Cold-Blooded Myrtle

by Elizabeth C. Bunce

  Up close—or at least no longer behind glass—the Chalice was even stranger and more wondrous than ever. The aged bronze glowed with warmth, and the figures on its surface seemed almost ready to come alive.

  “It’s extraordinary,” Miss Judson breathed. “Truly remarkable. And to think it sat buried for centuries under a farm field in Cornwall.”

  “I think it was actually near a tin mine,” said Mr. Smithson. “But yes. It’s a miracle they even found it.”

  “Is it heavy?” What must it have been like to see its buried face peeking out from the soil, then the excitement of unearthing it, watching the curves and edges emerge into the world once more? I couldn’t help myself, and reached a hand out to touch it.

  The keeper grinned. “Go ahead,” he said. “Bronze is sturdy. You can’t hurt it.” He handed me the goblet, and it was much lighter than I’d expected—perfectly poised to lift to the mouth in a celebratory toast. I felt strange and tingly, holding it, touching what Mum had touched.

  “Beautiful,” Miss Judson said. I lifted it to her, and as she accepted it from my hands, I caught a glimpse of its base. Markings were inscribed inside the hollow of the goblet’s circular foot.

  “What’s that?” I asked, pointing them out to the keeper.

  “We don’t know,” he said. “One of the Chalice’s many mysteries. They’ve never been deciphered, but we assume they’re some sort of maker’s mark. Here—have a look.” He rummaged about the workbench for a magnifying lens, to which Miss Judson politely said, “She has her own.”

  I accepted his, however, and we tipped the Chalice upside down, so it sat on its uppermost rim, and I peered inside the base with the magnifier. Shapes leaped out at me, crudely inscribed lines, begrimed with age and filled with tarnish. But—I tried to wipe away a smudge that someone had missed. Those symbols couldn’t be what they looked like. I took a sharp intake of breath, and stared—stared—at Miss Judson.

  Anxiously, I handed her the magnifying glass, and just as anxiously, she looked for herself, a long, long, very long moment.

  “Oh, dear,” she said.

  Our gazes met. I couldn’t speak. I didn’t dare. But inside the foot of the ancient Roman Saturnalia Chalice was a symbol I recognized all too well: a tiny dove. And next to that, an ouroboros—a snake swallowing its own tail. Heart in my throat, I followed the symbols around the edge, to an eagle, a laurel wreath, back to the dove. The symbols—the signatures—of Jemima, Nora, David, and the rest of Hadrian’s Guard.

  The Chalice wasn’t ancient at all.

  * A cave-dwelling monster from the eleventh-century poem Beowulf. Although the work has historical significance, I found myself impatient with its protagonist’s lack of scientific inquiry.

  † I am not convinced she was correct about catacombs.

  19

  Lord of Misrule

  If your holidays seem to pass all too quickly, consider that at one time, the Christmas season lasted from All Saints’ Day (1 November) to Candlemas (2 February). Certainly enough of an argument to convince stubborn parents to let you stay up an extra hour on Twelfth Night. —H. M. Hardcastle, A Modern Yuletide

  We couldn’t stand there staring at each other in alarm for very long; the museum keeper would wonder what was wrong with us. Miss Judson forced herself to smile and gently but firmly set the goblet down once more upon the bench. What could we say? What should we do?

  “It does take one’s breath away, doesn’t it?” said the oblivious Mr. Smithson.

  Miss Judson’s face was a study in reserved emotions. She held her features perfectly still, but I saw the passage of worry, consternation, disquiet, and half a dozen similar reactions shift across her cool eyes, before she finally decided how to proceed. “How is the age of an object like that determined?”

  Mr. Smithson was busy with his beloved artifact once more, and did not notice our concern. “A number of ways,” he said. “First is from the artistic style—it’s definitely consistent with other Roman British artifacts of the fourth century. Secondly, from stratigraphic dating—we know how old an object, like a fossil or an archæological artifact, is by the layers of soil it’s found in. The Law of Superposition, you know.”

