Page 37 of A Drop of Corruption

“Yet we shall have to trawl through it!” she snapped. “Do you think this is our impostor’s first robbery? His first murder? Remember, Din, that the only reason we’ve come to realize any of this happened is that some fucking turtle satisfied its appetite and happenedto leave some scraps in the waters! Without those fragments of flesh, we’d know none of this! And we now know he was possibly responsible for one of the first smuggling murders, years ago. He may well have committed a dozen more such crimes, leaving no evidence of himself behind! So. We need that list, no matter how ponderous, and I shall see what patterns may be divined in its innards.”

“And the missing reagents, ma’am? The healing grafts he did all this to steal?”

“Grafts! Ha!” She made a rude gesture with her hand. “Healing grafts in-fucking-deed!”

“I take it that you, too, do not believe that was what was in that box?”

“Absolutely not,” she said. “Respiratory diseases? Utter piffle. Very idea is absurd. And you told me that Ghrelin seemed unusually eager to open that box, even though you told him not to! It makes one think, naturally, there might have been something in that box he did not want any of you to see.”

“Yes. So. What do you think the killer actually stole?”

“Oh, I’ve no idea. Something very,veryvaluable, surely. I intend to find out what.”

“What could the Apoths be doing that would make them risk lying to the Iudex?”

“Something terribly dangerous, and secret. That is for certain.” She paused. “Tell me…when you first met him, this Immunis Ghrelin seemed nervous, yes? He seemed to know, instantly, what had gone wrong?”

“Yes, ma’am. Something in the way he looked at me. Trying to understand how much I understood myself. And then afterward, in the vault, he was overcome.”

“As if the damage done to him was so great,” she said softly, “he could not believe it had happened…Interesting. And the tapping. He kepttappingthroughout everything?”

“Yes.”

“Very loudly?”

“Yes. On his belt buckle.”

“With three fingers?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She whispered, “Tapping. Tapping…” and shut her eyes. “You engraved this tapping in your memory?”

“Of course. All I heard and saw.”

“Then summon the memories, please, Din, and tap out all you can for me. I wish to hear this myself.”

My eyes fluttered as the memories of the bank came swimming up within the dark well of my mind. Then I reached forward and rapped my knuckles on her table corner, imitating the tapping I’d heard and seen Ghrelin perform. Though now that I duplicated it, I realized that the tapping had repeated rhythms, echoing over and over again, mixed in among other rhythms that were totally new. It was very strange to have the sounds brought alive by my own knuckles.

Ana listened closely, eyes closed. When I finished, she whispered, “Fascinating. Very fascinating…Another tapping, yet again.”

I watched her leaning back where she sat, her own pale digits fluttering on her knee. Then I understood.

I recalled the maid I’d interviewed, describing the false Sujedo:His hand twitched, I recall, his fingers flitting against his belly.

And then Klaida:He did tap against his leg, over and over again, as he walked. Like drumming. Like he had a tune in his head and couldn’t help but beat its rhythm against something. It was a little strange, sir.

“The impostor did the same thing,” I said softly. “He tapped his body, just like Ghrelin—is that it?”

“You’ve grown sharp, Din!” she said, grinning. “How glad I am to see that. But don’t get too excited. We cannot clap people in irons at the twitch of a finger. I’d need to hear more of this tapping to see if it means anything, and the only way to do that would be to witness more samples.”

“How might we do that?”

“Well, the simplest way would be to simply go talk to Ghrelin again,” Ana said. “Which we are going to do tomorrow! And that shall be ourthirdattack front.”

“We,ma’am? You wish to come yourself?”

“Oh, yes. I wish to talk to this Ghrelin personally. Make a request for an interview with the Apoths first thing in the morning, Din. I doubt if we’ll be able to get him alone—odds are some of his superiors will demand to be present as well—but we’ll use that audience to request all our records from them. We shall listen to what Ghrelin says, see what the Apoths give us…and sift through the tea leaves carefully.”