Fantastic Detectives Page 12

  Mr. Bailey laughed and lifted his glass. “Perhaps!”

  “I say,” Mr. Crane said to Brookwind. “Mr. Bailey has entertained us with tales of the savage saurian beasts and the not-men that live in the wilds beyond the wall. Are the wild lands really so fierce?”

  “For such as you, yes.”

  Mr. Bailey traced the line of his scar with one finger. “You only have to look at me, to see that!”

  Emily had sat silent through their banter, gauging their responses. Mr. Bailey was his usual self, including that gesture with the scar. He brought it up frequently, and his encounter with the raptor that had nearly taken his head off.

  The Cranes were their usual jovial selves, flushed with drink and food in equal measure. Mr. Dempsey, she had already ruled out, looked uncomfortable sitting next to Mrs. Watersmith. She sat quite stiff and tall, sipping her drink the way a bird might dip its beak to drink. For her, that was normal.

  On the other couch, the Mumfords were whispering to one another, following the discussion of what to call Brookwind. As far as Emily was concerned, elf was perfectly polite.

  Of the whole party, only Mrs. Bailey was quiet. In fact, she hadn’t said a word most of the night. Mr. Bailey did tend to go on at length, but she’d been particularly quiet since the break just before dessert.

  In the awkward moment following Mr. Bailey pointing out his scar, Emily spoke up.

  “I quite forgot to mention that the scream earlier was my housemaid discovering a body.” She pointed past Brookwind. “Right over there, in front of the fire.”

  She watched their reactions carefully. Everyone tried speaking at once, except Mrs. Bailey who shrank closer to her husband.

  Mr. Dempsey rose to his feet. “Have you called the constables?”

  Emily shook her head. “Our friend Brookwind was pursuing the victim, apparently a criminal from beyond the wall.”

  “Here?” Mrs. Crane squeaked.

  Mrs. Watersmith rose to her feet. “Mr. Dempsey, please escort me back to Watersmith Tower at once!”

  The Cranes both tried rising at once and the entire couch tipped forward. They fell back into the cushions, their brandy sloshing from their glasses. Pieces of cake tumbled down Mrs. Crane’s front.

  Mr. Crane recovered first and leveraged himself up. Once on his feet, huffing hard, he helped Mrs. Crane out of the couch.

  “We’re going too!” he said when he finally got her up.

  Mr. Mumford shook his head. “Fools. We’re staying right here where it is safe. At least until the constables arrive and provide an escort!”

  Emily rose to her feet. Across from her Brookwind also stood.

  “I’m afraid I can’t let anyone leave, quite yet.”

  Mrs. Watersmith looked down her nose at Emily. “You can’t keep us here!”

  “Oh, I think our guest is quite capable of ensuring that no one leaves.”

  Mrs. Watersmith darted a glance at Brookwind and took a small step closer to Mr. Dempsey. The young man placed himself in front of Mrs. Watersmith.

  “Look here,” he said. “You can’t mean you’ll force us to stay!”

  Still seated, Mrs. Bailey huddled against Mr. Bailey’s arm. He patted her hand.

  Emily smiled at Mr. Dempsey. “By the Treaty, I have no say in this, it is an elvish matter.”

  “Gaian,” Mr. Mumford muttered.

  Brookwind looked over the others to her. “You know who the shifter is?”

  “Shifter?” Mr. Bailey stood up. “I say, do you mean that the killer is a goblinman?”

  Mrs. Bailey squeaked and grabbed at Mr. Bailey’s leg. He stumbled and barely avoided spilling his drink.

  Emily gazed across at the others. Maybe she was elf-struck. She’d happily gaze into his eyes for hours and hours. Of course there was a killer to deal with. She smiled.

  “Of course.” She pointed at Mrs. Watersmith. “She is the other one!”

  “I saw her!” Mrs. Bailey shrieked, springing to her feet and clutching Mr. Bailey by the shoulders. “I saw her!”

  Mr. Dempsey turned and Mrs. Watersmith snarled, her once-regal face twisting, and struck him with a back-handed blow that knocked him aside. She ran toward the servants’ door.

