The Corpse with the Sapphire Eyes

by Cathy Ace

  “Will they arrest me for murdering him?” asked Alice. She sounded like a small, scared child.

  Bud looked worried. “Alice, I just don’t know. Of course I, we, are duty-bound to tell them the truth, when they get here. We can’t change what happened, but how it’s handled by the authorities from this point on remains to be seen. All I can do, all we can do, is present them with the facts.”

  “Rhian—you won’t let them do anything to her, will you?” said Dilys. “The missus is ninety-two. It would kill her.”

  Rhian sighed. “I’m not sure it’s got anything to do with me, Mam. It’ll be up to the police when they get here.” The young widow turned to her aged employer and said, “Oh, Alice. If only you hadn’t decided to do something so spiteful—even if you were doing it for what you thought was a good reason . . .”

  Silence.

  Dau ar bymtheg ar hugain

  EVENTUALLY MAIR BLURTED OUT, “WELL, Cait. You’ve told us that our family is wealthy, and that Mother is a killer. But none of that explains all the other things that have been going on here, does it? What about all those terrible, malicious things? You said everything came out of love, Cait.” She looked at her mother. “I can see that Mother might have loved me enough that she wanted to save me from a man she thought was going to break my heart. But the rest?”

  I nodded. The only way I could press on was to try to compartmentalize things. Two puzzles explained, one more to go. I plunged in. “You admired, and maybe even loved David, didn’t you, Gwen?” I said.

  Gwen tensed.

  “It’s alright,” I continued, “you don’t have to answer that, I know you did. David gave you the attention you craved—and you let him use you too. I don’t mean like he used Alice’s nurses, but he used you to carry a heavy load for him with the choir, used you to run about and fetch and carry for him, I heard. But you put up with it all, because you got to be in the limelight with him. And, when he died, you immediately suspected that someone here had something to do with it. Slashing the painting, breaking the plate and the Christmas decorations? At first I thought they’d all been done to throw people off the trail to the treasure, but your only plan was to destroy things beloved by certain people—Alice, Owain, Idris and Eirwen, and, last night, Mair, when you wrecked her apartment, all to avenge David.”

  “But what about Mair’s Ravelry account being hacked weeks ago?” asked Siân.

  “Shall I tell her, or will you?” I said to Mair.

  Mair shook her head, so I spoke. “Mair wasn’t hacked. She wrote a lot of nasty messages in a fit of temper, directed toward herself. Last night, when we saw her rooms, Bud, we both thought she might have done something to harm herself, that the mess up there was a symptom of self-loathing. It wasn’t, it was Gwen’s work, but I believe that the online incident was Mair’s. An attempted escape, if you will, but one she regretted. After posting angry messages, she covered her shame by saying she’d been hacked. That’s right, isn’t it, Mair?”

  Mair nodded.

  “So there weren’t two different modus operandi in play,” said Bud.

  “No,” I replied, “just one. And I believe that Gwen has acted this way for many years. I suspect you managed to make your ‘good friend’ at school so sick that she didn’t do well enough in her exams to get into university, so she had to go to college with you, Gwen. I dare say that if someone took a good look at your life, they’d find other, similar examples of your spite, vindictiveness, and ruthless pursuit of your own ends and desired outcomes.”

  “You told me to do it,” snapped Gwen. “You told me I shouldn’t let anyone, or anything, get in my way. And I haven’t.” She looked around the room at the assembled group. “You were all horrible to David, and you all deserved what you got,” she spat. “Not you, of course, Rhian. I really like you. You’re my friend. I did what I did for you, as much as for David.” Rhian looked shocked.

  I said, “And what about me, Gwen? What did I do to deserve you sneaking into my room and ruining the clothes I was to wear for my marriage ceremony?”

  Gwen looked at me with the coldest stare I’d ever seen. “I told you yesterday that I’d done you a big favor, and you never even said thank you. You should have said thank you, that’s what.”

  I took a deep breath. “You mean you did me the favor of not talking to me in the street in Cambridge one day when you were visiting, because I was upset after an argument with my ex-boyfriend? Well, thank you very much for giving me my space, Gwen.” I could hear my voice get angrier with each word.

