Scholar's Plot
Page 30
“Depends on how it’s played,” Fisk said frankly. “If the university tries to make amends for being fool- ed by Hotchkiss, pleading for leniency toward Clerk Peebles…”
“You could even give her her job back, if she’s declared unredeemed,” I put in helpfully. “’Tis hard for someone outside the law to find a job.”
My voice may have been too fervent, for he looked at me oddly.
“I’ll admit, this is a bad time to be without our head clerk. And if people start flocking to withdraw their children it’ll get worse. But wouldn’t they be appalled, to find themselves dealing with the murderess herself when they did? And she did murder a man. Are we supposed to forget that?”
“She murdered the man who killed her son,” said Fisk. “They may be appalled at first, but once they meet her she can explain. I can’t promise they’ll leave their kid in your school, but they’ll understand why she did it. And they’ll be more likely to understand, and forgive, than they will if they don’t meet her.”
“And Seymour Peebles was completely innocent,” Portner mused. “I could spread the word about how the university is trying to right that wrong, by officially renaming the alphanumeric system after its true creator. The Peebles system. Academics all over the Realm would be talking about that.”
“All evidence of what happened with the project was destroyed in the fire,” Fisk pointed out. “You can’t lie about it, but Professor Dayless can pay off her debt to the university in some non-professorial job.”
Being forced to work in a menial capacity for the university where she’d once taught — likely for years — would probably be more painful for the professor than going unredeemed. But she’d deserved it, and I found I felt little sympathy for her. Unlike Clerk Peebles, even though she’d succeeded in her murderous intent, and Dayless had failed. And if extenuating circumstances made so much difference in my consideration of these two women, should I not bring them into my consideration of how Fisk had let Jack Bannister go free?
“Simply working off a legal debt, in the usual way, will attract a lot less public attention than a mother/murderer saved from the gallows,” Fisk went on. “And while the rest of the Realm is entranced by all this drama, everybody else just goes back to work. You quietly return the Heir’s money—” The headman winced, but he nodded, too. “—and the case is closed. Hardly any fuss at all.”
“I take it back,” Portner said. “I’m glad you came by today. Though I’ll have to think more about what Nancy Peebles did before I agree. And since you’ve given me so much to think about, on top of everything else I have to deal with, you can save my staff some trouble and carry my letter to Professor Sevenson.”
He reached into a pile of papers that had been pushed aside and extracted it. The ink was still tacky, but it had been written before we arrived — so he might do the right thing by everyone else, as well.
I wanted to get this letter to Benton as soon as I could, and Fisk was eager to brag to Kathy about what he’d arranged. He deserved the bulk of the praise, though I’d assisted him ably. Just as last night, he’d so ably assisted me.
The truth was that we worked well together. It seemed a pity to dissolve such a team, even over a matter of principle. Particularly as it seemed that my former squire might become my brother-in-law. Assuming Father didn’t kill him.
Benton was overjoyed by Portner’s offer; full reinstatement of his degree, his job, and the university’s official apology. He promptly departed to share it with the friends he’d discovered last night.
Kathy was more concerned with the greater tragedy.
“Will he really argue for Mistress Peebles to be declared unredeemed, instead of hanging? It seems a lot to ask.”
“It’s to his own advantage,” said Fisk. “He’s an ethical man, but I don’t see there’s any justice to be had from hanging the helpful Peebles. And since it’s in the best interest of his university not to… With compassion and selfishness both on the side of letting her off? He’ll do it.”
“Captain Chaldon may argue for her as well,” I added. “And most of the judicars are probably parents. ’Tis no light thing, to be unredeemed,” I finished soberly. “But if she gets her old job back, surrounded by people who understand why she did it… She’ll be all right.”
“The alphanumeric system will become the Peebles system,” Fisk said. “Her son’s name, his genius, will be recognized as long as there are libraries. She’ll be better than all right.”
“And she has you to thank for that, squi — partner.”
I had hoped to catch him off guard, but of course I didn’t.
“Partner? I think I’m in charge. I was the one who persuaded Portner to let Benton off the hook. And I did it using Hotchkiss’ murder as my lever, which makes that the ‘pivotal’ crime.”
Even Kathy grimaced at that pun, and he grinned at her. But…
“Portner had written that letter before we got there. And ’twas Professor Dayless’ cheating that got Benton into trouble in the first place. And anyway, I’m the one who solved Hotchkiss’ murder. So if anyone is to be placed in charge, ’tis clearly—”
“But I’m the one who figured out what was going on with the project! It’s not much use for your theory to be right, if you never solve the crime. So I—”
“Men!” Kathy stamped her foot, a habit she must have picked up at court, for I’d never seen her make such a pettish gesture. Or mayhap Fisk had driven her to it.