  Brookwind vaulted over the couches and in a few swift strides caught her well before she reached the door.

  “Unhand me!” She yelled.

  An obsidian blade was in Brookwind’s hand and pressed to her powdery neck. She went very still.

  Mr. Crane and Mr. Mumford were helping Mr. Dempsey to his feet as Emily walked over to face the impostor. Clasp’s bulk was a comforting presence behind her.

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Bailey,” Emily said. “She won’t be harming anyone else. What did you see?”

  Mrs. Bailey, clutching Mr. Bailey’s arm, peeked at them.

  “Before dessert, Mrs. Watersmith went to the powder room. Then I decided to go, and on the way, I saw her with herself going into the side hall! And one of her was wearing a man’s dinner suit! It was only a second, and I thought my eyes must be playing tricks on me. By the time I got back, she was sitting with Mr. Dempsey at the table. I thought I might have imagined it, except she kept looking at me.”

  Mrs. Watersmith’s breath hissed between her teeth. Emily went to Mrs. Bailey and touched her arm.

  “Thank you. I had noticed that she had freshly powdered her face when she returned, not just a touch-up, mind you, but she was entirely powdered even down her neck and hands. That seemed unnecessary, but at the time I didn’t think much of it.”

  Emily walked back to face Brookwind and the impostor. “You can drop the disguise. You’ve given yourself away more than once.”

  Mrs. Watersmith’s face wrinkled and sagged like collapsing bread. Her eyes rolled up, and when they came down the irises were pink shot through with red. Her mouth puckered and she sneered at Emily.

  “You wouldn’t have figured it out if that fool hadn’t imprinted on her also!”

  “Maybe,” Emily said. “If you hadn’t killed him and left the body you might have gotten away with it.”

  “I didn’t have time,” the goblinman hissed. “I didn’t expect the elf!”

  “You truly believed you could elude me?” Brookwind sheathed his knife, keeping a tight grip on the goblinman’s arm. He pulled the silver necklace free and wrapped it around the goblinman’s wrists, behind its back. The silver band constricted like a snake.

  “I was more interested in your actions,” Emily went on. “You didn’t remember Mr. Dempsey’s other appointment tonight. Leaving early would make you stand out, so you insisted on staying. At least until I broke the news to everyone else. You were the first to want to leave then, when there was a good excuse. But the Watersmiths and Hathaways have always been allies. The real Mrs. Watersmith would never have left me here to deal with this alone.”

  Mr. Bailey patted Emily’s shoulder. “We wouldn’t leave you, dear.”

  The goblinman wasn’t looking at any of them now. Its gaze was fixed on the floor. Emily stepped in front of him. “Where is she?”

  Then it looked up. “Why?”

  “To save yourself pain, why else?”

  Brookwind pulled up on the silver binding the goblinman’s arms. Its breath hissed between its lips.

  “Closet!”

  Emily turned to Clasp. “Find her, make sure she’s unharmed.”

  The troll nodded and thumped off.

  Emily looked up at Brookwind. “You’ll take it, now?”

  “Yes. Thank you, Lady Hathaway.”

  His gaze lingered for a moment, his beautiful eyes on hers, and then he moved away with the goblinman over his shoulder. The door banged behind him and she was left alone with her guests.

  ***

  Emily stood alone on her balcony enjoying the cool night wind through her thin nightgown. It was late, already well past midnight. Hathaway Tower dropped away far, far beneath her. Around her tower stood the others, including Watersmith Tower where Mrs. W
atersmith was recovering from her ordeal after being rescued from the closet.

  There was a soft sound behind her, like that a cat might make. She didn’t move until she felt the heat of his skin and his forest scent touched her neck. She turned and gazed up at his beautiful face.

  “Are the stories true then, you can fly?”

  Brookwind smiled.

  “What happens to the goblinman now? Is it dead?”

  His smile faded. He shook his head. “Death is not enough, for justice.”

  Emily stepped close and raised her hand. Her fingers hovered above his bare chest. When he didn’t pull away she lightly touched him. The muscles jumped beneath her finger tips but he stayed.

