A Study in Charlotte

Holmes wasn’t anywhere to be found, but Lena was holding court in an improbable top hat. I’d seen her around, but I hadn’t paid much attention to her before. There wasn’t any doubt that she was beautiful, in a way I’d heard Tom wax rhapsodic about late at night: long straight hair, inky eyes, brown skin. Tonight, she was flushed with excitement and something else—probably vodka—and she’d stacked her mountain of chips into a neat pyramid. When she spotted me, she waved me over.

The boy sitting next to her wasn’t Tom, and he didn’t look happy to see me. “Hey, killer,” he spat. I ignored him.

“Hi, Jamie,” Lena said, ignoring him too. “Do you want to play? We’re out of chairs, but I can totally deal you in if you want to stand.”

“Actually, he can have my seat. I need another drink.” The girl on her other side—Mariella, I think her name was—pushed herself to her feet and tottered over to the counter, where I spotted a handle of Vodka-brand vodka and some dubious-looking pineapple juice. The freshman girl that had asked me to homecoming was playing bartender. I avoided her eyes, too. Was there anyone I wasn’t avoiding?

“I’m happy Mariella left,” Lena told me conspiratorially. “At least fifty bucks’ worth of this haul is hers. Was hers, I guess. Oops.”

If she were anything like the other Sherringford students I’d met, Mariella wouldn’t miss her money in the slightest. I thought of the thirty-five dollars left in my checking account that I couldn’t afford to lose and turned Lena down when she offered to deal me in, telling her I didn’t know how to play.

“I’ll try to pick it up, though,” I lied. Really, I just wanted to keep my seat until Holmes arrived, since I didn’t know anyone else here.

“Oh my God,” Lena said, putting a hand to her chest. “You’re British, too? You two are adorable, I love it.”

In England, I was an American. Here, it was the opposite. “Actually, I was born here,” I said.

“Are we going to play or not?” the guy next to Lena asked.

“Not,” she said, pushing back her chair. “Or whatever, you guys play. I want to talk to Jamie.” She stuffed her chips into the pockets of her dress and pulled me aside. I didn’t bother to correct her on my name; I’d just about given up on asking people to call me James.

“I just want you to know,” she said, over-enunciating each word, “that I don’t think you and Charlotte killed Lee. Look at you! You’re adorable, and now you’re blushing, that’s even more adorable. It’s like you were invented to get her over that whole August thing. I totally refuse to believe you guys have gone all Bonnie and Clyde on Lee.” She frowned. “He sucked, anyway.”

“August?” My voice caught on his name, and I winced. “Um. I don’t know any Augusts. Who’s that?”

“Hold on,” she said. “Let me take another shot.”

I may have been a terrible liar, but Lena was drunk.

“Oh, you know. August. The guy back home. She was pretty upset about it when she got here last year. I mean, she didn’t say she was upset but I heard her talking on the phone about him. You know, through the door? Then her brother came to visit and they were all like CIA about it the whole time. I kept hearing his name, which is a weird name, so I remembered it. Anyway, Milo left, but before he left, he was all like, Rrr, I’m going to do something about this, and she was a lot happier after that.” She put a hand to her mouth. “Shit. Oh, shit. I probably shouldn’t have told you that. Girl code.”

I wanted to ask her what, in fact, she had told me, except maybe about one of Milo’s drone hits. “It’s fine,” I said, drawing from the sane, imaginary place in my head, where no one was brutally killed down the hall and my only friend deigned to tell me the barest facts about her life. “I know all about it. Failed love. Tragic, really. And that house fire, with . . . with all the puppies.”

“Exactly!” She pressed her hand against my arm. “You guys are going to homecoming, right? I ordered this dress from Paris—you know, we go there every summer, my family does—but then it didn’t fit right, and no one does alterations here. Not good ones, anyway. Charlotte has this beautiful black dress that I asked if I could borrow—Tom would totally flip out—but she said no, so I figured that she had a date.”

Holmes probably had that dress made specifically for some Norwegian gala where she beat a foreign minister at chess, stole a French-Yugoslavian treaty, and then smuggled herself into the hotel clothes hamper so that she could escape through the laundry chute. I wondered what it looked like; it had to be pretty spectacular if Lena wanted it that badly. A long dress, I imagined. Black and slinky, something a Bond girl would wear. But Lena was wrong about Holmes having a date. The only boy she’d ever consider taking was—

I cut off that line of thought. Where was she, anyway? It was past midnight.

“Yeah,” I said, craning my head to look over the crowd. “Er, no. No. I don’t think Holmes does dances. Is it okay if I step outside and look for her? I can throw out your drink if you’re finished.” Lena was beginning to look a bit sick. As I eased the cup from her hand, a thought occurred to me.

“Um, Lena?” I said. “Why did Holmes start having these poker nights? She doesn’t seem to like”—I was about to say anyone before I caught myself—“crowds. Isn’t it kind of weird for her to host them?”