Snow White Red-Handed (A Fairy Tale Fatal Mystery) (30 page)

She turned and aimed it at Prue’s head. She pulled the trigger.

Prue screamed. There was a bang and a smash. The bullet had exploded a jar of pickled golly-knew-what, on a shelf right next to Prue’s ear. Brine and shattered glass and little brownish lumps puddled around Prue’s feet. Brine dripped down her cheek. She was fair certain she was going to lose her breakfast. Just as soon as she finished having a hysterical crying fit.

Gertie puffed the smoke from the end of the revolver’s barrel and snuggled it back inside her satchel. “Don’t you dare follow me, or I
shall
kill you. I’m in just the mood.”

A
fter Gertie left Professor Winkler’s office, Hansel and Prue waited a couple of shaky minutes to make sure she wasn’t coming back. Then they hurried out into the sunshine. Prue’s ugly brown dress reeked of fairy tale brine and Gertie sweat. Ugh. How she hankered for a nice, hot bath, and then a big stack of waffles with honey.

“We must return to Schloss Grunewald,” Hansel said. He glanced up at the clock on top of one of the university buildings. “We will catch the evening train back to Baden-Baden—it leaves in less than twenty minutes—and speak to Professor Penrose. He may have an idea of where to search next.”

“Professor Penrose? But he said you was bent on putting him off the scent.”

“I was. I detested the notion of him poking about on the cliff, on my own family’s land. But now, well, we need his help.”

“Treasure,” Prue said. “That’s what Franz and Miss Gertie are bent on finding.” She glanced up at Hansel. “That’s what your pa told you to find, in his letter, he just couldn’t come right out and say it. That’s what he was . . . what he died on account of. And Mr. Coop, too.”

“Perhaps. The manuscript in the library noted something about the dwarves bringing Snow White jewelry, which they had crafted themselves from the gemstones and ore they mined. I wonder. . . .”

The comb felt heavy in Prue’s bodice. She was going to have to tell him. She took a deep breath. “I know where Snow White is buried. And the dwarves.” She dug into her bodice and pulled out the comb. She passed it to Hansel.

He stared at the comb. “Where did you get this?”

“I found it . . . outside.” She swallowed. “Up on the cliff that night you took me along.”

“You found it in the dirt?”

“That’s right.”

“But why did you not show it to me earlier?”

“I just wanted it to comb my hair with, up in the tower.” She studied the toes of her banged-up boots. “I didn’t tell you about it on account of I didn’t want you to think I was . . . think I was vain.”

She reckoned he was going to either tell her she
was
vain or accuse her of being a thief.

Instead, he smiled, crinkling up the corners of his eyes. “This is Snow White’s comb.”

“Yes, sir. Just like the one in the manuscript and the one in that painting of the girl at the Order’s house.”

“She must be buried on the cliff somewhere.”

“Miss Gertie knows it,” Prue said. “And so does Franz.”

“Franz?”

“He saw the comb this morning and said something I didn’t understand till now. He put the pieces together, see, and guessed that if I had that comb—”

“Which he would have recognized, like we do, from the manuscript and the portrait.”

“Right. He must have guessed, since we were talking about the grave and the footprints, that I found the comb on the cliff. And he realized that if Snow White’s comb came from up on the cliff,
she
’s probably buried up there, too. And so is her treasure.”

Hansel placed the comb back in Prue’s hand. “Keep it.”

“Truly?”

“Yes.” He grabbed Prue’s hand, and they set off at a canter towards the railway station.

*   *   *

Ophelia and Professor
Penrose rode into Baden-Baden and went directly to the
Conversationshaus
. Ophelia waited in the carriage while Penrose went inside. He wore his evening clothes and carried the brief note he’d jotted at the inn. It read,

Herr Ghent,

Understanding that you are a gambling gentleman, I’d like to propose a game. If I win, you talk. If you win, I’ll leave you in peace.

Lord Harrington

Penrose disappeared through the
Conversationshaus
doors.