  “You came back,” she said, “why?”

  Brookwind pushed closer. He ran his hands lightly along her hair as he gazed into her eyes. His eyes caught the dim light and gleamed. “The soul search, you called me back.”

  Was it possible? If she was elf-struck, could he feel the same about her?

  She licked her lips, watching his eyes. “What now?”

  He picked her up and carried her inside.

  Introduction to “Trouble Aboard the Flying Scotsman”

  Alistair Kimble’s website is called thedashingchap.com, which suits him perfectly. Once upon a time, Alistair enlisted in the Navy and performed search-and-rescue missions while dangling from a helicopter. He now works as a Special Agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and somehow finds time to write. His short fiction has appeared in Eric Flint’s Grantville Gazette, and I’m told the two are scheming together on other projects.

  “Trouble Aboard The Flying Scotsman” is the origin story for two characters in one of Alistair’s upcoming novels. He’s planning many more adventures featuring the two of them.

  Trouble Aboard the Flying Scotsman

  Alistair Kimble

  Harland Stone clicked the train compartment’s door shut and sunk into the plush bench seat. He dropped his crinkled bowler on the empty space next to him—a shame, that bowler, alas, he’d obtain another once back in London.

  Ah, alone and not a Scot in sight. A deep breath released pent-up stress and the deep cushion melted away some of the exhaustion the bumpy trip by road from Inverness to Edinburgh had exacted upon him. Never mind dealing with the Highland Council and their nonsense over the past fortnight. Being a junior operator in His Majesty’s Dashing Chaps promised an array of tedious, yet necessary assignments, and thank the Maker the Scottish Affair was resolved due to his keen eyes and ears.

  Such a horrid corner of the Empire, barbaric really. He glanced past the open drapes, and spied an airship emblazoned with Saint Andrews Cross along its metal skin, gaining altitude. Below the Scottish Flag was a date—7 July 1887—a sober reminder of Queen Victoria’s death. Had it really already been a year since her assassination?

  The airship’s massive backside belched a trail of dense, black smoke. Traveling by air up to Inverness and back to London would have been faster, however, a few years ago when dirigibles had ruled the skies (before these combustible, combustion contraptions polluted the air with acrid smoke and dissonance), Harland had had a close call.

  Nope. Never again. No more flaming zeppelins, please.

  A whistle blew, loud and long, the moment for which he’d waited. The oddly named Flying Scotsman (it didn’t actually fly, thank goodness) of the Caledonian Railway was leaving the station for London proper. A long nap loomed.

  No one else entered the compartment, most excellent. He stared at the empty seats across from him, and his head bobbed. A folded copy of the London Times caught his eye. He leaned across and snatched the rag. Standard stories—Prussians rattling their sabers and building war machines, while the French fortify their borders against their menacing neighbors.

  The familiar clacking of the locomotive combined with exhaustion and the comfort padding his bottom and back eased him toward slumber—

  A breeze tickled his scalp, or had something brushed the top of his head? Harland frowned and drifted.

  An unoiled hinge creaked. Harland’s eyes fluttered.

  A slam brought him to full alert, and he snapped his gaze toward the compartment’s door. Nothing.

  Bloody annoying.

  ***

  “Mister Stone,” a worried voice whispered in his ear. “Mister Stone.”

  Harland shook his head. “What is it?” He leaned toward the window and shrunk from the voice, no, the breath reeking of a full English breakfast—though on the Caledonian Railway was likely of the Scottish variety—and kinked up his nose.

  His eyes focused, and the form next to him coalesced into that of one of the conductors. He had a round face and bulbous nose, a rather Falstaff like character, only uniformed. “Can’t a man get some well-deserved rest?”

  “But we’ve a problem,” the conductor said, and straightened.

  “All right, all right,” Harland said. “Give me a moment here. How far along are we?”

  “Sir?”

  “To London.”

  “Oh,” the conductor said, “well, that’s the problem. This train isn’t going to make London on schedule. Not at this speed.”

  “That simply won’t do.” Harland sat up. “That won’t do at all.” His lower back ached and his neck had tightened during his sleep. He glanced at his watch—”We’re only an hour out of Edinburgh?”

