Detective Nicely Strongoak and the Case of the Dead Elf (12 page)

‘All because of a missing barkeep and a lost trophy?’ She raised one perfectly shaped (for an elf) eyebrow. ‘Or is there something else currently engaging your attentions that may have caught their attention too?’

From where I was sitting there was a lot engaging my attentions, but I didn’t think it gallant to mention it. This also did not seem like the right time to casually mention my predicament with regard to a recently deceased member of her own kin, and since she hadn’t mentioned anything either, I decided that somebody was indeed really keeping a very tight lid on matters. The only problem was that it you kept a lid on a pot too tightly, and then keep adding more heat, you generally end up with a very messy explosion indeed.

I tried a different approach. ‘Maybe Highbury keeps more dishonourable company than we have considered? One quiet word in the right ear can kill as surely as an arrow.’

‘That’s a very unpleasant thought. All this sporadic violence that keeps breaking out around the Citadel, do you think perhaps it’s not quite as spontaneous as it seems?’

‘Ouch!’ I said. ‘That is an even more mean and cynical idea than I was contemplating and I think it’s a vein we should dig a great deal deeper.’

Thelen sighed, ‘I find it hard to believe that my own kin could behave in such a fashion.’

‘Lady,’ I replied, ‘nothing has surprised me since I did a body search on a Witch Queen and found a wand in a place it had no right to be.’

Thelen had a further appointment, so she made her apologies and left, while I stayed for another perfectly brewed coffee. I left the restaurant feeling strangely unsatisfied, though, and it was not just about the size of their portions. I thought it was about time I got back on the offensive. I had been everybody’s favourite punch-bag and it was beginning to sour. It was time to take the dragon by the tail, or a least poke him a bit with a very long stick from a very long way away.

I found a street-horn nearby, put a few calls through and then kick-started part two into operation. For my next step I needed some more background. I was not sure who to connect with, but when in doubt ask the Citadel Guard. Ralph was at his desk when I called, and I got straight through.

‘Hi Ralph, Nicely here. How’s my wagon, any chance of seeing it again this side of winter?’

‘I am sorry, sir,’ came the reply. ‘I am afraid you will have to make that request through the appropriate channel, and no, sorry, I will not be available for comment later, as I have to visit my dental technician concerning some bridgework.’

So, someone was now breathing that close down Ralph’s neck as well. Or was my speech-horn style in need of some attention? Interesting, especially given Doroty’s earlier reticence. There was something that Ralph wanted to tell me – he’d given me our secret password. The bridgework he had mentioned had nothing to do with dentistry. The bridge in question was over the River Everflow.

The Dwarfholm Bridge is the last of the great bridges that span the Everflow as it makes its way past the Hill down to the Bay. It is a combination of drawbridge and suspension elements and a mighty fine piece of engineering. The four structural towers would not be out of place in a grand fortress and they have more pointy bits than is strictly necessary for crossing a river. But an abundance of pointy bits can never be a bad thing on a building, it’s like the wings on my Dragonette, it just wouldn’t look right without them.

Some years before, when we were both still with the CIA, Ralph and I had been responsible for busting a ‘dust ring’ based there. The once bustling Dwarfholm Bridge area was, at that time, pretty derelict, with empty storehouses made obsolete by the new docks opening up further down in the Bay. The ‘dust ring’ had set up business in rooms built into the very foundations of the bridge. Being of dwarfish construction, the rooms could only be opened by key-and-code. By some oversight, Ralph and I had both ended up with keys to one of the secret doors, and we both kept forgetting to hand them in long after the investigation was over. What are the chances of that, I ask you?

It was a fair step to the Dwarfholm Bridge and I had not been out there for some time. A lot of change was happening. Storehouses were being taken over by bright young things from the upper levels and being converted into dwellings. Stockshops and knife-and-finger joints were reopening as licensed provisioners and rather smart little eateries. I hardly recognised the old place. Fortunately, the Bridge itself was still home to nothing more than a few bottle-boys and wormheads, and they had more things to worry about than one lone dwarf out for a stroll by the riverside. I still double-locked the Helmington and kept a careful look over my shoulder as I entered the combination and undid the lock to the Bridge Room.

