by Kay Hooper
“Smart man. Any sign of Jasper yet?”
“Nothing. Tom and Farley combed the woods a little while ago, but they didn’t find anything. It’s getting late, too. Malcolm has the tea party going.”
“You aren’t playing?”
“Not today. You’d better go rescue that man of yours. He was looking tense when I last saw him.”
Taking that advice to heart, Maggie left Tina’s wagon and went in search of Gideon. She found him leaning against a wagon wheel as he watched the ritual poker game from a distance of several yards, his expression far less bemused today than it had been yesterday.
“Didn’t they invite you to play?” Maggie asked him.
“Yes. Maggie, where have you been?”
“Making sure we had all the paperwork your lawyers will need for the transfer of ownership.”
“This place has paperwork?” he asked incredulously.
“You’d be surprised,” she murmured.
“I am. I’m also trying to think of a way to get even with you for leaving me in the hands of that…that demon seed.”
“Sean?” Maggie smiled up at him. “He couldn’t have been all that bad.”
“I’ll admit I’m not used to children. But Sean is not a child. A midget, maybe. Do you realize he hears and sees everything? I mean everything. He started telling me things I really didn’t want to know.”
“For instance?”
“Tina colors her hair. Oswald is trying to teach his parrot to say some…impolite things. Farley wears blue shorts under his kilt—which answers that age-old question. And somebody named Merlin found a bear pond. What on earth is a bear pond, and who the hell is Merlin?”
“A bear pond? Beats me. And Merlin was before my time. Gideon, I should go into town so I can call my mother; I promised her I’d keep in touch. Do you want to get away for a while? Have dinner or something?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
Maggie smiled. “All right. I’ll change and meet you by your car in a few minutes.”
She left word with Tina and then changed into a silky skirt and print blouse. Within half an hour she and Gideon were on their way into town. Conversation was casual, with Maggie setting the tone by asking him about his work and his usual lifestyle. He answered her questions as lightly as they were asked, feeling a definite relief to be away from the carnival.
When they reached the small town, Gideon rather dryly suggested the only restaurant that wasn’t part of a fast-food chain; it had a lounge that served drinks and provided piano music, and the food was supposed to be the best in town.
“I guess that means more variety than burgers and fries?” Maggie said with a laugh.
“Probably. Are you game?”
“Sure. Look, there’s a phone out front. Why don’t you go in and get us a table while I make my call?”
“All right. But don’t let some stranger steal you away.”
“I’m not in the mood to be stolen.”
“I hope you’re in the mood to dance.”
Maggie waited until they got out of the car to answer, then said, “I love dancing. Meet you inside.”
She went to the pay phone on the corner, just down the street from the building. She glanced over her shoulder to see that Gideon had gone inside. Before she could even lift the receiver, a somewhat imposing and very familiar figure came around the corner of the building and smiled at her.
“Uncle Cyrus! What are you doing here?”
—
The moment he was inside the restaurant, Gideon knew that they’d have no trouble getting a table; the place was only about half full. Still he reserved a table for seven o’clock and said they’d be in the lounge until then. He returned to the door to wait for Maggie, looking out through the glass panes more to reassure himself that she was still there than out of curiosity about her call.
She wasn’t alone.
The man standing before her, head bent as he listened to her talk, looked like a king-size version of a Kentucky colonel. He was a big man, dressed all in white and leaning slightly on a gold-headed cane. From where Gideon stood, the man looked very old; he had thick white hair and a full white beard. But there was something about him that spoke of a great deal of physical strength no matter how many years he had put behind him.
Gideon watched as Maggie talked earnestly, then saw her pull a folded piece of paper from her skirt pocket and hand it to the man. The paper was unfolded and studied, and then the man said something to her that brought a smile to her face.
Gideon retreated from the door, feeling curiously unsettled. What the hell was going on here?
It looked good-natured, she thought; still, it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that it ought to be treated with respect.
Chapter 5
Gideon said nothing about what he’d seen. At first when Maggie came inside the restaurant, her eyes were as guileless as a child’s. They went into the dimly lighted lounge where a bored looking young man in a dinner jacket was playing the piano. There were only about a dozen people, couples mostly, and everyone was talking in hushed tones.
They found a small table tucked away in a corner, and when the waitress came, Gideon ordered brandy; he thought he might need it. Maggie ordered plain tomato juice.
“I get strange when I drink,” she explained.
Gideon waited until the waitress had left, then said, “You get strange when you drink?”
“All right, then—I get even stranger. What’s wrong, Gideon?”
As usual in her company, he found it all too unnervingly easy to say exactly what was on his mind. “You tell me. What’s going on?”
Her candid green eyes studied him for a moment, and also as usual, she surprised him.
“Oh. You saw Uncle Cyrus with me outside.”
The contrary thought popped into Gideon’s head that it would have been nice if she’d prevaricated at least a little this time. He could have gotten mad and maybe vented some of his tension. Despite his earlier words to her, his vaunted patience was hanging by a thread; he wanted to understand her now, dammit, and it was driving him crazy to believe she was deliberately hiding something from him.
