Chapter 13

The cops spentthe rest of the day and night collecting evidence and questioning suspects. Serafina spent the rest of the day convincing them not to close down the theater as the show's opening night was now less than twenty-four hours away. A little money into the hands of Wilde City's police chief didn't go astray, but Serafina was warned that as soon as opening night was over, a full investigation would begin.

It was also agreed that Stanley Small would be released from jail immediately, given that he was clearly no longer a suspect, and that Miss Overton now had a bigger role to play other than that of rope-wrangler.

"At least we'll have our stage manager back," Serafina muttered, glaring at Miss Overton. "I hope you're better at The Dance of the Cobra than you were at ropes and sandbags."

"Just watch me," Miss Overton said with more confidence than I had ever seen her display. "I'm ready to shine like a star!"

"You'd better be," warned Serafina. "Otherwise I'll make sure you spend the rest of your life waiting tables and washing dishes."

When Stella and I left the theater, it was well past midnight.

"If you ask me, it was the whole damn lot of them!" Stella announced flippantly. "Miss Overton did it so she could have the lead. Errol did it so he could get into Miss Overton's happy pants. Barnabas probably got paid to do it so he could afford his gigolo addiction. Raja probably arranged for his cousin to ship the snake in from India. And Serafina did it because… well, just because that bitch hates everybody!"

I stopped walking. "What did you just say?"

"What's the matter, you got a little gum still stuck in your ears too?" Stella shouted, "That bitch hates—"

"No, before that. You mentioned something about the snake being shipped in."

"Are you kidding me? Of course it did. That weren't no cottonmouth from the Louisiana swamps. Raja already admitted his cousin imports lots of exotic things in from India. Who's to say he didn't hide a snake in his crate of Ceylon tea?"

For once, she was right. I crouched down to her level. "Stella, go home, get some sleep, then first thing in the morning find out what kinda snake that was."

"It was a cobra, stupid."

"I know that. But what kinda of cobra? Where is it from? Why would a cobra like that be here in Wilde City? And who could have brought it into the country if not Raja Kahn or his cousin?"

Stella looked at me with excitement. "You mean you want me to dig up some dirt? Talk to some lowlifes? Rummage through people's trash if I have to?"

"It's called investigating."

"Who needs sleep, I'm on the case! At last I can get my hands filthy!"

With that, Stella raced away into the night on her short but fast-moving legs.

As for me, I knew we were getting closer and closer to cracking this case. But first, I needed to clear my head, search my soul, and seek out the only true wisdom I knew of in Wilde City.