Chapter 11 #2
“What’s going on here?” Nora asked, voice stern. “One of our staff said you and Sal were disrupting the memorial?”
Arthur couldn’t help but notice all her ire was pointed at him. Sal might have been a disruption, but at least most of the guests seemed to think his antics were entertaining. No, Arthur owned this particular upset all on his own.
“Brody and I were merely having a conversation and it got a bit heated—”
“This is not a conversation,” Brody said scathingly. “I’m calling you out for ignoring my case so you can go play detective and get in the news again.”
“This isn’t the place, Brody,” Nora said.
“Take it outside,” Quinn added. “Please.”
“No need. I’m done.” Brody threw his hands up and backed away toward the tent entrance. “If you won’t do your job, I’ll just have to find my mom on my own.”
Arthur stared after him for a moment, feeling as if he’d eaten rocks for dinner instead of a goblet of blood. He had absolutely no idea how to remedy this situation.
“Maybe you ought to go, too,” Quinn said. “This is a solemn affair.”
At that moment, Sal floated by, doing a version of the Macarena that seemed not at all appropriate for a public event meant to mourn the loss of a witch. Ambrosia and Chet glowered at him from the corner.
Quinn was right. They were only doing more damage by staying.
Hurrying to the front of the tent so quickly he nearly knocked over the flowers around Lola’s portrait—that would be all they needed—Arthur grabbed Sal by the wrist and towed him outside, murmuring apologies as they went.
Sal blessedly left the microphone behind, pouting.
“The crowd was loving me! Why’d you have to ruin my fun?” Sal complained, seeming to have forgotten why he started the distraction in the first place.
“Fun isn’t the point of a memorial service.
People are grieving.” Arthur glanced around.
The festival was still going strong, with plenty of tourists milling about.
Night brought an entirely different atmosphere to the festivities.
Glowsticks and strobe lights patterned the fairgrounds like the world’s strangest, neon constellation.
People walked by wearing glow-in-the-dark stars along their limbs, giving the effect of extraterrestrial skeletons passing among them.
Others wore headbands with glowing antlers and crystals.
There was even someone wearing a dangling sort of headlamp that reminded him strongly of an anglerfish.
Most of those people had no idea who Lola Lataurelle was, or that there had been a murder here at all.
Poor Lola. Arthur was failing her, just as he was failing Brody. The general air of celebration around them seemed to mock him specifically.
Sal took his hand and kissed his knuckles. “Don’t fret, my love. You’ll—hang on, is that the other Arthur Miller?”
From his vantage, floating a little higher than Arthur’s height, he could apparently see over the crowd.
He pointed toward an open area where a silent rave was underway.
Revelers wore headphones, bouncing and gyrating in sync to a beat he couldn’t hear.
Just beyond them lurked their guest, wearing the same tourist attire as all the others at the festival, but he wasn’t playing carnival games or eating fried foods.
He glanced furtively about, as if checking to see if he was being watched, before lazily dipping toward the edge of the festival.
“Let’s follow him,” Arthur said at once. “At a distance, so he doesn’t notice us. Sal, come down from there.”
Sal had, with effort that shone on his face scrunched in concentration, hovered a bit higher still. He relaxed and drifted down to his usual range. “You’re no fun at all.”
“We need to blend with the crowd, and your flight is too spectacular. People will notice, and want to talk to you, and we can’t afford to lose him.”
“Perhaps you’re right. My splendor is too distracting. Very well, you’ve convinced me.” Sal turned his attention to the place where Other Arthur Miller had been. “Tailing someone! How dramatic. You really do take me to the nicest places.”
Arthur smiled a little, though the heaviness of his argument with Brody still weighed him down.
He couldn’t do anything to help Brody just now, but he could do something about Lola Lataurelle’s murder.
He didn’t know much about Other Arthur Miller, but this was the second time he’d caught him skulking about. He had to follow that lead. Literally.
They slipped through the crowds, never letting Other Arthur Miller leave their sight.
When he began to cross the field toward the trees, Arthur knew they were onto something real here.
There was no reason for a random person to approach the woods that didn’t involve either libations or some sort of tryst. Other Arthur appeared entirely in control of his faculties, so it was unlikely he was wandering in a drunken haze or chasing some hallucination.
Arthur didn’t like to pass judgment without more information, but Other Arthur hadn’t seemed a particularly social individual thus far.
A romantic rendezvous seemed unlikely as well.
Other Arthur headed into the woods with purpose to his stride. He knew where he was going.
And so did Arthur.
“He’s out of sight,” Sal said, a worried lilt to his tone.
“It’s all right.” Arthur squeezed Sal’s hand, which he still held. “Don’t you recognize where we are? We’ve been here before.”
“That isn’t fair, Arthur! You know I don’t pay attention when we go on our little walks. It’s all just nature and more nature. Yucky!”
“Yucky, indeed,” Arthur murmured as they passed through the trees. There was no sign of Other Arthur Miller’s trail, but Arthur felt, if possible, even more confident they were on the right track. “Do you smell that?” Arthur asked, suppressing a grin.
“Is it dirt?” Salvatore sniffed the air. “It’s not poo, is it? If I’ve stepped in it, I don’t think I can cope emotionally. You’ll have to carry me back to the inn—”
“It’s lavender.” Arthur tugged him forward a few more steps, and their surroundings came into relief.
They were in the platinum pavilion.