by Angie Fox
“How fortunate for you that you’re not a monkey,” De Clercq said.
Yes, well, the inspector wanted to put Frankie in a cage for eternity if we didn’t solve this mystery. I pursed my lips and kept my opinion to myself for once. I didn’t think the inspector would appreciate the irony.
De Clercq opened his pocket watch. “Our timing is excellent.”
“Excellent for what?” I readied myself.
“For murder,” he said simply.
A bloodcurdling scream split the night air. I instinctively looked to the monkeys, but I knew that they weren’t responsible this time around. That had been a woman’s cry.
De Clercq tucked his watch away. “It is done. Follow me,” he ordered. Then he stepped right through the door.
“We could have been there.” This was ridiculous. “We could have helped! Why didn’t we hurry?” I asked, trying the door handle.
Naturally, the entrance was locked.
De Clercq obviously knew the timeline by now, and he wasn’t one to miss a detail like a time of death.
De Clercq paused just inside the door. I saw him clearly through the broken glass. “The dominant ghost, whom I also believe is the killer in this case, has hidden the crime,” he said gravely. “We can only deal with the aftermath.”
“How awful,” I said. Worse, it suggested we were dealing with a very powerful ghost. I pondered that thought as De Clercq once again left without me.
It wasn’t like I could climb over the doorway or through the shattered panes.
I turned the handle and banged my hip against the door in an attempt to force it open, but only succeeded in getting rust on my dress and most likely a bruised hip.
“Frankie,” I pleaded, as if he could help.
Frankie let out a curse and looked to the inspector, who didn’t even slow for Frankie this time. The gangster lowered his voice. “You gotta start carrying around a jimmy kit if you’re going to take breaking into places seriously.”
“I’m not breaking into anything,” I told him in no uncertain terms.
“You’d better start,” he said as if that were my only option. And perhaps it was.
I would have to use one of the side windows. Those were bigger. And full of jagged shards in my realm, not to mention solid glass on the ghostly side. Great. I gathered my skirt and kicked in the window in the ghostly realm. Glass shattered, and I cringed at the icy sensation that clung to my foot.
“Speed it up, buttercup,” Frankie urged, passing through the entrance the inspector had used moments before.
Yes, well, I didn’t want to slice myself open while I was throwing away the remains of my dignity.
“You should also wear more practical clothing,” Frankie said from the other side as I used my generous skirt to brush broken glass off the windowsill. “I recommend black pants,” he added as if I were some sort of protégé. Smoke curled from his nose. “I mean, if you’re going to commit to a life of crime, doll, you ought to commit to doing it right.”
I liked him better when he left me alone to go suck up to De Clercq.
“I’m not committing crimes,” I corrected, clinging to the rotten wood as I hoisted a leg over, “I’m solving one.”
“Hold on to that thought,” Frankie advised as I levered myself up and through the window frame.
When my feet touched the floor, I eased my rear off the windowsill and settled onto the slivers of glass below with a wince. Hopefully, none of them would poke through my sandals. I’d dressed for a date with a police officer, not a gangster.
“If you could hurry, Mr. Winkelmann?” the inspector called. He was already halfway down the central hall of the long dark building.
“You got it,” the gangster assured him as I shook out my dress. “Coming right up.” As soon as De Clercq turned his back, Frankie’s smile vanished. “Damn, I can’t wait to get this over with. I could get labeled as a snitch just for being seen with this guy.”
“We haven’t run into anyone you know so far,” I reminded him.
“We’ve only met the monkeys,” he said.
Good point.
“Hopefully we’ll solve the case quickly, and then you’re scot-free.” No more inspector breathing down our necks. No more trips to strange, dark places—at least not under the threat of Frankie’s imprisonment.
It was dark in the menagerie. I pulled out my mini flashlight and clicked it on.
