The Ivory Painting

~Chapter 2: Rear Ends & Frustration~

     The next morning arrived, and the groggy detective was walking out of a police station before the warm light of the sunrise even touched the damp streets of London. Lilith walked down the street with her head held high with pride and determination, although a bit of exhaustion was visible under her eyes. She may not have slept last night, but she had calmed her frantic thoughts and organized her ideas on the case she was about to take on.
     She clutched the nearly empty case file in her hand angrily, for two reasons. First, the delivery of the file she had called for was unavailable, as the station's messenger boy was out sick. Then, when she arrived to pick up the file herself, it was nearly empty. The only official papers in the file were the copies of the death certificates of Mr and Mrs Windell given to the local police that investigated and quickly closed the case.
     Lilith headed east down a side street, angered but not deterred by the lack of information on the two deaths. She opened the case file; a thin black leather folder, periodically glancing at the two photos of the Windells as she walked. Another paper which included a small amount of handwritten background information on the married couple was placed neatly under the two death certificates on one side of the folder. Lilith, a natural multitasker, read as she walked.
     "Hmm... Thomas Windell... father of two, married... and- oh?" Lilith stopped walking.
     A small newspaper clipping slipped out from between the two death certificates.
     'Thomas Windell, Owner Of Marconi Radios, Found Dead' the headline read.
   And that was just the beginning of the wave of new theories that crashed over Lilith's mind.

* * * * * * *

     The detective sat in her favorite chair in the corner of her flat under a lamp, reading the death certificates again and again. Yet she read absent-mindedly, skimming over the words without much thought. Her mind was elsewhere, specifically on the two brothers. According to the inexperienced young officers she spoke with, there were only a few people present at the manor the day Thomas' death was investigated. Alastor and Emmet, a young woman they called Iris, one of the maids, and the cook; none of which were interrogated.
    "My taxes paid these imbeciles, and for what?" she sighed, setting down the case file.
    There was no evidence, the only people present at the scene of the crime were never questioned, and the case had been tossed aside as if it were nothing. This wasn't normal, and it infuriated Lilith the more she thought about it. She was left with practically nothing.
    "Well, if I have to do it the hard way..." she mumbled, rising from the chair.
    She didn't even stop to grab the case file, she didn't need it. She grabbed her coat, keys, and her satchel. On the way to the door, she stopped at her bookshelf. Her hand immediately lowered to the bottom shelf, and snatched an empty leather folder. She took the newspaper clipping from the case file and tucked it into the folder. She would start over, and she would do it right.

* * * * * * *

    It was 10:30 A.M. The tires of the taxi cab splashed through the small puddles on the streets. Lilith had planned to meet the Windell brothers at the location of the two deaths; the home of the Windells. She had decided to leave early, intuition she supposed. Intuition or frustration. The frustration was a bad sign. She hadn't even been to the scene of the crimes, and she was already frustrated with the cases. She gazed out the window of the cab as the buildings passed by. The driver was taking her to the address written on the death certificates of the Windells. She closed her eyes for a moment. She had a lot on her mind.
    That was when she heard the distant tire screeches. A horn sounded to her right, then the car jerked her forward. She was pushed into the back of the passenger seat, her leather folder fell to the floorboard. The car jerked backwards after coming to an abrupt stop. The cab driver leaned out the window and yelled incoherently, that was how Lilith knew her ears were ringing.
    Someone had cut into traffic, causing a chain of commotion. Lilith's cab was rear-ended in the ensuing chaos. She sat there for a moment, a bit shaken and even more frustrated. She gathered her things, and slowly rose out of the cab. She hopped around the still cars, their drivers all shouting and arguing with each other. She leaned back on a wall of a nearby building. It took her a moment to shake off what had just happened. She looked at the minor wreckage, it wasn't much but it had certainly unnerved her.
    She walked the rest of the way, almost dazed, and not wanting to get back in a cab at the moment. She arrived around 1 P.M., an hour late. It was a good thing her intuition had led her to leave early, otherwise it probably would have been later in the evening by now. She would have looked quite daft if she had been late. Well she was late, but at least she wasn't late-er.
     The size of the manor would have impressed her more if she hadn't been jostled by the earlier car accident. The manor, or mansion rather, was far larger than the average street house of London. Settled into a five acre plot of lush green lawn and landscaping, the manor looked to be about 160 ft long, and 150 ft wide. The rows of intricate windows indicated it had five stories. A beautiful greenhouse off to the back left corner only added to the display. The landscaping that surrounded and engulfed the house made it look like a new, yet old palace. Beauty was in every style of its architecture, and the fanciful iron wrought fence with its matching gate locked out any and all onlookers.
     Yet there stood Detective Hawthorne, completely indifferent. She lifted a finger to the small brass button near the gate. The gates opened, and she strode up the main driveway to the marvel of architecture that stood before her. Completely uncaring and still unnerved by the already tiresome day, she wasn't expecting how much worse her day would get.