  “No, that’s not it,” replied Gwen dismissively. “That day I heard you say you wanted to chuck a drink at that bloke you were arguing with, I followed him to a pub and I threw a pint of beer all over him for you. So there. See? I did you a big favor, and you never said thank you.”

  Automatically I grabbed for Bud’s hand. He immediately knew there was something very wrong. I felt my entire body begin to shake. And it wasn’t only Bud who could tell that something was awry. Siân began to rise from her seat.

  “What’s up with you now?” said Gwen harshly.

  “What’s up with me?” I managed. “I’m going to say this, then I’m going to leave, because, otherwise, I won’t be responsible for my actions. Gwen Thomas, you think that all you did was throw a drink at a man that day. Let me tell you now that, no, there are no coincidences, there are only choices, and actions, and consequences. What you did that day changed the course of at least two people’s lives. The beer that you threw led directly to Angus getting involved in a bar brawl, which resulted in him sustaining a ruptured spleen. That’s what killed him, and it was why he ended up dead on my bathroom floor a few days later. And I ended up being arrested for murder, hounded by the press, being in a position where all the research I’d done would go up in smoke unless I left the country and started again in a place where people wouldn’t point and stare, referring to me as ‘the criminologist who was arrested for murder.’ Your action, like that of Alice, was born of spite—or born of love and admiration in your mind—and had terrible consequences.”

  “I meant it to be a kind thing,” said Gwen.

  “I do understand that throwing a drink at someone might seem like a small thing, Gwen, but do you now see how the consequences of that choice you made, and that action you took, led to the death of a human being, and the absolute upheaval of my life?”

  Gwen nodded. Her chin puckered. The faces around the table displayed a range of emotions, from horrified to sympathetic. I thought I’d reached my limit, but Gwen’s next words pushed me right over the edge.

  “If I hadn’t done it, and you hadn’t gone to Canada, you’d never have met Bud, and you wouldn’t be marrying him today,” she said slyly. She even added a sweet smile. “You told us all about your great-great-whatever spending the money he made by being a taxidermist to get your grandfather trained up as a baker, and that’s why your mother, then you were born. See? Everything’s connected. Really, you’ve got me to thank for you and Bud being a couple.”

  I literally heard the blood rushing in my ears, and I worked hard to slow my pounding heart. Eventually I was able to speak. As I did I could hear my voice quiver. “I see,” I replied, seething.

  “It wasn’t my fault that he died,” said Gwen. “I did it so you’d have your revenge on him, and it’s all worked out for the best.” She sounded almost proud.

  “I could have thrown a drink over him myself,” I said. “But I chose not to do it. Actions have consequences. When I told you about our family history I told you about people making decisions—decisions to work hard at their lives, their careers, to invest in the next generation, to apply themselves. It wasn’t all just a series of connected coincidences that allowed me and my sister to exist, but a series of decisions, actions, and consequences. And if you want to invoke the idea of ‘but good came from the spiteful thing I did’ then you also have to consider what I’m about to say now. Before I made the final move to the University of Va
ncouver, I went to visit the place, and they offered me a trial run. I took it. It was a chance for me to get the feel of Canada, the university, the people and the systems I’d be working with. I rented a small apartment for six months, and left a lot of my belongings in storage with an old friend in Cardiff. Once I’d decided that I would make my new life in Canada, I asked my parents if they’d take some of the things they’d been keeping in their attic for me since my schooldays to that same friend, so that I could ship everything to my new home from one location. Oddly enough, Gwen, the Llwyn-y-Bryn School magazines they were transporting for me probably had photographs of you in them, because I know there were some of our House Choir.”

  Bud squeezed my hand. He knew what was coming.

  I pushed myself to finish. It was important to me to do so. “So, on a sunny Sunday afternoon, Mum and Dad loaded up their car and set out for Cardiff, happy to be a small part of helping their daughter to start over, after a very tough year. Because you threw that beer over Angus, Gwen, my parents died in a fiery car crash, on the A48 between Swansea and Cardiff. Your actions led to Siân and me losing our mother and father. Your choice. Your action. The consequences.”

