22

Brenda Glass scribbled a few words on a small slip of card, signed it at the bottom with an illegible swirl, and told Mick to present it to Sergeant Smallhands over at the station inventory. Better be quick, she told him, Luke Smallhands closed shop at four o’clock for his daily stock take.

The inventory was on the other side of the building, meaning Mick had to navigate his way through a series of corridors and walk by offices where constables, sergeants, and inspectors were busy keeping this district of Full Striding safe. Some of the inspectors were sitting alone at desks battling their way through piles of paperwork, while others gathered in groups in front of chalkboards. He caught stray words as he passed open doorways.

“Hindle, Butcher - need you to door knock on Crease Street, see if we can’t find out who our mystery tavern man was.”

“No. Sorry, Bill. Just don’t see it. Why would anyone possibly-”

“What? Are you telling me you let him take a carriage to-”

Mick knew he must have looked a bit stupid, smiling as he walked through the station. If there had been any more of a spring in his step, he’d probably have smashed right through the roof. He didn’t even mind when he walked past the break room and heard someone say “Come here, Greener, got a case for you. The Riddle of the Missing Biscuits,” prompting a laugh from the other constables they were with.

Mick swatted their mockery like summer midgeflies. Today, nothing could pour water on his campfire. Not when he was clutching a letter in his hand that entitled him to five blank skill tokens. I’m officially on the sleuth token training program. Give it a year, maybe less, and I’ll be a fully classed sleuth.

Mick couldn’t wait to show Ma his own five blank skill tokens. And Spruce, Nell, and Lee, of course. They’d want to see them, even though they all had tokens of their own. Hell, he felt like he wanted to show the whole town.

No, need to be more discreet, he told himself. Folks will know I’m earning the class, no hiding it in a town like ours. But they might start acting weird around me if I go around singing about it.

He got to the inventory two minutes before Sergeant Smallhands was closing it for the day. Smallhands wasn’t just one person, though; the inventory was actually operated by Sergeant Small and Sergeant Hands, and everyone called them Smallhands because they were never separated, not even after work.

“Can I see your slip?” asked Sergeant Small.

Mick handed him the card that Glass had given him.

“No, no, no. This won’t do. You’re in the wrong place.”

“I am?” said Mick.

“You want Sergeant Hands. He deals with issuing equipment. I deal with evidence.”

“But you’re sharing the same counter.”

“Sorry. I don’t make the rules.”

Mick took one step to the right and handed his card to the short, bald-headed man standing right next to Sergeant Small. He studied the card.

“A three-slot token bracelet, five blank skill tokens, and a poor-rated sleuth kit. Hold on a moment.”

“Poor-rated?” said Mick.

“You’re lucky you get that. Our budget’s tighter than a mage’s arse when it‘s his turn to buy a round. Greeners – if you’ll forgive the expression – get the poor-rated kit. A promotion or two in rank and you’ll get something better. Of course, you could always buy your own. No law against that, is there, Sergeant Small?”

“No, Sergeant Hands. There isn’t.”

Mick thought about taking a few gold coins out of his pouch and asking if Hands could take another look, see if maybe there was a better rated piece of kit that he’d overlooked. But then, bribing a superior in a guard station, on his first day? Not a good look.

Hands was gone for a few minutes, lost amidst the rows upon rows of various pieces of equipment and tat. Mick caught sight of boxes filled with uniforms, handcuffs, and lots and lots of notepads.

“Going anywhere nice this summer?” asked Sergeant Small.

“Don’t think so. I reckon I’ll be busy trying to get my tokens. You?”

“Oh, well, I’ve been saving up my leave, and I’m just going to go to Striding station and jump on a wagon for the Cove. Spend a few days there and then see where life takes me.”

Mick couldn’t help noticing that Sergeant Small had used the correct term for the commuter wagon. Until a day ago, Mick – like most of Easterly – would have just said cart. From this, he could deduce that either Small knew a thing or two about wagons, or had just learned the correct parlance somewhere. This insight probably meant nothing, but this was the thing with sleuthing – the more knowledge you amassed, the more connections you made. You never knew when one would be the hammer blow that cracked the case open.

Hands returned with a small, rectangular box with five blank skill tokens inside, a bigger box that contained a poor-rated sleuth kit, and a leather strapped token bracelet that bore scuffs and scratches, suggesting Mick wasn’t its first owner.

“Don’t lose ‘em,” said Hands. “You lose ‘em, then I’m sorry, my friend, but you’re playing Hangjack Twist with a deck of ones. Don’t come crying to me about wanting replacements, because our budget’s shut tighter than a clam’s arse.”

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The bracelet didn’t fit around his wrist that well. Seemed to have been made for a much bigger-wristed person. Mick had to use a pen to jab an extra hole through the leather to get it tight enough. Hands was clearly unhappy watching Mick do this, but he wasn’t going to wear a token bracelet that hung off his wrist.

The tokens, each only slightly bigger than a copper coin, were where all his earned experience would go. Each of his skill trees had a different requirement in order for him to earn them, and if Mick did the work, his tokens would soak it all in and eventually become proper skill tree tokens.

“The hard work starts now,” Sergeant Small said as he watched Mick strap on his bracelet. “Getting enrolled on the program is one thing, but now you’ve got to earn your supper.”

And how would Mick do that? Well, the same way as every sleuth, inspector, or detective. By earning experience through solving mysteries. The techniques he employed to solve the mysteries would decide which of his skill trees leveled up. Bit by bit, puzzle by puzzle, he’d earn all the skills he needed to be a sleuth, good and proper.

From where he was in the station now, the only way to leave it was by circling back clockwise and going through the reception area. Mick found his way there, and was just crossing through reception and toward the street-facing door, when he overheard something that made him pause.

