What are you doing here? There is a clipboard under Madrigal's arm. You attempt to arch an eyebrow, fail, and raise both instead. "I could ask the same thing!"

  "We're not fucking doing this. You're not supposed to be in town, you realize? You're blacklisted? You're way too lucky nobody's here right now…"

  "Okay," you say, and count on your fingers. "One, I was not blacklisted from town… I wasn't even blacklisted from the Nothing, okay? I was greylisted. It's a trial period, not a full ban. Two… that's it, actually."

  "You got banned from the Nothing?" She guffaws. "God, the guy lets fish in there! Did you spike the drinks? Steal someone's side chick?"

  "No!" You're reddening again. "It was a misunderstanding. And not the point, anyways."

  "You're right. The point was that you're blacklisted."

  "I'm not—"

  "From town. Margo doesn't want you anywhere, and she's got everyone in her palm, too. Did Monty leave that out?"

  You don't say anything.

  "Guess so. So how about we not stay here, and you can— sorry, did you say what you wanted again?"

  >[1] Give her the bare minimum. Ellery says he'll stop being freakish. Problem solved. Can you get a raise?

  >[2] Tell her everything. You want her perspective on what you found, assuming she believes you.

  >[3] Do some kind of balance. (What parts do you want to tell Madrigal?)

  >[4] Write-in.

  "Yes," you say. "Ellery said he'd stop being weird."

  Madrigal folds her arms. "What?"

  "No need to thank me," you add, pointedly. Madrigal does not look like she wants to give you a raise. She looks like she wants to deck you. For once, you're not sure why.

  She's considering her words hard. "Did he really say that? What did he say, exactly?"

  It's funny— in the harsh light of day, the entire Ellery escapade doesn't quite seem like it actually happened. All your memories of it have a fuzzy, dreamy tinge to them. You think. "Something like... 'she doesn't need to worry about me; I'll talk to her'?"

  Did she always look quite so purple?

  "So…" She is grinding her foot into the cobblestone. "Either you're lying through your teeth… or you told him it was me?"

  "You never said it was supposed to be a secret!"

  "I thought it was implied! By… everything!"

  Pah! You refuse to be blamed for this. "Well, that's your fault, isn't it?"

  "No, it's not my fault that you—" Madrigal, realizing that she's on the verge of yelling, lowers her voice. "—that your common sense has been rotted away by years of unremitted hedonism, you bitch. You have just ruined the entire point, don't you realize?"

  You are standing on your tiptoes in a futile attempt to match her height. "Excuse me?! I delivered exactly what you wanted less than a day after you asked. Do you want his head on a platter, too? Should I lick your boots?"

  She leans towards you. "You don't!" she breathes. "You know what's going to happen? He is going to talk at me."

  "Yes!"

  "No. At me. For hours, probably, and in all that time he's not going to say a single thing. Do you know how good he is at dodging questions? He's a fucking acrobat. And then he will go back to not talking at all."

  "He sounded sincere," you protest. "He got all sad-eyed, okay? I know what sad eyes look like."

  "Yeah! That's just how he looks! And sounds! He's very good at this!" Madrigal throws up her hands. "You got played, and therefore I got played. Congratulations. Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

  >[1] In your defense, he was literally openly threatening you, okay? Would she rather you were never seen again?

  >[2] Excuse you? Would it have killed her to tell you all this *before* you went to talk to him? Are you supposed to read minds?

  >[3] Yeah! Is she aware he has a freaky mind tower full of freaky mind stuff? It seems kind of relevant, doesn't it?

  >[4] She never actually said how this ruined everything! What's so bad about him knowing?

  >[5] Just how long has this been going on? What has *she* been trying?

  >[6] Write-in.

  ?Get control of the situation. You are being humiliated.?

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Get control of the situation. Get control of the situation. You square your shoulders and smile primly. "Congratulations are due to you, too. From the sounds of it, by not telling me anything, you, eh—"

  ?She played herself.?

  "—played yourself! Like a harp, or a fiddle, or a— I mean, some kind of autonomous fiddle, of course, but—"

  ?I take it back. Stop there.?

  Thank goodness Madrigal stopped listening to you: all you needed was a supercilious tone. She fumes. "You…"

  Back on solid ground. You can do this! "Just another in a long string of failures, huh? What's that… fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me… Four, five, six times is still shame on me, I believe."

  "Oh, for fuck's sake, it's not like that! We can—" Madrigal cranes to look behind you. "Look, let's get out of the open, okay?"

  You keep the smile on as you lead the way down the trail and into the underbrush. "Oh? So what is it like?"

  She crosses her arms defensively. "I'm not getting yanked around, okay? It's not malice. He's just… I don't know, he's skittish."