  I stood and walked to the doorway. “I hope you all prosecute this woman, who has caused physical damage to your property, to the fullest extent of the law, because there’s nothing I can do about the fact that she once hurled a drink over a man in a pub. All I can do now is work out how to live my life from here on.”

  I looked down at Gwen, then at Bud, and tried to soften my voice as I said to him, “Bud, this is not how I wanted our wedding day to begin. I’m so sorry.” My voice broke. “Now I know what they mean when they say a person can be so sharp they might cut themselves. I didn’t know what Gwen had done in Cambridge. I saw her as a woman with a borderline personality, whose warped sense of love, loyalty, and retribution had led her to carry out the wanton acts of destruction we have seen here. I never imagined I’d meet the person who began the fight in which Angus sustained his fatal injury, let alone know her—slightly. I need some time to process this, Bud. It’s big.”

  I looked across the table at my sister. “I know how you felt when you saw David’s corpse, and it brought back all the emotional turmoil you thought you’d managed to deal with. Like you, I’ll get through this—and I won’t have to deal with jetlag and strong painkillers at the same time.” I forced a smile, as did Siân, through her tears.

  “So sorry for you, sis,” she half whispered. “I know you’ll be fine. You’ve always bounced back.”

  “But never from so far as this,” I replied, my tears turning to sobs. I turned and ran up the stairs, crying.

  Bud came after me, calling, “You’re not dealing with this alone, Cait, wait for me.”

  I stopped and said the hardest thing I’d ever had to say, “I need to do this alone, Bud. I have to allow this to come to an end, for me, without you being a part of it. Let me do that? Then we can start on a new path, together. I know you understand, because it’s what you needed to do after Jan died.”

  “You’re right,” he said simply.

  Dim

  WHEN BUD KNOCKED ON MY door half an hour later, I knew I still had a long way to go before I could even begin to cope with what had happened, what I’d discovered. But all my psychological training allowed me to know it was a journey, and that it wouldn’t go quickly, but it would go less well if I tried to rush it. It would be a voyage through grief, and that takes time.

  Bud sounded excited as he knocked. I pulled open the creaking door. Bud was smiling. “Do you care what you’re wearing when we get married?” he asked, gazing into my eyes.

  At least he hadn’t been stupid enough to ask me how I was feeling.

  I managed a smile. “Not at all. It’s completely immaterial to me. All I need to marry you is you, Bud Anderson. Though I know we must have registrars and witnesses as well. But that’s it. Oh, I suppose we’ll need our rings—and Siân, of course.”

  “Good,” replied Bud, “because I need you to dress for the weather, and come with me. I have a plan, and it involves a bit of climbing.”

  “Climbing?” I knew I sounded horrified.

  “Yes—but just down a set of steps, and a bit of a pathway, not up a cliff, or anything like that.” He grinned. “Do you think you can cope?”

  I nodded.

  Ten minutes later, I was dressed for a walk on a sunny winter’s day, and Siân, Bud and I, Idris and Eirwen, and Mair and Owain were picking our way, carefully, down the path toward the beach below Castell Llwyd. It took a while, and as we went, Bud explained that the bridge was still unusable, but it would be repaired sufficiently by the end of the day for us to be able to drive over it in the morning. Apparently, with the discovery of huge panels of gold behind various mirrors, as I had predicted, money was now no object, and Idris had hired a mass of people to make sure it happened.

  Knowing we’d be able to leave the next day gave me a sense of relief, but Bud still wouldn’t tell me why we were making our way down to the beach. Eventually, we all stood on the golden sand, the sea rippling at the low tide mark, the sun pale and round in the duck-egg blue of the clear sky. Our footprints grew into large, dry-looking patches as we moved around. Bud held my hand.

  “Don’t go too far,” Bud warned. “Idris—are we okay here?”

  Idris nodded, then he and his wife, as well as his uncle and aunt, pulled some oars from a pod attached to the cliffside. They shoved them into the sand so that they met in a makeshift pointed arch.

  I was even more puzzled when two men, who seemed to be out for a walk along the sweeping sands, began to approach us. The younger of the two was carrying a large backpack.

