AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I saw him frequently at parties and the like. I wouldn’t say that we were close, especially not after our early teenage years. We had different friends. He was far more of a partier than I ever was,” Charlotte said.
“I see. I’ve heard this report as well,” he said. “It sounds as though he was quite the life of the party. The sort of man to invite if you wanted a raucous time.”
“I suppose so,” Charlotte affirmed.
“Did he have any sort of suspicious friends that you know of?” Charles asked. “The sort of people you wouldn’t have necessarily hung around, due to fear of what might happen?”
Charlotte furrowed her brow. For the millionth time, she tried to drum up views of the sorts of people Brooks had normally drunk with, laughed with. Her images were necessarily Brooks at the centre of a crowd of people; her mind couldn’t articulate the faces of the others.
“I don’t quite know,” Charlotte said. “Like I told you before, we weren’t incredibly close. I liked him a great deal, and perhaps I thought, one day, we might build our relationship …”
Charles made a note on a notepad. Charlotte ached with curiosity, wondering what he’d felt was necessary to write down. He then returned his twinkling eyes towards her and said, “Where were you on the night of Brooks’ murder?”
“I believe I was at my dear friend Louisa’s,” Charlotte said. In her mind, that final night before Brooks’ death was one of the last glittering, free memories of her life. “I had dinner there after an outing.”
Here, Charlotte tried to drum up the courage to talk about the mystic.
“What sort of outing?”
Charlotte’s heart burned with fear. “We went to town. Shopping. That sort of thing.”
“Nothing out of the ordinary?” Charles asked.
“No.”
Why couldn’t Charlotte tell him about the mystic? Her tongue felt dry with panic. If only she could muster the strength to explain, perhaps he could use it to get to the bottom of it all. Still, if she told him she’d gone to a mystic, he would surely think she was a sort of idiot. After all, mystics were known scam artists.What sort of imbecile goes to a scam artist?He would assuredly mark her as someone not to trust on his little pad of paper. Charlotte felt she couldn’t manage it.
“Okay,” Charles said. He heaved a sigh and traced something else across his notepad. “If there’s really nothing else that you can think of, I suppose you can leave.”
Charlotte paused. She gripped the armrests on the little study chair. “What do you know thus far?”
Charles arched his brow. “To be honest with you, we don’t have a great deal to go on at the moment.”
“I see.” Charlotte’s stomach churned with guilt. Perhaps her words could have given him something.
“We have an eyewitness account,” Charles continued. “But it’s unclear at this moment if it means anything at all. I’m still in the early stages of the investigation. Speaking to everyone I can get hold of.” He bowed his head toward her. “Like you, your family.”
“I’m glad we could help,” Charlotte said.
“Yes.” He tapped his quill at the edge of his nose, then said, “When was the last time you saw Brooks? Out of curiosity.”
“I suppose it had been a few weeks, at least. Perhaps a month,” Charlotte said.
Charles nodded and made a final mark. He then flashed his eyes towards Charlotte once more. “If you don’t have anything else to report …”
Charlotte ached. She so wanted to help; it was in her nature. She felt herself akin to a thick brick wall between this man and the truth.
Suddenly, her stomach jumped.
“I actually have one more thing,” Charlotte said.
The investigator furrowed his brow. “What is it? If it’s an invitation to dinner, don’t worry. Your mother has already invited me, and I’ve declined, as I have several things to—”
“No. Nothing like that. Do you mind waiting here for a moment?” she asked.
She didn’t wait for Charles Baxter to answer. Instead, she leapt to her feet and rushed towards the door. In moments, she was a blur in the doorway of the parlour—moving just quickly enough not to hear the bickering her parents had fallen into in the wake of her mother’s flirtation. Upstairs in her bedroom, she gripped one of her books, opened it, and discovered the letter she’d found in Brooks’ bedroom. This was the only key she had, the only thing she could give to the investigator without putting any undue stupidity label upon herself.
Back downstairs, she dropped the letter on the desk before the investigator and pointed. “This is all I have for you.”
