Chapter Text
Our story is about a city, and the people who live in that city. It's about the dark corners, the hiding places nobody knows where the hand of the law doesn't quite reach. It's about broken-down old buildings, about concealed switchblades. It's about what is commonly known as chiaroscuro: the intense, blinding contrast between light and dark. In this city, though, there's a little more oscuro than there is chiaro.
The name of our city is Riverdale.
I've lived in Riverdale long enough to know that nobody knows half of a percentage of what there is to know about it. So when I heard the purr of an engine by the sidewalk outside my office and went to take a look out the front window, I was hardly surprised that I didn't recognize the car, or the redhead behind the wheel, or the blonde getting out of the passenger side. Riverdale's a small city living in the remains of a bigger one, but we're not small enough yet to turn into one of those towns where everyone knows everyone and everyone's business to boot. The day that happens, I'll be out of a job, because if you want to know something in one of those towns, you're best off asking a little old lady.
The redhead parked and kept on loitering. He seemed like one of those pointless sorts of people that either goes nowhere at ninety miles an hour or goes somewhere at five. The blonde shut the passenger side door and started marching up the sidewalk.
That was unusual. Usually, when I get a client, they march three steps, stop, look back, walk down the street, walk back, twist their fingers in their handbag if they're a lady and stuff their hands in their pockets if they're not, draw themselves up stiffly, mutter to themselves something along the lines of "I've got to do it!", march two more steps like they're being chased by the devil, sink back and stare at the "Twilight Investigations" sign, then either resolutely stride up to ring the doorbell, or turn tail and flee for the car.
I let her out of the waiting room, which was more of a closet anyway, and sat down at my desk, watching her. "Good morning," I said.
She looked up from the ground, which had been interesting her immensely. "Oh! Good morning, Mr.--Jones," she greeted, her eyes flicking to the nameplate on my desk. "I don't have an appointment, but the office seemed empty, and I only have an hour before I have to go back, so I thought I'd try."
"Okay," I said, more interested in my visitor than her schedule. As I'd noticed from outside, she was blonde--not dirty blonde or platinum blonde or honey blonde, but the real deal. Up close, she had two blue-green eyes a fraction short of over-large (currently turned appealingly towards me), a mouth painted over in tulip pink, a nose of the customary sort, and skin of the variety that more romantically minded people might term "Dresden-china". She was wearing some sort of wool jacket-and-skirt set in a rather unassuming shade of tan over a pastel pink blouse, with stockings and flats. Her handbag was of the "sensible" family, but she carried it as if it was a glamorous accessory. She wasn't any older than me, which is to say that if she knew what was good for her, she should have been at some sort of boarding school instead of messing around on the seamy side of town. All in all, she couldn't have been more guileless-looking if she had worn her hair in two plaits with blue ribbon bows at the end and carried a sign that read "Ingenue."
Clients don't come into a PI office looking that naïve unless they have a definite reason.
She was still standing at the far end of the office, eyeing the scattered chairs like she intended to defend herself fiercely when they inevitably rose up to attack her. "Sit," I suggested. "You want advice?"
The best judge of a client's character is the way they sit down. Any PI worth his salt puts a variety of chairs out there, none of them so close to the desk as to be considered a shoo-in. She took a good, long look at the assemblage, which today consisted (in order of closeness to the desk) of a yellow horsehair armchair with a high back, a wooden stool upholstered in blue, a tall wicker something-or-other, and a red monstrosity that was somewhere south of a couch and somewhere north of a loveseat.
The clients who know what they're about head for the first available seat that puts their eyes somewhere near mine in level. If they're trying to trick me, that goes double. She took a long hard look at the wicker, dismissed it, and glided over to the monstrosity, on which she sat with her ankles crossed and her back straight. The effect was something out of an advertisement for a finishing school. Her eyes ended up a few inches below mine, though. "Yes," she said, getting herself settled. "I do want advice--sort of."
I took a perfunctory glance at her ring finger: empty, which wasn't surprising at her age. "Before we start, I don't follow cheating boy-friends. Or recover incriminating photographs."
She flushed a definite red, half-smiled, then bit her bottom lip. The smile beat a hasty retreat. "You mean Archie, right? No, he hasn't got anything to do with why I'm here. He just drove me so my mother wouldn't know."
"Archie is the redhead outside?"
A quick nod.
"And you are?" I prompted.
"Betty. Betty Cooper."
The name rang a very faint bell, but it wasn't an alarm sort of bell, so I pressed on. "Nice to meet you, Miss Cooper. What do you need advice about?"
She took a deep, shuddering breath, fixing her eyes on the ground. When she looked up, her eyes were dead serious. "I need you to find my sister."
"Did your mom cheat on your dad, or vice versa? You can pay me to hunt up the lovechild's address, but Town Hall might be an easier bet." She was obviously going through rough times, and maybe I should have been nicer, but anyone who knows me knows that sardonic humor is just my way of relating to the world.
The red flush made an encore appearance. "She's my full sister, Mr. Jones. I don't think you get what I'm saying. She's gone missing."
Silently, I pulled a pad of paper towards myself and prepared to take notes. She noticed it in the corner of her eye, paused for a millisecond, then continued in a clear voice as if determined to take the plunge and be done with it. "I've been at college up until recently. Out-of-state in a journalism program. Then I did a program of study abroad in Paris with some friends. I wasn't in in touch with my family at all, really. When I got back home--that was a few weeks ago--my sister wasn't there."
I jotted down the salient points and looked up. "Your sister's name is--?"
