Swotting Up Read online

  I realised I was being childish. I should just answer any questions Finn might have, and then get on with the rest of my day. But what if, once I started talking about the case, I just couldn’t stop? What if I caught the bug again, and couldn’t help myself from pointing out useful clues? What if this was the very moment when the truth finally hit home – that coming to Crooked College, even if it was my dream for as long as I could remember, had been a great big waste of time?

  Eventually I had to stop humming, because I was growing hoarse. I also had to take my fingers out of my ears because it was just plain uncomfortable. That should have been the moment when I upped, left, and made myself forget all about Bess’s murder. Unfortunately, the sound in this place carried ridiculously well.

  ‘He’ll be here any minute,’ said Adeline, her face splotched with pink (okay, I might have looked as well as listened). ‘He’ll confirm my alibi. Because yes, I felt fit to strangle Bess on many an occasion, but I would never have gone through with it.’

  She’d just come to the end of that not at all interesting sentence, when Dean Carmichael appeared in the room. All attempts to feign disinterest went out the window, and my mouth hung open and let out an incredibly loud gasp.

  Dean Carmichael was … well … he was not a man I would have pictured Adeline with. There was a cigar behind his ear, though, which would explain why she had stunk of smoke – so I might just have to face reality. Even though it was chilly, he was wearing sandals and a flowery summer shirt. He even had a necklace made of shells around his neck. His grey hair was worn in a carefully dishevelled style, and he’d grown one of those trendy beards that every man in the world seemed to have.

  He walked immediately over to Finn and whispered, ‘Now, before I answer any of your questions, I just need to lay out how this is going to go down, young Finny. This will stay between ourselves, do you hear me?’

  Finn very nearly growled. ‘I’m not young Finny, anymore, Dean Carmichael. I haven’t been one of your students for a long time. I’m the head of the Wayfarer Major Crimes division, so it’s Captain Finn Plimpton to you. I get to decide how this goes down. Were you or were you not with Adeline Albright from ten a.m. to eleven?’

  The dean stroked his beard. ‘Fine. All right. We were fooling around up in the Boudoir Books section. The chaise longue up there is very comfortable, and what with all of those saucy books, well … you know how it is. Anyway, Adeline heard Wanda Wayfair chatting away with those Bookworms, and she rushed down here. I skedaddled back to my office and knew nothing about poor Bess until you called me, young Finny – I mean, Captain Plimpton.’

  My eyes travelled unbidden up to the gallery where the Boudoir Books were housed. Why did the dean have to be so graphic about it all? I felt like I needed to rub some soap on my brain.

  Finn seemed to be having trouble digesting the dean’s information, too. His face kept twitching between a grin and a grimace, and although he was clearly trying to find the right words, they were not forthcoming.

  It was Gretel who spoke next. ‘You were up there for an entire hour? You’re sure about that? How can you be positive it was from ten to eleven a.m.?’

  Dean Carmichael let out a little laugh. ‘Well … I could easily have stayed longer, believe me. I do like to take my time. I definitely got here at ten, and I looked at my watch just after I heard Wanda, so yes, I am positive we were there from ten to eleven.’

  Adeline’s face was now completely aflame. ‘Yes, he’s right about the time,’ she confirmed. ‘And I didn’t actually see Bess arrive this morning, either. She was due in at nine, but she was late as usual. She must have come in when we were … otherwise engaged. I’m sure the security cameras will confirm that.’

  Finn pasted a smile on his face and said, ‘Fine. You can go, Dean Carmichael.’ As the dean disappeared with a click of his fingers, Finn turned back to Adeline. ‘How long had Bess worked here? I don’t remember her from when I was at the college.’

  Adeline gritted her teeth, pulled off one of her pairs of glasses and said, ‘She’s only been here a few weeks and it was still too long for my liking. The College Board foisted her upon me. I didn’t need another assistant.’

  ‘Oh.’ Finn arched a fair-coloured eyebrow. ‘This place is called the Longest Library for a reason, Adeline. Because it’s enormous. Why on earth would you be against having another assistant? From what I hear the rest of them barely bother to turn up for work.’

