Carol O’Connell - Shell Game

„It wasn’t faulty wiring,“ she said. „The timing was too damn perfect.“

There was only one way to take the tone in her voice. She was obviously counting him among her enemies. The enemy team was everyone who was not in complete agreement with her.

Charles braved the odor as he entered the platform room and reached up to the lamp suspended from the ceiling. He unscrewed the lightbulb and shook it. „You’re right, it wasn’t the wiring.“ He emerged from the room, shaking it again so she could hear the sound of the metal filament against the glass. This was the time-honored test of a burnt-out bulb. Now that should reassure her.

Too late, he saw his second error of the afternoon. He looked down at the dead bulb in his hand and shrugged his apology for this indisputable evidence against her own theory.

Riker made a game effort to distract her from Charles, saying, „If Nick Prado hadn’t mentioned that you were – “

„Where is Prado now?“ She was not in a pleasant mood.

„Here I am.“

Charles looked toward the end of the stage behind the backdrop curtain and beyond the reach of the overhead lights. In this shadowy silhouette that didn’t show his paunch, Nick Prado might pass for his own delusion of never-ending youth.

„Someone locked me inside the platform.“ Mallory was glaring at Nick, not exactly aiming for ambiguity in that accusation.

Feeling a draft at the back of his neck, Charles turned to the square hole in the wall where the window glass had not yet been installed. A sheet of plastic had come loose at one corner, allowing a steady breeze in his direction. So the wind had blown the door shut. He hesitated to mention this. First, there was the rudeness of pointing out the obvious. And then, she so disliked being corrected, particularly when she was wrong.

Riker, wise man, jammed his hands in his pockets and kept silent.

„Only the wind,“ said Nick Prado. „You get a lot of things wrong, don’t you, Mallory?“ He was aging badly with every step toward the lights. „Take Louisa’s death. It looked accidental to me. I was there, and you weren’t.“

Mallory was cooler now. Her words had only the barest trace of malice. „It might’ve been staged as an accident, but she wasn’t mortally wounded.“

Nick seemed to be considering this as he walked beyond the backdrop curtain to look over the new bags from the deli. „She could’ve died from shock. That happens.“

„In fifteen minutes? Not enough time,“ said Mallory, walking away to inspect the plastic over the window.

Charles noticed that Nick was slightly irritated, disliking her insult of the turned back.

„Right, I keep forgetting. You know everything.“ Nick looked down at the fun-house mirror that served as a tabletop. It was littered with paper bags and a half-empty bottle of champagne. He lifted the bottle and held it out to Riker in an obvious invitation.

In a rare exception to habit, Riker shook his head, declining to drink with the man, and Charles had to wonder about that. A half hour ago, the detective had no problem lifting a glass with this man. And who could eat a pastrami sandwich without something to wash it down?

Nick poured wine for himself. „You know, it could’ve been shock. During the war, textbook rules for death were broken all the time.“

Mallory was busy collecting tenpenny nails from the floor beneath the plastic window covering. „The medical examiner said – “

„Do you ever listen}“ Prado raised his voice. „To anyone?“

Charles was staring into his wineglass, as if it might offer him sanctuary, and Riker was looking at his scuffed shoes. But Mallory did no bloodletting. She only dropped her collection of nails into a zippered compartment of her knapsack.

Nick continued, expanding his voice in a stage projection, as if he had a larger audience. „One morning toward the end of the war, a plane went down near my field camp. It was in flames seconds after it smashed into the ground.“

He paused for dramatic effect, and Mallory squashed the moment, saying, „I don’t have time for war stories.“

„Shut up!“ said Prado, in a rare display of anger – in fact, the only show of temper Charles had ever witnessed.

Oddly enough, Mallory did shut up, ignoring the man as she opened a notebook to a page of numbers, which she seemed to find more interesting.

Nick went on in a louder voice. „One wing was sheared off in the crash, and the nose section was crushed. A dozen of us ran across the field toward the fire. And then – ten yards from the wreck, I couldn’t believe what I was looking at.“

He turned to Mallory – a mistake. She did not care what he was looking at, past or present. Only slightly daunted, Nick played to Riker now. „The plane’s three crewmen were walking away from the crash – unharmed. Well, this was impossible. Everyone aboard should’ve died. But the crew walked away – all of them. They sat down in the shade of a farmhouse, and there they died. It was over in minutes. Minutes. Not a mark on them, not one injury in the lot.“

„Shock?“ said Riker, in an effort to be a polite audience.

Mallory, clearly unimpressed, ran her pencil down a column of numbers. „Shock doesn’t work for me.“

„Me either,“ said Nick. „I had a different idea. All three men had seen the ground coming up to kill them. People believe their senses, and this was an indisputable fact – there was no way they could’ve survived that crash. I think those three boys bowed to the logic of their situation. It was absurd to be alive, and so they closed their eyes and died.“

Charles thought the man might take a bow, but he only retired to sit on the steps of the platform and sip from his wineglass.

Mallory’s attitude changed to mere annoyance on the level reserved for flies. „For the last time, Louisa was not mortally wounded. She had no idea she was going to die until that bastard put a pillow over her face.“

„Mallory, you don’t know that,“ said Charles. „What went on at the poker game – it was all speculation. You can’t expect Edward to do an autopsy secondhand and half a century late.“

„Thank you, Charles,“ she said, not at all thankful, and making the strong suggestion that he should close his mouth – now. She folded up her notebook of numbers. „Oliver’s death was no accident, either.“

„Poor Oliver,“ said Nick. „The Quixotic aura of the hapless failure. But in reality, it was a rather pedestrian death. He screwed up the trick. Life can be so simple, Mallory, if you will only let it.“

Nick was entirely too smug. Apparently, Mallory was about to adjust his expression. All the signals were there. She was rising off the balls of her feet, all but levitating in anticipation of a strike. If she had a tail, it would be switching. Charles adored her feline grace – but some of the things cats did just turned his stomach.

In the spirit of throwing himself in the path of raking claws aimed at the older man, he said, „Nick’s right, Mallory. Oliver did mess up the trick. He obviously didn’t know the effect – “

„You’ve been talking to Malakhai.“ Her implication was clear. Charles stood accused of consorting with her enemy, his lifelong friend.

„Just a series of accidents?“ Her eyebrows arched. „All right.“ Her hands moved to her hips. There would not be another warning sign. „I’ve seen the error of my ways.“ She said this too gently. „But what about that nasty little corpse I found inside the platform? Oliver’s nephew? Remember him?“

Nick slugged back the rest of his champagne. „The boy died of a drug overdose. Everyone knew Richard was an addict. There was a spot of blood on his shirtsleeve. That came from the needle, right? But no blood from the arrow. The dead don’t bleed – so there was no murder.“ He waved his hand. „Lessons of war.“