Chapter Seven
The Institute for the Betterment of the Soul
The moment Ansley shutthe door of the meeting room and twisted the lock, the din of the investigators noisily working in the staff room died away as the muting magic swept along the walls. Wiping his nose, Oliver’s grey gaze traced the wainscotting suspiciously, but when Felipe took a deep breath, he couldn’t smell the magic lingering in the air like Oliver could. It was strange to be back in the bustling communal space meant for investigators. He had only used these rooms early in his career. Once he started spending more time traveling and working on complex cases outside of that branch of the Paranormal Society, he found little reason to linger with the other investigators.
After years of use, the meeting room’s heavy furniture was battered but still comfortable. The oak table had scratches and rings from cups left too long, and the chalk board on the far wall was dusty and only half erased from the previous occupants, who appeared to have been puzzling out a sigil. As he sank into the squeaky chair beside Oliver, Felipe’s eyes ran over the paintings lining the walls. Some were of the stern-faced founders of the society while others were landscapes that always felt a little uncanny.
Shaking his head and releasing a loud breath, Ansley collapsed into the seat at the head of the table. “Let me start by saying this wasnotmy idea. Trust me, the last thing I want to do is mix business and pleasure.” When Oliver made a disgusted noise, Ansley rolled his eyes. “Don’t give me that, Oliver. You know what I meant. I’m trying to be professional.”
“If we’re being professional, stop calling me Oliver. We are no longer on those terms. You are Inspector Ansley, he is Inspector Galvan, and I amDoctorBarlow. I want to make it exceedingly clear that I am not working with you willingly, and if we must work together, there will be boundaries.”
Ansley threw up his hands. “Must you be difficult?”
“With you? Yes.”
“Enough, both of you. This bickering isn’t helping.” Catching Oliver’s gaze, Felipe held it and caught a flash of something akin to fear, but it disappeared as quickly as it came beneath a look of shame as he crossed his arms and sat back. “Let’s figure out where we stand. If we can set the past aside for a little while, perhaps we can find a way for everyone to get what they want while spending as little time as possible in each other’s company.”
“See, Oliver? That’s how a reasonable person behaves,” Ansley said.
When Oliver opened his mouth to retort, Felipe held up a hand for silence. “Ansley, what can you tell us about your investigation or what you’re doing here?”
“Well, you heard what I said in the head inspector’s office. We have been trying to get our investigators on the inside of the Institute for the Betterment of the Soul for months, but it has been exceedingly difficult. The staff is tight-lipped and openly hostile toward the Paranormal Society as a matter of principle, as they’re anti-magic, and our early attempts at bribery only put them on the defensive.” Ansley swiveled languidly in his chair as he spoke, despite the line of tension between his blonde brows. “We don’t want to submit any of our investigators to treatment at the rest homes for the well-to-do, but even in those off-shoot establishments, our people were quickly ousted from staff positions before they could make much headway. People who were already inside that we tried to make contact with disappeared, not that we can prove the institute had anything to do with it.”
Felipe glanced at Oliver. Was that how Mr. Judd ended up dead? “Did you have any intelligencers at this location?”
“No. This is their latest clinic, and it’s different from the others. The clientele seems to be poorer, which concerns me. After what happened in the other facilities, we didn’t dare plant anyone blindly, so I’m here to feel it out. My plan is to go there this afternoon for a tour of the institute. I wrote to the doctor who runs it and explained that I have a wife in need of treatment for her excessive use of magic, but before I made arrangements, I wanted to see what they were about and speak to him personally. He seems to have bought it.”
“What does this clinic do exactly?” Oliver asked slowly.
“They claim that they can cure people of their magic.”
Felipe’s blood ran cold. “Curethem of their magic?”
“Yes, they believe magic is a vice that can be cured through newfangled medical treatments, bland food, and god knows what else.”
“It sounds like quackery. Surely, people can’t want to be rid of their magic,” Felipe replied, but when he looked at Oliver, his partner’s face had softened into understanding. Of course, there were people whose magic was scorned by their families or made their lives difficult. They had seen it with Herman Judd and Oliver, to a lesser extent, but for most people, magic was as normal to them as breathing. “Sorry, but I can’t imagine they have many patients.”
“Oh, but they do. And their influence is growing every day, especially now that they’ve thrown in their lot with people like Comstock. The owner, Dr. Yates, is tied to some pretty influential people, and where there are deep pockets, anything is possible. If they were some run-of-the-mill Christian fanatics saying nonsense, we would leave them alone, but with the intelligencers disappearing and this new clinic popping up, something more is going on. My job is to get inside and figure out what. Why do you need to speak to them?”
“We’re working a suspicious death case, and the victim supposedly worked at the institute. He was hired directly out of prison and turned up dead six months after starting his job there. We can’t tell if he was murdered or if it’s merely a case of improperly disposing of a body, but we thought if he did work there up until his death, maybe one of his coworkers would know more about his life, and if not, then we might find out where to look next.”
“They seem to do that a lot: hire people straight out of jails, workhouses, orphanages. It looks charitable from the outside, but I’m suspicious. They only started doing that within the last year or so. Either way, let me see how it goes this afternoon, and we can figure out what to do about your dead man’s job history.”
“What does your partner think about you going to the institute?” Oliver asked.
“My partner? I don’t have a partner.”