“Can’t you simply admit you’re a team?” she went on. “Why does anyone have to be in charge?”
Only a woman could ask something so silly. Fisk and I both stared.
“Someone has to be in charge,” Fisk said. “Suppose we disagree about where to go? Or what to do? Someone has to make the final call.”
It occurred to me that I’d stopped making ‘final calls’ some years ago … until I’d decided to go after Jack Banister, against Fisk’s wishes. And nearly gotten both of us killed, though I hadn’t been wrong. But I had been wrong to expect Fisk to fall in with a decision he didn’t believe in. ’Twas time to admit it.
“We could discuss such matters,” I said. “We could argue for our opinions, and work out where to go and what to do. That’s how partners would handle decisions. Even serious disagreements.”
Finally, I had caught him off guard. Fisk stared at me so skeptically I couldn’t help but smile.
“I’m not saying ’twould be easy. But being a knight errant shouldn’t be easy. I accept your challenge, Kathy.”
I held out my hand to my new partner — knowing that in doing so, I was also accepting the challenge of Kathy, and how to get the two of them wed. Fisk knew it too, and he needed my help.
Just as I needed his.
“Well,” he said. “I can’t let your sister think I’m not up to a challenge.”
His hand gripped mine, strong and sincere, sealing the bargain.
“Done!” Kathy’s slim fingers fell atop our grip. “We’ll all face that challenge … together.”
Hilari Bell writes SF and fantasy for kids and teens. She’s an ex-librarian, a job she took to feed her life-long addiction to books, and she lives in Denver with a family that changes shape periodically — currently it’s her mother, her adult niece and their dog, Ginger. Her hobbies are board games and camping — particularly camping, because that’s the only time she can get in enough reading. Though when it comes to reading, she says, there’s no such thing as “enough.”
Learn more about Hilari’s books and her writing at HilariBell.com and the WildWriters.com.
A damsel in distress—or at least, a damsel mysteriously vanished and quite possibly in distress—is a most fitting a task for a knight errant. But this damsel had gone missing from the High Liege’s court, and peril lurked there. Not for me, which I would have shrugged off, but for those I held most dear. Which is probably why I made the mistake of saying, “She’s only been gone for about twelve hours—that could be accounted for
by a lame horse or a broken wheel. Surely she’s returned by now. I say we send this fellow back, and wait for word that all’s well.”
The messenger, who’d ridden all night to deliver the letter Kathy held, looked indignantly at me, but he spoke to my sister. “The Heir’s fair worried, Mistress. He bid me get this letter to you as fast as I could ride.”
Fisk, Kathy and I stood on the landing of my brother’s lodging, which he’d begun to hint he’d like us to vacate eventually—a request that seemed reasonable given that the knocking of the messenger had roused us shortly after dawn. Kathy was clad in a well-worn dressing gown, her mouse-brown hair in a tousled braid down her back and rosy light reflecting in her spectacles as she read. There was no reason for Fisk to look at her as if she was the source of the sunrise…which increased my apprehension about going to court.
“Meg didn’t take a coach,” Kathy told me, still reading. “’Tis a bit incoherent—he must be really worried—but Rupert says she left on foot. She might have rented… Why does he think she’d rent a carriage to come to me? Or come to me at all, for that matter.”
This was addressed to the messenger, who shrugged. “I’m to bring back your reply, if you don’t return yourself, Mistress Katherine. And escort you if you need it.”
“She doesn’t need an escort,” said Fisk. “We’ll take her.”
“I don’t think…” I didn’t think that was a good idea, but I couldn’t reveal my reasons in front of the messenger.
“I do think,” said Fisk. “And so does Kathy. You’re out-voted… Partner.”
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 Fisk
Chapter 2 Michael
Chapter 3 Fisk
Chapter 4 Michael
Chapter 5 Fisk
Chapter 6 Michael
Chapter 7 Fisk
Chapter 8 Michael
Chapter 9 Fisk
Chapter 10 Michael
Chapter 11 Fisk
Chapter 12 Michael
Chapter 13 Fisk
Chapter 14 Michael
Chapter 15 Fisk
Chapter 16 Michael
Chapter 17 Fisk
Chapter 18 Michael
Chapter 19 Fisk
Chapter 20 Michael
Chapter 21 Fisk
Chapter 22 Michael
Chapter 23 Fisk
Chapter 24 Michael
Chapter 25 Fisk
Chapter 26 Michael
Chapter 27 Fisk
Chapter 28 Michael
Chapter 29 Fisk
Chapter 30 Michael