He sat behind his desk in shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows, jacket slung lazily over the back of his chair, watching ash crawl across a stack of unpaid bills. In the corner of his vision he saw the flicker of his ever present system, always there, like it was watching him. The system gave him the skills to be a detective, but the one he really wanted right now was something to help him find a few new clients. That was a skill he could get behind. That or something to keep the creditors from busting down his door.
Behind him, the window was open just enough to let air in from the courtyard below. It smelled like metal, petrichor and that acrid, bitter alchemical ammonia from the guild laboratories across the street. Still, it was better than the musty, cigar smoke infused smell of the office on its own.
Effie Ferine knocked once and then came in without waiting.
“Lu,” she said. It was a statement, not a question. Just doing her job, not asking permission. It was one of the things he loved about Effie. She didn’t need anyone to tell her what to do and would likely cut you down a peg if you tried.
He took a last drag from his thin cigar and looked up slowly. "Yah?"
Effie was a lanky, sunburned woman, though where she found enough sun in this city for a sunburn he’d be damned if he knew. Today she was wearing a burnt-yellow dress of thin woolen stuff that hung loosely off her shoulders. Her eyes were brown and playful and whatever she may have lacked in traditional looks, she more than made up for in attitude. She was the fierce protector of this office and wouldn’t take bullshit from anyone, including her bosses.
Shutting the heavy wooden door behind her, she leaned against it and said, "There's a girl here wants to see you. Name's Wonderly."
“A client?”
“Well, not a bill collector anyway, she’s dressed too nice.” Effie tilted her head. “But she looks like trouble all the same.”
Spade leaned back slightly and looked up at her. Effie was a great judge of character. It was one of her many talents that he had come to rely on over the past year and not for the first time, he wondered what her class was. “What kind of trouble?”
“The expensive kind.”
“Well, that’s the best kind I suppose. Send her in.”
Effie gave him a long look with a raised eyebrow. “Watch yourself with this one, Lu,” she said before finally opening the door and walking back out into the office.
Voices floated in through the opening as Spade blew ashes off his desk and shuffled papers and envelopes into a bad semblance of order.
“This way, please Miss Wonderly.”
A soft voice answered, “Thank you,” with a careful precision that had to be practiced.
Then a young woman stood in the doorway, Eiffe only a step behind. She looked around the room. Not judging exactly. There was no recrimination over the spartan interior that Spade could see. But she did a thorough job of cataloguing her surroundings. Her cobalt eyes flicked from one surface to the next with alacrity. Trouble indeed.
Spade watched her eyes and didn’t say anything.
She was a tall woman and pliantly slender, without a sharp angle anywhere. She stood erect on long legs that showed delicate calves beneath a blue dress. Dark, rusty hair curled out from under a long hat sporting a short striped feather. The hair was curled, but Spade doubted that was any more natural than the timid grin she showed after finally deigning to look down at him.
Spade rose, smoothed the fabric of his freshly pressed black suit coat, and bowed his head towards her. Whoever she was, she came from class and money and a little deference would only grease the wheels of this meeting. He held one hand out towards the better of the two briarwood armchairs beside his desk.
Miss Wonderly murmured a soft thank you and sat down on the barest edge of the chair’s shaped seat. She clasped her hands, one over the other, on top of her blue velvet handbag and flashed another of those timid grins as she looked back at him.
Spade sank back into his own darker wooden chair and swiveled to face her, returning her smile.
Effie, who had watched the procession up until this point, slowly closed the door with another long look at Spade. The click clack of her heels faded as she made her way back to her desk in the front office.
Somewhere in the building, a glyph-press thrummed, pushing a dull vibration into the floorboards that caused Spade’s guest to raise her eyebrows in surprise. Spade pretended like he didn’t hear it.
Miss Wonderly’s dark-gloved hands tightened around her handbag as Spade drew the moment out. Cigar smoke rose from the large green ceramic ashtray on his desk and twitched and curled towards the open window, framed in heavy, buffalo checked curtains.
“What can I do for you today Miss Wonderly?” Spade asked finally.
Miss Wonderly watched Spade for another moment with uneasy eyes before swallowing hard.
“I’m afraid my sister Corinne has run away.”
Spade watched her face and noticed a small twitching around the eyes. Okay. “And that’s a problem I presume?”
