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The Dancers of Phantom – Part 07

The sky was so clear, the afternoon sun shining brightly on the streets, that it was hard to believe it was winter.

Cars and roofed carriages passed by, horns blaring and hoofs clattering. Pedestrians crowded the pavements, and gorgeous items filled the display windows of various stores. It was your typical, bustling Sunday.

The door of the Phantom Theater, shaped in the mouth of a huge lion, opened, and Inspector Blois appeared. His golden drill glinted under the sun, catching the attention of passersby. The suitcase he tossed onto the pavement rolled into the distance.

Kazuya Kujou came running out of the door after him. “Teach!” he called as he stumbled after the suitcase. A white rabbit followed him behind.

Passersby exchanged glances, smiling and shrugging as they continued walking. They thought the little oriental boy had mistakenly used the wrong word for suitcase.

“Teach!”

The suitcase finally rolled to a stop. Kazuya ran over to it and pried it open.

Ms. Cecile popped out from inside. She was wearing her round glasses, and a woolen hat sat atop her shoulder-length brown hair, a little tilted to the side.

“Oh, you were actually inside.” Kazuya stepped back in surprise.

Ms. Cecile seemed to be in a sour mood. She emerged from the suitcase like a bear awakening from its long hibernation. Placing her hands on her hips, she glared at the entrance to the theater.

“Hey!”

But there was no one there anymore.

The lion’s mouth was tightly shut, its two large eyes staring at their direction. The wind whistled, carrying a dry leaf across the pavement.

“Huh? Where’d they go?” Ms. Cecile said, disappointed.

“Teach! How did you end up inside the suitcase? Who put you in there?! How could they treat a young lady so roughly?! It was the inspector, wasn’t it? In that case, I’ll go lodge a complaint. This is inexcusable!”

“Uh, no. Actually…” Ms. Cecile suddenly blushed like a lit candle. She went after Kazuya and stopped him.

“What is it? I’m just gonna give him a piece of my mind. What, I can’t? Why are you shaking your head so much? Okay, then. If you really don’t want me to.”

Kazuya went silent. A horn sounded. Footsteps of passersby clicked loudly.

After a moment’s silence, Kazuya said, “Did you enter the suitcase yourself?”

“O-Of course not! A young lady wouldn’t do that! What are you talking about? That’s so stupid.”

Kazuya went quiet again.

Ms. Cecile looked around, trying to change the subject. “How about we have lunch in that café?

“A café? Sure, I guess. But we have a serious situation at hand.”

“We’re going to have a strategy meeting.”

“Ah, I see.” Kazuya nodded.

Ms. Cecile pulled him to a small café in the corner of the street. The rabbit hopped after them.

“Nicole Leroux? Weird newspaper ad?” Cecile said as she took a big bite of her sandwich that was about the size of her face.

Kazuya nodded. A shrimp cooked in herbs fell out of the sandwich and bounced on the white plate like it was still alive.

Ms. Cecile stuck a fork in it and brought it to her mouth. “Does it really have anything to do with this case?” she wondered. “But Victorique asked you to look into it.”

“Yeah.” Kazuya nodded vigorously. “But what exactly is the case this time?”

“That’s the thing. I was hiding in the suitcase, so… I mean, I was locked inside. I could only hear bits and pieces.” Ms. Cecile swallowed the shrimp. “Victorique’s father, Marquis de Blois, is apparently the one behind this. He was waiting in the basement of the theater. I don’t know the exact details, but he told Victorique about a murder case.”

“Was someone killed?”

“No.” She shook her head. “Don’t you know about it? Ten years ago, Coco Rose, the Queen of Sauville, was murdered in the palace. It caused a huge uproar. The culprit has yet to be caught, and we don’t even know how they killed her.”

“I’ve heard about that.”

“I don’t know why Marquis de Blois wants her to solve that case now.”

Kazuya cocked his head. “But that doesn’t answer why Victorique is asking us to look into Nicole Leroux, the Downtown Blue Rose.”

“Yeah. Well, let’s look into it anyway. I’m sure we can assist her in a way. She said she can’t return to the academy until she solves the case.”

“Okay, then.” Kazuya nodded.

Ms. Cecile gently peered into his face. He looked calm, but a closer look revealed firm determination, as though he had resolved to do all he could to face an immeasurably powerful force that was history, a forest so vast it was impossible to see the whole thing.

Kazuya stood up. “Well, then.” He tried to sound as cheerful as possible. “First, let’s check out some documents.”

Ms. Cecile quickly got up as well. “Good idea. I’ll do my best.”

The sun slid behind the clouds, and the temperature seemed to drop. Their shoulders hunched from the chill. Pedestrians had their collars up as well.

They examined old newspaper articles in the Royal Library located on the main street, right across the theater.

Using the information they found, they hurried to the screening site mentioned in the ad.

“Wait, Kujou!” Ms. Cecile was already short of breath. “I’m wearing a nightgown under my coat!”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Kazuya said. “I should’ve been more thoughtful. Wait, a nightgown? Why?”