There were a lot of steps up to our little secret hideaway in one of the two main towers that house the hydraulics and engines that lift the leaves of the drawbridge. After the steam engines were upgraded the near-bank tower had become largely superfluous to needs, but as a hideaway it could not be beaten.

Ralph was already halfway down his first pipe when I entered. Lit only by the glow from his bowl and the glow from Citadel street-lamps, he looked like some weathered hero from days gone by, more suited to guarding against the ravages of goblins and trolls than dealing with the politics of modern-age detective work.

I lit a pipe and looked out of the Tower window, which gives an unbeatable view upstream along the Everflow towards the Troll’s End Bridge.

‘So Ralph, what’s the tally?’

‘As I remember it, the New Iron Town Delvers got taken to the cleaners by the Citadel Eagles and lost 6–2.’

‘Ballgames aside?’

‘Well.’ He took a contemplative draw. ‘Let us say it’s not so much what is happening, but rather what is not.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Remember Scout Telfine?’

‘How could I forget, such an unalloyed addition to the Citadel Guard. I forgot to mention, I bumped into him at Guard Central, about to lay a dragon’s egg, from the look of him.’

‘Yes, indeed. It has been remarked upon before. A man with a pike so far up his own fundament he has trouble putting his hat on. And if he has a nice word to say about any of the Citadel’s folk, apart from men, I have yet to hear it. He is right about one thing, though: even more so than in your day, when we have an incident involving an elf you really have to watch which way the dragon is flying, and when you hear leather wings flapping you keep your head well covered!’ He poked absent-mindedly at the embers in his briar with a pipenail. ‘Or otherwise you are going to get dumped on from high up.’

‘So, the heat came down?’

‘No, that’s just it, Nicely. The opposite, if anything, happened. Let’s just say that the investigation so far has been characterised by a period of untypical cool and clement weather.’

‘Josh said folks were getting rattled, though.’

‘Displacement twitching from those that mistake activity for action.’

‘Always the way, Ralph. Some people have got to be seen to be doing something, even if it’s thrashing around like a swimmer well out of his depth being tickled by a kelpie.’

‘But we didn’t get grief from the folk that really mattered.’

I pulled on my pipe.

‘Which should tell us something?’

‘I don’t know what though, Nicely.’

‘How about background on the dead elf? I just hope he wasn’t some well-connected lordling slumming it.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Ralph, looking genuinely perplexed. ‘We’ve run our own trace on this Truetouch character, of course, and come up with a big fat pixie’s breakfast. No real close friends, no address, nothing.’

‘Did you talk to a young lord by the name of Highbury, by any chance?’

‘Oh yes!’ Ralph raised his eyebrows and looked to the roof, as if for release. ‘And what a charmer he was as well, a delight to waste an hour of my life with him.’

‘Had you heard the rumour that he might be running for political office?’

Ralph gave this some consideration before he answered. ‘I hadn’t, Nicely, but somehow I’m not surprised, judging by what else has been crawling out of the woodwork this year. It’s enough to make you consider taking up whittling wooden teeth for Wulvers.’

‘But Truetouch …?’

‘He might just as well have stepped straight out of the Hidden Lands.’

‘Elves tend to be more tight with each other than that.’

‘Sure, I guess when you’ve been round the mountain as often as they have, you tend to get a pretty full address ledger.’

‘So how about his other Surf Elf buddies?’

‘Another blank. Everybody seemed to be vaguely aware of him, but that was all.’

I thought of the figure on the beach, holding the towel. A hero in nobody’s story, probably not even his own, but with a nice line of threads and a smile that surely must have opened a few doors somewhere?

‘What is Widergard coming to?’ I asked Ralph. ‘Folk minding their own business, whatever next: men not overcompensating?’

‘And dwarfs not carrying grudges?’

‘That really will be the day!’

