Chapter 2
"What did I just do?" I found myself saying.
"I'm not quite sure actually." Clive shrugged. "If you ever want to be a lawyer you could pretty much skip law school. No, wait, you should go into interrogating at the Yard. Inspector Chelmey could use a bulldog like you."
"A bulldog? No, I don't think so." I paced the floor. "That wasn't me."
"Are you sure? Because it sure looked like you. Face it. You, like everyone else, have an assertive side. You, like every other woman, can't stand to see injustice." Clive stood up. "Put them together and voila."
I raised my eyebrow. "Have you been looking through the Psychology section?"
"Perused is more like it. Anyway, not the point." Clive reached for the pile of mail still on my desk. "A case, I see?"
He ripped off the seal and pulled out a yellowed piece of paper. It looked like it was ripped out of an old book.
"Page 54. What book is this?" Clive turned over the page to inspect it.
"Looks like… the Phantom of the Opera?" I shrugged.
"That movie Descole is always going on about?"
"It's a book, silly. Anyway, what are these lines under the words?"
"Hmm… a coded message, probably." Clive shrugged.
I pulled out a pen. The individual words were nonsense, but maybe if I put the first letter…
"It says 'university'"
"Well, usually I would say which university, but obviously this means Gressenheller."
"How do you know?"
"Someone stamped the back of this with a 'Property of Gressenheller U Library'" Clive flipped it over and showed it to me.
"Well, then we're leaving. Is the professor there?" I grabbed my coat of my desk.
"Er… it's 7:00 pm, so no, unless he's grading papers."
"Perfect. We can walk there since it's only a few blocks away."
I noticed as we were walking out that Clive wasn't the least bit worried. If I were him, I would. He could possibly be going back to prison for something he didn't do and I just made it worse. I guess that's confidence for you.
A/N: Descole has to have seen Phantom of the Opera. Where else would he get the idea to wear a white mask and cape? Even his theme sounds like it.
