Deadly Thyme

by R. L. Nolen

Jon set his awful coffee aside. “How can I help? What would you like me to do, sir?”

  Trewe gathered a small stack of what looked like handwritten notes and handed them to Jon. “Mrs. Butler was receiving these, each with a handful of wildflowers, on a regular basis. We need a translation, if you’re not doing anything.”

  Jon gathered the notes. “If this is Gaelic, there are likely books in the library … local historians … the Internet.”

  He glanced up. Trewe was gone.

  Most villages and smaller towns had only a mobile library, but the village of Perrin’s Point had a library. Unlike the Tudor Revival architecture of most of the rest of the village, the library was a square tank of a building made of yellow brick and few windows, and ugly as a bald goose.

  As he made his way down a narrow alleyway to the building’s entrance, a large black dog appeared out of nowhere, almost knocking him down. A second’s panic later he realized the creature was Chelsea, the dog that discovered the child’s body. He gave the hairy head a pat. “Good girl.”

  The dog stared at him and sat down, barring his entrance.

  “Right! Now, go home!” He snapped his fingers and pointed away from the door, a move he’d seen on a doggy training show. “Move, Chelsea!”

  No response. The dog must not have seen the show.

  “Come now, let a man past.” With the toe of his shoe, Jon nudged the dog carefully. In response, it turned its woeful eyes up at Jon’s face. Jon backed away. “Sorry.”

  The creature rested its head on its paws and heaved a sigh. When Jon attempted to pull the animal away from the door, she planted her feet causing her already massive weight to exceed that of a small house. Jon decided to try something else: “Are you hungry girl?”

  Her tail dusted the walk. Jon turned and walked back to his car. A half bag of leftover crisps was all he found. He grabbed it and walked back. She was still there.

  “Here, girl. Here, Chelsea.” He stood away from the door and knelt, emptying the greasy paper to the walk. The brute cocked its head sideways as if to say, “Humans do odd things.” Then she lumbered over and made the twelve or so crisps disappear like the end of yesterday. She acted starved. Where was Tavy? He couldn’t imagine the old man would normally let his dog wander the streets barring entrance to county buildings.

  He stepped past the dog and entered the library. Chelsea slowly ambled away. Jon shook his head and turned to his task. When he showed the librarian the inscriptions, the soft-spoken woman told him she couldn’t read Welsh properly, but there were plenty of language references available. She pointed him in the right direction.

  With stacks of books to keep him company at a quiet desk in a corner, he worked for an hour, referencing and cross-referencing. He sat back and rubbed his eyes. The notes were not meant to harm but to warn. Did the person who wrote them know something? Why did this person not come out and say it plainly? What were they afraid of?

  Despite the tide of opinion in some circles and efforts to explain evil away with platitudes and reason, no one could explain it away. Evil manifests itself in innumerable forms in any environment, no matter how bucolic. Evil had affected the village and all the surrounding area. The very nature of a peaceful environment made shattered peace all the more traumatic.

  He stacked the books into a wall surrounding his notes.

  Years in the force had him desensitized, to a point. He could usually witness the effects of evil without emotion, but today raw emotion swept him into an anger he hardly recognized. In those moments of fury, he wondered if he should give up the job and call it a day—call it a lifetime.

  He’d often thought of advancement in the police ranks, but it was crimes like this one, involving a child, that made him wonder if his temperament wasn’t best suited to do just what he was doing. Some people wanted a desk job, but even an hour at this desk in the library had him tapping his foot to get away. A regular desk job would probably kill him. Take the super in his role as a liaison between policing agencies: he worked hand in hand with Policy Authority Inspectors, HM Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate, HM Inspectorate of Court Administration, HM Inspectorate of Probation, and HM Inspectorate of Prisons in their process of drawing up a joint inspection scheme and associated framework. The job kept Bakewell busy writing reports and contributing to the content of the AMIC website. Bakewell had become the hand watching the hand watching the hand of various agencies of police where they intersected with the public. It was a desk job.