Ophelia drummed her fingertips on the carriage seat. What would she do if this plan flopped? Smuggle Prue out of town in a traveling trunk? Join a band of gypsies, maybe? Or surely there were circuses here in Europe. Circus tricks and acting weren’t the only things Ophelia knew how to do, anyway. She could garden, cook, and sew. Churn butter, lay up preserves, delouse cats. . . .

Three minutes went by. Seven.

It was only a matter of time before the police tracked her down. They’d find the revolver hidden in her chamber, of course—

Penrose emerged, strode down the steps. His expression was bleak.

“Ghent’s accepted my offer,” he said, climbing inside the carriage. “I am to play roulette tonight at ten o’clock. But he’s changed the terms. He sent a note down saying he’d talk if I win back my original stake seven times over—”

“Yes?”

“—but if I lose, he’ll make certain we never talk again.”

“This is mullet-headed. You can’t!”

“He’ll never get away with it.”

“You didn’t agree, did you?”

“It is possible that Ghent, for some reason, means to do away with us either way—recall the two thugs shooting at us in the wood. At least this way we might have a bit of a say in the matter. Now.” Penrose eyed her rumpled woolen dress. “You must accompany me tonight. There’s nowhere else for you to go, and I mean to be there when Schubert puts in an appearance. So we’ve got to get you something to wear.”

*   *   *

Baden-Baden had an
uncommonly great need for pawnbroker’s shops, Ophelia soon learned. The back streets were crammed with them.

“Because of the gambling,” Penrose said. “The wheel of fortune revolves rather quickly here, I’m afraid. That, and everyone here wishes to display their every thaler on their backs or in their equipage.”

They chose an unassuming shop in a quiet court. The front of the shop was cluttered with the usual pawnbroker’s shop fare—violins, candlesticks, books, china, and watches—but a back room held stacks of oil paintings, marble sculptures, wardrobes overflowing with opulent clothing, and a case of winking jewels.

The shopkeeper was an odd little chip with a pince-nez and a greasy waistcoat. He assisted them in finding an evening gown. It was a deep, shimmering, sea blue silk, with a gorgeous cream lace overskirt and an open neckline edged with another wide band of lace. The lady who’d been forced to pawn it off had also sold her crinoline, cream satin elbow gloves, a matching blue silk reticule, and dainty blue and white slippers with a high heel.

Ophelia sighed when she saw the slippers. Her toes throbbed already.

Penrose paid for the clothes, and they left.

They spent the rest of the day in a humble café in an unfashionable district. When evening fell, Ophelia changed into the gown in the washroom, fixing her hair as best she could in the cracked mirror. She stuffed her feet into the slippers. Ouch.

She emerged from the washroom.

Penrose, still at the table, looked up from his newspaper.

He didn’t seem to notice the way she was hobbling like a lame pony.

“I hope it’ll do,” she said. “I’ve played grand ladies on the stage, but never . . . up close.”

“I daresay,” he said in a curiously gruff voice, “it’ll do.”

*   *   *

Ophelia and Professor
Penrose swooped into the gaming rooms just before ten o’clock.

“You choose the table, Miss Flax,” Penrose said in her ear. “You are luckier than I.”

Ghent’s two guards were watching them from the other side of the room. They stood like great black andirons, with their hands behind their backs.

Ophelia led Penrose to a table near the back. The table was less crowded than the others, with a grave cloud hanging over it. The green felt table was mounded with bank notes and coins.

Everyone held their breath as the croupier released the ivory ball into the spinning wheel, and everyone cheered when the ball fell home. The croupier raked money into eager hands.

Seemed a lucky enough table. If you believed in that sort of thing.

“This should do it,” Ophelia said.

Penrose stepped up to the table.

“
Monsieur
?” the croupier murmured. He had oiled black hair and a narrow moustache.

Penrose placed a modest stack of gold Napoleons on black.

The wheel spun. The ball fell on black 15. Penrose swept half his winnings off the table, and left the remainder on black with his first stake.

The croupier spun the wheel again. This time the ball landed on red 7, and Penrose’s stake was whisked away by the croupier’s L-shaped stick.

Penrose placed a new modest sum on black.

Ophelia watched, standing just behind Penrose’s elbow as he continued to place his stake on black. He was playing it safe. Since he was betting on all of the black numbers and keeping his wager fairly low, he never lost very much. But he didn’t win much, either.

