~~~~~~
Shotgun quietly drifted away from the discussion. Ignoring the firemen, the technicians, and the police officers, he picked out the only person wearing the lime green overalls of the Nodlon Sanitation department.
The engineer sat perched on the utility ledge at the foot of the tunnel wall. Telecom cables, closed circuit vid cables, alarm systems, instrument cables, and a manna tube all ran along the wall just above the ledge.
“Hi, I’m Shotgun,” he said.
“Niles,” said the engineer. He doffed his cap. The dwarf sported a red chip on his forehead. “Don’t you work for Cretaceous Clay?”
“Yes, I’m his butler.”
Niles trembled beneath an olive drab blanket thrown over his shoulders.
“Are you all right?” Shotgun asked.
“Never better,” he shivered again. “I just had a bit of a fright. Guess, I’m not quite over it yet.”
Shotgun perched on the lip on the wall, and sat beside him. “She was pretty.”
“Aye,” Niles agreed. “Disgusting. How could anyone do it? No one deserves to go that way.”
“What way?”
“Shot in the forehead, I reckon.” Niles looked up. “Why should I talk to you, Shotgun? I’m sorry, but the police told me to say nothing.”
“Inspector Lestrayed recruited Cretaceous Clay as a consultant for Nodlon Yard. We’re working with the police.”
The dwarf shaped an inaudible, “Oh.” He hugged himself and looked down at the bricks. “I’ve taken the family to Mr. Clay’s show more than once. The missus and I loved his dancing ice fairies, and we both miss the polar bear.” Putting his hands on his knees, the engineer bounced once or twice. “Hey, since you work for him, maybe you know what happened to his bear?”
“She’s fine. He gave her to the zoo. They call her Polly. Everyone loved her except the crew. A half ton bear leaves an amazing amount of, uh, deposits.”
Niles regained his composure. “Ah, yeah, I know plenty about deposits.” He sniffed. “That Mr. Clay may be good, but the dancers are the best part.” Niles leaned over conspiratorially. “Please don’t tell the missus.”
Shotgun flexed and deliberately imitated the engineer’s bounce. “Not if you don’t tell my fiancée.” The dwarves bounced together, and shammed a silent belly laugh.
“What do you want to know?” asked Niles. “I’m not as much of a fool as I seem. I’ll help you out if I can.”
“Did you see or hear anything unusual? Anything the crime scene techs might miss or overlook? Any rumors, speculation, or unfounded suspicions? Anything no one can report?”
“Down here, we don’t repeat stories or tales. Everyone’s the same. Elves, goblins, dwarves, and even humans respect each other. Gossip might reach the wrong ears, if you know what I mean. Sanitation guys stick together.”
“Mum’s the word, Niles.” Shotgun crossed his heart with his pinky. “Pinky swear. It’s just for the investigation. Just to find Angela’s killer. Nothing you say will be repeated officially. I’m not the police. I’m just Mr. Clay’s butler, and I’m just trying to help him find a murderer before he kills again.”
“No,” Niles wrung his hands. “If I had anything to say, Shotgun, I’d say so. I don’t want anyone getting killed.
“Niles, we need to stop the Black Dwarf” Shotgun tilted his head upstream towards the crime scene. “The scum has killed twice. He will kill again if we don’t catch him.”
“I saw that girl.” Niles sucked in a deep breathe. “I’ll never forget her face.” He rubbed his face with his hands. “I’ve got a good job. I’ve paid my contract, married my girl, moved into a nice place, and I’ve got a baby.” He mumbled through his palms. “I’ve got nothing more to say.”
“Nothing? How do you know? Maybe you’ve got a clue that can help us work out what happened?”
“Nothing is on the cameras. I know, I checked.” Niles shivered again. “I’m not risking it all on a trick of my imagination. They’d investigate me. I’d have to admit I was scared. Then, they will say I was seeing things.”
“Gotcha,” Shotgun filled in the pieces. “If you say you heard a bump in the night, they might demote you.” Niles nodded and for a moment they sat in silence.
Niles shivered and glanced upstream.
Shotgun followed Nile’s glance, and pushed, “Niles, can you tell me anything?”
“Yeah, the kind of stuff you don’t report.”
