The Mystery Megapack: 25 Modern and Classic Mystery Stories

by Talley, Marcia

  We returned to the city-house of Licinius Aper, but the horsemen did not dismount, nor did I get out of the carriage. I sent one of the secretaries in to fetch him. When he emerged, I leaned out between the curtains of the carriage—it would not do to let him see our informant—and told him where we were going. I suggested he come with us.

  He pleaded his health, the heat, the roughness of the road.

  “Nevertheless, I think you should come,” I said.

  There was nothing he could do. He followed in his own carriage, driven by one of his burly slaves. And so the whole company, carriages, carts, the troop of mounted soldiers, would through the town and up into the hills, where, after a time, it was indeed cooler. A pleasant breeze blew. It was nearly sunset by the time we reached the villa. Under other circumstances, I might have appreciated the view or even written a poem about it.

  But not now. My mind was turning. The last pieces of the puzzle were coming into place. Pudens, Arpocras, and I had all sat in silence during the journey, each of us thinking. I exchanged glances with my colleagues, but none of us wanted to say anything in front of Theon.

  We burst into the house without formalities, leaving the porter and the household slaves fluttering, trying to make excuses to their master.

  “This is an imposition,” Licinius Aper protested. “After all my hospitality, all my kindnesses, is this how you repay me?”

  “I believe something which I hope is wrong,” I replied. “I sincerely hope I am misinformed. If I am, someone will pay, and I will give you my profoundest apologies.”

  “Well, then, let’s go back to the city and discuss this over dinner like gentlemen, shall we?”

  Instead I proceeded to a certain room. The door was locked.

  “There’s nothing in there.” said Aper. “That room is not in use.”

  I nodded, and some of the soldiers forced the door.

  It was a large, high-ceilinged room, with murals on the walls. It might have been an extra dining room, or even a bedroom, but there was no furniture in it now, and it was, indeed, not in use.

  The thousand-breasted Venus leaned against the back wall, propped up rather precariously, her arms reaching out toward us. Now that I saw it up close, it was, indeed, a deeply alien thing, a frightful image, really, of perhaps great antiquity. It had, indeed, no legs. Breasts like udders covered the whole body, front and back, but for the arms and the fierce, mask-like face. It was, I would guess, about ten feet tall.

  Some of those present let out cries of amazement. A couple of the Aper’s servants tried to run, but soldiers caught them. Pudens, Arpocras, and I all looked at one another, as if to say, it is as I thought, even if, very likely, some of our theories differed.

  But before any of us could congratulate one another, Licinius Aper put on the most amazing performance of his otherwise unconvincing career. He knelt before the goddess. He beseeched her forgiveness. For all he purported to despise barbaric images, I think he was afraid. I think he saw the workings of supernatural providence in this. I think that, far more than anyone else, he was utterly and genuinely astonished to find her here.

  All of my theories collapsed at that point. I was at a loss. But before I could say anything or do anything, the whole scene came to its dreadful climax. I don’t know if Licinius Aper had somehow bumped against the statue, or if his massive bulk dropping down before it had shaken it from its doubtful balance, or if there was another, less explicable cause, but so quickly that no one could react, stone began to grind and the goddess moved. She fell forward, her marble arms reaching out to embrace Licinius Aper, her awful face bending down to kiss him—or to devour him.

  The statue crashed to earth. There came more cries of amazement and horror. Several people ran from the room and no one stopped them. In the eyes of the Greeks, I am sure, the goddess had taken her vengeance. All I can say is that there was a lot of blood, both arms and the head broke off, and marble breasts scattered all over the floor.

  I too wanted to run away, but I remained steadfast. Even Arpocras looked on speechless, as did Pudens. I was the one who managed to tell the centurion to bring the informer Theon in to see what had happened, and when he did, as Theon reacted, the chain of events almost began to make sense again. Almost but not quite. There were still huge and mysterious gaps.

  Theon rejoiced. He laughed. He virtually danced for joy, and once more launched into a vast recital of the sins of Licinius Aper, which only stopped when I broke in and said, “I arrest you, Clodius Carus, on some charge or other. I am sure I will think of something.”

