Constable Hopgood caught me. I staggered and tried to find my feet, but I could barely breathe, let alone stand.
Supford watched me, his impassive expression softening just a fraction. When he spoke again, it was more of a statement than a question. “You did not know.”
“No,” I managed. “No, I did not.”
Supford stood there for another thoughtful moment, before he came to a decision and began to re-cover Mr. Stoke’s face.
“No!” I snapped, stepping out of Hopgood’s supportive grip. He did not stop me. “Let me see him. It cannot be him. Itcannot. I must see.”
Supford nodded and I, with limbs that were not my own, crossed the floor.
My employer was nearly unrecognizable. His face was blackened and battered, one cheek caved in and his jaw broken. Bruising rose about his throat and across his shoulders, signs of a struggle that he had failed to win.
Nausea assailed me, but I managed to say, “It looks as though he was cudgelled to death. How can we be sure this is him?”
“You do not believe it is?” Supford asked. He nodded to Hopgood. “Constable Hopgood and I both knew Stoke, back in the day. We are certain it is him.”
I glanced at Hopgood. “You may be right, but…” Clearing my throat, I studied the corpse with an attempt at clinical detachment, but it was no easy thing. “When was he found?”
“This morning, around seven o’clock. He had not been dead long.”
“I see…” I took a deep breath to gather myself, but only took in more of the stench. “The clothes are his. His height, weight… What did you find in his pockets?”
“He had these on him.” Supford picked up a box from a side table and held it out. “Do you notice anything unusual?”
It did not occur to me until later that, with that question, I had begun to fade from the realm of suspect to victim—at least regarding Mr. Stoke’s probable demise.
My spark of hope died as I saw the contents. In the box lay Mr. Stoke’s pocket watch, a billfold, cigarette tin, a book of matches, scrap receipts from his usual shops, and a familiar pen. The sight of them filled me with immeasurable sadness, and all at once, I could not bear to look at the body anymore.
With gentle hands, I pulled the sheet over Mr. Stoke’s face, careful to hold the chain of my manacles out of the way. Then I clasped my hands before my skirts and turned to Supford. “Where did you find him?”
“At the Mithos,” the detective replied, citing one of Old Harrow’s middle-class hotels, some three blocks away. “In a room booked under an assumed name.”
“Was there anything else with him? In the room?”
“No. Should there have been?”
I made an uncertain expression. “He disappeared with an artifact, a box marked with circular symbols, the one I spoke of before. We were hired to retrieve it for Lord Stillwell. It is likely the reason he was—It is valuable enough to kill for, in any case.”
Supford shook his head. “There was nothing of the kind.”
“Perhaps his killer took it,” I observed. “Will you speak to Stillwell on the matter?”
“In due course,” Supford said. “But I must warn you, Miss Rushforth. You are not yet above all suspicion.”
A moment of quiet settled over the room.
“Pardon me, sir, but can she not… look?” Hopgood asked the other man. “As an Eventide Adept. To see the killer.”
The notion nauseated me. “No.”
Hopgood looked perplexed.
“I mean…” I gathered myself, setting one hand on thetable beside Mr. Stoke. My gloved fingertip brushed the sheet. Somehow that small touch finally broke through the desert of my shock, and my eyes began to moisten. “I may not be able to see anything important. Deceased humans and Entwined become inanimate objects upon their death, all memories prior to that are erased. Sentient, self-aware life is a magic all its own, and when it departs it takes more than animation. Death corrodes the memory of life. Once a corpse is cold, I can see nothing before its death.”
Supford nodded. “I understand. Would you be willing to look, regardless?”
The urge to flee the room over whelmed me. It was becoming increasingly hard to breathe, let alone think. But I nodded.