She opened her mouth as if to talk then closed it again and just nodded in response. As she drew breath to continue, he inwardly sighed and reached for his Detective class abilities and activated the one he used for interviews. It was almost second nature by now as much as he hated using the system at all.
>>> Cold Read
He felt the ability activate like a cool towel on the back of his neck. It settled into place, increasing his own, naturally sharp perception.
She started again. The words sounded rough and too hurried. "Yes, but… Could you… That is, I thought…" Then she stopped again and bit into her lower lip with too-white teeth and said nothing else. He focused on his status window, while trying to make that look natural.
>>> Pulse: Steady.
His ability registered no spike in her heart rate at all and only minor stress, despite her halting words.
Spade leaned forward and rested one elbow on his desk with a smile, trying to lighten the mood. "Suppose you just start at the start Miss Wonderly. You know. Just tell me the story that happened and I’ll ask you any questions where I need to."
She nodded again and took a deep breath. "That would be in New Kroy, on the other side of the country."
>>> Breath: Consistent. Controlled.
"Okay."
"I’m not sure where she met him exactly. I don’t know if that matters. She's younger than I am and we ran in different circles, you understand? And we didn’t often talk.”
>>> Minor hesitation.
Was that a deflection? Her eyes twitched when she said that. Likely she did know where her sister had met this man. Did it matter? Or had she just decided it was irrelevant?
She dropped her gaze to her gloved hands for a moment and then met his eyes once more. She looked worried, but there was an edge to her stare and she didn’t look away. “Our parents are travelling and don’t know. It would kill them. I've got to get her back before they come home."
"I understand," he said.
"They'll be home by the end of the month."
Spade's eyes brightened. The end of the month would give him fourteen days to find the woman’s sister. Missing people cases could easily fill that calendar space, especially if the missing person didn’t actually want to be found. It had been months since he had a case that paid much more than an afternoon’s work and he could use the dough.
"Then we've got two weeks to find her," he said calmly, not letting his own thoughts show. “Best you tell me all about it.”
“I didn’t even know where she had even gone until her letter came. She disappeared almost a month ago.” Her lip trembled.
There. Cold Read flagged a spike. It felt like a gut feeling telling him she had definitely lied, but about which part? That she didn’t know where her sister had gone? Or was she lying about how long ago her sister had left? The better question though, was why lie about either if she wanted her back?
“I was completely frantic." Her hands mashed the straps of her handbag. "I was about to go to the police when her letter arrived, but since she left on her own I didn’t think they would even help me. I had no one else to go to for help, you understand? And I couldn’t send a message to our parents. What else could I do?"
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"Nothing, of course," Spade said calmly, steering the conversation forward, "but then her letter arrived?"
"Yes! Yes. And I sent her an aethergram right back. Asking her to come home. I sent it to General Delivery here in San Vaneris. Right back to the same office her aethergram was sent from. I waited a whole week, but no answer came. Not another word from her. And our parents’ return was drawing closer and closer.
“Finally I decided to come to San Vaneris to get her myself.”
>>> Micro hesitations in statement.
That felt like sand paper. It was uncomfortable. The pauses made the whole thing sound like rehearsed lines to his ears and it itched to listen to. Maybe they were rehearsed though. Did it have to do with the earlier lie? Or was it just that this was hard for her and she’d practiced her speech a few times before knocking on the front door.
“Did you warn her that you were coming? Send her another aethergraph?”
“Of course! I was… am, so worried about her. I wrote to her that I was coming from the train station. Should I have not done that?"
"Maybe. Maybe not. It's not always easy to know what to do of course and you were worried,” he said. She only nodded so he prompted her further, “Have you found any trace of her here yet?"
"No, I haven't, not her. I waited at the main terminal for three days. I told her I would be there, in my letter. But she never came."
Spade nodded his head and put on a sympathetic frown and thoughtful look.
"It was horrible," Miss Wonderly said. "Just sitting there, day after day. Not knowing why she didn’t come to talk to me. Not knowing what might have happened to her, what might be happening to her." She shuddered visibly.
>>> Heart rate low. Controlled breathing.
Miss Wonderly was hiding something. She was altogether too calm for someone who was supposed to be upset for a missing sister. Her vitals just weren’t lining up with her tone.
"But yesterday, I stayed there until after dark. I couldn’t bear to go back to my hotel empty-handed again. I still didn't see Corinne, but I saw Floyd Wedby, he’d come to check for letters."
