Snow White Red-Handed (A Fairy Tale Fatal Mystery) (13 page)

*   *   *

Ophelia and Professor
Penrose trailed Madam Pink at a discreet distance. They passed grand hotels, cafés and restaurants, jewelers, haberdashers, and tourists’ trinket shops.

“Easy enough to keep sight of them,” Ophelia said, “with her wearing that enormous hat.”

“Rather. Like tracking an animated flowerpot.”

A block later, Ophelia noticed an advertisement hung on the side of a building, with French lettering in gold and colorful pictures of fairy tale queens, frogs, geese, and dragons. “What does that say?”

Penrose stopped to read the advertisement. “There is to be a masquerade ball tomorrow evening in the public dancing rooms—in the
Conversationshaus—
and the guests are to dress as fairy tale characters.”

“Everyone here is mad for fairy tales!”

“It’s the Black Forest. Come on. We’ll lose sight of Hunt.”

They followed for a few more blocks.

“What have we here?” Penrose pulled Ophelia into the doorway of a building. Slowly, they both poked their heads around the corner to see Mr. Hunt and Madam Pink ascend the white stone steps of a splendid hotel and disappear through the doors.

Ophelia became aware of the professor’s hand on her arm, and she tensed.

He dropped his hand.

She pretended to adjust the brim of her bowler hat. Wait.
What
was she doing gallivanting with this strange gentleman?

Oh, right: Prue. Prue was locked up in a tower, accused of murder.

“Presumably that is Hunt’s hotel,” Penrose said, “or else it is the . . . lady’s.” He
ahem
ed again.

Mercy. If Penrose knew Ophelia was an actress, he wouldn’t have to be so
delicate
all the time. She knew exactly the sorts of things ladies and gentlemen got up to in hotels. Never mind that she’d never done any of those things herself.

On the other hand, if he knew she was an actress, he wouldn’t trust her as far as he could—well, the professor surely didn’t spit.

“Hotel Europa?” Ophelia said, noticing the elegant sign above the hotel’s doors. “Mrs. Coop told me that’s where Princess Verushka is residing.”

“Did she? Then we’ll kill two birds with one stone. Let’s wait until they come out. Then we’ll go inside and ask the hotel workers about both the princess and Hunt.”

Ophelia pushed her bowler down more firmly on her head. “I’ve got a better idea.” She was already setting off towards the hotel. “Let’s follow them and find out where they go.”

Penrose gained her side in a few strides. “Are you mad?”

“No. Bold.”

“How would we profit from this? Aside from being recognized by Hunt, that is?”

“And I thought you were logical.” Ophelia tut-tutted. “If it’s the lady’s chamber, then if we know its number, we may easily discover her name, and who she is, and perhaps what Hunt could be doing with her.” They trotted up the steps to the hotel doors. “And if it’s Mr. Hunt’s chamber. . . .”

“You can’t be serious,” Penrose said through gritted teeth. “
Danke schön
,” he said in a louder voice to the doorman, who bowed and held the door.

The lobby had pillowy carpets, fat velvet chairs, potted palms, and chandeliers dripping crystals.

Ophelia spied the hem of a seashell pink gown as it twitched around the landing of the grand marble staircase. “There they go,” she whispered.

They tried to appear nonchalant as they hurried to the stair. At the top, they craned their necks left—the wide, carpeted corridor was empty—and right.

“Ah,” Penrose whispered.

Hunt was unlocking a door halfway down the corridor. Madam Pink hovered at his side.

Penrose jerked his neck, and Ophelia followed him back down to the staircase landing. They waited until they heard the sound of a door closing shut, and then returned to the upper corridor.

Hunt and the lady, they swiftly figured, had disappeared into room number seven.

From behind the polished door came the faint sound of Madam Pink’s kittenish giggles.

Ophelia lifted her eyes to Penrose’s and fought the urge to giggle herself when she saw his embarrassed grimace.

Poor fellow. Trying to shield her maidenly purity.

“Perhaps”—Penrose was ushering her back towards the staircase—“that is Mr. Hunt’s sister. Or cousin.”