Ralph stretched his long legs and they clicked like so many breaking twigs.

‘And then finally, some time during the small hours last night, the elves turned up and took the body.’

‘Was it the dune huggers?’

‘No, that’s another thing. Top-of-the-tree, real Higher Elves. Then, when I get in this morning we get the word, a lot of new boys are being drafted into the team; all from off the Hill. And a couple of elfin “advisors” suddenly turn up, doing interviews. All completely unconnected, or so they say.

‘Next I get the whisper that they are asking rather a lot of questions, including quite a few about you, Nicely. And every time you pick up the horn those elfin ears are sent a’twitching in your direction.’ He broke off and by the pipe light I could see him considering. ‘Anything else you can tell me yet, Nicely?’

‘Nothing that makes any sense, Ralph. I’m not even sure who I’m dealing with. I’ve two, maybe three cases on the go, and try as I might to keep them separate, they all seem to be getting mixed up.’

Ralph got up to leave. ‘Well, just as long as you are aware that there are probably some very important people now watching from the shadows.’

‘I appreciate the warning.’ We made for the door before I remembered the reason for my call. ‘Tell me, Ralph. Who would you go to ask for information about elves?’

‘The elves?’ he replied helpfully.

‘Let’s say, if one didn’t want any more involvement of the pointed-ear persuasion.’

Ralph paused at the door. ‘How about Arito Cardinollo?’

‘What, the gnome scribe?’

‘The same. Lives out in Little Hundred. He wrote a best-selling scroll on that very subject last year.’

‘Oh yes, of course, it got up a lot of perfect noses.’

‘Elves have been his life work, and he’s been very, shall we say, discreet, in the past – when awkward questions needed some answers.’

I laughed as I imagined what some of those questions might have been. ‘Thanks Ralph, I owe you.’

‘For what, Nicely? Nothing happened. I haven’t even seen you.’

I let him go down the staircase first and caught up with him waiting by the parked wagons. He looked the Helmington up and down with a mixture of distaste and curiosity. ‘If this is what you end up driving, I’m glad I never went private.’

‘The offer is still there Ralph,’ I said with a laugh. ‘Strongoak and Fieldfull has a nice ring to it.’

‘Fieldfull and Strongoak sounds better.’

I laughed again and then got serious. ‘Ralph, I have just been thinking – it would be very useful to get a tail on lord Highbury. Whatever is going on here, my grandfather’s bones tell me that Highbury is up to his pointy ears in it.’

‘I’m not going to argue with you there, Nicely. And certainly not with your grand-da’s remains either.’ He paused and gave the matter some thought before continuing, ‘But if I’m found putting the tail on any elf at the moment, without a reason more solid than an ancestor’s anatomy, I’m going to kicked round all five levels and back again.’

‘Oh, well – worth a try.’

‘I’ll give it some thought. By the way, the old bird told me you might be after these.’ Ralph threw me a set of wagon keys. ‘I cleared your Dragonette with the top brass and sent it down to your grease goblin Sceech for an overhaul. I think you’re going to be needing a fast set of wheels to keep ahead of this particular game.’

We both took a moment to consider what exactly the game might be, and if we were winning, before we waved our goodbyes. Ralph’s parting shot seemed particularly apt.

‘Don’t go spitting in the eye of any dragons, Nicely; especially the big pointy-eared ones.’

As I gave the Helmington some steam and reversed out from under the bridge I thought, just for a minute that I saw something move in the shadow of one of the bridge supports. I looked again and it seemed to be clear. I took this as a sign though, if Petal wanted to jump me again the shooter under my jacket was not going to be there just for show.

The Wizards’ Quarter was a strange place even by Hill standards. It was in an untidy part of Old Town and seemed out of phase with the rest of Widergard. It was still furnished with the trappings of a bygone era. I swear the lamplighters conspired in this, by keeping the place permanently under-lit, or maybe the wizards just don’t pay their bills. A few years back a terrific stink had been kicked up when there had been some talk of turning the whole Wizards’ Quarter into a theme park. The wizards, even in these days of reduced influence, had so far managed to resist this move.