  “Are you Bud Anderson?” said the short, round, gray-haired man in a Barbour jacket as he greeted Bud.

  “I certainly am,” replied Bud. “You must be Mr. Williams, the superintendent registrar.”

  My tummy flipped.

  The man nodded. “And this is Mr. Hobbs, who will assist us today.” He turned toward me. “Are you Miss Morgan?” I nodded. “Good,” he continued. “We’re the most nimble people in the Swansea Register Office, so we were picked to clamber down the path to Three Cliffs Bay, and then walk all the way here.” He winked.

  “Thank you, Mr. Williams, Mr. Hobbs. Bud—you’re brilliant!” Then I panicked. “But the license is only valid at Castell Llwyd, isn’t it? Do we have to climb all the way back up again? You poor things have already walked so far.”

  Idris smiled and said, “The Cadwallader Estate owns one hundred yards of this beach, and, as such, it is a part of Castell Llwyd. We never enforce it, of course, but this is the bit we own—right here.” He grinned. “So it’s just the same as being inside the castle. Except for the wind, and the spray off the sand. And this,” he gestured to the oars, “is a structure, for now. Will this meet your requirements, Mr. Williams?”

  The registrar looked dubious. “Our rules do not allow marriages to take place in anything but a permanent structure, and certainly not in the middle of a beach. As you can imagine, we’d have people getting married all over the place, willy nilly, if we allowed that sort of thing.” His stern expression softened as he looked at me, bundled up against the elements, with a bruised face and eyes still red and swollen from crying. He also glanced up at the climb he’d have to make to the castle. Eventually he said, “Under these very unusual circumstances, it will be acceptable.”

  I was hugely relieved.

  The paperwork, which had been in the backpack, was quickly sorted out by Mr. Hobbs, then Mr. Williams took the lead.

  Ten minutes later, Caitlin Morgan and Börje Ulf Dyggve Anderson were married.

  “A new year begins tomorrow, wife,” said Bud immediately after our embrace, and a lovely kiss, “and we face the unknown future together.”

  “And here’s to no more corpses!” said Siân as she pulled me aside and dropped two tiny stones she’d picked up from the beach into my palm. “If you
stick these where the two stones are missing on the picture frame I brought for you from Perth, it should say FAMILY again.”

  I could feel tears pricking my eyes.

  “I have a little something for my bride too,” said Bud, suddenly beside me.

  “I thought we said no presents for each other,” I gasped.

  Bud smiled. “We did—but this is a gift for both of us, not just you.”

  He handed me a thick, glossy brochure with a picture of a sleek ocean liner on its front.

  “A cruise?” I was astonished.

  Bud nodded. “Hawaii. It’ll be our honeymoon.”

  I stupidly blurted out, “But I can’t swim! I’ve never been on a ship. What if it sinks? And, anyway, you have to get all dressed up for dinner, and I haven’t got anything suitable.”

  Bud and Siân laughed. Eventually I joined in.

  Siân said, “You’ll have a smashing time, Cait. Todd and I have cruised, and it’s right up your street. Food everywhere, all the time. So many bars you won’t know which way to turn. The Hawaiian Islands are lovely. You’ll be safe on a cruise ship, Cait. Lovely. And you’ll be with your husband, of course.”

  “You’ll be with yours soon,” I said, seeing her misting over.

  Siân nodded. “Yes, not too long now. But I’m not leaving the Gower, or Swansea, until we’ve had a chocolate sundae together at Joe’s Ice Cream Parlor in the Mumbles—after we’ve had sausage, chips, and gravy at Dick Barton’s Chip Shop, of course. Tomorrow? All three of us. Agreed?”

  “Agreed,” I said. “Does that sound alright to you, husband?”

  “Whatever you say, wife,” replied Bud.

  Pronouncing Welsh names and words

  First of all, don’t worry about it! You’re the one reading this book and, unless you choose to read it aloud, no one will know or care if you mangle the pronunciation of anything. Just enjoy the story and let the words that look unfamiliar find their own shape in your head. But, if you enjoy learning as you read, here are a few general, and specific, hints and tips about Welsh pronunciation.