  "Uh huh," you say.

  "You know, you try to sit down and talk about one thing, and he's off rambling about… god, I don't know. It was blood for a long time, but he's probably onto something else now."

  You nod.

  "It's cute, you know, until you have something serious. Then it's…" She puts one hand to her cheek. "Why am I telling you this? Look at you, you bitch. You're eating it up."

  Just a little bit. You tone your smile down to polite levels. "I wouldn't have to if you'd told me this before, you realize? It's relevant?"

  "Yeah, well…" Madrigal gestures with the clipboard. "I didn't expect you to go ask him to his face, okay? I wrongly assumed there would be a little more subterfuge involved. So fuckin' sue me, I guess."

  "Oh, that won't be needed. I'd just like to know, uh, anything else you've conveniently omitted? Preferably something interesting."

  "You're an awful person, you know that?" Your smile must've widened again. Darn. "Your enjoyment is just radiating off you in, like, waves. Fuck. Do I have to give you the Ellery crash course? Seriously?"

  "Only if you want an effective investigation!"

  "You're despicable. Fine. Fine. Do you want diagrams? A flow chart, maybe?"

  You stick your hands in your pockets. "Words ought to be fine."

  "God, I don't…" She leans back against a tree and plays with the zipper of her jacket. "Look, it's not really that complicated. He's— he was a live wire. Always moving, always talking, always on. But god, good luck getting close."

  "Did you get close?"

  "I think— I don't know. I think so. But it's like trying to catch an eel barehanded, yeah?"

  You nod. You feel like you've been doing a lot of nodding.

  "He cares, though. Cared, I guess, I don't know. Way down. I think he cares a lot."

  "Oh."

  "He's not a bad person."

  "Never said he was," you say. "So, you're not together, clearly."

  "Hah." It's more of a sharp exhale. "It was mutual."

  "Ah."

  "I couldn't stand it, in the end. The… everything. I don't know what he thought."

  Eureka. There it is. You pounce. "You don't know why he wanted to break up with you? How is that possible?"

  She shrugs limply. "You know, it's… Ell. He gets that way. And by the time I really wanted to know, he was already…"

  "Shut down?"

  "Yeah. So it's still a mystery."

  This is the one. "So… you didn't send me because you were worried. You sent me to find out why he broke up with you."

  "You're a bitch." Madrigal narrows her eyes, but there's no real joy in it. "I am worried about him."

  "But…"

  "Okay, a little. You can't blame me, though. You'd want to know."

  You pump your fist. She scowls. "Be mature."

  Ha! So that's 'real motive' crossed off the list. Richard ought to be celebrating this with you, but he's asleep, or something. You can't win them all.

  "Just so I don't retread any ground," you continue jovially, "what have you done to investigate this?"

  She shrugs again. "I tried asking around, but it was kind of a delicate topic, you know? And then I mostly gave up, except for trying to corner him every so often."

  "Okay…" It occurs to you that something may be missing from this picture. "Say, would you happen to know anything about a… a manse? You know, a sort of mind... house..."

  "I know what a manse is, goddamn. He wouldn't shut up about them. What of it?"

  "Uh…"

  >[1] You've well and truly softened her up. Time to dump your entire list of findings on her and see what she thinks.

  >[2] Test the waters first. Does she know if Ellery, say, has one? Has she ever possibly been in it? Maybe seen anything weird?

  >[3] No, nothing, just a question, ha ha. Change the topic. You'd be happy to investigate this stupid breakup thing, but you're going to have to adjust your rate based on new information…

  >[4] Write-in.

  You swiftly recover. "...It's possible it could be relevant. So he has one?"

  "Or had one, or something. I dunno. Not like I've ever seen it. I don't go in on that stuff." She squints, shoves her hands in her pockets. "Whole thing is skeevy."

  Ah, the vulgar patois of the lower classes. You'll try to be polite. "Skeevy?"

  "You know. Gross? Creepy? You'd have to be both to want to mess with someone else's head?"

  Mmm.

  "So yeah, no. I never visited. Now, did he ever talk about… god, I don't know, maybe? Maybe indirectly, but I didn't take any special note of it if he did. Does that answer the question?"

  "Yeah," you hasten on, "sure. Are you aware of his having any communications with anyone? Writing letters… on walls, maybe…"

  "On walls? What?" Madrigal squints. "Sorry, did you say how this was relevant? Did Ellery talk about a manse, or…"

  God-blessed.

  >[1] Yep, that's right, he did. Good guess. About those communications?

  >[2] Yep, that's right, he did. Good guess. About a potential renegotiation?

  >[3] She can't get mad at you— she did say she didn't care how you did this, right? Walk her through it. (If you want to leave anything out, specify.)

  >[4] Write-in.