The Seer (8 page)

“A carriage,” Jesco said. “They’d think something odd about a person dragging a body from one street to another, but not a carriage going past.”

Scoth did not disagree. “And the location . . . was he left where he was because his murderer thought that no one would look in an alley in Poisoners’ Lane? Why not move the body deeper into the alley than where we found it, or kick trash over it? Or dump the body in the water?” Scoth was speaking more to himself than to Jesco. “Tramps go through there regularly, even though they shouldn’t. Did the murderer want him to be found? Or not want him to be found?”

“If someone wanted him to be found, then just dump him in the road,” Jesco said. “No need to go into that alley at all.”

“Someone wanted him to be found, but not immediately,” Scoth ventured. “But why would you kill a courier, steal his things, and want the body to be discovered? Jibb had to be in the area on personal business. It makes no sense otherwise, unless this is a message.”

“A message?”

“Murders can be messages. There were two street gangs put down in my first year as a detective, gangs that selected innocent people and killed them, marked them up with the opposing gang’s insignia and left them to be discovered. To get the opposing gang in trouble, to settle an old score or start a new one, which was carved into the flesh of the body . . . the victims had nothing more to do with it than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. This could be Hasten Jibb’s end, to prove a point to someone that had little to nothing to do with the man himself.”

“Are your cases usually so muddy?” Jesco asked.

“We don’t all have your gift of seersight.”

Jesco had been planning to offer a sugar cookie, but at that sarcastic dismissal, ate both of them. They did not speak again as the carriage rattled along through the many neighborhoods within Cantercaster. It was a bright day, and too windy except for the most diehard aviators to be up and about. The gusts of air ruffled the locks of the pedestrians and trembled the carriages. This one was heavier than it looked, and the wind failed in its challenge and parted around it.

Ragano & Wemill was a solid brick building of two floors. About the door was a flurry of signs listing methods of delivery, weights, and costs. Bicycle, horse, autohorse, it was a bustling business and evidence of that was everywhere. Office workers passed behind many of the windows, walking at a fast clip and some outright running. The door swung open and shut every few seconds, customers going in and out with packages, couriers in green jackets bolting to the bicycle racks on the sidewalk or to the stables across the road. In the building’s driveway, a heavier delivery was being loaded into a wagon by a half dozen couriers. Already hitched, a sturdy white autohorse waited with its chest flap open for a destination card.

The carriage pulled over to the curb and halted. Scoth opened the door and let himself out, holding it for Jesco to disembark and closing it behind him. A courier shot past them on his bicycle, shouting, “Pass!” With a thump-thump, he rocketed off the sidewalk and swerved into the road. The satchel over his back was stuffed to the brim.

“Stay out here,” Scoth ordered.

“Why?” Jesco asked.

“It’s a madhouse in there. Someone knocks into you on accident and you’ll be seeing nothing to do with our situation.” The detective went up the steps to the front door and vanished inside, a clot of couriers coming out with their arms laden and calling to those at the wagon.

For several minutes, Jesco waited beside the carriage and watched all of the activity. Bicycles were jerked from the racks and returned to it with a clatter; couriers bickered about the way to Amon Hollow; a man dropped a stack of packages going up to the door and swore heartily as they bounced down to the sidewalk. The chest flap was closed on the autohorse and a sole courier took the driver’s seat on the wagon. The autohorse pulled into the road and clopped away. Over at the stables, it was nearly as busy. Real horses finishing their shifts were being brushed and put away for feeding; fresh mounts were brought out and saddled. One was spooking at a scrap of paper on the ground, its nostrils flaring as it stamped a hoof. A groom spoke sharply and the horse quieted. Then the wind fluttered the paper, which was trapped beneath a rock, and the horse stamped again.

It was a very exciting place to work, and Jesco thought of the dead man who had once gone up and down these steps with a green jacket and satchel. But the image that came to mind more strongly was of his corpse, still and staring upon a carpet of trash.