The Wizards’ Quarter also provided cheap accommodation for any number of purveyors of other occupations which, like wizardry, now also do not command the respect they once had; poets and scribes and such-like. And in the cheapest of the cheap I found Renfield Crew, the scribe who had written
The Green Book
’s account of the political dealings of Mr Hardwood that I had read in the Citadel library.

If cellars can have subcellars, I’m not sure what subcellars can have by way of lower floors. Renfield Crew lived in such a place though, in a chamber that the poor unfortunates in the dungeons of old would have looked down on. I only stumbled upon his new abode by accident in the end. I’d almost given up, when I leant on a fence for support, in order to remove something from my boot that I really didn’t want on my boot. The fence turned out to be an unlocked gate, and that led to a staircase that I then floundered down in a very inelegant fashion until I hit the first turn. From there it was another two flights to the particular hole in the ground that Renfield inhabited. By the time I had carefully reached the bottom of the other staircases, and taken in this hovel, I was able to conclude that Renfield’s literary career was not on the up and up. ‘It’s all because of Hardwood!’ insisted the disgruntled scribe, when the sight of a bright shiny crown finally got me past the impressive display of padlocks, bolts, fasteners and clasps which protected his few miserable possessions. It transpired that it wasn’t his possessions that he sought to protect though, but his equally miserable personage.

‘He is out to kill me, you see? I dared write the things that nobody else would! Oh yes! The power of the quill, you see! Yes, I made him fear me. Me, Renfield Crew! I made him fear the quill of Renfield Crew! That is the power of the word!’

Renfield Crew, the feared scribe, was obviously still swinging his axe with no handle and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. If wretch ever became a sought-after commodity then Renfield was going to be a millionaire. He was thin to the point of famishment, with interesting skin conditions usually found in sailors who have been shipwrecked on deserted atolls for many years, living only on whelks. He had an odd number of teeth, or maybe it was an even number of teeth. Whatever, every other one seemed to be missing.

His room was in an even greater state of disrepair: a few crates pretending to be furniture, a stove and a sleeping palette. Writing must really be its own reward because it certainly didn’t seem to provide anything else.

‘I’d won awards, you know?’ He pointed to a few framed bits of parchment hung on the walls of the sub-subcellar, which were the only items breaking up the otherwise uniform coating of mould. ‘Oh yes, awards! For “most promising reportage” and “investigative insight” and “naked ambition”.’ He blinked a few times behind spectacles that seemed to be cultivating their own special coating of mildew. ‘I’m not so sure about that last one.’

It seemed Renfield was determined to prove his grievances had some grounding in reality even if his life no longer did. The loss of his job and the closing down of
The Green Book
were both the result of the press owner being bought out shortly after the Hardwood piece was pressed. Renfield was still tracing this sale and had come up, via a chain with more kinks than a chain-mail corkscrew, with a company that may, or may not, once have had a connection with Mr Hardwood. It seemed pretty scant evidence to me.

Renfield did still write; from what I could see he wrote lots, on just about anything that would hold ink: waste board, packaging, the backs of posters liberated from outside of Citadel entertainment establishments of every ilk – here low and high art definitely rubbed naked and well-dressed shoulders.

‘Soon, I’ll have it all! Soon, I will be vindicated! The whole of Widergard will see I was right about Alderman Hardwood! And they’ll learn about how he victimised me, ensured no press would hire me, made my life the black pit it has become!’

‘So, you’ve got fresh evidence as well, have you?’ I tried to see what he was currently writing, but the little pixie of distrust had lit a candle of anxiety behind his eyes.

‘No, no! Get away! Not yet, not yet!’ Renfield gabbled, grabbing at his damp and decaying writings. ‘Not until it’s finished! Who are you anyway? He sent you, didn’t he? Get back, get back!’

Renfield Crew’s few remaining faculties had gone west for a holiday. I gave him my card, which I think he saw as an opportunity for an interesting new expansion in his writings, and asked him to get into contact if he found anything solid for me to chip at. I climbed sadly up the three flights of stairs and went to find myself a wizard.