Sergeant Nichols wasn’t on shift now. It was the pink-haired lady standing behind the desk. She was talking to a young girl, maybe a teenager, though he could only see the back of her, and she was wearing a cap that covered most of her head. Standing next to the girl was a guard constable.

It seemed like they were in the middle of booking the girl in for something. He wondered what kind of crime she could possibly have committed. Whatever it was, his instincts were flaring now. There was something about that girl….

“Any health conditions we should be aware of?” asked the sergeant.

“I get tired easily,” she said, yawning loudly. The yawn stretched on for much longer than its natural lifespan.

The sergeant was silent for a moment, before grunting and saying, “Do you realize the trouble you’re in? This isn’t a game.”

“It was a cone of fried potatoes, that’s all,” said the girl.

A cold shiver ran through Mick. He knew that voice!

“Zip?” he said.

The girl turned around, and sure enough, it was Zip, his thirteen year old niece. She was taller than a lot of kids her age, but that height came with an awkward teenage gangliness. Her thick, horse chestnut brown hair was hidden under her cap, as always, and Mick couldn’t help noticing that she wasn’t wearing her Sunhampton school uniform. The constable standing beside her was holding her school rucksack, which was covered in black ink shapes Zip had drawn all over it.

The rucksack looks like it's so full it was hard to even close it, thought Mick. It doesn’t just have her school books in there; her uniform’s stuffed inside it as well. She must have left home this morning and then changed into her regular clothes.

“Uncle Mick?” Zip said. “You’ve got to help me. They’re saying I’m a thief.”

“That’s ‘cos you are,” said the constable. “I saw you with my own eyes.”

“Well, yeah. But you’re forgetting the circumstances. There were circumstances.”

“Such as?”

Zip thought about it, drumming her fingers on the counter. “Well, the way the economy is going. Employment in this part of Easterly is falling. How do you think that looks to us kids? Not knowing what we’ll do when we’re older?”

“Book her in, please, Sergeant Wiles.”

“Can someone explain what’s going on here?” asked Mick.

The constable eyed him. “Solicitor, are you?”

Mick held up his right arm to show his token bracelet. His tokens were blank, of course, so the gesture was mostly symbolic. “Mick Mulroon, Head of Sunhampton guards, trainee on the sleuth program.”

“Really?” said Zip. “Congratulations, Uncle Mick!”

“Shut it, you.”

“Don’t talk to her like that,” said Mick. “Whatever’s going on here we can straighten it out.”

The constable, clearly irked at Mick’s interference, said, “If we were in Suncrapton, I’d listen. But Striding market’s my beat, and I caught Quick Hands here pinching a cone of fried potatoes. Book her in, please, sergeant. Throw away the key.”

Mick wished he could say it was a surprise. Zip had never been caught shoplifting before, but if there was any other trouble a kid could get into, then she’d sought it out. Mick blamed her ancestry; when he was doing the family tree for Ma, he’d discovered a theme among the Mulroons, whereby every other generation spawned a troublemaker. There was Old Fell Mary, who’d burned down a church. Tulip Mulroon, who’d spent her whole life conning the state by claiming benefits for five children that didn’t exist. The list went back hundreds of years.

So far, Zip’s hijinks were mostly playing truant from school, chalking rude pictures on the side of Percy Tattersall’s store, and throwing eggs at Spruce Wilkinson’s window. Stuff that didn’t leave lasting damage, but could be a slippery slope. Was Zip this generation’s rogue Mulroon? Well, she was actually a Lade, given her father’s surname, but still, there was Mulroon blood in her.

With her father gone, it was Mick who was going to have to step up. He’d been too lax, he realized. Too wrapped up in his own life. He needed to be a better uncle.

“Look, don’t book her in,” he said. “She lives in Sunhampton, and as I said, I’m the head of guards there. Let me take her back to her ma.”

“She’s a thief. She needs booking.”

“She’s a first-time offender under the age of sixteen, and we’ve discretion in how we deal with her. Come on, now. Are we really going to go through the trouble of putting her in a cell and getting her poor, hardworking single mother to come all the way here to collect her?”

“No skin off my nose.”

The constable was clearly having a bad day. Mick didn’t blame him; working the Striding market was probably a tough assignment, and it didn’t help that Zip could be a real pain in the arse sometimes. If only his niece would look just a little bit contrite, it might ease matters. He guessed it also didn’t help that he’d stepped in and put the constable’s nose out of joint. Had he undermined the fella’s authority? That was a sure way to get things off on the wrong foot.

Mick took a step back, both metaphorically and physically. “Look, you know best. All I’m saying is, book her in for this, and you’re staying behind an extra thirty minutes after your shift to write her up.”

“It is beef casserole night. And Graham makes the best casserole in Easterly,” he said.

“Exactly. If I escort her to Sunhampton and have a word with her mother, then we’re acting to the letter of the law, aren’t we? If a minor with no priors is caught in the act of a minor-ranked crime, we have discretion in how we deal with it, which includes a conversation with a parent or guardian.”

“Ooh, someone’s been reading up,” said the sergeant.

It would have been ridiculous to Mick that a guard knowing their own regulations was seen as novel, but nothing about the Striding guards surprised him anymore. Whatever ideals he’d had of them just a couple of days ago were long gone.

“What do you say? You go home and have casserole with Graham, and I take this brat back to Sunhampton.”

The constable thought about it, then answered, “Fine, but if I see her on my market on a school day again, I’ll make sure she spends the rest of her sorry life-”

Mick could see Zip rolling her eyes in his peripheral vision, so he tapped her shoulder and gestured toward the exit. Before she could find a way to make things any worse, the pair of them made their way out of the station and headed toward the commuter cart station.