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The Clients of the Gray Wolf Detective Agency – Part 04

After hearing their concerns, Kazuya said, “Victorique, can you explain things to these two as well? About the mailman who stole the meat, and the cat wearing a skirt at the store?”

Victorique, already bored of the whole affair, took a weary puff of her pipe. “Fine,” she mumbled reluctantly. “I-It’s really simple.”

“Yeah?”

“Let’s start with the police officer with the mole at the butcher’s.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Tell me, why did you think the man with the mole was a policeman?”

“Huh? Well, because…”

“Because of his uniform, perhaps?”

“Ah, yeah. That’s it.”

“But when your father looked into it, he found out there wasn’t a police officer that matched the description. You see, when you mistook him for one and you asked him for help with the stolen meat, he pretended to be one and said, ‘I’ll handle the case.’ A suspicious fellow indeed. But it’s unlikely that someone would bother to disguise himself as a policeman just to steal meat from a butcher.”

“Hmm…”

“My guess,” Victorique continued, “is that you mistook the uniform. A dark cap and jacket. In the U.S., the job with the most similar uniform to a policeman’s would be a mailman. The mailman entered the shop, saw a child tending the counter alone, and took some meat. When he was mistaken for a policeman, he simply went along with it. If he weren’t the thief, he would have said he wasn’t a cop.”

Kazuya nodded. “I see. That’s why you told her to look for a mailman with a mole on his forehead.” Turning to the girl, he said, “Did you get all that? Can you tell your parents when you get home?”

“I can!” The butcher’s girl eagerly nodded. “Here’s your fee.” She pulled out a bag of bright green animal-shaped lollipops from her apron pocket and pressed it into Victorique’s small hand before running off.

“O-Okay?”

Perplexed, Victorique took one of the lollipops. It was shaped like a long-tailed cat. She gave it a cautious lick.

Pleased, she reached back into the bag, pulling out and happily munching on rabbit, monkey, and bear-shaped lollipops.

“Now, about the skirt-wearing cat and the girl,” Victorique said through a mouthful of candy.

The boy from the general store leaned forward, eager to hear more. “Yeah?”

“I highly doubt a cat could dress itself in a skirt. Clearly, someone else put it on and sent it into the store. But why would they do such a thing? There’s only one possible reason: the boy who stole money from the register was about to get caught by the shopkeeper. He needed a distraction—something attention-grabbing—to make his escape.”

“So you mean there was an accomplice?” Kazuya asked.

Victorique shook her head. “The thief was just as surprised by the skirted cat as anyone else. That means he wasn’t in on it. Most likely, someone close to him happened to witness the crime and acted quickly to help him.”

“Someone close to him, huh? Are you referring to the girl peeking into the store?”

“Precisely.”

“And how did you figure out that only her upper body was visible?”

“Simple. To create the distraction, she tied her own ribbon to the cat’s head, took off her skirt, put it on the cat, and sent it inside. So if you only saw her from the waist up, she’d look normal. But if you saw below that…”

The general-store boy nodded grimly. “She would’ve been naked. What an idiot.”

Licking a duck-shaped candy, Victorique spoke with the solemnity befitting a professional detective, “Exactly. Now, do you understand?”

The children nodded fervently. The tobacco girl handed over six oversized leaf-shaped pies, each as big as her face, and the general-store boy gave two shiny, candy-coated green apples. Then the group scampered away down the spiral staircase.

Once they were gone, Victorique and Kazuya exchanged a glance.

“Phew,” Kazuya sighed.

“What a loud bunch,” Victorique noted.

A gentle breeze drifted through the triangular window, stirring Victorique’s silver hair.

“Oh, right. About this…” Kazuya gestured toward the swing chair.

Victorique glanced over. The swing was a long, pink rectangular seat, with a wavy backrest. Its claw feet were intricately carved, and the buttons were acorn-shaped, made of brown wood. It hung from the low ceiling by two sturdy silver chains.

Holding a leaf-shaped pie in both hands, Victorique nibbled at the edge as she climbed down from the old dresser and toddled over.

She got on the swing cautiously, but when Kazuya gently pushed her small, fragile-looking back, her cheeks softened ever so slightly in what looked like quiet delight.

The swing creaked as it began to sway slowly.

Kazuya peered in from behind. “Ingenious and philosophical, don’t you think? Who would think a detective agency had a swing?”

“Hmm?” Victorique mumbled, her mouth full of pie. “But I…”

A summer breeze stirred the room, rustling palm leaves and setting the vibrant tropical flowers swaying. The green-and-pink frills of her dress caught the wind, swelling and fluttering softly.