“But it wasn’t the killer?” Shotgun pressed. “Surely, whatever you saw was related?”
“No, I don’t think so. No one can get in or out without being caught on camera. The scum know that.” He looked Shotgun in the eye, “It wasn’t the killer anyway.”
“How do you know it wasn’t the killer?”
“I just know.” Niles paused. “I’ve worked down here a long time. You learn things. You know things. What I saw – what I think I saw was big. It wasn’t anything that can wander around Nodlon without attracting attention. Especially nothing going topside where the hoity-toity live. If Upper Nodlonder’s saw this thing, bet their bubble would pop faster than a bottle of champagne.”
Shotgun leaned over the engineer. “Was it Noddie?”
Niles looked away and then back at Shotgun. “I don’t know. No one’s seen her. All I heard was thump, thump. It was big and moving away from me, if it was anything at all and not my imagination.”
“Bumps in the night?”
“Yeah, only these happen when you’re wide awake. And you can’t say anything cause there’s nothing on camera.”
“If a camera can’t catch anything, it’s not an animal.” Shotgun scoffed, but he searched the dim sewer main trying to reassure himself there was nothing in the shadows.
“Oh, yes it can be an animal,” Niles began. “Accidents happen. Ten years ago, a gator escaped from the zoo. Terrified the old hand who found him, but no one got hurt. That gator wandered around down here for weeks before we caught him. When they tried to figure out what went wrong with security, they found the gator on just a few fuzzy frames here and there. He was on-camera all the time, but we didn’t see him at all. He looked like a log.”
“Help me out, Niles. Noddie is too big to be mistaken for a log, right? If no one gets in or out of here without being on camera, how can Noddie do it?”
“She makes her own holes.”
“Stands to reason,” said Shotgun timing his words. “Mythical monsters never appear on security cameras.”
“Exactly,” snapped Niles. “I’m not gonna be the one to argue with the cameras. We’ve all heard noises. We’ve all seen shadows. You know what I mean?”
“It’s okay, Niles. I won’t say anything. I’ve got kids too.” He put his hand on Niles’ shoulder. “If it’s not Noddie maybe there’s another explanation.”
“The older guys say Nodlon Yard found several dead dwarves down here years ago. According to the rumor mill, they were all black dwarves.” Niles tapped his forehead. “Guess red dwarves must have more sense, huh?”
“We dwarves tend to be naïve,” said Shotgun. “We can be hoodwinked pretty easily.”
“You said it.” Niles gave Shotgun a gentle push.
“You said years,” Shotgun rolled the idea around in his head. “So it’s happened before? When was that?”
“Thirty years ago,” said Niles. “They say a dwarf killed several black dwarves.”
“Why do the gossips have to blame the dwarves? If black dwarves were the victims, that doesn’t mean dwarves were the killers.”
“Not dwarves, just one black dwarf. Nodlon Yard discovered this dwarf was a witch doctor. He led a coven of witches who practiced black magic. He turned some of his followers into zombies so they would follow him mindlessly. The Yard tried to arrest him. It turned out to not be so easy. They all went out in a blaze of glory. After the firefight, the Yard didn’t find the killer. They never found his body. After that, the murders stopped so the
police figured they got their dwarf. The black dwarf just disappeared.”
“Whoa, that’s a story I haven’t heard before. Can you back this up?”
“No, it’s all gossip. The Yard buried the story. They didn’t want anyone knowing what happened. It’s supposed to be one of Nodlon Yard’s most closely guarded secrets.”
“Understandable. If Nodlon’s citizens knew a dwarf might become a killer, the city would erupt in pandemonium. Dwarves may not show up for work once in a while, or get depressed, but they don’t murder or steal.”
“Right, they couldn’t afford to let this get out.”
“If that’s what happened, I wonder if there’s any link between those crimes and the ones we’re investigating.”
“There’s that,” Niles stuck his thumb at the wall above them. “There’s a bunch of spots on the wall there. I told the techs, and they got pretty excited about it.”
Shotgun stood up, and turned to look at the wall.
The dwarf tugged on Shotgun’s sleeve. They stepped off the sidewalk and backed into the creek bed. Niles pointed at the wall.
Anyone unfamiliar with the tunnels might have overlooked the spots. They appeared to be no more than dirt on the brick.
