Castle Murders Read online

  “We’re ready, Jeremy,” Linda said.

  “Okay. Remember, no more voice communications once you get started, but my messages will be on the computer screen. The computer will be doing most of the piloting anyway. If contact is broken for some reason, the craft’s automatic systems will kick in. So don’t be too worried. I programmed it to do just about everything on its own.”

  “Reassuring,” Gene said. “For some reason Chernobyl comes to mind … but, hey, this is an adventure.”

  Jeremy sounded a bit put out. “A good … you know, like, attitude would help, Gene. A little respect for technology, maybe.”

  Gene tugged at his collar. “Hey, it’s rough bein’ a computer, you know? You don’t get no respect.”

  “Very funny, Gene,” Linda said sternly. “Does everything have to be a joke with you? Can’t you take one thing seriously? I mean, just for once?”

  Gene cringed. “Eeep.”

  “I’m scared! I don’t know about you. You always act so goddamned brave and macho. Sometimes … Gene, sometimes you really make me mad.”

  “Sorry,” Gene said in a flat voice. “Okay. Jeremy. Let her rip. Don’t bother with a countdown or anything. That’ll just make it worse.”

  “Okay. Good luck, you guys. Be careful.”

  “Yeah, we will.”

  It was quiet inside the craft except for Goofus’s heavy panting.

  “I’m sorry I snapped at you, Gene.”

  “Forget it. We’re all under pressure here.”

  Gene busied himself with checking instruments, most of which he didn’t understand. The computer screen was a confusion of numbers and letters decipherable only to those fluent in hieratic computerese.

  Gene turned to say something and bumped into Goofus’s enormous head. “Get your dog breath out of my face, Goofus.”

  As if he understood, Goofus scrunched back in his seat.

  “Good boy. God, this is nerve-racking, I’ll tell you. Maybe we should have had a count —”

  A high-pitched whine filled the tiny compartment. Then the craft shuddered slightly.

  The view out the view window disappeared, replaced by something difficult to apperceive: a murky, swimming nothingness, inchoate and devoid of feature.

  “We’re off,” Gene said. “We’re out in the interuniversal medium, I guess. The non-space between the universes. I hope this scheme works.”

  “I’m not even sure what the scheme is,” Linda said.

  “Well, I’m not crystal clear on it either, but somehow Jeremy reduced Melanie’s old clothes to data and fed them into the computer.”

  “How’d he do that?”

  “He faxed them. I dunno what he did. I think he just took two video shots of them, getting perspective parallax, combined those two signals into a 3-D image, and fed the results into the mainframe. So now the locator spell has something to work with.”

  “Okay,” Linda said, “I think I understand that.”

  “You’re one up on me. Anyway, what we’re going to do is this. We’re going to riffle through whole bunches of universes and let the spell sniff at each one. If Melanie shows up in any of them an alarm will sound. When that happens, we enter that universe and Goofus tracks her down. Got that?”

  “Got it.”

  “Simple and straightforward. And highly implausible.”

  The whine of the craft’s engines increased in pitch. The Sidewise Voyager’s occupants felt a barely perceptible sensation of thrust.

  “Okay, here we go.”

  There appeared outside the viewport a flickering montage of rapidly changing scenes, similar to the effect produced by a motion picture film in which each frame is a discontinuous and separate image — or by a slide projector gone berserk. Each image appeared only long enough to persist in the human (and probably nonhuman) visual apparatus, a fraction of a second at most.

  They sat and watched. Nothing else happened for a good while. At the top of the computer screen an intelligible message appeared — ALL SYSTEMS GO, GUYS.

  Gene gave up trying to make sense of the instruments and sat back. “Well, this could go on forever, since there are an infinite number of universes. Or variations on the same universe.”

  “Which is it?” Linda asked.

  “I dunno. I think the latter. Look at this stuff. Each universe has a world, a planet really, in it, right underneath us. There may be universes in which there isn’t a planet, or maybe no planets at all. But if that’s true, we haven’t run into one yet. I guess what we would be seeing would be empty space.”

