An Inquiry Into Love and Death

by Simone St. James

  I turned to the window. It was high and narrow, the shutter nailed into place; I could do nothing with my bare hands.

  My throat burned now, and screaming became difficult. Behind me, the table was aflame, the books, and now the cabinet. I could barely see for the smoke. I looked around me for a long moment in despair as my stomach turned and spots began to dance before my eyes. Past that window, just past the glass, was the copse of trees, the fallen leaves, the crisp, fresh sky. The world went about its business, unable to hear my screams through the thick walls of the old vicarage. This is not happening.

  I tried the door again, but my hands were sweaty now and slipped off the knob. I looked wildly around the room through the black haze of smoke. I was coughing, unable to control it, each breath scraping painfully through my throat and sending me into another convulsion. I thought incongruously of Drew, far away in London, oblivious of me at this moment as I choked to death.

  The table was nearly burned through now, the center falling in. I pushed it over with my foot, coughing again as it heaved to its side, cinders spiraling up to the ceiling. I kicked at it again and again. There were large spots of black in my vision now, but I kept kicking. I lost my balance and the room swung wildly, but I pushed myself upright, stars dancing in my vision. I thought I could hear thumping on the door. I was still screaming, but no sound was coming from my throat.

  When the desk fell apart, I grasped one of the legs, pulling at it with all of the weakened strength left in my arms. It cracked with a sickening sound and came away in my hands, taking a narrow part of the edge of the tabletop with it. I now held a thick wooden club in my hand—or as close an approximation as I was going to get.

  I set to the shutter. I had hacked at it with my makeshift tool for a few precious seconds before I realized, with sluggish logic, that I was wasting my time. Even if I could get the shutter off and break the thick glass, I had no hope of getting myself up and through the window. The best I could hope for would be a few breaths of air before I died.

  The leg broke in two, and I fell to the ground. I stared at my ruined weapon. I didn’t have the strength to get another one. My head hurt, each cough was painful, my chest hurt, and my brain wanted to shut down. My legs wouldn’t get under me again.

  I wiped my forehead. The remains of the desk were still burning, and the bookshelf and cabinet were aflame. The wainscoting was also on fire. The wooden door was burning.

  The door was burning.

  The top half of my table leg was a long, thin wedge, the wood lighter where I had splintered it away from the rest. I crawled to the door and peered at it through the flames. If the wood was weakened around the lock mechanism, then possibly I could break the lock and smash it out of the jamb. It was a long shot, but it was all I had.

  I probed with the wedge of wood, the heat burning my fingers, and placed it just so under the metal plate. I waggled it, my mind stupid. It wedged in a tiny bit, giving me just enough purchase. Someone was definitely pounding on the door now, unless I was imagining it. I wondered vaguely who it was.

  When I had the wedge placed, I took the heavier end of the broken leg and pounded it into the other piece of wood as hard as I could. I could barely breathe now, and my lungs were gasping hard, trying for oxygen. My vision blurred, and the piece of wood fell from my hands, disappearing in the smoke.

  I leaned back on the floor and took off my shoe. Propping myself on my elbows, I set my stockinged heel against the widest part of the wedge. My chest heaved with coughs; my eyes watered. I stared at my foot and thought of tennis matches on the green lawns at Oxford, the summer breeze fragrant in the gardens. The way we girls had laughed and chased one another through the sunlight, our faces tanned, our legs flashing, not a thought in our minds except who would win the next match and what was for supper.

  My partner had been Evelyn Matchhouse, a girl a year ahead of me who had incredible power in her shoulders and arms. She could have knocked a grown man off his feet, and she thought of nothing but tennis. A single shot, she had told me once, well planned and well executed, can mean all the difference between winning and losing.

  I squinted through the smoke. I pulled back my heel and smashed it directly into the wood. The shock jolted straight up my leg. The lock splintered, and the door swung open.

  There were shouts. Someone grasped me under the arms and dragged me from the room, the grip both gentle and forceful. Those feel like Drew Merriken’s hands, I thought vaguely as I watched the fire recede from my vision. Then: I wish I’d had more time with all those precious books and papers before they burned.

