And a woman wielding a candlestick, unexplained.
Three people misread the darkness as an opportunity.
(That metaphor is not lost on me, here on this cusp, on the horizon where light and dark are offered as my choices.)
And oh, my Stella. I feel her queasy light-headedness as a spinny, echoing sensation. She hears Sir Arthur Conan Doyle shout into the mouthpiece, “Operator? Yes, operator. Send the authorities. Quickly! We have an attempted murder.”
And ten stories below, in an apartment owned by Carole, Laura the librarian’s aunt, William intercepts Doyle’s call to the police, replying, “Yes, sir. Right away, sir.”
This is a party line; all the tenants in this building share the same telephone connection. In most cases, a party line is a necessary inconvenience; sharing a telephone line with others means one must be patient and wait one’s turn, until one’s neighbor has wrapped up her gossip. But to our merry band of bandits, it is exactly the tool we need.
Doyle shouts at what he believes is an operator, but his request instead goes to William.
William, downstairs, alerts the boys in blue. The next step of the plan is underway.
THE HIGH PRIESTESS
THE 2ND MAJOR ARCANA CARD
A woman sits regally on a throne with pillars on either side of her from the mystic temple. She wears a crown that holds the moon.
Upright: mystery, creativity, intuition, common sense, discretion
Reversed: unwanted attention, obstacles
As Kiyoko is dragged into the back room, to be locked inside as a suspect in an attempted murder, she scans the area for opportunity as keen persons always do. She sees it in a set of bare toes.
She grunts at a column of silk curtains, “Give me eight minutes. Then make as much noise as you possibly can.”
The silent, shoeless boy behind the curtain nods.
The irony is not lost on Kiyoko. She is counting on the quietest person she’s ever met to make as much noise as possible.
The gentlemen grip her upper arms too hard—there will certainly be bruises. The brutes kick open the bedroom door and shove her onto the bed.Oof!
“Rokudenashi!”
Kiyoko hears the click of the lock on the outside of the door, and her panic rises. Here she is, a child of an immigrant, accused of attempted murder of a wealthy heiress, locked in a bedroom in a penthouse, awaiting police.
And now she is expected to meet the others, SOON. Damn Pax, making her the touch.
This plan has gone cockeyed, and she has somehow found herself at the crux of it.
She closes her eyes and takes stock of her panic. She takes five deep, calming breaths, and soon she tames her waterfall emotions into a smooth, glassy pond.
When she opens her eyes, she sees the room anew:
Two large windows.
Two sitting chairs.
And from her knowledge of the blueprints: a very wide ledge that encircles the exterior of the Potter Building.
Okay, this could work.
But she cannot escape in her lovely kimono; it was not made for scaling buildings, after all. She removes the garment and lays it reverently on the bed; she still wears her nagajuban—her undergarments. She shakes her hair loose. She takes off her shoes.
She tests the heft of one of the sitting chairs.
