Author's Note – Here's chapter two! This is where things get tricky; I'm almost making this up as I go. I know what pieces of evidence I want, and I know what they mean, but it'll be difficult getting it all to fit. I told you before – I'm rubbish at mystery. But I'm willing to give it a try. Enjoy!
Disclaimer – I do not own The Mysterious Benedict Society. *Sigh*
~Mr. Curtain and the Case of the Enab's Bane~
~Mysteries and Mud~
It took a bit of convincing, but eventually Mr. Curtain agreed. Kate (Having been the one nominated to talk to the prisoner, as she got along best with him and was the most adept at sneaking unnoticed out of houses (They had decided against telling Inspector Blue).) had only been speaking with him for five minutes before their old enemy had decided to investigate the murder of Reynie Muldoon.
"But I'm afraid that, to do so, I will need to go to the crime scene myself. To see the body and such."
The remainder of the Society had thought it likely that Mr. Curtain would say this, and so had supplied Kate with a ready response. "I'm afraid that that wouldn't be very legal. We thought that maybe we could just take photos of the crime scene and show them to you. Alright?"
Mr. Curtain didn't look entirely pleased with this development*, but he took the camera that Kate was waving at him all the same. Looking through the pictures, he shook his head. "This really isn't good enough. I need to go myself. I'll stay handcuffed and guarded, of course, and I won't try anything."
Kate looked uncertain.
"Be certain of Curtain. I won't try to escape." Mr. Curtain scrutinized Kate's face. She looked away.
"Well... all right. I'll get the guard." She ran down the narrow hallway, returning in mere seconds dragging behind her a policeman in a navy blue suit. "Here he is, sir!" she called, smiling charmingly (she had long ago finished her crying, and now she was almost her usual self).
"Madam, I'm not at all sure that I'm allowed to release him, even if I keep him in cuffs. His sentence is for –"
"I promise on my honour that I won't do anything illegal. I just want to investigate the crime scene. I promise." Mr. Curtain seemed to be boring two holes in the officer's head with his eyes.
"I suppose I could allow it, just this once. But you'd better not try to escape! I'm armed." The officer stepped forward, keys in one hand, cuffs in the other. He opened the door to Mr. Curtain's cell, clapped the handcuffs onto the older man's wrists, and led him out of the cell, his left hand hovering near his gun.
When the three arrived at the mansion half an hour later, it was to find Inspector Blue leaving, arm in arm with Officer Darcy. Kate and noticed that Rhonda (whom the Society had told about their plan before Kate had left) was looking at them with relief.
"Thank goodness you're back!" Rhonda exclaimed once Inspector Blue and Darcy had driven away. "I was afraid Blue'd never leave. He's hopeless."
"A hopeless romantic, you mean," Constance said, looking with mild disgust at the retreating backs of the two, now closely entwined, figures driving away in the police car.
Rhonda nodded glumly. "He's too busy trying to get Officer Darcy's attention to actually put any work into the case. And even when he tries, he doesn't tell us anything that we don't already know."
"Is Curtain going to help?" asked Number Two, who had also been in on the plan.
"He agreed to, yes. But I had to bring him here. He said that the photos weren't good enough. But don't –"
"You WHAT?" Constance interrupted, making the others jump. "Kate, I'm certain that Curtain is our foe; in past he's caused us naught but woe! And you brought him here?"
"Look, you said yourself that he's the only one around with brains enough to solve this case, and the only way he can do that is to bring him here. So I brought him." Kate stuck out her chin and narrowed her eyes slightly; an expression that always meant that she intended to be stubborn. And when Kate decided to be stubborn, there was no changing her mind.
"I suggested that we ask his assistance, not bring him here! But did you listen? No! You just brought him along, without any thought for our safety – as usual."
Stung, Kate opened her mouth to respond, but was cut off by a glare from Rhonda.
"At any rate," Number Two said, "Why don't you show Mr. Curtain the scene. He may be able to gleam additional information. More than Inspector Blue gleamed, anyway." She spoke the detective's name with a definite note of dislike.
Kate nodded and dashed off to the car where Mr. Curtain still sat, listening to the policeman's mingled threats and cautions as he gazed at the mansion. She led the two men from the car, looking back impatiently when they didn't move quickly enough.
As they approached the front door, Kate gave Mr. Curtain a summary of all that they knew. "– And we know that the Enab's Bane was put in his food somewhere between the kitchen and the dining room, because Constance was in the kitchen, and everyone could see his food in the dining room, and no one touched it," she finished.