  Miss Judson and I had briefly studied stratigraphy, how geologists were hard at work across the globe, dating the layers of sediment, rocks, and minerals in the earth. And I understood it as a basic tenet of archæology as well: objects found closer to the surface were necessarily younger than those found below. (Rather like a heap of dirty laundry.) We nodded attentively.

  Mr. Smithson continued. “And thirdly, from provenance and provenience.”

  I frowned at this—provenance I knew from Miss Judson. It meant the history of a work of art or an antique, everyone who had ever owned it and everywhere it had been since its creation. Provenience sounded similar, but I didn’t know what it meant.*

  “Provenience?” said Miss Judson.

  “Ah—it’s a word used by archæologists,” he explained. “It means the exact details of an artifact’s discovery, its location within the dig site, what other items were around it. It’s how we understand the context of the find. That’s why it’s so important not to just yank things out of the ground willy-nilly as was done in the past, but to record every detail of how they were found.”

  I glanced at Miss Judson. I was afraid I understood the context of this discovery all too well. If it was not the ancient artifact Professor Leighton and the others had always claimed, there were so many implications, tumbling up through the strata of years, that I could barely count them all. But they started with Olive Blackwell’s disappearance, and ended with Henry Spence-Hastings as Mayor of Swinburne—with at least two murders in the layers between.

  Running my finger along the edge of the wooden workbench, I said, “Do you have any more information on the Chalice and its discovery? Maybe the professor made some—erm, notes about these symbols?”

  “Unfortunately, no.” Mr. Smithson looked up with an apologetic smile. “My understanding was that the professor intended to donate his personal archives before he died, but there’s been some—” He made a vague motion with his hand, suggestive of the current upheaval in Mrs. Leighton’s life. “It’s a real disappointment—we would love to have all of the documentation here along with the artifact, of course.”

  “I see, yes, such a shame,” Miss Judson said smoothly. “Well, thank you anyway.”

  Somehow we managed to extricate ourselves from the museum’s laboratory without explaining our discovery or giving ourselves away.

  “Although we have to tell someone,” I insisted. We were huddled beside the diorama of Hadrian’s Wall again, staring down at the tiny soldiers and their model garrison. It seemed so obvious now. Professor Leighton had made all of these Roman objects—what was one more, a life-sized one? My thoughts rattled loose, and I tried to keep my voice hushed, lest these awful truths echo from the marble walls, before we quite knew what to say or who to tell it to.

  “Nora told me that they never expected to make a big find in Cornwall. Experts all said there was no real Roman presence there.” I wanted desperately to pace, but didn’t dare move from Miss Judson’s side. For her part, she was frozen in place, hands locked together at her waist. “They were running out of time. The Chalice saved Professor Leighton’s career.”

  “. . . Until it didn’t,” she murmured.

  My mind reeled. All those things Nora had said, about how archæology was full of frauds before Professor Leighton, when she was a fraud all along! I had another thought. “Could they have made it for him? To save him? And then slipped it into the dig for him to find?”

  Miss Judson’s face was set. “That seems a terrible way to repay a beloved mentor. And surely he’d have seen through the ruse?”

  I gnashed my teeth (or I wanted to; I wasn’t certain how it was accomplished, but it sounded entirely appropriate for the circumstances). “Do you suppose Mrs.
Leighton simply didn’t have time to turn over the professor’s papers, given everything that’s happened—or that she didn’t want to turn them over?”

  “I’m afraid we must consider the possibility that she wished to guard this secret just as keenly as her husband had. Perhaps with the dedication of the gallery coming up, he’d decided to come clean, and she put a stop to having their name dragged through the mud again.”

  “I won’t believe it,” I said fiercely. I was still stuck on the older mystery. “Olive must have known—or found out—that they’d forged the Chalice, and threatened to expose them all.”

  “Or she blackmailed everyone, then ran off with the booty.”

  She was full of horrible thoughts today.

  I turned to face her. “The Mayor knows. We have to talk to him.”

  Miss Judson shook her head—and I braced myself to argue, but she said, “It’s premature. We need proof to confront him.”