She frowned.

As the hour wore on, she observed another player at the table, a frazzled old dowager with a faded velvet reticule and curly white hair. She bet on only a few numbers at a time, and the payout when her numbers came up far exceeded Penrose’s winnings.

After an hour and a half, Penrose had barely doubled his original stake.

Ophelia had never played roulette before, but the lads backstage at the theater had whiled away the time gambling on simple coin-toss games that had fifty-fifty odds. One fellow—he’d managed the footlights—often won big by always doubling his bet after a loss. That way, he’d boasted to the admiring circle around him, when he won again, he’d make up for all previous losses.

The ivory ball clicked and hopped onto red 9. There was a collective murmur and sigh around the table. But the frazzled old dowager took in several thousand francs.

“Could I have a few coins?” Ophelia whispered to Penrose.

He glanced back at her, his eyebrow lifted.

“Let me have a try,” she said, “or we’ll be here till doomsday.”

“I’m insuring against catastrophic losses, Miss Flax.”

“But also against large winnings.”

He straightened his spectacles and plopped a fistful of gold Napoleons into her gloved hand.

*   *   *

Gabriel continued to
employ his conservative strategy. Beside him, Miss Flax won four times in a row by placing her stake on only three numbers. Remarkable. A throng swelled round the table as people came to join their luck to hers or simply to admire the lucky young lady in blue.

And she
was
admirable—and very nearly beautiful, with the flush in her cheeks and that flash in her brown eyes. Her upswept hair shone amber in the chandelier light, and the lines of her shoulders and throat were worthy of a muse.

Something coiled darkly about Gabriel’s heart. Miss Flax didn’t cringe away from all those gazes as a proper young lady, used to quiet domestic scenes, would. What gnawed at him even more, however, was the simple fact that she seemed quite in her element gambling. Almost, in fact, as though she’d done it before.

She was an actress. A former circus performer and factory girl, for God’s sake. He had no right—and, naturally, no need—to care one way or the other how she conducted herself. He’d been a fool, of course, trying to shield her virtue when that well had surely dried up long ago.

“Are you mad?” he whispered in her ear, as she nudged a pile of coins onto a single number—13.

“You said yourself that I’m lucky,” she said.

The sparkle in her eye was diabolical.

The croupier spun the wheel, tossed the ball.

Gabriel stared in disbelief as the ball fell home on 13.

The crowd exploded into an uproar.

Ophelia laughed as the croupier pushed a tinkling mountain of gold towards her.

“You’ll break the bank if you keep this up, miss,” a British gentleman said, sucking on the stump of a cigar.

Gabriel felt a heavy tap on his shoulder. He turned. It was the guard with the enormous chin.

“Herr Ghent will see you now,” he said.

*   *   *

Ophelia and Penrose
followed the guard up the staircase they’d taken before and down the third-floor corridor with its hissing gas sconces.

Ophelia’s reticule jangled with all the coins she’d won. She knew it rightly belonged to the professor—after all, he had put up the original stake—but still, it felt delicious to be lugging around all that gold. If it were hers to keep, well, just
think
what she could do with it. She’d buy herself and Prue first-class passage back to New York, buy her dairy farm and an entire herd of the best Brown Swiss cows—

“Gold gone to your head?” Penrose said.

His eyes were distant, but his lips curved upwards in what appeared, at least, to be good humor.

“It does seem to feel different than other things. Heavier and, I don’t know, warmer, somehow.”

Now his mouth was set. “Seductive, isn’t it?”

The guard stopped at the door to Ghent’s office. He thumped once with his huge fist.

The door opened a sliver.

It was the tiny, papery little secretary they’d seen before. In the crack of the door, his blue eye glittered like a shard of glass. “Ah,” he said, fixing his eye on Ophelia. “Mademoiselle Luck.” His eye swiveled to Penrose. “And the professor—or should I say earl?”

“We’re here,” Penrose said, “to see Herr Ghent.”

“He is expecting you.” The secretary opened the door. “That,” he said to the guard, “will be all.”