  However, where was the public in all this framework and scheme drawing? The core purpose of police officers was the prevention and detection of crime, not drawing up frameworks for schemes. The higher the rank the more obvious the politics. Policy had become more and more about finance, soothing grievances, and reaching targets.

  He didn’t want that. He wanted to be in touch with the people he had to work with and with the public. The death of the girl had affected him deeply, eaten him up with cold anger, the kind that grew colder, harder, and more determined with each day.

  As he closed the last book, a voice coming from above his head startled him out of his thoughts.

  “Halloo, sir! Halloo!”

  Jon looked up to see an older man with thin hair slicked to his head peering at him over the top of the wall of books on Jon’s desk. Jon backed away slightly at the overwhelming scent of aftershave.

  “I’ve seen you about and would love to make your acquaintance. My name is Quentin Malone. Local magistrate. Local.” The man extended a hand over the books. His long jowls quivered and bloodshot eyes squinted when he flashed a toothy smile.

  Jon grasped the hand before him. “Mr. Malone. Jon Graham. This is a fine library you have here.”

  “Oh! Not mine. Not mine. Only do the odd job, volunteer you know. Love the old books, the feel of the place. Wonderful place.”

  “I meant, for a village this size, to have a library.”

  “Ah yes, of course, of course, I see what you mean. Yes well, just thought I’d introduce myself. I heard you were a policeman. A policeman from London.”

  “I am.”

  “Yes. Well, so the local Bobbies can’t do it on their own when murder hits the village, eh? They call in reinforcements? Even more than there already are?” Malone cocked his head to the left when he asked a question.

  “I’m here on holiday. I’ve only recently made Detective Chief Inspector Trewe’s acquaintance.”

  “I see. Well. If you need anything, anything, or would like to know the best tourist spots, you can count on my help. Like to help out the tourists. Like to do all I can. Time on my hands. Pensioner, you see. Only volunteer here one day a week. If you wish to visit with me in my office, you’ll find it at the combined county courthouse. Or come by my home. You’ll find the local history quite fascinating. I’ve always fancied I know a little something about the history of this part of the world. Ask away! Ask away!”

  Malone pressed into his personal space but Jon would not give an inch. “I’ll keep that in mind, Mr. Malone.”

  The pear-shaped man moved away a pace. “Do come round. Don’t feel you’re interrupting me. I’m available. Pleasure to meet you. A pleasure, to be sure.” With one last shake of the jowls and a quick wave of his hand, the effusive Malone walked with jaunty quick steps to a stack of books which he set about replacing on a shelf.

  Looks the part of dapper country magistrate, dressed and pressed in tweeds as he is, Jon thought. Funny, the vanity of some men—the way he wears his hair. Yes, I would like to know something more, Mr. Malone, but not about history. The present is what I’m most interested in.

  It was then he realized his notes were turned so anyone leaning over the stack of books could read them.

  Monday, late afternoon

  Ruth left the hospital with a reminder to “mind your health” and with many a “thank you” from the staff. Though she tried to say her own thank yous, she was still outmatched in that department. So with final “cheers” and �
��taras” from the staff, she was released to her mother’s care.

  A police constable had taken them home.

  The door of her cottage home opened as they stepped across the stoop. Ruth’s heart skipped a beat, but no, it wasn’t Annie at the front door.

  Sally greeted her with a hug. “How are you now, my duck?” Sally asked, her red hair floating around her face like a blaze.

  Ruth held up her plaster-bound right hand. “Hurts like the dickens.”

  “Ah! You’ve picked up some Texan since your mum arrived. Look, table’s set. I’ve warmed some stew. That’s it then. I’ll be leaving. Ring if you need anything—I’m on the phone.”

