I tried to work after that, but I found myself growing increasingly aggravated. It wasn’t just effectively being gaslit by Lexi and Dorian. There was more to it, and if I was honest with myself, it all went back to the relic. I’d searched Casimir’s office and the cabana, but had found nothing. I tried to tell myself I had time. I was here all summer, and academic research was often slow and plodding, more about methodically paging through archives than chasing exciting leads, but the desire to find it had moved beyond professional curiosity. After the past few days, I was fairly certain I didn’t want to stay at Hildegard all summer. Something wasn’t right. I just wanted to find it and get out of this place as quickly as possible.
A violent frustration building in my chest, I walked out into the garden, and before I even knew what I was doing, I foundmyself digging through soil, searching inside planters, looking for the relic in places I knew it couldn’t possibly be. My desire to find it felt nearly biological, and I had to admit that on some level, that drive was actually starting to frighten me. But my frantic search came to naught. After about fifteen minutes, it was clear that it wasn’t hidden in the garden, and then I had to spend the next thirty trying to make the overturned space look presentable again.
Covered in dirt and feeling like a fool, I went back inside, cleaned up, and tried to think. Whatever was going on with that grave, there was no way I could just leave it be. I knew what I’d seen, and I knew that although it might be quick work to remove a headstone, moving whatever was underneath it wouldn’t be so easy. If it really was Casimir, then she was still there, and if someone was hiding her body out in those woods, then I had a much bigger problem on my hands than a missing artifact. It was very possible a woman had been murdered, and I wasn’t going to sit idly by and let it be covered up. What I needed was a shovel.
After closing up the cabana, I headed down to the apothecary garden, where I found Aspen with her hands also buried in soil.
“Oh!” she said when she saw me. “I’ve been thinking about your sangdhuppe. Are you sure it’s one word?”
My mind was in such a different place that initially I was startled by her question. “What? Oh, yes. That’s what is in the letter.”
“But what if it’s not?” She removed her hands from the soil and began wiping them off. “What if it’s a misspelling or a typo?”
“What are you thinking?” I asked.
“What if it’s supposed to besang d’huppe?” She pulled out her phone.
“What’s that?”
“Well, nothing, butsang de la huppewould mean blood of the hoopoe.”
“What’s a hoopoe?”
Aspen was typing on her phone. She looked up at me with a sparkling smile and flashing eyes, even her diamond nose stud glinting in the early-morning sun. “It seems to be a bird.”
“Blood of the hoopoe? The formula calls for bird’s blood?”
“Seems like it.” She was busy typing on her phone with the infectious enthusiasm of an academic faced with a mystery in her field. “But you didn’t come here to discuss bird blood, did you? What’s up?”
“I was wondering if I could borrow a shovel.”
Her eyes widened. “You’re never going to believe this, but I can’t find any.”
“What?”
“Yeah, all of mine are inexplicably missing today. I’m about to go yell at someone, but I’m not sure at whom I should yell.”
“Are there shovels anywhere else on campus?”
“Probably in one of the toolsheds,” she said distantly, still focused on her phone.
“Thanks,” I said, but she didn’t respond.
When I left the apothecary garden, she was still distracted. I climbed the low steps and set off in search of a toolshed. I wended through formal garden after formal garden, taking a detour through a Japanese garden and a moon garden (so named because it is intended for nocturnal viewing), and then back to an English garden—all regrettably shed-less. Finally, I took an arterial path that emerged onto a grassy clearing, on the edge of which stood(thank god) a wooden shed. As I stared at the structure, a cold, curious feeling washed over me. I supposed toolsheds in general were never particularly sunny places, but there was something about this specific one that gave me the creeps. Squarely built and composed of old dark mangled-looking slats of wood, it resembled more of a remote torture chamber than a building for storing helpful implements.
I strode toward it, and finding the door ajar, I yanked at the handle. It lurched open and I stepped in, closing the door behind me. Inside, the shed was extremely orderly, though dank smelling. The tools hung neatly on hooks, and a thoroughly modern chest of drawers stood in the corner. It was uncommonly clean, without a spider in sight, though I could still feel them there with their ten billion eyes, secretly watching me from their hidden lairs. I picked up one of the three shovels, and turning to head out, I noticed a shadow filtering through the slats in the wooden door. Startling, I dropped the shovel on my foot.
“Fucking hell,” I yelped, wincing from the pain.
Jim towered in the doorway, framed by the midday sun, evincing none of the buoyant charm he’d displayed on the ride up to the college. Rather, he now seemed straight out of a vampire novel, giving off serious Renfield vibes.
“Hey, Jim,” I said, trying to sound casual. “I was just wondering if I could borrow some tools.”
“What for?” he muttered.
“A project.”
“What kind of a project?” he asked like he was trying to catch me in a lie.
