael direct. And also as if they’d worked the whole thing out.

  “Did you tell them you’d do it?” I asked.

  “I told them I would talk to my wife and give them a decision as soon as possible, but that it definitely wouldn’t be anytime today, because my wife had just captured a murderer and we were going to take some time off to celebrate.”

  “Good answer.”

  “Seriously,” he said. “I have very mixed feelings about this. It’s a great honor, and could be a lot of fun. But if it disrupts our life—”

  “If you really want to do it, let’s do some serious thinking about how to make it happen without disrupting our life.”

  “Okay.” He looked more cheerful.

  “Starting tomorrow.”

  “Absolutely!” He glanced down. “Are those Rob’s bells? He’s been going crazy looking for them.”

  “I suppose we should take them over to the stage.”

  “If you wrap them up in something they don’t make all that much noise,” Michael advised. He had taken off his cloak and was wrapping it around them.

  My attention had wandered. I was staring at the sky, where Gracie—pretty sure it was Gracie—was soaring high above the woods.

  “So beautiful,” I sighed.

  “The bells?” Michael sounded puzzled. “I thought you found them annoying.”

  “The falcons.”

  Michael glanced up, but Gracie had landed again.

  “I missed them,” he said.

  “You’ll get another chance,” I said. “They always wing twice.”

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks once again to the wonderful team at St. Martin’s / Minotaur, including (but not limited to) Joe Brosnan, Lily Cronig, Hector DeJean, Paul Hochman, Andrew Martin, Sarah Melnyk, and especially my editor, Pete Wolverton. And thanks to David Rotstein and the art department for yet another beautiful cover. You’ve all got me spoiled.