Snow White Red-Handed (A Fairy Tale Fatal Mystery) (31 page)

The guard bowed and left.

The secretary led them through the outer room, which was filled with velvet sofas, dusky oil paintings in gilt frames, and marble statuettes. He opened another door and, without announcing his arrival, led them in.

They found themselves in an office with polished mahogany shelves and cabinets, green leather chairs, and a massive desk, behind which was a high-backed chair, turned to face the other way.

Ophelia and Penrose stopped just inside the door.

Ophelia stared at the chair, expecting it to swivel around and reveal—what? A lion-headed patriarch, massive and threatening and—

Her jaw dropped.

The secretary had seated himself in the chair and turned it to face them. The chair dwarfed him; he looked like a marionette’s puppet.

“I am enjoying the expressions on your faces,” he said.

“You are,” Penrose said, “Herr Ghent?”

“Yes. And you are the nuisances who have given my guards such a trying time of it.” He tilted his head. “I thought they would have killed you by now—that is, after all, what I instructed them to do. But here you are.” He studied Ophelia.

Even though Ophelia could probably lug Ghent around on her hip like a baby, she shrank back under his gaze.

“You,” he said to her, “thought you would break my bank, did you?”

“I thought I’d try.” She pretended boldness. “I didn’t get a chance to finish.”

“Well, close enough, close enough. When my messenger came up from the gaming rooms and said the young American lady was on a lucky streak, my curiosity got the better of me.”

Ghent swung his legs to and fro beneath the desk. His feet didn’t even reach the floor.

“I assume,” Penrose said, “that even though you stopped the game short, you’ll uphold your end of the bargain?”

“Of course. I am a gentleman.”

“Then tell us, pray, what is Mr. George Smith’s true name?”

“You cannot guess? I thought university professors were attentive.”

Ophelia’s breath caught. Ghent’s eyes. She’d seen that shade of blue before. Recently. “Mr. Smith’s real name,” she said. “Is it . . . Ghent?”

“The maidservant outthinking the scholar!” Ghent smacked his small palms together. “Delightful.”

Penrose’s mouth was tight, but other than that his expression remained mild. “Mr. George Smith is, what? Your brother?”

“Cousin. My father’s brother’s son. He went off to seek his fortune in California during the gold rush of 1849. He left me to tend our family greengrocer’s shop by myself.” Ghent sniffed. “He told me he would not stay poor, like me, nor would he consent to sharing the profits of one small shop. He said that he would find gold and become a wealthy man. I stayed behind, scraping together enough to travel to Paris for a time and invest in speculative stocks. I earned enough money in Paris to purchase a small hotel in Baden-Baden, and it grew into a success. Over time, I saved and invested enough to buy this gaming establishment and make it into the triumph it is today.”

The weight of all that gold in Ophelia’s reticule no longer seemed delicious. It was a burden. Gold drove people to leave their families, to circle the globe, to sacrifice. To kill.

“P
rincess Verushka,” Penrose said to Ghent, “intimated that learning Smith’s true name would reveal something important about the deaths of Mr. Coop and Count Grunewald. Yet I fail to see the connection between those crimes and the fact that the owner of the
Conversationshaus
happens to have an American cousin.”

“No?” Ghent looked to Ophelia. “And you, Mademoiselle Luck? Have you any guesses?”

“Gold,” she blurted. “You both want gold. There’s gold hidden somewhere on the castle land, isn’t there?”

“Very good. What a clever maidservant you are.” Ghent sneered at Penrose.

Penrose shoved his hands in his trouser pockets.

“The gold is not precisely hidden, however,” Ghent said. “There is a gold mine somewhere, said to be richer, deeper, than anything to be found in California. My cousin has been searching for it. But I shall have it.”

“How did Smith—your cousin, that is,” Penrose said, “know there was a mine on the estate?”

Ghent steepled his toy-like fingers. “Our family has known there was a rich mine, somewhere in the
Schwarzwald
, for generations. We have been searching for it, without luck, as we grew poorer and poorer. But that mine by rights belongs to us. It is our inheritance.”

“Are you. . . .” Ophelia furrowed her brow. “Are you Grunewalds, then?”

“
Ach
, perhaps you are not as clever as I thought. No. The Ghents are descendants of an ancient race of men who worked these mountains, bringing up gold.”

“You are descended,” Penrose said in a slow, wondering tone, “from Snow White’s dwarves.”

Ghent pounded his tiny fist on the desktop. “As though we belonged to that girl! As though we were her servants! No. The dwarves in that tale were my ancestors. But there is much more to the story than that. They had worked the mines since time immemorial, until somehow—no one is certain what happened—they lost access to their mines, and the knowledge of the mines’ whereabouts was forgotten.”

“Until Smith arrived,” Penrose said.

