The Golden Specific (21 page)

The man responded angrily in Castilian, and Sophia got to her feet. “I don't understand you.” She frowned, and the combined effect of her frown and her words seemed to temporarily silence him.

“La-pe-na?”
he asked very slowly and distinctly.

“No,” Sophia replied emphatically, shaking her head. “No, I'm not sick. I'm just tired.” She tucked her hands beside her head to mime sleeping, and then for good measure she threw in the gestures for food and water. Perhaps if the old man was concerned, he would want to help.

Instead, these gestures seemed to make him immediately lose interest. Placing the end of his pole firmly on the cobblestones and glaring at her with the full weight of his bushy eyebrows, he said something dismissive and turned away. Sophia watched him limp slowly down the street and sighed. She wondered if the young woman who had given her bread was the only kind person in all of Seville. The old man walked a
few more paces, then raised his pole to the nearest streetlamp. With an expert movement he passed a tiny flame into the lamp, lighting the candle within. He lowered the pole and moved on.

Sinking down again in the doorway, Sophia rubbed her eyes. Even with the lamplight the narrow street was getting dark. It had not yet grown cold, but the declining sun had left the air cool and dry, and Sophia had no wish to spend the night out of doors. Nor did she want to ask for help again from the kind young woman. Rising to her feet, she looked both ways and tried to gauge her chances of finding shelter in one of the empty homes. She squinted. It was really getting dark, she realized.

Suddenly, a shape at the end of the street near the plaza caught her eye. Was someone standing in one of the doorways? It looked like a woman—Sophia could see the shape of her skirts. For a moment Sophia thought it might be the woman who had helped her, but then she realized that it was a different door. The figure began to move, gliding along the cobblestones in Sophia's direction. Sophia stepped out into the street, a little flicker of hope lighting within her. Perhaps someone had seen her sleeping and would take pity on her. “Hello?”

The figure moved closer, but it remained in the shadows. Sophia squinted. “Hello?” she repeated. Then the figure made a gesture, and Sophia recognized her.

“Is it you?” Sophia whispered. The pale figure took another step. “You followed me here?” Her voice shook. She paused, and the word slipped out like a secret breathed into the ear of the Fates. “Mother?”

Sophia drew closer. Though she could discern Minna's pale outline, the details of her face and dress were obscured. Her face lifted slightly, and more by this than by any expression she appeared to smile.
“The falconer and the hand that blooms will go with you,”
Minna whispered.

“What?” Sophia replied.

“
The falconer and the hand that blooms will go with you
.” Minna raised her hand, stretching it outward.

Sophia took another step forward, her arm raised in response.

Without warning, a sound like a whistling reed hissed past her ear. At the same moment, a whir of movement disturbed the air. The object that had hurtled past her collided directly with the pale figure, embedding itself deeply and soundlessly, like a knife plunged into a pillow. The apparition collapsed and disintegrated.

“No!” Sophia cried, rushing forward. She ran to where the figure had fallen, but all that remained was a long stem of a pale green wood with a blunt point: a rude arrow cut fresh from a branch. It was unmarked, intact, as if it had hit nothing at all. Sophia looked down the street and saw the man with the gray hood, his hood now pushed back, walking toward her with his bow in his hand. “What have you done?” she cried.

“Nothing of consequence,” he said brusquely.

“Where is she? She might still be here.” Sophia looked wildly up and down the street.

The bowman took her firmly by the arm. “Stop,” he said. “She's not here.”

“Let go of me! I have to find her.” She tried to shake him off.

“I said stop,” the bowman repeated evenly. “Listen to me. That specter in the shadows is not what you think it is or who you think it is. It is an illusion.”

“How do you know?” Sophia realized she was weeping. “How do you know? You know nothing about her. I have to find her.” She tried to pull away against the bowman's grip.

“I can tell you for sure.” He took her shoulders in his hands so that his face was directly in front of hers. “I promise you on my life,” he said slowly, “that the thing you saw a moment ago was an illusion. It was sent for one purpose: to draw you away and into oblivion.”

Sophia cried and shook her head.

“I can prove it to you,” he said softly. “Would you like me to prove it to you?”

She shook her head again.

“Look over my shoulder.” He knelt on the cobblestones so that Sophia could easily see the street behind him.

She gasped and started, but the bowman held her fast. “Look carefully,” he insisted. There was a pale figure in the shadows several houses away. Tall, broad-shouldered, and with a slightly drooping head, it stood languidly by the wall.

“Who is it?” Sophia whispered.

“It is no one. Watch.” Without rising, he swiveled on his knees. He took the freshly cut branch that lay at Sophia's feet, drew his bow, and loosed the arrow. It struck home, plunging soundlessly into the pale figure, which disintegrated as if it had
never been. The arrow clattered onto the cobblestones. “Did you see that?” the archer asked.

“Yes.”

“And do you know how I know that specter is no one I have ever loved or wished with all my heart to find?” he asked, his voice hard.

“How?”

“Because I have sent my arrow into its heart every night for the last two years.”

