Page 16 of When 're Silent

“I got us here in one piece, didn’tI?” Finn replied.

“Barely,” she quipped.

“Did you almost lose your falseteeth?”

“Pretty sure you’re older than me,Cowboy,” retorted Amelia.

“So this is the place?” Finn asked,gesturing to several large, Elizabethan looking buildings.

“I believe so.”

Finn took another look at thecampus. “Looks classy. You better let me take the lead.”

Amelia let out a snort as sheinvoluntarily laughed hard.

Finn found it adorable. “If you aregoing to snort, please don’t do it in front of the academics.”

“Come on, you,” Amelia said.

They exited quickly, their feetsounding on white gravel as they made their way to the entrance of one of thebuildings. The hallowed halls of academia were quiet, the usual thrum ofstudent life absent under the cloak of investigation.

“I guess it’s pretty dead aroundhere on a Saturday,” Finn observed.

Finn and Amelia stepped through theheavy wooden doors of the Elizabethan building, their footsteps echoing in theempty corridor. The dim lighting cast long shadows on the walls, adding to theeerie atmosphere that seemed to permeate the entire campus.

“The case file said his office ison the ground floor here,” Amelia said.

“Feels like we’ve stepped back intime,” Finn muttered, his eyes scanning the rows of closed office doors liningboth sides of the hallway.

Each door bore a small brass plaquewith a name and title, indicating the occupant within. Amelia nodded inagreement, her gaze focused on a particularly ornate door at the far end of thecorridor.

“That must be Hemingway’s office,”she said, pointing towards it.

They approached the heavy oak doormarked with a brass plaque engraved with Hemingway’s name.

“Cordial or intrusive?” Finnwhispered.

“Let’s try intrusive for a change,”Amelia answered.

Finn’s hand hovered over thehandle.

"Ready?" Amelia asked,her voice steady, but Finn could see the anticipation in her eyes.

“Always,” he replied, his griptightening. With a deep breath, he pushed the door open and stepped into theunknown.

Finn stepped across the threshold,the scent of old leather and parchment letting him know that this was asanctuary for the intellectually devout. More than that, it also let him knowthey were on the right track.

The office of Prof. HaroldHemingway was less a room and more a monument to the past, with historicalartifacts lining the walls like sentinels. Among them were ancient manuscriptsencased in glass and relics Finn could only guess at their origins. The air wasthick with the musk of time-worn books on linguistics, which filled toweringshelves to the brim.

Amelia brushed her fingers across aglobe antiquated by centuries, its surface a tapestry of explorations longconcluded. At the center of this academic treasure trove sat Hemingway himself,hunched over his desk littered with parchments so similar to those found at thecrime scene that Finn’s pulse quickened.

“Professor Hemingway?” Finn’s voicecut through the stillness, causing the elderly man to look up with a start. Hishair was a wild mane of white, his clothes a disarray of academia—tweed jacketwith elbow patches worn thin, bow tie askew. He peered at them through roundspectacles, magnifying wary eyes.

He glared at them for a moment andthen almost grunted. "I know you two, I've seen your cases in the Times.Finn Wright, isn't it and Amelia Winters?"

Finn usually liked when peoplerecognized them, he had grown accustomed to that. But when a suspect knew moreabout them than they did of him, that provided a distinct disadvantage.

“Detective Wright, Miss Winters,”he reiterated with a cautious nod, as if acknowledging players in a chess gamehe had been anticipating.

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