Two different hallways loomed in front of me, one superimposed on the other. The first was the present-day mess of dirt, leaves, and glass. The second appeared the way the dominant ghost saw it. Clean, bare. Dark, as if the menagerie had closed for the night.
It made sense. The party was going on at the main house.
Anyone in here now—save for us—was probably up to no good.
We followed the inspector deeper into the building. It became harder to keep my bearings with cages on either side instead of windows. From the outside, the menagerie seemed to lead to the main house. I clung to that thought as we ventured deeper.
Pale, glowing eyes stared out at me from the cage on my right. I was about to take a closer look when a low, menacing growl trickled from the cage to my left.
I swiveled, and my light landed on a ghostly mountain lion. It hissed and bared its teeth. I backed away. Fast. Straight into the cage on the other side.
A furry body screeched and rattled the bars at my back.
“Holy geez!” I rocketed back into the center of the hall. When I was tuned in to the ghostly plane, those things could take a bite out of me. Or worse.
The round, watery beam of my flashlight shook as I trained it on the path ahead.
“It’s going to be fine,” I reminded myself.
I hoped I was right.
I tucked the flashlight under my arm and smoothed my sweaty palms over my dress. Nearly every cage was occupied by the spirit of whatever animal had once lived there. You’d think some would move on.
Perhaps some of them just moved out.
I whipped around and shone the light behind me, revealing an empty corridor.
I didn’t like this one bit.
A prickle of unease crawled down my spine as I ventured deeper, careful to keep my footing in the rubble. That prickle grew into a full-fledged ache in my gut when my light shone upon a cage with the door flung open.
No telling what it had contained.
“Frankie,” I said quietly, “did this place ever house any big, bad, dangerous animals? Besides the mountain lion?” At least its cage had seemed solid.
“I wouldn’t know. I was never invited here, remember?” he said, his image flickering into existence next to me. He’d chain-smoked his cigarette down to the nub. He was as nervous as I was.
The hallway turned a hard right up ahead, and I spotted a dark corner, perfect for something to watch us from. Or jump out of. And right now, I was vulnerable to every ghostly animal in this place. If I could see them, then they could hurt me.
“Too bad you can’t dissolve,” Frankie muttered, stubbing out his cigarette.
No. I was very much open to attack.
We neared the corner, and a pair of orange eyes stared out at us from the darkness.
“Oh, no, ohnoono,” I said, dashing around the corner.
I couldn’t go back. It was too far, and who knew what might be following us. But we had to be near the end. I clung to that thought as I hurtled forward through the darkness.
“Jesus!” Frankie cursed, on my tail. “What did you stir up this time?”
No clue.
I ran so fast I buzzed right past Inspector De Clercq.
He glared at me, but I didn’t care. I whipped back and saw a wide-eyed Frankie behind me. He’d lost his hat and wrinkled his suit. He stood panting as if he needed to breathe. Of course, he didn’t, but it showed how freaked out he was.
“Did you see what it was?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Only that it was massive.”
“G
reat.” I heaved out a breath.
“Are you two finished?” De Clercq snapped.
I nodded. I’d been right on one count. We were almost out of the menagerie. Only a circular wrought-iron cage stood between us and the side of the house.
The bars had been hammered to look like vines, and the top was an elaborate filigree dome. A trembling young couple emerged from behind it. The girl leaned into the man’s embrace like her legs might go out at any moment. Her lipstick was smeared, and the top few buttons of his shirt were undone. It was clear that they’d been—
“These two were in the middle of a tryst when they found the body,” De Clercq said, his tone crisp.
A ghostly boa constrictor coiled inside the cage with a grown man in its grasp. The wide, glistening body of the snake wrapped around his torso, shoulders, and neck. I gasped when the ghostly boa tightened its grip, scales gleaming as its thick body looped up and over the poor man’s gaping mouth.
Chapter 6
I stared at the dead man crushed in the coils of the snake.
“Hey,” Frankie burst out. “I know that guy. That’s Greasy Larry!”