"Polly," she answered.
"And she looks like you? Any differences I should know about in terms of describing her?"
"People mistake us for twins."
"When she disappeared, did the police investigate?"
She shook her head slightly. "That's the thing. It was all completely legal. My sister supposedly had a nervous breakdown and tried to kill herself. My parents committed her to an asylum." She leaned forward pleadingly. "But I know Polly's not insane. You have to understand, Mr. Jones, I've known Polly my entire life--I know her better than anyone I've ever met. If there was something, anything like that, I would have known." Her eyes locked on mine with a burning intensity. "Polly's not insane," she repeated.
"So you want me to find her?" I asked in a businesslike manner.
"I'm not done yet. I'm a journalism student; I can follow a paper trail as well as anyone else can. I found my mother's financial records and tracked Polly down two days ago." That was impressive, I had to admit. I asked for the name of the asylum, and she gave it.
"And then--?" I prompted delicately.
"And by the time I got there, Polly had run away. She broke her window minutes before I arrived and jumped out. I want you to find her before the police do," she insisted. She gave me a sidelong glance as I opened my mouth to protest. "My parents can't have her. The place where they were keeping her was awful! I saw it myself, I took pictures--"
"You're asking me to break the law," I pointed out. The naïve schoolgirl act was beginning to seem less incongruous. Only the really scary ones tried to act innocent.
"No, I'm not," she insisted hotly. Then she calmed herself down. "I'm not asking you to withhold information from the police, or to stop my parents from getting Polly. I've got that part of things covered. If somebody asks you flat out what you're doing or what you know, go ahead and tell them." She gave a little shrug, probably to illustrate her indifference.
"And you can pay? On your own?"
Her eyes rolled faintly towards the ceiling. "Yes, I can pay. I have savings from some columns I did on the side."
"I'll take your word for it," I decided. It wasn't like business was exactly booming at the moment.
"Alright. I feel so relieved, you have no idea. What do you need me to do?" she asked.
"Nothing?" I suggested. "That's kind of the point of hiring a private eye."
"Let me know if there's any more information I can get you," she said, standing up fluidly.
"You really want to get involved, huh?" I observed.
"I'd do it all myself if I had the faintest idea how to start," she confirmed resolutely. That was something I could well believe, from what I'd learned of her. There were gaps, but I had a fairly well-formed picture of Betty Cooper's life. It was an ability I prided myself on: taking bits and pieces of fact and weaving it into conjecture, like an author establishing a backstory.
"I'm sure you would, Miss Cooper." I went to open the door for her, standing to the side to leave room for her to pass. She retrieved her handbag from the floor and stood a moment longer.
"You're sure there's nothing I can do?" she asked again.
I shook my head. She deflated a little in disappointment, but after a moment, she perked herself up and headed for the door.
When she was about a foot away, I reached out and snagged the sleeve of her top between two fingers. She turned, outraged, raising a hand to slap me. Then her eyes darted down, as she took in what I was looking at. "That's nothing," she mumbled hastily. We remained there for a moment in tableau.
"Why don't you come back inside, Miss Cooper?" I suggested.
She shook her head. "I really must be going."
"You said you had an hour."
Her eyes widened. "No, I had an hour inclusive, which comes to twenty minutes if you count driving time. Mr. Jones, the marks on my hand are--"
"Several layers of self-inflicted scars caused by digging your nails into your skin. You want to tell me what that's got to do with things? Did Polly teach you that?" If Polly had self-harmed, then maybe a suicide attempt wasn't too far out of the question--
Her eyes darted to the door. "I don't see how that's your business--"
"Did Polly do that?" I pressed again.
"What? No, you have to believe me, Polly's not insane!" Her hands twitched upwards as if she wanted to cover her ears.
"Nobody's saying she is. Listen, if you have to go, you have to go. But I'll tell you what. Can you get away tonight?"
She seemed much more at ease now that I'd dropped the other line of questioning. "Yes. Yes, I can."
"Alright. Bring any hard evidence you have, and meet me at the Blue and Gold. You old enough to drink?" I asked, giving her a hard look. She didn't look it, but neither did I.
"Yes, I am. Can I have the address?"
I told it to her, and she gave me a card with her number and address in case I needed to get a hold of her, along with detailed instructions for lies to tell her mother when I did call. She asked if I had better ideas for mother-evasion tactics, seeing as I was the professional, but I demurred, since having no mother to speak of doesn't exactly lend itself to the practice of mother-dodging. Then I changed the topic, since she looked to be in danger of pitying me. "The Blue and Gold's where I always start when I want to know something. Get there whenever you can make it. I'll shoot to get there around nine. Go to the bar and ask for Ronnie; tell her you're a friend of mine and she'll keep an eye on you. I have some people I can talk to there, and if you keep fairly quiet, you can listen in." It might be useful to have her there anyway. I don't know half the names I ought to in this business, and so she'd be able to give me a sense of which leads seemed relevant. Besides I figured that keeping her occupied might keep her nails out of her palms for a bit. Sue me for soft-heartedness.
"I really have to go now," she insisted.
"Nobody's stopping you," I observed.
"Yes. Alright, then. Tonight, at nine. Goodbye, Mr. Jones." She shook my hand and was gone. I watched through the windows as she loaded herself into the car, startling the redhead from a reverie that apparently involved fingering guitar chords in the air. He woke up quick, though, and hit the gas the instant she hit the seat leather. They tore off faster than any non-suicidal beings ought to, and were gone before I had time to blink.