Chalk, Lines, and Tights

“What are you doing, detective? It’s in here.”

Detective Maude ignored him as he clicked the doors shut, leaving the museum director alone inside the exhibit, mouth agape.

After examining and counting the locks, of which there were three, he opened the double doors again. Sam the director’s face resembled a seagull, lacking amusement.

“If you are about finished, it’s in here. Or, rather, it was. Now I suppose I need to find something else worth displaying on this empty slab of marble,” he said, his arms starting to limp.

“Yes, it’s a handsome pedestal in there indeed, but no statue.”

“Figurine, detective.” Sam said, after looking up again. “Statues are large. Figurines are small, and sadly, easier to steal. It was an extremely rare eleventh century Germanic figurine depicting the marriage of-“

“Is this door kept locked?” Maude said.

“Of course! Three dead bolts. The keys are kept in a lock box, no copies are made. Locked in a fingerprinted cabinet.”

“Whose prints unlock it?”

“Mine, and Eli Rooj, our chief of security here.”

“Yes, I’ll need to speak with him after. How long has he been here?”

“18 years. He has been security for 12, and chief for 6, after our previous chief, Maurice, retired.”

Maude took out his notepad and began writing notes.

“Was he here on shift last night?”

“You can ask him, but no. He locked the door at 9:00 after we closed on schedule and then went home. You can’t get in here without the key.”

Maude pointed up at the ceiling with his pen as he watched Sam’s face.

“What about up there? Is there a way in through there?”

Sam’s gaze reluctantly directed up to the glass dome ceiling, then back down. “Yes, but highly unlikely. It would require someone of extraordinary agility and preparation. Not to mention an awful lot of rope.”

“Well, I once broke my leg while trying to impress a girl with my motorcycle. If people want something bad enough, they will do anything. How rare did you say this was?”

“Rare enough to be in here,” Sam said. “As I was saying, if you really are interested in its history, it is from the eleventh century, believed to be depicting a couple hand in hand at a marriage ceremony of the Germanic-”

“Could we get up there? On the roof? Please?” Maude asked, not letting Sam finish again.

“There’s an access ladder behind the building. Allow me to get the key,” Sam said, sighing as he stepped away.

Sam’s grey curly hair was flat in places, and his eyes were tired. His face read like a man overworked, trying to hide his fatigue. A man woken suddenly to some really bad news. His walk, however, did hide it well. The motion of hope and determination that the show must go on.

As Maude waited at the desk, he found Eli and interviewed him. When he was done, he had a page in his notebook titled “Eli” and a list of notes confirming everything Sam had told him. After shaking his hand and thanking him, he flipped to a new page, titled it “Sam,” and wrote a couple of brief notes.

“Ready, Detective?” Sam said, walking towards him holding up the key for him to see. “Before you ask, no, this one is not kept in the fingerprint cabinet. It’s in the maintenance closet on a hook. Sadly, a lot of people have access to it.”

“We might be getting somewhere at least,” said Maude. When they got to the door, he said “Don’t forget your hat.”

“I don’t have a hat, what makes you think I have a hat?”

“My mistake,” Maude said, looking away from Sam’s hair.

“I see you’ve met Eli,” Sam said as he held the door open.

“Yes. He was helpful. Thank you.”

The museum was not in good shape on the outside. Several stones in the walls were chipped and cracked. Others were stained with several generations of dead leaves and vines, fallen and crunching into dust under their feet as they made their way to the back.

There, a steel maintenance ladder reached from the ground all the way to the roof. Anchored by bolts, all along the way, at least Maude hoped. It was protected on the bottom by a padlocked gate. Everything was rusted.

“One moment, I’ll get that open,” Sam said. He inserted the key and, after some twisting it back and forth a few times, pulled the lock open.

The opening gate screamed loud as a siren and clanged like a gong, rattling the whole frame. Before Maude could start praying for a safe climb up, a chunk of straw and twigs thumped on the bottom next to them. Above, he saw a bird circling, searching for its lost nest.

“The poor things,” Sam said, looking down, at their feet. “They work so hard on those. If it’s any consolation, I don’t see any chicks or unhatched eggs in here at least. Want me to climb first?”

“While I don’t doubt your own agility, I don’t think that would be wise. It is fair to say that no one has used this for some time, let alone last night. I think I’ve seen enough. I’ll be back if I find anything.”

“Detective?” Sam said, letting go of the bars. He clapped his hands in a sweeping motion and Maude watched the puff of rusty red dust wade into the open air. “Detective? Are you leaving? Is there anything else I can help with?”

“Yes,” Maude said. “That building next door here. What is it?”

“L’Hotel D’Oiseau.”

…

Maude ran in the Hotel lobby and ignored the concierge yelling “sir” after him as the door to the stairs slammed behind him.

