Hadia nodded slowly. “You really still think he’s the imposter?”
“He’s where our investigation left off.”
“But why disrupt a peace summit his father helped plan?”
Fatma didn’t have an answer. Why disrupt the summit at all? It was one thing to sow chaos in Cairo, but an international meeting of world leaders and dignitaries? That was upping the stakes considerably. Then there was the Clock of Worlds. It still bothered her that the one thing they lacked for this imposter, whoever he might be, was a motive—or an endgame. Still … “Alexander Worthington’s absence at a moment al-Jahiz makes an appearance is at least suspicious,” she noted.
Hadia chewed her lip. “Checked on that. It was one of the things you mentioned last night before disappearing. Turns out Alexander did try to attend, but had car trouble. His driver confirmed it.”
“Convenient,” Fatma huffed.
“There’s more.” Hadia pulled a folder from her satchel, placing it onto the table. “I had some research done on Alexander last week. Results came back this morning.”
Fatma raised an eyebrow. “You mean you did what we were expressly forbidden to do?”
Hadia blushed. “I have a cousin who works in Immigration and Customs. I merely suggested it might be good to look into Alexander Worthington as a foreign national. Standard background review.”
Fatma opened the folder. “I’m really liking your cousins. What am I looking at?”
“Military school records. Turns out Alexander isn’t exactly what he seems—but not in the way you might think. See his graduation?”
Fatma scanned the page. Alexander did attend military school as he claimed. Only his marks were less than stellar. Dismal in fact. “Bottom percentile,” she read. “He barely passed.”
Hadia handed over another sheet. “You know how he went on about serving in India? He spent most of his time game hunting sacred Makara. The one battle he did lead was a disaster. He and his men had to be rescued. My cousin claims his commanding officer wouldn’t stop talking about how useless he was as a captain. Was relieved when he left for Egypt.” She shook her head. “Alexander doesn’t strike me as some great mastermind. More a mediocre Englishman.”
Fatma looked over the file. It seemed the Worthington name, rather than merit, had bought him the rank of officer. She closed the folder, unsure what to make of it. Alexander was still their best lead. He was involved. Somehow.
“You’re not the only one who went digging,” she said. “Contacted a bookie I know about that Illusion djinn Siwa.” Khalid confirmed the djinn was well known among the betting circle—for placing hefty wagers, making fantastic winnings, and then losing it just as fast. “Siwa’s in debt, like we thought. The money wired him went right into paying some of that off—and placing new bets. But it’s a long way from proving anything.”
“So how do we get proof?” Hadia asked.
Fatma finished her cup. “We start with what we have and work from there. Did you get the items I gave you last night to forensics?”
“Dropped them off before I went home. Told the clerk on duty we needed a quick turnaround.”
“Good. Let’s see what they’ve found.” She stood up, adjusting her bowler. “Then we need to have a talk with our librarian.”
Entering the Ministry after the attack was surreal—like walking in on a patient undergoing surgery. The debris had been cleared, and masons were recasting the emblem—laying down fresh blue quartz where the stone had been chipped away. High above on scaffolding, a blue-skinned djinn with black curling horns barked out commands to a crew of harnessed workers dangling by ropes. They worked fitting together gears under the djinn’s frantic instructions, calls of “Yes, ya bash-mohandes, right away!” ringing out. She heard the djinn architect had cried when he saw the destroyed clockwork brain. Their old building was dead and gone, but he’d construct a new brain to make it live again.
The elevators at least were working, operated for the time by boilerplate eunuchs. She signaled to the machine-man they were headed to the third floor, and watched the doors close, dulling the cacophony of the workers.
“I’m hoping Dr. Hoda can give us some clues,” she told Hadia.
“Dr. Hoda? The chief of forensics is a woman?”
“You didn’t know? Been with the Ministry since the beginning. Kept it quiet, though, so as not to cause a scandal. Was easier when headquarters was stuck out in Bulaq. Ministry tried to keep her there when the new building opened in 1900 and hired a forensic paranormalist to be the public face. Only he wasn’t very good. Agents bypassed him, sending everything to Dr. Hoda. He got upset, I hear, insisted either she’d go or he would.”
“Guess we know how that ended,” Hadia deduced as the doors opened.
Supernatural Forensics took up the third floor—a maze of desks topped by laboratory equipment and gadgets. Men in white coats bustled about, peering through spectral goggles at specimens or taking measurements with calipers. The laboratory had taken damage during the attack, as rampaging ghuls smashed instruments and overturned tables. They were beaten back by Dr. Hoda, who whipped up an alchemical concoction that melted the undead to soupy puddles. You just didn’t mess with her lab.
They found the chief of forensics in a room with darkened windows, sitting before a large glass orb filled with clear liquid being heated under a burner. Dr. Hoda peered at it through an odd contraption covering half her face—with about eight lenses of various sizes, some retracting or extending at the tap of a finger. Her hair was a frizzy gray mass like a halo, with some strands dangling heedlessly close to the open flame. She paid no mind to that, studiously holding a dropper to a spout at the sphere’s top.
“Mind your eyes,” she remarked, not looking to them, and let a tiny globule fall from