 23 

Doubting the Champion

T
HEO
APPROACHED
N
ETTIE
Grey's house with high hopes. He had spent the night pondering the case, and while he could not quite see the connections yet, he knew they were there.

The Eerie whom Miles had told him about, Goldenrod, had been attacked by a Sandman. The Sandmen were working for Broadgirdle. Goldenrod had been convalescing at Bligh's house. And now Bligh was dead and Goldenrod was gone. The connections lay somewhere in the questions he still could not answer. How had Broadgirdle come to work with the Sandmen? Why would he want to attack an Eerie woman? Where had Goldenrod vanished to? What did she have to do with Bligh's death? Theo shook his head. He wished, for the hundredth time, that
Sophia were there to help him think it through. She always saw the connections before anyone else did.

But he hoped, as he approached the window of the Grey residence, that Inspector Grey had discovered something in the last twenty hours that would make all the connections clear.

Nettie was practicing scales again. Theo watched her with a bemused smile. She played a scale, stopped, stared out over the piano, twirled her hair around one of her fingers, stared some more, and played another scale. Theo tapped on the glass.

He was rewarded with a look of wide-eyed excitement; she had been expecting him. She gave a little wave. “Good morning!” she said happily, as she opened the window. “Is it already nine?”

Theo smiled broadly. “Good morning, Nettie. It is. I wanted to arrive earlier, but we said nine and I waited until nine. I was ready to see you hours earlier.”

Nettie gave a pleased little smile in response and opened the window more widely. Then her face collapsed into an expression of dismay. “I'm so glad you're here, because I have the most shocking thing to tell you. I've been going over it and over it in my mind, and the weight of it is almost unbearable.”

Climbing deftly over the sill and guiding her over to the poppy-patterned sofa, Theo said with concern, “Of course, Nettie. You can tell me anything. What is it?”

Nettie fanned her face, as if the unbearable thoughts were breaking out like blisters on her cheeks. “Charles, I am so worried. I knew when my father began this investigation that it would relate to Matters of State, but I had no idea how much.
Now I'm afraid Matters of State have come crashing down upon us like a tidal wave, and it has fallen to my poor father to somehow turn the tide.”

Theo shook his head sympathetically. “Your poor father,” he echoed.

“Oh, Charles, you have no idea.” She dropped her voice. “New Occident is on the brink of disaster, and my father is the only one who can prevent it.”

Theo's face obligingly took on an expression of awe, admiration, and anxiety. “What in Fates' name do you mean?”

“Here is the thing,” she said, pausing for a moment in order to draw out the suspense. “Father spoke yesterday to the prisoners who were arrested for murdering Prime Minister Bligh.”

“Yes?” Theo asked encouragingly.

“At first one of the prisoners resisted and would not speak to him at all.”

He pursed his lips. “How rude.”

“But finally Father won them over, and persuaded them to tell him everything.”

“They confessed?”

“No.” Nettie shook her head, and her curls bounced. “But he learned that Prime Minister Bligh was trying to prevent the New Occident parliament from declaring an embargo on the United Indies.”

“You mean the Indies embargo on New Occident,” Theo corrected her automatically. “How shocking.”

Nettie stood up and crossed her arms. She looked down at him with narrowed eyes, her expression entirely altered. “Yes,
shocking.” Her voice had lost its high-pitched lilt. “I am shocked that you already knew that the embargo would be an Indies embargo. I am shocked that you've pretended not to know anything about any of this, when you clearly know a great deal.” She gave him a shrewd smile. “Who are you? And why are you so interested in the investigation into Bligh's murder?”

Theo looked up at her, thunderstruck. He hardly recognized the girl who stood before him. She had the same elaborately ribboned shoes and the same frilly dress with the same smattering of pearls, but her pretty face was twisted into a fierce scowl. “I . . .” He was momentarily lost for words.

“You thought I was a brainless brat who would spill information to a stranger. You thought it was an easy way to get to Inspector Grey. I can see that. It's quite obvious, Charles. What I can't see is why. Are you working for the murderer? Are
you
the murderer?”

“No!” Theo exclaimed, aghast. He jumped to his feet. “No, I'm not the murderer. I knew Bligh; I liked him. I . . .” He ran a hand through his hair. “Look, I'll be straight with you.”

“Please,” Nettie replied.

“I work for Shadrack Elli. He's my employer—and a friend. And he is innocent. I know he is. I'm just trying to do everything I can to prove it. He and Miles didn't commit this murder, but someone else did, and that person has to be found.”

“Why not leave that to the police?”

“I'm sure the police will conduct a good investigation. But what if the person who murdered Bligh is smart enough to make it seem like Shadrack and Miles really did commit the
crime? The police don't know them like I do. It's their job to suspect anyone and everyone. Just by doing their jobs, they might accuse the wrong people.”

Nettie listened to him pensively, and when he was done she tapped her fingers on her arm as if playing rapid notes. Then she sighed. “As it happens, I agree with you.”

“You do?”

“Yes. I don't think Elli and Countryman are guilty. The evidence is both neat and partial in a suspicious way. And they really have no motive. I don't believe the hogwash about Bligh changing his entire political outlook. He wasn't the type. His political philosophy was formed over decades, matured deeply through personal experience. He would not throw it over for expedience or ambition or greed.”

