House of the Morningstar: Chapter 9
Created | Updated Mar 19, 2023
House of the Morningstar: Chapter 9
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Today I was introduced to Hank. Well, at least everyone calls him Hank. Nobody is sure how to spell his name or how to pronounce it, so everyone calls him Hank and he never complained. In fact Hank doesn't talk much at all, it seems. He shook my hand and smiled nicely, but nobody is sure which language he speaks and all tries to communicate failed. So... basically Hank sits at his work station in Imre's office and does... nobody could tell me. He does whatever Hank does. And he doesn't show up every day and sometimes is gone after an hour. Whenever they tried to get him to contribute, Hank didn't understand a thing, so at some point they just gave up. That was a few months ago. So Hank just sits there. Someone tried to talk to the boss about it, but of course he didn't want to hear any of it. He needs every worker he can get, they were told. They should be grateful for his help, and anyhow, Hank's resume showed that he had once worked somewhere some day, so that had to be good. That's also why he was hired in a senior position – with appropriate pay. We could all probably learn something from Hank – if anyone would understand him.
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Wildlife
Harry was sitting at a work station in a boring beige office at the central police station together with a number of other people. He looked out of the window, watching the clouds rush by in a hazy sky. There was a small bird at the feeder outside of the window, which was half hidden in the dark red leaves of a creeping vine. Harry watched it for a while, then turned back to his work.
Harry had found footage of two wildlife suvaillance drones which passed over the area. Due to the fog none of them had any visual data, both did however record various heat patterns. The first drone came through at 2:42. It recorded couple of deer in the field, running somewhere as fast as they could. Or from somewhere? Then it crossed over the Morgenstern estate, where it recorded a person in the garden near to the house. That could have been Henry Morgenstern or someone else, the footage could not give that information.
The second drone passed at 3:30. It recorded an owl on a tree at the edge of the forest and then a fox hunting in the fields. When it corssed the Martin farm there was clearly a man and a dog outside of the house, hastily crossing the yard. That may have been Mr Martin running to fight his rogue robot. When the drone crossed the fields between the farm and the Morgenstern estate a large number small of birds flew out of the bushes and a badger ran towards the forest at top speed.
Harry frowned. Something had obviously frightened the animals, but there was no indication of what it might have been. The drones showed nothing out of the ordinary. As the drone passed over the Morgenstern estate nothing was to be seen. At this time, Harry knew, Henry Morgenstern was persumably already dead, lying in the glass house, but the heat sensors could not penetrate the glass to show it. And then there was someone else.
At what time did Henry's daughter Angela leave? Harry looked it up. Her flight left at 6am, she was supposed to leave the house at roughly the right time. So Harry assumed it was Angela who left the house and got into a car when the drone came through. And what then? Harry looked at the notes which were stored in the police system. It was verified that Angela checked in at the correct time and got on her flight, but then her traces were lost. She must have arrived at her destination at some point, surely? Harry took a note about looking into it himself.
There was another note in the system: someone had made a full inventory of Henry Morgenstern's office. The list was long and detailed. He quickly skimmed through it. There were mostly books, some artworks, writing supplies and technology. Nothing out of the ordinary. The poor soul who had written it all down had also questioned Robert Morgenstern about the list, but he could not spot anything that was missing. He was sure some of the artworks were not cheap, but all of them were accounted for. He had mentioned an antique letter opener, but it turned up on a shelf in the living room.
Harry sighed and leaned back in his chair, then quickly leaned forward again as he almost toppled over. It was not the best chair. This was just a police station after all. He took a sip of his coffee, which also was not particularly good. He sighed again. He wished that there was any progress. Hopefully Elanor had more luck in her inquiries.
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