KILLALOT

by Cindy Brown

  The map’s corner had been sticking out from under the latest copy of The New Yorker. I replaced it just as John Robert came back inside. “I’m off,” I said, air-kissing him on both cheeks. “’Til tomorrow!” He held the front door open for me and I left, waving to show him that he didn’t need to see me to my car. He smiled and shut the door.

  Those maps were only distributed at the faire. John Robert had said he never attended. Why did he lie?

  I pondered the question as I drove to Mother Cluckers (since it wasn’t a faireday I had time for lunch). John Robert didn’t want anyone to know he’d been to the faire because…why?

  Before sitting down at the restaurant, I slipped into the restroom to fix my wig hair and wipe off my Marilyn makeup. I’d worn today’s outfit specifically so I wouldn’t have to change—it worked as well for everyday clothes as it did for a costume.

  John Robert didn’t want anyone to know he’d been to the faire because…he was embarrassed about being a Rennie? Why would he be?

  I continued to ponder the problem over my two-piece broasted chicken special. John Robert didn’t want anyone to know he’d been to the faire because...because he was really a jouster in disguise and a killer who’d murdered another jouster with no ties to the theater. Yeah right. It was about as likely that he’d worked in the oil fields with Angus.

  After finishing lunch, I gave up pondering and went out to the fairegrounds. I’d texted Bianca to let her know I was coming. She replied that she would be at the mews.

  The faire was closed, so there was no traffic, no line to get in. I parked close to the entrance, walked through the quiet fair to the mews and opened the unlocked door. Bianca was there feeding an owl, Edgar perched on her shoulder. I stepped inside. “So you got Riley’s message?”

  She didn’t say anything to me, just nodded and handed over the keys to the fifth-wheel. She kept her back to me.

  “So you must have gotten mine, too.”

  Bianca nodded again, but didn’t turn around. “I didn’t have anything to say about the situation.”

  “But you’re open to helping Riley?

  She shrugged. It wasn’t a no. I’d give her a little time to get used to the idea, and then talk to her when I returned the keys. “How will I find the trailer?”

  “It’s on the southwestern edge of Tin Can Alley, the RV section of the camp. There’s a big eagle painted on the side. You can’t miss it.” She turned her attention back to the birds.

  I thought about Bianca’s reticent attitude as I trotted back to my truck. Was it belligerence? Nervousness? Or was she just concentrating on her birds?

  I drove to Tin Can Alley, figuring Riley’s armor might be awfully heavy to haul all the way to the jousting arena. The trailer was easy to find. I unlocked its flimsy door, stepped inside the gloomy interior, and immediately backed out. You know those little boxes they use as solar ovens? Must have been inspired by a metal trailer in the desert sun. I left the door open for the little air circulation it’d provide, and went back inside. All the windows were closed. Did Bianca keep it closed up for safety’s sake? Seemed like roasting to death was more likely than being murdered in her bed.

  Maybe not, I reminded myself. There was a killer loose, and he—or she—was connected to the two most important men in Bianca’s life. I’d probably keep my place shut up too.

  I flipped on a light switch. Oh shit. I backed away from the figure on the bench seat. His armor shone dully in the overhead light, his eyes black holes.

  Because it was Riley’s suit of armor. Sheesh, Ivy. I walked over to the invisible knight, maybe a little slower than usual, reached out my hand toward his face, and raised the visor. Empty. Phew. I knew it would be, and yet I was relieved. The way the suit of armor was seated was creepily lifelike, as if it was waiting for a tankard of ale or someone’s head on a pike.

  I examined the armor. Still a bit black around the seams from being burnt, and a very slight dent on the back of the helmet where the killer had hit Riley. I rapped a fist on the helmet. Made of pretty sturdy stuff.

  Next I looked around the interior of the fifth wheel. The place was neat—it’d have to be when you had two people living in an eight by thirty-two foot space—and had few places to hide things. No wonder the police had found Riley’s weed. I searched through the drawers and cupboards and found dirty underwear (Riley’s), books on birds (Bianca’s), and a photo face-down in a cupboard: Riley and Bianca in Ren faire finery, smiling at each other rather than the camera. Nothing of real interest.