I
n the lobby, Gabriel cornered a bellboy behind a potted palm while Miss Flax waited with a newspaper on one of the velvet chairs.

“
Entschuldigen Sie bitte
,” he said to the spotty lad, who wore a red suit decorated with brass buttons and a visored cap. “Could I trouble you with a few questions about two of the guests of this establishment?”

“We do not speak of our guests,” the bellboy said in a nervous warble.

“Nein?”
Gabriel pressed a coin into the boy’s gloved palm.

“Well. Er.” The bellboy gawked through the palm fronds towards the reception desk. “You must be quick. Herr Lipsett will be looking for me.”

“Room number seven. A certain Mr. Royall Hunt is in residence?”

“That is correct.”

“For how long has he been staying here?”

“Since the start of the season.”

“This must be a very costly establishment. Is he current on his account?”

The bellboy ran a finger beneath his collar. “I do not handle accounts. I only carry luggage to and fro.”

Gabriel slid another coin in his hand.

“Now that I think of it”—the bellboy gawked again through the palm fronds—“I did hear Herr Schmidt, who manages the billing in the back office, say that Herr Hunt has not paid a thaler
for several weeks past.”

“Indeed.”

“But that is all I know.”

“Is it?”

“Er. . . .”

“What of the lady he went upstairs with only minutes ago? A wealthy-looking lady, in pink.”

“Sir, you must know what sort of place Baden-Baden is. The gamblers. . . .”

“Hunt is a gambler? Perhaps in debt?”

“N-not that sort of gambler.”

“I see. And is there a Princess Verushka in residence as well?”

The bellboy frowned. “No.”

“Are you certain?”

The bellboy puffed his chest. “I always know every single guest, and there is no Princess Verushka at the Hotel Europa.” He emitted a yelp, and his chest deflated. “I beg your pardon, but I must go.” He skittered off in the direction of the reception desk, before which a portly, managerial-looking gentleman had begun to pace.

*   *   *

Gabriel didn’t tell
Miss Flax what he’d learned from the bellboy until they were back outside on the sunny sidewalk strolling away from the hotel.

“Well?” she said, breathless.

“There is no Princess Verushka in residence at the Hotel Europa.”

“I’m certain that’s what Mrs. Coop said.”

“She was lying to you. Or Princess Verushka lied to Mrs. Coop about where she was lodging.”

“Or Princess Verushka is not her real name. Or she’s booked into the hotel under an alias.”

“You’ve a diabolical imagination, Miss Flax. How ever do you think of such things?”

She was silent.

His conscience gave a twinge. The poor girl was only trying to help.

“It is,” Gabriel said, “rather interesting, because this would not be the first instance of Princess Verushka being caught in a lie.” He told Miss Flax about how he’d encountered the princess rifling through Coop’s desk. “I also learned from the bellboy,” he said, “that it seems our Mr. Royall Hunt is a fortune hunter.”

Miss Flax frowned.

“That is,” Gabriel said, interpreting her frown—despite the whiskers and spectacles—as one of naiveté, “a gentleman who hopes, like a debutante, to make his fortune through a good match, but who in the meantime supports himself with the . . . attentions of wealthy ladies.”

He hated discussing this with her. True, Miss Flax wasn’t exactly a debutante herself, but there was an innocent air about her.

“If ladies may do it,” she said, “gentlemen should be able to as well.”

Gabriel quirked up a corner of his mouth. “The important thing is, this explains how Mrs. Coop and Miss Amaryllis made Hunt’s acquaintance so quickly after their arrival in the neighborhood: he is presumably on the lookout for wealthy ladies. He knows how to flatter and charm his way into their good graces.”

“But he couldn’t have fancied that Miss Amaryllis possesses a fortune, could he? And he couldn’t marry Mrs. Coop because she’s already. . . .” Miss Flax’s voice trailed off, and she came to a standstill. Pedestrians flowed around them as she stared up at Gabriel. “She’s not. She’s free.”

“Free as a lark, and very, very wealthy. That’s what we might call a rather good motive for murder, isn’t it?”

“Let’s go back to the hotel,” Ophelia said.