“I wish to be an ordinary person,” she murmured. “And when that day comes, I will be happy. But it’s a long road ahead.”

“But you’re you,” Kazuya said.

“Hm?” Victorique raised an eyebrow.

From the triangular window came the hum of city life—car horns, the clip-clop of horse-drawn carriages, the cries of street vendors. Inside the Carousel, sewing machines whirred, telephones rang, and faint chatter echoed. Brightly colored tropical birds circled near the ceiling.

“Ah! I have to go.” Kazuya abruptly rose.

Victorique took a drag. “To the Daily Road, I presume? To your new workplace filled with materialistic concerns.”

“Yeah. I’m heading to Central Park today. The editorial office got a call yesterday. Someone claimed they saw a boy riding a lion. I’m supposed to cover it.”

“A lion?”

“Y-Yeah. I mean, there’s no way that’s real, but I still have to follow up. Anyway, I need to pick up the photographer first.”

He quickly gathered his things and headed toward the spiral staircase. Just before he made his way down, he turned back.

“I… I have to go now,” he mumbled reluctantly. “See you later, Victorique. Behave yourself, okay? I’ll come get you this evening.” He then disappeared down the stairs.

A soft breeze flowed through the room. Victorique rocked gently on the pink couch swing, smoking her pipe.

Creak, creak. The swing swayed in rhythm with the wind.

The moment her attendant was gone, Victorique turned cold, lifeless as porcelain or stone. From a small, awkward human being, she transformed into an old doll, weathered and forgotten by time.

Creak, creak, creak.

Only the swing moved. Strands of her silken hair quivered, the frills of her dress billowing softly around her.

Then, her lips parted, and in a voice raspy and low, she murmured, “When the journey with the War Goddess is complete, the door to the future shall open, was it?”

Her trembling voice sounded like faint ripples of the past, spilling through the cracks of time.

“Hmm?”

Just then, Victorique noticed two people peering into the room. Her golden lashes fluttered as her large, green eyes flickered back to life, regaining a semblance of humanity.

It was the man and woman who had entered earlier with the children. One was a young Caucasian woman with brown hair in long braids down to her waist, wearing glasses and a yellow cotton polka-dot dress. She looked about Victorique’s age. A bandage was wrapped around her left ankle, and she leaned on a crutch, while in her other hand she held a ceramic piggy bank. A peculiar ensemble.

The other was a man in his mid-twenties, dark-skinned, likely of South American descent, with a bandage wrapped around his head from which a faint trace of blood had seeped through.

Victorique observed them silently for a moment before pressing a hand to her temple, as if a headache was coming on.

“Wh-Who are you two?” Her voice was cold as ice, almost inhuman in tone.

The pair exchanged uneasy glances.

“Uh, um…” the woman stammered.

“I’m a client too,” the man said.

“M-Me too!” the woman added quickly. “But the kids earlier didn’t give me a chance to speak.” She shook her head.

Victorica stared blankly for a while, then slowly tilted her head. Moving stiffly, like a clockwork doll, she rose from the swing, shuffled to the triangular window, and peeked outside.

“K-Kujou?”

But there was no sign of Kazuya, nor his old black bicycle, anywhere on the premises.

“A-Ah.” Victorique turned weakly back toward the man and woman. “So you’re, um, clients?”

Both of them nodded vigorously, over and over.

Victorique eyed them suspiciously. “You’re both injured—your head, and your leg. You’re not acquaintances, are you?”

“Nope,” the woman replied.

“Not at all,” the man affirmed.

Victorique placed her pipe between her lips, her gaze distant.

The young woman in the polka-dot dress pulled out a yellow notebook dotted with the same pattern. “Detective, this is a photo of Central Park. So, so… listen!” she began.

“Hold it,” the man interrupted. “My case comes first.”

Victorique froze, looking distressed.

The man spread out an old newspaper featuring a bloodied corpse on its front page. The headlines read: “Infamous Bank Robbery Gang Strikes Again!” and “Kid Makes His Move!”

The woman glanced at the article. “Oh, your case involves Kid? But that’s such an old article.”

They both turned their eyes toward Victorique. The man raised the newspaper, while the woman opened her yellow polka-dot notebook. Both began speaking at once.

“Last night, Public Enemy No. 7 escaped, and—”

“I-In Central Park—” the woman interjected.

They glared at each other.

“I want you to stop Kid from raiding the Federal Reserve again!” the man barked.

Not to be outdone, the woman shouted, “P-Pedem tuum edam!”

On the swing, Victorique slowly raised her head. Her face stiffened in fear.

“Kid raiding the Federal Reserve Bank again? Central Park? P-Pedem tuum edam? Who are you people?” she rasped.