IX: The Prey pt. II
Kenny
"Did what I was told! She never said nothing about countin' them, I swear it. If she said to, I would 'ave done so, on my life! The girls, they run all round the house all the time, and I 'ave too much going on to go chasin' after each one," Footman Eckel said with his hands raised as if ready to fend off a blow, his back pressing against the wall.
Laurens was jotting down notes on a pad he'd pulled out of his immense greatcoat, while Kenny leaned into the man, interlocking their eyes.
The acquaintance had begun with Eckel splitting his trousers, partly because Kenny had kicked down the door to the staff quarters, but mainly because Eckel had been in such a hurry to get out of the way it was a wonder he didn't rip himself in two. He squirmed now, face screwed together, his fat lips wobbling like two mounds of jelly bumping together.
"Sure, ya should slow down. Ain't good for a man to be working so hard, not if he aspires to die quietly in his sleep one day." Kenny grinned.
Nothing to lighten the mood like seeing a man squirm like the slithering spineless worm he is. People would wrinkle their noses at cowardice like it gave them a bad taste in their mouths, but when it comes down to it, nothing's more transparent than cowardice, and thereby nothing's more honest. Eckel's chins bobbed up and down as his mouth performed a stunning impression of a fish gulping for air. Probably searching for words in response, but of course, worms can't speak.
"When was the last time ya saw Lucie Wäber?" Kenny asked, and when the pale maggot only stared stupidly at him, he grabbed a fistful of fabric from the front of the man's shirt.
Eckel let out a noise like a mouse being stepped on. Bright beads of moisture filled his round eyes, and he stared up into Kenny's face like he saw something truly awful there. Which was kind of rude, considering that he'd shaved and all before going here.
"Yesterday mornin'," Eckel regurgitated, and then panted heavily. "N-no, three! Three days ago it was, before they found the master in his chambers."
Kenny let go of the man's collar.
The doc smiled as if this was all one big quiz contest, and Eckel had just given the right answer. "Three days is correct, Mr. Eckel. Very good, now let us go back to that day. Tell us, in your own words, what happened. Anything you remember might prove useful, and we are grateful that you take the time to answer our questions." The look on his face suggested that he was resisting the urge to stroke Eckel' hair.
Eckel, who was apparently not a completely dull, insensitive moron, wiped his hands down his chest, almost as if he'd discovered that he was covered in filth. "Like what?" he said, grimacing.
Strike that part about him not being a dull, insensitive moron, the man's clearly only good for shittin' out of both ends and copulating with himself, like any old worm.
"That too many words in a row for ya? Let's try somethin' shorter then: what were ya doing that mornin'?"
"Same as always weren't it. Inspected the grounds, checked on the storages, and checked off the day's wine and beverage lists. Had more to go about, but then everyone started screaming, didn't they."
The doc flipped a page on his little pad. "Was it ever established how the perpetrator entered and exited the house?"
"Back door," the oaf said straight away. "Had to have been, guards by the front door at all times,"
"Is there no side entrance?"
"Nah, we use the back way for deliveries and all such. Big door." He made an encompassing motion to illustrate just how big the door was.
"Correct me if I am mistaken, but you are telling me you have a door at the back of the house that anyone might enter through?" Laurens jotted down a few misshapen characters, finishing it off with several heavy-handed question marks.
"Nah, nah, that ain't it. It's locked at all times, ain't it. You'd have to be pretty daft to just leave it open."
"Quite. And who has a key?"
"Just... me and the housekeeper?" Eckel said, like he wasn't quite sure.
"And which of your keys have gone missing?" the doc asked.
Eckel stared at him open-mouthed. "What?" He looked at Kenny, mistaking him for someone helpful. "Huh? Missin'?"
"Yo Bosslady! Ya got that key o' yours handy?" Kenny shouted.
They had been given a storage closet to conduct their interviews in, a small space that smelled faintly of dog and mildew, which was odd, as this was not a house that would tolerate the presence of either. They heard brisk steps approaching from outside, and then the door cracked open.
"If you wish to speak to someone, Mr. Hunter, I suggest you go look for them instead of braying like a lame mule. You mustn't disturb the mistress in her grief."
"Dontcha think 'disturbed' is what she oughta be right now?" he said.
"Grieving peacefully is what she should be doing," the housekeeper snapped. "Now what did you want me for?"