  Ruth was grateful, but when her friend left, she collapsed on the sofa. Every square inch of her house brought another remembrance of Annie, only now they seemed to be hitting her painfully by twos and threes. Her home couldn’t have felt more desolate.

  Despite her mother’s protests, she couldn’t rest, so instead wandered around the house checking things, touching things. If she stopped, the sadness would catch hold and she wanted to avoid feeling anything.

  She checked her email and found several poems that had come in before the last three days. Whoever was sending them must have known she was in the hospital. All of the emails were disjointed and confusing. She forwarded them to the police, but only after she printed them out and saved them on her computer. She reread the most recent:

  As time would birth events

  in their separate spheres, two people

  meld in death when their worlds collide.

  Hopeless love

  becomes sorrow’s guide

  in the monstrous eternal

  of such return.

  There is no place to hide

  For such as this

  would our hearts burn.

  No place to hide? She shivered. The poems she received were nothing compared to the one entitled “ An Ode to the Stupid Police.” Either someone or a group of someones in the village was getting their jollies from sick persecution, or there really was a madman loose. Trying to one-handedly wrap her shawl tighter, she went to sit close to her mother on the couch.

  “I can’t believe you don’t have a TV in the house, honey.” Her mom’s voice held a thin whine, “I don’t know how I would have raised you without one. Funny, I never thought about that—but you thrived, didn’t you?”

  Ruth rested her aching head on the back of the couch and listened to the clicking sound of her mother’s knitting needles for a moment before she answered. “We had television when we first came, but it took a lot of my time that I could use for work. I kept it for Annie. But honestly, now we both find television boring. I didn’t want to pay another license fee for it.”

  “A license fee? What in the heck is that? You know I’ll pay.”

  “No, we’re fine.” She saw her mother’s hurt look at her sharp tone. “Sorry.”

  “I feel so blasted cut-off from the rest of the world without it.”

  “You said ‘blasted.’ It sounds so foreign coming from you.”

  Her mother chuckled, “Well, it’s not really cussing coming from me, either.”

  She patted her mother’s leg. “Don’t worry. I’ll get a paper. We do get news here.”

  She hoped to set her mother at better ease than she could muster for herself. Should she tell her about the constant stream of news on the Internet she kept online at all times? If she did, her mother would want to get on the computer, and then she would accidently see the emails. It would be just another thing for her mother to worry with.

  But who was she to dictate what her mother could worry about? When she could gather her wits, patience, and physical strength she would set her up in front of the “blasted” machine and let her make her own choices.

  The sound of the surf came from outside. It seemed to come from below also, and this was worrisome. Annie’s stomach couldn’t settle thinking about it. Were the waves real, and how close were they to the sea? What if water came in and drowned her, chained to the wall as she was? Everyone knew the caves around Perrin’s Point were too dangerous to explore because they were underwater at high tide.

  Water had formed most of Cornwall’s caves. Over time the sea’s tide had washed out the softer layers of sediment between the heavy granite, which caused the layers to collapse, and sometimes spaces were left behind. Some of the caves weren’t caves at all but adits, those engineered tunnels leading from earth’s surface to the mines. Breathing tubes for the miners, her mother called them.

  Mummy help me.

  She counted the links in her chain: twenty-five. She’d managed to work the bolt in the wall loose, but it would not come out. If she twisted it around and did a body flip she might be able to unscrew it. How long it would take she couldn’t tell. There were no clocks and no sun. Her sleep and awake times seemed to be running together. She stopped working on the chain when the blood ran down her hand from where the cuff bit into her skin.

  Her clothes were filthy. Everything smelled putrid. Her mummy kept everything clean at home. Oh, how she wanted to go home. She squeezed into a ball on the filthy mattress. Both arms hurt now. She wiped her snot onto the greasy material and wailed, “Mummy!”

  No. No mummy.

  There was no one to help her.

  She stretched the chain as far as it would go and could only reach the little pond of water. The effort had her tuckered out. Why did no one come? Why couldn’t she get to her mother? Someone whispered, “Let me go. Let me go. Let me go.” The words came from her own mouth. Ugh, she thought, Shut up!