At the top floor he yelled “Stop Cleaning! Police Department!” running up the hall towards a yellow cart with cleaning equipment hanging from it. “Sir! Mam! Stop cleaning! Police Department!”

A petite woman’s head poked out into the hall from a room then disappeared, and a door slammed.

“No!” Maude said, as he got to the door and found himself locked out.

“Mam, I’m from the police department. Can you see my badge through the peep hole?” But before he could hold it up in front of the door, he felt himself doubling over. His lungs finally remembering that he was completely out of breath. As he heaved and took deep breaths, he could hear the woman’s voice talking quickly inside, speaking in French. From her point of view, he was just some scary man chasing her.

After catching his breath finally, and swearing off cigarettes yet again, he heard the elevator make a sound, and the concierge from earlier, accompanied by a heavy set man stepped out.

Maude held out his badge for them to see. “Detective Flynn Maude, police department,” he said. Their marching pace toward him slowed down when they were close enough to see the badge.

“Monsieur Detective, what is this about? Why are you harassing my staff?” He said.

“Do not let her clean any of the rooms on this floor. I have reason to believe there may be evidence of a crime.”

The concierge tapped on the door to the room with a single knuckle.

“Gigi? Madame? C’est ok?” He said.

The voice of the woman on the other side was hard to make out. “Did you hear her?” He said.

“She’s talking too fast,” Maude said. “My French isn’t great. Please, ask her not to clean any more rooms on this floor and please let me in to look.”

The room, in fact, had been completely cleaned. All but the bed was finished, its old sheets already pulled off. Maude stepped closer to it, trying to ignore the three members of the hotel staff behind him, glaring.

The shapes in the matted sheet from the bed’s occupant could possibly be used to determine the person’s height. Just maybe. He leaned closer. No hairs on the pillow.

“I’m going to need to see all the other rooms on this floor that have been stayed in last night.”

“And I’m going to need a warrant from you for that.”

“Ici! Seulement ici!” Gigi said.

“She says only this room was occupied last night,” the concierge said, translating for her. “Detective, is that all? I’m not trying to be difficult, but we have a hotel to run.”

Maude looked at the small square windows. They were maybe a foot by a foot in measurement.

“Of course, just one last thing. Do those windows open? Do you mind?” Maude said, walking over, not waiting for permission. He turned the crank and it stopped only four inches wide.

“Are you finished? Not wide enough for anyone to squeeze through, I’m guessing?” The concierge said.

Maude smiled and closed the window.

“No one ordinary,” he said, “but Extraordinary! Magnificent! Merci Beaucoup!”

…

The next morning, Sam greeted him at the museum lobby.

“Detective!” he said, with a smile. “I saw your motorcycle pull in earlier. Is there anything I can help with? Did you want to see the exhibit room again?”

“No, not at all. Just a little more information from you, if you don’t mind. I’d like to know more about the exhibit.”

“Oh. You would?”

“Yes, sorry about brushing you off yesterday, but now I realize it would be very important to my investigation. Plus I am just personally very interested in it. I have a soft spot for genealogy.”

“Ah, well I’d be happy to fit you on a tour today. The first starts at 8:00. It’s on the house, of course.”

“That’s very kind of you. But why don’t we discuss it together at the museum cafe. I want the real scoop, every detail you don’t get to share with the tours.”

“Well, sure. Right this way.”

Neither of them sipped their coffee. Maude spoke first.

“So what is special about this figurine? Slavic Nordic weddings were nothing uncommon.”

“Aha detective. Now I see you weren’t being rude, but coy. You have done your research already.”

“Last night, actually. Kept me up half the night. Yesterday you looked tired, now I fear the table has turned. Germanic tribes are rich in history, but surrounded in mystery. That’s where a lot of speculators often swoop in to try to fill in the blanks. Some are well meaning, they just want answers to life’s big questions like the rest of us. Others are, sadly, more malicious in their intent. But I don’t think you fit into the latter by a million miles.”

“Nor the former, detective.” Sam said, finally taking a sip of his black coffee before continuing. It was not tea, but the cup was small enough to justify holding out one’s pinky, which he did. “While I must admit that my personal opinion on the missing figurine is less than mainstream, our tour guides are always kept up to date with the latest painstaking peer reviewed research.”

“Of course it is, I wasn’t accusing you or the museum of anything,” Maude said. He also sipped, before setting down his cup and saying nothing.

“Perhaps we should continue this another time,” Sam said, standing up. Maude stood up with him.

“Of course. My mistake. I sincerely didn’t mean to offend. Thank you so much for your time again.”

Maude reached out his hand for Sam to shake. As soon as Sam returned the favor, Maude scratched inside his palm with his finger nails and Sam pulled his hand back, crying out in pain.

“Detective!” He said, looking down at his palm. A red line was burned across the middle, left to right, underneath the knuckles, the burn being the true source of his pain.

