I was at the copy shop within the half hour, xeroxing and scanning the file so I could return it to Mallory’s bag before sunrise. I thankfully made it back to the house before Dad was awake, and took it as another miracle when the bag was right where I’d left it. Though, in the light of morning, it became obvious to me that the inspector had more likely left the files for my father than for myself. Since Dad was in all probability barely capable of stumbling to bed when he came home the night before, perhaps the bag’s continued presence in our hall was less a miracle than I’d thought.
After the boys were ushered off to their school day, I stood outside my house for a few minutes before making an important decision—I was not going to school. I had never skipped school before. Not even when my mother was dying. The week after she died, my choices were to stay in the house or sit in classes. That is to say, stay in a house filled with nosy neighbors, awkward policemen, and their cooing, tittering wives; or go to classes, where hardly anyone knew or cared my mother was gone, and all I had to tolerate were the crowded halls, monotonous lectures, and an incompetent lab partner.
I didn’t need to attend class to keep up my grades, or wouldn’t need to if the professors didn’t require attendance. But I enjoyed certain trappings of academia—the smell of old books, chemicals, and fresh paint; the facts and figures and symbolism; and most of all, the knowing. Knowing more about the things that mattered than almost everyone in the building.
That was why I willingly walked into the embrace of the most monotonous institution on earth, using little tricks and games to keep me sane while reveling in the parts of school that were tolerable. But that day, holding a copy of the file on Lily’s dad’s death, with the photo of Mum and Mr. Patel in my pocket, I couldn’t do it. Lock’s game suddenly felt like one of the most important things I’d ever done.
So, I’d decided I wasn’t going to school. But I couldn’t stay home, either. I toyed with the idea of going to London Library, or to a pub or café, but something about having a copy of the file in my bag made me feel like everyone was staring at me, waiting to find me out.
In fact, it wasn’t until I’d had lunch and was out in the middle of the lake, oars safely tucked inside my boat, that I felt free enough to take the papers out for a good read. Most of the file was boring and useless, testimonies by every officer on scene, all saying the same load of nothing. The forensics were minimal and equally useless, with the exception of a note that there were scratches in the tree bark above Mr. Patel’s body that looked like four circles. There was a reference to an evidence number but no actual photograph. Could be worth going back to double-check, but could also be some stupid vandal mark that meant nothing.
The coroner’s report was interesting but didn’t reveal much we hadn’t already guessed. The weapon had been some kind of long knife or short sword that had pierced through the throat and into the spine, incapacitating him, then through the heart, killing him instantly. But the text was odd—like the thought wasn’t complete. “Victim’s wound is the same shape and angle,” and then nothing. Not even a period. It was almost as if the coroner had forgotten to finish his thought midsentence.
Maybe he’d seen the connection to the other murders. Maybe he’d thought the shape and angle were the same, but they didn’t match in the end. Maybe a million reasons, and I was inflating the oddity in my mind like Lock would’ve done. I was suddenly very glad he wasn’t there.
That wasn’t true. I looked around the lake and felt very alone.
I lay back like he had done and closed my eyes against the brightness of the sun through the clouds. I pictured Sherlock’s map, and filled in the details from the file, following the strands of information up to the blank page, willing it to fill in with a face. But my mind kept stalling around useless data. Like the way the coroner’s sentence had trailed off without warning. Like how the file had been left splayed on Lock’s floor, despite our urgency to see it, all so he and I could kiss and talk about nothing and kiss some more.
I sat up with a start when a few drops of water scattered across my face, and almost collided with a giant goose that had chosen a flight path directly above my boat. I’d drifted up against a bank without realizing, and when I looked out at the lake, the light seemed muted, the shadows different. I’d fallen asleep.
I was late.
And, as happens when one is late, it took most of a year to row back to the café, and apparently everyone in London turned in their boat rentals at four thirty-five in the evening. So, by the time I got through the queue and started home, it was nearly five, and I was sure I’d walk in on World War Brothers or something worse. I never imagined another bad night would come so soon.