by Kim Wright
“What are you talking about? We can’t go cutting up theatrical props because something doesn’t seem right to you.”
“I swear to you that someone has altered this set.”
“Look, Emma,” Tom said, his voice lower and kinder, “you’re rattled. We both are, and the others as well. We’ve all traveled a great distance with little preparation and come to such a different sort of place. Even Trevor has been set on edge. And now this day…this day in itself has been quite extraordinary.”
“If you don’t have a knife, we’ll have to pull it,” she said. If she went up the steps to the very top, if she stood on one of the seats… She would still be at least four inches too low. She looked at Tom expectantly.
“Very well,” he said, stepping onto one of the chairs and indicating with a turn of his hand that she should move closer to the wall. “But I will pull it, certainly not cut it, so that you can behold your flag and then we shall depart this bizarre place and go take a rest. I really think that the sight upstairs –“
A single yank was enough. With the sound of an exhalation, an enormous Russian flag was released. It unfurled towards Tom and Emma’s upturned faces and, halfway through the process, released the dead body of Cynthia Kirby. She dropped past them and then began to roll down the steps, her head bouncing cruelly with every increment of her descent until she at last came to rest on the edge of the dance floor, sprawled with comic gusto beneath the great lights. She was dressed as the king of the gypsies.
Chapter Eleven
The Winter Palace – the Kitchens
June 19, 1889
10:20 PM
“The cause of death is a broken neck,” Tom said.
“And there is no chance it was broken during the fall to the ballroom floor?” Trevor confirmed.
“Absolutely none. For one thing, it’s a clean snap right at vertebrae C2, known as the hangman’s fracture, since it generally brings about instantaneous death.” Tom looked up from the body of Cynthia Kirby, which was lying swaddled on a long wooden table. “Someone knew what he was doing. Also, there’s bruising around the front of the throat. She was likely grabbed from behind, choked into unconsciousness, and then the neck was broken.”
“Which would indicate that the killer was a man of strength,” Trevor said, bent forward on his wooden stool and steadily scribbling in his notebook.
“That’s one way to look at it. But it’s just as important to know where to break as it is to use great force. My guess would be we’re looking for someone who knows how to most efficiently dispose of a life – a former military man, a member of the guard, or a doctor, of course.”
“Possibly a dancer?” Rayley ventured, from the other side of the room. “They make study of the human body too, do they not?”
“There’s a thought,” Tom said.
They were in a room off from the kitchen, although not in the same meat locker where the ballet dancers had been stored. Presumably Mrs. Kirby would be moved there after the autopsy, but that was a cold, dark, and airless place. For now, they were conducting their examination in a brighter room which, from the profusion of white flour around, evidently was used each morning for the making of the palace bread and pastries.
It was hardly a sterile environment for an autopsy, but under the circumstances, Trevor supposed they must take what they could get. When Rayley had asked Viktor Prakov, the bald man who headed the palace police, if they could examine Mrs. Kirby before his unit, the man had readily agreed. “Since the woman was English…” Rayley had said vaguely, which was all it had taken for Prakov to nod. Examine anything you want, seemed to be his unspoken response, just so in the end you turn her body back to us. And so they had been escorted to this distant part of the kitchen and left alone. In the larger rooms, the staff was finishing the final cleaning from the evening meal and a young maid had most considerately brought them a tray of pork sandwiches as they worked.
“Funny that a place this size doesn’t have a proper morgue, isn’t it, Sir?” Davy asked.
“Very odd,” Trevor agreed. The Palace may function like a city, but it was a city which strained to maintain the illusion that no one within it ever died. His request to do the autopsy within the Palace infirmary had met with an abrupt refusal, as had his next suggestion, that they might conduct their exam within the woman’s own bedroom. So instead Mrs. Kirby had been carried here, stripped bare among the rolling pins and ladles, then wrapped in a tablecloth. None of them had particularly liked the woman, but Trevor doubted anyone present would have wished her this ignoble end.
At least they had plenty of room. Tom was examining the body with Davy’s help, as they systematically lifted each limb and section, going over it with a magnifying glass. Tom called his observations out to Trevor, who served as secretary, while Emma and Rayley stood at another table going through the woman’s clothes and the boxes of her possessions, which they had snatched from her room in an effort to take possession of any potential evidence before the palace police. Emma had draped the gypsy costume over a chair and was studying it dubiously.
“This loop of cloth on the hip,” she said. “What purpose would you guess it to serve?”
“It appears to have been designed to hold some sort of weapon,” Rayley said, glancing up from a box of books and papers.
“So I thought,” Emma said. “It’s on the left hip where an officer wears his sword.”
“The loop isn’t large enough to support a sword,” Rayley said. “More likely a dagger of some sort. Was there one with her when she was found?”
“I don’t see anything of the sort,” Emma said. “This costume is quite elaborate. Look at the way this vest ties and all the buckles on the britches. How on earth would a woman begin to know how to get into such outlandish clothing?”
“How on earth would her killer have gotten her into it so quickly is a better question,” said Tom, peering into the hollows of Mrs. Kirby’s left ear. “I keep thinking of the time frame.”