“This is the man that your sister met?” Spade asked.
"Yes! And he wouldn't tell me where Corinne was," she went on, hopelessly. "He wouldn't tell me anything, except that she was well and happy. But how can I believe that? That’s what he would say either way, isn't it?"
"Sure, possibly," Spade agreed. "But it might also be true." This was starting to sound a lot like another 2-afternoon case. Find Wedby, follow him to the girl. Close the case.
"I hope it is.” She said quietly.
Spade quirked an eyebrow at her change in tone. “Did he threaten you?”
“No,” She said hesitantly, like she hadn’t considered it before.
“Occupation?”
“Me?”
“No Miss Wonderly, I’m inquiring about Mr. Wedby.”
“Oh… I don’t know.”
He felt something strange through his Cold Read ability at that. Her answer might be true, but he doubted it. Either she was confused on some of the details she was sharing, or she was a damned fine actress. But then, what would be gained from withholding information?
He’d only been a detective for a little over a year and he hadn’t worked many cases that had him dealing with seriously distraught women though. What did he know about how they should act?
“He told me to just go home," she exclaimed. "When I saw him. But I can't go back home like this, without having seen her, without having even talked to her. I told him, but he refused to take me to her. He said she didn't want to see me. Can you believe that? Not want to see her own sister?”
She stared at him after that. Clearly trying to get his buy-in on the situation. But that wasn’t his job. He was here to understand the facts. She hesitated for a long moment, watching him, but Spade only raised his brows expectantly, urging her to continue. Finally she did.
“I kept bugging him and he finally promised to tell her I was here, and to bring her to see me, if she would come. This evening at my hotel. He said he knew she wouldn't want to though. He…"
She broke off and a single tear glistened in the corner of her eye. Spade watched her for a long moment. His gut, and his class, were both telling him she was lying about something. But either the story was mostly true or she was a damn fine actress.
He shut down his Cold Read ability and activated Civic Authority, a core class ability that came with his new Detective license. The ability was a bit of a detective’s toolbox and had a few sub-abilities, but he wanted the first one down the list: Municipal Identity Trace.
The bread and butter skill of a municipally licensed Detective, the ability allowed him to read another person's registered data, including name, address and class. What he saw though, only really told him one thing: she was rich.
>>> Full registered name:
>>> Registered address:
>>> Public class:
>>> License status:
>>> Civic standing (good / fined / flagged):
Only the rich could get away with the level of municipal control necessary to have all their personal data pulled off the system. He wondered how much her family had paid to scrub their data from the damned corrupt system.
It sickened him. There was nothing he could do about it at the moment though and he fought to keep his feelings off his face.
Spade leaned forward slightly. “What class does this Floyd Wedby carry?”
Her eyes flicked up and to the right. She looked like she was considering but then simply said that she didn’t know.
Another lie? Had she just checked her own system for something? Activated her own class? He didn’t press. “And what exactly do you want from me, Miss Wonderly?”
“I want her to be found of course. I want to make sure she is safe. And then taken away from him and returned to me.”
“Before your parents return.”
“Yes.”
“And if she doesn’t wish to leave Mr. Wedby?”
Her lips tightened. “She will.”
As she spoke, the door opened behind her and she jumped, startled at the sudden, loud click of the latch.
“Oh…” Miles Archer stopped short, hat half removed, one foot inside the office, the other without. “Didn’t know you were engaged Lu.”
“It’s fine, Miles,” Spade said. “Come in. Miss Wonderly, this is Mr. Archer, my partner.” He turned his head to look at his partner. “Miles, Miss Wonderly here is from New Kroy. Her sister has run off with a Floyd Wedby and the pair are hiding out in the city here somewhere.”
As Spade spoke, Miles Archer came fully into the office and shut the door behind him. He nodded formally to Miss Wonderly with a smile, making a vaguely polite gesture with the hat in his hand. He was older than Spade and shorter, but solidly built.
Spade continued as Archer hung his hat on the stand beside the door and dropped a folder on his desk across the room. “Miss Wonderly has seen Wedby and is to meet him again tonight. He may or may not be bringing said sister along. But we’re not holding our breath on that. Miss Wonderly would like us to find her sister and get her away from Mr. Wedby." He looked over at Miss Wonderly. "Did I miss anything?"