Kenny nodded to the thin band of waxed cord tied around her neck. "Got your key there?"
"Keys." She plucked out a set of three keys from inside her neckline. "The key to the house, this one's for the pantry, and this one unlocks the back door."
"Unlocks—so the door's always locked then?"
"Of course! Do you imagine we'd just leave it open?"
"Just wanted to check that your footman wasn't gettin' creative with the truth," he said.
Schulz left, muttering something uncomplimentary under her breath. Her interrogation hadn't revealed anything exciting, and what was worse, several other members of staff backed her story, adding their own, pointless one to the mix. The unmistakable feeling of defeat had begun to creep through the walls when Eckel's turn under the proverbial lash came around, and Kenny hadn't expected things to heat up with the arrival of this sad mistake of nature, which goes to show how wrong a man can be.
"Your key," Kenny said to Eckel.
"M-my… what abou' it?" Eckel dabbed the growing beads of sweat from his brow.
"Show-" Kenny stepped in closer. "Me-" He leaned in. "Your-" He drove his open palm into the naked plank beside Eckel's head. It gave, letting out a muted snapping sound. "Key."
Eckel's hands jumped to his waist, starting to fumble with his belt. He made a breathless hee-haw sound that had nothing to do with mirth, and a perfect droplet of sweat plunged from the tip of his nose into the abyss that awaited below. A musty smell of damp and unwashed human body poured from him, and the tangy reek of fresh anxiety wrapped itself around them. For some reason it made Kenny feel right at home.
"Here, I got it here. See—it ain't lost innit." Eckel's hand shook as he held it up.
"Odd, don't ya think?" Kenny said. "If a group of maniacs got inside the house, a lost key would be the first thing I'd assume. But here we are, both keys in their rightful place. Makes ya wonder if someone let them inside, don't it?"
All colour drained from Eckel's face. "I didn't let no one inside, I wouldn't!"
Kenny shrugged. "Alright, so maybe ya just forgot to lock it."
"No! I'd have remembered, seeing what happened and all, wouldn't I—no way I wouldn't."
"Ya realise they didn't fly in through the window? Someone either stole a key, or ya let them in, or ya forgot to lock the door ya squirming shitbag!"
"No!" Eckel screamed, tears squeezing out of the corners of his tightly shut lids. His broad face scrunched up in a grimace that made him look like an immense squalling baby.
Kenny hit him. A backhand blow right in the mouth. One meaty thwack , and then silence.
"I suggest ya come up with a better explanation real fast," Kenny said.
Ironic how he always ended up here, inside a cramped room with his knuckles stinging. Ever since he took Uri's outstretched hand. Ironic how it felt so pointless, but also comforting. He smiled, and Eckel winced as if he'd hit him again.
It made him smile even wider.
"Perhaps," Laurens said and put a light hand on Kenny's shoulder. Most people wouldn't have done that, were they in this situation. Sure, most of the time you could count on nobles being immeasurably stupid, but as the doc carefully manoeuvred him out of the way, Kenny wondered instead if the man was actually brave. A really stupid kind of bravery, but still.
"Perhaps you only left the door unlocked," Laurens continued. "Because someone approached you about it? It's alright—no one need ever know. It can be our secret. We only ask so that we may piece together how the events transpired on that fateful day. You did not know what would happen, no one could have. But had you known, you would have prevented it, wouldn't you, Mr. Eckel?"
The doorman shrunk like a punctured balloon, his shoulders slumping, breath huffing out. "Yes," he whispered, eyes downcast. A bright droplet fell and burst upon the floor, followed by another.
"Didn't ask why he wanted it, did I. Only thought of the silver, clinkin' together almost like... Like music. Never would've seen so much silver again, if I'd said no. Thought they'd just take some stuff, ain't like no one would miss it here, 's all nothing to them, to the lord and lady... Stuff like this, they don't happen, do they? They just don't." He wiped a sleeve across his face. "Please sirs, it'll be the gallows for me if someone finds out. All I wanted was four pieces of silver, seein' as I never had nothin' before. Spare me, sirs," he pleaded as if it was even an option to keep quiet about the matter.
Just stumblin' through life in a daze, never understandin' the way the world works, eh. At least not until it's already too late.
"Do not worry, we will keep this to ourselves. Won't we, Mr. Hunter?" the doc said to Kenny.