“Spell it out for me,” said Trevor, pencil in hand.
“You start, Emma,” Tom said, absently, turning the corpse’s head to inspect her other ear.
“My lesson with Konstantin concluded at precisely five,” Emma said, folding the pants of the costume as she spoke. “I know, because we heard the chapel bells strike. He told me I was his last private lesson of the day but that I should get some rest and have something to eat, for the group rehearsals would begin at seven. At the time he and I parted company, there was no body wrapped up in the flag hanging above the pirate ship. I am certain because he was scolding me to look upward as we waltzed, so I was paying particular attention to the top of the room. There are sets located on the second level of the stage, what they call the performers’ level, and one of them was this ship. I assure you that during the time I was dancing, the flag at the top of the mast was furled neatly.”
“But then you closed your eyes,” Tom said.
“Closed your eyes?” Rayley inquired, looking at Emma over his glasses. Judging by the number of books in the box, Mrs. Kirby had evidently been a great reader. Rayley was shaking them, one volume at a time, but so far nothing had fluttered out onto the floor.
How like Tom to say something both so embarrassing and so off the point, Emma thought, and she hastened to explain. “It hardly matters, but my dance instructor suggested that I close my eyes while we were waltzing so that I might be better able to follow. But they remained so for only a minute or two. Certainly if someone had hauled a dead body by rope to the top of the ceiling I would have heard the commotion and opened my eyes.”
“I doubt the body was pulled up from the floor,” Rayley said, mercifully not becoming distracted by the idea of Emma waltzing with her eyes closed. “More likely lowered from the balcony, I would guess.”
“Either way, Konstantin and I would have heard it.”
“You waltzed without music?” Trevor asked.
“Yes, he counted the beat. That’s the way prac
ticing often is,” Emma said with authority, as if she had been taking formal dance instruction all her life. “But the point is that when I stepped out of the ballroom at a few minutes after five there was no dead body in that flag. Once I exited into the hall, I promptly met Tom, who was waiting there for Mrs. Kirby and wondering why she might be running late for their appointment.”
“And from there,” said Tom, who was now bending to look into the dead woman’s bloodshot eyes, “we went together back into the ballroom and did a slow circle of observation. So I can confirm Emma’s claim that the body was not in its cruel position dangling from the ship’s mast at just after five o’clock.”
“If you could confirm my timeline, why did you make me start?” Emma said in exasperation.
“I just wanted to hear you tell everyone about how that Siberian got you to close your eyes,” Tom said cheerfully, gently pushing Mrs. Kirby’s left eyelid closed. “He told her she’d be more submissive to his burly masculine will if she couldn’t see, and, against all odds, our girl agreed.”
“Moving on,” Trevor said.
“We went up the grand staircase that connects the ballroom floor to the performance level and spent just at twelve minutes poking around the costume and prop rooms behind the curtain,” Tom said. “Like Emma, I am quite certain of the time, for I looked at my pocket watch just after we found the body. Thus it seems that whoever placed Mrs. Kirby in the flag did it with an amazing rapidity, almost as if he knew that we would be coming back into the ballroom within minutes.”
“Was she killed there in the theater, do you think,” Davy asked. “Or killed and moved?”
“What would your guess be?” Trevor asked mildly.
“Killed and moved,” Davy said promptly. “Obviously Mrs. Kirby was not going to her meeting with Tom dressed in a gypsy costume. So while he was in the hall waiting for her, she was late because she was either already dead or was being murdered at that very moment. Then the murderer dressed her as a gypsy and took her to the theater.”
“Quite right,” Trevor said. “Although it’s nearly impossible to imagine that anyone could murder a woman, strip her of the clothes she was wearing, and then dress her in this rather complex and outlandish outfit, and still have the time to hide her body all within twelve minutes. So most likely she was already dead and dressed when Emma and Tom went up the stairs to explore the costume and prop rooms.”
“The choice of the costume is bewildering,” said Rayley. “It’s meant as a message, obviously, the sort that would be impossible to ignore, at least if you were the person to whom it was being sent. The killer garbs the poor woman as a gypsy and rolls her in a flag, for God’s sake. A flag placed in a position that is guaranteed to not only be found, but be found and released in a most spectacular fashion. What we have is the opposite of trying to conceal a murder. Our killer wished to show off his work, to turn the unveiling of a dead body into a theatrical flourish, staged for maximum dramatic impact.”
“Much like the Romeo and Juliet we began with,” Trevor agreed, still scribbling. “But at least there the message was clearer. Why the deuce was the Kirby woman dressed up as a man? Or a gypsy?”
“Whose costume is it?” Davy asked. “Who wears it in the show, I mean?”
“An excellent question to start with,” Trevor said. “Although the answer is more likely to tell us who the message is intended to frighten rather than who sent it.”
“The killer was in the room the whole time Konstantin and I were waltzing, wasn’t he?” Emma said dully, still holding the shirt in her hands. She had left Rayley to contend alone with the task of going through Cynthia Kirby’s worldly possessions, which was unlike her, and seemed instead singularly preoccupied with the gypsy costume, which she had now folded and refolded several times. “Hiding in the balcony just above the pirate scene with this poor woman’s dead body. Waiting for us to leave. Waiting for his chance.”