  He babbled in protest as the soldiers grabbed him. I turned from the horrible scene and hurried away.

  Arpocras ran after me. I have never seen him so flustered. I think what amazed him the most was that for once I’d thought of something he had not.

  “But … how did you know it was Carus?”

  “He and Aper were two of a kind. Who else would know so much about a man’s misdeeds, and be so eager to relate them, except his mortal enemy? Aper and Carus had this fault in common. They both talked too much.”

  * * * *

  These events did not settle the puzzling affair, Most Noble Emperor, not entirely.

  Since Clodius Carus was not a Roman citizen, I could have him interrogated locally. I am told he became incoherent under torture, but there was evidence of sufficient crimes that I had him executed.

  Yet the enigma remains. There are three explanations at which one might grasp: the first that Licinius Aper stole the goddess, hid it in his country villa, and merely put on a last, desperate performance for us when his enemy, who had learned of it, exposed him. But I reject this. He was too convincing at the end. He wore his lies like a badly-fashioned mask. I think he was sincerely astonished and even terrified to see the goddess there.

  Or could it be that the fatally-loquacious Clodius Carus stole the goddess, placed it in Aper’s villa with the connivance of corrupted slaves, in order to destroy his enemy? The image actually crushing Aper was an accident, but the result was the same. This, indeed, is what both Servilius Pudens and Arpocras think happened.

  The people of Claudiopolis cling to a third view, which sometimes, toward which, in unguarded moments, I lean myself: that Aper stole the goddess, hid her elsewhere, and she came of her own accord to deliver her vengeance.

  * * * *

  I write to you then, Sir, with a specific question.

  Something has to be put back into the temple, to restore the religious commerce of the city. Was Arpocras correct, that the true forms of divinities may never be apprehended by human senses, and that consequently all such images, however grotesque they might seem to Roman eyes, are equally sacred? Should I take this opportunity to install a proper, Roman Venus in the temple, or should I employ a local craftsman to recreate the goddess in her original form?

  * * * *

  4. Trajan to Pliny

  You should restore the goddess in her original form, to which the Bithynians are accustomed. It would certainly be out of keeping with the spirit of our age to demand such a change in immemorial religious usage.

  Very likely, your wise Arpocras is correct. Certainly the gods and goddesses work through human agencies in mysterious ways. No one can deny that.

  REAR VIEW MURDER, by Carla Coupe

  “Is he dead?”

  Her voice broke on the last word. She pushed lank, damp hair off her forehead, the musical tinkle of her charm bracelet loud in the momentary stillness. Sunlight sparkled off the crisscrossed street signs on the corner, ghosting the words “Fourth” and “Cedar” onto her retinas.

  The cop shifted his weight from one foot to the other and glanced down at her, the shade of his hat brim a dark slash across his broad sunburned cheeks.

  “Looks that way.” His voice an unexpected tenor. “He must of cracked his head on the pavement when he went down.”

  She nodded and wrapped her arms around her knees, staring at the deep scratches on the toe of the cop
’s left shoe. Dead. The cracked cement curb radiated heat, the thin cotton of her shorts little protection against the rough surface. A crumpled package of Lucky Strikes lay in the gutter beside her. His?

  With a shudder, cold and hot flashing over her skin faster than a Times Square marquee, she tightened her grip on her sweaty legs. Her cotton shirt stuck to her back, drops of perspiration trickled between her breasts. It was beginning to sink in. She’d killed a man.

  A muffled clang buffeted the humid air, cut off in mid-strike, then began the deep resonant tolling from St. Cyril’s. They still hadn’t fixed the bells, even after … how many years? She counted the peals. Five o’clock.

  She raised her face as the sound shivered into stillness. “He just walked into the street right in front of me. I didn’t even have a chance to stop.”

  “Yeah, miss. I got it down when you told me the first time.” The cop rubbed his nose.