  “It’s hard to make anything of that jumble out there,” Linda said. “It goes by so fast.”

  “Yeah. It’s like we’re skipping across the surface of the big pond of space-time, skipping like a stone, touching but not really entering the water.”

  “There’s not much feeling of motion.”

  “No. How’re you doing, Snowy?”

  Snowclaw said, “I’m fine, except I got a cramp in my leg.”

  Gene shifted a little. “Is that better?”

  Snowclaw moved his leg. “Yeah, thanks.”

  “Well, at least the thing works,” Linda said.

  “Seems to be working.”

  Flashing red lights appeared on the control panel.

  “What’s that?”

  Gene peered at the instruments. “I don’t know.”

  More warning lights appeared, flashing ominously. Soon the whole panel looked like an eight-alarm fire.

  “Gene, are we in trouble?”

  “Uh … yeah. Massive systems failure, it looks like. Either that or there’s a sale at Kmart.”

  “Is Jeremy still in control?”

  The computer screen was blank.

  “Looks like we lost contact. We’re on our own.”

  Outside the craft, the flickering had stopped. A vast red sky was the main feature. Below was an ocean edged by a thin strip of beach. The whole scene was suffused with red light.

  “Are we going to crash?” Linda asked.

  The ground was slowly getting closer.

  “No, this thing becomes an aircraft when it enters a universe. There’s enough left of the control system to land us, it looks like.”

  The craft settled slowly, but not slowly enough to avoid landing with jarring bump. The whine of the engines died, and there was quiet.

  Gene exhaled. “Well. That’s that. Unless we can fix this thing, here we stay.”

  “Where are we?”

  They looked out. Something very unusual was in the sky, a great swollen sphere of redness, bathing everything in its dim light.

  “A red giant,” Gene said.

  “What’s that?”

  “A stage in the evolution of some stars. They get real big, losing brightness and energy. It could be our sun a couple of billion years from now.”

  “We’re billions of years in the future?”

  “Some future, somewhere.” Gene sat back and folded his arms. “In any event, we’re stranded.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “Linda?”

  “What?”

  “I’m scared now.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Castle by the Sea

  “I was talking to Baron Delwyn when I heard someone groan behind me,” the princess was saying to Tyrene.

  “Yes,” the baron said. He was a small man in knee breeches and hose. “It was Damik. Actually he was just passing by. I saw him. He walked behind Her Highness, stopped, seemed to be about to go back the way he’d come, then groaned.”

  “He bumped into me,” Dorcas said. “He turned around with this awful look on his face, clutching at his chest. I saw blood where he was touching. Then he collapsed.”

  “Baron, you saw no one near him?” Tyrene asked.

  “Well, there were a dozen people milling about out here after dinner. But I didn’t see anyone near him when he fell.”

  “And you were faced the other way, Your Highness?”

  “Yes. I di
dn’t see a thing until Damik backed into me.”

  “Who was out here at the time?” Tyrene asked the group of lords and ladies in the foyer.

  Lord Arl looked around first before answering. “I was one,” he volunteered. “Although I went into the library shortly before it happened.”

  Tyrene said, “My lord, did you see anything suspicious?”

  “Such as?”

  “Did you see anyone near the count?”

  “Well … I hesitate to direct suspicion at anyone.”

  “My lord, there has been a murder committed. Someone stabbed the count. Someone here, in this room.”

  Trent said, “I was talking to him. Out here in the hall. I suppose there’s no denying that he left me just moments before he collapsed.”

  “And where were you when he did, Your Highness? If I might ask.”

  Sheila, disturbed and distraught, was standing at Trent’s side, her arm in his. He pressed her hand reassuringly. “Right there, near the door to the dining hall. Right where I spoke to Damik.”

  “And what, sir, were you doing at that exact moment?”

  “Just standing there thinking. Thinking about what Damik had just said.”

  “Sir, which was?”

  “That he was going to go to you with the name of the person who owned the dagger.”

  “He was …?”

  “He claimed he saw someone recently purchase a dagger similar to the murder weapon. He told this to Thaxton, Dalton, myself, and my wife.”

