A Girl, a Murder, and Twelve Dreadful Children

Chapter VIII: No Good Deed...

I don't like it, but I'm a person, thank goodness, who can do what I don't like. -- Henry James, The Wings of the Dove

Dani ground her teeth. She took a deep breath, clenched and unclenched her fists, and tried to speak calmly.

"No. I will not get involved in this. I absolutely refuse."

The two towns looked at each other. Some sort of understanding seemed to pass between them. Dani steeled her nerve. She had faced monsters, relatives and monstrous relatives. She could deal with this latest nuisance.

"It's entirely your decision," Ballinamallard said at last.

"Thank you for acknowledging that," Dani said with more than a hint of sarcasm.

Ballinamallard paused and gave her a mildly rebuking look. It was surprisingly disconcerting to get such a look from someone who appeared to be a small girl of barely ten. "We won't ask you to investigate what happened to Belfast."

Good. That was a can of worms Dani would happily leave unopened. What the towns had said about Belfast's personality, combined with the strange events plaguing the people who lived in the city, had convinced her that she never wanted to go further north than Lisburn ever again.

"But we believe that you can solve the murder. And I am willing to help you if I can."

Oh bother.

Dani drew herself up to her full height. At five foot eight she was as tall as or taller than most of the people she interacted with on a daily basis, and certainly taller than Ballinamallard. Unfortunately, the town wasn't intimidated. No doubt she had seen far more frightening things than someone who was taller than her.

"Just what makes you think I'm going to get involved in this again?" Dani demanded. "I already tried investigating. I got nowhere. The police are investigating, and they've gotten nowhere. Do you think you can do better?"

Ballinamallard nodded. "I don't know who the murderer is, but I know plenty of supernatural beings who would be willing to investigate if I asked them."

Good heavens. This situation was getting increasingly surreal. Dani felt the sudden urge to pinch herself and make sure she wasn't dreaming. She shook her head to get this thought out of it. Living towns that wanted to turn detective were hardly the strangest thing she'd ever encountered. Well, alright, so they were in the top ten, but still.

"Then you go and talk to some of these beings," Dani said. "And then come back when you have some useful information. I'll consider helping you then."

~~~~

She thought that would be the end of this sorry mess. And for a week, it was.

Then the doorbell rang in the middle of the night.

The clocks showed the time was a quarter to one. Dani was curled up in her bed, fast asleep and blissfully ignorant of everything around her. All the children were asleep, even Max who hated going to bed. Silence reigned through the house.

And then the silence shattered.

Riiiiing! Riiiiing!

Dani's sleep-addled brain interpreted the sound as her alarm clock. She reached out, searching for the mute button so she could go back to sleep. But even hitting the button repeatedly did nothing to stop the noise.

A chorus of sleepy grumbles and exclamations echoed from the children's rooms. Max, startled out of a sound sleep, began to wail at the top of his lungs. Dani staggered out of bed, feeling like something that had just crawled out of a tomb and not entirely sure she wasn't dreaming.