“I saw you with someone,” he said finally.
“That was my uncle Cyrus. He’s interesting looking, isn’t he?”
Gideon didn’t offer an opinion. “Since you haven’t mentioned relatives living around here, I can’t help but wonder what he was doing here.”
“I asked him that. He and Aunt Julia—she’s here, too, he said—moved to Oregon a while back, so I thought they’d be there. But they travel a lot.”
“So what are they doing here?”
“He didn’t say.”
Gideon stared at her. “I thought you said you asked him?”
“Oh, I did. But he didn’t answer. He’s like that, I’m afraid. He’s got the ears of a bat even though he’s older than rocks, but he only answers the questions he wants to.”
“Older than rocks?” Gideon ventured.
“Just an expression. But he is old. Very old, I think. I traced the family tree back as far as the turn of the century—and he wasn’t on it yet.”
“You’re sure he’s your uncle?”
“Well, no. That is, I’m sure we’re related, I’m just not exactly clear how. Everybody else in the family is younger than he and Aunt Julia, I think, and we all call them aunt and uncle. However we’re related, they are the heads of my family, we all agree with that.”
Their drinks arrived, and Gideon took a healthy swallow of his. Fortified, he said carefully, “Is there any reason why you didn’t introduce me to him?”
“You weren’t out there.”
“Maggie, why do I have the feeling you really would like it if I changed the subject?”
“Because you’re perceptive?”
It was difficult for Gideon to get angry in the face of her hopeful air; in fact, he wanted to laugh. But various kinds of frustration could erod
e even the kindest of tempers—and his was hardly that. “I’m also stubborn,” he told her. “It’ll save time if you tell me what’s going on.”
“I don’t think I want to do that. Have you noticed that we talk about time just the way we talk about money? We save time and spend it—save money and spend it.”
“Are you making a point of some kind?”
“Not really, I guess. It was only a passing thought.”
Gideon finished his drink. He wished that he’d ordered a double. “You obviously aren’t willing to tell me what’s going on. All right,” he said. “Let’s see if I can work it out on my own.” He frowned at her for a moment, then shook his head. “Dammit, I can’t. Give me a clue.”
“I think the butler did it.”
“Maggie.”
She sipped her drink, watching him speculatively. “What makes you think something’s going on?”
“Tension among the carnies that you could cut with a knife. A missing carny—and I checked Jasper’s wagon, Maggie. All his things are there, and why did he leave them if he were going away for good? The fact that you’re clearly hiding something from me. And an itch at the back of my neck that tells me I’m being watched every moment I’m at the encampment.”
Her eyes widened slightly, then turned thoughtful. “Being watched? You should be used to that by now, I’d think; they all watch you.”
“I don’t mean it that way. I mean there’s someone watching me on the sly—someone who’s taking a hell of a lot of trouble to make sure he doesn’t get caught at it.”
“Even today after we made the announcement?”
“Yes.”
Maggie didn’t like that. She didn’t like that at all. Her innocent expression began to change. If Gideon was right—and he didn’t strike her as paranoid—then her quarry considered him a threat apart from his ownership of the carnival. But why? She couldn’t come up with a single answer to that question. But there was one answer she was sure of. If Gideon was a threat, he’d have to know about it so that he would be on guard.
“Maggie?” The chameleon had changed colors again, he realized. Her eyes were direct and clear, her features almost imperceptibly sharper. This face matched the mind he had suspected lurked underneath all the layers: quick, intelligent, serious, and quite rational.
She braced herself mentally and kept her voice quiet when she began to talk. “I wasn’t going to tell you because I think I know how you’ll react. But it looks as though you need to be aware of some things.”
“What things?”
“A few weeks ago a member of the carnival, missing for a while, was found dead…at the bottom of an old, abandoned well. The police decided his death was accidental, that he’d fallen in, maybe in the dark. They were satisfied with their conclusion.”
“But you weren’t?” Gideon was watching her intently.
“I wasn’t with the carnival then. But the man who was killed was a cousin of mine. Merlin.”
“Sean’s Merlin?”
Something shifted in the back of Maggie’s mind, gone too quickly for her to grasp it. But it would come clear sooner or later, she thought. She hoped. “Yes,” she said. “My aunt Julia decided he’d been murdered.”
“She’s his mother?”
“No. Or at least, I don’t think so. She’s never said she was.”
Gideon blinked. “Another vague connection?”
“I suppose.”
He drew a deep breath. “But she decided he’d been murdered. She was with the carnival?”
“No, she was in Oregon.” The expression on her face and in her voice was still serious, in comparison to which the words were lunatic. Gideon sent a glance down at his empty glass, wishing again that he’d ordered a double. He took a moment to try to find a logical thread. He failed. “Why did she decide he’d been murdered? I mean, what led her to believe that his death wasn’t accidental?”
A faint glint of sympathy shone in Maggie’s eyes. “It sounds absurd, I know. All I can tell you is that my aunt Julia’s pronouncements are rarely—and I do mean rarely—wrong. If my aunt Julia told me the sun rose in the west, I’d believe her until I found evidence to the contrary.”