  The conductor nodded, sending his double chin wriggling about his high-collared shirt.

  Harland’s brow furrowed as he pondered the conductor’s earlier statement. “So you have a problem,” Harland said, “and you’re of the belief I can be of some assistance?”

  “I was told to—well wake you and ask if you’d assist. We radioed the station and the Highlands Council informed us that you’re our man.”

  Harland bit his lip and his hands balled into fists. He sucked in a large volume of air—

  And yet another reason to disparage Scots. His presence in Inverness was supposed to have been kept close.

  —and blew it all out from between barely parted lips. He’d cautioned the commodore—head of the Dashing Chaps—about the clans’ gossip mongering.

  Harland laid a hand across his eyes. “So, for exactly what sort of problem do you require my assistance?”

  “Sabotage. The engineer and head conductor are both of the belief the Flying Scotsman is the victim of, well, sabotage. Sorry, said that already, didn’t I?” The conductor’s face reddened and sweat issued from giant pores.

  “No need for apologies, Mister uh,” Harland gestured toward the conductor—

  “Donald Cooper,” the conductor said.

  “Yes, Mister Cooper,” Harland said, “Are you able to articulate why everyone believes this to be sabotage?”

  Cooper shook his head. “Not precisely.”

  Harland sighed and got to his feet. Ah, but the seat was comforting. Inviting. Sleep beckoned. “Well then, take me to some people who can explain what is happening on the train.”

  “Yes, sir.” Cooper flashed a gap-toothed smile.

  Harland glanced about the compartment. “I had a bowler,” he said, “a little crumpled and dirty, but I placed it right there next to me, and now it’s gone.”

  Cooper shrugged.

  “Oh well, I’ll need a new one regardless,” Harland said.

  Cooper led Harland forward. Wood paneling lined the passageways and low-piled crimson carpet covered the flooring. They entered the restaurant carriage, now filled with people eating their breakfasts. Harland’s stomach complained, but sustenance had been shoved down the priority list, behind sleep, and now, solving their little sabotage problem.

  He paused for three seconds taking in the crowd: eight tables, four to a table. Eight married couples, roughly half happily married. The others in various states of tolerance down to not being on speaking terms. A nanny with a child belonging to one of the not-on-speaking-terms couples, and quite a few business men—one Prussian wearing a pince-nez and
a drooping mustache hanging down below his chin—

  Keep track of that one.

  —two French, two Americans, an Englishman, and a Scot. Younger men and women either returning to London or escaping the blasted lands of Scotland rounded out the carriage. The Dashing Chaps had recruited Harland for his ability to size-up situations in a heartbeat or two—it’s what made him valuable in tense situations, investigations, and negotiations.

  Eight tables of conversation filled the restaurant carriage as well as a dozen breakfasts as he passed through:

  “What a dreadful—”

  Rashers of bacon and poached eggs.

  “—breakfast—”

  Well-browned toast, and black puddings.

  “—worse though are the—”

  Harland glanced down.

  “—rats.”

  The end of a tail, or what appeared to be a tail, poked from between a man’s feet. “Sir,” Harland said, louder than intended, “you’ve a ro...dent...”

  It disappeared. The dining car quieted.

  “Excuse me?” The thin, wrinkly man peered up at Harland, and dropped his fork and knife, the metal clanking the china.

  Harland winced. “Never mind. My apologies.”

  The dining car’s conversations resumed and washed over him, as did the smells of breakfast and otherwise.

  “They better—”

  “—patch up this wagon.”

  “—I’ve a deadline, must reach the station in London on time.”

  A draft rushed through, low to the ground, and something brushed Harland’s legs.

  “Oh, dear,” a woman said a second later.

  “—sabotage?”

  Harland spun on his heels, and caught a glimpse of grey bordering on faint green vanish under a table. So tired. Seeing things now.

  “—called in an expert.”

  Harland took one last look back, and shook his head as he ducked into the next car.

  “There he is now, I believe.” A male voice, one of the Americans, said as Harland left the carriage.

  ***