The Barker Street Regulars

others?
    Rowdy had been a good, quiet boy. Transmitting unspoken words of praise, I stepped carefully back to him and rubbed his head in gratitude. Then I silently patted my leg to signal him to get up. As he rose, I took long strides away from the alcove in case he decided to treat himself to the kind of full-body shake that might be audible through the panes. Distracted by my eager steps, he trotted with me to the corner of the house. When we reached it, I turned left, slowed my pace, and walked toward the fence in confident search of the gate to Upper Norwood Road. Why head back down through Ceci’s yard, where we would certainly have another encounter with Hugh and Robert, and might almost literally run into Irene’s confederate? Instead, we’d follow Upper Norwood to the fork. As we did, I’d make a new plan.
    Confidence was my word of the moment. Self-confidence, that is. I now knew that Ceci was innocent. And for the first time, I understood exactly what Irene was up to. Con artists, Kevin had insisted, are never violent. Irene, I now saw, was a true con artist on the verge of a major sting. Would a bona-fide grifter have allowed violence to ruin everything? But how much control did she have over her violent confederate? Watson had cured Holmes of the cocaine habit. The man with the bulbous forehead was no Dr. Watson. Did Irene depend on him for the means to commit violence against herself? Even if he had murdered Jonathan without her foreknowledge, she was an accessory after the fact. But had he murdered Jonathan at all?
    Hugh and Robert remained a mystery to me. They were human snails: I knew their shells, but had only glimpsed the animals inside. Effective armor, I thought, always created an appearance of caricature. Armadillos, for instance, were foolish-looking, although probably not to one another. And real dog people? I’d known thousands of men and women almost exclusively as collie fanciers, top obedience handlers, AKC judges, Akita breeders, active members of kennel clubs, or Doberman people, for instance. I was equally at ease with presenting myself dog first, so to speak. I was as malamutian as Robert and Hugh were Holmesian. In my case, the persona and the soul were one. A chromosomal examination would undoubtedly reveal that I possessed the canine complement of thirty-nine pairs instead of the human twenty-three pairs. If you scratched Hugh and Robert, what sort of Study in Scarlet would flow? Did the fluid run only along the surface of the extremities? Did it gush through the heart? Were their hearts set on Althea? Or on the character she represented to them— the former lover of the King of Bohemia, the woman in someone else’s life? The woman with a face that a man might die for! Had they killed for her? If so, for the person or the persona?
    Hugh and Robert lurked downhill. Both were armed. The spectral Simon was apparently late for his scheduled appearance. He and his handler would approach from Lower Norwood Road. Reaching the fence that separated Ceci’s yard from Upper Norwood, I searched for the gate. Her house was to my immediate left. The kitchen was on the opposite side of the house. I had no idea what room lay beyond the dark windows on this side. The gate should be here, shouldn’t it? Midway between the house and the property line. The fence that ran along Lower Norwood was of some expensive variety of coated chain link. The gate there was iron. Here, a wooden fence that matched the style of the house presented an attractive face to Upper Norwood Road. I’d noticed it when I’d brought Kimi here. On the other side of the house, the wooden fence and gate that ran between the big colonial and the garage were topped with a foot or two of handsome latticework that I’d admired. Now, a gas lamp on the street let me see the same latticework atop the fence on this side. Shouldn’t the same light creep around the outline of the gate? But this was a solidly constructed fence. Holding Rowdy’s leash in my left hand, I explored the heavy boards with my right. The gate could be anywhere, really, I told myself, here in the middle of the fence, next to the house, or next to the adjoining yard. Its latch was probably at waist level. I slowly worked my way from the center of the fence toward the house and found no latch, no handle, no hinges, no indication of a gate. Backtracking, I did a thorough search. Latches were sometimes set high up, weren’t they? My fingers felt for metal,