De Clercq dipped his chin. “County Judge Lawrence Knowles,” he said, his tone clipped. “I’m sure that colorful nickname derived from the ease with which men like you could grease his palm. We were opening an investigation into his acceptance of bribes when he died.”
Frankie did his best to appear unaffected, but I saw the way his eyes jumped and his features tightened. No doubt the inspector noticed too. De Clercq rarely missed a thing.
As the investigator drew closer to the dead man and the snake, Frankie pulled me aside.
“This is bad.” He crammed a finger between his collar and his neck as if he could feel the noose tightening. “Plenty of my guys would have offed old Larry to shut him up, especially if he was about to get investigated. Think De Clercq’s trying to set me up?”
“If the inspector knew who did it, he wouldn’t be asking for your help,” I assured him. But he was right. We could be in real trouble here.
The young couple began to slink away.
“You can’t leave,” I told them. They were witnesses.
De Clercq directed a sharp glare my way. “They are free to go. I have questioned them extensively. For years.”
Right. He’d been on this case a long time.
I watched as the young couple hurried out the door toward the house.
“Okay, I have a question,” I said, earning a look of disdain from the investigator. “You said earlier that the dominant ghost has hidden the actual crime. What did you mean by that?”
De Clercq’s frown deepened. “Our killer is the dominant ghost. That means we see the events through his or her eyes. This ghost has chosen to delete the record of the murder altogether.”
Frankie shifted his shoulders uncomfortably. “I didn’t know anyone could do that.”
“It’s rare, but possible if the killer is a psychopath,” the inspector said, “capable of divorcing himself or herself from the actual crime so completely that he or she can make the memory of the event vanish. And since in this case, the killer was also the only witness, we can’t see the event, either.”
“Oh my,” I murmured. That was new. “It must take a ton of energy.” Especially since this ghost had kept the truth hidden for decades.
De Clercq stood stiffly. “Some ghosts use their power to go poltergeist. Some are able to move objects in your plane. Our killer uses a considerable force to dominate this place and block out the memory of the past.”
“So Greasy Larry suddenly appears inside the cage with the snake,” Frankie said, his gaze flicking back toward what remained of the crooked judge.
De Clercq gave a sharp nod. “We see him enter the menagerie at 9:02 p.m. We see nothing more until he is dead at 9:18 p.m.”
Frankie nodded slowly, no doubt fearing the worst. “That snake works fast.”
“What else happens during that sixteen-minute period?” I asked. “Maybe we should have gone to the party at the house to see who was missing.”
The inspector directed a withering look at me. “I’ve tried that.” He thawed slightly and shook his head. “The party inside is a separate event. It’s based on the combined memory of every guest who attended. It’s the same ghosts, but the events do not progress exactly the same as they did that night in 1928. Memories can be…imprecise.”
Through the windows I saw party guests spilling out onto the lawn, some into the menagerie itself, most of them still holding their drinks. Excited chatter filled the air. Night had fallen, and fireworks shrieked up into the air to light up the sky with glittering sparks. Someone cheered.
“The party will go on,” De Clercq said with disdain. “It always does.”
That seemed almost callous. Then again, the ghosts had been living with this death, and De Clercq’s investigation, for nearly a century.
Back to the problem at hand. “We can’t nail the killer in the act,” I said, thinking out loud. “Instead, we’re trying to figure out who lured the crooked judge into the boa’s cage.”
I was pretty sure it wasn’t the young couple. De Clercq said he’d questioned them already.
“No one lured him to his death,” the inspector corrected, “at least not in this cage. Look at his hands.”
Only one of them was still visible. I leaned in a little closer and frowned. “There’s blood under his nails. He struggled with someone.” He’d fought for his life, poor man. Fought and failed.
“Now look at the snake,” the inspector prompted. “There are no marks on it.”
I was about as close as I wanted to get to that snake, ghost or not. It was preoccupied now, but I didn’t want to take any chances.
