The Fourth Day of Vortas 2719, morning
An alien sight in an alien city. A sight she found she did not mind. That had been unexpected. It was a novelty, a departure. The city was an easier place to accept in the bitter air, with a sky the color of old lead, even with ice forming on the fringes of the river. A place of its own, to be examined under its own terms. The snow had wiped the city clean, blurred its outlines, and made of it a ghost.
Lower Ro Hill, between Kingsway and the Courts; the streets just beginning to narrow into that mad labyrinth of little alleys and hidden courtyards that surrounded the juridical domes. Streets she was beginning to learn, even their names. There was Thurlowe Street with its clothiers shops, Snagsby Lane where a gaggle of old ladies started, gimlet-eyed and suspicious, at anyone who passed by. Useful contacts. She doubted she would be invited to their sewing circle or to take tea with them. She did not know how to sew, for one.
Good tea, real tea, green and sharp and scented with cardamom, well, that was vanishingly rare. Even the odd half-Mubrobi coffee shop on Gadwine Street made only an unremarkable pot. The coffee was better. Much better. It would not do to admit it was some of the better coffee she had drunk, in any city. Well, no sense in wasting the opportunity. The place was comfortable, generally with clientele that kept to themselves or chatted in small business-like groups. The staff was neat and efficient. It wasn't quite the place she normally haunted. So far she’d not seen anyone be murdered over an unpaid bill, or had their hand pinned to the counter with a kitchen knife. Some days, she really did miss The Drowned Man. It had character. It was a good source of tips, of contacts, and a little bloody entertainment.
The Elephant too had character. Its own colorful cast of characters. The two aged gents who played draughts at a table in the back corner, complaining of their joints and boasting of their ailments. The gaggle of young lawyers from the court who talked too loudly about tedious cases. Now there was a resource. Anaxi jurisprudence was well set among this labyrinth of streets. The garrulous lawyers provided a useful primer, a useful map. Occasionally there was the man with the side whiskers. He seemed to be a friend of the place, but mostly kept to a table of his own, drinking coffee and turning his cup in a strange repetition, and writing in a tiny neat hand in a set of notebooks.
She rarely spoke to anyone, yet somehow it had gotten around that she had some legal connections, some affiliation with the Investigative branch. Maybe the Mugrobi-looking proprietress, the one with a Vienda accent thicker than honey, knew the meaning of the Prefects ring she wore. After it became known, the garrulous lawyers would ask her over from time to time to discuss comparative legal theory. She always felt like a damned professor when that happened. They meant well, and they had their uses, but what she needed was to sit alone, to think over the coffee.
Nine legal circulars, crime reports from the Patrol Division, trial dockets, and two of three broadsheet newspapers of the most salacious kind now covered her table. Most of what was there was useless. Ordinary murders, robberies, tedious lawsuits, assaults. Crimes of finance were common enough, but most were tricky accounting and fiddles with investors schemes. Only the vaguest of possibilities for counterfeiting. A kid who tried to pass off a couple of badly made metal discs as tallyes. A few dodgy banknotes had been cashed by a grocer who swore she accepted them in good faith. Who from? She had no idea, honest. That was probably true. It probably meant nothing.
She took a sip of her coffee, turned back to the reports.
A few minutes later, one of the coffee girls, a small slip of a thing with eyes that took up too much of her face, tapped her on the shoulder.
‘Inspector?” her voice was unsure, quarrelsome.
“Prefect.” The correction was neutral, merely informative.
“Right, right, sorry Prefect, Ms Sebele keeps telling me that, but I ain’t got the best way with words.” There was something wrong about her face, well, beside the huge owl-eyes. She looked nervous, scared. “Only, I think there’s something you need to see, Prefect. Only, I found him just a bit ago, out in the alley behind.” She gestured over her shoulder toward the back of the place. “A dead man. Dead in the snow.”
Well, that was a turn. It seemed half like old times. Some fool died of misadventure, exposure, too much opium, a terminal encounter with the fists of another man. Some other fool roused whatever Prefect could be found to have a look, to give it the official squint. She hoped that was all this was, some poor idiot who froze to death in the night. If it looked at all suspicious, well, that was going to ruin her entire day.
Did she have the power here to convene and inquest? Back home that would have been easy enough. Half the patrons here had more than a passing familiarity with the law. An ideal coroner's jury. She looked at her watch. A little luxury she had afforded herself here in the capital of timepieces. Sidewhiskers had recommended an horologist. It had not been a disappointment. She was cutting it close, the cantankerous Chief Inspector would not be pleased if she were late. Again. She took another sip of her coffee.
"Right then, let's go."
And, like any good Prefect, she went out to inspect the body.