When it first happened, no one knew what to do. Seeing that they couldn’t go anywhere, many of the guests decided to take a seat around the dance floor. Phillip wandered around, trying to find the killer, but he had no idea where to start. He knew that the killer was most likely a male, seeing that a woman could have never thrown a two-hundred pound man over a ledge of that height. He started asking around and found that, due to the fact that most people didn’t like Prince Jasper, they were not cooperating. People said that he was rude and inconsiderate of others, including his own family. They said that his own father was dying, and Prince Jasper was too busy having parties and drinking his life away to care.

As Phillip went around, there were three people that really stood out as suspects for the murder. One was Count Louie, a count from Slovakia who was in town on business of a different matter and had a somewhat cold air about him, almost like he was hiding something. He had jet black hair and very pale skin. He was very slender and had extremely big arms for such a lanky body. The Count was dressed in all black with a royal purple mask embroidered in gold. Phillip decided to move on to the next person, keeping everything very casual so people didn’t get mad.

His next suspect was a mistress from England who was a dear friend to the prince. She was in tears due to the fact that her good friend had just died, and she was practically falling apart. Her name was Abigail, and she was as skinny as a rail. She looked like she hadn’t eaten in days! She was in a dark red gown that fell to the floor like water going down a stream. She had a mask in the shape of a heart, that was embroidered with lots of care. “Do you know anything about tonight, m’am?” asked Phillip.

“NO! No I don’t and I would really appreciate it if you left me alone,” replied Abigail. She was in no mood to talk to someone about her dear friend.

“I am very sorry. I am just trying to get to the bottom of things, as you are well aware,” said Phillip in a comforting manner.

“All I know is that there are two people in this room who the prince despised. And that would be Count Edward over there and Princess Victoria, that stupid blond.”

“And what does the Prince have against those two?” asked Phillip.

“He wrote me awhile back, telling me there was to be a wedding soon, and that he was to be the groom. Now, from what I gathered, Count over there decided that he was going to marry the princess instead of Jasper marrying her. Even though the princess didn’t want to marry because she is a… let’s just say, she is loose… She went along with it because she wanted the money, and to mess with Jasper,” she replied.

“So now we know what we are looking for: someone who had something against Jasper or someone who would gain something from his death. Thank you, my lady! You have been a great service to me,” spoke Phillip.

Phillip knew now what he needed to do. He needed to find the killer quickly because these guests were not going to sit around all night!

(to be continued)