  She would kick him where it counted. Except if she did, what good would it do if she couldn’t get the chain from the wall?

  All this movement was exhausting. Her mom would say it made her “bone tired.”

  She lay down and stared at nothing. Her heart thundered inside. She pinched herself and it hardly hurt. She gulped back tears. Why couldn’t she feel anything? She turned to her side and curled up, holding her tummy. Tears dripped to the mattress and the rhythm of the crashing waves out beyond the doorway were rocking her out and away until she jerked back to the present.

  It seemed that she slept all the time. No matter how much sleep … she always wanted to sleep more. Why could she not shake the urge to close her eyes? What was wrong? She could hardly lift her arms above her head. When she struggled to stand, she couldn’t stop trembling. Her legs went rubbery until she crumbled into a heap again. She tried. Every time she woke up, the first thing she would do was stand on legs that didn’t feel like legs.

  Were her legs real like the real of the walls, of trickling water, of hissing waves? She cradled her head and sobbed, “Get me out of here!”

  This real—the little tufts of long hair hung on the wall, the bits of rag, the jars of blood, the blasted drip, drip, drip—repulsed her until she wanted to scream. What was real was no good.

  11:30 p.m.

  Charles didn’t like to talk to them, didn’t like to think of their needs or their names. He liked to think of what they were—tiny flames, so delicate, so easily extinguished. But while they were alive, they had to eat, and so he had to feed them.

  He tied a string around each trouser leg to keep the material from snagging on the rock along the cliff’s side as he made his way down the slanted and very narrow path. The turquoise water below foamed around the rocks at the base of the cliff. Above, turf overhung the edge to within six or seven feet from the path. The wind whipped his hair aside, and he paused to smooth it back before pulling the grass mat aside to squeeze into his little hidey-hole. He laid the platter down and lit a torch he kept near the door.

  He checked to make sure the heater had oil, and he made sure the temperature gauge was correct before picking up the platter to set it near the girl. She lay on a mat about ten feet from the cave’s entrance. Her portion of the cave was perfect. She had her toilet, her watering hole, and her bed. He brought her food. She had it made. He hoped that in time
she would learn to be grateful for his thoughtful care.

  She didn’t stir, and he decided she was asleep. He didn’t want to check on her yet. He had other things he could do with his precious time.

  He played his torchlight across the keepsakes on his special wall, in the niches he’d carefully crafted in the rock—the small jar of teeth, the tube of lipstick, the snatches of hair, blond, brown, and red. There were slots for more, like that lovely golden brown of the American woman. Next to the hair were the lovely knickers, white with lace, blue, the pink ones with Sunday written on the front, the funny little stringy thing—what good was it, but it did make the juices flow didn’t it? Knickers—that was what they called them in the old days before this spoilage of language made them “pants.” Such a wearisome word. Knickers brought titillation to the thing, which was the way it should be, the way it should remain.

  Then he let the light dance across his little collection of shoes. They had come in so handy.

  He always saved the next keepsake for last. He liked to take his viewing of it slowly. It was the best prize of all. First, he slid the light down the object, and his breath caught from the delight of seeing how the light reflected on the blade—so pretty. The handle came down just so. He liked its heft. When he was ready—when the power was coursing through his veins and he could hear it sing to him—he would go forward with his plan to take back his true life.

  He heard her shifting, the scrape of her foot against the stone. She uttered a small groan. He’d have to bring her more medicine. Her head injury made his gleanings puny, as he was ultimately afraid of losing her too soon if he took too much.

  The place reeked. The water and soap that he’d scrubbed the floor with didn’t do much good. He needed to grab a couple of bunches of the thyme that grew at the mouth of the cave and spread the floor with it. He would crush it underfoot; its fragrance would mute the stench of death he couldn’t wash out.