The door opened and Scoth came out with a thickset older man. The buttons of his jacket were under great strain from his extra bulk, and he had a file tucked under his arm. Gauging from the style of jacket, he was not a courier. It was green, but had red trim. Running a hand through his thinning hair as the breeze tossed it about, the man looked over the railing as he followed Scoth down the steps. Then he shouted at a boy crashing the front wheel of his bicycle into the racks. “Ho, there! You! If I find a popped tire on any bicycle today, it’s coming out of your paycheck!”

“Sorry, sir!” the boy yelled, kicking down the stand. A limp satchel over his shoulder, he ran for the steps, squeezed by Scoth and the man with a polite nod, and went inside.

“Endrick Wassel, this is Jesco Currane. He is helping with the case,” Scoth said when the two got to the carriage. “Mr. Wassel was Hasten Jibb’s supervisor.”

The man glared over his shoulder to two couriers aiming for the rack. “Ho, there! Mind yourself! Mind those bicycles more; I can replace you faster!” They hit the brakes and brought them to the racks at a crawl. Wassel turned and said, “The crash, all day long I hear the crash of them hitting those racks. They think it’s grand fun, but I daresay it won’t be so fun when I dock them all a penny per crash I hear. So, this is better then. We can talk out here. Office is being repainted-” he explained to Jesco, “-and there’s no place to talk in there without someone running into you every minute. Let’s keep this quick, eh? I’ve got a meeting in ten minutes.”

“How long did Hasten Jibb work here?” Scoth asked.

Jesco assumed that the file was related to Hasten Jibb’s employment, but the man answered without needing to check. “Eight years and a little more. Odd chap but regular, and I’ll put up with odd for regular. He got the job done and that’s all I care about.”

“How was he odd?”

“Just odd. Odd is odd.” Seeing that this was not a sufficient explanation, he elaborated. “Jibb didn’t make friends out of the other couriers. They go out and get a drink after a shift; they stand about in back between jobs and have a lark. He never did that with them, just wanted to be on his own. It was like they weren’t worth his time. We’ve got some very pretty women here and he never showed a whit of interest in making their acquaintance.”

“What about the men?” Scoth queried.

“Got some strapping men here as well and he wasn’t interested in making their acquaintance either. They certainly wanted to make his, a lot of the women and a few of the fellows. Jibb was a handsome chap. He worked his way up to Golden Circle two years ago and the smile on his face when I gave it to him . . . first smile I’d ever seen on him.”

As they didn’t understand courier parlance, the man hastened to clarify. “The newest couriers work Iron. Cheap jobs taking cheap goods to cheap places. Some of them are far out so they spend the day biking only two or three deliveries. Do a good job on Iron and move up to Brass. Then they spend their days doing business strips. We got contracts with over a hundred companies and they love our Brass boys and girls. Iron made them strong and Brass teaches fast. When Leggato Music Limited tells Mr. Customer that a wagon will be at his house tomorrow morning with his brand new piano, then that piano had better be there tomorrow morning as promised. If we can’t provide excellent service to both Leggato and the customer, well then, Leggato will just hire its own couriers to deliver and dump us on the curb.”

He gave a foul look to another courier on a bicycle, but that one dismounted and walked it the last steps to the rack. Pleased, Wassel said, “Do good on Brass and move up to Silver. Those are for our companies and private citizens who have paid for preferential treatment. They want their money carted to the bank for deposit, or their messages carried from one office branch to another lickety-split. And at the top is Golden Circle. You’re working with the richest of the rich there. They expect strength, speed, honesty, and discretion, and they’ll tip for it. Jibb was odd indeed, but he had those things.”

“Do you keep a list of his jobs?” Scoth asked. “We’re especially interested in the jobs that he had on the day he died, anything that might have carried him near or within the Wattling area.”

The supervisor looked at him incredulously and opened the file. “We’ll deliver just about anything to anywhere for the right price, but I can’t think of the last job that took one of our couriers to
Wattling
. Nothing but slums and grime, Wattling, and I very much doubt our Golden Circle clients have family or business there.” He shuffled through the paperwork. In minute print, each shift and its jobs were catalogued. “This file has the work he did for the current year . . . if you want back years, I’ll have to get a secretary to dig them out of the basement.”

