Steeplejack (Alternative Detective, #1)(20)

“That’s not hard,” I said before I could stop myself.

His slitlike mouth widened again unreadably, and the scar quavered. “No,” he agreed. “I would imagine not. But I am curious as to what inspired his wrath on this particular occasion. A businessman such as Mr. Morlak does not give up his best assets easily. I have heard that there are companies who utilize his services expressly on condition that the actual work is performed by you, and judging by the account of the way you evaded his men this evening, I am not at all surprised.”

I blinked at the compliment but kept my eyes lowered, my hair half masking my face.

“What did you do, Miss Sutonga? Did you take something of Mr. Morlak’s? Or perhaps, something Mr. Morlak didn’t actually own but paid you to acquire for him? I believe you had a conversation with a member of Bar-Selehm’s excellent police department this evening.”

I looked up then, bafflement like a curtain of fog parting around a distant prick of bright light in my mind.

The Beacon?

I opened my mouth, but no words came out, and at last I sat down to still the trembling of my legs. The chair was soft and comfortable, its timber seemingly molded to my form. It was one of the most perfectly designed objects I had ever touched.

“There, now,” said the man. “Isn’t that better?”

I managed a nod, feeling young and vulnerable in ways I had not felt for years, not since I lived in the Drowning and Rahvey had used that phrase of hers to make me do the chores.

Third daughter a curse.

I felt it more acutely now, a dragging anxiety edged with the white-hot glow of panic.

“So,” said the young man, still pleasant, still apparently oblivious to all that was slicing through my mind, but with that same keen-eyed intensity. “Let us talk business.”

Under his gaze I felt a moment of choice, as if I were standing on a narrow line of crumbling brick high above some factory, knowing that I needed to jump to safety or cling to where I was and hope my perch stayed intact. I decided quickly, fighting off the self-conscious paralysis I felt under those curious green eyes.

“I don’t know what you think I’ve done,” I said, forcing myself to look up and meet his gaze, “or what you think I know, but you’re wrong. Morlak attacked me. Tried to … Tried to force himself on me.” My lock on his eyes broke only for a second. “I fought back and hurt him. It was self-defense. That is why he fired me. That is why he wants to punish me. Nothing more.”

He sat back and his eyes contracted with thought. The knowing quality he had exuded to this point evaporated, and he was all watchful attention. “Is this true?” he asked at last.

“Yes. I know nothing about the Beacon.”

He leaned forward again. “Who said anything about the Beacon?” he asked.

“That’s why you brought me here,” I said.

His silence conceded the point. “A boy died this morning,” he said. “Or late last night. His name was—” He scoured his desk for where he had written it down.

“Berrit Samar,” I inserted.

“Indeed,” he said. “And he was supposed to be working with you today, though you did not know him, correct?”

“We met only once,” I said.

“And what makes you think he might have been connected to the theft of the Beacon?”

I said nothing, more than tongue-tied. I had no idea who I was talking to.

“And you believe the boy … Berrit,” he continued, “was murdered. A wound, you said, in the back, yes? Inflicted by an assailant who had been waiting for the boy on the top of the chimney.”

“On a ledge below the cap,” I clarified. I fished the loop of cord from my pocket and tied my hair back so I could look him full in the face.

“I think you are right,” he said. “The body has been examined, which—without your report—would not have happened, and the coroner concurs. Death resulted from a single, narrow incision just right of the spine, penetrating the heart.”

I closed my eyes for a second.

“You know the spire above the exchange?” he said. “Where the Beacon was housed?”

“Yes.”

“Could you have climbed it?”

“Yes.”

“You sound very sure,” he said.

“With the right equipment I could scale any tower, chimney, or spire in Bar-Selehm,” I said. It wasn’t a boast. It was simply true.

“Could any steeplejack have made that climb?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “The steeple is stone clad. Tight grout lines. There’s nothing to fasten to.”

“And, other than yourself, do you know any such person in Bar-Selehm?”

I frowned and shrugged noncommittally.

“Berrit?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“As a helper?” he asked.

“Only in the most basic way. For anything involving actual climbing, he would have been a liability.” I felt disloyal saying it, but it was true.

“But you think he was involved,” said the young man with the shrewd green eyes.

“He could have been bullied into helping,” I said, choosing my words as if I were selecting from a range of tools, “by someone he looked up to who didn’t trust his more experienced workers with something illegal.”