  I wrangled Riley’s suit of armor out of the trailer and into the bed of my pickup. It took longer than I thought it would—the armor was unwieldy as well as heavy, but as I put it into the back of my pickup I realized something wasn’t right. I closed my eyes, the better to see that fatal joust. That was it—the jouster wasn’t wearing the full suit of armor. He—or she—wore chain mail, plus Riley’s helmet and gauntlets and shin guards or whatever they were called. I went back into the trailer. Ah, there was Riley’s chain mail. The suit-of-armor-knight must have been sitting on it. I lugged the incredibly heavy stuff outside and placed it alongside the armor in my pickup.

  I hopped into my truck and started it, soaked through with sweat already. I parked as close as I could to the jousting arena, got out of my truck, and picked up the chain mail. Yikes. So that’s what chain mail felt like after sitting in direct sun. I’d made a tourist’s mistake—forgetting that the weatherman measured the ninety-degree day in the shade. It was at least a hundred in the sun. I touched the metal-plated armor. Yep, even hotter, probably due to the shiny surface.

  Huh. I sat there baking in the sun along with Riley’s armor. How could I cool it down? I could put in the cab and run the AC, but that might take more power than my little truck had. Too recently, I’d watched the engine light creep into the red zone while I was stuck waiting for a train. The faire was closed, and even so, most of it was outdoors and not air-conditioned.

  Except for the administrative offices, which weren’t too far away. I grabbed the helmet, and dropped it. Ow. Too hot to carry. And it wouldn’t get cooler sitting here...Ah. I rifled through my duffle bag. There it was—my magic roll of duck tape (aka duct tape to those who don’t know the waterproof tape’s WWII origins). I wound it around both hands—triple strength—and picked up the chain mail. Still hot, but not so much I couldn’t carry it. I carefully carried it and Riley’s chain mail to Doug’s office. When I opened the door, Doug and his assistants looked up without interest. Guess they were used to people carrying weird stuff. “How about a few minutes in front of your air conditioner?” I said.

  Chapter 41

  I made a second trip to the admin office with the helmet and gauntlets and shin-thingies. Once everything was nice and cool, I wrangled it outside to a semi-shady bench. Setting the sheet-metal-armor stuff down, I took off my button-up shirt and slipped Riley’s chainmail on over my tank top. The cool silvery fluidity of it made me feel like I’d become a magical fish. A really heavy magical fish. I was pretty strong, but still, the weight of the thing made lifting my arms quite the workout. I eyed the rest of the armor I’d brought, which looked less like a fish and more like the can the tuna came in. Oh, well, in for a penny in for pound, as they said in England. As I hoped they said in England. Really did need to look up some current British slang.

  I put on the rest of the garb so I was wearing exactly what the killer did during the joust, and started walking to the jousting arena—right into a signpost. Couldn’t see much at all out of the eye slits in the helmet. It was sort of like wearing a Halloween mask that covered my whole head, except it didn’t move with me as easily. I had to turn my head to have even the tiniest bit of peripheral vision.

  And walking felt like slogging through shoulder-high mud. Could Bianca have worn this and pulled off the joust? She’d have to be awfully strong.

  I walked (clanked) pa
st a few vendors who were restocking their wares, raising a hand in greeting. They raised theirs, too, even though it was clear they didn’t know who I was. The armor was a perfect disguise. Maybe I should have disguised myself as a knight instead of a belly dancer. Wouldn’t have to go to the gym.

  Nah. Too hot. Besides I never went to the gym anyway.

  By the time I reached the jousting grounds, I’d been wearing the armor for about twenty minutes, and realized that whoever had worn it and jousted was a lot stronger than me. I dragged myself to the arena and pointed my helmeted head (the better to see, my dear) toward the staging area.

  Dang, the helmet was hot, like someone had miniaturized Bianca’s trailer and stuck it on my head. I felt like I was inside an EZ Bake oven.