  The hands set me down. I rolled to my side and retched emptily onto the worn carpet, over and over, the ugly rose pattern dancing in the spots before my eyes.

  When I had finished, or as near as I could, the hand touched me again and rolled me over. I was dimly aware of other shouts in the background, calls for water. I was defenseless, unable even to lift my arms, and a dim pulse of fear beat in my temples like a heartbeat. I had to get out. I had to run. . . .

  “Jillian,” came a familiar voice.

  I looked up at him, and his face became clear in my watering vision. “Oh, my God,” I managed, and then the blackness overtook me.

  • • •

  I came to on a hard sofa that smelled of old wool and something pungently rotten. It took a moment for me to realize I was in the front room of the old vicarage, with the cold fireplace and stains on the ceiling.

  “Oh, good,” said a voice. “She’s awake.”

  It was a voice I didn’t recognize. I turned my head, which seemed to be attached to my neck with rusty screws. Two men stood in the room with me, ranged along the opposite wall as if they’d been waiting for some time. They both wore overcoats and hats. One was Drew Merriken in his familiar black coat, tall and looming. The other man was fairer, with high cheekbones and an angular chin, his eyes a vivid light blue. From under his hat came a hint of wheat blond hair. The man I’d seen twice in Rothewell.

  I stared at him. “You,” I said.

  He tilted his head. His mouth quirked; it was supposed to be a kindly smile, but it came across as wry amusement. “Scotland Yard, at your service,” he said. “You were in a bit of a fix in there.”

  I looked back at Drew. I opened my mouth to speak.

  “Miss Leigh,” said Drew, before I could say whatever I’d intended. “How are you feeling?”

  I blinked. His voice was impersonal, as if he were passing the time of day. “I don’t know,” I tried to say, but it came out as only a rasp.

  “I’m Inspector Merriken,” he went on, as if he hadn’t heard. “If you remember. And this is my partner, Inspector Easterbrook.”

  I stared at him, my mouth quite likely agape. If you remember? He had kissed me, shared my bed. My sluggish brain turned the words over.

  “You had a scare,” Inspector Easterbrook chimed in. He had a voice of such clear, perfectly modulated alto tones, I had the incongruous thought that the Oxford choir would kill for him. “You’re lucky you came out as you did. Breaking the lock was a clever move, by the way. We’d nearly given up on breaking the door in.”

  “How are—” My voice would not work. “How—”

  “Please don’t strain yourself.” Drew reached to the mantelpiece for a pitcher of water and a cup. He poured me a glass and carried it over.

  I looked up at him. I was glad to see him, and embarrassed—oh, God, I had retched as he held me. I tried to read his face for some sign—for anything that showed he knew me. From where he stood, handing me the glass, his back was to his partner. I looked for some secret communication.

  “Please,” he said blandly. “Drink this. We’ve sent for a doctor.”

  I took it from him, and he turned away.

  Inspector Easterbrook’s glance met his partner’s, and now it was me who could not see Drew’s face. Agai
n came that smirk from the blond man, brief but unmistakable. The two men, it seemed, were sharing a joke at my expense.

  I looked down at myself. I was lying on the awful old sofa, my shoes off, my skirt rucked up above my knees. My blouse was deeply unbuttoned, and I had lost my jacket. I rolled myself upright in alarm and put my feet on the floor, spilling some of the water. My head spun, and it hurt to breathe.

  “Don’t exert yourself,” said Inspector Easterbrook, the smile gone from his face, but I ignored him and drank the water.

  “Miss Leigh,” said Drew, back in place now. “We have a few questions for you.”

  “If you’re up to it,” Easterbrook added.

  I leaned forward, my elbows on my knees, and nodded.

  “First.” Inspector Easterbrook took a notebook from his pocket and opened it. “You were here looking at the vicar’s archives; is that correct?”

  My throat hurt, so I just nodded again.

  “Right. Did you hear anything before the fire started? Notice anything at all?”

