The Missing Tray Stayed With Me

I opened a rusted cupboard and immediately confirmed what employers mean by “clear route.” Clearly the route was clear if nobody had a pulse.

The supervisor called me a trespassing scavenger in front of Delya’s staff. I gave him the laugh because everyone was watching and a sulk would have looked worse. That does not mean it did not lodge under my skin. I could still hear the word “scavenger” every time I passed a laundry basket. I have been called worse by worse places, but I wanted them to know I had done the job properly. I wanted the case intact, the evidence clean, and no missing piece for him to wave at me.

Delya opening the inventory on the pavement saved me. Not my pride, exactly. My pride would not have let her do that. She made the missing tray feel less like my failure and more like a deliberate gap in Rale’s hiding place. That distinction matters, even if nobody else would understand why.

I keep looking at the photographs instead of the instruments. The false plate with Rale’s initials is too neat, too useful, too much like another door disguised as a dead end. I want to know what he thought he was protecting and whether he still believes I cannot follow a clue that other people found. It is childish, and it is still one of my strongest reasons to keep going.

The thought I keep circling is this: if I reach Clerkenwell and Rale has spent the afternoon preparing his version, I have to beat him without the cheap satisfaction of catching him. I want the truth, not merely the upper hand. But I would enjoy the upper hand. I would enjoy it thoroughly.