  “I see.”

  Baron Delwyn said, “He told me as well. In fact, he seems to have told a number of people. Lord Linwold remarked to me just an hour ago that Damik had told him the same thing. Seems he was disturbed about this and didn’t know what to do.”

  Tyrene nodded. “So. This is very interesting. Count Damik was privy to potentially damning information regarding the identity of the murderer, and now he’s dead.”

  Thaxton and Dalton were standing off to one side.

  Dalton leaned over and whispered, “They were all in a position to stab him. Trent, Belgard, Rilma …”

  “And a cloud of witnesses standing about, none of whom saw anything, as usual.”

  “Well, this murderer seems to have some tricks up his sleeve. Don’t forget your hypothesis about magic. Hypnosis, black magic spells …” Dalton thought. “Invisibility?”

  “An invisible murderer,” Thaxton said. “Now that would explain a lot.”

  “Yes,” Dalton agreed. “It would. If it weren’t for the fact that there’s no magic in this aspect.”

  “Who says there isn’t?”

  Everyone watched silently as Guardsmen bore the body away.

  When they were gone, Tyrene turned to face the assembled group. “I will do all further questioning in private, my lords and ladies,” he announced. “But in the morning. There is a storm gathering, and it looks to be an ominous night. There is a murderer loose in the castle. I suggest you all retire to your rooms and bolt your doors. Good night to you all, and may your respective deities, whosoever they may be, forfend any harm.”

  The group broke up and dispersed, almost all ascending the wide staircase that led to the level where most of the bedrooms were.

  Tyrene came over to Thaxton and Dalton. “At least there will be no more murders tonight. I’m going to post guards at the doors of all the prime suspects.”

  “Ah, you have a list,” Thaxton observed.

  “And a short list it is,” Tyrene replied. “Unlike those in mystery romances.”

  “I should say not,” Thaxton said. “Just under a dozen suspects is de rigueur.”

  “Thank the gods that’s not our problem here,” Tyrene said. “I can’t say that I’m close to a solution of these crimes, but things are becoming increasingly clear.”

  “Such as?” Thaxton asked.

  “That this is a relatively simple matter made obscure by deliberate obfuscation, if not outright lying.”

  “How so?” Dalton asked.

  “Gods, man. Can’t you see? They’re all covering up for someone! Murder’s committed under their noses, yet no one sees a thing. A likely story! Oh, they’re thick as thieves, this lot. They’d rather see the culprit go scot-free than break their damnable code of ‘discretion.’ Scandal is the worst thing they can imagine.”

  Dalton said, “We were discussing the possibility of some supernatural means.”

  “Don’t think it didn’t occur to me. I suspected thaumaturgical homicide right off, but have since discounted it. There are a thousand dark spells designed to do a man in, and this lot knows ’em all, I’ll wager. But, you see, each is a magician himself, and can employ forfending spells to ward off a hex or a curse or a dozen other eldritch evils. They’re all well versed in these matters, let me assure you. Which is why the simplest method is all the more effective. It’s unexpected.”

  Thaxton said, “And you think the murderer is counting on the silence of his peers to keep his identity concealed?”

  “Damik did much soul searching about revealing even circumstantial evidence,” Dalton pointed out. “Though he decided in the end to do it.”

  “So Trent says,” Tyrene acknowledged. “But he may be lying.”

  “Wouldn’t Trent lie the opposite way?” Thaxton asked, “and say that Damik wasn’t going to tell?”

  “Possibly,” Tyrene said.

  “In any case, I find it unlikely that Damik would announce to a group that included the murderer himself that he knew who the murderer was.”

  “Damik was like that,” Tyrene responded. “Very given to subtleties and devious ploys. It may have been his way of giving Trent notice, yet providing witnesses if anything should happen to him, which in fact it did.”

  “I see,” Thaxton said. “But I find it difficult to imagine Trent a murderer.”