  Sweat poured into my eyes, obscuring my vision even more. The helmet was claustrophobia-inducing, but it also curiously focused my attention. When you can only see a sliver of the world, that sliver takes on new importance. Before, the arena floor had looked like a wide expanse of plain old Arizona dirt, but now, tilting my head downward, I noticed hoof prints, a scrap of lace, a turkey leg bone. I was lost in those details when suddenly, I was inside the mind of the murderer, watching Angus ride toward me, his black horse flying, his lance pointed at me, coming closer and closer until all I could see was the slash of black across his eyes.

  Yikes. As an actor, I put myself in other people’s shoes on a daily basis. That ability to really understand someone had also helped me in my PI work. But I’d never had it happen when I wasn’t trying to get into character. It was kind of creepy. I pushed the discomfort away and walked across the arena to the staging area. It took me forever.

  Finally. The gate opened easily and I walked in. A tall wooden fence enclosed the space. There were two entrances: the gate I’d just used to enter the arena, and another gate that led to one of the faire’s dirt streets. I stood in the exact spot where we’d found Riley. Yes. If Riley was facing the arena, his back would be to the street entrance. It was possible, even probable, that he wouldn’t see anyone coming in, especially given the restricted vision he’d have had when helmeted. It would have been hard to hear anyone too. There was the crowd noise, the announcements and cues to concentrate on, and the peculiar Darth Vader-like sound of breath inside a helmet. Wait, was that my breath, or—

  Bang! I felt the sound as much as heard it, and then...blackness.

  Chapter 42

  Tap tap tap.

  The sound was close by and loud, ringing metallically in my ears. Someone rapping on a metal desk? Drumming on a tin can?

  Tap tap tap.

  I opened my eyes. I couldn’t see, and my head felt thick. I was lying down. I experimentally moved a leg. Heavy.

  Tap tap tap. I lifted a hand with some effort and touched my head, which was encased in...ah. I pulled Riley’s helmet off. A flutter and a little cloud of dust, then a beady eye staring at me. Edgar. Probably ascertaining if I was dead and therefore okay to eat.

  “Not dead, Edgar,” I said, sitting up slowly. “But thanks for checking.”

  “Edgar! There you are.” Bianca ran up to us, long legs covering the ground easily. She pulled up short in front of me. “Ivy? Why are you wearing that? I mean, I thought you just wanted to see Riley’s armor.”

  “I wanted to see what he could see that day. Or not see, as it turns out.” I rubbed my head. “Someone hit me on the head too.”

  “Are you okay?” Bianca knelt down in the dirt next to me.

  “I think so.”

  Bianca and I had both been through Riley’s hit-on-the-head scenario, so we thought we knew what to look for, and decided I wasn’t concussed. “It looks more like dehydration to me. Maybe you fainted.” Maybe I did. I’d lost about a gallon of water in sweat. “Come back to the mews with me,” Bianca said. “I’ve got water there, and it’s cool and dark. You can sit for a while until you feel better.”

  Maybe getting hit on the head was worth it. Maybe now Bianca would talk to me. We walked slowly back to the mews, where she sat Edgar on a perch and me on a stool, and gave us both some water. I shucked off Riley’s armor and chilled for a while, watching Bianca with the birds. She fed and watered them, then cleaned their cages, sometimes lifting the heavy cages to get at the dropping-filled newspaper underneath. Definitely stronger than me.

  After about a half hour, I stood up, not too fast, and fished Bianca’s keys out of a pocket. I gave them to her, then sat down again. “I’m going to hang out awhile longer, if that’s okay. Don’t want to get woozy on the freeway.”

  “Sure.”

  “Do you want me to take Riley’s armor back to your fifth-wheel?”

  “No. I’ll take it when I go back tonight.” Bianca seemed nervous, fussing with the birds, looking in their cages while she talked to me.

  “That’s a really nice place you’ve got.”

  The flash of a scowl from Bianca—almost a micro-expression—quickly replaced by a placid look. Huh. She clucked at Igor, smiling at him like he was a little baby sparrow instead of an enormous bird with sharp claws and a beak made for tearing meat.