  A local boy, she thought, her mind veering onto yet another tangent. Most of the boys she’d grown up with had noses that size and shape: squat, fleshy, eastern European noses. Over half the town could still trace its roots back to the same handful of villages on the Ukrainian-Polish border. Their ancestors—and hers—settled in these coal-rich hills, working in the mill down by the river, saving up to buy a tiny house with a deep front porch up by the Orthodox church.

  Dark, wet patches spread under the cop’s arms. A shrug, a glance over his shoulder at the knot of people busy on the other side of her car. “Lucky for you, you got a couple witnesses who say it was an accident, too.”

  Lucky, indeed.

  Her lips twisted, and she lowered her head. The charms bit into the tender underside of her arm. She’d taken a man’s life.

  Her fingers groped for the small boot that hung on the bracelet. Drops rolled down her cheeks, collecting in the corners of her mouth. Salty, like a faint taste of the sea. The cop would take them for tears of shock or sorrow.

  * * * *

  The door of the bar had opened and three men emerged, squinting in the brutal sunlight.

  Mouth suddenly dry, she took a sip of her soda and glanced at the clock on the dash. 4:07. As she suspected: creatures of habit. She tucked the cup into the holder between the seats and pulled out of the parking lot. The tires sent an empty beer can skittering across the broken asphalt. Two of the men, bellies lapping over their belts, crossed to the left side of the street near the corner. They turned and called to the other man. Brown hair scraped back into a scraggly ponytail, a faded yellow Steelers tee-shirt stretched across his narrow shoulders, he flipped them the bird and continued his shambling course down the opposite sidewalk.

  Keeping the speedometer exactly on twenty-five, she headed down the street.

  Not much traffic. A quiet time, school buses finished with their routes, and the evening shift at the mill already underway. Down the steep curve of the hill; remember to flip on the right turn signal and brake for the stop sign at the bottom. The two men stood on the left corner, gesturing expansively. She craned to see around them. All clear. A pause, a breath. Then she turned the wheel to the right and pressed the gas. The car shot forward.

  A flash of yellow as he stepped into the path of the car.

  Fast, so fast her foot still held down the pedal, the hood plowed into him. For an instant, his startled eyes met hers. Then a thud and his body rose, a crane poised for flight, quickly aborted. A shout from behind. She jammed on the brakes, her heart pounding wildly, a scream clawing its way up her throat.

  He sprawled on the patched asphalt, arms and legs twisted, yellow against black. And red.

  She struggled with the seatbelt catch. The belt retracted with a whirr. The two men she’d passed pounded up to the car; one wrenched open the door.

  “Jesus Christ, lady! You—”

  “I didn’t see him!” Her nose wrinkled at his cigarette-and-beer stench. “I turned, and he stepped out in front of me.”

  The man raised one hand and shaded his eyes. The hair on his arms glinted gold, his fingers tightened on the door frame. The other man knelt on the street, next to the … He looked up, ran a hand over his thinning hair and shook his head slowly.

  “Damn,” the man beside the car murmured. “You got a cell phone, miss?”

  She nodded and fumbled in the backpack on the seat next to her. Her hand shook as she pulled out the phone, and the man gently took it from her.

  “We need an ambulance.” His voice husky, he stared at the men in the street. “There’s been an accident at the corner of Fourth and Cedar.”

  * * * *

  Her Aunt Natalie had warned her about the speed traps when she first arrived, so she’d been careful when she drove around town. Things had changed so much over the years; the neighborhood she’d grown up in suffered from what politicians called urban blight, and what her aunt called too damned high property taxes and not enough decent work. A few landmarks remained, though. Enough for her to get her bearings.

  Fat raindrops polka-dotted her windshield as she turned down Fourth, passing boarded-up shop fronts—the shoe repair, the beauty parlor, and the little grocery where her mother would send her to buy a forgotten dinner ingredient. Where she and her best friend Donna would spend their hard-earned dimes and nickels on licorice whips or a box of Cracker Jack. Across the street, Pete’s bar, sole survivor on the block, celebrated business with lurid neon lights that could barely be seen through the grime-caked windows.