  ‘Look, Bess was irritating from the moment she got here, okay?’ screeched Adeline. ‘It wasn’t just the fact that she was constantly smoking cigars in here when I told her she could only do it in the yard. It was her stupid familiar, too!’

  At the mention of Bess’s familiar, my ears pricked up. Was he down in that vault with Bess? I’d scuttled out of there so quickly, I hadn’t taken much time to look around.

  ‘What was the problem with her familiar?’ Finn asked.

  ‘Well, Terrence is a Bookworm. And I’d just gotten rid of the last infestation when he arrived. Now he’s forever inviting his mates around. You know perfectly well how annoying Bookworms are.’

  I thought of what Dee Dee and Ted told me when I arrived. But the fact that Adeline hated Bess and her Bookworm … that didn’t mean anything. No one would make up an alibi like Adeline’s. Admitting to being with Dean Carmichael was clearly as embarrassing to Adeline as it ought to be. So where was Terrence?

  Sure, it was natural for familiars to die at the same time as their witches, but not when there was murder involved. When there was murder involved, it was me they came to. I thought of the Bookworm, with his huge round eyes and his sweet little smile. If he came looking for me, there would be no way I could turn him away. And if that happened, then I’d be right back to being a Wayfarer again.

  Which was why I was going to scarper right now, and hope to the goddess that Finn found the murderer before Terrence found me. I was just gathering up my belongings when Finn spun his head my way.

  ‘Hey, Wanda, where are you going?’ he asked. ‘We have to ask you some questions.’

  ‘Oh, but … I have Potions. And you know what Ronnie is like.’

  ‘Understanding? Laid back? Relaxed? So crazy about her favourite student that she wouldn’t mind if that student was late for a very important reason?’

  Crap. He did know what Ronnie was like. Just as I was trying to think of any other excuse not to get involved, he said, ‘And you won’t mind chatting to Gretel for a minute or two, will you? Your best mate Gretel? Sweet and lovely Gretel who you love so much?’

  Sod him, anyway. And sod Gretel, too. She was giving me a cute little smile, tossing her braids back. And when one of those braids caught itself in the scanner Finn was holding up, and it took her a good two minutes to extricate herself from the situation, well … that just made her all the more adorable. ‘Of course I’ll talk to Gretel. But just so you know, I don’t think you’re playing fair.’

  Finn gave me one of his cockiest grins, and continued questioning Adeline while Gretel joined me at the table.

  ‘Lot of books you’ve got in that bag,’ she said. ‘I heard you’re taking an extra class, though, so I suppose that’s why you have so many. How did you wrangle that, anyway?’

  I looked down at my hastily packed bag. For the first two years in Crooked College, students could take two courses and then drop one in year three. An exception had been made for me, and I was taking three subjects instead of two.

  ‘The dean let me take an extra class,’ I said. ‘I was em … a little bit ahead, so …’

  Actually, the exact words of the dean had been, ‘The students are getting a bit fed up with you being top of the class all the time. Last I heard, they were planning on staging a protest to get you removed from the college. So how about we let you take that other class you were jonesing for? Even up the playing field?’

  That conversation might be a tad embarrassing to repeat, though, so instead I said, ‘I just … well … I j
ust did.’ And seeing as I knew she was far too smart to fall for a non-answer like that, I decided to change the subject altogether. ‘Hey, how come you’re on this case? I thought you were heading up a task force of your own.’

  Gretel sighed and tossed back her braids. This time, they narrowly missed knocking over one of Bess’s abandoned mugs. ‘I’m having to split my time between many jobs at the moment,’ she said, glancing back at Finn before leaning closer to me. ‘He’s hired five different people to replace you, and he’s shunted every single one of them off to different positions within a couple of days. I don’t think he’s going to be happy with anyone. So maybe you’d better keep on being super nerdy and get all of your degrees as quick as you can. So you can come back to us.’ She squeezed my hand. ‘We miss you, Wanda. Sixteen is taking your departure a bit worse than the rest of us, mind you.’

