by R. L. Nolen
So, they had gone to London. He had told Cecil that he intended to marry her, and had told his mother, as well. His mother had been outraged. She railed against her, railed against him, railed against the natural order of the world. Her vehement accusations had left him shattered; he couldn’t go on. His ardor dried to a hollow husk. Cecil had had a fit and said if Charles didn’t marry her she would tell everyone that he had made her pregnant by force.
His mother had told him to make her quiet or she would make her quiet. He tried to calm everyone, but Cecil wouldn’t listen—wouldn’t be quiet. His mother would not stop yelling, and Cecil would not stop talking. He had pulled Cecil away to the car where she had continued to not be silent, his mother's words ringing in his ears. It wasn't his fault. He couldn't take all the noise. He made Cecil quiet then.
His life, his world, his being, was torn asunder. He carried her off to Cornwall in the trunk of his car. The countryside was less crowded back then, more empty space and beach. That was when the idea of flowers and herbs had first come to him. The gesture was a requiem of his love.
From that point onward emptiness plagued him. Regret grew to remorse. He had to bring her back, had to find her again.
When Cecil hadn’t come home from her day off and couldn’t be located, the police arrived. When his turn came around, the police had grilled him for what seemed like hours, but he remembered distinctly how surprised he was to learn, when all was said and done, that he’d been with the police for about a quarter of an hour. He had answered as naturally as if Cecil had only been one of his prized lupines, nothing more than something pretty to look at. He told the police that she had had many admirers, how she had often complained about the lack of money working there, how she had had greater plans for her future, that lately she had become quite secretive about her comings and goings, and that he believed she had had a lover in Devon. The police never suspected that he’d made it all up. They put her down as a runaway.
It was while he was experimenting with crossbreeding lilies that the idea had first come to him. If he could turn back the clock, make a wrinkle in the fabric of space and time, he might be able to undo what he had done. Perhaps he could bring back his one true love. One idea that he’d read about was blood replacement. So he took it a step beyond. If he changed his blood to the blood of someone younger, then he would become younger—he would reflect that change. It only stood to reason that, if he could turn back the clock of his own body, he could turn back the clock altogether.
If he could go back in time, he could retrieve Cecil.
He noticed the traffic had increased. He should move. Getting the video footage and other evidence had been easy. If the slightest thread of real information had been on the policeman’s tapes, he would have received a visit. Now, he need not worry about such mundane things. He needed to worry about getting food to his hidey-hole. He didn’t want to have to bury another so quickly. She was doubly important. Her blood was tasty, but without her alive, how could he lure the American woman near?
He witnessed a dark-haired, young man so bone-thin as to look near starved enter the Wicked Flowers storefront on the other side of the pub. His curiosity had him wondering what the boy was doing, but then he remembered that there was an apartment above the shop.
What he could not observe was the young man from the cliff-top walk, after entering his home, tossing his rucksack on a rickety chair inside the door. The rucksack slid across the chair and opened, partially revealing its contents: a few tattered paperbacks, a broken pencil, some candy wrappers, and a black videocassette.
The young man’s mother came out of her kitchen, wooden spoon in hand, and told him to get ready—his supper was on the table.
28
Monday morning
Day nine
After last night’s uncomfortable confrontation with Trewe, Jon took himself to the daily briefing and then back to the Inn to put a call through to Bakewell at home. He explained in short order the bomb that Trewe had dropped on him last night about Bakewell’s wife Neena.
“A mare’s nest,” was Bakewell’s reaction. “I’m certain you will sort everything.”
“Wait a tic, it’s you has the trouble with this man.”
“Our troubles happened many years ago.”
“That’s a laugh. You know, I get the impression he isn’t over it.”
“It’s none of your—”
“I would have appreciated a heads-up on this one, boss.”
“Look, if he makes an issue of something that took place so long ago, then that is a problem and I apologize to you. But it is not very professional of the man, and if I remember correctly, he was the definition of professional when I knew him. So this must go to the issue of what is taking place now and very likely has something to do with his sudden windfall. Sounds as if you’ve touched a nerve, something that makes him emotional enough to get personal, so get to the bottom of it and find out about the money. I shouldn’t have to remind you why you’re there. Try to avoid discussion of your assignment, and Jon …”
“Sir?”
“Stick to every directive Trewe passes down. Do not think you know best, even if you do. Your main assignment depends on Trewe trusting you enough to let you get to know him. This murder inquiry gives you the perfect opportunity.”
Jon thought, Yes, it is very convenient, isn’t it? But he said, “I’m not sure I like this.”
“Don’t put a foot the wrong way now.”
“Why did you hand-pick me for this assignment?”
“You were the best man for the job. I don’t believe you should take my decision lightly. And one more thing …”
“Yes?”
“Don’t get too close to the victim’s family. Their lives are miles away from yours, and I know you. You tend to take things to heart. You get involved. I don’t want you to. Don’t forget, you won’t be there much longer.”