“Does your other hand have the same marks, director?”

Sam looked up at him.

“I suggest you leave, Flynn, before a further scene is made. You’ll be hearing from my attorney about this assault within the hour. Thank you. Go. Now.” He snapped his fingers with his left hand, even wincing in pain from doing so.

“How good is he?”

“Excuse me?”

“Your attorney. What is his name? I deal with a lot of attorneys in my line of work as you can imagine. I’m just asking, is he any good?” Maude was shrugging, passive.

“Of course he is! He’s very good! He’s excellent! He’s …”

“Magnifico?”

Something in Sam’s eyes changed, and he went quiet. Maude sat back down.

“I’m a huge fan. Please.”

Sam folded his arms and lowered himself back down.

Maude began:

“At first I looked into Eli Rooj, your chief of security. And wow, he has quite a record. Nothing too violent, just a history of crime in his past. At first I thought it had to be him. But it seems he got himself together a long time ago. Thanks to you actually. It’s very impressive that you were willing to see his potential and give him a chance to work here, where most others wouldn’t.

“But the thing is, he’s just too big. A man of his stature wouldn’t have fit through that window at the hotel. Not of that size. But you, one of the Magnifico Brothers! The way you clapped your hands? I got a chill down my spine. I saw your trapeze act together with my father when I was a boy. You two waved, clapped some chalk dust in your hands and bam! The way you two moved into the air like that was amazing! I begged my dad to go see you two again and he promised we would but it was too late. Then he had to explain to me that circuses pack up and move to other towns.

“That must have brought back memories when you put on that cat burglar looking outfit again. I bet it was all muscle memory from there. The squeezing, stretching, the climbing, the rappelling. It must have been eerie walking across that tight rope in the middle of the night, with no audience.”

Sam smiled.

“What I don’t get, is why? Why take this? It is proof of your true heritage. It proves your Slavic heritage goes further back than ever.”

“It doesn’t. It’s a fake.”

“Why not just prove it?”

“I’ve been trying to for years. No one is interested anymore. As soon as they hear Viking this or Northmen that, the books close, and everyone else is forgotten. I concluded that since it isn’t even real, the world is better off without it.”

“Still, that’s no reason to just take it.”

“I know. So what now? Is it too much to request that you not put me in handcuffs until after we step outside the museum?”

“Sorry.”

Sam laughed.

“I have a better idea. I don’t think I’m welcome at the hotel next door anymore, but I’ll pay for your room this time. There are some conditions of course.”

…

Maude sat on a lawn chair on the roof of the museum in the cool night air with a lit cigarette in hand, waiting for the show to start. He opened his pocket watch, and set it on his lap.

A dark shadow started moving up the side of the wall of the hotel, each brick picked with determination and vigour. It grabbed the edge of the roof and pulled itself up in one motion like a cat.

Sam, all in black, stepped over to the edge of the Hotel roof, took off his back pack and retrieved a long coil of rope. He picked up a loose brick nearby and tied the rope just below a pre tied loop at the end.

After clapping his hands together twice, he spun around two times and hurled the brick into the air in Maude’s direction. It hit a narrow cast iron chimney a few feet away from him and let out loud clang sound. The lasso on the rope fell straight down, with the chimney pipe in the center. He got it first try. Maude laughed and clapped loudly.

“Shh!” Sam said. He tied the rope on his end and picked up a long pole that was on the roof at his feet, simply left behind from two nights ago.

There’s always something I miss, Maude thought.

When Sam made it across his tight rope, he took off his face cover revealing his grey matted hair.

“Well done,” Maude said.

“It would have been easier if you didn’t make me wear that safety harness.”

“Well I couldn’t have you falling to your death while trying to return it.”

“I suppose not,” Sam said. “Ok let’s finish this.” He walked by Maude and opened a small glass window over looking the exhibit below.

Maude put the watch back in his pocket and stood up. The figurine was already out of the bag and held in Sam’s hands.

“Hey, do you need a hand tying the rappel up here?” Maude said.

Sam looked up at him and smiled. His hands now empty, they both waited for the sound of an inevitable crash on the ground inside, which came immediately.

“You must be joking!” Maude said.

“All I asked was for them to look inside this thing,” Sam said. “Now they have no choice.”

“I see. Well, thank you for the show, Magnifico. It certainly ended with a bang. I’ll take the service ladder back down, but I’m afraid you are going back the way you came. Hey, at least you had an audience this time.”

Sam pointed up.

“I had one the other night too. My family was always watching.”

He picked up the pole and stepped back on the tightrope and began walking back to the hotel roof.

Maude took out his pocket watch and opened it up again. On the left, were separate pictures of different family members pasted close together, including his father.

“Mine was too,” he said. “Wasn’t he great, guys?”