“Yes. My cousin learned, I know not how, that the richest mine of all was located in the forest of Schloss Grunewald. He convinced Coop to purchase the castle, and he set to work searching for the entrance to the mine. When I learned he had returned to the
Schwarzwald
, and when my men reported that he had been sighted in the hills, making maps and testing the rocks, I knew at once what he was doing.”

“Did you kill Mr. Coop?” Ophelia said.

“Of course not. I had no opportunity. When he died, however, I did send my men into the
schloss
to retrieve the skeleton and the rest of the contents of the house.”

“Why?” Ophelia said.

“Would you want scholars poking and probing the remains of
your
ancestors?”

“Where are those relics now?” Penrose said.

“Relics, you say. As though they were meant to be in a museum. Or perhaps filed away in a crate on a university shelf.”

Penrose flexed his jaw.

“The skeleton was buried,” Ghent said.

“And the relics?”

Ghent smiled. “I sold them.”

“Sold them!”

“You do not believe you are the only person in the world interested in folk relics? There are certain persons—collectors, properly speaking—who pay extravagantly for such things. And, as it turns out, it is fortunate that I sold them off quickly to the highest bidder, because I have, now, a deficit to make up in my gaming rooms.” Ghent sighed. “I have revealed enough. Now listen. You, both of you, are to take the first morning train out of Baden-Baden—I care not where—and never return. If you do not leave, I shall make certain you are killed and buried so deeply in the
Schwarzwald
, no one but the wild beasts shall ever discover your remains. Go now. The thrill has worn off.” He turned to some papers on his desktop.

“But who killed Mr. Coop and the count?” Ophelia said.

“
Miss Flax
,” Penrose whispered.

Ghent lifted his vivid blue eyes. “Why, I thought that would be obvious. Once Coop and Count Grunewald became aware of the presence of the mines, my cousin killed them. He never did, you see, like to share.”

*   *   *

“We must go
directly to the police,” Penrose told Ophelia, as they hurried down the corridor. “Smith told us in the cave yesterday that he planned to return to America, whether it was forbidden or not. We’ve got to tell Schubert about him before it’s too late.”

“Do you believe Herr Ghent?”

“He seemed forthright enough. Particularly when he got to the bit about having us killed.”

“I mean the part about his ancestry, and Smith’s ancestry. That they are descended from Snow White’s dwarves. How are we going to tell
that
to Inspector Schubert with a straight face?”

“We’ll tell Schubert exactly what Ghent told us. Prue shall be exonerated. Your goal shall be accomplished.”

Why did he sound so chilly?

“What about
your
goal?” she said. “You haven’t gotten an inch closer to it.”

There was a pause. “Yes,” he finally said. “Yes, I have.”

“And?”

“I am well aware that you are a Yankee, and as such, you cannot extend your mind far enough to comprehend mysteries beyond your everyday scope of experience.”

What?
Ophelia scowled. “Why are you being so—so
sniffy
all of a sudden?”

“I believe—if that is even the correct word—in the truth of fairy tales, Miss Flax. I believe there are things that pass below our mundane routines, above our comprehension. I have committed my life to learning more of the mysteries contained within and alluded to in these pieces of folklore. They are based upon fact, not fiction.”

“It seems you’re most interested in relics,” she said. “Not stories.”

He stopped. They’d reached the top of the sweeping staircase that led to the foyer.

Ophelia stopped, too. “It’s true, isn’t it? You’re one of those collectors, like Ghent sold those relics to. You pretend you’ve got a scholarly interest, but when it comes right down to it, you’re just like any other rich fellow who reckons he ought to be able to buy whatever pretty bauble he wants. And if he can’t buy it, why, he’ll steal it!” She was panting.

His hair, always so neatly combed, was loose across his forehead, and his lips were parted in anger. “How dare you speak of things of which you know nothing?”

“How dare I? I reckon I’d never speak at
all
if you had your say! The fact is, professor, I kept thinking you were helping—not me, I guess—but I thought you were helping get to the bottom of these murders because it was the right thing to do. But it was staring me in the face all along that you were doing it out of greed. Out of—of an
obsession
with those relics. It’s not wholesome—it’s not right. They’re just things! Aren’t people more valuable than things? Well, you can take your relics, and welcome!” She took off down the stairs.

He was trotting down the steps beside her. “I’m aware you New Englanders adore staking out the moral high ground—”

“Why, I—”

“—but we mustn’t overlook the fact that you, my dear, are a confidence trickster. And not as much of a new hand at it as you’d like me to believe. The way you positively soaked up the attention from the crowd at that roulette table—”

Wait. He almost sounded . . .
jealous
.

“—but, of course, it’s really none of my concern. As soon as we relay this information to Schubert at the police station, you shall have no further need for me.”

“Now wait a minute. You make it sound as though I just—just used you to get what I wanted!”

“That’s what confidence sharks do, is it not?”

They rounded the last curve in the stairs.