Jon rang off. His super had taken the piss and thrown it back at him. Maybe he was feeling the lack of sleep. He had just spent a night walking hospital hallways. He’d had a short nap, but he needed true sleep to think straight.
He was the only police officer at Hasten Inn Bed and Breakfast. Mrs. McFarland, the proprietor, had fussed over him as if he were a helpless fledgling. He made the mistake of telling her that he needed a few hours of quiet.
She waved her oven mitts. “And that you will have, dear. And you’ll let me know if you need anything, will you?”
“I will.”
She followed him to his room. “You’ll just call down to me. I’ll be listening.”
“I understand. Thank you.”
“Just you call.”
It didn’t take long to figure out what she needed was constant assurance she was doing a top-notch job. “I’m fine. Wonderful place you have here.”
“Thank you, dear.”
“Yes, well, I’ll just get settled then.”
“Oh! I’ll see that you have quiet. You need your rest, because of this terrible business. Soon you’ll be right as rain.” She flapped her ever-present oven mitts at him and floundered away toward the kitchen at the back of the old house.
But the promised quiet had done him little good. He couldn’t stop his brain thinking, especially now that he knew he had been the intended target, not Ruth Butler.
So the mystery remained. Why?
What Trewe had told Jon about Bakewell’s wife was a real shocker. His mistake had been not getting more information from Bakewell in the beginning. If he’d asked, he wouldn’t have wasted time trying to picture why Trewe left London for Cornwall. Or why after all these years Bakewell and Trewe were still at odds with one another. It wasn’t just because of the marriage breaking up. By keeping silent with the others at the station, Bakewell had let everyone believe Trewe had something to hide and therefor had run away home. But he didn’t have anything to hide. He left because his marriage ended. Bakewell had not only taken his wife but his reputation as well. Everything ma
de sense now. He would tread carefully around Bakewell.
He didn’t know how much time had passed, but the sun shone right into his room to wake him. He ran a toothbrush over his teeth and shaved. He was very impressed with the comfort of this B & B with its modern appointments and spacious, brightly lit rooms. He could sit back, relax, and really think. A shower with hot water, what a delightful concept. What would they come up with next?
He dressed and went searching for food.
Mrs. McFarland scampered around wiping crumbs from the sideboard with her oven mitts. “Oh Mr. Graham! What can I get you?”
“Some eggs would be nice, Mrs. McFarland.”
“Veggies?”
“No, thanks.”
She brought out a steaming dish of eggs and added it to a side table where several other dishes were being kept warm. He helped himself and was soon quite satisfied. He was on his third cup of strong coffee when a group of six student-types, gesturing and speaking in staccato bursts of Italian, crowded into the room. They spotted him and began gesturing “hello” and wanting to speak “the English.” He nodded, smiled, and excused himself before he had to commit to a word of it.
He drove back toward the beach. The incident room had its own car park, which was great because parking in the village was a problem. The village had begun as a port. There were no cars—only horses, carts, and, if you were wealthy, carriages. The narrow streets allowed for no turning around of cars. The car parks across from the Spider’s Web and next to the incident room were the only places for cars to get turned around in the area. He parked and locked his car. On his way into the building he almost ran into Perstow coming out.
“Sergeant, tell me what happened after the fire.”
Perstow seemed surprised to see him. “Oh! Not much—a few villagers hung about after.”
“Anyone stand out in your opinion?”
“No.”
“SOCO turn up anything unusual?”
“Your fingerprints. Some footprints. They’ll need shoes of those who entered the yard for reference.”
“Were any videocassettes or DVDs found?” Jon said.
“None.”
“Thank you, Sergeant, that’ll be all.” Jon walked down toward the beach. None. The flash drives he’d sent to Bakewell turned up nothing new. The VHS cassettes had yet to arrive. He was still kicking himself for not hiding the copies of the tapes in the boot of his car.
The incident room was empty save for two officers busy at computers. He skimmed through the reports. So many villagers had been interviewed. These officers were likely adding to the nominal index of Home Office Large Major Enquiry System, or HOLMES, a record of each person of notice during an enquiry. Apparently some interviews were flagged for further investigation having to do with other cases. They could wait.
He turned to leave.
“Have you been helped?” came a voice from the back of the room.
He turned. It was a young officer he didn’t recognize. “No, I was looking for DCI Trewe.”
“He’ll have gone back to Treborwick, something about another message found. Are you Jon Graham?”
“Yes.”
“He was looking for you.”
“Right. Thanks very much.” Another message. What fresh hell has been uncovered?
Wind whistled around stone. The muffled sound of waves came from out beyond the grass and leaf door. The heater gave off its occasional warmth. The rest of the time Annie shivered under her rag piles, clutching her button tightly in one hand. Even with the mattress it wasn’t easy to get comfortable on the knobby, damp cave floor. Her school used to have a guinea pig. She had had to clean the cage when it came to her turn. This cave smelled like the urine damp shavings.
