Chapter 27

Chapter 27

The strange incident in Herona occurred just after torrential rain poured down, making the July heat even more unbearable.

The dark clouds had not yet cleared, yet the temperature was rising again, and warm air was rising from the muddy roads that had been heated through.

“Tsk, tsk. It really did rain far too much.”

During a leisurely tea time after the meal, I was spending time with Count and Countess Brough for the first time in a while when the count, who had been reading the newspaper, clicked his tongue.

The countess, who had been talking with me about Arthur, became interested.

“Why? What happened?”

“Apparently, several children have gone missing. It seems they were swept away by the river during the torrential rain.”

“Oh my, how pitiful. Their parents should have kept a closer eye on them.”

“Exactly. Sending children outside when it was raining that heavily. Were they out of their minds?”

The two of them blamed the parents for the children’s disappearance and soon forgot about the matter.

But for some reason, I could not stop thinking about it, so as soon as they returned to their room, I picked up the newspaper the count had been reading.

After turning a few pages, I saw the small headline from the article I had just heard about.

「Reports of Missing Children Continue to Pour In」

The article said that reports of missing children had continued to come in to the police station after the torrential rain had stopped.

They were all commoners, and most of them were girls.

「……The police are currently assuming that the children were swept away by the river, which had suddenly risen, and are conducting searches at the river mouth and along the riverbanks.」

That was where the article ended.

‘If that is what the police say, then I suppose that is what happened.’

I wanted to stop paying attention to it there.

But I could not shake off the ominous feeling that something sticky and pitch-black was crawling up my back.

‘It can’t be. This is Herona. Something like that couldn’t possibly happen so openly here.’

I shook my head and folded the newspaper.

Even if a terrible suspicion had taken root in my mind, what could I do about it?

For some reason, I could even understand Count and Countess Brough a little for casually brushing off the article. If I simply dismissed it as someone else’s problem and moved on without emotion, I would not feel this uneasy.

Unfortunately, since I was incapable of doing that, I felt that I would be unable to escape this gloomy mood for at least the rest of today.

***

“This has become a real headache.”

Lord Linberg sighed as he tossed his nearly finished cigarette onto the muddy ground.

The investigators around him, including Ash and Jacob, waited for him to speak.

“They say there isn’t a single child’s body.”

They had searched the area around the Timber River because of the seven reported cases of missing children, but not a single one of the children they had suspected might have been swept away and drowned had been found.

“Then that means the torrential rain and the disappearances aren’t related.”

“It’s too early to jump to conclusions, Jacob. We do know for certain that these incidents all occurred during those three days of rain.”

In fact, missing-person cases happened all the time.

But this was the first time several had occurred simultaneously within such a short period.

Because of that, they could not ignore the cases even though they involved commoners. If they simply let the matter pass, the citizens’ council would certainly make an issue of it.

That was why they had rather hoped the children had drowned…….

Ash, who had been listening to Lord Linberg, spoke.

“I suspect it may be kidnapping, serial murder, and concealment of the bodies.”

“Haa……. Yes, we have to keep that possibility open. But first, we should check whether they ran away from home or whether these were false reports…….”

“We need to determine whether kidnapping is a possibility first. If they were kidnapped, the longer time passes, the lower the chances of the children being alive will become.”

At his assumption of the worst-case scenario, Lord Linberg sighed, while Jacob frowned.

“Do you know how much work we already have piled up? If we mobilize police forces based on an assumption that has not even been confirmed, what happens to the other cases?”

“The children’s lives are at stake, so we need to solve this first. Is there another case where someone’s life is hanging in the balance?”

Jacob, who was currently handling a bribery case involving an executive of the citizens’ council, furrowed his brow.

His investigation had already reached a dead end and he was pressed for time, so naturally he was irritated at having his time taken away by a case that would bring him no benefit even if he solved it.

That did not mean he could reveal his true feelings. If he did, it would amount to openly denying the police’s creed of ‘putting the safety of citizens first.’

“That’s something you can say once it’s confirmed that this is a kidnapping case. Ah! You’re free these days anyway, so how about you take this one, too?”

