The Pearl Crucible - A Dardana Fenek Mystery - MARDONIOS - (part 1)

(Chapter 3, part 1)

The militia showed up with remarkable swiftness, six uniforms, and an officer, the always disrespectful Subaltern Alagon. “Cor,” he said. “That’s no good. And look who’s here. Miss Nosy-panties herself.”

“Subaltern,” I said, giving him a citizen curtsey while Barsina made a full obeisance.

The subaltern ordered the lights up to full, and the majordomo hobbled around, touching the controls and looking gray and shaken. “All right, you men, don’t touch anything for Temes’s sake. You! Start writing the description of the scene. You two, get the lumography scanner in here. You two, canvas the premises for anyone who ain’t supposed to be here. You, in the hall, and keep anyone else out. Nosy-panties, why are you in here?”

“Mist’ Fortunato asked me to come and examine his ground-car.”

“What, you buying it?” He laughed thinly.

“It was wrecked.”

“Tcha, yah, we all know that,” Alagon said. “What did he think you were going to do for it?”

“He was concerned that someone had tried to kill him. He wanted me to look at it.”

“I guess he should have watched out for statues,” he said.

“They were messing with Mist’ Fortunato’s desk,” the majordomo complained.

“That right?” the subaltern said, interested.

“He was my client. I’m still investigating.”

“Nothing for you to investigate. Stand over there by the armor and keep your hands off everything. Temes’s bum, I’ll have to call the golden boy. Shite.”

He reeled out the handheld from his shoulder comms gear and clacked the key, slipping in an earpiece.

“Well, this is nice,” I said to Barsina.

“I hope they do not question us, Miss.”

I looked at her. She was pale and trembling and had reason to be alarmed. “I’m sure they won’t,” I said casually, feeling a tremble around the edges myself. “Not you anyway.”

“Oh, Miss—”

“On his way,” the subaltern said, reseating the handheld. “And almost already here. Somebody slipped him the word after me. Maybe first. Dam’ me, he’s moved fast all day.” He prowled around the room, scribbling down notes as fast as he could.

Finally, he gave me a look. “You, Miss Bint—”

“Fenek,” I corrected.

“What did you find here, eh?”

I walked to within sight of the body and began to point “As you see him, face down, struck from behind, one blow with that statue. Windows are locked, no bloody footprints, and I feel the body was rifled after the attack—see the right pocket? This was ripped and left behind.” I offered the torn card tag.

The subaltern grunted, looking at it carefully before putting it in a celuglas evidence bag and slipping it inside his cuirass. “Maybe,” he said suspiciously. “Was he warm when you got here?”

“And should still be. We entered the room not thirty minutes ago.”

“How’d you get in?”

“Check the door latch,” I said.

“You making me check myself?”

“Hadn’t you better?”

He went over with no good grace, found the jammed latch, and swore. “You’re always bloody trouble, Nosy-panties—”

“Subaltern Alagon, do you regularly curse around women?”

“Sir!”

There was a stir among the other militiamen and quick salutes, quicker and sharper than I’d ever seen given to old Fat-and-Farty Topĉu.

He entered the library from the hall and stood there with his hands on his hips, looking at the crime scene, at the militiamen—and at me. He was wearing his dress blues, with his white gloves in his belt and his peaked cap under his arm, and tall boots. He had gold-brown hair, was freshly shaved, was every span of two meters, and he was the officer who’d taken my yellow pornographic novel and said, “Really?”

He gave me a long look, and again, I picked up a scent—a different one this time, not a touch of flower but a touch of musk. It fit him. It also calmed me. I folded my hands, then quickly crossed my arms instead and looked nonchalant.

“Alagon, what’s the situation here?”

Alagon, with an unhappy frown, aped what I had told him and waved his own notes, and the ensign-captain approached the body carefully, looking at the floor. He squatted and gently touched the damaged head. The lumography scanner was busy moving its focus at the end of its arm slowly back and forth over the scene with a low whine.

“Who is this man?” he asked.

“An aristoi, sir,” said Alagon, with dogged confidence.

The ensign-captain nodded gravely. “There are some clues that point that way,” he agreed. He counted on his long, tanned fingers. “The house. The fact the house is in the Green Quarter. Everything in the house.” He looked around and nodded. “The silk clothing on the body. But!” He raised his forefinger and looked at Alagon. “Subaltern?”

“Yes, sir?” Alagon’s unhappy frown was deepening.

“I was having a fine dinner in fine feminine company at a very expensive restaurant that I can’t truly justify on my salary, so, if I am to investigate a murder on the first day of my authority in the Night Market Commissariat … I would like to know, subaltern, who he is. Or was, if you will.”

Alagon’s eyes slid to me. The ensign-captain caught the look and pointed at me. “Perhaps she … ?”

“Miss Fenek was summoned to see him, sir,” the subaltern said stiffly.

The officer rose, wiping his fingers of the dead man’s dampness on a kerchief from his sash, and approached me. Barsina faded into the background, folding her hands and looking at the floor, bowing her head and hunching lightly. I fairly wanted to do it myself but held myself as rigid as possible and practiced my aristoi icey expression.

He bowed. “Ensign-Captain Mardonios,” he said.

I gave him my most practiced citizen curtsey. “Miss Dardana Fenek, Ensign-Captain.” I offered my hand, and he bent over it, which, strictly speaking, he need not have done as he is of a higher class than I.

“The intriguing Miss Fenek,” he said. “Ensign-Captain Retired Topĉu mentioned you.”

“Good things, I hope,” I said. Topĉu had never referred to me as intriguing. I heard him call me a whore once when he thought I couldn’t hear, but that’s not the same thing.

“He mentioned that you solved private cases and got in the way of militia business.”

I curtsied again. Now that he was standing so close, he was engaging all of my senses and making it somewhat difficult to think. I gently tugged on the cords of my girdle to focus myself.

He’s very tall, is the ensign-captain.

“Explain to me who he is, and why you’re here.”

“He was afraid he was a target for murder,” I said. “He was the Director of the State Gallery.”

( … This way to Chapter 2, part 3 … ) ( … This way to Chapter 3, part 2 … )