  I got up and walked slowly among the cages. There was an owl, a falcon, Igor the vulture, Edgar’s empty cage (identified by a wooden sign with “Edgar Allen Crow - the Raven” in Olde English lettering), and a large cage near the back with a white sheet draped over it. I started to lift a corner.

  “Don’t!” Bianca snapped. “Sorry,” she said quieter. “It’s just...she’s sleeping. She’s been sick.”

  “I heard you help out with some wildlife rehabilitation place.” I nodded at the sheet-draped cage. “Is she part of that?”

  “No.” Bianca’s voice caught. “I don’t do that anymore.”

  “Why not? It sounds cool. And you obviously love birds.”

  Bianca turned away quickly and ducked her head, busying herself with Edgar’s cage. I almost missed the slight shake of her shoulders. “What’s wrong?” I went to her and put a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay?

  She snuffled, and turned toward me, wiping her eyes. “It’s nothing,” she said. “Just...Angus.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “I’m such an idiot. Of course you’re still grieving.”

  “So you know about me and him.”

  “Riley told me.”

  “Stupid Riley. I can’t believe he thought to mention it. He doesn’t care, not about me. Just about...”

  C’mon, c’mon, tell me what Riley was doing, how he was using you...

  “Oh, never mind.”

  C’mon... “You think he only cares about...?”

  “It doesn’t matter. We’re over.”

  Dang. So close. “Were you going to leave him for Angus?’

  Bianca bit her lip. “I was, but...” She shrugged.

  Wow, she was hard to pin down. “Were you in love with Angus?”

  “Angus was an assho—a charming bully.”

  Guess that really was his nickname. My gossip source had also said Bianca had discovered that Angus was using her. But what did that mean?

  Bianca reached up to get a cobweb off the top of a cage. The loose sleeve of her white shirt slipped down, exposing a bit of her upper arm, tinted the purple and yellow of a healing bruise.

  “Did you have a fight with Angus?”

  Bianca quickly dropped her arm and flipped her long hair over her arm. “We were always fighting and making up. One of the things that made our relationship exciting.”

  “Really?” I hated fighting with anyone. Especially Matt.

  “It’s actually how he wooed me. He stormed into the mews once, sent the birds squawking and flapping. He was yelling, ‘I am slain by a fair cruel maid!’”

  I recognized the line from a song in Twelfth Night. Seemed Angus used Shakespeare to get the ladies. I felt my face flush. I’d been won over so easily.

>   “I laughed at him, and he said, ‘O, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful in the contempt and anger of your lip!’”

  Another Twelfth Night quote. Angus was mixing up the characters, but the lines were still pretty darn effective.

  “I told him I had no time for flirting, and he said, ‘Flirting? This is beyond flirting. I can’t stop thinking of you. I burn for you. I can’t sleep at night.”

  He should have stuck to Shakespeare.

  Bianca’s eyes were unfocused, dreamy. “You don’t know how incredibly exciting it is to have a man say those things to you, to say he’s coming to you because he’s powerless to do anything else. It was...well, let’s just say that’s not how it was with Riley. So I gave in to Angus. The sex was amazing. The sense of danger added to the thrill too.”

  “Danger?”

  “Of getting caught, of course. Plus, Angus was...volatile. You felt like he might go too far at any given moment.” Bianca subconsciously pulled at the sleeve that hid her bruises. Then her eyes focused on me and her face closed down like a shade was drawn across it. “I don’t want talk about it.”

  Sheesh, first she tried to tell me about fantastic sex, which was really too much information, and then she wouldn’t tell me about Angus “going too far,” which was just the information I wanted. I tried a different approach. “You said that’s not how it was with Riley. How was it with him?”

  A slight smile, again subconscious. “Riley’s like a big happy kid. He just loved hanging out with me, eating Oreos inside the trailer when it rained, sitting around the fire with me by his side, everyone drinking and singing songs.”

  “But?”

  “But he never really committed to me. He’d tell me how cool other women were, but never that I was cool. He’d drop my hand when they were around. When he talked to them, he always said, ‘I’, never ‘we.’ You know, like ‘I’m going on a road trip,’ or ‘I live in a trailer on site,’ that sort of thing.”