A Demon Summer
Page 38
Awena said, “I wonder how alike the brothers might have been, had the younger one survived, that is. The thing with two siblings born that far apart is that, fully related or partly related, they have little in common from a generational standpoint—exacerbated by the fact they were practically raised by different parents.”
“I don’t follow,” said Max.
“Parents in their twenties are different from parents in their forties. They are practically different people from their younger selves. Child-rearing techniques evolve like any other skill.”
“I’m sure you’re right. I can only hope I’m ready. I don’t want to just practice on this little one. I want to be—I don’t know. Perfect, I guess. Everything a child can look up to.”
His eye caught on the crèche scene in his office, purchased from the abbey shop. He’d decided not to pack it away but to leave it on display year round. The little painted figures brightened his bookshelves, which otherwise mainly held the heavy religious tomes inherited from his predecessor.
“I nearly forgot,” he said, and striding over to the desk he handed her a small package, wrapped in white cotton cloth and tied with a yellow bow. “As I was leaving the nunnery, Dame Hephzibah rushed out—well, for her it was rushing—and handed me this gift.”
Awena unwrapped the present to reveal one of the tiny christening dresses Max had seen in the abbey gift shop.
“Oh, Max,” breathed Awena. “I’ve never seen anything so beautiful. I’ll have to write and thank her. What kindness.”
Just then a little car trundled by, laden with flowers for the handfasting ceremony. The windows had been rolled down to allow the blossom heads to wave free. The white car with its burden of summer flowers—Max recognized the marigold, and cornflower, and pink roses, and daisies—was on its way to Awena’s cottage, where the ceremony was to be held the next afternoon.
“I thought the day would never arrive,” said Max. And resolutely, he tucked the case of Monkbury Abbey into the back of his mind. But the memory of Dame Meredith would be a constant in his prayers for years to come.
* * *
The handfasting ceremony of Maxen Tudor and Awena Owen was to become the stuff of legend, the sort of event destined to be woven into the lore of the village. The details were to be embellished and improved upon in the telling, although in truth, it was as perfect a day as it could be, from beginning to end.
The preparations for the handfasting had been under way for weeks; the heavens cooperated with nightly meteor showers in the clear skies over Nether Monkslip. Max and Awena would stand before the village and speak the vows they had written, promises that would seal their unity and affirm their greater strength as a couple. The service would invite Air, Fire, Water, and Earth to witness the healing power of their love. The celebrant, having poured cleansing water over Max and Awena’s hands, would then lightly bind together their hands with a silken handkerchief as the words of blessing were spoken. The pair would promise to support each other through good and bad times and daily renew with word and deed the loving foundation of their lives.
The day itself continued a warm and languid trend, although the villagers under the somnolent clouds had been anything but idle. Indeed, all of Nether Monkslip had been in a fizz of activity. No one could recall a social occasion to match it since the owner of Totleigh Hall had brought home his bride many years before.
“But this,” Elka Garth, in charge of organizing the food, told one and all, “will be even better.”
And of course Elka herself had gone into overdrive, keeping the ovens at the Cavalier Tea Room and Garden going practically night and day to produce the magical baked goods for which she was known. There were summer berry tartlets, including almond tartlets made with raspberries and glazed with red currant jelly, each piped with tiny rosettes of whipped cream. And there were glazed figs. And melon cubes. And small squares of chocolate cheesecake. She had rented several tables to hold the food, and worried there would not be enough room for it all.
Elka, Suzanna Winship had decided, was often happiest when worried, in having something or someone to fuss about. This, thought Suzanna, would be her shining hour.
Even Elka’s normally feckless son Clayton had pitched in, helping his mother with the washing up. And even though he chipped a few dishes in the process, it was generally agreed, his attempt at helpful participation was a miracle in and of itself.
Max, seeing the arriving delicacies—the red, black, and white currants on the pies, biscuits, and cakes, and the summer berries of every kind—had a sudden flashback to the doings at Monkbury Abbey, which he quickly erased from his mind. But Dame Ingrid had not forgotten him and had produced a specially decorated fruitcake, his name entwined in icing with Awena’s. Enclosed was a note wishing them happiness and pointedly assuring them that this cake she had made herself.
