“Tch, a hidden attic.”
Inspector Serret let out an irritated sigh.
They should have made a law to punish any contractor who creates a space like this.
That alone might have reduced the capital’s crime rate by ten percent.
But what good was grumbling?
Inspector Serret squeezed his body through the open crack of the attic door.
Soon, the tragic scene of the incident was revealed.
“So, that’s the body in question.”
The inspector clicked his tongue as he looked down at the corpse lying on the bed inside the narrow attic.
“Tch. That detective sure has a strong stomach.”
How could he look at a corpse in this state and be so unfazed?
Of course, due to the nature of his job, the inspector had also seen countless corpses.
Among them were many who had met more gruesome deaths than Washers.
But the corpse of Washers placed here was particularly unpleasant.
It was because of the light illuminating the body.
“It looks like some kind of pinned insect.”
A bed blocked by wooden bars, preventing any movement.
A body curled up on that bed, lying face-up.
In fact, there was one characteristic of the corpse that Hayes had not seen.
No shadows could be found on the body’s appearance.
A bizarre, monochromatic light corpse, with all natural shadows removed.
“Must be because of that device.”
Inspector Serret raised his head and looked up at the ceiling.
A strange metal structure shining light down onto the bed.
In fact, that was once a shadowless lamp that Claire had developed for her husband.
A device designed to limit the direction of light from an incandescent bulb through a cover and precisely reflect that limited light through mirrors, allowing a patient lying on an examination table to be scrutinized without a single shadow.
Washers had gone out of his way to bring this shadowless lamp into the attic and had it installed, replacing the original bulb.
There was no reason Adriel’s treatment would have required surgical measures.
Why on earth did he install a shadowless lamp here?
“What a strange man.”
Inspector Serret frowned deeply and opened the black notebook.
The blood-soaked black notebook he had received from the detective.
On the page where the housekeeper’s resentful memoir ended, new writing was inscribed.
The prison diary of a convict locked in a prison from which he would never emerge.
Perhaps the answers to the suspicions were written inside.
*
1.
That crazy housekeeper! Was she in her right mind when she wrote this?
She tried to kill me for just that reason? Because I was trying to kill Adriel?
That woman must have been suffering from paranoid delusions. Is she saying I abused Adriel? No. I was only trying to treat Adriel.
Of course, he might die from not being able to endure the treatment. But isn’t that just the child’s weakness?
I just wanted to return everything to normal. Do I have to die here for just that reason?! Don’t make me laugh!
2.
My mistake was not knowing Claire was close to such an ignorant woman. I didn’t anticipate Claire showing the letter to the housekeeper.
Should I not have sent the letter?
But, I wanted to reunite with Claire as soon as possible.
3.
Failed to open the door again.
I tried to pry my fingernails into the closed door crack to open it, but my nails just tore and blood flowed.
It hurts terribly.
The problem was the soundproofing material and rubber packing plastered all over the door. The barriers put up to prevent Adriel’s beastly screams from leaking out. Those barriers are now strangling me.
Nothing can leak out of this room. Even if I scream, no one will hear it.
…Let’s not think so negatively.
Maybe I failed because I was weak. If I rest a bit more and try again, it might be better.
3.
It was a misjudgment.
I failed to consider that I had lost too much blood. Having spent time without proper treatment, even the strength I had left seems to have vanished.
I’m terribly thirsty and dizzy.
4.
How much time has passed?
5.
I just wanted to return to the happy past.
Claire and me. Our little paradise where just the two of us were enough.
The two of us were enough.
Why did it have to become three?
6.
The cold from the floor seeps into my bones. To survive, I have no choice but to lie on the bed.
But it’s too bright here.
When I look up at the ceiling, countless versions of me in the mirrors stare back at me.
My sunken, skull-like, shadowless appearance.
I shouldn’t have screamed.
My throat is so parched it’s agonizing.
I want to lick up the blood I spilled, but it’s all dried up.
7.
Darkness is evil, light is good.
Claire is a pure white angel who drove darkness from the human realm.
This light Claire made for me burns away all darkness.
So that the child filled with evil may be cleansed within this light.
To get rid of all shadows and become pure white.
So, I am not afraid of this light.
I am not afraid of the countless mirror images reflecting me.
I am rational.
I am not a child, nor a lunatic.
So I do not fear intangible light or reflections.