“All right, I’ll accept that since I don’t seem to have a choice. She decided he’d been murdered. And then?”
“She called me.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m the logical member of the family,” Maggie said.
He stared at her.
“Well, I am. And I’m very good at solving puzzles and problems. I’ve become sort of a troubleshooter for the family over the past few years. So, naturally, she called me.”
Deciding to ignore her claims of logic for the moment, Gideon said carefully, “Do you mean your aunt sent you to look for a killer?”
Maggie nodded gravely. “Well, Cousin Merlin’s spirit could never be at peace until his murder was solved. Aunt Julia didn’t want him chained to that awful well for eternity. Think how bored he’d be.”
“Maggie, you don’t really believe that stuff?” His question was cautious.
“It doesn’t matter what I believe. Cousin Merlin believed it. And Aunt Julia says it’s always safer to hedge your bets, so she’s willing to accept the possibility. So, on the possibility that he was right, we owe it to Cousin Merlin to resolve his death and set him free.”
It was said with such reasonable understanding that Gideon was more or less forced to accept it.
“All right,” he said slowly. “For whatever reason, your aunt sent you to the carnival to find a murderer.”
“Yes.”
“And have you?”
“Not exactly. But I’m working on it.”
“How are you working on it?”
“There wasn’t much I could do at first except watch and listen. Merlin was well liked and didn’t have a temper to speak of, so I doubt he made somebody mad enough to kill him. He was an old man. A very kind and honest man. So why would anybody want to murder him? I couldn’t think what the motive might be until something you said today rang a bell.”
“What did I say?”
“You called the carnival a sanctuary. I started to think about it, and I realized that it would be a good place for somebody to hide if they’d committed a crime.”
“What kind of crime?”
“My bet is a profitable one, with the spoils valuable enough to make murder worthwhile. Otherwise, why bother? I think Merlin found out something and threatened the killer with exposure. He would have done that; he was always honest.”
She frowned briefly. “Suppose you’d stolen something valuable and decided to lie low until the statute of limitations ran out. A carnival would be a good place to hide. Very good, in fact. Always on the move, in costume whenever you wanted to be, and plenty of places to hide the goods.”
“But carnies are suspicious of outsiders,” Gideon objected.
“Right. Which means that either you’d have to be familiar with the life, or else be good enough to fake it.”
“Like you,” Gideon murmured.
She smiled. “Like me. You would also have been a part of Wonderland no longer than seven years; if you’ve hidden a fortune in one of the wagons or cages, you wouldn’t want to wait any longer than necessary to claim it.”
“That’s logical as far as it goes,” he admitted. “But you don’t know what was stolen, where it was stolen, how long ago it was stolen. Your assumption is based on the theory there was that initial theft.”
“I know, it’s a shaky long shot. But it’s all I’ve got. I checked the Wonderland books and found two people who’ve been with the carnival less than seven years.”
“Who are they?”
She hesitated. “I’d rather not tell you yet. Wait a minute,” she added when he opened his mouth to speak. “I’ve got a very good reason.”
“Which is?”
“With the best intentions of being objective, I’ve still come to know those people. And that knowledge
might be coloring my ideas of who the killer could be. You don’t know them; you’ll be more objective. Until we have something that points specifically to one person, I’d rather you consider the whole problem with a completely open mind. If you’re suspicious of everyone, you might notice something I’ve missed.”
“ ‘Problem’? Murder?”
“It’s as good a word as any. Do you agree?”
“Not with the word—but I suppose you’re right not to give me the names. For now, anyway.”
“Good.”
He nodded. “So you found the names. And then?”
“I noted down where the carnival was when they joined up, along with the exact dates they arrived. Uncle Cyrus is checking that out for me.”
“Looking for thefts?”
“I need a few facts. All I’ve got so far is wildly speculative and based, as you said, on the assumption that behind at least one murder is a thief protecting his cache.”
“At least one murder? You think he’s killed again?” Gideon frowned, then said, “Jasper.”
“I hope he’s wandered off. I really do hope so. But if he found out something he shouldn’t have…”
“Go to the police,” Gideon said flatly.
“And tell them what?” She steadily held his gaze. “We have a carny who’s been missing, for certain, only since this morning, not even twenty-four hours. We have a death weeks ago that the police in another state judged to be accidental. And that’s all we have.”
“I don’t like it, Maggie.”
“Neither do I. Especially if somebody’s watching you.”
He thought about that for a moment. “Why me?”
“Exactly. I thought at first that you’d be a threat to the killer if you planned to break up the carnival. That made sense; he wouldn’t want to lose his handy hiding place. It’s also one of the reasons I was so hard on you. If you’d announced you were going to sell out piecemeal, he might have panicked; there goes his nifty hiding place, and you were responsible for the loss. But that wasn’t the announcement you made today. And if he still considers you a threat, the question is definitely why. I don’t know the answer. Do you?”