Arthur and Isaac ventured fearfully toward the rugby field and all the way into the locker room. Arthur felt too ashamed to admit it out loud, but it was his curiosity and not his morality that led him on; he had a great desire to get to the end of this mystery, no matter what it took.

    "Which locker is Wilson's, again?" Arthur asked, taking a torch out of his bag and turning it on. He didn't want to turn on the locker room's light, because it could attract someone's attention from afar.

    "Shawn said it was number 13, which is quite ironic," said Isaac, following him across the room.

    Arthur rolled his eyes. "That's rubbish. Don't be so superstitious."

    "It's not always rubbish," Isaac whispered, keeping his voice down. "And can you not speak so loudly? Someone could hear."

    "Who could possibly be around here at this time of night?"

    "I don't know. And I don't want to find out either."

    Isaac kept glancing behind them at the locker room's door fearfully as Arthur searched for a locker with number 13 on it, stopping when he finally found it. "Here. Hold my bag."

    Arthur placed the end of the torch in his mouth to hold it up and took the plastic gloves out of his pockets, wearing them. He then fished into his bag which Isaac was holding and dug out a few paperclips and bobby pins from inside it. Arthur then handed the torch to Isaac to hold as he got to work.

    Isaac watched him worriedly, looking behind his shoulder at the door every once in a while, in fear of getting caught.

    "Hold the light higher. And stop breathing so loudly. It's distracting," Arthur said without taking his eyes off the locker's lock.

    "Oh, I'm sorry," Isaac said sarcastically. "Would it help if I stopped breathing completely?"

    "Yes, that would actually help a lot," Arthur said without a single hint of sarcasm voice.

    Isaac glared at him, but he didn't get the chance to respond, because exactly at that moment, the lock opened.

    "Yes!" Arthur smiled to himself in triumph, opening the locker.

    The inside of the locker was an absolute mess. From books and useless papers, to old water bottles, hideous hand-made necklaces, and dirty shirts.

    Isaac grinned. "Ah! Finally, a worthy opponent for you."

    "Oh, please." Arthur scoffed, returning the smirk. "No one can compete with me when it comes to messy lockers and closets."

    Isaac nodded. "Yes, as your dormmate, I can vouch for that."

    The two boys chuckled. With that, they began to search the locker for the red envelopes, but no matter how many times they looked, they couldn't find anything that could be connected to Nancy.

    "Merde!" Arthur cursed under his breath in frustration, huffing. "There's nothing in here!"

    "I'm not too surprised." Isaac shrugged, certainly not as disappointed as Arthur. "If Wilson had anything to do with Nancy's death, he would've obviously wanted to get rid of her letters or anything that could be counted as evidence against him."

    "Yes..." Arthur mumbled grimly. "I suppose that's reasonable."

    "C'mon." Isaac handed Arthur his bag. "Let's get out of here."

    David Wilson and John Carter were the ones who had been seen carrying the red envelopes, although Arthur knew there was a chance that those letters weren't from Nancy; she wasn't the only person in the world who used red-colored envelopes for her letters.

    Dissatisfied to have reached a dead-end, Arthur began to put everything back in the locker. But he couldn't help but to wonder what could've been written in those letters.

    What was Nancy forced to do? What secret had she found out? How bad could it have been that it cost her life?

***

The next morning, Arthur was shot awake by someone before his alarm clock had even gone off. Opening his eyes with difficulty, he was surprised to see that it was Luca.

    His eyes widened at his sight. "Luca, where were you last night? You and Shawn didn't show up for the meeting. We were worried that you'd been caught."

    "It's long story." Luca shook a hand at him. He looked pale and sick with grief. "Did you and Isaac find anything last night?"

    "No. Nothing." Isaac shook his head from where he was sitting on his bed sleepily. "How about you and Shawn?"

    "We found something. Shawn's waking Nicholas up and bringing him here right now so we can ta —"

    He was in mid-sentence that the door to the room opened.

    "Good. You're here," said Luca when he saw Shawn and Nicholas walk inside the room, closing its door behind them and locking it. Nicholas was still in his pajamas, but Shawn was wearing the exact outfit he had on last night.

    "Eve and I broke into the mailing department, but we didn't find anything. There was no recollection of Nancy sending any letters to anyone outside the university. Not even to her parents," Nicholas informed, hopping up on Isaac's desk and sitting there.

    "Same here," Arthur said gloomily, getting up to his feet. "It was a total waste of time."

    "Not for us," said Shawn, catching their attention.

Only then did Arthur realize that Shawn still had his plastic gloves on. With that, Shawn dug into his coat, taking out at least five red envelopes and placed them down on Arthur's bed.

Shawn went on, "Luca and I have been reading them all night. They don't have dates written on them, but we tried to guess their correct order."

    "Where did you find them?" Arthur asked in a hollow voice, staring down at the letters. Nicholas hopped off the desk and walked toward the bed, where everyone else had gathered around the envelopes.

