by Mary Bowers
Gavin was staring at me as if I were the only one there. “You already told the police I killed her, didn’t you?”
“Actually, no. I didn’t accuse anybody outright. They asked me who might have had a motive to kill her, and at that point I did mention your name.”
“So did I,” Pixie said. Then she shrugged. “Anybody would’ve said you had a motive. You’re the one who wanted her out of the way the most.”
Lobbing accusations didn’t fit with her timid, creature-of-the-forest image, but it struck me suddenly that with Vanessa dead and Gavin accused of murder, Orwell would be left all alone with . . . Pixie. Her confidence was growing.
“I see,” Gavin said. “So I needn’t feel guilty any longer for telling them about all your motives for killing her.”
Her eyes widened, but she said nothing.
He turned back to me. “In the meantime, why don’t you tell me why I killed a woman who was on her way out of my world anyway?”
“Oh, I don’t think you killed her,” I said.
He recoiled. “You don’t?”
“No. But I may need your help to explain who did.”
“And you know who did?”
“I think so.”
Michael stirred beside me, but kept his silence. Bastet was as still as a statue.
Gavin regained his aplomb, but sounded doubtful. “All right then. I’ll play along. Ask me anything you like.”
“Thank you. You know, it’s interesting that you keep referring to your ‘world.’ Isn’t that how they refer to fictional series that create entire universes, full of magical beings, strange landscapes, outsized heroes and villains? The author creates a World that the reader wants to go to. And you and Orwell have created a World, haven’t you? That’s the appeal of The Questian Society. It’s a complete World, a very separate and special place, members only, and you love living there, don’t you?”
He looked like I was laying a trap for him. “Was that a question?”
“No. Just a comment. So where do we begin? Shall we start with cake? That seems to be the starting point for so many things.”
“Just as you like.”
“Over time, your group seems to have built up quite an elaborate ritual with the cake. It began as a concept, a stripped-down overview of life, elegantly stated in just four words. But then it morphed into something quite literal; it became a part of his legend – his insistence on retreating to the happiest days of his boyhood, and doing it every day without fail. It became a privilege to bring his cake, to handle it, to serve it, to share it with him.”
“It was my privilege,” he said. “It always has been.”
“It was still your privilege to acquire the cake,” I corrected. “At one time, it was also your privilege to serve it, I imagine. And then Vanessa invaded your World. She took over the privilege of serving the cake, she became the one to taste the cake – to eat a piece to make sure it was safe for Orwell to eat. Did she volunteer for that, or did Orwell choose her?”
“Oh, she volunteered,” Pixie said. “It was her idea, after that one time when Orwell got sick on the cake.”
“He did not get sick on the cake,” Gavin said testily. “He got sick on the entire feast he’d gorged himself with before he ate the cake. He simply overate that day. The cake was perfectly fine. You should know. It was from your bakery. As I recall, you were the delivery girl who brought it.”
“Was I? Yes, I suppose I was.”
“Anyway, I took some of the leftovers to be tested and there was nothing wrong with that cake, or anything else he ate that day.”
Pixie was looking past me again with doe eyes, and I knew just from the change in her that Orwell Quest was behind us.
“Interesting, Gavin,” he said, taking at seat behind us at the table where Jack Peterson was sitting. He was so close he may as well have been at our table, and Gavin did a quarter-turn to look at him.
“I told you that,” he said. “You refused to believe it.”
“Actually,” Orwell said, “if I recall correctly, Vanessa was the one who refused to believe it. I was rather flattered when she offered to be my food taster after that. I suppose I should have known. I am not a handsome man,” he said in a startling non sequitur. “I receive no special attention from women until they realize who I am, and that I am very, very wealthy. Even you, my little Pixie. You’re a darling thing, and I do enjoy having you around to look at, but if I had been a cake decorator at that bakery you worked at, you wouldn’t have bothered to remember my first name.”
“Orwell, you know that’s not true!” she said in a baby-like voice.
