“Your Majesty,” one said, bowing his head and taking the old man gently by the elbow. “Are you all right?”
“Never better, my lad, never better,” the king said, patting the guard on the hand. “Just having a nice chat with my two new friends here.”
“Your wife is terribly worried about you, Your Majesty,” the other guard said. “She sent us to find you and bring you back to your chambers.”
The king appeared to think this over and then nodded. “Yes, I imagine that’s for the best. Can’t have my darling bride fretting over me. Off we go, then.”
The guards guided him off toward the nearest staircase, and as they turned to head down it, the king called back to Dick and Big. “Have a lovely evening, my fine fellows!” He gave them a hearty wave, then disappeared.
Dick and Big walked back down the hallway in a daze. They re-entered their suite and Dick took a moment to catch his breath.
“We need to wake the others,” he said, and Big nodded.
The two men crossed to Ewan’s room. Dick knocked and called Ewan’s name before turning the knob and swinging the door wide.
He and Big froze in their tracks. Ewan was lying naked on his back in the bed. Anne, also very much naked, was astride him, grunting and moaning softly as she ground herself against him.
“Eeeeeeeewwwwwwwww!” Big cried, impossibly loud in the otherwise still night. “Old people sex! Ew ew ew ew ew!”
Big ran from the room, his hands over his eyes. Ewan and Anne paused their activity and looked over at Dick, who felt himself go hot.
“I’ll—” Dick said, taking steps backward. “Just gonna—sorry, I—okay then.” He swung the door shut. In the communal room, Big was running laps around the dining room table.
“Oh God oh God oh God,” Big was panting. “Can never unsee it. Never unsee it. Burned in my brain forever. Oh God oh God oh God!”
He ran past Dick, who grabbed him and swung him around so the two men were facing each other.
“I know this is traumatic for you,” Dick said as Big squirmed in his grasp. “It’s no picnic for me either. But we have more important things to deal with right now, okay?”
Big covered his eyes with one hand and his mouth with the other. Dick pulled them away.
“Okay?” Dick pressed.
Big finally nodded. He dry-heaved once, but then seemed in control of himself.
The other bedroom doors opened as Weatherbee, Hissie, and Siya emerged, bleary-eyed and confused. Ewan joined them, his normally coiffed hair sticking out in every direction, and then Anne emerged as well. They were both, thankfully, robed.
“What in the world is going on?” Weatherbee asked, as Big continued to curse and Ewan and Anne glowed unabashedly.
“There’s a lot to unpack here,” Dick said wearily. “You’d all better sit down.”
“Rubbish,” Weatherbee spat after Dick finished telling him and the others what had happened. “I don’t believe it.”
“Which part?” Dick asked, nettled. He assumed they’d already be discussing what their next steps would be, but here was Weatherbee, a roadblock that Dick hadn’t anticipated.
“That King Edmund is the Wordmonger,” Weatherbee said. “The very idea is patently absurd!”
“Weatherbee,” Dick said, trying to hold on to his temper, “he confessed. Big and I both witnessed it. Not to mention the fact that he had unfettered access to Edwin’s bedroom, which explains how the typo ended up in there without the guards seeing anyone coming or going. It all fits.”
“Lieutenant Shonnary,” Weatherbee said, his voice rising, “you’re suggesting that the King of England is a murderer.”
“I’m not suggesting any such thing, Inspector Frienderfoe,” Dick replied, his hackles continuing to rise. “I’m stating it outright.”
“Gentlemen, please,” Anne interrupted, and all eyes turned to her. “Now let’s think this through. If the current Wordmonger is the same person as the previous Wordmonger, then my father certainly fits part of the profile, inasmuch as he was here in the palace forty years ago and is still here today.”
“You see?” Dick said to Weatherbee, who scowled.
“But back in 1972, the Wordmonger made threats on my life. And now he’s made threats on the lives of my entire family. What would motivate my father to do that?”
To that, Dick had no response.
“You see?” Weatherbee said smugly to Dick.
“I don’t claim to have all the answers yet,” Dick said. “But I do have a suspect and a confession, which is all I need for now. I’m going to see the captain of the King’s Guard.”
He rose from the table, and Weatherbee rose as well. “Lieutenant Shonnary, you cannot accuse the monarch of the realm of a high crime!”
Dick leaned forward on the table and locked eyes with Weatherbee. “‘Cannot’? Are you attempting to obstruct justice, Inspector Frienderfoe?”
“Whoa, hey, now let’s all just take a nice, cleansing breath here,” Big said, standing up himself. “Can we please sit our asses down and open the discussion to the rest of the team?”
Dick and Weatherbee continued to glare at one another, but both men slowly returned to their seats.
“Thank you,” Big said. “Goddamn, I never thought I’d see the day when I was the voice of reason.”
He turned to Hissie, Siya, Ewan, and Anne.
“All right, we all know where Dick and Weatherbee stand on the issue,” he said. “Siya? What do you think?”
Siya took a deep breath before she spoke. “I don’t know. It just seems so unlikely. The king creating an alter ego for himself? And if he were the Wordmonger, he’d have to be immune to typos and have a manageable tic.”
