I had a few minutes before my shift, so I popped my head into the ‘saloon’ to fill Vicky in on everything that I had uncovered the past few days. I was also going to tell her about my missing cat and ask her to keep an eye out for her. Maybe she could even help me put up flyers when we were both done at work.
The band was playing along and they sounded good enough, but it seemed to me like Vicky was out of rhythm with the rest of the crew, struggling to keep up. And then she hit a bung note, or the wrong chord or something. I didn’t have enough musical knowledge to know exactly what she had done wrong, but I just knew that it didn’t sound right. At all.
She looked a little pale and embarrassed as she came off the stage, and the rest of the band were sort of sighing and shaking their heads.
“How have you been?” I asked her, giving her a hug. “Don’t worry. No one noticed.” The saloon was pretty empty at that time of morning.
We’d been keeping our distance from each other while we were at work. I wondered if I had distracted her and been the cause of her weird performance, so I apologized and asked if it would be better if I left.
She shook her head and pulled me aside, whispering, “No, it’s not you, I’m just starting to feel uneasy here in this town. Like I am not safe here. Like neither of us are.” She raised an eyebrow at me. “You know, because we are witches.”
I was trying not to laugh, because it was a little ridiculous. “Vicky, we are not in any actual danger.”
She was still whispering. “Don’t you know what they used to do to witches back in the olden days?”
Okay, that was ridiculous for two reasons. Firstly, this village was set in 1870s Australia, not 1600s Salem. Secondly, it was all make-believe. None of the people we worked with were ACTUALLY from 1878 anyway. It was just people from the year 2019 dressed up in costumes.
“Vicky, I think we need to get you out of here,” I said. “Back to reality, the real modern world…at least for a little while. I can handle it on my own for a little bit while you get your head together. You can sleuth on the outside.” Like the original plan was, I thought, but it wasn’t the time to say that.
She glanced over her shoulder at the rest of the band. I could tell I was coming close to actually convincing her. “They do all seem to hate me right now.”
I wasn’t sure that was accurate, but to be fair, no, they didn’t look too impressed about her bungled banjo.
“Why don’t you at least take today off? Go and pick up your banjo and tell the band leader that you’re not feeling well.”
I watched her walking off uneasily. She kept looking over her shoulder, almost in a paranoid fashion. I didn’t like to see her genuinely scared like this. But she was just being silly…right?
The drummer, Campbell, came up to me.
“Friend of yours?” he asked, talking about Vicky.
I was playing it cool, so I just shrugged and said, “Nah, just see her around this place from time to time.” I just had a feeling it was better for the case that people didn’t know about our personal relationship. Once someone found out we were friends, then the next thing you knew, they would discover that we were detectives.
I supposed the next thing they could discover was that we were witches. But that didn’t seem likely.
“I don’t know why they even hired her in the first place. She’s far too young and inexperienced,” Campbell said.
She was definitely young, and she’d been offkey that day, but I thought he was being a little harsh. Vicky was a talented musician, and she had been practicing since she was a kid.
“She just messed up a couple of notes… It must be hard fitting in with a new band,” I said, trying to defend her without sounding like I had too much personal stake in the matter.
He rolled his eyes. “Well, if she doesn’t shape up, she’s going to be out of the band. And that will be a good thing, as far as I am concerned.”
“So, did Campbell say anything about me?” Vicky asked as we walked out the front door of the saloon and into the main street, where a horse went by and almost knocked both of us over. I literally ate dust and had to cough it out of my lungs before I could speak again.
“Er, no, not that I can think of,” I said. I didn’t want to lie to her, but at the same time, there was no point in hurting her feelings when she might not be working there for too much longer anyway.
She was shivering as we walked past all the statues in the next street. We both paused next to the statue of the women with the scrubbing board that I had been transfixed on my first day there. “Kinda reminds me of Geri, don’t ya think?” Vicky asked. She laughed and raised an eyebrow. “Maybe she was also the victim of a freezing spell gone wrong?”
Ooh. I started to get a little excited as I spoke. “Huh. I had actually thought that myself, but I thought it was kind of dumb. But now that you mention it— Yes. Maybe she has just been frozen for over a century! Maybe she is trapped—”
Vicky laughed. “I didn’t mean they were actually frozen people, Ruby. That is just ridiculous.”
“Oh.” Right. Now I felt kinda silly.
Vicky was thoughtful as I escorted her to the front gate. We watched the reenactment to the side of us, just out the corners of our eyes. Beside us, a young child was squealing as a horse trotted by pulling a carriage. A happy family waved from the carriage. The entire family was dressed in costume. There was an entry package where costumes for the day were included, as well as a set of professional photographs. “It does feel like we have traveled back in time, though.” She had that same worried look in her eyes. Like we were going to be burnt at the stake for being witches if we weren’t careful.
“But we haven’t,” I reminded her brightly. “And we are safe.”
But as Vicky left to go and catch a bus out front and I watched her, I was shivering. I kept looking over my shoulder at that statue. Was she moving? No, no she couldn’t be. Geez. Maybe I was the one who needed a break from Old Swift Town.