  I let out a soft laugh. Sixteen was a robot created by our cheese-loving tech wizard, Paul. He looked almost exactly like my friend and housemate, Max. And due to some glitch that Paul couldn’t yet pinpoint, the robot had developed a crush on me. ‘He still emails cute pictures to me,’ I said. ‘Just this morning I got a picture of two puppies poking their heads out of a pair of wellies. But Gretel … shouldn’t you be asking me about the whole dead body in the vault thing?’

  Gretel nodded. ‘I should. I guess I’m most curious about this book that was stolen. I was always scared of the Bad, Bad Books when I was a student here. Hey, did you notice that the page in Bess’s hand looked awfully … modern?’

  ‘Really?’ I feigned ignorance. ‘That’s strange. So … if there’s nothing specific that you need my help with, maybe I ought to just run off, because I really will be late for Ronnie’s class.’

  Gretel gave me a wry grin. ‘Fine. You don’t want to take the bait. You have no interest whatsoever in getting involved in an incredibly strange and exciting murder investigation. That’s absolutely fine with me. But I do need to talk to you, okay? Put yourself in my shoes, Wanda. You and Adeline found the body. You must have had some impressions. You and that famous Wayfarer gut of yours must already be halfway to solving the crime.’

  I sighed. Pretending not to care was exhausting. ‘Gretel … you know I can’t come back, right? I can’t work with you on this investigation. Or on any investigation. I mean, it’s hardly fair, is it? No one else makes detective without a Magical Law degree at the very least. Why should I be any different?’

  For a moment she looked like she might be about to list off quite a long ream of reasons why I was different, but she placed a stoic smile on her face. ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘This is what you’ve always wanted. I shouldn’t pressure you to come back just because I miss you so much. How about you just tell me what you saw as an average, non-Wayfarer witch helping me out with my inquiries?’

  ‘Well I did notice the page in her hand was awfully new looking,’ I admitted, my reluctance melting away. ‘And I smelled her cigar smoke before we found her. That’s the reason I was looking at the section in the first place. It had stopped smoking by the time we got down there, but it was probably still warm. Which means … well …’ I screwed up my face in confusion. ‘Which means that none of this makes sense. Because if Bess was smoking when I arrived, then the murder probably happened right before we found her.’

  Gretel chewed on one of her braids, looking worried. ‘Yeah. Shane said he thought it had just happened, but he’ll have to run some tests to be sure. He also noted that the cigar was still warm, and it seemed like it had only just gone out.’

  ‘But in that case, I should have seen the murderer,’ I pointed out. ‘And I definitely didn’t. There are no windows in there, and you can’t travel in and out of that section via finger-click. The second I smelled the smoke I went to the gate and …’ I trailed off, thinking. ‘I heard clanging. Like someone was shutting the gate and locking it. But I heard that before I smelled the smoke. I think … I think maybe I heard Bess going in. Locking the gate behind her. But no one came out. Hey, did you notice the keys in her cardigan? They looked like a copy of Adeline’s keys. The shapes are pretty distinctive. There are bone-shaped keys for the Bad, Bad Books section.’

  Gretel bit back a smile. ‘Wow. You notice a lot for someone who’s not a Wayfarer. Okay, so … Adeline was telling Finn that she’s the only one with the keys to the Bad, Bad Books section. The bunch Bess had must have been a copy. Has Adeline ever been a little less than careful with those keys? Could Bess have managed to nick them without her knowing? I mean, she does come across as a little distracted, don’t you think?’

  Okay, even I couldn’t play dumb with that one. ‘Yeah, I guess she can seem distracted at times. And clearly Bess did make a copy. It still doesn’t explain who strangled Bess, though. Or how they managed to get out when the keys were still in Bess’s pocket. Sure, Adeline has a set, but she also has a vomit-inducing alibi. What about vamps? Any telekinetic energy picked up on your scanners?’

  Gretel shook her head. ‘Nothing like that. There was a high concentration of magic, but the signature seems to be scrambled. Hopefully we can pick it apart, but I’m not too confident.’

  From the corner of my eye, I saw Finn and Adeline peering at her computer screen. ‘Gretel, come and have a look,’ Finn said. ‘Adeline’s bringing up some scans of the stolen book so we’ll know what to look out for.’