"Yeah sure," said Kenny, because it seemed to be a good way to keep this flood of information going. Eckel's face lost its stricken cast, and he rubbed his hands together, bowing profusely.
"The walls' blessings upon you good sirs. Anything I can do you for, just say the word. I'm in your debt, that I am. Thought you looked like thoroughly decent folk, but no one ever were so kind before."
Now there's somethin' ya don't hear every day.
"Describe the man who paid ya. How d'ya make contact in the first place?" Kenny said.
"T'was on my way back from a night at the Tilted Goose, a fortnight past. Told him to sod off at first, I did, but then a few days later I found myself short on coin, and I started thinking. Saw him again five days ago, same place, and this time I heard 'im out."
"And the description?"
"Well he looked alright, didn't he. Not dangerous or nothing like that." Seeing the look on their faces, Eckel quickly added: "Rather well dressed I thought, brass buttons on his coat. Looked to be made from wool. A hat too, real horsehair I think."
"Noble?"
"Nah, not that fine. Hear people get rich off of trade in some places, maybe he was one of those? Or servin' someone less stingy than the von Rohrs. Middle age, brownish goatee. Wore leather gloves. I remember 'cause he had these fluttery hands."
"Fluttery?"
"Aye, fluttery," Eckel said, wiggling his fingers to illustrate.
"No name?" Kenny asked, though he already knew the answer.
Eckel shook his head.
"Did he mention why he required entry to the house?" said the doc, to which Eckel shook his head.
"Said to take the coin, and to mind my own business."
And it seemed Eckel had done just that.
By the time afternoon came around, they had learned a lot about what happened that day. Sadly, none of it was even remotely connected to the case. The last person to be interrogated, or 'questioned' as Laurens insisted on calling it, even though they both knew what they were up to, was a housemaid named Ida.
Or, did they both know what this really was?
There's a fundamental difference between an interview and an interrogation, and it seemed to all hinge on whether the subject was a voluntary participant or not. Though noblemen, like the good doc here, always got the simplest things mixed up, like whether they were telling the truth or convenient lies, and whether their actions derived from ethics or personal gain. Tricky things to keep apart, apparently.
Ida kept looking down at herself while the doc asked about where she had been, and what she'd been doing the day von Rohr was killed. Brushing invisible dirt from her left sleeve, she replied, "I cleaned the breakfast room in the morning, shaking the drapes before dusting and sweeping; or it'll all be undone, Mrs Schulz says. I set the table for Lord and Lady von Rohr, and when breakfast was over we washed up before I tidied and replaced the porcelain. I had a short break, the mistress is kind and allows such twice a day even if we are busy, and I was sweeping the hall upstairs when the master was found."
"Did you see Miss Lucie that morning?" the doc asked, scribbling furiously on his pad.
The girl nodded.
"We met in the hallway. She was carrying the master's shirts, so I thought she was on her way to the laundry."
"Was that the last time you saw Miss Lucie?"
"Yes," the girl said. Her hand gripped the corner of her apron and she began to pluck at the seams.
"And you said the master was found while you were in the upstairs hallway—found by who?"
The girl fumbled with the lace trim on her apron, hands shaking visibly.
"I did," she said.
"Oh, so you did? What exactly was it that drew your attention to Lord von Rohr's room?" Laurens asked.
When the girl did not reply Laurens continued. "Did you see something around there that caught your attention? Or hear a strange sound?"
"I-" she said, wringing her apron back and forth. "I don't know what it was."
"So you left your task unfinished and went into your master's room for no particular reason? Is it your habit to do so unbidden?" the doc asked, not quite smiling but looking gently amused. Before the girl had been given a chance to reply, he continued, "What was your intention when you went inside? Do you clean the master's apartments? Fetch his laundry? Did you knock before you entered?"
"It's not-" the girl protested. "Miss Lucie does all that, it's not why I went, and I don't remember if I knocked or not."
"Allow me to rephrase, miss," said Laurens. He searched for the girl's gaze but didn't seem able to catch it, seeing as the girl's eyes were darting around like a tit in a trap. "Why did you go to Joachim von Rohr's room?"
"I don't remember," the girl said, which suggested it was time to remind her of the difference between an interview and an interrogation.
