Gilded Latten Bones

23

As mistress of an empire spanning the full underbelly of TunFaire, employing more than a thousand people, Belinda had obligations outside Fire and Ice. And she had digging to do. Yet she just sat there staring at Morley, muttering, while seated on a hard folding chair, courtesy of the genius of Kip Prose and the production acumen of the Amalgamated Manufacturing Combine.

Miss Tea had brought four chairs.They took hardly any room when folded. No doubt they cost a fortune. And cheap knock-offs would be available within weeks if I remained unavailable to fight for Amalgamated's intellectual property rights.

There are laws but we have to enforce them ourselves.

"Belinda?"

She did not respond.

"Hey. Girl. Listen up. Investigator working here. Let's get on with the questions and answers."

She turned weary eyes my way.

"A long time ago, two days and a few hours, you told me some things about Morley's situation. There have been changes since, all moving toward the less specific and more ambiguous."

"That can happen when you talk to witnesses."

"True. You had an eyewitness. Now you don't?"

"Like I told you, he disappeared. His story didn't hold water, anyway."

"A ringer."

"Looking back, I think he was fishing for a trace on Morley. I wasn't thinking clearly. I didn't hide the fact that he was alive."

"Could he have been the villain himself?"

"I don't know."

"Sergeant Berry insists that we're up against a sicko. Could he be one of those who feeds on the action around his crimes? Some even try to get in with the tin whistles so they can tag along during the investigation."

"Could be. I'll bet this one is sick in more than one dimension."

"Remember what he looked like?"

"If I was an artist I could paint his picture."

"You have trouble drawing stick figures."

"I do."

"We could recruit an artist."

"I don't think. . Hell. I know my powers of description aren't good enough."

"I was thinking we could have the Dead Man capture the image and pass it to a skilled painter. We have some good portraitists in TunFaire."

Belinda glared like she meant to cause spontaneous human combustion through sheer willpower.

"I thought you'd be too paranoid to do it the easy way."

"Paranoid? Me? You're the loon if. ."

"Suppose he did rummage through your head?"

She did not answer. The idea terrified her.

"He's done it before. You survived. What would he do with anything he found? Besides sit around radiating smug because he'd gotten a peek up your skirt?"

She had no ready answer. The arrival of a flustered Miss Tea saved her the need. Miss Tea gushed, "You better come down, ma'am. The bloody, frigging Crown Prince his own self is here."

Belinda said, "Looks like I'm needed."

"Want me to come with? I know the man."

"Bullshit. You don't even ooze between the toes in his circle, let alone run."

"Bet that and you'd be wrong. He asked me to be his own personal, private investigator one time." And I turned him down. I like being my own boss. As I have been since I told him, "Sorry, no." The job had gone to a clever rascal called Lurking Felhske instead.

Felhske was sure to meet a bad end. So I told myself while stalking the floors of Amalgamated's manufactories, hoping to intimidate the rare fool who would steal from his employer at a time when people starved if they lost their job. Amalgamated and Weider Brewing were the only employers creating jobs, these days. And I worked for both.

Sitting there in the waning hours with the queen of crime and a best friend who couldn't show me his mocking smile, I had no choice but to look at who and what I had become. Which left me a little embarrassed.

Belinda told me, "You stick to your job. I'll charm Rupert."

"Try not to hit him. If you do, though, try to pull your punches."

"Wiseass. I keep telling you I'm not that girl anymore."

Yes, she was. She just hid it better. And she was about to go into the presence of an abrasive and condescending personality.

For all his high-mindedness and determination to do right for Karenta, Rupert was a dork. He was a hard case about his good works but did not have a ghost of a concept of royal subjects being anything but social and mental inferiors.

He was a shepherd oath-bound to shield his dumb animals from danger.

"Good luck then, darling," I told Belinda.