The Marsh Madness

Uncle Mick always said when you saw the Dippers to make sure someone wasn’t dipping into your pocket to steal your wallet. I chuckled to myself remembering that, even as I unconsciously checked my pocket, as I’d done when I was five years old.

Uncle Lucky had gone even further and introduced me to the constellations when I was six. He’d taught me that my beloved Dippers were part of the Ursa Major constellation. He promised that the Great Bear was something I could count on. It would always be there. I smiled. I could also always count on Uncle Lucky, who was a great bearlike figure himself. It was good to remember that. Uncle Mick might be out of commission, but Uncle Lucky was out there, and tomorrow I would find a way to reach him.

I scanned the sky, and sure enough, there were the three stars marking Orion’s Belt. I had to admire a constellation with great accessories. But Orion, the hunter, always had to watch his celestial back. Behind the scenes—and unseen in April—was Scorpius. I knew there was some kind of Scorpius behind our scenes too, lurking out of sight, malicious and dangerous. Who was my Scorpius? Why was he or she targeting us?

I hoped that, like the outlines of the constellations, all would be revealed if I could just see the patterns. That was something else Uncle Lucky had taught me. Look for the patterns; your eye will fill in the connecting lines.

All my uncles were fascinated with the night skies, maybe because so much of their business took place under cover of darkness. I shared the fascination, if not the business.

It felt good to sit there, covered in the quilts, thinking, reviewing everything that had happened without distraction. By distraction, I meant Uncle Kev and the police. But no matter how I looked at the stars, we were in a mess of some magnitude.

Would Inspector Alleyn have seen the connections between the seen and unseen players in our drama? He sure had a knack for finding links and noticing small, discordant elements. Would he have spotted our Scorpius?

Of course, unlike me—a fleeing felon on the run and in the woods—he’d be well-groomed, calm and aristocratic, and he’d never find himself hiding under a bed. He’d take his time and look at each aspect of the case. Mull over the small things that stuck out and nagged at the back of the mind. I hadn’t done that. I’d been too busy dashing around and panicking. Not that I didn’t have good reason to panic. I had people to worry about. Uncle Kev wouldn’t last ten minutes in prison. Vera might, but that was an awful thought. I wasn’t so crazy about hearing the doors clang behind me either. Orange didn’t suit me at all, as I’ve mentioned.

It looked grim for all of us. Were the police still holding Mick and Lance? I couldn’t check with Smiley. Kev was a disaster. I was working alone.

Not only were we headed for the slammer, but two people were dead, two people who didn’t deserve that fate. What had Chadwick Kauffman ever done to be bashed with a sculpture and pushed down the staircase at Summerlea? Nothing, as far as I could see. His employees seemed distraught. He had no heirs. There didn’t appear to be anyone with a motive.

But, like the constellations, things were starting to take shape. I just couldn’t make out what that shape was.

“Look to the stage,” Inspector Alleyn had said in my dream. What did he mean by that?


*

WELL BEFORE DAWN, we met Cherie at the edge of the road. For once she was not in the cable van, but in an unmemorable older Ford Focus. She followed us to the most isolated spot we knew of, a quarry twenty miles north of Harrison Falls. There Kev drove the van into the lake. He’d wanted to torch it, but saner voices prevailed.

It is said there are more cars at the bottom of that quarry than at any car dealer in the region. I chose not to think about that as we drove back.

Cherie had the laptop from Uncle Mick’s secret location. “That’s a cool space across the street from Mick’s antique shop. You ever think of opening a boutique in the vacant shop downstairs, Jordan? It might be less dangerous that working for a book collector.”