  “You didn’t know him in his youth,” Tyrene told him. “Admittedly that was quite a spell ago, even as Perilous time is reckoned, but he was one hotheaded young buck, quick to anger, quicker to pick a fight. I’ll admit I’ve seen him change, and he was an exile on Earth for the longest time, which might have worked some ameliorative influence on him —”

  “Earth isn’t exactly the most peaceful of places,” Dalton pointed out.

  “Be that as it may. He has changed for the better in some respects, but I’m old enough to know that pards may change their spots yet still be pards.”

  “Leopards,” Dalton supplied to Thaxton. “Poetic usage, as a lot of castle lingo is.”

  “Yes, leopards, I beg your pardon. But you take my meaning, I’m sure.” Tyrene scratched himself, which Thaxton had by then put down to nervous habit. “If only these were a pack of your common cutthroats. I could order a strip search and turn up the second murder weapon in a trice. We weren’t so lucky the second time. No one left a knife lying about for us to —”

  Tyrene had turned his head as he spoke, and now froze. Thaxton and Dalton followed his astonished gaze. Something was lying near the base of the far wall.

  “Ye gods!” Tyrene breathed.

  They went running to it.

  “Damn me!” Tyrene said, kneeling to examine it. He was mortified.

  The knife lying on the floor next to the wainscoting was a twin of the first murder weapon.

  “That’s what you kicked,” Dalton said to Thaxton.

  “What’s that?” Tyrene asked, looking up.

  Thaxton told him.

  “So it was there all along. But how is it no one saw it before?”

  “It was invisible,” Thaxton said.

  “Damn me.” Tyrene clucked and shook his head. “So it was magic.”

  “I think so,” Thaxton said. “But we’re no closer to finding out who did the magic.”

  “True,” Tyrene conceded, “but the light grows ever brighter.”

  “Invisibility certainly explains why no one saw anything,” Dalton remarked. “There was nothing to see.”

  “At least not in the murdere
r’s hand,” Tyrene said. “You might tend to dismiss or forget seeing someone do this” — he made a fist and brought it up against Dalton’s chest — “if it looked like a jape or a friendly tap.”

  “Again, though, there’s a problem,” Thaxton insisted.

  “What’s that?” Tyrene asked.

  “Why would the murderer drop his weapon at the scene of the crime? For the second time?”

  The captain ruminated before answering. “Ordinarily, I would say, simply to get rid of it as quickly as possible so as not to have it turn up in a search. But they all know I wouldn’t and couldn’t ask them to submit to such an indignity.” Tyrene scowled. “I simply haven’t a clue as to why the knife was dropped.”

  “Neither do I,” Thaxton said. “As of now, anyway.”

  Tyrene’s brow lifted sardonically. “I trust you’ll apprise me of any sudden revelations.”

  “I’ll be sure to,” Thaxton said dryly.

  Tyrene picked up the knife. “I suppose it won’t do any good to test it for prints. I’m not going to get a messenger through that storm out there, anyway. It can wait till the morrow.”

  “No prints,” Dalton said, shaking his head. “I can’t recall any of the prime suspects wearing gloves.”

  “Aye, but I’ll wager any purse it’ll be clean, as before. Mayhap the trick was done magically,” Tyrene declared. “Damn me again. I’m hoist by my own petard.”

  “Well,” Thaxton said. “I suppose there is nothing left to do. Everyone’s locked doors by now.”

  “I suggest you gentlemen do the same,” the captain told them. “And I’ll take my own advice. I’m fagged out, truth be told. This nasty business has sapped me. My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains my sense.”

  “As though of hemlock you had drunk?” Dalton asked.

  “Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains.” Tyrene yawned. “I crave your pardon, gentlemen. I must to bed.” He turned and walked off, waving. “Until the morrow, then.”

  “Good night, Captain,” Thaxton said.

  “These people have such poetic speech,” Dalton observed, marveling.

  It was a dark night of Sturm und Drang.

  Lightning split the sky, revealing the desperate sea as it dashed itself against the rocks below. Rain pelted the castle, and wind wailed over the ramparts. Between flashes, the sea was gray green, suffused with a strange luminescence, boiling and churning.