She fetched her laptop and typed in the name of the artist, Maddock Tipring. Nothing came up. So she tried Doc Tipring, and more about the artist came up—three articles in total. The first showed a picture of Doc at a city hall in Mandy Ford. He sat in a wheelchair before one of his art pieces, at least ten times the size of the ones she owned. She read the article, hoping to discover more, but the only thing he said was that the town had meaning for him and that he used to come there many times as a boy to hunt. And as far as she was concerned, the art had nothing to do with hunting.

The next was a short interview, also from a Mandy Ford newspaper. Sophia scanned the page until she came across the question: Why do you create art with tile? What does it symbolize?

On occasion I had used tile when working as an electrician and when I had to stop, boxes of leftover tiles sat about my upstairs flat. No one I knew wanted them so I began to use them for an idea I had.

So it doesn’t symbolize anything?

The tiles, no. However, the art, though it looks like nothing, has a great deal of meaning. Reminds me of the days before I lost my leg. There’s a story behind every single one.

A story behind each one? She couldn’t see any story. The folder containing information on each piece of art held no clues either—he had only numbered them. What possible meaning could they have held?

What was she doing? She was running in circles. Why run in circles, she said to herself, you’ll vomit. Onto the bed beside her, she threw the art reference folder and stretched her legs. Why couldn’t she just enjoy art like everyone else? Even in school, she over-analyzed art until the point her teacher told her she had taken all meaning out of it. She couldn’t help it. Every day she worked with numbers and codes. Her job entailed finding meaning in what others wouldn’t. Maybe Liam was right. Perhaps she liked them because they would resemble code she would have created herself.

Of course she would. In fact, the phrase Why Run Backwards You’ll Vomit was a code phrase. She paused. It was a code phrase. Could it be? His uncle worked in intelligence and Doc sent one to his uncle. Perhaps they were a message. A message only Doc and his uncle could understand. She had to understand too.

On the Internet, she looked up the phrase again. The first group of colors in the telecommunications wiring code was white, red, black, yellow, violet. Her eyes examined the tiles. Yes, there was a white tile, a red one, and also black, yellow, and one that could be violet. It couldn’t be. She looked at the next set of colors in the code: blue, orange, green, brown, gray. Her heart skipped a beat.

If she matched a color from the first set to each color in the second set she had a twenty-five pair code. With twenty-six letters in the alphabet, it wouldn’t be too difficult to make the letter Z a double white tile.

Her hands went to her mouth. She wasn’t just trying to find a code. There was a code staring at her. There was a reason she was drawn to the art! She wasn’t mad. The desire to immediately decrypt the code struck her but she held back. How was this different from reading Doc’s diary? He had never sold the pieces, but had kept every one. That must mean the messages were personal. She shook her head. If he meant them to be private, he wouldn’t have sold them. Perhaps he meant for someone to eventually figure it out. Maybe he meant for his uncle to decrypt them. He was the only person who would.

She started seeing if she could find a message in the tiles. The first two tiles were black and gray. Based on the code, that gave her the letter O. The next two tiles were white and gray which gave her an E. White and brown which gave her a D. A red and a brown gave her an I. And back again with the white and gray for an E. She looked at what she had so far O-E-D-I-E. What did that mean. OED? IE? Those were the endings to words and mostly vowels. She could pick out the word DIE but what is the OE before it?

The only thing she could do is continue on. After a few more letters she had: OEDIESOFULLOFGRACE. O Edie, so full of grace. That made much more sense. Who was Edie? She went over to her computer and did a search through the stolen Doc Tipring file. There was no mention of any Edie. Perhaps it was someone Doc used to love. So, she finished the code.

O Edie, so full of grace

I had nothing left

So it was only right

That you did burn that night.

What kind of poetry was that? Was Edie someone he had loved and lost? She went through all the files she had on Doc Tipring but found nothing. She decoded all the other pieces of art. What she read disturbed her even more. This was something she needed to talk to Theo about. She needed to examine Earnest Tipring’s notes further.

Her hands shook as she pushed the send button on her mobile. All she asked was whether she could discuss the art with him. She didn’t like to find any excuse to see him but Theo intrigued her. Almost as much as Doc did.

Within a minute, she received a reply: I’m in the office, can you meet me here?

She replied in the affirmative, printed out the code reference, and took pictures of each painting. At least Theo could see what she was on about. Not that he wouldn’t think she was crazy.

1

A half hour later, she entered the incident room. It was almost dark, only a small office in the back of the room had light.

“Theo?” she yelled.

She heard a squeak of a chair and saw a shadow cross the office behind closed blinds. The door opened, and a scruffy Theo stood before her.

“Were you working late?” she asked. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your work, especially to bring up an old case.”

“No,” he replied, “no bother.” His hair parted in a large round circle on the right side of his head. Clearly he had been sleeping for a while. “I’m just going to make myself a cup of coffee. Would you like some?”

She nodded.

“What old case did you want to discuss?”

“The Tipring murder. I know you think it’s because I bought his art that I’m concerned, but I’ve come across some really interesting . . . codes. Ones that I think will give us insights into the case. I decrypted all the art.”

“What? Are you telling me those tile things were actually code?”

“Not only were they code, they were incredibly disturbing as well. Read these.” She handed him the poems and he sat down to read them.

“He seems to be talking about women. What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, but each of the poems is pretty morbid, some implying the woman dies. Don’t you find that odd?”

“They could be just women in his mind or symbolic of something else.”

“Maybe, but don’t you find it odd that his uncle kept a file on him?”

“Not after reading these.” He held up the sheets of paper. “Perhaps it was just a game they played. His sister did say they got on. From the time he was a boy Tipring and his uncle exchanged codes.”

“Oh.” She sat down. “I feel so stupid. I can’t actually believe I thought there was something to this. I’ve been off my game lately.”

“I understand the feeling.”

“Here, you take these notes and add them to his file. You never know when they’ll come in handy. I best be off, it’s getting late.”

He took the papers and laid them on his desk. “You don’t have to leave you know.”

She paused for a moment before replying, “See you around, detective.”

She left the building and got in her car when her mobile rang. It was Theo. She hesitated to answer.

“Yes?” she asked.

“Where are you?” Theo asked.

“In my car. Why?”

“Come back up. You’re going to want to see this.”

When she re-entered his office he motioned her to the other side of his desk.