“Is immunity to typos genetic?” Anne interjected.
“Sometimes,” Ewan said. “Why?”
“Well, I’m immune, as is Edwin,” she said. “And he’s our father. Not that I want this to be true, you understand.”
“Hissie?” Big asked. “Thoughts?”
Hissie looked from Weatherbee to Dick, then back to Big.
“He confessed,” she said resignedly. “If we were discussing anyone other than the king, we’d already be making the arrest.”
Weatherbee looked as though he’d bitten deeply into a lemon. Hissie cast her eyes down to the table.
“Love Machine?” Big asked Ewan, and the tension in the room lightened just a bit as both he and Anne grinned guiltily.
“The king swears an oath to the country and the realm,” Ewan said. “I refuse to believe he would willfully ignore that oath, and I cannot accept he would attempt to bring harm to his own family.” He patted Anne’s hand.
“Anne?” Big said.
“The king has been a good father,” Anne said after a long, thoughtful pause. “Not a wonderful father, but a good one. He has served this country faithfully for nearly seventy years. Tonight’s events notwithstanding, I would much rather we endeavor to eliminate him as a suspect.”
“How?” Ewan asked.
“For the moment, let us keep the information about my father’s actions tonight confined to this room. Over the next forty-eight hours, we can all begin making new inquiries based upon what we know. We should learn whether or not my father has an alibi for the night the two guards were killed, as well as when the two signs appeared. We should check the records and see if the king was in the palace—or even the country—the night Ewan spoke to the Wordmonger on the telephone. If we can find nothing that definitively clears his name, then yes, let us move forward with formal charges.”
There was a sudden knock on the door to the hallway.
“Yes?” Dick called.
The door swung open to reveal the figure of the captain of the King’s Guard. He was in full, resplendent dress, and Dick wondered if the man slept in his uniform.
“I understand there was an incident of some kind involving the king this evening,” the captain said without preamble. He looked squarely at Dick. “Do you have
something to report?”
Dick looked briefly around the table, then back at the captain. He took in a deep breath, unsure of what he was about to say.
“Not . . . at this time, sir, no.”
The captain scowled and took a step farther into the room.
“Then at what time, Lieutenant Shonnary?”
Dick stood, refusing to be intimidated or bullied after everything that had happened over the past few hours.
“You will receive a report when I have gathered all of the relevant facts,” Dick said coldly. “Marion.”
For a brief moment, it looked like the captain was going to reach for his ceremonial sword and run Dick through with it. Dick didn’t flinch.
“I’ve killed men for less,” the captain said menacingly through clenched teeth.
“That will do, Captain,” Anne said, rising from her seat and crossing the room to wedge herself between the two men.
“Your Majesty!” the captain said breathlessly, and bowed his head. “My deepest apologies, I didn’t realize—”
“If you’re going to apologize to anyone, do so to these fine people,” Anne said, cutting across him. “You’ve been unduly harsh toward them since their arrival, and it stops now. You’re both here to protect my family, so you will treat them as equals and allies. Is that clear?”
“Y-yes, Your Majesty,” the captain said, bowing again.
“Good. You’re dismissed.”
The captain backed out of the room and closed the door behind him. Dick smiled at Anne. “Thanks for that.”
“And thank you for covering for my father,” Anne said, returning his smile. “Does that mean we are agreed? Forty-eight hours?”
Dick gestured that Anne should return to her seat. She did so, and he followed suit.
“I’m not saying I like this, but all right. Forty-eight hours to clear the king’s name. But if there are any more attacks or attempts over the next two days, the deal is off and we formally charge Edmund. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” Anne replied.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
There was a definite coolness that had settled into the team as they shared a quiet breakfast the following morning, and it was reflected in the seating: Dick, Big, and Hissie, who had all assumed King Edmund’s guilt, sat together on one side of the table. Weatherbee, Siya, and Ewan sat on the other. Anne, perhaps appropriately, sat at the head.
After the plates had been cleared, Weatherbee looked across at Dick. “May I?” he asked stiffly.
“By all means.”
“Very well. Siya, you and I will make subtle inquiries about the king’s sleeping habits, and find out if he’s prone to nightly excursions. Ewan, check the archives and see if you can establish whether the king was here the last time the Wordmonger struck. Anne, do you think you can glean any insights by speaking with your mother? Without showing our hand?”
“Leave it to me,” Anne said brightly.
“Hissie, Big, Dick, can you conduct another round of interviews with the staff? See if anyone can recall seeing the king out wandering on the night the two guards were killed? Or his whereabouts when the two signs appeared?”
“Of course,” Hissie answered for them.
“Excellent,” Weatherbee said, rising. “Good hunting, all.”
Dick didn’t need to go far to start his staff interviews; he started in the hallway right outside their suite where the guards had been killed and he and Big had had their encounter with the king.
Pen and notebook in hand, he knocked on doors and made note of the ones that weren’t answered. He found a few butlers and maids and spoke to them, but they weren’t able to tell him anything of consequence. He finished his sweep, then circled back to the unanswered doors to try again.
He knocked on a door halfway down the hall from the suite, and a pretty blonde girl putting the finishing touches on her maid uniform swung the door open with a neutral expression.