Inspector Schubert lurked at the bottom of the stairs, flanked by policemen. “Miss Flax,” he said, “you are under arrest for murder.”

One of the other policemen grabbed her arm.

“Before you arrest her,” Penrose said, “I’ve something to tell you.”

He told Schubert all they had learned, about Princess Verushka, Mr. Smith, and Herr Ghent—even the part about Snow White’s dwarves.

To Ophelia’s surprise, Schubert didn’t even smile at that part.

When Penrose had finished, Schubert was silent, thinking. At last, he said, “I am displeased that you both have meddled to this extent in my investigations. Nonetheless, the evidence that points to Mr. Smith as a possible suspect is compelling. I shall go with my men immediately to Schloss Grunewald. Miss Flax, return to the
schloss
as well, and await my further instructions.”

Ophelia wrenched her arm free of the policeman’s grip.

Penrose escorted Ophelia to the waiting carriage and helped her inside. But he didn’t get in.

“I shall pay the driver and instruct him to return you to the castle,” he said.

“Pay him? Oh! I nearly forgot!” Ophelia thrust her reticule towards him.

He waved a hand. “You keep it. You did quite a lot of hard work to earn that gold.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You, Professor Penrose, are a sight too big for your breeches! You’re a gullible, highfalutin stuffed shirt!”

“Gullible? Perhaps your superb acting abilities got the better of me.” He moved to shut the carriage door.

“You think,” she choked out, “you’re too good for the likes of me.” Just before the door closed, she flung the reticule to his feet. It burst open and gold coins flew out, sparkling yellow in the gaslight, falling to the gravel in a tinkling shower.

He hit the top of the carriage with unnecessary force, and the driver set his horses into motion.

Inside, Ophelia kicked off the pinching slippers, pressed her fist against her forehead, and, her breaths coming sharply, wished she could cry. Her carriage rolled off into the night.

*   *   *

Gabriel paced the
streets of Baden-Baden for more than an hour, hands thrust in pockets and head hung low, before he decided to return to Schilltag.

Once in his chamber at the inn, he peeled off his evening jacket, loosened his tie, poured himself a large brandy, and sank down on the chair.

He took a first long swallow to dull the edge of his fury. The second swallow was to assuage his niggling conscience. Miss Flax was only a poor, young, uneducated lady trying to eke out a life. The third gulp was to blur the too-vivid memory of her lovely eyes.

From where he sat, he could see into the closet where his tweed jacket hung. His boots were on the floor, and beside the closet door was the chair with his leather valise. There was also a shelf at the top of the closet.

He stared hard. The shelf was empty. Yet—he lowered the brandy glass from his lips—yet that was where he’d stashed the two boxes from Horkheimer’s shop.

The cuckoo clock and the dwarf figurine he’d purchased were gone.

He set his brandy aside and did a quick once-over of the chamber. The boxes were nowhere to be found.

When his chamber had been searched that night, he’d thought nothing had been taken.

He’d been wrong.

He slumped back down on the chair. It had to have been Ghent’s guards.

A pity. That clock was the only thing Gabriel had left of the wondrous find in the wood to take with him back to Oxford.

Perhaps, before he went to the railway station in the morning, he’d stop and purchase another one.

He turned back to his brandy.

*   *   *

Ophelia stole back
into the castle and hurried up to her bedchamber to change. Then she went down to the kitchen.

The kitchen was empty. Orange coals glowed in the grate. She paced and waited.

She would
not
think of the professor.

Fifteen minutes later, the police arrived.

By the time Schubert and his two men were at Mr. Smith’s bedchamber door, in a remote wing of the castle, most of the household trailed in their wake.

Ophelia wanted to see Smith arrested and taken away with her own eyes. Then she’d demand that Prue be cleared of all suspicion.

“Miss Flax,” Cook whispered to Ophelia, as they hovered behind the police, “I fancied I would never lay eyes on you again!”

“What do you mean?”

“Why, the police came here to arrest you and Prue, and they discovered you were both gone missing. Those naughty maids Katrina and Freda had been paid by Hansel to keep mum about Prue being gone. Prue went off with Hansel, to elope, I would judge. I never saw so much lovesick mooning in all my days.”

“Prue is still gone?” Ophelia’s blood chilled. Surely Prue should have returned from Heidelberg by now.

Cook nodded. “Mind you, I did not believe for a minute that you two were murderesses.” She glanced at Ophelia. “Actresses, now
that
I could believe.”

“Silence!” Schubert ordered.

Everyone clammed up.

Schubert knocked. No answer. He knocked again. Not a sound.

“This is the police, Smith! Open the door!” Schubert tried the door handle. To everyone’s surprise, it opened easily.

It was soot dark inside.

“A light, Benjamin,” Schubert said.

Benjamin lit a gas lamp, and the policemen ventured into the chamber. The servants hung back.