Jackaby (Jackaby #1)(21)

I read the earliest date aloud, October twenty-third, and scanned the numbers for the next oldest, and the next. I glanced up after four or five. “What’s that you’re drawing?” I asked.

Jackaby scowled. “Recording the dates. Keep going.”

“Is that an elven language or something?”

He stood back from the chalkboard and stared at it blankly. “No.”

“Are those pictograms? What’s that bit you just finished? The one that looks like a goose tugging at a bit of string?”

“That’s a seven.”

“Oh.” We both looked at the board. I tilted my head. “Oh right—I see. I think.”

Jackaby handed me the chalk and plucked the paper from my hands. We traded positions without further comment and recommenced. Shortly, with Jackaby reading off numbers and locations while I wrote, we had produced a list of twelve dates. On average they were five or six days apart. Beyond that, no discernible pattern existed. Jackaby moved on to the abbreviations.

“C and N,” he thought aloud. “The Wd. is consistent, whatever it means. What could C and N signify?”

“Central and Northern?” I suggested. “It is a map.”

“Possible, but they’re certainly not accurate, if that’s the case. Look, there are two marks around Glanville, south of us, and the southernmost of those is an N. What else could they be?”

“Let’s see, Bragg was covering the election, and he interviewed the current mayor. C for Current, perhaps, and N for what? New? Maybe he was taking a poll?”

“That’s good—only most of these marks are out of our district. In fact, all of them are. Look. We’ve got three up in Brahannasburg, four in Crowley, two each in Glanville and Gadston, with one more out in Gad’s Valley. That’s at least four separate jurisdictions with their own . . .” Jackaby froze. He stared at the map in his hands.

“What?” I asked. “Have you worked something out?”

Jackaby’s eyes were dancing back and forth, chasing thoughts. “What? No, nothing. Maybe nothing. Possibly nothing. Just a hunch. I’ll need to pop out to send a telegram or two. You’re welcome to stay and settle in if you like.”

My eyes flashed to the ceiling as Jackaby folded the map and headed into the hall. “Before you go,” I ventured, “tell me, have you got anyone else staying in the building? Lodgers or tenants of some sort?”

“Oh, ah, hmm.” Jackaby stumbled toward a response. “Yes, yes, I suppose I do, indeed,” he called out from across the hall.

“That’s fine, then. Anything I should know about them?”

“Which one?”

“ ‘Which one’? How many people have you got living here?”

Jackaby popped his head back through the doorway. His mouth opened as if to speak, and shut again, his lips pursed in concentration. “Well,” he managed at last, “that depends on your definition of people . . . and also of living.” He pulled on his baggy, brown coat. “It’s complicated. Fetch you a meat pie while I’m out?”

I gave earnest consideration to my definitions of people, and living, and found the prospect of remaining on the property less and less appealing. “Wouldn’t it really be best if I accompany you on your errands?” I said. “For . . . learning purposes?”

“Suit yourself, Miss Rook.”

My employer was on his way with no further discussion, and I hurried after.





Chapter Eleven


My stomach was growling audibly as Jackaby paid the vendor for two steamy meat pies. I was all the more grateful I had come along, and that the little pie shop had been en route to the telegraph office.

They were sturdy things, with a thick crust that held together and made them fairly easy to eat as we walked. Jackaby held his gingerly with the end of his scarf, blowing on it to cool it down. Far too hungry for patience, I devoured mine with less grace, and with manners that would have made my poor mother blanch, losing more than a little crust and hot filling to the cobblestones.

“So, what we know thus far,” Jackaby said suddenly, as if the ongoing conversation in his head had bubbled over and simply poured out his mouth, “is that our culprit left poor Mr. Bragg with a wicked chest wound and a grieving girlfriend, and he made off with a good deal of the fellow’s blood. From the look of it, just the blood. The heart and other organs appeared to be intact, and his wallet and watch were still safely in his vest pockets.”

“Who steals blood?” I asked, wiping my mouth.

“More creatures than you might think, and many you would never suspect. Blood is a hot commodity in many circles, used for any number of things. Legends suggest a certain Hungarian countess actually bathed in the stuff back in the sixteenth century. Earned her titles like ‘the Blood Countess,’ and ‘the Bloody Lady’ among the terrified townsfolk.”

“You think Arthur Bragg was killed by a sixteenth-century Hungarian countess?”

“Of course not. The Bloody Lady was human. We’re looking for something decidedly supernatural. True, though, it’s likely our culprit appears human enough. He or she clearly stopped to sit in Bragg’s chair for a spell before dispatching the poor fellow.”

“So, we’re looking for someone who looks human. Hardly narrows it down, does it?”