main | table of contents The Reflecting Eye Copyright © 2003, S. Y. Affolee 12 In Defense “I’m going to find out more about this Samuel Verne,” said Gammell. “I’ll also look into the underground market. I have a few acquaintances that are good sources of gossip.” “You don’t dabble in the underground market yourself, do you?” asked Verity. “Of course not. It’s too easy to get caught. Besides, it’s not such a good idea to get yourself known in such circles. It carries a certain risk.” “Risk? Like backstabbing and cheating?” “Well there is that. But there are some worse things. Like disappearing suddenly if you know the wrong information. The police don’t look that hard at those disappearances if they even come to their attention. They think that if you’ve done illegal activities, you probably got what was coming to you anyway.” “That doesn’t sound too reassuring—that no one cares that you’re dead and that your murderer is on the loose.” “I don’t think these underground disappearances are due to some murderer. Sometimes one is just taken by one of those people and offered up as a sacrifice to something from elsewhere.” She raised an eyebrow. She shouldn’t be surprised any more when he lapsed onto this strange topic. “How do you know all of this? You sound like you made it all up.” “I did not make it up,” he replied defensively. “This is part of my research, remember? I pieced it together from all the evidence I’ve gathered so far.” “I’d like to see all this evidence.” “Sorry. I burned it all after I studied them. Everything is up here,” he tapped his head. “If I let any of the evidence lying around, someone, those particular people probably, would get it. And they’ll know that I know.” “Then tell me all this evidence,” she challenged. “Give me the references.” “Demanding, aren’t you?” His mouth quirked upward. “All right then, I’ll tell you. But not here where there are ears. Perhaps when we get back.” Gammell paid for dinner. Verity, of course, had objected, but he had argued that the dinner was part of her salary as his assistant. She stopped protesting after that, but she had the suspicion that it was only a flimsy excuse to take her out. “Are you always suspicious that someone might overhear you?” she said as they exited the restaurant. “Why are you afraid of that and not that I might blab what you tell me to one of your rivals?” “I told you before that I trusted you.” “You don’t know me very well.” He glanced down at her wrists, still bandaged. She reflexively hid them in the pockets of her coats. “I think you know that I know you well enough.” “And what about the reverse?” But she never got to hear his answer. Gammell had suddenly toppled onto the pavement as if he were a sack of potatoes being thrown into the produce truck. A cry was partially out of her mouth when she glanced back just in time to see a dark figure swinging a long metal bar as if it were a club. She ducked. The figure missed. Dimly, she noticed that this was a man in a ratty woolen coat, a dark scarf to obscure his face, and badly scuffed shoes. She thought to shout for help when the man swung again. She ducked too late and he clipped her arm. Pain radiated to her shoulder, but she had no time to think. The rogue had thrown himself on her and she was suddenly grappling with this smelly thing pawing at her, searching for something. The metal bar dropped onto the ground with a clang as the man needed two hands to subdue his struggling victim. “Verity?” Gammell cried out weakly. Her mind clicked abruptly and she felt hot anger course into her face. She was not going to let this idiot get to her. She got one of her arms free, but the metal bar was too far away. Instead, she reached downward, between the man’s legs, and twisted hard. The man shrieked so loudly in a high-pitched voice that Verity thought her eardrums would burst. He rolled off her and limped off, clutching his wounded pride. Breathing hard, she picked herself up and went over to Gammell. He was sitting up, his head in his hands. “Gammell? Are you okay? I think I should take you to the hospital to make sure you didn’t get a concussion.” “No.” His voice sounded thready, but it was adamant. “The bastard gave me a good whack on my head, but I’ll be fine after I sit down somewhere for a while. Did he hurt you?” “I fine. But he may be worrying about the viability of his future children for a while.” He leaned heavily on her when she helped him up. His winced as they took a step forward to cross the street. “I really need to sit down soon.” “We’re almost there,” Verity told him. “You’re in no condition to drive, though. Give me your keys.” He reached into his pocket and placed the car keys into her free palm. She opened the door to the passenger side and made sure he was sitting properly when she took the driver’s side. Once they were both inside the relative safety of the car, she started up the engine and eased it out of the alley. “We’re going to the hospital.” “No,” he repeated. “I’ll be all right. I told you that.” “Why? I may have worked at hospital archives reading case studies, but I don’t know anything about how to triage a patient. If you were to lapse into a coma, I wouldn’t know what to do with you except to take you to the hospital.” “I’m fine.” His voice was getting stronger which made her suspect that he was right, but she had control of the car at the moment. “I don’t want any of the doctors touching me.” “Doctors are supposed to touch their patients.” “But they’ll be asking about my case history. They’ll find out soon enough that I regularly go to the Rothburne Institute to see Dr. Miram Greene.” “I don’t think that part of your health will affect their initial examination.” “The hell it will. The bastard hit my head. They’re going to want to do tests to see if I’m even more cracked than I am even though I’m not crazy in the first place.” She took the car down Dorsum and then down all the way to the intersection of Main Street. “I’m going to the hospital whether you like it or not. If it’s any consolation to you, I’ll stay with you until their done examining you.” He sighed in defeat. “All right. Now let’s see if that bastard managed to take anything.” He stuck his hands in his pocket and pulled out his wallet, a paperclip, some change, and a crumpled piece of paper. “After we visit the hospital,” Verity continued, “We’re going to the police station to file a report.” “At this point, I’m not going to even argue with you even though I could point out that even though an attack on Dorsum Road is interesting, it’s nothing new to the police. Did you see what he looked like?” “He covered his face with a scarf.” “The police are never going to find him then. And considering we both got through it with relatively few scratches, they’re probably never going to look at our case. They have other more pressing things to investigate.” “You’re being rather chatty after being hit on the head.” “That’s because I told you I was fine.” He looked through his wallet. “It doesn’t look like he robbed me. What’s this?” He unfolded the crumpled paper and squinted at it in the dark car. “There’s a message on it.” “Don’t strain yourself reading it.” “It says, ‘It’s gone.’ Now what does that mean?” “It’ll probably come to you when you finally remember why you wrote that note to yourself.” “It’s not my handwriting though.” He turned the paper over. “It looks like it got written on the back of a business card of some sort from the Verne Storehouse. The address is in the old business district. You don’t suppose someone is trying to warn us off of the job, do you?”