There was water in a pool at the center of the cave. At first she wouldn’t drink it, no matter how clear and cold it was. But her resolve passed when thirst and dry heaving drove her to gulp it down. Within no time she had the runs. The illness left her feeling like a deflated balloon. Her toilet needs ran through the tissue. She had to use what was nearest at hand: her windcheater. Afterward she had to toss it down the hole. She hoped creeper wouldn’t notice the missing jacket.
The worst thing about sitting chained to a wall was the nothingness. She yelled a lot at first. She cried. She kicked the wall and strained to get the chain loose. Then came the nothingness, because nothing she did did any good, so she had nothing to do.
She thought about things she would do to the creeper if she were ever free. Because when she got her chance, she would do something. He crept around the cave, whispering things she could not understand that sounded poisonous. He was revolting. She hated him. So, she would do something to him if she got the chance to escape.
She had uncovered some marks on the cave’s wall when she rearranged the rags around where she was supposed to lay. Marks had been etched into the stone, tiny straight lines about as big as her thumbnail, all in a row. There were eighty-nine of them. Marks to count the days, perhaps.
Her skin tingled when she realized what it meant. There had been someone here before her. She hurt all over when she thought of it.
Flashes of memory surfaced from the time when her eyes were still covered and she had sneaked a peek. A groan escaped as she remembered. It had not been a nightmare—the grotesque, hollowed cheeks and sunken eyes, the white face with a gaping hole where a mouth should have been, the limp, rag-doll quality of body and limbs, the feet with her socks, and one of her new shoes being crammed onto one foot. In that half-out-of-mind moment, she had witnessed her fate.
She curled up and closed her eyes, grinding her teeth, willing herself to stay calm. If she had seen what was to happen to her, there was nothing left for her to do but to make it unhappen.
TREBORWICK POLICE STATION
Trewe was in rare form. “So I went looking for you at the B & B and Mrs. McFarland said you were asleep. Tired from all your time spent at the hospital?”
Too late, Jon realized he’d dumped four teaspoons of sugar into his cup. “Yes, sir.”
“Bakewell assures me you’re the best. I don’t know if I share his opinion. I can’t police my police apparently. You’ve been asked to keep your distance from the victim’s family?”
“Yes, sir.”
Trewe glowered for a few moments, then let a file drop from his hand to his desktop. “There are a few things we haven’t made public about this investigation.”
Jon stared at his coffee. He hated sweet coffee, but he’d have to drink it. “I’d be interested in hearing about these things.”
“There’s the bunch of twigs found tangled in the string around her neck.”
“Twigs?” He swallowed against the lump forming in his throat. “What kind?”
“Forensics called in some local plant specialist.” He paused. “As it turns out, we needn’t have called a specialist. Perstow fancies himself a gardener and smelt of the twigs. Common thyme.”
“Common thyme,” Jon pondered aloud. He felt his chest tighten as the implications hit him. The world around them ground to a halt as the center of the universe rested in that moment. Plants and herbs with the body, the shoes—this confirmed his suspicions beyond a shadow of a doubt. He took a sip of the coffee and had to hold his breath to keep from gagging.
“Yes,” Trewe said, “and stranger yet, the twigs had had blooms, possibly when they were stuck in the string.”
“Isn’t it too early to bloom? And how’d they know there were blooms? Hadn’t the waves and water taken care of that?”
“Experts could tell there’d been blooms. The wild thyme that is common to this area is not blooming yet, but Perstow saw thyme in bloom in Mrs. Butler’s back yard. I suppose with the sun and the walls reflecting the heat …”
“The killer had to have had access to her yard.” His mouth went dry. “She isn’t safe.”
“What’s that?”
“Tell me, was the body identified by the mother?”
Trewe nodded
. “They shouldn’t have allowed it. I gave those officers some thoughts to take home when I heard about it.”
“But what did she say about the body?”
“That it wasn’t her daughter, naturally. There wasn’t much to recognize. But she did identify the clothes and the shoe as her daughter’s.”
“The famous shoe. What about DNA?”
“Mitochondrial results aren’t conclusive enough, so we’ve ordered a nuclear DNA result. Takes weeks. Meanwhile, the blood type matched Mrs. Butler’s.”
That didn’t answer Jon’s questions about what he suspected was a series of murders, but it would be a long, hard road to convince Trewe. “I have a question for you. How could a person change their name? I mean, how could they—say, if they were wanted by Interpol for terrible crimes—how could they change their name and hide their identity so well they could assimilate into local society or village life without notice? People are naturally suspicious of strangers.”
“They’d have to have money, lots of money. They’d have to be someone coming into a new area, with all the trappings of wealth, and a history—even an invented one which made sense or that no one questioned. Ever.”
“Yes.” Exactly like you, Jon thought. He rubbed his chin, saying aloud, “Police work has come down over the years to cleaning up, clearing away, and playing games with evil, hasn’t it?”
“Aren’t you the philosopher this morning?” Trewe took a sip of his own coffee and smiled as he looked pointedly at Jon’s cup.
29