Death and Transfiguration

Chapter 6

Jean-Luc sheepishly looked up at Moreau and I. "Do you promise not to tell my father?" he said.

His friends looked away, pretending not to be involved. They were the same ones I'd seen at Jean-Luc's school earlier that day: one of them was a small boy with a dark complexion, while the other was a huge, hulking figure, somehow taller than both Moreau and I at the age of thirteen.

"I promise," I said, against my better judgment.

Jean-Luc looked toward his friends and then looked back at me. "Our mathematics professor's house is just across the street," he explained. "We put a hat outside, but it has a brick in it, so when he kicks it..."

"How do you know that your teacher's actually going to do that?" I asked.

"Doesn't everyone kick a hat when they see one on the street?"

"He might not be the first person to find the hat. That street's pretty crowded during the day," I said. "Besides, the old brick-in-a-hat prank has been done to death. Can't you come up with something a little more creative?"

Jean-Luc paused for a moment before deciding to turn this back on me. "What are you doing out so late, Miss Brackenborough?" he said.

"I bet she was having a secret rendez-vous with her little boyfriend over there," the smallest of the three boys said.

Jean-Luc high-fived him. "Nice one, Antoine," he said.

"No...no, it's not like that at all," I said.

"Miss Brackenborough is right," Moreau said. "We're just good friends."

Jean-Luc and his friends didn't look like they believed us. "Listen Jean-Luc, I don't care if you were pulling some prank on your teacher," I said. "Just make sure that you're home at a reasonable hour."

"Fine," Jean-Luc said. "Come on, Antoine. Come on, Romain. Let's go."

The three boys ran away, while Moreau and I walked back toward the boarding house. "I nearly forgot how annoying thirteen-year-old boys are," Moreau said.

"Well, you were one once, weren't you?" I said.

Moreau laughed and said, "I like to think that I wasn't that bad." He then added, "I can't imagine having to put up with that kid every day."

"I don't know how Sylvestre does it," I said.

"Me neither," Moreau said. "Apparently things have been difficult for him ever since his wife died."

"Do you know how she died?" I asked out of sheer curiosity.

"I'm not sure," Moreau said. "I thought it was consumption, but consumption won't kill you that quickly." He paused and then said, "Regardless, it must be difficult for him, raising two children on his own."

"I'm sure," I said.

"Maybe Jean-Luc was so annoying that he snapped and murdered Bergmann."

I shuddered and said, "I hope that's not true."

"Me too, but who else could have done it?"

Moreau was right. I couldn't think of anyone else who despised Bergmann like Sylvestre did. There weren't any other obvious suspects, but that didn't necessarily mean that Sylvestre killed him.

Eventually, the two of us made it to the boarding house, and we said our goodbyes as we retired to our separate rooms. However, I couldn't stop thinking about the Order of the Nightingales, replaying the whole day over in my mind, wondering whether it was true, whether Bertrand Sylvestre had really done it.