  “If you’re asking whether the fire was deliberately set,” I managed, “it was.”

  The men exchanged glances again. Under my exhaustion and barely suppressed fear, anger began a slow, satisfying burn. I looked slowly from one man to the other. “May I go now?” I asked.

  Inspector Easterbrook narrowed his eyes at me. Next to him, Drew stood mute, his gaze unhappy. “Not quite yet,” said Easterbrook. “We have to wait for the doctor. Who do you think might have set the fire, and why?”

  It was a trick question asked to make me look paranoid, his tone frankly unbelieving. Who do you think is trying to kill you, Miss Leigh? I did not dignify it with an answer. “Why are you here?” I asked instead.

  Again Easterbrook glanced at his partner, but Drew’s gaze stayed on me. “Why, we’re here to look into this incident.”

  “No. You”—I pointed to Easterbrook—“were already in Rothewell. And both of you were already here when the fire started. Why were you here?”

  That gave them pause, but only for a moment; Inspector Easterbrook laughed. “Ah, well. And I thought I was traveling incognito.”

  “We came to see the vicar,” said Drew, ignoring him. “Can you think of anyone who would want to do this?”

  I hadn’t rebuttoned my blouse, and I was leaning forward, elbows propped on my knees. I’m not very large in the breast department, but both men would have been able to see the gap where my blouse opened, and the lace edging of my camisole. I glanced at Drew, but he was looking directly into my eyes, his expression inscrutable.

  “I don’t remember,” I said.

  Drew’s expression darkened, but he said nothing. Next to him, Inspector Easterbrook smiled, pleased with the view, which he took advantage of without a second thought. “Do think about it,” Easterbrook said. “Do. You’ll excuse us for a moment, won’t you?”

  I nodded, but as they moved to the door, Drew looked back at me. “We’ll return directly. Will you sit still for a few minutes?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Of course.”

  My hands started shaking before the door closed, and I pressed them together between my knees. I bent my head and took a few long breaths through my ragged throat. The anger drained away and left only panic and the barely suppressed instinct to sob.

  The men were talking in low voices, probably about me. I waited until the sound of them retreated down the hall. Then I limped to the door in my bare feet, slid soundlessly through it, left by the front door, and ran as fast as I could for my motorcar.

  Twenty-four

  I have very little recollection of the journey back to Barrow House. I remember the strange feeling of my bare feet on the pedals, the cold penetrating the thin fabric of my skirt and blouse. I had lost my coat and handbag somewhere in the vicarage. I remember nothing about the drive itself. If anyone saw me pass, I must have looked like a ghost.

  I got all the way to the door of Barrow House before I realized I didn’t have a key. It was here that I understood, with a horrified detachment, that I was in the grip of a terror so immensely large I could hardly begin to understand it. I was like a man standing with his nose to the wall of Notre Dame cathedral, unable to see the edges of something so big. I rattled the front door helplessly; I paced out into the front garden. A strange mewling sound came from my throat, and only when my neck grew wet did I realize that tears were streaming down my face, though I was not sobbing. I paced back to the front door again, just as helplessly terrified in daylight as I had been at night with Walking John hunting me through the woods.

  I had just thought to go ’round to the kitchen door in the back when my eye caught something gleaming on the sill of the parlor window. I walked barefoot through the damp loam of the garden and stretched up to reach it, the cold penetrating the sore bottoms of my feet.

  It was a key. I took it in shaking hands, used it to open the front door, and went inside.

  I locked myself into the house. I paced from room to room, checking the windows and latching them tightly. I rattled the kitchen door, making sure it was secure. When I was finished I went over everything again like an automaton, my breath choking in my throat. At some point Sultana emerged, sleepy eyed, and watched me. Then I ran up the stairs and pulled off my clothes.

  I drew a bath. I was shaking so hard as I lowered myself in that I nearly slipped. Then I sat in the hot water, hugging my knees to my chest.