“We’ll start with the current,” Scoth said.

“Here we go, his last day. Yes, it was his regular trip to Lord Ennings over in Kevor Heights.” Wassel looked up with an expression that could only be described as preemptive indignation. “Am I to understand that this conversation is privileged between us?”

“Nothing is privileged within the context of a murder investigation,” Scoth said. “However, should the lord be determined to have no connection to this case, his private information will remain private.”

That satisfied the supervisor. “Lord Shooster Ennings is . . . a man of mercurial moods. He owns seven homes scattered about the area, all of them filled with the finest in art and furniture and which he is constantly moving about as fancy takes him. We are contracted with him for that reason. Jibb had a monthly appointment to take an autohorse and covered carriage to whichever residence the lord is currently residing within, and to move whatever the lord deemed necessary.” Squinting at the miniscule print, the man said, “It says here that Lord Ennings had nothing to move between his homes that day, but he wished Jibb to place several pieces of jewelry within his bank vault in Corder. Jibb did so and returned to the office.”

Jewelry
. Jesco shot a look to the detective, who kept his attention on Wassel and said, “I’ll need the bank information.”

In umbrage, Wassel said, “You can be sure that the jewelry is there! We don’t promote couriers to Golden Circle to steal and ruin our image. I’ve got a tick here that indicates the bank gave him a receipt. That will be in another file, if you want to see it.”

“I am not accusing the deceased,” Scoth said. “But he was in possession of jewelry that someone else might have had a keen interest in acquiring.”

With a grunt, the supervisor returned to the notes. “It says here that he got back late in the day. But that wasn’t surprising. Lord Ennings has kept our couriers late before as his mood and decisions change, and Jibb also had to swing wide for Corder.” He closed the file. “I know the rest of it since I saw him when he was here. There wasn’t anything left for Golden Circle, but a Silver job had come in and all of those couriers were out and about. None of the Brass knows that circuit so I couldn’t use them. I asked Jibb. Figured that he might be insulted, but he had no problem running the package. He had to take his bicycle; the autohorse was needed for something else. It’s a lovely area, though, Melekei, fancy homes and not far. The package had five of those whirly-gigs inside, so it was marked fragile all over. Going to old Mrs. Daphna Cussling for her grandchildren and she likes her deliveries sharp. She doesn’t care if it’s dinner or almost bed; she just wants that knock on the door and she’ll slip the courier a personal if she’s pleased. That was Jibb’s day, and he never showed up the next. And I know those whirly-gigs made it or else Cussling would have stomped in here days ago and rapped her cane on the counter.”

“He had to take
his
bicycle, you said?” Jesco asked.

“Couriers serving Silver and Golden Circle often buy their own bicycles. Lightweight and speedy. Nothing wrong with the company bicycles, but it’s something to show off and they don’t have to come back and return it at the end of the day. They can ride whatever they want as long as they wear the green jacket. Jibb pedaled about on a sapphire blue Fleetman, rode it into work and locked it up in the special rack out back when he didn’t need it. He must have been saving up his personals since he worked Iron to afford a Fleetman, or else he was slipping courier work on the side.” Primly, Wassel said, “Ragano & Wemill doesn’t approve of that, but it’s hard to stop.”

The detective and supervisor traded information and then they parted, Wassel going up the stairs quickly to make his meeting and Scoth opening the carriage door. Jesco climbed in. There was nothing here for him to touch, since all of Hasten Jibb still at his workplace was a file that he had never handled himself.

Once the carriage was moving, he said, “What did you make of that?”

Scoth scribbled a note into his pad. “What did you?”

He wanted Jesco’s opinion? Jesco tugged at his gloves and said, “It wasn’t a job that led Hasten Jibb to Wattling, although he wasn’t necessarily killed there. He couldn’t have been murdered too far away, though, could he? He died in the night and was found early in the morning. The comment about the jewelry was interesting. I wonder if the timepiece was something he lifted from it. Perhaps he deposited some of the jewelry but kept the rest for himself.”