“Actually, it doesn’t matter. I’m just exhausted.”

Kazuya stopped and waited for Ms. Cecile. The rabbit followed spiritedly, hopping.

The venue was on the sixth floor of an old building. There was no elevator, and the stairs were very steep, but Kazuya climbed up without much effort.

“How do you have so much stamina?” Ms Cecile asked.

Kazuya slammed his fist onto his palm. “I climb up the library tower in the academy every day. Up and up to the top floor, until my thighs become sore.”

“I see. You go ahead, then. I’ll take my time.”

“Okay.”

The sixth floor was like a deserted warehouse that no one had used for a long time. There was only an old desk and three chairs in the middle of the room, nothing else. Piles of dust stung Kazuya’s eyes.

Kazuya asked the building’s manager about the place.

“I don’t know anything about it,” the manager said, “but there’s an accounting firm a floor below that’s been around for a long time. There might be someone there who remembers what happened back then.”

He went to the fifth floor and asked around politely. Then, an office staff who was somewhere between middle-aged and a senior citizen said, “Are you talking about what happened 24 years ago?”

“I know it was a long time ago, so you might not remember much.”

“Nonsense. I remember that day well.”

“Really?”

Ms. Cecile had just arrived at the fifth floor. Kazuya, together with her, listened to what the old staff had to say.

“The requirement was young, with blonde hair and blue eyes? Ah, that explains it.”

The staff served tea and sat down across from the old sofa where Kazuya and Ms. Cecile were seated.

The windowpanes were sooty and cracked in places. The mountains of documents on the cabinet suggested a hefty number of clients. The phone rang occasionally, and someone would pick it up.

The tea was delicious. Nodding, Kazuya listened carefully.

“I still remember. There was a long queue of young blondes on these stairs that ran from the first to the sixth floor. I didn’t realize that they all had blue eyes. It was blinding. I like pretty, blonde girls myself, but seeing so many of them at once, and all crammed on a narrow staircase, was suffocating. Ah, but they were pretty, all right. Young and full of spirit. When they chatted with each other, it was like golden birds chirping in unison.”

The staff cast the door a distant look. Kazuya and Ms. Cecile followed his gaze.

It felt like the spectacle that morning twenty-four years ago was still there. Women with blonde hair that glittered like the sun, filling the stairs of the multi-purpose building up to the sixth floor like a gathering of mythical goddesses.

A scene that endured the test of time. Drifting across a sea of memories.

“I always thought it was an audition for a job, like an actress or a singer,” the staff continued delightedly. “After all, they all looked pretty much the same, and from the conversations I overheard, the pay was really good. Three times what I was earning back then. I had no idea they were looking for a secretary. That sounds very strange.”

“Hair color, eye color, age, height. Even the shoe size was specified,” Kazuya said.

“Hmm. That Roget guy sounds odd, all right.”

“Roget?!” Kazuya exclaimed.

The staff and Ms. Cecile jumped.

“There was a man by that name on the sixth floor?!”

“Y-Yeah.” The staff nodded. “It was weird. Until the day before, the sixth floor had been unoccupied for a long time. The stairs are steep, it’s hot in summer and cold in winter. It’s not an ideal place for an office. But then one morning a signboard for their office appeared out of nowhere, and then there was a crowd of pretty blondes on the stairs. Naturally, I got curious.” He tilted his head. “Then by evening, they finally finished interviewing everyone. The army of beautiful women disappeared, except for one. Apparently, she was selected as the secretary.”

“Was her name Nicole?”

“I’m not sure.” The staff searched through his memories. Then his eyes lit up. “Ah, yes. It was Nicole! I’d forgotten all this time. I heard it when they were coming down the stairs and passed by our office. She happened to have the same name as my cousin in the countryside, so it caught my attention.”

Kazuya and Ms. Cecile looked at each other.

“I knew it,” Kazuya mumbled. “Nicole Leroux found the ad, applied for a secretary position, got the job, and then disappeared. The recruiters must have done something to her.”

“Yeah,” Cecile nodded.

The staff pointed toward the door. “The frosted glass on the door there was transparent back then. I glanced three or four men, all of them wearing fine suits. Their splendid attire made you wonder what they were doing in a building like this. They looked like people involved in the royal court or the government, basically.”

“And you remember one of them?”

“Yes. They called him Roget. Apparently, he was the boss. The other men gathered around him, asking for instructions.”

“Roget,” Kazuya murmured. “That was probably Jupiter Roget, the president of the Academy of Science. He’s also close with the King of Sauville. Sworn enemy of Marquis de Blois and the Ministry of the Occult.” He looked at the door.

It felt like Jupiter Roget and the men of the Science Academy, hiring Nicole Leroux for some kind of a plot, were passing by at this very moment. He thought he could see the Downtown Blue Rose’s bright, playful, always-spirited, yet thin and ephemeral figure.

Like a mirage, it shimmered and vanished.

Kazuya was deep in thought, his face hard.

“What does this mean? How is the Academy of Science involved in this case?”

Outside, the winter sun shone softly on the streets.