    "In the music room. They were hidden inside the piano stool," Shawn began to explain. Luca seemed unusually quiet, so he went on. "The caretaker locked us in the room last night. We were stuck there all night. Let's not mention my bladder which was bursting with pee until morning came and the caretaker unlocked the door again."

    "Yes, let's not mention your bursting bladder," said Arthur blankly, already taking out new plastic gloves out of his bag which was tossed on the floor.

    "Didn't the caretaker see you?" Isaac asked.

    "No. We managed to hide."

    "Never mind all that! What's written in the letters?" Nicholas said.

    "Just read them," Luca muttered. He was the only one not gathered around to look at the letters. Instead, he was leaning against the window, right beside Arthur's invention, staring outside with a blank expression.

    "Quickly! Open them!" Isaac tried to rush Arthur on, but he was trying to be delicate with the envelopes as he opened the first one. And so, he began to read the letter out loud,

Dear John,

I loved spending yesterday with you, and thank you for cheering me up and comforting me. I truly needed that. How about we meet at Tony's pub tonight, at eight o'clock? None of the students go there, so there's enough privacy. I do hope to see you there tonight.

Best,
Nancy

    "We figured that this would be the first one, because Tony's pub closed at the end of last spring," Shawn explained when Arthur had finished reading.

    "They were in a relationship?" Isaac said with wide eyes, probably thinking about the big age difference between them, and the fact that she had been one of his students.

    "Read the second one," said Nicholas, and so Arthur began.

Dear John,

I had a wonderful time last night! Perhaps drinking at the pub shouldn't become a habit of mine, because I kept blacking out. There are parts of the night that I don't remember at all, but I do remember having a blast! You may think it's too soon, but I love you. I love you like I've never loved anyone in my life.

Yours,
Nancy

    "This has to be the day after going to Tony's," Isaac acknowledged and Shawn nodded, while Arthur had already started opening the third envelope.

Dear John,

There's something I need to talk to you about. I'll meet you at your room tonight. I have a new roommate as you know, so we cannot meet at my dorm; she's an odd girl. I'll have to wait for her to fall asleep before sneaking out. I have a secret I that can't hide anymore. At least not from you.

Love,
Nancy

    "How did you know this was the third one?" Isaac mused.

    "It had to be written at the beginning summer — probably July — because Eve only moved into Nancy's dorm during the summer term," said Shawn.

Arthur then began to read the fourth one.

John,

I went through with it, but know that it was because of you. Know that it was not a decision I had made on my own. It was you who forced me into it. You who ruined my life. I did as you asked me in the end, but know that I can never forgive you for it.

P.S. Congratulations on your engagement

   "I can actually hear the sarcasm in the last part," said Arthur, setting down the letter.

   "What had he done, though?" Nicholas wondered. "I remember Nancy writing in the book that someone had forced her to do something. This has to be it."

  "Yes, that's what we thought, too." Shawn nodded. "Luca said that John Carter had gotten engaged in August, only a few months ago. He is going to get married in April."

   "But what was the secret Nancy wanted to tell John about?" Isaac questioned. "She kept mentioning a secret in her notes, too."

   "I don't know, but I think the third and fourth letters are somehow related," Arthur observed. "Maybe after Nancy told John about her secret, he made her do something that she was uncomfortable with."

    "She was more than uncomfortable," Nicholas muttered, his gaze glued to the letters that laid on the bed before them. "It had to be something unforgivable. Something... horrid."

    "Well, go ahead." Shawn nudged Arthur along. "Read the fifth one."

  
Dear John,

I know we haven't spoken in weeks, and I know that you're engaged, but I need to see you one last time. I need to say goodbye. I'll come by your room after midnight. I need to wait for my dormmate to go to sleep. I feel like she's always watching me or following me around. I can sometimes hear her whisper horrible things about me when I have my back to her. I must admit, I'm a little scared of her. But never mind that for now. That's not important. I miss you terribly. I'll be seeing you tonight. I hope you'll be happy to see me as well.

Forever yours,
Nancy

    When nobody said anything, Arthur picked up the final letter.

Dear John,

I know I had promised that we wouldn't have to see each other again, but we need to talk. I can't keep our secret anymore, because it's eating me up. I've been silenced for too long. Meet me at my dorm at six-thirty. The convocation starts at six o'clock, so we'll be alone.
Please, if you ever cared for me at all, you would come.

Nancy

(4/4)

    "The night of the convocation... That's the night Nancy died," Isaac said quietly, throwing his gaze down.

    "That's the night she was killed," Shawn corrected him grimly, collecting the letters and putting them back in their envelopes carefully. "Maybe that's why he killed her; because she didn't want to keep this secret anymore. But what I don't understand is what 4/4 means. See here? She's written it on the bottom right."

    Arthur's mind was otherwise occupied. He kept thinking back at the notes Nancy had left in the book, saying things like 'he made me to do it' or 'it was all his fault' or 'all he does is kill... he'll never stop'.

    The questions gushed into Arthur's mind and he could do nothing to stop them.

    Who else had he killed? Was there going to be a next victim?