“Oh, hello again,” she said, her words laced with a heavy brogue. “What can I do for you?”
“Hi there,” Dick said amiably. “You’re . . . Patience, am I remembering that right?”
“Aye,” she said. “And you’re Dick, if memory serves.”
“That’s right. Look, I know I already interviewed you, but I was just wondering if I could ask you another question or two.”
“All right, ask away, but don’t make me late for my rounds.”
“I’ll be quick, I promise,” Dick said. He thought about how to phrase his next words. “Tell me . . . have you ever seen King Edmund wandering the palace at night?”
The girl’s eyes narrowed. “That’s an odd question.”
Dick raised his eyebrows. “Is it?”
“Well, I mean to say, it’s his home, isn’t it? And he’s the king, so he can do as he pleases in his own home.”
“So you’re saying you have seen him walking the hallways at night.”
Patience crossed her arms. “Aye. I have.”
“And the night the two guards were killed?”
“They weren’t just two guards,” she said, clearly getting annoyed. “Their names were Colin and Neil, and they were friends o’ mine.”
“All right, then. The night Colin and Neil were killed, did you see King Edmund anywhere?”
She pursed her lips, looking back at him defiantly.
“Patience?” he prodded.
“Aye, and you should have a bit of patience yourself,” she said tartly.
“Look,” he said, leaning in and dropping his voice. “I’m just trying to get to the truth here, whatever it is. If you don’t help me, a lot more people could join Colin and Neil. Is that what you want?”
He could see the internal struggle on her face as her eyes darted out to the hallway, around the doorframe, and back inside her room. Finally she locked them with Dick’s.
“All right,” she said, her voice just above a whisper. “Yes. I saw the king that night.”
“Go on,” Dick said, his pen ready on his notepad.
“I was just about to turn me light out when I heard a noise in the corridor here,” Patience said. “I think now it was the sound of Colin’s body and Neil’s body hitting the floor.”
She looked slightly nauseated at the thought, but pressed on.
“I opened me door a crack, and saw the king strolling past, as though he hadn’t a care in the world.”
“It didn’t alarm you that Colin and Neil were lying there dead and the king was a few doors down from them, walking away?”
“I didn’t see Colin and Neil!” she exclaimed. “I saw the king and closed the door as fast as I could.”
“Why?”
“If you’d had your arse pinched by the king as many times as I have, you’d avoid him too.”
“And then what happened?”
“I got into bed, and then you and your lot raised Cain when you found Colin and Neil, and I got up like everyone else on the floor.”
Dick cast his mind back to that night. They had all been so focused on the dead guards, none of them had looked in the other direction. The king had probably just turned the corner, as he had the night Dick and Big found him.
“Why didn’t you mention any of this to anyone before now?”
“Why would I?” asked Patience.
“You saw the king in the same hallway where you know two bodies were found,” Dick said.
Patience looked at Dick as though he’d gone crazy. “Aye, but it’s not as though the king killed them.” Realization dawned across Patience’s face, sharpening the lines around her eyes as she put it all together. “Oh, angels and saints preserve us,” she said, an incredulous smile bursting onto her face. “You think King Edmund is the Wordmonger!”
“Shhhhh!” Dick said. Patience merely laughed and shook her head.
“You know what you and your lot should do,” Patience said. “You should pay closer attention to the palace gossip. And make no mistake, there’s plenty of that.”
“Oh?” asked Dick. “And what would I know if I listened to the palace gossip?”
“That there’s no way the king could possibly be your Wordmonger.”
“Why not?”
Patience smiled a knowing smile. “As often happens to those in advanced years, the king’s eyes have failed him. He can’t read.”
Dick spent the rest of the afternoon conducting more interviews, but now adding in the question of the king’s eyesight. Everyone he spoke to confirmed it: Edmund could still see, but due to his advanced age, could no longer read the printed word.
He returned to the suite in the early evening to find everyone already gathered around the table, looking somber. Ewan looked up.
“Ah, Dick. There you are. We were just about to discuss our findings.”
“Well,” Weatherbee began, “it seems that the king is quite the night owl. He spends more nights than not walking the hallways of the palace.”
“Indeed,” Anne said. “Mother says that when she wakes and finds him missing, she sends members of the King’s Guard to track him down. She’s constantly fearful he’ll fall and hurt himself.”
“Ewan?” Weatherbee prompted.
Ewan shook his head. “They keep meticulous records here, and all of them show that the king was at Buckingham Palace the entire time the Wordmonger was here the first time.”
“Hissie?”
She shook her head as well. “I spoke to as many staff members as I could find. None of them knew anything that could help.”
“Same here,” said Big.
“Dick?” Ewan asked. “Anything?”
“As a matter of fact, yes,” Dick replied, and he recounted his conversation with Patience.
“Why, that’s wonderful!” Weatherbee exclaimed, his face lighting up. “If he can’t read, surely he can’t write! So he couldn’t possibly be behind the typos!”
“He’s not out of the woods yet,” Dick said soberly. “We still have him at the scene and we have his confession that he slipped the typo under the door. So even if he’s not originating the typos, he’s delivering them.”
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