  Gretel’s eyes widened with excitement, and she looked at me. ‘Wanna come look?’

  Oh dear. I was already far too invested in this case.

  ‘Yeah, Wanda.’ Finn gave me the kind of smirk that told me he knew exactly how interested I was. ‘Come and have a look.’

  I gritted my teeth. ‘Fine. But then I really do have to go.’

  ‘Sure you do,’ said Gretel, pulling me along with her. ‘Sure you do.’

  As Adeline tapped away at her computer, seemingly entering about a hundred different passwords, I stood between Finn and Gretel. I wasn’t sure whether to seethe or to smile, to be quite honest. These were my friends. My lovely, wonderful friends who only wanted me to be happy and true to myself. And so what if Finn was still smirking? He often wavered between a cocky grin and an annoying smirk. It was part of his charm. A charm that I suddenly realised I missed.

  ‘Here it is,’ said Adeline. ‘There are only scans of the front and the back. Like I said, you can’t open it unless you know its name. Although I have to be honest – I was very glad I couldn’t open this particular book. I have the feeling that no one could do that without being affected by it.’

  I peered at the picture on the screen. It was a large book, with a plain leather cover, worn with age.

  ‘Can you flip to the back?’ I asked.

  Adeline clicked her mouse, and the image of the back of the book appeared on screen.

  ‘What is that?’ said Finn, pointing at the centre of the book’s back cover. There was an indentation there, a little nook. And the nook was far from empty – in it, there was a circular piece of metal.

  Adeline shrugged her shoulders. ‘My fingers brushed against it once. It was not a pleasant experience. A face appeared in my mind. A whisper in my ear.’ She shivered. ‘As soon as I shut the book away, I couldn’t remember a single word that was said. And as for the face … I doubt I could pick it out of a line up.’

  As Adeline expanded the picture, I peered closer at the metallic object. It reminded me of something, I realised. I heard a sudden tick-tick-tick in the back of my mind. ‘It’s a timepiece,’ I said. ‘A watch, with a cover over the face.’

  Finn frowned. ‘It does look like an old-fashioned watch. But … what’s it for?’ He turned to Adeline. ‘How long has the book been at the library? And where did it come from in the first place? And … how do you know that it’s such a terrible book?’

  ‘It’s been here for decades,’ Adeline replied. ‘I have no idea how it got here, or where it came from. And I have to tell you that, as an Albright, not knowing anything more about it drives me absol
utely batty. But as for the reason we know it’s the worst book in existence …’ She took off her glasses, and sat down to clean them yet again. ‘That’s something that’s been passed down from librarian to librarian over many, many years. But I believe that the first person to say that it was an extremely dangerous book … well, that would have been the sióga queen.’

  Finn’s mouth opened wide, and he turned to me. ‘Well now, isn’t that a turn up for the books?’

  I glared at him. ‘This is not the time for puns, Finn. Why is that so amazing?’

  ‘Because,’ he said with a smirk, ‘I was just chatting with the Queen last night, and she said she would really love it if you finally accepted her invitation to her realm. So how about it, Wanda? You and me, dinner with the sióga queen. Say about eightish?’

  I bit my lip. ‘I’ll go,’ I said. ‘I’ll call round to your place at eight.’

  Finn blinked in shock. ‘You’re serious? You’ll be part of the investigation?’

  ‘I … I’ll go to dinner tonight. That’s all. Other than that, I can only help you as much as any other civilian who happened upon a body. I just … I’m too busy for this. College is hard. There are so many difficult things to get my head around.’

  ‘Really?’ His brow furrowed. ‘Because Ronnie tells us you’re sailing through your classes so easily that it’s irritating to every other student on campus, and that Dean Carmichael is thinking of letting you add a fourth. And maybe a fifth. That, or insisting that you sit your final exams as soon as possible and get the heck out of here before one of the students strangles you.’

  ‘Anyway,’ I said, ignoring all references to how annoying I was. ‘I’ll go and visit this fabulous and magical faeryland with you, Finn. But I’m telling you, there had better be a whole lot of sparkles and pretty dresses on show.’