Another Detective
At Conan's question, Kouichi Takeuchi blinked in surprise. It struck him as a little odd for a small child to be the one asking, but he answered in earnest all the same.
"They didn't come today. Honestly, I found it strange myself. Up until now, the letters have always arrived in the morning — but this morning, nothing."
"Maybe the culprit's given up?" Mouri Kogoro offered.
Conan didn't think so. From what Editor-in-Chief Takeuchi had said earlier, it was clear that reporter Charlotte hadn't been intimidated in the slightest by the threatening letters. In other words, the culprit's purpose in sending them hadn't been achieved — there was no way they would quit halfway through.
"Unlikely. Charlotte has shown no intention whatsoever of halting her investigation, so..." Takeuchi's thinking, evidently, ran along the same lines as Conan's.
"Then why no threat letter today?" Mouri Kogoro couldn't wrap his head around it. Had the culprit simply forgotten?
"Could they have mailed it straight to Miss Charlotte's home instead?"
That was Conan's conjecture.
Takeuchi's eyes went wide. "That's entirely possible! Right — I need to go check on Charlotte immediately." He rose to his feet.
"Mouri-detective, would you mind coming with me? If someone really has delivered a threat letter to her door, I may need your help when we get there."
"Huh? Of course." Mouri Kogoro agreed without a second thought — it was the only case on his plate, after all.
Before long, Kouichi Takeuchi and the Mouris stood before an apartment building in Beika-cho.
Glancing at the building, then sideways at Ran, Kogoro couldn't help grumbling, "Honestly, Ran, what did you come along for? The client asked for me — the great detective — and no one else."
"What's the harm? I'm worried about Miss Charlotte too," Ran replied. "Besides, if the culprit skips the letters and decides to get physical, you might need me to protect you."
"And why is this brat here?" Kogoro's gaze dropped downward.
Conan flashed him his most charming smile. "Maybe I can help out somehow."
Oh, please. Without me, there's no way you'd ever find the culprit on your own!
Kogoro rolled his eyes, clearly giving Conan's words no weight whatsoever.
Well, they're here already. Might as well bring everyone.
After a few parting instructions to Ran and Conan, the group followed Takeuchi up to the fourth floor and stopped in front of apartment 406.
He pressed the doorbell. No answer came, no matter how long they waited.
Takeuchi's nerves were visibly fraying by the second.
"That's odd — why isn't anyone home? It's her day off. Charlotte almost always stays in organizing her materials," he said anxiously.
Hearing this, the others began to worry about Charlotte's safety as well.
At last, when Mouri Kogoro suggested breaking down the door, a panicked Takeuchi agreed. The two men exchanged a look, squared themselves, and readied to ram the door together.
"Editor-in-Chief, what on earth are you doing?"
Thankfully, a woman's voice rang out just in time, stopping both men mid-charge — and saving Charlotte's front door from destruction.
Only, her shout had come a beat too late. Momentum carried Kogoro and Takeuchi forward, and they thudded into the door anyway.
They had managed to pull most of their strength at the last instant, but the impact still wasn't light. Kogoro and Takeuchi clutched their foreheads in unison, heads spinning.
Ran rushed forward to steady her father, concern all over her face, while Charlotte hurried over to check on her editor.
That left Conan, the only one with nothing to do, free to observe the central figure of this threat-letter affair.
To be honest, Miss Charlotte cut a rather different figure from the image he'd formed in his mind — the poised, coolly intellectual journalist who feared no powerful enemy and dared to expose the truth. She seemed anything but reserved; if anything, her personality was lively and a little flighty. You'd never guess she was capable of writing articles with prose that sharp.
"Charlotte, where were you just now?" Once the dizziness had passed, Editor-in-Chief Takeuchi whirled around to face her.
"Eh? I was organizing my investigation files when I heard someone sneaking around outside my door. I opened it and caught a stranger stuffing something into my mailbox. He was so startled when the door swung open that he dropped the letter — I picked it up and chased after him." As she spoke, Charlotte held up the white envelope she'd been clutching the whole time.
"Charlotte! How many times have I told you — be careful, be careful! Do my words just go in one ear and out the other?! You saw a suspicious person and just chased after him without a thought — what if it had been dangerous?!" At her words, Takeuchi forgot all about the threat letter and launched into another lecture on her personal safety.
"......"
Watching the editor show no sign of stopping, Conan stepped forward and slipped the envelope out of Charlotte's hand to examine it. Her attention was clearly elsewhere by now, and she let it go without protest.
He turned the envelope over. It was sealed with glue, and had not yet been opened.
Carefully, he tore it open and drew out the letter inside. Sure enough, both the envelope and the paper were made of the exact same material as the three threat letters that had arrived at the detective agency.
Just as he was about to unfold the letter, Conan felt a speechless twinge as two heads popped up on either side of him — Kogoro and Ran had crowded over, curiosity written across their faces.
Sighing inwardly, he paused for only a moment before opening the letter.
Written across the paper, in bold strokes, was: This is your FINAL warning!!!
The last three exclamation marks were a vivid, glistening red — as if written in blood.
Ran's whole body jolted, and she swayed backward in alarm.
Conan never got the chance to play the gallant — Charlotte had already caught her by the arm before he could move, reassuring her: "Don't be scared. That's not blood — it's just written in red paint."
Conan sniffed at the paper. No scent of blood, just as she'd said.
He shot Charlotte a probing look. How had she known it wasn't blood from that far away? He filed the question away for later.
By this point, Takeuchi had finally said his fill and let Charlotte off the hook, taking the opportunity to introduce her to the Mouris.
When she heard that Kogoro and company were detectives he had personally hired to resolve the threat-letter case, an awkward smile crossed Charlotte's face.
"What is it? Is something wrong?" Takeuchi noticed her strained expression and asked, puzzled.
Charlotte hesitated, wrestling with herself for a moment, then answered in a small voice, "Well... the thing is... I may have already hired a detective of my own to deal with this..."
"What?!" Takeuchi's eyes went wide with shock.