  “But it’s obviously a fake—”

  “And it was so obvious that it took twenty years and two amateur Young Ladies of Quality to figure it out? No. They’ll never believe us, and the Mayor will have all sorts of plausible explanations. He’s had years to come up with them. No one will be able to refute him.”

  “Because everyone else is dead,” I muttered.

  She fixed me with a chilling look. “Exactly.”

  That night Father was late for dinner. Again.

  I sat alone at the table long after everyone else (even Peony) had left, fiddling with the remains of my meal whilst I pondered the case. What had begun as a straightforward mystery had tightened into a knot of suspects and motives as tangled as the network of tunnels under the town. I glared at my water goblet and absently slid the tall silver saltshaker next to it. A forged Roman chalice had somehow led to Olive’s disappearance at the Campanile. And then what? Olive had come back twenty years later to send threatening letters (I tossed my napkin to the tabletop) to Professor Leighton and the Mayor and a young reporter at the local newspaper (the knife rest) who had barely been out of the nursery when she vanished? None of it made any sense.

  And what about Mrs. Leighton? I moved over one of the dainty crystal candlesticks with the fluted base. Maybe Miss Judson—and Father, and Inspector Hardy, and Constable Carstairs, and Dr. Munjal were right, and she really was just that desperate to keep her husband’s past from becoming a scandal once again.

  If so, she’d failed rather spectacularly.

  I stared miserably at the objects before me, assembled in an absolutely meaningless tableau. It took all my Exceptional Forbearance to keep from sweeping them off the table in frustration.

  “Ho-ho-ho,” said a soft voice from the hall. I turned round to see Father in the doorway, face drawn, still in his overcoat and hat, brief-bag in hand. “Is that the remains of Stansberry Pie I see?”

  I hopped up. “I’ll ring Cook.”

  Father waved me back down. “Don’t bother,” he said. “I think I’m too tired to eat.”

  “No,” said Peony with alarm, appearing from nowhere. She trotted off to the kitchen, announcing to the household that the master had returned and Second Dinner was required forthwith.

  Father came in and sank into the chair next to mine, not even doffing his hat. “What’s all this?”

  “Nothing,” I mumbled.

  “Ah. Well, it looks a bit like my desk at work at the moment.” He picked up the saltshaker. “Who’s this represent, Mrs. Leighton?”

  I shot him a look. “No, she’s the candlestick. That’s the Campanile.”

  “What’s the mustard pot for?”

  “Mustard.” I pushed it out of the way.

  We both regarded the strange Display glumly. “It’s a tough one, isn’t it, Detective?” he said.

  “Do you really think Mrs. Leighton is guilty?”

  Father was silent so long I thought he might have fallen asleep, but he finally said, “I can’t ignore the evidence, Myrtle.”

  “What evidence?” I demanded. “You promised.”

  “So I did.” He sighed and rubbed his whiskers. “Emily Leighton has means and opportunity. She had access to the shop—and, more to the point, the display window—and she could have acquired the hemlock from any chemist. Or any roadside ditch, for that matter.”

  Not in December, as had been pointed out already. In which case the crime was very much premeditated. “But you don’t know that she did.”

  “No,” Father admitted. “We haven’t traced the murder weapon to her yet.”

  I kicked my chair legs and stared long and hard at the stand-in for the Chalice. I should tell Father our theory about the forgery—but I hardly wanted to give him more material to hang poor Mrs. Leighton with. “What about motive? Was there insurance money? An inheritance? Did she have a—a gentleman friend?” Father and I both winced at that.

  “Not that we know of.”

  “And Miss Carmichael?”

  Father loosened his collar. “Nora Carmichael was last seen entering the basement of the Antiquities Museum. Presumably she was killed there sometime overnight, although the killer left no clues behind that we could find and the exact site has not been identified.”

  “Mrs. Leighton wasn’t at the gala,” I reminded him. He had no answer for this. I frowned and pressed on. “You don’t think Mrs. Leighton has been sending all those threatening letters, do you? They were written by a woman, but Mrs. Leighton doesn’t speak Latin.” I hated to think it, but I supposed that wouldn’t preclude someone determined enough from copying out a threatening phrase.

