The Manual of Detection by Jedediah Berry Read Free Book Online Page B

the Agency seal. She held her hands suspended over the keys and tilted her head a little to the left. Her eyes went unfocused, as though she were gazing into some distant, tranquil place.
    Unwin began, “To colon Lamech comma Watcher comma floor thirty-six return from colon Charles Unwin comma capital C capital L capital E capital R capital K comma floor fourteen comma temporarily floor twenty-nine return.
    “Now for the body of the text. Sir comma with all due respect comma I must request your immediate attention to the matter of my recent promotion comma which I believe has been given in error point.”
    Emily’s typing was confident and somewhat brash—she threw the carrier to each new line with a flourish, as one might turn a page of exquisite piano music, and her fingers danced high off the keys at the end of each sentence. Her style lent Unwin even greater resolve.
    “As you may know comma I am solely responsible for the case files of Detective Travis Tee point Sivart point. Naturally comma I hope to return to that work as soon as possible point. If you are unable to reply to this message comma I will assume that the matter has been settled comma as I would not wish to trouble you any further than is necessary point. I will of course make sure that you receive a copy of my report point.”
    Emily plucked the page from her typewriter, folded it into thirds, and slipped it into an envelope. The messenger put it in his satchel and left.
    Unwin wiped his brow with his shirtsleeve. The messenger would go directly to Lamech’s office on the thirty-sixth floor and discover Lamech dead. That relieved Unwin of the responsibility of reporting the fact himself.
    “A clerk,” said Emily thoughtfully. “It’s the perfect cover, sir. Criminals will naturally underestimate a common clerk, never suspecting that he could be their undoing. And you already look the part, if you don’t mind my saying. Since your subterfuge must prevail within the Agency, as well as without, I assume this is an internal affair. No wonder you’re the one they got to replace Detective Sivart.”
    Emily rose from her chair and gestured toward the back of the room. Her nervousness was gone now—her virtuoso performance at the typewriter had restored her confidence. “Sir,” she said, “allow me to conduct you to your private office.”
    There was a door behind the desk, painted the same drab color as the walls—Unwin had failed to notice it before. Emily led the way into a room sunk in greenish gloom. Its dark carpeting and darker wallpaper gave the impression of a small clearing in a dense wood, though it smelled of cigar smoke.
    The single window offered a much better view than those on the fourteenth floor. Through it Unwin could see the rooftops of the tightly packed buildings in the old port town and beyond them the great gray splotch of the bay, where smoke from ships mixed with the rain. This was the view Sivart would have turned to gaze upon while writing up his case notes. Down there, near the water, Unwin could just make out the dilapidated remains of Caligari’s Carnival, which had served for years as Enoch Hoffmann’s base of operations. Strange, Unwin thought, that the detective could see the lair of his adversary from the comfort of his own chair.
    But then, Hoffmann had not been heard from in a long time—not once in the eight years since The Man Who Stole November Twelfth—and the carnival was in ruin. Could it be that Sivart was gone as well? Unwin remembered discovering, in some of the detective’s reports, inklings of plans for retirement. He had been careful to excise them, of course—not only were they extraneous, they were tendered gloomily, when a lull between cases put Sivart in a dour mood. They appeared with greater frequency after November twelfth, and Unwin supposed he was the only one who knew the toll that case had taken on Sivart. I was wrong about her, he had written, meaning Cleopatra Greenwood. And it was