He held up a hand. “I’ve learned to accept many sad things in my life. That my mother enjoyed the company of gigolos and second-rate actors more than she did mine, that I wasn’t especially handsome, or even ugly enough to be interesting, I was un-athletic and pudgy, a man who would look as slovenly in a tuxedo as he would in dirty overalls. No lovely creatures would ever be enchanted by me. These are bitter things. I choose not to be embittered by them. Instead, I celebrate the sweet rewards of life. I enjoy the company of eccentrics. I enjoy my money. And I enjoy surrounding myself with pretty things.” He smiled at Pixie.
I expected her to look abashed, but instead she warmed to his smile and began to glow. He hadn’t made her feel ashamed; he had made her feel secure.
“Vanessa was a pretty thing,” I said.
Orwell looked at me. “Yes. Pretty. Like a water sprite. But she came into our world and caused dissention. I was becoming unhappy with her. She was cruel to Pixie. And she worried my best friend in the world, Gavin.”
I was facing the other way, so I didn’t see how Gavin reacted, but I heard him gasp. I wondered how long he had to wait between kindnesses from Orwell.
“And now, Taylor, a little bird has told me that you claim to know who has killed Vanessa,” Orwell said. “I came out to see what Gavin and Pixie had gotten up to, and somebody told me about what was going on in here. I’m greatly interested. Proceed, please. What was it that made you believe you could penetrate the mystery of who killed the terrible Vanessa?”
I thought back. “It was a conversation I had here at the convention, while Sparky was giving a demonstration. You remember Bernie, Orwell. The reporter who interviewed you at Karma café? She was tired and in a contemplative mood, and she made the observation that everyone here was playing a role. Everybody wanted to be somebody else. That gave me the motive. The opportunity wasn’t so easy, but I think I’ve worked that out. And securing the cyanide – I think I’ve worked that out, too.”
“Wait!” Orwell said. “Let me guess. The one who most obviously plays a part is our Paracelsus. He experiments with various chemicals in his own home laboratory, and so he could have a supply of cyanide. And of course, like all the rest of us, he has attended every day of the conference. Our killer is Bobby Beck, a/k/a Paracelsus. Officer,” he said, addressing Jack, “do your duty. He’s the large man in doctoral robes and a velvet cap, out there somewhere in the crowd.”
Jack frowned at him, then turned to frown at me. “Is this all you’ve got? Some guy in a velvet cap, because he wants to be somebody else?”
“Sorry, Jack. I don’t have much more than that. But I do have more than that. And sorry, Orwell. It’s not Paracelsus. If he’d been trying to sneak into Orwell’s dressing room to get at Vanessa’s bag, or picked the lock of the kitchen right in front of everybody after Vanessa left the cake in there, everybody would’ve noticed.” I looked at Sparky. “Did he go into the dressing room?”
“No. Nobody did. Nobody even tried.”
“Were you watching it all the time Ed asked you to, that first day, before Orwell’s speech?”
“I did it as a special homage to the master, even if he would never know,” Sparky said. “I never took my eyes off it, but in fact, Orwell never came out of the dressing room until it was time for him to come out and make his speech. Vanessa was in and out, and Gavin spent a lot of
time running around the conference. Pixie too. But Orwell was in there all the time.”
“That’s right,” Orwell said. “If I had come out, it would’ve caused a stir, as I’m sure you realize. Even a trip to the Men’s room would’ve been out of the question. No, I never left the dressing room until I came out for my speech. By then the floor was so crowded with people, I managed to get to the back of the room and take a seat by putting my finger to my lips and inviting all who recognized me to hold their tongues. People love to join a conspiracy, if you’ll only invite them.”
“So there was no opportunity to poison the icing while it was in the dressing room, before Vanessa brought both the cake and her bag – containing the icing – into the kitchen. She left them there and came out again to make sure everything went smoothly, up until the moment the speeches began. She took the opportunity to needle me a little, then when Ed took the podium, she made sure Orwell was in place, ready to make his characteristic entrance from the back of the room --?” I paused and looked at Orwell, who nodded.