"I see." Mr. Curtain stumbled slightly on an uneven patch of ground. Unable to catch himself due to his cuffed hands, he fell, stopping mere inches away from the ground as Kate caught him. "Thank, you, Miss. Wetherall. I'm afraid that grace is rather difficult when one's hands are cuffed." They continued across the front lawn and up the steps.
Rhonda opened the door for them, and they all stepped through. As they wound their way through the maze, Kate asked Mr. Curtain how he was going to solve the murder case.
"Why, it's elementary, my dear Wetherall." Mr. Curtain tapped his nose, looking very much like his dead brother. "I shall simply use the method that all great detectives use; start with all the people in the world as suspects, and then logically eliminate all but one. The one remaining is the criminal." Kate nodded. His logic was so strong that it seemed pointless to say anything else.
The next hours were spent by Mr. Curtain carefully examining the dining room, the kitchen, the hallway, the windows, and, finally, the maze. Right as he came to the front door, he stopped and exclaimed.
"What?" asked Sticky, looking around. "What is it?"
"My dear Washington, I do believe that we have just eliminated most of the world from our list of suspects." Mr. Curtain pointed at the floor, where muddy footprints from the storm the day before Reynie had died trailed into the maze.
Comprehension dawned suddenly on Sticky's tea-coloured face. Kate, still confused, looked up at the newly appointed detective. "You see," he said patronizingly, "the footprints show who has entered the mansion in the past day. Constance?"
"What?"
"Would you kindly tell us who's footprints are there?"
Constance would have loved to object, to stick her tongue out, to do anything other than do as her old enemy wished, but she knew that Mr. Curtain was right; it would eliminate an awful lot of suspects. She obliged. "Me, Sticky, Reynie, Kate, Moocho, Miss and Mrs. Perumal –" She squinted at the muddy mess on the floor, trying to discern the distinct patterns and marks that different shoes made, "–Mrs. and Mustard Washington (this was her nickname for Mr. Washington, who was particularly fond of the yellow condiment) , Number Two, Rhonda, Inspector Blue, Officer Darcy, the other policeman, and… Mr. Benedict? Oh, no – sorry! That's just you." She looked up. "That's it."
"Thank you, Miss Contraire." Constance frowned at him, disliking being referred to as such. "Gentlemen," he said, turning to the others, "I believe we have our suspects."
They stared at him, amazed (and in Kate's case, jaw agape). It was amazing how simply and logically he thought about the murder case – and how he managed to, seemingly effortlessly, narrow the list of suspects from well over a billion people to only fifteen.
"Now, we merely need to begin eliminating the remaining people. Let us begin with those who reside at the police station – Inspector Blue, Officer Darcy, and that other officer – Officer Daniel, if my memory serves me correctly."
"Officer Daniel," Sticky confirmed.
"Thank you, my dear Washington." Mr. Curtain was obviously enjoying how similar 'Washington' was to 'Watson.' "Now as I was saying, I think that we can rule them out, seeing as they had never even been inside the mansion before today, as I believe young George here can confirm." Sticky confirmed. "That brings our suspect count down to twelve, I believe. Lovely!"
"Miss and Mrs. Perumal were both off grocery shopping at the time, so we can eliminate them, too," piped up Number Two.
"Down to ten, then. Actually, make that nine. I have been in prison during this entire affair, and could not possibly have put Enab's Bane in young Reynard's spinach."
Kate could keep silent no longer. "But none of the suspects would have killed Reynie! None of us! We all loved him, and don't look at me like that, Constance. You know I don't mean that we all loved him as in romantically," for Constance had been looking at Kate with a slight smirk.
Constance knew full well that Kate hadn't been romantically interested in Reynie, of course, but that didn't prevent her from teasing her. Though she wasn't really in the teasing mood, she still couldn't resist a smile when the opportunity arose.
"We know that none of our remaining suspects would do such a thing, but perhaps one isn't who we think; either a different person in body or in mind. I'm sorry to upset you, but it really must be one of the nine. We've logically ruled out all the others."
"I… but… I suppose so." Kate looked down, embarrassed.
"Now, my friends, things get a little tricky. We must now try to eliminate the rest. I suggest that we start with Moocho."
"I already told you – Constance would have sensed it if Moocho put Enab's Bane in Reynie's food! She was right there," Kate said. Her anger and grief and frustration would not remain in check for very long, and she kicked a wall to burn some off. It worked, if only a little.
"Even so, my dear Wetherall, if Constance wasn't concentrating on Moocho's thoughts at the time, she might not have noticed his intentions. Isn't that right, Miss Con–?"