The cold-light sign outside
The
Homely House
Bar and Grill
flashed half-heartedly in the still cloying air. I opened the bar door and smoky air slipped round me like an old familiar overcoat. The wizard had arranged the time and place for the meet. I asked how I would recognise him, and he laughed mysteriously, and said I would know. I expected to find him, a mysterious figure lurking in some dark nook. What I did not expect was to find a place full of dark nooks (a nookery?) and sat in each one, a hooded and shadow-wrapped, staff-hugging mysterious figure.

I was feeling a little edgy after my conversation with Renfield and not in a mood for playing nice as I made my way to the servery. The keeper was seated behind it with his evening scroll. He glanced up and spoke in my general direction from behind some truly appalling dental work. ‘Can’t you read?’

‘Sure,’ I replied. ‘Five different languages in four different scripts.’

‘Well.’ He pointed to a badly penned sign on the servery top. ‘As this doesn’t seem to be one of them, this here sign says, “No Gnomes”, that’s G-N-O-M-E-S.’

‘And I am a dwarf, D-W-A-R-F, and this is an axe, do I need to spell it out any clearer?’ I watched the little gears turn over in his brain box.

‘Bog no, master. It’s a bit difficult to make you out in this gloom.’

‘Try turning a few more lamps on,’ I suggested.

‘I would do, but this is the way the wizards like it. They say it gives the place atmosphere.’ He got up off his stool and reached for a crock. ‘We don’t get many dwarfs up here in the Wizards’ Quarter. What can I get you? A goodly flagon of foaming ale, is it?’

I cannot stand stereotyping, and I didn’t think he had anything to match Mother Crook’s brew, so I replied tartly: ‘Juniper sling, very dry.’

‘You what?’

‘I said, a juniper sling. You having problems with your hearing as well as your eyesight? Perhaps both could be improved by moving your head nearer the floor.’

‘Bog no, master, I’m going bowling tonight.’ He started on the cocktail. ‘Olive and a twist?’

‘Yes,’ I replied, turning round and surveying the darkened bar.

‘I’m sorry but I’m all out of those little cheesy biscuits.’

I let him have that one, took my drink and made for a likely-looking candidate, hiding in one corner. It was a process of elimination. As far as I could tell in the gloom and smoke, he was the only person in the place sitting by himself.

‘What’s the matter with the Citadel suddenly,’ I said, taking a seat. ‘Has there been a mass outbreak of hives, or has the council brought out a sconce tax suddenly?’

‘It’s what the punters expect,’ replied the shrouded figure. ‘The mysterious image, all runes and pointed hats. Personally,’ he said, putting a flint to a large lamp on the table, ‘I feel it is all rather outdated. Still, we have to go with market forces, and as we seem to do most of our business in these places, we have to give the punters what they want. Anyway,’ he adjusted the wick to a more reasonable level, ‘perhaps we can dispense with that now.’

‘And what’s with the anti-gnome policy?’

The wizard blinked a couple of times as he played with the lighting.

‘I had never noticed that,’ he admitted.

‘Yes, powers of observation make a wizard, I’m told.’ I looked around by the improved illumination. ‘So, how is business? It doesn’t seem to be too bad.’

My drinking companion gave a shrug. ‘You would be well advised not to believe quite everything you see when dealing with the concerns of wizards.’ When I looked blank, he carried on. ‘For example, it has not been unknown for some wizards to employ people to sit with them, to make commerce appear a tad more busy.’

‘Which is not something you approve of, I take it.’

‘I think, Master Dwarf, that it is bad enough that we have to ply our art like a half-crown camp follower, without colluding in the charade.’ He said this with all the dignity one would expect of a wizard.

Not that I am much of a judge, to be honest. I have not had a lot of dealings with the mystical services. To be completely honest, I am not too sure what to make of them. They look like men, they talk like men, but treat them like men and you are liable to wake up with the head of a horse next to you, or worse, just with the head of a horse. If they are not men, then where do little wizards come from, you may ask? If anyone has ever found a lady wizard, I have yet to hear of it.