“Perhaps not,” Rayley said, for she seemed genuinely distressed at the thought. “It is possible, of course, but it seems to me far more likely that most of the people connected to the theatricals, perhaps even many more people from all sorts of walks within the palace, knew that the dance lessons ended at five and that there was generally a lull before the group practices began. So he might have entered the ballroom from the top floor with the body, which had already been killed and dressed just as Davy and Trevor say, and believing himself to have a leisurely two hours in which to stage his grand unveiling. The idea was most likely that when any number of people were assembled for rehearsal that someone would notice the alteration in the pirate scene and pull the rope. And thus the shock of finding Mrs. Kirby’s dead body would be witnessed not merely by two inconvenient foreigners poking about, but rather by the entire dance troupe, including a coterie of the imperial women and their attendants.”
“Excellent,” said Trevor, writing with increased fervor. “Whatever message implied in the choice of costume was meant to be delivered to someone the killer expected to be in that room during the group rehearsals at seven. Our man believes he has two hours to do his work but then is startled when Emma and Tom, without warning, enter the room and begin to explore. When they disappeared into the dressing rooms, he seized the chance to finish his task, no doubt more clumsily than he intended, and escape.”
“We must examine the balcony above the ship scene,” Rayley said. “If the killer waited there, whether it was for the full hour of Emma’s practice or merely the few minutes she and Tom were exploring the theater, he may have left some evidence of his presence.”
“That’s it,” Tom said, standing back. “I doubt the body has much more to tell us, at least not at this point.”
“And we must talk to your Konstantin,” Trevor said to Emma. “He and everyone else that was in the theater this afternoon or who might have been expected to be at the group rehearsals at seven.”
“Why Konstantin?” said Emma with surprise. “I am his most perfect alibi, am I not?”
“Only if your time line is correct and the killer was hiding in the balcony between four and five,” said Trevor. “I’m more inclined towards Rayley’s theory that whoever intended to hang the body waited for you to leave the ballroom before beginning the task. And who knew the precise time you left the ballroom better than Konstantin? If the Kirby woman was already dead and dressed, then during those twelve minutes he could have –“
“Oh I assure you, he has a most perfect alibi for those twelve minutes as well,” said Tom, matter-of-factly pulling the tablecloth over Mrs. Kirby’s face.
“Is there really any need to go into that?” Emma asked.
“But don’t you see, my dear? What began as your teacher’s condemnation has now become his defense.” Tom removed his apron and wiped his hands on it before turning to Trevor. “Because while Emma and I were exploring the costume and prop rooms we happened to come across–“
“Dear God,” said Rayley.
“What is it?” said Trevor.
“The very last book in the stack,” Rayley said. “I shook it and this flew out.” He advanced toward Trevor, holding an object very lightly between his fingertips. It was a photograph of the dead ballet dancers.
Chapter Twelve
The Winter Palace – The Gentleman’s Enclave
June 20, 1889
1:20 PM
“Would you like me to beat you with rushes?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Bulrushes brought up from the river,” Filip said. “Once the sweat begins to flow, a steady tapping helps to bring the blood to the surface of the skin and aid in the purification process. The blows are very light, of course,” he added, noting Rayley’s skeptical expression. “But the raising of the blood is an important part of the sauna ritual.”
“Seeing as how this is my first sauna,” Rayley said, “perhaps I should content myself with only the most basic sort of purification.”
“Truly? Your first sauna?”
; “I’m English.”
“Yes, I know who you are,” said Filip, holding out a beefy hand which Rayley clasped and shook in an ineffectual manner, their sweat-slicked palms sliding from each other at the first touch. “One of the queen’s bodyguards, which means that you and I are in the same line of work. I similarly serve the tsar.”
Rayley nodded slowly. When the invitation had come this morning suggesting that Trevor and Rayley might enjoy the services of the gentlemen’s enclave, they had been temporarily flummoxed. It was undeniably an opportunity to observe a new part of palace life and also undeniably some sort of trap. The cream colored piece of paper sitting on a heavy silver tray bore no clue as to who might have sent it. A brief conference between the two men had led to the conclusion that Rayley, whose time in Paris had left him with a greater proclivity for foreign cultures, should accept the invitation while Trevor, along with Tom and Davy, explored the theater balcony where they believed Mrs. Kirby’s body must have been hidden.
At the appointed hour there had been a knock at the door of their apartments and a silent servant had arrived. Rayley had followed him down a series of hallways until he had arrived in a large dressing room where the man had handed him a red silk robe and simply disappeared. It had been a strange matter indeed to strip off his gray suit and don the robe, quite uncertain what, if any, garments were meant to be left on beneath, and to venture across the broad stone floor toward the cave-like entrance of the adjoining room. A blast of hot damp air had engulfed him before he was fully over the threshold, filling the room with hisses and fogging Rayley’s small round eyeglasses so thoroughly that he had been forced back into the dressing area where he pulled his spectacles off and peered nervously in the direction from which he had just come.
This was surely what the gates of hell must be like. Minus the silk robe, perhaps.