"Doc," Kenny said, and searched along his belt until he felt the old leather wrapped around the hilt of the knife he always carried. He drew the blade—not the same one he'd used to end so many MP's lives, shit, not even that blade had been the same one each time—but a curved steel one bought and paid for by the boss himself. They had both known that the knife, along with everything else, was wasted on Kenny, but for all he could tell Uri didn't care. He continued to give things Kenny never asked for; things he didn't know what to do with. Like faith. Trust. What the hell's a man to do with that, except do anything not to disappoint, it seemed like.
"Hold her arms," he said to Laurens.
"I beg your pardon?" the doc spluttered. His eyes jumped from Kenny to the girl, whose body had gone rigid at the glint of steel in Kenny's hand. "But," he said, rather weakly.
"I said hold her arms. From behind." He sighed when Laurens stepped in and held the girl like a man might hold a pissed off viper—tentatively and from far away.
"Cross her wrists and hold 'em tight." Kenny said, and showed her the metal gleam without angling it towards her. You do that when you know you're gonna use it. Now he was just giving her a good look at that brutal edge, and enough time for her to imagine what it could be used for.
"See, the doc here, he's very well-behaved. Ya might even say he's kind. The truth is that what matters ain't kindness, and it ain't you, or me either for that matter. 'Thing with nobility is that when someone helps them into an early grave, a debt is owed to their kin. And now someone's gotta pay. Now, who do ya think's gonna pay in the end? Same ones that always do—the people at the bottom. Next thing I'm gonna tell ya is real important, so listen up." He paused, giving her a little time to imagine the worst. How did he know the worst is what she would picture? Well, people always thought of the worst whenever they saw him. And sometimes, they were right.
"Someone's gonna pay, but it don't have to be you. So start rememberin', real fast."
The girl's lips trembled. Maybe she understood what he'd said. Maybe she had already known but hoped that this one time the world might bend to her will. He saw it all the time, inside the rooms of the palace where he usually spent his days. The problem with magical thinking though is that it doesn't work.
"I heard a cry, that's why I went and looked," the girl stammered, perhaps having arrived at that particular conclusion herself. "The door was half open and I thought perhaps someone needed help, so I went."
"Better. Why didn't ya just say so in the first place?"
"Because-" she twisted her head around to look at Laurens. "Oh please, won't you let me go? I promise I'll tell you everything! I didn't want to lie, I just made a mistake and now everything's all messed up." Tears spilt from her eyes.
The doc let her go, his face pale with bright red flowers blooming on his cheeks. There was no mistaking the horror there. Kenny had seen it many times before, the 'what have I done'-look.
"I'm so sorry," he stammered, backing away. Wiping his hands on his coat, again and again. His eyes found a point far from the girl's tear-stained face and rested there. She let out a hiccuping sob. Kenny wished she would stop crying so they could get on with it.
"Well," he barked. "Let's hear it then."
"I didn't want to say anything because… because when I was almost at the door someone came out. It was-" She sobbed again.
He wanted to slap her. If she could just keep it together for a few minutes they might get something intelligible out of her, and be on their way.
"It was Lucie, and she was crying," she continued, just as the silence became unbearable. "She rushed past me and didn't seem to hear when I asked what was wrong. I looked inside the room, and of course, I understood then."
"So ya saw her cryin' and runnin' out of the room, then ya went inside and saw what was there. Why the hell didn't ya say so right away?"
"Because I thought she'd just gone in and found him there, the master, same way I did! I thought she'd gone half mad with grief. She was supposed to be just a maid like the rest of us, but the master doted on her. He kept her as his personal servant, and she got all sorts of special treatment, better meals and more rest, he even gave her silver sometimes. So much there were rumours, although surely none of them were true. But see, with all that it wasn't strange at all that she'd be shattered, so I thought she'd just had a terrible shock and needed a bit of time. That's something they can't take from us, can they? Not when something like this happens. Anyway, the first night I waited for her to show up anytime, but when she wasn't there by breakfast I started wondering. The days just flew by though, it's all been so stressful, and no one asked where she was until today… and then I realised what everyone might think. So when Mrs Schulz asked I just panicked and said I hadn't seen her either… And now I think…. Did I let the master's murderer get away? Was it my fault?"
Me, me, me, always the same song, isn't it?
"If she did him in, yeah," Kenny replied.
Or maybe not, since it didn't fit with their findings, but this girl didn't know that. Too busy wallowing in self-pity.
"But how could she be the one?" the girl said. "I know I lied and that it was wrong, but how could she possibly have done something like that?" She put her face into her hands and wept.