Courtesy of the Grimaldi brothers of the White Bean restaurant, there were dozens of appetizers: bruschetta by the platterful, and artichoke hearts, mozzarella cheese, cherry tomatoes, and basil leaves speared together on sticks, the whole painted with pesto sauce.
In addition to the food there was a world of things to drink: cucumber water, lemonade, and of course wine. Lots and lots of wine, provided as a handfasting gift by Mme. Cuthbert of La Maison Bleue.
Then there were the marzipan creations for which Elka was most famous. Elka had thought long and hard about this, wanting to symbolize what many saw as a mystical union between two people operating on similar spiritual planes. In the end a fiery sun and half moon seemed to symbolize it best, each candy decorated differently and with exquisite precision.
Of course the pièce de résistance was her handfasting cake, a towering confection of white pastry and icing decorated with summer blossoms of every color. Small figures representing Max and Awena stood atop the cake, holding hands.
Elka, not quite believing she had pulled it off, took dozens of photos for her Web site. Orders from future brides and grooms already had started to pour in.
And then there was Awena, the bride herself, resplendent as all the meteors of heaven on a clear night, in a foamy ashes-of-roses dress she had made herself, a dress that shone and glittered with a million beaded and appliqued flowers in oranges, reds, and yellows, colors chosen to represent both the warmth of the summer sun and the approaching changes of the harvest season. Her dark hair with its streak of white at the temple had been braided through with vines and flowers.
The ceremony was held on Lammas Day, a day to celebrate the first wheat harvest of the year, and officiated by a woman from Awena’s childhood in Wales, a woman of wide-ranging druidical beliefs who yet operated within the confines of the established church. Druidism, recognized in the United Kingdom as a religion, did not particularly speak to Awena’s own beliefs but was flexible enough that a Universal Mind was acknowledged in the ceremony—a ceremony preceded by a brief civil union in Monkslip-super-Mare, to placate the authorities and Max, who had insisted on it.
Sitting in the congregation for the handfasting were Awena’s sisters from Wales, Max’s mother, and assorted cousins and nieces and nephews belonging to both bride and groom. DCI Cotton was there, of course, along with Sergeant Essex, to watch Max and Awena promise to live lives full of courage and love. Also in attendance were the Bishop of Monkslip and his wife, she in a fascinator hat and beige mother-of-the-bride type of linen suit. They both looked determinedly game if rather bewildered by the proceedings, and they may have stumbled a bit over the responses, but as the bishop had told Max on receiving the handfasting invitation: “I don’t see how Awena can meet us halfway unless we try to do the same for her beliefs and customs. And I hope I’m not too old to learn new things.” The generosity of the statement summed up everything Max loved and admired about the man, completely describing how the bishop had achieved the highest reaches of his calling.
Music was provided by the small, high voices of the Nether Monkslip Angel Choir singing a cappella and, for the
after-festivities, by the St. Edwold’s Rock of Ages band, which seemed to get better as the night wore on and the wine disappeared. As a special request from Max, they played “I’ll Never Find Another You,” by the Seekers. Max and Awena, laughing, held hands as they followed the age-old custom of jumping over an antique sword, to symbolize the cutting of old ties. The dancing and whooping and celebrating went on into the wee hours. There was no one to complain of the noise, for the entire village was there.
And for a little space of time, Max and Awena came to know that it was true, that happiness was not in the future, and never in the past, but right in the here and now.
ALSO BY G. M. MALLIET
Pagan Spring
A Fatal Winter
Wicked Autumn
Death at the Alma Mater
Death and the Lit Chick
Death of a Cozy Winter
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
G. M. Malliet’s novels and short stories have been nominated for many crime-writing awards, including the Anthony, Agatha, and Macavity, and she won the Agatha Award for Death of a Cozy Writer. She holds a graduate degree from the University of Cambridge and continued her graduate study at Oxford University. She lives with her husband in the Washington, D.C., area. Visit her Web site at www.gmmalliet.com.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
A THOMAS DUNNE BOOK FOR MINOTAUR BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
A DEMON SUMMER. Copyright © 2014 by G. M. Malliet. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
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Cover design by David Baldeosingh Rotstein
Cover illustration by Rob Wood/Wood Ronsaville Harlin, Inc.
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The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-02141-0 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-02142-7 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781250021427
First Edition: October 2014