Page 12 of Hawk & Sparrow

Vesper stared, eyes sifting over the rest of the bag’s contents. Her pens, some loose papers, and her coin purse were all accounted for, but the red leather notebook she always kept with her was gone. Dread gave way to panic. She looked up, scouring every inch of her tiny apartment. No notebook. Her strap slipped through her fingers, and the bag landed at her feet with a soft thud.

Her notebook had been a birthday gift from Tom. Bought new, it was one of the few things in this world that had belonged to her and only her. It contained two years of notes and rough drafts, everything from musings to random drawings to quotes from every one of her interviews. She’d never bothered to collect her clippings for the Globe, so her notebook had also been the closest thing she had to a portfolio of her work. It had always lived in her satchel, a familiar weight against her hip. In its absence, she felt out of step.

She shuffled over to her armchair and sank into its lumpy cushion.

Think. Think.

She’d last had her notebook in the maze when she’d been interviewing Maximilian Kite. It stood to reason that she’d simply left it there. A spark of hope rekindled. She would find her notebook. She would get it back. She slipped into clean clothes, then headed down the stairs and out the Globe’s front door.

By the time Vesper reached the museum, any warmth she’d taken from her apartment was gone.

She shivered as she made her way up the museum’s long gravel drive, trying not to think about how eerie it felt to be back. Just last night, she’d walked this very path on her way to interview a man who was now dead.

She hadn’t expected the museum to be open for its normal business hours this morning—and indeed, its front doors were locked—but as Vesper descended the front stairs and edged around the building, she was still disturbed to see the lingering evidence of last night’s tragedy in daylight. All around her there were morbid contrasts: abandoned champagne flutes tagged with crime scene markers, decorative ribbons that had been torn and displaced as party guests had hastily left the museum. The grounds themselves appeared to be vacant. She’d just started for the maze’s entrance, when—

“Hold it right there, Miss Evans!”

Vesper winced, then fixed a polite smile in place before turning to address the familiar voice. Chief Stettner was marching toward her. He was not smiling.

“Morning, Frederick!”

“That’s Chief Stettner to you,” he said brusquely.

“Of course,” Vesper placated. “Good morning, Chief Stettner.”

The police chief stopped and crossed his arms. “The museum grounds are closed to the public until further notice,” he said. “That includes members of the press.” He gave her an admonishing look. “Honestly, I’m surprised at you, Miss Evans. Returning to the scene of a crime is the behavior of a perpetrator.”

“Speaking of perpetrators, do you have any lined up?” she asked.

A furrow appeared in the chief’s brow. “It’s been less than twenty-four hours.”

“That’s not a no.” She leaned in and lowered her voice. “Chief, what can you tell me about the investigation so far, off the record?”

Chief Stettner shoved his hands into his pockets. “The medical examiner will have to finish his report before we know anything conclusive, but we believe Francis Gladwell’s cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head. We haven’t located a murder weapon yet, but—”

“What about the champagne bottle?” Vesper interjected. “The first time I saw Mr. Gladwell, it was right by his feet. The second time, it was gone. I told an officer when I gave my statement.”

Stettner nodded. “I had my men go through the entire maze with a fine-tooth comb, but there’s no trace of it anywhere. Whoever the perpetrator was, he had the wherewithal to take the bottle with him when he left.”

Vesper massaged her chin, thinking. “How sure are you that blunt force trauma was Mr. Gladwell’s cause of death?”

“I see no reason why it wouldn’t be.” The chief raised a brow. “You know something I don’t?”

Vesper turned the events of last night over in her mind. “I smelled something on him,” she said slowly. “At first, I thought it was champagne, but maybe it was something else. Before he collapsed, Mr. Gladwell was acting strangely.”

“It sounds like he was quite intoxicated,” Stettner offered.

“Maybe…” Vesper chewed her bottom lip. “But what if it was something else? What if he was drugged? What if someone put something in his drink?”

Stettner scratched his chin. “I suppose it’s possible,” he conceded. “But why would the murderer drug Mr. Gladwell, then bludgeon him?”

“It could’ve been a botched job,” Vesper suggested. “Or maybe it was a crime of passion.”

“Point taken.”

“Mr. Gladwell had just unveiled the prototype of an eponymous invention,” Vesper added. “Based on what he said during his demonstration, it would have allowed people to perform Thaumaric incantations without the need for years of study, which would have allowed anyone to perform sorcery. I don’t have any proof, but my gut tells me that it’s not a coincidence he died the same night he went public with it. Your men should look into it.”

Chief Stettner paused, considering. “We didn’t find any prototype in the museum.”