  I turned off the tap, and without the rush of the water, quiet fell on the house. Late-afternoon sunlight came through the high, fogged window. Sultana padded through the half-open door and sat where my skirt pooled on the tiles, watching me with mild curiosity. The heat from the water seeped into me, and I felt the shivers begin to subside. I ached everywhere; in the mirror I’d glimpsed bruises on my arms and legs, my heel hurt where I’d kicked the latch, and my hands were raw and stinging. I hugged my knees harder, feeling the bands of pain around my body as I breathed, and didn’t look down.

  I had a strange moment of clarity. I saw the washroom in perfect detail, as if etched in my mind. I saw the coils of the old radiator against the wall, the mirror with its scrollwork about the edges, covered in steam. I saw the basin with the thin towel tossed over the edge, the tiles, my blouse and skirt and underthings on the floor. I saw the key shining dully in the faded light, protruding from the pocket of my skirt—and, beneath it, the corner of the photograph of the girl I’d taken from the archives. Everything went ’round and ’round in my mind, faster than I could catch it, some parts clicking together with hideous clarity, others hanging in mystery as fog hangs in the air. But I felt that at long last I was beginning to see. I had always been good at puzzles, after all.

  My chest heaved, and suddenly I was weeping. These weren’t silent tears of terror, but a real storm of grief. The tears fell unheeded into the bathwater, and no one heard my sobs except Sultana, who lowered her ears and gave me a look of disapproval for such an unseemly display.

  I cried myself out as the water cooled. Then I washed the smoke from my hair and dressed. I put the photograph in the pocket of my fresh skirt, the action automatic, as if I could not quite bear to put it down and walk away.

  I thought I had calmed myself, but I jumped when a knock sounded at the front door. Instinct screamed for me not to answer it; I couldn’t stand to talk to anyone yet, least of all Scotland Yard. My throat hurt, and I was still shaking.

  But through the window I could see it was Diana Kates and her daughter, Julia. A memory came upon me like a cold splash of water.

  “I’m sorry,” I said without preamble as I opened the door. My voice was barely more than a rasp. “I was supposed to come to tea, wasn’t I? It’s just . . . there was an accident. . . .”

  “My dear! You mustn’t worry. We know all about it. We came to check on you. Are you all right?”

  The local gossip telegraph
must have worked like lightning. I squeezed my trembling hand on the edge of the door and tried to sound normal. “I’m quite fine, thank you. It’s kind of you to check.”

  “My goodness. If you don’t mind my saying so, you sound a perfect fright.” She patted my hand with her gloved one as Julia goggled at me. “The smoke, was it? How horrid. Let us come in and make you tea.”

  Us, of course, meant Julia. Diana Kates led us both to the kitchen, then waved her daughter in the direction of the teapot as she sat across from me. “Now, you simply must tell me everything,” she said.

  I almost died. Someone tried to kill me. I will have nightmares about it for the rest of my life. No, that wouldn’t do. “There, ah, isn’t much to tell. I was looking at the archives, and—”

  “Oh, goodness, that awful old vicarage! I’ve always hated the place. Of course, Aubrey Thorne won’t do much until his wife tells him to. She’s not from here; I’ve never liked her. Have you met her?”

  “Yes.”

  “Such an awkward girl! And older than Aubrey, too. I’m amazed she married at all, though it was only the vicar. Not that tea, Julia—the other one, over there. I always thought he’d marry Rachel.”

  I tried to follow. If I kept her talking, she might not ask me any more questions. “Aubrey? Why?”

  “Well, she lost her husband in the war, so she needs to marry someone. She said she was in mourning, but really—she has a boy to raise. Edward Bruton has no money, so that leaves Aubrey or William Moorcock as the only men her age. She can’t marry her own brother-in-law, and besides, everyone knows William came back from the war a little strange. So unless she wanted to marry a boy or an old man, it had to be Aubrey.”

  In her mind, it made perfect logical sense. “I see.”

  “At least he has a bit of money, or he has since the war. So does William. But Aubrey found Enid somewhere and married her, and that was that. He must be thinking twice about it, as they have no children, so she must be barren, and there’s Rachel turning into an old maid. Thank you, Julia, that is just right.” She smiled at me.