What frightens me is dehydration and dizziness.
I can feel my consciousness slowing.
Even when I pinch my skin, the mark doesn’t fade, and I can feel my skull caving in.
I cannot die in a place like this.
So, I’ll lie on the bed, which still holds some warmth, and preserve my strength.
Because I am a rational human.
The light shining relentlessly down on me as I lie on the bed.
The dozens of mirror images looking down at me are not frightening in the slightest.
8.
Was this what Adriel was afraid of?
9.
Don’t look at me.
10.
People with faces identical to mine live up there.
Humans with bizarre, shadowless faces, terribly emaciated.
Their eyes are so deeply sunken, it’s just grotesque.
The identically-looking humans look at me and grin creepily.
Even if I try to avoid their gaze, I cannot. The wooden bars block me.
Trapped motionless on the bed, I have to look up at the ceiling and look up at those people.
Each one has no shadow has no shadow has no shadow has no shadow
Where did the shadows go?
Why do they all have no shadows?
Maybe I am the shadow?
666.
I found a way! I found a way out!
Thank you. Claire. It’s thanks to you.
Thank you for whispering the way out to me.
Vibrations travel farther than sound.
No matter how much soundproofing you use, you can’t block vibrations.
So I’ll bang my head against the closed door!
If I bang and bang and bang my head, my sound will travel through the vibrations to Claire.
Then Claire will open that door, appear, and run towards me.
She’ll cover me with a soft blanket, bring me water, and hold me warmly.
Claire’s embrace will be peaceful, warm, and dark. No one will see me.
Only Claire will look at me with worry and say she found me, that she was worried.
Huh? But Claire is looking down at me from up there right now?
2.
My skull hitting the door isn’t enough to make sufficient sound.
If my skull hit a bullet, it would surely make a better sound.
I might die, but Claire will find me.
She’ll read the records I left, shed tears, and remember me forever.
I won’t be trapped in this narrow attic and forgotten forever.
We will create a paradise for just the two of us.
We will live together forever.
0.
Claire! Claire! Don’t forget me!
*
“Tch. What on earth is written here.”
Inspector Serret scowled and roughly tossed the black notebook aside.
The further it went, the more blood-soaked it became, and the handwriting turned into a mess.
By around the seventh diary entry, it was utterly indecipherable.
“Did he go mad before he died?”
Anyway, that sort of thing wasn’t Inspector Serret’s concern.
“That notebook and the grotesque corpse. Might as well burn it all, lest some evil spirit attach itself.”
It was Inspector Serret’s arbitrary decision, but it probably didn’t matter.
There was no one left to watch over the dead Washers.
Washers.
He was a forgotten man.
-Epilogue 2-
One week after the incident.
Claire was sighing.
‘I just can’t forget.’
Dolores’s absence was too great.
To the point that nothing else mattered much.
But she couldn’t just stay like this.
Because she still had someone precious left.
“Adriel’s condition is quite good.”
The doctor who had just finished a session with Adriel said.
“He seems to be gradually recovering from the emotional instability caused by the abuse.”
“Are you sure he’s really okay? He keeps standing in front of the front door or the broken clock….”
“But he’s reportedly following the rules he set with Ms. Dolores well. Sleeping on time, eating on time, playing or studying on time. Is that right, Adriel?”
Claire nodded.
“Then it’s okay. Also, I hear there’s a friend who often comes to play with him?”
The doctor showed a reliable smile.
“That’s a good thing. Adriel is growing up healthy and well.”
At those words, a faint smile formed on Claire’s lips.
It was a phrase rarely heard elsewhere.
Everyone focused on the child’s shortcomings, not on the child’s growth.
But here, Felix’s convalescent hospital, was different.
“Waaah! Teacher!”
“Hey, Helen! I told you not to play with the teacher’s bag, didn’t I?”
A child suddenly bursting in and shouting.
Felix gently soothed the child and handed her over to a nurse’s care.
There was no hitting the child or tying her up and locking her away somewhere.
In Felix’s hospital, everyone was free.
A hospital that lets mental patients roam free.
There were people who mocked it, saying it was more a stable than a hospital, but Felix didn’t care.
He was fine being called a stable keeper.
His mission was here.
“I’m always grateful, Doctor.”
“No. It is I who should thank you, Ms. Claire. Thanks to you, I’ve received Chairman Peterson’s patronage.”
