“We’re nobody,” Thomas answered promptly. “And we’re leaving.”
No one spoke again until they were all safely onto the street. After the close, warm atmosphere of the room upstairs, with its smells of old cigar butts and cheap aftershave and mildew, the air was as delicious as a fizzy bottle of soda. Max didn’t even mind the faint fishy smells coming off the Gowanus Canal. The homeless man she had spotted earlier was still there, and still lurking by the trash bins—almost as if he was waiting for them. But he didn’t look up as they passed.
Suddenly, Pippa whirled around to face her. “Hand it over,” she said, sticking out her palm.
Max’s face went hot. “What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play dumb, Max.” Pippa shoved her palm practically in Max’s nose. “Give it over or I’ll search you myself. I can see it, remember.”
Thomas and Sam were watching curiously. Muttering a curse, Max reached into her pocket and extracted the silver locket from Mr. Anderson’s desk. Pippa snatched it from her, glaring so hard Max was amazed her eyeballs didn’t rocket out of her face. Pippa marched back into the shop. Moments later she returned.
“Unbelievable,” she said, as she breezed past Max.
“Hey.” Max nearly had to jog to catch up with her. “If it wasn’t for me, we’d probably be in jail right now. The locket was mine, anyway. My grandma gave it to me, remember?”
“You made that up,” Pippa said.
“Good thing I did, too! The rest of you were just standing there with your mouths open.” A rat scurried in front of them and Max dodged it neatly. “Besides, what does Anderson care? He roped himself, didn’t he?”
“He didn’t,” Thomas said quietly.
Max turned to him, frowning. “What do you mean? The cops said—”
“The cops are wrong,” Thomas said. “Look. I’ll show you.”
They stopped walking. The wind had risen and made a paper bag turn circles across the street. A single streetlamp twenty yards away cast a pale white circle on the cobblestone. In it, Max could see a stray cat, skinny as a stick, playing with a chicken bone. It was very quiet, and she suddenly longed to be back at the museum, with its comforting murmur of sounds and the rattling of the pipes and the burble of water boiling in the kettle and the smells of furniture polish and chamomile tea: the whole warm, chaotic, lovely mess of it.
Thomas unstrapped his belt. He was so thin that without it, his pants sagged down over his hipbones. He held up the belt to his neck. “If I were going to hang myself—”
“Don’t joke, Tom,” Pippa said, shivering. “It’s awful.”
Thomas ignored her. “Watch what happens if I string myself up.” He cinched the belt tightly and mimed attaching one end to the ceiling. The belt slid to his jaw, extending upward on a diagonal and striking just below his ears, like an inverted V. He undid the belt.
“I still don’t get it,” Max said, crossing her arms. She wanted to get out of the street, out of the emptiness and the dark. But she would never say so.
“The mark on Mr. Anderson’s neck,” Sam said slowly. “It was all wrong.”
“Exactly!” Thomas said. This time, he slid the belt against his neck and pretended that someone was pulling it tightly from behind. “Now watch this. Let’s say I didn’t string myself up. Let’s say, instead, someone strangled me. Someone approximately my height.”
In a flash, Max understood. The bruise on Mr. Anderson’s neck went the wrong way. It went straight across his neck, instead of up toward his ears.
Pippa inhaled sharply. “It was murder,” she said, in a whisper.
Murder. The word hung between them like one of Max’s knives, sharp-toothed and frightening. Every time Pippa closed her eyes, she saw Mr. Anderson’s face, purple as a bruise, and the terrible mark around his neck.
First that old woman had plummeted from her balcony. Then the head was stolen. And now, a murder. What did it mean?
The subway ride from Brooklyn seemed to take ages. Sam appeared to be sleeping, although Pippa was sure he wasn’t. Max picked her nails with a blade and did her best to look unconcerned. Thomas produced a book from his back pocket. It had a bright red cover and was called Statistics for Everybody, and Pippa was sure he hadn’t taken it with him from the museum.
“Where did you get that?” Pippa asked suspiciously.
Thomas blushed. Suddenly, Pippa understood.
“Oh no,” she said. “Not you, too.”
“It was just sitting on a shelf,” Thomas said sheepishly. “Besides, it’s not like Mr. Anderson will miss it.”