“She gave me a wink as she went by,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows.
“And when she got to the kitchen, you said she had to unlock the door to get in.”
“That’s right.”
“She went in, locked the door behind herself and tended to the cake, unnoticed by most people. At that point, everybody was facing away from the kitchen,” I said.
Orwell held up his hand. “Edson Darby-Deaver would’ve seen. He was already on stage. This is fun,” he added, throwing a grin at Jack.
“Ed took the stage in a state of shock,” I said, “thanks to your little game of entering from the back of the audience, well after the time you were supposed to begin. He had trouble with the microphone and nearly lost his glasses, then he dropped some of his note cards. He didn’t notice Vanessa slipping into the kitchen, or he would have gone bananas. After that, the hall quieted down, and any movement at the back would have been noticed. So the only time somebody could have gotten at the frosting and poisoned it was between Vanessa’s two trips to the kitchen. It’s a pretty narrow window of time. I’ve worked it out. Vanessa brought the cake into the kitchen at about 10:35, while Purity’s workshop was still going on. She probably set her purse and the container of frosting on the counter, shoved the cake into the refrigerator, and left immediately, say two minutes later. Later, she went back in as Ed was beginning his speech, about 12:10.”
“So that gives a window of about an hour and a half,” Michael said.
“Right. And during that time, lots of people were circulating in the hall, including Edson Darby-Deaver, who would’ve stopped anybody who tried. Someone up to no good would have had to go in and come out again, unobserved by any of the hundreds of people there who might recall it later and tell the police. It would have meant taking an incredible risk. But there’s another door into the kitchen, from the old dining room, which is being used for workshops. There was only one workshop that morning: Purity’s. Nobody could have sneaked into the kitchen from that room during the workshop. But they could have afterwards.”
Purity gave a small cry of dismay.
I looked at her sadly. “The class ran over. You were in there much later than you should have been. And you took your time collecting your materials after you dismissed them, didn’t you? He didn’t expect you to still be there.”
“I was distressed,” she said. “Nobody was taking me seriously, and I knew I needed to do something. So after I’d finished the class, I lingered. I needed to make a plan. Oh, not about the aliens. I knew it wasn’t aliens. I knew it was Sparky and his robot. But I knew it was disturbing the Wee Folk, and I was worried – very worried. So I stayed in the room, alone, brooding.”
“And once things really quieted down, somebody came in,” I said.
“Hey,” Sparky said, “I’ll cop to the bot thing. That was me. But I never poisoned anybody, and I sure as hell never went into her workshop.”
“No,” I said. “It wasn’t you, Sparky. It was Phineas, wasn’t it, Purity? He wasn’t expecting you to still be there, and he was startled. And then he told you . . . a lot of things.”
“He said he’d been trying to find me, and he was taking the opportunity to see me alone, so he could tell me.” She stopped, choked up, then said, “Tell me how he felt about me.”
I looked across the table at Phineas, radiating anger. The creep had fawned all over her, filling her up with sweet nothings so she’d keep quiet about seeing him in that room at precisely that time. But he was looking at Purity, and he tenderly said, “I really do like you, you know.”
“I know,” she said bravely. “But you don’t love me. You never will.”
“I might have,” he said. “You’re an old-fashioned kind of a girl, and you do have a gift. I like old-fashioned things.” His voice was becoming dreamy.
“In fact,” I said, “you wish you’d been born long ago, into an age of gentlemen and ladies, and exciting exploration. A time when a scientist could be a man of moderate means doing experiments in the back room of his own home. Today, no independent genius can make scientific breakthroughs; we’ve come too far. But go back 120 years, 130 years, to the time of Edison and Bell and Marconi. A single man working alone could rock the world. And every learned gentleman had his learned friends. He would gather with them and discuss exciting ideas long into the night, in a smoke-filled room under gaslight, drinking fine wine and being silently attended by servants. Perhaps, if he were interested in the paranormal, they would discuss Spiritualism. Fish rain. Zig-Zag and Swirl.”