Chairman Peterson’s company, Peter Herring Co., smoothly emerged from its crisis.
Upon learning the full details of the incident, the chairman offered a generous donation to Claire and her child, but Claire politely declined and instead suggested another recipient for the donation.
That was Felix’s convalescent hospital.
The hospital where she had consistently brought her child for treatment until Washers, suspecting Claire’s infidelity, had a big argument.
“You don’t need to thank me. Actually, Detective Hayes’s share in that donation is probably much larger than mine.”
“Huh? He donated to this hospital?”
“It’s not exact, but I think that’s the case.”
Felix made a puzzled expression.
Claire smiled and told him the story she had shared with Chairman Peterson.
*
“Huh? You can’t get in touch with Mr. Hayes either?”
Claire asked back with a bewildered face.
“If even you, Chairman, can’t reach him, then what should I do? I was so out of it that day, I couldn’t give Mr. Hayes any reward.”
She had come to her senses belatedly and tried to express her gratitude, but her benefactor had already disappeared.
Even when she visited the Hayes Detective Agency, the door was always closed.
“Don’t worry too much. Teacher Hayes is likely intentionally avoiding your contact.”
“Really?”
“Teacher Hayes is originally that kind of person. He doesn’t enjoy receiving rewards for his cases.”
“He doesn’t take rewards for cases? Where in the world is there a detective like that?”
Claire simply couldn’t believe Chairman Peterson’s words.
A detective who doesn’t take payment, how could that be?
“I thought it was a misunderstanding at first too.”
The chairman said.
“When he solved my son’s case, Teacher Hayes didn’t utter a single word about money to me.”
He just wasn’t shameless enough to ask for money in that atmosphere.
“When I went to give him the fee, the agency door was firmly shut.”
It was due to a business trip to the Northern Region.
“Since it seemed hopeless, I requested a visit. When the teacher came to see me, I even told him I wanted to become a formal patron. Yet, Mr. Hayes still didn’t request any patronage funds.”
At the time, Hayes was distraught because Detective Beron had been kidnapped.
More than anything, Hayes still wasn’t very familiar with the ways of this world.
It never even occurred to him that he should directly ask his patron for money.
“It was the same even after he gained fame solving Madame Moss’s case. I heard countless people sent letters offering patronage or rewards, but he never sent a single reply. When they enclosed payment with the letters, he only accepted very small, token amounts of sincerity and sent back large sums.”
Though that was just because Lure was timid.
If Hayes had dealt with it directly, the result might have been different.
“Even after this case ended, he never came to see me. Seems he was afraid I might shove a bundle of money at him, calling him the company’s savior. How did he know? The gold bars I had prepared just ended up sitting there awkwardly.”
The chairman burst out laughing as he spoke words that would have made Hayes shed tears of regret if he had known.
“As far as I know, Teacher Hayes has never once received monetary compensation after solving a case.”
“Then, him disappearing without a word to me after this case ended is also…”
“He must have been embarrassed to receive payment.”
Good heavens, does such a person really exist?
Helping someone in distress, then disappearing without taking a single reward?
He’s like a romantic detective straight out of chivalric literature.
Chairman Peterson’s logic seemed flawless.
“Giving mere silver coins as a reward to such a noble person might be an affront to his pride.”
“I think so too. So I decided to use the case fee I intended for the teacher for other good causes. I’m sure the teacher would be more pleased with this.”
*
“My goodness, so that’s how it was. To think such a righteous person exists!”
Felix exclaimed in admiration, praising Hayes.
“The world should know that such a person exists.”
“I think so too. That’s why I’m telling you this, Mr. Felix.”
“I should start telling this story to everyone I meet from today.”
And so, the reputation of the honorable detective Hayes, who solves cases without taking a single coin, began to spread quietly throughout the world.
Meanwhile, at that very moment.
What was the honorable detective Hayes doing?
Pursuing the suspect in Taylor John, Duchess Catherine?
An adventure wandering in search of Taylor John after obtaining a new clue?
Or perhaps investigating another case he happened to get entangled in?
No.
“Don’t move!”
Hayes, his face covered with a black hood, shouted.
“Put the money in this bag! Try anything funny and I’ll shoot!”
The noble saint Hayes was currently in the middle of a splendid robbery.