Brian McClellan - Murder at the Kinnen Hotel

“Very little,” Adamat responded. He couldn’t help the spike of annoyance when White’s eyebrows rose. Cold-blooded killer or not, have a little damned decency. “I managed to find two more of my informants yesterday. Neither of them had any idea who in the Brickmen gang might be related to the powder mage. One said it wasn’t a relation at all, just someone who happened to be in the right place at the right time and was hired to kill a rival gang member. Regardless, the story is the same: as soon they found out he was a powder mage no one in the docklands would come near him.”

“Did you find out a name?”

Adamat shook his head. It was one of his greatest frustrations from the previous night. A name would let him ask more specific questions, peruse employment, prison, or even church records. It was so much more useful than “powder mage.”

“Did you find anything at all of use to us?” White drummed her fingernails on the table.

“I left the Public Archives just an hour ago,” Adamat said. “Found something curious about the Kemptin family.”

“That applies to our search?”

“I think so.” Adamat raised his eyes from his newspaper. “The Kemptin family is much larger than I thought. None of them are particularly high in the peerage, nothing more than a baron, but they have to be the most prevalent example of nepotism in the whole country. Members of their family occupy public office and high station throughout most of central and northern Adro.”

“So?”

“Commissioner Aleksandre is one of them. A second cousin of Walis Kemptin.”

“You’re looking for a conspiracy.” White narrowed her eyes at him.

Adamat almost balked at that look, but he forced himself to go on with confidence. “I’m not looking. I’m being smacked in the face with it. Ricard Tumblar was framed for murder. Tumblar is trying to get the House of Nobles to legalize his union. The Kemptins are a prevalent family who employ thousands of laborers, giving them vested interest in seeing his efforts fail. They’ve put dozens of family members in useful positions all over the country, and they would damn well make use of them. They could have hired an assassin to frame Ricard Tumblar, and then when someone like myself fingered the real killer, had cousin Aleksandre step in and make sure Tumblar would still take the fall.”

Adamat was out of breath by the time he finished. He leaned back, finding his heart racing. The outburst had done more to wake him up than the coffee had, but now his mouth was dry. Had he said too much? He gestured for the waiter to bring another cup.

“It could just be coincidence,” White said. “The commissioner’s relation to the Kemptin family.”

“It could be, but I very much doubt it was.”

“You’re forgetting the most important thing, Adamat,” White said. “It doesn’t matter. Tumblar will take the fall for this because my masters don’t give a damn what happens to him. All we want is the powder mage.”

Adamat slammed his fist on the table. “Are you being willfully ignorant? If the Kemptin family hired a powder mage to perform a political assassination once then they may do it again. They’re defying the cabal and by letting Ricard go to the guillotine you allow it to happen!”

He took his cup of coffee from the waiter and raised it to his lips. Oh pit, what had he done? This time he had gone too far. His hand trembled violently and he had to set the coffee down so as not to spill it. He shrank into his seat.

White examined her fingernails. “I’ll be honest, Adamat. I find your earnestness endearing. Don’t mistake that for us being friends. You have not proven that Kemptin is even involved with this powder mage.”

“I can,” Adamat said.

“And you better. I have permission to proceed. We’re going to see Walis Kemptin in an hour. I can see,” she said slowly, “why your captain chose to bring you with her on her transfer to the First.”

“Because I’m good at my job,” Adamat said. It came out a whisper. Permission to proceed was an enormous breakthrough.

“No,” White replied. “I suspect that she grew to like you at the Twelfth, and she brought you along because without her protection you would very quickly get yourself wrapped up in something too big for yourself and get killed.”

“The cabal’s involvement is not to be mentioned,” White said as their cab pulled up in front of the Kemptin townhome. “As far as anyone is concerned, I am your junior partner.”

Adamat stopped a snide comment about White being twice his age before it could slip out of his lips. He nodded and climbed from the cab. The townhome was very similar to that belonging to the late Viscount Brezé and, in fact, was less than two blocks away. Adamat wondered how soon that poor cook was going to face the guillotine and who, exactly, was the real killer.

Nothing could be done for that. He had more than enough to focus on, and his own luck had already been more than stretched.

The butler, an aged woman in a black suit, answered the door and showed them to the sitting room, where they were left to their own devices, the door closed behind them. Adamat did a long circuit of the room. “Silk wallpaper,” he noted aloud, absently. “Recently repapered. Probably to cover the plaster repairs after they installed this gas lighting.” Adamat ran his finger over the wallpaper then tapped on a glass lamp hanging from the wall beside the door. “The coal business must be doing very well. Though I can’t imagine Kemptin would be nearly as receptive to gas if it was used for heating as well.”

Adamat stopped in front of the fireplace and looked down. “Speaking of heating,” he muttered.

White joined him. “The flames have been doused,” she said. “The logs are wet.”

“About fifteen years ago,” Adamat said with a sigh, “the Iron King ordered the nobility to be accessible to the police at our convenience. They weren’t used to having to answer to commoners, which so many of us are, so in protest they would douse their fires during a winter visit and leave the constables in the cold room for as many as several hours. It’s terribly petty.”

“I made an appointment,” White said, looking slightly annoyed.

“As a constable,” Adamat reminded her. “Not as a representative of the cabal.”

White’s nostril’s flared, but she remained silent.

Their wait, it turned out, was only about fifteen minutes. Walis Kemptin turned out to be a man in his mid-thirties. He was well kept, freshly shaven with short black hair clinging to the sides of his head while the center of his skull shone baldly. His skin was darker than most you’d find in Adro-a Deliv mother, perhaps-and his manner was easy, giving Adamat and White a friendly smile as he entered.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said. “By Kresimir, it’s cold in here. Let’s make this quick, shall we? I don’t want to keep you officers any longer than needed.”

Adamat glanced at White. Walis acted as if it was he that made the appointment. Despite his friendly demeanor, Walis didn’t offer them a chair or summon a maid to relight the fire. Why would he? He was a busy man and to most nobility the police were nothing more than a nuisance to be paid off or ignored.

A superior at the academy had always told Adamat not to antagonize the nobility. It was the quickest way to end your career. Smile, bow, defer to them in all things, even if they were the most vile human being you’d ever had the misfortune to meet.

Adamat bowed. “Lord Walis,” he said, “I’m Special Detective Constable Adamat. This is Constable White. I’ll make this very quick indeed.” He paused to laugh, as if what he said were of little consequence. “I don’t want to alarm you, my lord. This is more of a courtesy visit than anything else.”