“Whatever for? And shouldn’t you be returning to the castle soon? Surely Mrs. Coop shall be expecting—”

“We’ve got to look around Mr. Hunt’s chamber. If we are to convince Inspector Schubert to stop thinking of Prue as the murderer, we must show him something that’ll convince him once and for all.”

Penrose set his teeth.

“You know I’m right.”

“This is harebrained.”

“It’s necessary.”

He sighed. “Very well. Shall we sit in that café across from the hotel and watch for them to come back outside?”

*   *   *

Prue paced, twiddled
her thumbs, and dodged sparrow ploppings for eternity and a day. At last, she heard Hansel’s voice in the garden.

She hurried to the window.

He was flushed, tipping his head to see her. “That woman you saw is indeed a tourist. Staying at Gasthaus Schatz, in the village. British. Her name is Miss Gertie Darling. She has been tramping about the forest for days, and she will not tell the innkeeper’s wife what she is about. She has just eaten her luncheon at the inn and is returning to the forest. I mean to follow her.”

“Throw me the key! I want to come, too.” The key opened the tower door from either side.

“Someone will see. It is daylight.”

“Not in the forest it ain’t. Besides, I saw her first.” Prue batted her lashes, just in case Hansel needed more convincing. Hopefully he could see her eyelashes from down there, and her pretty new plaits. Not her shiny nose and chin.

Hansel heaved a sigh, pulled the key from his vest pocket, and tossed it up through the tower window.

The clank of the brass key hitting the stone floor was the sweetest sound Prue had heard all day.

A coiled stair connected the battlement outside the tower door with the kitchen gardens below. Prue scurried down the stair and burst out into the sunlight.

“Hurry,” Hansel said. He was already jogging towards the door in the garden’s outer wall. “She was going in the direction of the orchard.”

No sooner had they passed through the door than they saw Miss Darling’s ample, biscuit-colored backside sway into the dark of the pine trees at the bottom of the orchard. They hurried after her.

The orchard was hot and bright, but the forest, when they stepped across its leafy edge, was all coolness and shifting shadows. Sun mottled the floor, illuminating orange-and-white toadstools, flitting butterflies, wafting ferns, and moss-fluffy tree trunks.

They paused to listen. Snapping and crunching up ahead.

Miss Gertie didn’t tread silently like a fur trapper.

Prue and Hansel minced their way around crackly things on the forest floor. They came to a walloping big tree that had fallen slantwise. Side by side, they peeked over it.

Gertie crouched many paces ahead, half obscured by a clump of thicket. She was staring through a pair of binoculars. She balanced a notebook on her squatted knees, spread open across her skirt.

Something in the green shadows had snagged Gertie’s attention. The binoculars were glued to her eyes. Her shoulders were hunched, her mouth slightly ajar. From time to time, she paused to scribble in her notebook, and then she’d press the binoculars back to her eyes.

One of those scientific ladies. Prue had heard of them. They liked to pin beetles to cork boards, stalk zebras, collect rocks in jars, wade into ponds after tortoises—

Hansel poked her.

Gertie was on the move.

They crept after her, keeping to the deepest pockets of shadow. A few minutes later, they saw her again, this time ogling through her binoculars at—

Prue clapped her hand over her mouth to keep in a guffaw—

At Mr. Smith, Homer T. Coop’s secretary.

Mr. Smith was far off enough to resemble a mantelpiece figurine. He perched on a large rock, swinging his stumpy legs and doing something with his shotgun. Loading it up with bullets, maybe.

“He enjoys hunting,” Hansel whispered. “Fowl, I believe.”

“Poor Mr. Smith’s just minding his own business.” Mr. Smith had always been kind to Prue. “That Miss Gertie, she’s a—a peeping tom. It’s downright rude.”

Hansel’s eyes twinkled. “But
we
are spying on Miss Gertie.”

There came the tinny sound of Mr. Smith whistling. He laid his shotgun over his shoulder, hopped down from the rock, and marched further into the trees.

Gertie jammed her binoculars and notebook into her satchel and went after him. She hadn’t gone three paces when she screamed. Then she crashed, flailing, to the ground.

