The Chase for the White Mist - Chapter Five - Part Two

The Questionnaires Part Two

It was early afternoon, when they arrived at the Frozen Goat. They left the carriage and went down the street, around the corner and shortly after, they were there. The old lady with the pipe was sitting outside next to the door again. 

“Good day, madam. Do you happen to know a Ray Reed?” Alex asked, as they walked up to her. 

“Nope, can’t say that I do. Who’s asking?” the old Lady said in a deep husky voice. “Weren’t ya’ll here yesterday?”

“My apologies, madam. I am Alexsander and this lovely lady is Meave.” Alex introduced. “And yes, we were. But I want to say hi, since this was the second time we stopped by.”

“Aha? Like I told you. Ain't nobody by that name here.” she said over pronouncing all the words. 

“If it’s all the same to you, madam. I’d like to take a look, myself.” Alex said, as he stepped past her and headed up the stairs. 

“Whatever you like, ain’t here no more.” She mumbled to herself. 

“We should stop by this Mary after this, the address that dwarf gave us is nearby.” Mev pointed out, while they crossed up the stairs. 

“Good idea, then we can have dinner with my mother after.” Alex replied as a second thought. “If she didn’t run back to the woods already. I swear she loves that cabin and those woods more than anything else.” 

“Yeah, she is a special lady, your mother.” Mev grinned. “Remember when she had been on the hunt for the giant boar? What did she call it?”

“Lord bobo. took her 4 months to find it. Ha, she barely spoke common when she got back.” Alex laughed, shaking his head. “Let’s finish up, so we can get out of here.” 

“Right.” Mev replied, as she knocked on the door. “Mr. Reed?”

The door fell open, as she knocked the second time. “Mr. Reed? Oh damned ones! Sorry!” 

Alex stepped inside: “Nobody here! It looks like somebody packed in a hurry.” 

“Seriously? A guy on the run?” Mev smiled a bit too much. “I’ll call it in with the nearest cityguard.”

“Yes, do that! I’ll have a look around, maybe he forgot something.” Alex said smiling.

“Great, I’ll be right back!” Mev laughed, “this is great!”

Alex shaked his head laughing to himself, as he started to look around. The bed was still a mess, the desk had been moved out, the closet was empty. He looked under the desk, over the closet and lastly under the mattress. What do we have here? A small notebook. Alex flipped through it quickly, each page was divided up into four categories: a date, job, a description of some kind and an amount. 

“This is very interesting.” Alex whispered to himself. “A crime journal.” hm, it looks like some kind of code or maybe a different language. It looks Elvish, but I can’t read it. 

“I’ll check with Mev, She might know.” he mentioned to the room, as he left. He came out of the building moments later, nodded to the old lady.

“Told you. Ain’t nobody by that name here.” she sneered, while puffing on her pipe. 

“You know, you could have said so, before we went up there.” Alex remarked back with a bit of venom in his voice. 

“Won’t have done nothing.” She said with not much care. 

“Right.” Alex shook his head. “I hope you find it in your heart to be more helpful to the cityguard when they get here.” 

He started walking towards the corner they had come from, seeing Mev coming around the corner together with two cityguards. 

“There you are, Mev!” Alex smiled, “and you got company.”

“Yeah, I did. Did you find something?” Mev said in a huf, as she walked towards him. 

“Nope, sorry I didn’t.” Alex lied, winking to her. 

“That’s too bad.” she replied, looking a bit confused. “I’ll just show the guys here, where everything happened. Wait here.”

“No problem.” He smiled again. “gentlemen!”

The three of them walked past him and went to the building, with the old lady sitting outside. Alex went to the corner and waited for Mev to return. 

Moments later, Mev returned. “You really didn’t find anything up there?”

“Of course, I did. But I can't tell that to cityguard. They would take it.” Alex said grinning, holding up the notebook. “It’s written in Elvish, but I can’t understand a word of it.”

“You do know this is exactly why the cityguard dislikes private investigators, right?” Mev huffed, “can I take a look? I don’t speak Elvish, but maybe I’ll see something you didn’t?” 

“Yeah, absolutely. Here.” Alex threw the notebook to her. 

“Thanks. Give me a minute.” Mev said absent mindedly flipping through the notes. “Some kind of overview, date, job, description of some kind and an amount. Do you think he wrote down all his jobs?” 

“I think so, he didn’t strike me as an organiser. But it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing.” Alex thought out loud. “Do you know the language?”

“Well, I can see it is Elvish. So it could be Elvish, or Undercommon. Since you can’t read it, it must be undercommon or it could be some code too?” Mev questioned, flipping to the last page.

“Yeah, that is a good point. Undercommon or code.” Alex noted, picking the notebook from Mev’s hand. “It’s good, we’re going to my mother’s estate today, she might know something about undercommon, or know someone who does.”

“Sounds good, let’s get going then.” Mev replied as she started to walk towards the carriage. 

“Hold on a second, shouldn’t we go talk to this Mary?” Alex asked, “She might have some important information about our Dear Lady.” 

“Do you really believe that?” Mev replied.

“No, chances are she doesn’t know any more than the others. But that is no reason not to go. She might also have the clue that closes this case.” Alex chastised. 

“You are right, you are right.” Mev grumbled. “Come on. Mary’s address is not far from here.”

“Lead the way,” Alex smiled.