"But I was concentrating on his thoughts!" Constance wailed. "I was! I wanted to know if he was going to give me ice cream after dinner like I asked. If he put Enab's Bane in Reynie's food, I would have sensed it." Tears sprang unbidden into her eyes. What if it had been Moocho? What if she just hadn't been paying enough attention? Reynie's death wasn't her fault – was it?
"Wait – you were reading his thoughts while he was walking into the dining room? Were you reading them while he was carrying the food to the table?" Mr. Curtain demanded. Constance sniffed and nodded. Mr. Curtain made a horrible screeching sound, like a fork scraping on metal, or fingernails on chalkboard – in short, Mr. Curtain was laughing. "Why then, our suspect count is down to eight! Miss Contraire would have known if he intended to murder Reynard. Down to eight already! This is proving to be a very simple case indeed." The others stared at him. They failed to see the humour in the situation, and Mr. Curtain's laughter just wasn't as infectious as Mr. Benedict's had been.
"What about suicide?" asked Rhonda tentatively.
"Reynie wouldn't –" Kate began, but Rhonda cut across her.
"I know he probably wouldn't," she conceded, "but we have to take all possibilities into account. Unless I'm very much mistaken, Reynie is still one of our suspects." She looked at Mr. Curtain, who stood pondering the possibilities for quite a while.
Finally, His eyes lit up and he said, "It couldn't have been a suicide, because to handle Enab's Bane safely, he would have had to be wearing gloved dipped in formaldehyde, and he wasn't wearing gloves, nor were his hands showing tremendous tissue damage or excessive bleeding. So now we're down to seven suspects."
Kate blinked back tears and looked away. She had been nursing a secret hope that it had been suicide. It still would have been terrible, but at least none of her living friends would be accused.
"And now that I think about it, Constance couldn't have done it either. She was in the kitchen, not in the hall. Six more to go!" Mr. Curtain was saying.
Rhonda stifled a yawn (for it was now quite late). "What about me and Number Two? What's to say that we didn't do it?"
Once again, Mr. Curtain thought about it for a long time before answering. "From my previous examination of the mansion, I can conclude that Number Two was – ah – relieving herself at the time. You however… Where were you at the time when Reynie died?"
"I was at the table, like the rest of us. But only after I was called. When the food was being served by Moocho, I was in the study on the second floor."
"Well, then by all means, let us go to the study!" exclaimed Mr. Curtain. They ran off through the maze.
The second-floor study was – like most rooms in the old mansion – covered in books. Save a set of footprints, the rest of the floor was carpeted by dust.
"Excellent. Most excellent!" Mr. Curtain hurried forward, nearly tripping over a copy of The Madison Family Tree and History that was lying on the floor. With some assistance from Kate, he knelt on the floor, bringing his large, lumpish node inches from the footprints. "These footprints were made by someone of about Rhonda's height and weight at about… 6:00 PM. Judging by the layers in the dust."
The others stared in amazement. Mr. Curtain, while at times a mortal foe, was also a brilliant man. Constance had been quite right; no one else would be able to solve the case. It had to be Curtain.
"Well, that means that Miss Kazembe is also off our suspects list." He straightened a grim expression on his face. "That means that the person who murdered Reynard Muldoon is among these four – Mrs. Washington, Mr. Washington, George, or Kate."
There was a horrified silence, interrupted by Sticky clearing his throat softly. "Um… Excuse me?" he said, reaching for where his polishing cloth had been before he had gotten his contacts only to withdraw it as he remembered that it was no longer there, "I can rule out me and my parents."
Kate looked at him in horror, immediately grasping the implications.
"We… we were at the table, but we never touched the Reynie's food. If we had, there would have been finger prints on his plate, but Moocho's finger prints were the only ones on there. So we couldn't have been the ones who poisoned Reynie…" He said the last part in a whisper, barely audible over the ticking of the clock resting on a nearby stack of books.
"But that means," Kate breathed, her eyes wide with horror, "That I was the one who killed him."
*Ha! Puns! Get it? Cameras, not pleased with this development! Ha ha ha! Hee hee! Ha… Never mind.
Author's Note – All right. There's a little cliff hanger to keep you interested until I get the third and final instalment out. I think I did a decent job with the mystery, but it wasn't very dramatic. It was just a bit of logic and deduction. Ah, well. I'm no Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. On my profile, you can vote on who you think the murderer of Reynie is. So far, I have two votes for Inspector Blue and one for Reynie (suicide). Speaking of which, there are a few things in this story that make little to no sense. But never fear! (Grammar Defender is here? That sounds really weird…) All shall click together (hopefully) in chapter the third. Have fun waiting! It could be a while…