“As we do in The Questian Society,” Gavin said.
“I was getting close,” Phineas said. “We were getting close to Orwell Quest, especially after this conference. And with that bitch out of the way, The Questian Society was in no danger. Gavin and I would have nurtured it, and nobody still alive would have tried to shut it down. I was so close. Only she stood in the way. She wanted to turn him into a garden-variety Internet guru, here today, gone tomorrow. But together, Gavin and I could have built up that World, and made it real.”
“Only from what you could tell from the outside,” I said, “Gavin was on the way out. Vanessa was taking over. And with Gavin gone, everything would change. The Questian Society would be dissolved. You needed him, and you needed to get rid of her.”
“But now I know that you were against me, too,” Phineas said, transferring his stare to Gavin. “You thought we were beneath you. That show – it wasn’t me, Gavin! I wanted to do serious things. It was Sparky that turned it into a sideshow. But I planned to reshape it. I would have made it something to be proud of. You should have given me time.”
“Phineas,” Ricky said, “I think you should stop talking now. Just stop.”
But Phineas wasn’t listening. He had stopped staring at Gavin and was looking back at me, and his glazed stare was going blank.
I knew the next few moments would be dangerous. So I spoke gently, almost affectionately, and I never broke eye contact with him. “You have your own unique image, the whole Victorian World, beautiful things, all the trappings of a gentleman. And you are a gentleman. Everybody knows that. And along with the Victorian clothing, you have a snuffbox, don’t you. Put it on the table, please. We’d like to see it.”
He stared. Then, to my horror, he smiled.
I screamed for Jack, and Michael lunged across the table, but it was too late. Phineas took the tiny silver box from his waistcoat pocket, opened it, and before anybody could stop him, he swallowed the contents whole.
Chapter 20
The Activities Lounge lived up to its name for a while after that. It wouldn’t be exaggerating to say it became the Hysteria Lounge, except for the fact that Jack and his colleagues took control, got the right people out, the right people in, and made sure nobody left the premises.
There were lots of questions thrown at us – at me in particular – some of which never got answered. What did Phineas do with the poisoned snu
ffbox after using it on Vanessa’s frosting? I had no clue. The police searched everybody as soon as they realized they had a murder on their hands and it was probably a poisoning, but by that time Phineas had hidden the snuffbox somewhere. He had hours in which to do it; we didn’t find Vanessa until she’d been dead for about five hours, and presumably, Phineas poisoned the frosting about half an hour before that.
At least half an hour. If he could have, he would’ve done it sooner. He’d been hoping to get into the dressing room and find the frosting container somewhere and poison it, but the room was never left unattended, and Sparky was watching it like a hawk. Considering it a personal honor, Sparky wouldn’t even let Phineas relieve him on the job, and he didn’t dare insist. But then he saw Vanessa, with her big designer bag slung over her shoulder, take the cake from Pixie and go into the kitchen with it. If there was extra, homemade frosting – and it was a sure bet that there was – it was in the shoulder bag. She left the kitchen after dropping everything off, came out again and locked the door, and he knew he had another chance. He, Sparky and Ricky had been in the workshop room earlier that morning, helping Ed set up the tables and chairs for Purity. They all must have noticed the door that could only have led into the next room. He was good at picking locks. He knew he could get in unnoticed through that door.
Purity said he’d surprised her after her workshop (and been pretty surprised himself, when she was still there). Her story was that Phineas came in, found her alone, flirted with her a while, said something about being overwhelmed and wanting some “alone time,” (they didn’t know there was a Zone of Silence then), whereupon she fluttered her eyelashes and demurely left him in the room. After that, he must have picked the lock in the door and gone into the kitchen to find the frosting. It must have been sitting right out on the counter. Vanessa wouldn’t have refrigerated it; it would have been too hard to spread on the cake if it was cold.