  She dug into the take-out bag on the passenger seat and pulled out a French fry. Blew on it before folding it into her mouth. Hot. Salty. Greasy. So good. Scanning the deserted street, she slowed down, then pulled into the trash-strewn parking lot across from the bar.

  Turning on the radio, she twisted the dial until the muted sounds of soft rock filled the car, then sat back, occasionally munching on a fry and watching raindrops spatter on the hood and windshield. Fog hazed the windows. She cranked down the one on the driver’s side, clammy air thick on her skin. She’d forgotten the smell: sharp, acrid, stronger when the wind blew up the valley, or when the air hung still and damp.

  She’d checked her watch twice, and the fries left at the bottom of the carton were cold when the bar door opened and a man stepped out. A limp ponytail hung out the back of his black Steelers cap, jeans rode low over skinny hips. He hunched his shoulders against the drizzle and stuck his hands into his pockets before turning and walking away, swaying like a sailor newly ashore.

  He staggered down the street, never pausing or turning his head, disappearing below the crest of the hill. He’d cross Cedar Street at the bottom, take the direct way home. Her clasped hands felt like blocks of ice. When she took a shaky breath and forced her hands apart, the street was long deserted. The chill in her bloodstream quickly turned to heat.

  No. Hate.

  She checked her watch—4:17—then twisted the key in the ignition and peeled out of the parking lot.

  * * * *

  “It’s good to see you, girl.” Her aunt had smiled, faint echoes of her grandmother and mother in the shape of her aunt’s jaw, in the faded blue eyes. “It’s been too long.”

  She smiled back at her aunt and sipped her iced tea. A bead of water meandered down the glass, dampening her fingers as she stared down at the pile of potato chips and the sandwich on her paper plate. Two slices of bologna on white bread, spread crust to crust with mayo; it used to be her favorite. Could she eat it now without gagging?

  “Work keeps me busy.” Which was true, during the day, at least. At night, memories roamed freely. That was what she had come here for, to make her peace with those memories.

  “And life in the big city.” Aunt Natalie gave her a knowing look. “So, have you found a nice boy yet?”

  Instead of answering, she asked about Uncle Mike and her cousins.

  After lunch, they moved to the tiny living room. Aunt Natalie settled in front of the TV—a huge monstrosity housed in a cabinet, bought with pride in 1968—to watch “her story,” h
er feet propped on a vinyl hassock, a bottle of Iron City on the TV tray beside the chair.

  Time to get to work.

  “I’ll just make a couple of phone calls while you enjoy your show, Aunty.” She had to raise her voice above the toilet paper commercial, blaring at rock concert volume.

  Eyes already glued to the set, Aunt Natalie waved a careless hand in acknowledgement.

  She opened the hall closet. The phone book—so meager, compared to the ones she was used to now—sat on the shelf. She pulled it out and took it, along with her cell phone, to the front porch. The big glider squeaked softly when she sat. She flipped open the phone book and slid her finger down the cheap paper, finally stopping on a name.

  Still here. Still in the same house, his parents’ house.

  Would she recognize him after all these years? Stupid question; of course she would. She’d know him even if she turned into Helen Keller and had to run her fingers over his face.

  Disgusting thought.

  She knew where he’d be after work. All she needed to find out was which shift, and that should be easy enough.

  It only took a moment to look up another number, pick up her phone, and dial.

  “Mary Beth? Hi, it’s me. Long time, no see, I know. Well, I’m in town visiting my aunt, and she’s in the middle of soap opera heaven. I wondered if I could come over and catch up. Find out what the old gang is up to.”

  Her lips stretched into a smile and she pushed back her hair.

  “Great. Let me grab my purse. See you in a few minutes.”

  * * * *

  “Who’s that?”

  Frowning, she had stared at the guy standing across the school parking lot. He leaned against the hood of a white Camaro, his crossed arms almost obscuring the Steelers’ logo on his shirt. A chill breeze tossed strands of long brown hair around his face and stirred the thick layer of leaves on the pavement.