“Capricorn,” said Shotgun. “It’s the stars of Capricorn.”
“The constellation or the sign of the Zodiac?”
“What’s the difference, Niles?”
“One’s a sign foretelling one’s future, and the other is a group of stars.”
Shotgun shrugged in defeat, and mentally noted the observation.
Niles drew close, and clasped his arm. “I’ve got two more items to add to your notes.” He pulled the butler towards the maintenance hatch. The hatch stood open the way he had found it. Next to it a lifeless box dangled from a tangle of wires.
“Whatever went through that hatch, Shotgun, it went up to the access corridor. And it didn’t come down again. You can report this. I told the police techs, but I don’t know if they get it.”
“I’m not sure I get it,” Shotgun said. “What’s the point? So someone went up? Isn’t that the way they came down?”
“Whatever came down here, it didn’t come that way.” Niles pointed to the hatch, “When it left, it went up.”
“Up?” asked Shotgun again, “I’m missing it. What’s the significance?”
“Yeah, that’s why I’m making the point. Don’t you mistake it for nothing just cause I don’t know what it means. It means something. See the alarm dangling off the wall.” Niles’ whole body wobbled.
“Help me out, Niles. I’m pretty sharp on a computer, but I’m not picking up what you’re laying down.”
“Above us are the access corridors. All of Nodlon’s utilities use some of the right of way up there. We use them for the lights and the power to the valves and the gates. The fastest way to get anywhere from the substations is the way we came today. Go through the service bays and up the mains.
“So if I need to work on a light, I drive out here and go up a hatch. During a flood, I can’t do that. I’m not a fish, right? I have to take a lift and drive through the corridors. It’s slow going. There’re lots of turns. It’s easy to get lost. It’s tight.” He tapped his head. “I’ve been whacked more times than I can count. A hard hat can protect you, but you can still get clocked.” Niles paused. “When we’re not using the hatches, they’re always locked. We can’t have flooding in the corridors. What a mess?
“What brought me here was a ‘no-response’ signal from the hatch. Imagine my surprise when I found the hatch open. If someone had gone through the hatch, we would have logged an open hatch.” He pointed to the hatch. “The alarm box was ripped out. That’s what opened the hatch. If they had come down, they would’ve forced the hatch to get it open.” Pleased with himself, the dwarf smiled.
“If they didn’t come down this way,” mused Shotgun, “how did they get here?”
“The next service bay is my guess. It’s a few hundred yards upstream.”
“Why?” Shotgun rubbed his ear. “Why leave the body here?”
“They were just dumping her. It’s out of the way, and no one is likely to notice. If they hadn’t triggered the alarm, I would never have found her.”
“Right, if they wanted to dispose of her quietly, why did they give away her position by setting off the alarm? Niles, did you go through the service bay or come through the hatch?”
“I got here the same way you did. I parked my cart at the service bay and walked upstream to the hatch. Instead of taking the level-ways, of course, I used the connectors between the substations to reach the service bay.”
“Did you see anything in the connecters?”
The hairs lifted on the engineer’s head. The dwarf put his hand over his mouth, and shook his head.
“Thank you Niles.”
“One more thing I need to tell you.”
“Yes?” Shotgun gave the engineer his full attention.
“Whatever pulled the alarm box off the wall; it must have been in a hurry or scared.”
“Scared? What would scare a murderer? Would it have been you?”
Wide-eyed the dwarf blew a low whistle. “Scared of me, that’s a laugh!” Bursting with excitement, the dwarf bounced on his toes.
“Niles, do you know what he saw?”
“What he saw? No, no, I don’t know, but he ripped that panel off the wall, and he ran up those steps.” Niles flew one hand up the other in a flying motion. “He was scared!”
“Maybe he saw what you heard?”
Niles shrugged, “Maybe.”
“Thanks Niles,” Shotgun pressed Clay’s card into the dwarf’s hand. “Call us if you think of anything. I owe you one. I can get tickets for you and your family when normalcy resumes.”
“Glad to be of help.” For a moment, Niles studied the technicians working several yards upstream. “Sorry I couldn’t help you more. I hope you and Mr. Clay catch this monster before he kills again.”
“Me too, Niles, me too.”