Theo stared at her with genuine astonishment.

Nettie laughed. “I wish you could see your face.”

“I just . . .” He shook his head. “The act is very convincing,” he said with admiration. “You're a real pro.”

“Thank you,” she said, smiling slightly. “I appreciate the compliment. This one is sincere, apparently.”

“It is.” Theo grinned.

Nettie gave a little pout, seeming for a brief second like her old self. “I know my piano playing is monstrous.” She sat on the couch. “But it helps me think.”

Theo joined her. “So if you don't think Miles and Shadrack are guilty, do you think your father will figure it out?”

Nettie waved her hand dismissively. “My dear father! He is
a sweetheart, but he is the most literal-minded man in New Occident. He has no imagination. He thinks of evidence as little building blocks, to be stacked up into a rigid tower, when they are really pieces of a story.”

“But then how is he so successful?”

Nettie looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Really? Still haven't figured that out?”

Theo was newly shocked.
“You?”

“There's a reason he's done so well in the last three years.”

“How do you do it?”

She sighed. “I can't injure his pride, poor man. So I break into his study. I read all his notes on a case. And I see what's there—what's
really
there. Then I make little suggestions. Oh, believe me, it is tricky,” she continued, fully engaged. “Most of the time he only gives me an overall sense of the case, and it taxes my ingenuity something awful to think of ways to point him in the right direction without letting on that I know as much as I do.”

Theo whistled. “Wow.” He sat up straighter. “Why are you telling me all this?”

Nettie sat back and twirled a curl around her finger. “Because I could use some help. Someone on the ground. I don't have the mobility you have.” The fierce scowl was back. “On the night of Bligh's murder I tried to go out and investigate, and look what happened. Mrs. Culcutty worked herself up into a frenzy.” She shook her head with frustration. “This is going to be the most important crime of the decade, and I want to solve it.”

Theo considered her, impressed. He had no doubt that Nettie Grey would make a formidable ally or a formidable foe. It was far better to have her on his side. “Well,
I
am mobile.”

Nettie grinned. “Excellent. We have a deal. You tell me what you find and I'll tell you what I find.”

“Done.” As he spoke, Theo realized he would not be able to tell Nettie about the knife and the bloodied clothes, because he could not tell her who he really was and why he had been present at the discovery of Bligh's body. And he was reluctant to talk about Broadgirdle, since his reasons for suspecting the man were ones he would never discuss.
But I can tell her some things without telling her how I know them,
he decided. “You first.”

“No,
you
first,” Nettie replied, “as a show of good faith.”

Theo grinned. “Fair enough. The woman everyone thinks murdered Bligh—Goldenrod? I know who she is, and I know how she ended up at Bligh's.” He repeated what Miles had told him, omitting nothing but the explanation of how he had tangled with Sandmen the previous summer. “I've tracked down one or two men in Boston who use grappling hooks,” he finished. “That's the lead I'm following now.”

“Fascinating.” Nettie had listened attentively and without interruption, more than once pulling on a brown curl and giving it a pensive chew. “Especially given what I have to tell you. About the examiner's report of the body.”

“Which is?”

“The injuries were not made by a knife. In fact, the
examiner could not say what instrument made them. He said there were fourteen entry wounds, and the instrument had barbed points.”

“Grappling hooks have barbed points,” Theo said.

“They do.” Nettie twirled her hair thoughtfully. “So whoever attacked Goldenrod may have killed Bligh. There's a story here we're not seeing. Perhaps Goldenrod knows something about what's happening in the Indian Territories—something she reported to Bligh, something that someone wants concealed.”

“Like what?”

“Like a railroad being built illegally or something like that.”

“Maybe,” Theo said, unconvinced.

“Or it could have to do with these Weatherers—the missing Eerie who never made it to Boston. Perhaps something happened to them, and Goldenrod was prevented from discovering it.”

“That would make sense.”

“Well, we need more, Charles,” Nettie concluded. “We need more pieces of the story.” She raised her eyebrows. “What is your next step?”

“I'm going to keep an eye on these men with grappling hooks. See if I can learn more about what they're doing.”

“That sounds good. And I'm going to see what I can find in Bligh's papers. Father brought several boxes of them home.” She gave a sly smile. “And he never looks at the sheet music I keep on the piano stand. You know how my teacher
insists
on my practicing scales.”

—19-Hour 52—

B
EACON
H
ILL
WAS
picturesque even in darkness. The streetlamps cast yellow light into the humid summer air, and the brick buildings seemed to lean away from them, their windows tightly shuttered. Theo walked silently across the cobblestones. He had left his stolen Goodyear at the foot of the hill, tied to a lamppost. As he approached Broadgirdle's mansion, he slowed his pace. When he reached the brick wall, he peered through the hole in the garden door. Ordinarily, it would have been difficult to see anything in the darkness, but the back of the house was illuminated by a pair of flame lamps. Sure enough, two Sandmen were stationed before the garden shed.