I guess it is just one of those mysteries of life, like how they get those ships in bottles, and how they make bottles that big anyway. And yes, I know all about witch queens and sorceresses, but they are pretty thin on the ground and would have to be remarkably fecund to keep the Citadel wizard supply topped up. There are rather a lot of wizards, considering that ‘wizarding’ might now be considered an endangered trade.

I broached the matter at hand. ‘Given the current employment situation then, I take it you might be open to some negotiations concerning a problem that is currently needing my attention.’

‘Master Dwarf, you have the floor.’

I flashed the shield. ‘Nicely Strongoak, Master Detective. Please call me Nicely.’

‘Nicely, an interesting name.’

I smiled thinly. ‘A bit of a long story.’

‘Well, no matter. I am Tollingstaff.’

‘Also an interesting name.’

‘Also a long story. However, as I was saying, Tollingstaff, Wizard, as certified by the White Cartel and the Citadel Licensing Authority. Fortunately, we have been able to escape so far without a need for some form of identity card, so you will just have to take my word for it. I usually have my clients call me Tollingstaff the Expedient. I dropped the rainbow-based coding scheme, as I found people were getting confused between myself and Vermilion & Co., interior decorators. I use the “Expedient” appellation instead, as the punters seem to like it, and it establishes a proper working relationship. In your case, Master Detective, as one professional to another I am willing to make an exception; friends call me Tolly.’

Yes, I liked this wizard. We spat, shook hands and I plunged into the tale. ‘You know Alderman Hardwood, the industrialist?’ The wizard supped his ale.

‘I know the individual, by reputation. Given his prominence in the affairs of the Citadel, I do not think that there can be a single individual, even the humblest of gnomes, who can claim ignorance on that score. I am also aware that many refer to him as a financial wizard. A term I have always found more than a little galling.’

I thought about this. ‘I can see how this might put a kink in your pointy hat, but from the way I read the runes, in all these old stories, wizards never really used to do that much, well, wizarding. Certainly not of the spells, magic and staff-waving kind. Oh, they lit the odd fire and set off fireworks as required, but most of the time they seemed to be dealing with nothing more esoteric than facts and information.’ I could see the wizard shift rather uncomfortably as I warmed to the subject. ‘It seems to me that by virtue of their positions – after all, they had the trust and confidentiality of kings and other high folk – and, with their own enviable intelligence-gathering network, this put them in ideal positions for being power-brokers. Now if these modern industrialists, with their connections in the markets, on the exchanges and council rooms, have achieved a similar pre-eminence, then surely they deserve the title of “Wizard” just as much.’

Tollingstaff inspected his ale before he replied, as if searching therein for inspiration. ‘A neat speech, Master Detective, and I fear there is more than an element of truth to it. We wizards became too introspective. We spent far too long poring over old manuscripts, and forgot that the world outside was changing apace. Somewhere along the way, we missed the last boat back to the Hidden Lands, and have been left feeling stranded ever since. However, our arcane knowledge can still be put to some use, I judge, or else you would not be here.’

I took the clipping from my purse. ‘This you will probably have heard of, but may not recognise; it’s the Hardwood Emerald.’ The wizard took out a pair of half-moon glasses, surveyed the picture and nodded. I continued: ‘From what I’ve been reading about this stone, and from what I have learnt, and from my own gut feeling, I believe that there may be some doubts concerning the authenticity of this ring. To be more exact, about its exact provenance and place of manufacture, which at the moment seems to indicate “manmade”.’

The wizard began to look interested for the first time. ‘You think that perhaps this is not as described, and hence perhaps did not arrive into the Hardwood hands, in, shall we say, the appropriate manner?’

‘What is more, I was wondering if this could be rather more than just an expensive piece of family jewellery. Specifically, I have been wondering if this may be a magic ring, and that is why I have come to you.’