A triumphant smile appeared on his smooth lips.

But Ash, whom he had expected to be flustered, readily nodded.

“If you permit me, I will take charge of it, Lord Linberg. If evidence of kidnapping emerges, I would ask for your full support then.”

“Are you really all right with this, Ash?”

“The Brough townhouse fire case isn’t urgent.”

At his request, Lord Linberg eventually nodded.

In truth, he would welcome it if Ash took sole responsibility for this troublesome case. Not only would it free Jacob, the commissioner’s nephew, from an annoying assignment, but he might also receive praise from Commissioner Astrid for assigning Ash, his rival, a case unrelated to promotion.

“All right, then. I’ll assign some support personnel, so investigate it yourself. Is there anyone in particular you want?”

“Sergeant Fidelo would be good, but…… Jacob, would that be inconvenient for you?”

At that, Jacob shook his head with an unwilling expression.

“No. Take him.”

“Thank you.”

With that, Ash succeeded in bringing Louis, who was familiar with the fire case, back with him.

But the seriousness of this case made it impossible to rejoice over it.

‘Seven children under the age of fifteen have disappeared at the same time. This is absolutely not a simple accident.’

Thinking of the children who might even now be dying somewhere, his throat went dry.

After completing the on-site investigation and returning to the police station, Ash took Louis, who had become his assistant, and went over the identities of the missing children in detail.

The children were between twelve and fourteen years old, consisting of six girls and one boy. They were all commoners, and none of their families were well-off.

Louis seemed to think the last piece of information was a clue.

“If they intended to kidnap someone and demand a ransom, they would have targeted nobles rather than commoners, and even if they chose commoners, they would have picked a child from a wealthy family.”

“So the ransom might not be what they’re after. There are too many missing children, and no parents have received any demands for money yet.”

“Or perhaps…… the children’s parents sold them off? Since they know human trafficking is illegal, there are apparently cases where parents sell their children and then report them missing.”

“That is also possible. So we need to interrogate the children’s parents as well.”

Ash removed the corkboard from the wall where he had been attaching information from the previous case for the sake of the new investigation. Then, as he was about to put up a new corkboard, Louis suddenly asked,

“You seem to have investigated the townhouse fire case from many different angles?”

He was tilting his head as he examined the corkboard Ash had just removed.

“Ah, that. Things are developing in a rather interesting direction.”

“Really? I thought it was simply a fire case, but it seems something else has turned up?”

“Rather than discovering any clear information, it’s more like various possibilities are popping up here and there. If we keep gathering the scattered clues, at some point we’ll see the lines connecting them.”

At that, Louis nodded, then suddenly clapped his hands as though he had just remembered something.

“Oh! Come to think of it, I forgot to give this young lady that!”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know the belongings we recovered from the fire scene. Among them, I said I would return the personal effects of Baron and Baroness Tessis as soon as there was nothing more to investigate.”

“You still haven’t given them back?”

“Yes. I was a little out of sorts at the time…….”

Then that meant Rosalyn had held her parents’ funeral without even receiving their personal effects and had simply been waiting all this time.

This was clearly a mistake on the police’s part.

“I’ll deliver them. There doesn’t seem to be any particular reason to designate the baron and baroness’s belongings as evidence.”

“It was my mistake, so I……!”

“No, it’s fine. I’m the one in charge now, so it’s better if I go. It could cause unnecessary confusion otherwise.”

Ash patted Louis on the shoulder and immediately headed for the warehouse where the items collected from the scene were being stored.

Inside the box labeled ‘Brough Townhouse Fire Case,’ the burned belongings that still smelled of smoke had been neatly arranged.

From there, he selected the items collected from the baron and baroness’s room and their remains and placed them in a bag.

‘She never once asked us to return her parents’ belongings…….’

He thought as he continued selecting the personal effects without slowing his hands.

‘What kind of expression will Rosalyn Tessis make when she receives these?’

Would she be flustered? Would she shed tears? Or perhaps, would she ask what they were?

On his way to acknowledge and apologize for the police’s mistake.

For some reason, a sense of anticipation crept into what should have been heavy footsteps.