“The snake isn’t the only thing that wrapped itself around Mr. Knowles’s neck tonight,” De Clercq continued. “When the snake uncoils from the body, it will be quite obvious to the trained observer that the killer strangled the victim and then dumped him in the boa cage.”
Frankie pulled another cigarette out of his case. “Who’d be that flashy?” he asked, almost to himself. He balanced the cigarette on his lip as he lit up. “Give me a gun and a pair of concrete boots any day.”
De Clercq raised an eyebrow at him.
“You wanted shady,” the gangster reminded him, taking a long drag and blowing out the smoke.
“So where do we start?” I asked.
Inspector De Clercq inclined his head. “You don’t start anywhere,” he chastised me. “Mr. Winkelmann and I will enter the den of iniquity behind us.”
“I’m coming too,” I said, not about to let him lose me this time.
“Is she always this way?” De Clercq asked Frankie.
“No,” the gangster said as we exited through an open door near the house. “She’s usually worse.”
Whatever. It didn’t escape me that the inspector could have led us inside through the door that was open to the living. He’d deliberately tried to cut me off.
Best for him to figure out right away that it wouldn’t be so easy.
A pair of ghostly spotlights roved across the front of the white stone mansion. The windows on the other side had been thrown open, and raucous piano music filled the air. Ghostly 1920s cars lined the driveway, and I didn’t miss how Frankie ran a covetous hand over the sleek body of a Rolls Royce.
“Don’t get distracted by the shiny,” I told him under my breath.
Inspector De Clercq cleared his throat as we neared the front door. “This is the Adairs’ annual Red Hot Ritz. They hold it every summer, and it lasts for three nights. That is how long we have to solve this murder before our chance is lost for another year.” He eyed Frankie. “If you can’t prove yourself before the party ends, I lock you up for good.”
No pressure there.
He pulled a pair of stiff paper invitations from inside his jacket and handed one to Frankie. They presented them to a man in a tuxedo at the door, who waved them through. I s
lipped in with them.
“Miss,” the man in the tuxedo called.
I kept walking. He couldn’t expect a living girl to see the dead.
My bluff paid off, and he didn’t follow. I certainly didn’t look back. There was plenty to see in every other direction.
I’d just walked into a raging party.
And if I’d been dead, I’d have been severely underdressed.
The vast front hall was packed wall to wall with girls in sparkling beaded frocks and men straight out of The Great Gatsby, in white slacks and dapper striped jackets. A glass fountain in the center of the space trickled merrily with pink champagne, judging by the flutes the guests were using to scoop it up.
This was amazing, a piece of Sugarland history, and I stood in the middle of it.
Ghosts smoked and laughed and danced to the music and, heavens, I couldn’t even see the piano through this crowd. Whoever sat banging out the notes had to have fingers of steel to keep up this kind of volume.
Double staircases wound up either side of the main room, with more guests toasting, teasing, and taking turns sliding down the wide banisters to the floor below. An enormous crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling, caught here and there with balloons and bits of tinsel. Clinging to the base of it and swinging around for all they were worth were two capuchin monkeys. One of them had stolen a cigar. The other one chewed on what looked like a diamond bracelet.
Because, why not?
At least I knew the monkeys hadn’t committed a crime. As for the rest of this crowd? Well, I couldn’t imagine how we were going to suss out a killer.
I narrowly dodged a giggling woman who stumbled past me with a man hot on her heels. “How on earth are we supposed to keep the witnesses straight, much less figure out who did it?”
“You see my problem.” De Clercq nodded grimly. “I have been gathering clues about this murder for nearly a century, and I’ve narrowed the possible killers down to five guests.”
“Then let’s get this party started,” Frankie said, grabbing a champagne flute off a passing tray.
A handsome ghost with pale, slicked-back hair and a dark black suit stood in the corner by the bottom of the right-side staircase, watching us with cold fury.