  Father’s sleepy expression had sharpened. “What do you mean ‘all’ the letters?”

  I blinked at him. “The ones that Dr. Munjal and the Mayor and—others got.”

  He sat up straighter. “How do you know this?”

  “From Caroline and LaRue. Didn’t they”—I meant the Mayor and the Police Surgeon—“tell you?”

  Father regarded the tableau of table settings grimly. “No, they did not.”

  Which meant the Mayor and Dr. Munjal were still hiding something.

  I could not help asking the one question I knew Father least wished to answer. “Do you think anyone else is in danger? What if—someone else gets a letter?”

  “Like who?”

  I looked at the tablecloth. “I don’t know,” I mumbled. “Like you, maybe.” Or Genie.

  Father tried to be reassuring. “Well, when did the letters arrive?”

  “Before you arrested Mrs. Leighton.”

  “I didn’t—never mind. The point is, we have a suspect in custody, and no further threats have been made, either by post or in the shop window. I won’t say we have all the answers yet, but we are very close to closing this case.” He spoke in his most authoritative courtroom voice, like he was giving a statement to a skeptical press.

  On those words, Cook arrived with a plate of roast and peas for Father and a second helping of Stansberry Pie for me. As we dug in, I could only wish I shared Father’s confidence.

  *Subsequent consultation with a dictionary revealed that they share the same French origin: provenir, “to come from.”

  20

  Shop Around the Corner

  The holiday season is best spent in convivial celebrations and shared activities with friends. —H. M. Hardcastle, A Modern Yuletide

  Saturday morning, we set off as a collective, the three Investigators: Miss Judson and I—and Peony, who had refused to be left behind. She followed us to the tram stand, hopping aboard to the amusement of the conductor, who waived all our fares.

  Peony would be insufferable after that.

  The Blakeneys were waiting at the High Street stop. Genie had a pack slung over one shoulder of her nubby blue jacket (I imagined it stuffed full with ropes and chalk and pickaxes, just like Olive’s must have been), and Mr. Blakeney had found a magnificent leather miner’s helmet with a candle on.

  Peony
nearly wriggled out of her skin to reach him.

  “I see you’ve brought another associate,” Genie said. “May I be introduced?” She held tentative fingers down to Peony, who sniffed at her skirts.

  Peony regarded her with wary eyes, then said (predictably), “No.”

  “Well, hello to you, too,” Genie said, breaking into a laugh. Affronted, Peony stalked off in the other direction.

  “She took your measure, sis,” Mr. Blakeney said.

  “Quite right, too,” Genie said. “Well, what now? I was thinking Robbie and I could take the college, and you two could explore here in town.”

  Miss Judson was nodding. “Exactly what I had in mind. Shall we meet back here at—say, half ten?”

  “Unless our paths cross before that!” Genie’s voice rang with anticipation. I felt it, too, rising in me like steam.

  Miss Judson took a final moment to gather us all together and speak to us firmly, like schoolchildren. No one seemed offended. “Now, be careful,” she said. “There’s no telling the condition these tunnels might be in, and it’s possible they’ve claimed lives before.”

  “And there could be a murderer lurking in them,” I put in.

  “And that,” Miss Judson said.

  “Now you tell us,” said Mr. Blakeney.

  “I’ve brought whistles for each of us.” She handed them out, lovely brass things on long leather cords. “Be sure to use them if you run into trouble. Carry a light apiece, and take notes. Blakeneys”—here her voice got especially stern—“your steam tunnels might be dangerously hot. Don’t touch any pipes you see, and proceed with caution. I don’t fancy explaining to your parents that I lost the both of you in a caving expedition.”

  “They wouldn’t be surprised,” Genie said, but she was looking soberly at her whistle. “Thanks, Miss J., this is capital.” As she and Mr. Blakeney made their way to the tram, I heard her say, “Miss Kittridge would never have taken us exploring tunnels for murderers.”