*   *   *

“Aaaaaaah!” Miss Gertie
wailed into the treetops. Startled birds flapped away.

“We must help her,” Hansel said, springing forward.

Hansel and Prue hurried to Gertie’s side. Gertie was a pile of rumpled beige linen and snarled satchel straps. Her straw hat was askew, and one long, blond braid dangled over an ear. Her eyes were screwed up, and her face was the exact shade of lobster bisque.

“What’s the matter?” Prue said, out of breath.

“Where did
you
come from?” Gertie unscrewed her eyes. They were small, a silvery color, and eerie without eyelashes. “What are you waiting for, you silly little ninny! Get this bloody thing off my leg!” She had a British accent, just like Prue had used sometimes in Howard DeLuxe’s Varieties. Well, sort of like it.

“Your leg?” Prue stared down at Gertie’s tangle of large leather boots and wrinkly skirts. Mixed in the jumble were two green apples. The kind from the orchard, with the pinky streaks.

The kind, as matter of fact, that Mr. Coop had been killed with.

Gertie met Prue’s eyes. Gertie swallowed.

Hansel knelt beside Gertie. He gingerly drew back the hem of her skirt to reveal a leg like a jumbo bowling pin in a white woolen stocking. It was sandwiched between the jaws of a rusty iron trap. Prue gasped; red wetness seeped through the white stocking.

“Get it off, lad!” Gertie yelled.

“Be patient, miss,” Hansel said. “These traps are meant only to be opened with a special key belonging to the woodsman.”

“You are
not
bloody saying,” Gertie roared, “that you’re going to go toddling off after a key while I—”

“No.” Hansel’s voice was firm. “I know how to open these traps without a key. But you must be still, or you will only hurt yourself.”

Gertie gnashed her teeth while Hansel fiddled with the springs on the trap.

Meanwhile, a thought hit Prue: funny that Mr. Smith hadn’t come running, too. Gertie had sure made enough racket. Maybe he’d just chalked up all the yelping to some wild critter.

There was a clink and a twang of the springs. Hansel pried open the jaws of the trap.

Gertie staggered to her feet and gathered up her satchel. “Damn and blast and botheration times ten thousand!”

“Allow us to help you to the castle,” Hansel said. “That wound needs tending to.”

Gertie cast a wistful glance towards the fold of trees where Mr. Smith had disappeared. Then she winced and took her weight off her injured leg. “I’d just as soon go back down to the village inn. Gasthaus Schatz. Do you know it?”

“Indeed I do.” Hansel glanced at Prue. “Although Miss Prue must return to the castle.”

Shucks. Prue had hoped he’d forgotten about the prisoner song and dance. “I’ll help as far as the orchard,” she said. She was itching to figure out what Miss Gertie was up to.

They limped along, over logs and around rocks. Gertie leaned her weight on Hansel’s and Prue’s shoulders.

Good thing Prue had eaten a hearty breakfast.

Prue licked her lips. “You known Mr. Smith long?”

Hansel shot her a
have you lost your marbles?
look.

Gertie said, “Mister who?”

“Smith,” Prue said. “The feller with the shotgun.”

“I hadn’t noticed,” Gertie said in an airy tone, “any fellows with shotguns.”

Was Gertie really expecting them to buy that clunker? “What’re you doing in the forest, then?” Prue said.

“This and that.” Gertie winced again, and paused to bend and touch her leg. “I adore viewing the birds and whatnot.”

Prue and Hansel traded a look over Gertie’s bent back. Those binoculars of hers hadn’t once strayed to bird-level.

“Are you enjoying your stay in Schilltag?” Hansel said. They were wobbling along again.

“Nice enough place, I suppose,” Gertie said. “Bit dull. I suppose you natives are used to that.” She glanced sideways at Prue. “You’re not a native, what? One of the American family that’s been getting bumped off, I assume?”

“Not me,” Prue said. “Staying much longer in Schilltag?”

“No,” Gertie said.

She was clamming up.

“Them apples you dropped back at the trap,” Prue said. “Were they tasty?”

Gertie’s gaze kept forward. But her cheeks went from lobster bisque to fire brigade red.