Ghastly Glass (25 page)

“You heard me.” Chase was obviously not impressed with his Village speak. “Don’t let it happen again unless you only want to see the monks and weapons makers out here.”

The Merry Men didn’t say another
forsooth
or
methinks
. They started off toward Sherwood Forest to lick their wounds, no doubt.

Grigg said good night (he was already close to where the
Queen’s Revenge
was docked) but added a personal word of warning. “That was an evil stunt you pulled this afternoon, Jessie. Rafe has declared there must be vengeance.”

I shrugged and bowed. “I await his Royal Smelliness whenever he can drag himself out of the shower.”

“What did you do?” Bart asked me after Grigg left.

I explained what happened and why I did it. “It seemed like a perfect opportunity. And he so deserved it for throwing me overboard.”

“I agree. But you better watch yourself. I hear those pirates can be dangerous.” He smiled at me. “You want me to watch your back?”

He was really the nicest figure of Death I had ever known. Not that I’ve known many, but I’m sure they weren’t as nice as him. I thought about flirting with him a little to make Chase jealous, but I was too tired and I wasn’t sure it would do any good. Bart was nice but not exactly the male version of Lilly Hamilton.

“Thanks. I’ll manage. Rafe and I go back a long way. I know the inside of that pirate ship better than my apartment back home. But it was sweet of you to offer. It’s nice to have
someone
that cares.”

Bart said good night and melted into the darkness between Sarah’s Scarves and Brewster’s.

I counted to four after we passed the Good Luck Fountain before Chase spoke. “What was that all about?”

I started to answer, but Chase cut me off before I could get a word out.

“And what was all that stuff about me and Lilly Hamilton before Grigg met us by the cemetery?”

“I know you, Chase. When all those guild people were giving you a hard time about Lilly at the meeting, you were blushing.”

“I was not blushing.”

“You were, too. You were super red in the face, and that’s saying a lot with your skin tone.”

“If I was red, it was exertion.”

“You looked guilty to me.”

He stopped walking as we neared Harriet’s Hat House. “I didn’t look guilty. I haven’t done anything to look guilty about. Lilly Hamilton is so
not
my type.”

“Right. Whatever.”

“What makes you think she is?”

“I’ve seen her looking at you like you’re a six-foot-eight, two-hundred-fifty-pound ice cream cone she wants to lick. Then there was the red face and the guilt. Need any more proof?”

We were standing near the Romeo and Juliet Pavilion. The irony of having this discussion at that spot wasn’t lost on me. Maybe we were star-crossed lovers who were never destined to be together. Our time was sweet but fleeting.

“Proof?” Chase demanded (truly red in the face now). “I’ll give you proof that there is only one woman for me. She’s completely crazy and messed up, but I love her anyway. Any idea who that could be?”

“Lilly Hamilton?” I whispered. He was looming over me with an expression on his face that boded no good. At least not for me.

“No, you idiot. I really think they miscast you in the Village. You should be in the Knave, Varlet, and Madman Guild.”

With that, he kissed me and lifted me off the ground, as he was so fond of doing. Okay, I didn’t really mind all that much. Besides, I was assuming he meant that I was the crazy person he loved, and I could live with that. I wrapped my arms around him and let him carry me into the night.

Then he dropped me into the fountain.

“Chase!” I screeched, coming up out of the cold water with something besides unspeakable passion on my mind. “I’m going to get you!”

 

 

 

The next morning, we were up early and headed to the hospital to visit Roger. Mary was already there but left as we arrived. “Don’t upset him,” she warned. “He’s been through enough.”

“We just want to ask him a few questions,” Chase told her. “If he gets too tired, we’ll leave.”

She nodded and smiled at her new husband before leaving us alone with him.

If I’d thought Roger was a mess the night before, it was nothing compared to what he looked like now. His whole body (at least the part I could see) was black-and-blue with angry red welts. The marks were rounded on his skin. I got down closer to the arm that seemed to have borne the brunt of the attack. I could almost envision the exact tube-shaped weapon that had hit him.

I stood up quickly when I noticed Roger looking at me. He could barely see out of one eye, and his nose was crooked on his face. No casts though, so it appeared as though nothing was broken.

“Roger.” Chase sat down in a chair beside the bed. “If this is too much, just say so.”

“No way,” he kind of slurred. “I want whoever did this, Chase. I can’t get him for a while. Maybe you can. Fire away.”

“Okay. I know the police probably asked you these questions, but I don’t know if they plan to share that information with me. Did you notice anything before you were attacked?”

“No. I was walking through the shortcut when something hit me in the back of the head. Next thing I knew, I was on the ground and Jessie was with me.” He lifted his head a little and tried to smile at me. It was pitiful enough to make me want to cry. “Thank you for helping me.”

“Sure.” I mean, what do you say in the face of life-saving gratitude? “Any time.”

“Was there a smell or a sound that could help us?” Chase persisted. “I know you have experience with this. Whatever you can tell me might help.”

Roger closed his eyes for a long time. I glanced at Chase, afraid Roger had fallen asleep. But eventually he looked at us again. “There was one thing. A faint burned smell, you know? Like something on fire.”

Chase wrote down Roger’s response, then asked, “Can you think of anyone who might want to hurt you?”

“Whoever the crazy SOB was who did this to me.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah. I know. I’ve been lying here all night trying to figure it out myself. Honest to God, Chase, I know I’ve had a few run-ins with people in the Village but nothing that would warrant something like this. I can’t imagine who’d do this, or why.”

