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Parson rifled through his box another time while Overra picked up the conversation for him.

‘Believe it or not, we aren’t trying to annoy you,’ she said. ‘We DO have the evidence you’re looking for, but we also wanted to establish a more precise sense of what is at stake here. Hopefully, you understand that much now, yes?’

The Gargoyle might as well have been made of actual stone, for all the response she gave.

‘And... well, the evidence involves some photographs... which I’m sure Parson will find... any second now.’ She tossed a few glances at her servant. ‘They depict the Elroys in various places, you see. And I’m sure you’ll understand once--’

“Got ‘em!” Parson pulled out another folder. “Sorry about that. It seems it was misfiled.” He threw a look up at the General still atop the gate. “Lawrence can be such a dolt, sometimes.” He offered the folder to Sanko, but she didn’t take it just yet.

“If these photographs are so damning, then why were we not informed of their existence earlier? Over the telephone, for instance. Did you not think to save us the trip here?”

“Ah, well, I apologize for that. It was an unfortunate miscommunication. And you know how these things are. With so much going on--so many moving parts. Sometimes the right hand forgets to tell the left hand that it has been conducting covert surveillance on suspected traitors.” He gave the woman a big smile.

It didn’t seem to do much for her. She snatched the folder away from him, though, and started thumbing through the pictures.

Parson pointed one out to her. “This here--we suspect this is Gema Elroy crossing the border into Sair. A mere twelve hours after the information leak took place, I might add.”

“This photo does not even show her face,” Sanko observed. “It could be anyone. You call this conclusive evi--?” The sentence was cut short as she stopped on a different photo. She flipped it over, perhaps to inspect the timestamp.

‘Is something wrong?’ asked Axiolis.

Sanko held the photo up for Zeff to see.

It was a shot of Juliana Salazar leaving the Elroy’s home. Zeff and Mariana were standing on the porch, watching the woman go.

“Explain your relationship with this person,” said Sanko.

‘She was the commanding officer of Zeff’s wife, Mariana, before they got married. Why?’

“Because this woman is a known traitor.”