I spun around and saw Dean staring at me. And my stomach completely dropped as I saw that he was talking to Marissa, of all people. They looked incredibly chummy, laughing together while they both glanced at me. They were whispering together. Dean pointed at me and then turned away, a look of scorn in his eyes. Whoa, what was with that weird look he’d just given me?
There was a loud banging noise and I realized that I hadn’t acclimated to the gun noises after all.
I was not going to just let this go. If these two were gossiping about me, I wanted to know what it was they had to say. They could say it right to my face instead of laughing and giggling like schoolchildren. I had no time for that sort of thing. So, I marched right up to them.
“What is so funny?” I demanded.
Marisa turned a little white, but Dean stood up straight. “You have some nerve showing your face here today after what happened at the dance.”
“Huh?” I asked, completely confused. “Look, I know I skipped out on you a little early and I’m sorry, but I don’t know why that makes me an outcast or worthy of this sort of scorn.”
Marissa had her hand on her hip. She was glaring at me. “Dean told me what he saw you do.”
“And what is that then, exactly?” I asked, rolling my eyes.
She glanced down at my rib cage. “He said he saw you using magic. You, Ruby Sparrow, are a witch.” She looked me up and down. “Also, you’re a detective.”
The words were dropped like a dead weight.
Uh-oh.
Maybe we weren’t so safe after all.
6
I had heard of witch hunts, of course. Who hasn’t? I had even been the victim of one, years earlier, before I’d even known I was a witch, quite ironically. Before I’d become a PI, I was a teacher at the local primary school. And one year, there had been a sort of panic amongst the parents after an article was published online that some of the teachers were ‘damaging’ young minds with the books they were choosing to read to the kids, which w
eren’t approved by the education board. For instance, once I had read my classroom Matilda by Ronald Dahl. This corrupted young minds, apparently. I was called a hippy, and ironically enough, a witch. Then there was poor Mr. Dutton who dared to read his class Harry Potter. We were both disciplined. So, I knew all about witch hunts. But I never knew that they could be so literal.
And what about detective hunts? Were those a thing? Could I claim that I was being unfairly discriminated against for being a detective? Because once the word was out in Old Swift Town, it felt like everyone was my enemy—and all eyes were on me.
Sarah didn’t even look up at me as I entered the candy shop. “Marvin wants to see you,” was all she said. “Immediately.” She tied a bow on a bag of green candies and threw it to the side.
My corset was digging into me as I trudged my way down the main street past the horses and the saloon where I could hear a Vicky-less band playing, though I didn’t dare to even adjust it, let alone escape from it again.
I just kept thinking, What do they do to witches in this town?
But I should have been more worried about my other secret identity.
Marvin was looking me up and down like I was a meal that he hadn’t ordered but had had set down in front of him anyway. I felt like I was completely on display, cut open, even though I was still fully clothed, corset and everything.
He tapped a pen against the desk and leaned back in his seat. He hadn’t offered me to sit down, so I was still standing, feeling like I was on complete display. I could feel the corset digging into my ribs.
“You applied for this job under false pretenses, Ruby.”
“That’s not true!” I exclaimed, sounding far too defensive and far too desperate to keep the job. I was, though. I was SO close to getting Marisa and now that she had exposed me like this, I had even more of a personal stake in the matters.
I composed myself and smiled at Marvin as I sat across from him at the desk, even though I still hadn’t been invited to sit down. “I love candy,” I said with as much sincerity as possible. “I have a huge passion for it. That was the only reason I applied for the job. And it’s the reason I want to stay here. That, and I love the history of this town.”
But he pulled a small rectangle out of his wallet, looked at it, placed the business card on the desk, and slowly pushed it across to me while I tried not to gulp too obviously.
I saw my name up the top and the name of my PI business below. I was just thankful in that moment that I hadn’t updated them yet to include Vicky as an alternative phone number. No one knew she was a detective or a witch yet. She was our sole hope.
“But you love being a detective more, I can only presume.” Marvin leaned back in his chair and peered at me.
“I— Business has been slow,” I said, trying to sound a little contrite. But genuine. “Yes, I have started a PI business, but that isn’t paying the bills yet. In the meantime, I still need a way to make ends meet. I need a job.” I grinned at him for good measure. Surely he would understand how tough it could be to make money at a business without a good reputation.
I thought this all sounded convincing enough. And partly it was true. I mean, it had been tough starting a detective agency from scratch. Sure, I had gotten plenty of inquiries about whether I could find people’s missing pets, but besides those, business had been kinda slow. In a way, I’d gotten ‘lucky’ with the Teresa case, though that seemed liked a strange way to think about it.
Marvin stood up. “So Teresa Orchid’s death has nothing to do with that fact that you are here.”
I looked up at him, acting stunned. “No. Gosh, Marvin. Of course not.” I put my hand to my heart—or tried to. Instead, I only felt the bone of the corset. “I know nothing about any of that.” I shook my head and tried to look offended that he was even suggesting such a thing.
But he wasn’t buying anything I was saying, and I was wondering how good at being ‘undercover’ I actually was.
You’ve really blown it this time, Ruby.