Having known Roger for a few years, I could imagine some people who might be willing to beat him up. “Remember that guy with the funny brown hat two years ago? He seemed like someone who might come back for revenge.”

“You mean that pervert I threw out of the Village?” Roger gritted his teeth. “People like that don’t belong here.”

Chase and I exchanged meaningful glances. “That’s kind of what I mean,” I explained. “You were the bailiff here for a long time. One or more of those people you tossed out could’ve come back.”

Roger seemed to consider the possibilities. “In that case, the list of men waiting to kick my ass could be pretty long.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t a woman?” I asked with logical authority in my voice.

“Maybe.” He tried to smile again (I had to look away). “You think Mary got fed up with me again?”

This was all well and good, but where was the serious Roger who’d been such a pain in the butt the last few days? He had the crap beaten out of him and suddenly he’s funny Roger. Go figure.

Chase asked him a few more questions, but it was obvious Roger had reached the limit of his strength. A nurse came in and we left with Roger asking Chase to catch the person who’d hurt him.

“Well that wasn’t much,” Chase lamented as we climbed into his silver BMW parked in the no-parking zone. “I was hoping for more than a strange burning smell.”

“But that might be important. Maybe the person who hit him works at one of the shops that have charcoal-broiled food.”

“Or maybe,” Chase said as he started the car, “whoever did it didn’t smell like burning at all and Roger was smelling a campfire from Sherwood Forest. As clues go, I don’t think this is the big one.”

“We need DNA and access to hair and tissue fibers from his clothes.” I smiled at him. “My misspent youth craves
CSI
deduction.”

“That would be nice but again probably not going to happen. Unlike
CSI
, it could take weeks for the police to have any answers like that.”

“Yeah. And that’s saying they’d share them.” I sighed, depressed. “How are we ever going to catch this guy and save the Village?”

“We have a large force of people at our disposal. Sure, some of them might be IQ challenged, but something should turn up.”

“Maybe we could put out a sign-up sheet for people ticked off at Roger. I wonder if any of them are still around.”

“I know a few that have been here for a while. We might be able to get them to talk.”

I didn’t share his optimism, but I didn’t say so. We’d made up during the night, and I was still in the afterglow where I didn’t want to see him unhappy. We drove back to the Village tossing lots of lame ideas around that really didn’t make any sense.

We talked about Marcus, the Black Dwarf, being a possible suspect. Chase said the little man had a giant-sized temper when he was crossed. Was it possible he was a new convert to the I-Hate-Roger Society? I liked Marcus, but a suspect was a suspect. We had to consider all the possibilities.

Chase had a hundred people waiting to report to him on their Village patrols. Bart was waiting to get a look at the new employee files Adventure Land had promised to send to the brand new computer in the castle.

I kissed him good-bye (Chase, not Bart) and went on to the Glass Gryphon. I’d managed to get my clothes fairly clean and dry. They were at least wearable until I could tackle the gorgon dressmakers again.

I wasn’t sure how Henry would be with Roger out of the picture. But he was in good spirits and fixed on a little demon he’d met that morning, so he kept his hands to himself.

Everything on my workbench was just as I’d left it yesterday. I sat down and turned on my burner, then picked up my pathetic excuse for a glass dog, which looked more like a mutant than anything else. Filled with sorrow, I dropped him in the trash and started over.

Business was brisk as the gates opened. No doubt the publicity from Ross’s death and now the attack on Roger were bringing them in. Their money spent the same, though, so I was sure no one minded the extra visitors, whatever their motivation for coming.

I waited on the first customers, who bought several hundred dollars worth of glasses Roger had made. Henry told them about his uncle getting hurt. The nice lord and lady (sporting expensive Renaissance garb they didn’t get in the Village) bought a few bowls to go along with the glasses. I wrapped all of them up and wondered at Henry’s lack of discretion.

When they’d gone, he burst out laughing. “Can you believe those idiots? Like it matters that Uncle Roger got hurt. At least it shouldn’t matter to
them
.”

“But you knew it would.” I sat down at my workbench again and took up a clear tube to resurrect my little doggy.

“Yeah. So what? The idea is to make money. You can’t eat art glass, Jessie.” He walked close to where I was working. “It’s all about controlling the heat,” he directed. “Start at the tip of the tube and work your way back. You have to get it hot enough to move but not too hot. Then heat your colored rod and lay it down on the tube.”

He went to his own bench, and I watched him, fascinated. He was a jerk but he was gifted. He slowly blew into the mouthpiece attached to the heated tube, shaping it with the graphite paddles to move the way he wanted it to move. It took only a few minutes before the figure was taking form. He was making a horse, probably a unicorn since there were more than a few of those on display in the shop.

Determined to make something recognizable, I heated my glass tube until it began to glow, then used my mouthpiece to blow ever so gently into the glass to expand it. I had already chosen my shape. A dog was beneath my talents, I decided; I would make something beautiful and ethereal instead. Maybe a fairy or a butterfly.

Everything was moving exactly as it should. I picked up a sapphire blue rod and began applying the colored glass to the tube. I planned to use pale green with it as my fairy/ butterfly began to take shape. Unfortunately, the four-foot glass rod of the sage green color I’d noticed yesterday was nowhere to be found. I looked everywhere in the shop, but all I could find was an emerald green.

“Have you seen that lighter green rod?” I asked Henry. “It was like a sage color. One of the long rods.”

He looked up at me with a two-foot blue rod that he hadn’t begun using yet in his hand. He held it in his fist like a weapon. Visions of the terrible welts formed in exactly the same shape on Roger’s body flew in front of my eyes.

I was suddenly pretty sure what had happened to Roger.