Page 7 of The Affair of the Mysterious Letter
“Of sorts. Mise en Abyme is a one part playhouse, one part nightmarish pseudoreality ruled by capricious, thought-devouring ungods.”
“That must make it difficult to attract an audience.”
“You underestimate the Khelathran love of spectacle.”
She passed me a playbill advertising a production ofThe Exceeding Violente, Piteous & Unnatural Fayte of Goode King Leontius’s Virgin Daughter, and I could not help but notice Miss Viola’s name beneath the title. “But this looks like the worst kind of salacious, unimproving, improper—”
“Yes, so you can see why it’s so popular.” Ms. Haas grinned with disconcerting relish. “The small risk of having one’s soul devoured just adds a little extra frisson.”
“I find it hard to believe a lady like Miss Viola could appear in such tawdry entertainment.”
“Mr. Wyndham, if you’re going to be shocked every time you discover that Eirene did something unsavoury, this is going to be averylong conversation. Besides, as I recall she was rather good. Of course”—she handed me another flyer—“he has since acquired a new heroine. A Miss Katrina de la Martynière.”
“If,” I suggested, “Miss de la Martynière is an intimate of Mr. du Maurier might she not also wish harm upon Miss Viola?”
“You forget that our blackmailer expected Eirene to be familiar with their handwriting.”
I blushed. “Of course, how foolish of me.”
“Pay attention, Captain, and I’m sure you’ll improve with time. Now, let us move on.”
My discomfort at my recent error was somewhat ameliorated by the notion that Ms. Haas foresaw a future in which she did not tire of me. “Who is our next suspect?”
“One Mr. Enoch Reef.”
“Enoch Reef!” Although there were more notorious criminals in Ven, the infamy of Mr. Reef was sufficient that even I, with my relatively limited exposure to the seamier side of the city, had heard of him. His star had been somewhat on the rise while I was at university and, when I had rooms in Ven, his name was spoken regularly, usually in the context of a fellow student seeking to supplement their income by selling this or that item of gossip on the open market. “I find it hard to believe a lady like Miss Viola could—”
Ms. Haas retrieved her pistol from close at hand and discharged it into the ceiling. “Mr. Wyndham, I gave youquite explicitinstructions. Eirene Viola is, or at the very least used to be, a delightfully wicked woman. She has done many delightfully wicked things. Live with it.”
“But she comports herself so respectably.”
“And therein lies her charm. And, indeed, a large part of the reason she was so useful to Mr. Reef for so many years.”
“Given his position on your list, I take it that they did not part on good terms?”
She absentmindedly reloaded the firearm and tossed it onto a pileof discarded papers. “Indeed they did not. Some years ago Mr. Reef acquired a confidential client list belonging to the Ossuary Bank.”
“Good heavens,” I exclaimed. “That seems a dangerous thing to possess.”
“But immensely valuable.”
That it would undoubtedly be. The soul-changers of the Ossuary Bank embodied two of Khelathra-Ven’s most despised and most indispensable professions, being at once bankers and necromancers. They offered loans at competitive rates of interest, asking only an eternity of service after death as collateral. This in turn gave them access to a veritable army of spirits with which they could secure their vaults and discourage their opposition, and who the city’s wealthier luminaries were able to hire at a princely sum for sundry unthinkable purposes.
“Unfortunately for Mr. Reef”—Ms. Haas rose from amongst the detritus of her researches, stretching with immodest enthusiasm—“the bank has very efficient mechanisms for safeguarding its secrets.”
“I’m surprised Mr. Reef survived the experience.”
At that, she turned to me with a faintly mocking smile. “The Ossuary Bank has a thoroughly terrifying reputation but, as I know well from personal experience, the great advantage of a terrifying reputation is that one seldom needs to act on it. The bank learned long ago that bribery and subversion are far more effective means to achieve their goals than armies of shambling corpses and shrieking spirits. They simply paid a large but tolerable sum of money to one of Mr. Reef’s associates, and she stole the list back for them.”
“That associate being Miss Viola,” I remarked. “It would explain why Mr. Reef might wish her harm. But surely such a man would have both the means and the inclination to seek more violent retribution.”
“My dear Mr. Wyndham, it seems that in your world there are but two sorts of person. Those who are incapable of any vice and those who indulge wantonly in all of them.” Stepping over a pile ofnewspaper clippings, Ms. Haas retrieved a decanter from the sideboard and, having recently smashed all the tumblers in a fit of distemper, drank from it directly. “Many an upstanding citizen has resorted to murder for profit and many a licentious reprobate has stopped short of it.”
This would not be the last time that Ms. Haas gave me occasion to reflect on assumptions I had not hitherto examined. Although her approach to morality was often disturbingly flexible, I realise now that my own—for all my attempts to move beyond the rigidity of my father’s teachings—was, in many ways, shamefully limited. Over the long course of our acquaintance, she introduced me to a bewildering number of new perspectives and experiences. Many of them were near fatal but, taken as a whole, I sincerely believe they made me a better man. And for that I shall always be thankful to the sorceress Shaharazad Haas, wherever she may be.
“Besides,” she went on, “Reef trades in information. It is his most precious commodity and his most dangerous weapon. Should his thoughts turn to vengeance, there would be no better way for him to pursue it.”
My wound, which had given no difficulty at all these past several days, suddenly jabbed me in the ribs. I adjusted my position to compensate. “Then it seems we have two promising leads.”