“Go back to the candy shop and collect your things. I want you out of the park by the end of the day.”
Vicky had a lot to say about unfair dismissal and all the lawsuits I could bring against the park. “This is not a fire-able offense,” she said with her mouth full of candy. She had a lot of passion for the topic. Apparently, she had lost a few jobs in her time.
That made sense.
“Marvin just wants you out of there because he has something to hide,” she said, biting down on the lollipop that she had pulled out from a pile of other candies on top of her milkshake. It was from this ridiculous “unicorn” style shake she had ordered that had cotton candy on top and everything in rainbow colors. It made a crunch under her teeth and for a moment, I thought we were going to have to take a trip to the emergency dentist, seeing as it was after five pm. We were the last people in the coffeehouse.
“Maybe,” I said, sitting across from her in the coffeeshop. I’d ordered a far less colorful hot chocolate “Or maybe he just doesn’t want the reputation of the park sullied again after it just started to get back on its feet.” I swirled my spoon in my hot chocolate and dunked the marshmallow under the surface. I thought that was the more likely explanation. “While people are still digging around and asking questions, the park is still going to be associated with the incident.”
Vicky nodded. “Hmm, you’re right. Smart. You’re a good detective, Ruby.”
I laughed and thanked her, even though I didn’t feel like much of one right then. “Good detective or not, how much use am I going to be if I can’t even set foot inside the park?” Not only had Marvin told me I was fired, I wasn’t even allowed to enter the park as a tourist. Maybe I could still buy that wig and sneak my way in.
Vicky was grinning at me as she held up the now bare candy stick. “You’ve still got me on the inside, silly! No one knows who I am.”
“But…aren’t you worried?” I lowered my voice. “About being caught as witch?” I still hadn’t been sure that Vicky was even going to return to work. She hadn’t been back since the day she’d messed up rehearsal.
She shrugged a little and tried to reassure me that she was fit to return to work the following day. “Nah, it’s no big deal. I’m not worried.”
I stared at her, trying to figure out if that was true or whether she was just trying to reassure me. It also wasn’t ideal, having to rely on Vicky only while I was banned. I was still questioning how valid her information was when it got relayed back to me secondhand, kind of like Chinese whispers. Something got lost in translation.
I came up with a plan.
“Okay, so if you’re my eyes and ears, then I am REALLY going to need you to be my eyes and ears. Okay?”
Vicky took the final sip of her milkshake and looked at me with wide open eyes. “Er, what do you have in mind?” She looked a little nervous.
But there was no need to be. I had trained for this in PI school. And I had spent a lot of money on the equipment that we were going to use to pull this off.
I winked at her. “I’ll go home and get the kit organized. We’ll meet here tomorrow morning and get you all strapped in.”
7
I could hear the nervousness in her voice. “Am I doing this right?” I could also hear the horses in the background. It was almost like being there, except that I was comfy in my blue jeans and blazer, watching everything through a special app on my phone. Vicky was coughing from the dust in her face.
“Try not to talk to me too much,” I advised her. “At least not while anyone is looking or listening.”
“I really don’t think I should be wearing a Bluetooth,” she said, turning her head and body, which caused the camera to shake a little and I lost focus of where we were in the park. The road parallel to the main street, I was pretty sure. I could see the statues.
What Vicky had said was true. No one was wearing a Bluetooth earpiece in 1878. Even putting it on with her bonnet over the top was risky. But
I needed to know everything that Vicky was hearing and seeing, as she was hearing and seeing it. Hence the camera and the speaker. She was the eyes and ears, but I could still be the brain, guiding her from the sidelines.
Her brooch contained a tiny little camera, one that I had bought at the spy equipment shop, so that I could see pretty much everything that Vicky could see. And I was telling her everything that she needed to say. But it worked better with communication going only one way, so I reminded her again not to speak back to me unless she absolutely had to.
“Okay, I will shut up now. Just one last thing. What should I do to avoid detection?”
“Just stay clear of Marvin for the day and you’ll be good as gold!” I told her.
Speaking of gold… A few days earlier, a tourist to the park had found a little nugget of gold while panning in the shallow river and news of it had reached social media and the local breakfast TV shows. It had spurned a sort of mini gold rush to the park, and on that day, there was a tourist bus filled with people who’d come from all over the state hoping to strike it rich. And I was missing all the fun. Well, what seemed to be fun. I had to keep reminding myself that what I was mostly missing was dust in my face and kids with broken teeth screaming for their parents.
Vicky was being pulled away by Campbell, who was telling her that Marvin had modified the park schedule for the day to accommodate all the extra visitors, and so everyone would be pulling double shifts. The band had been moved out of the saloon and outside to the river bank to entertain the gold panners.
“Great,” I said into my end of the microphone. “This might not have been the best day for this plan.”
I heard Vicky shriek and quickly looked at my phone screen to see what had happened.
There was a tourist jumping up and down with something small, shiny, and wet in his hand. One of them had actually found a small gold nugget. Maybe the gold rush should never have ended in Swift Valley. Maybe there was still gold to be found in the hills.
A Cold Spell Page 5