She shook her head. “No. Well, just that, I need her home by the end of the month,” she said as she picked nervously at the bag in her lap with a gloved finger.
“Of course. The parents are away but returning in two weeks.”
Archer came forward to lean at a corner of Spade’s desk. While the young woman was busy staring at her handbag, Archer gave her a long appraising look that was almost, but not quite professional. He turned to Spade and mimicked a silent whistle in appreciation.
Spade rolled his eyes and lifted two fingers from the arm of his chair as a brief warning gesture, hoping his partner would get the hint.
Archer listened, then said, “Easy enough really. We can put someone on him tonight at the hotel. Shadow him back to the sister.” He cleared his throat. “Sorry, your sister, I mean.”
“Assuming she doesn’t just show up in person,” Spade said.
“Sure. Of course. And if she does show up, we fall back into the hotel and help separate Mr. Wedby if needed.”
Miss Wonderly’s gaze sharpened. “And if you have to follow him. Once you found where they are staying?”
“Well, we'll wait until Wedby goes out again and then convince your sister to come home,” Archer said.
Miss Wonderly turned quickly to Spade, eyes wide and forehead pinched between her brows. "But you must be careful!" Her voice shook a little and her lips more so as she spoke. "I'm deathly afraid of him, of what he might do. She's so young and he might…”
Spade reached over and gave the back of one of her hands a reassuring pat. She was worried about something alright, but he wasn’t sure it was exactly what she was letting on about.
"Just leave that to us," he said. "We'll know how to handle him right enough."
She didn’t look entirely convinced, but eventually nodded. “Just know that he's a dangerous man. I honestly don't think he'd stop at anything. I don't believe he'd hesitate to… To kill Corinne if he thought it would save himself."
Spade paused, a little confused. Earlier he had asked if he had been threatening, she had said no. But now she claimed he was a dangerous man. There was a discrepancy there somewhere.
He leaned over and grabbed a pencil and pad of paper. "What does he look like?"
"He's about thirty-five years old, perhaps, and at least as tall as you, though not nearly so broad, more, athletic I suppose. He has darker skin, black hair and a thick moustache. He’s loud when he talks, but blustery-like and kind of nervous. He gives the impression of being… Well, of violence I suppose."
Spade, scribbling on the pad, asked without looking up: "Eye color?"
"They're blueish-green. Oh, and he has a deep cleft in his chin."
Spade asked his final question, more a quick test really, “and your sister’s name?”
She didn’t hesitate. “Ennie. Well, Corinne. But we call her Ennie.”
Spade put the pencil down on the desk. "All right, Miss Wonderly, we'll have a man there by eight tonight. It'll help if…"
"It won’t be you or Mr. Archer?" She looked decidedly frightened. "It’s just that I am so afraid for my sister. Could one of you not look after it personally? If it’s about money that isn’t an issue at all.” And without any prompting she opened her hand bag and brought out a small bag of coin, setting it nervously down on Spade's desk.
"Don’t you worry Miss Wonderly," Archer said, laying on what little charm he had. Spade tried to not roll his eyes. "I'd be happy to look after it myself."
Spade tried to not roll his eyes again but Miss Wonderly just stared at the man with a hopeful smile before standing up and holding out a hand towards him.
"Thank you! Truly, thank you both!" she exclaimed and then turned and gave Spade her hand as well, repeating: "Thank you Mr. Spade!"
"It’s not a problem," Spade said. "We’re glad to be able to help you with this. It'll make the evening go smoother though if you can meet Wedby downstairs in the lobby. It’ll give Miles here a better chance to identify him."
"I will," she promised, and thanked the partners again.
"And don't look for me," Archer cautioned her. "It may tip Wedby off.”
“Of course. They have a set of large chairs in the lounge at one end of the lobby. I’ll wait there,” she said brightly and moved towards the door.
Spade marveled at the change in attitude, but assumed the young woman to just be happy about finally getting close to her sister’s return after so many weeks.
After that, he walked her back out of the office and returned to his desk. Archer had the bag of coin open and whistled as he came in.
“Pretty lady. And look—Gold. Eagles, all of them. I’d say that’s more than enough for a little late night reconnoiter.”
He took half the bag plus one and tucked them away in a vest pocket. That was fine. He was the one going to sit in his auto all night.
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