The Mysterious Maestro #1

 

Chapter One: The Knife in the Spotlight

The crowd didn’t know whether to scream or applaud. For a heartbeat, everything seemed like part of the act.

Matt Harris stood still, his outstretched hand frozen mid-gesture as the assistant slowly drifted down from the rigged suspension wire. The lights dimmed automatically, but it was too late. The red pool beneath the elegant figure in yellow was already spreading.

Then the scream came again — not from the woman, but from somewhere in the crowd. A shrill, human wail. That was no illusion.

The spotlight operator — Jimmy, a kid from Bronzeville — swung the beam downward, illuminating the body more clearly. Gasps broke out like fireworks. A man tried to shield his wife's eyes. A white child pointed and asked if this was “another trick.”

It wasn’t.

Harris descended from the stage in slow, deliberate steps, careful not to run, careful not to panic. His years in front of crowds had taught him how quickly fear spreads. He knelt beside the woman, his shadow casting long and thin across the sawdust.

He didn’t need a stethoscope to know Lillian Archer was gone. The knife — a long, thin blade with a bone handle — had been expertly placed. Almost too expertly. It was meant for one thing: to kill, clean and silent.

A ring of carnival security was already forming, along with Calvin Harper III in his ever-immaculate cream suit, trying to look like he was in charge.

“Matt…” Calvin hissed, his voice shaking. “Is this one of your—?”

“No.” Harris stood, his voice low and measured. “And if you don’t get the crowd under control, we’ll have more bodies to explain.”

Calvin blinked. Then nodded. “Right. Right.”

Matt turned back to the corpse. Lillian Archer. Why here? Why now?

That’s when he saw the footprints.

Small, shallow imprints leading away from the body — not toward the back, not toward the crowd — but toward the lion cages, tucked in the rear corner of the grounds.

A second later, the shouting started.

Someone had been found near the cages. Blood on her hands. Clothes torn. Babbling nonsense.

It was Leona.

Matt didn’t run — he walked fast, cutting through the midway. The smell of popcorn and sweat clung to the humid air. Lights blinked overhead like nervous eyes.

By the time he got there, Leona was already in cuffs, two beat cops holding her by either arm.

Her eyes met Matt’s.

They didn’t plead. They didn’t beg.

They burned.

“You know I didn’t do this, Matt,” she said through clenched teeth. “You damn well know it.”

He did.

But knowing wouldn’t be enough.

To Be Continued...

See how Matt Harris came to be