6.The Alcatraz Rose

by Anthony Eglin

  Kingston leaned back and glanced at his watch. “I have one last question. Were you able to look at Fiona McGuire’s personal belongings, what she left behind at the house: photographs, letters, documents, her computer, CDs, e-mails, and the like?”

  Emma nodded. “You’re right to ask. Often, these things can provide clues or further insights into a person’s lifestyle—friendships, habits, and even secrets that open up new lines of investigation, but in her case we found nothing whatsoever. We turned the place upside down. As I remember there were some photos in a shoe box and a couple of albums. Most were old, but Molly was able to identify most of the people in them. But there wasn’t a single one that appeared unusual or out of place, nothing to warrant following up. As you might expect, there were no letters per se.” She leaned back and sighed. “Sadly, people no longer write letters. Handwriting, too, that’s another casualty of the technological age. You should see some of the rubbish we get from young people. Unintelligible.” She paused and shook her head, pursing her lips. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to fly off the handle like that. Getting back to your question, she did have a laptop. We had our computer forensics chaps search the hard drive, but again, nothing raised any red flags. We went through every e-mail, of course, but they were of no help.”

  “What about books?”

  “Books?”

  “Well, what I mean is that often you can tell quite a lot about people by what they read, particularly nonfiction.”

  Emma smiled. “You mean if they have the Communist Manifesto or How to Make an Atom Bomb in your Kitchen on the shelf for all to see? Pressed flowers?”

  “You never know,” Kingston said, smiling back, recalling an experience involving a highly poisonous flower.

  “Now that you mention it . . . I do recall a small bookcase in the living room. One of our young chaps, a bookish type, took a quick shufti at them, joking that there were no first editions. Anyway, it may be moot, because I honestly can’t recall what happened to them—if they were given to Letty’s foster parents, the library, or simply thrown in the rubbish bin.”

  “I’d still be curious,” Kingston said.

  The phone rang before Emma could respond. She excused herself and headed for the kitchen to answer it. She walked slowly, with a pronounced limp, which Kingston hadn’t noticed when he’d first arrived. A result of the accident that had caused her to leave the force, he presumed.

  While she was gone, Andrew got up and stretched, looking out the window, while Kingston thought about their conversation so far, encouraged with the way it was going. When Emma returned he would ask her about the specifics of when and where she planned to meet and talk with Letty. And, even though he knew the answer, he’d ask what she thought the chances were of it working. Would she really be able to persuade Letty to give up tormenting herself and accept the painful truth: that unless new evidence presented itself, her search was in vain. For what it was worth, more for curiosity’s sake, he would ask if she had any thoughts outside the scope of the official investigation, if she could and would be willing to speculate about the case in general. As he was thinking on it, she returned.

  “Sorry about that,” she said, easing herself slowly into her chair. “Where were we?”

  “I was thinking about your meeting with Letty. Have you decided how you want to set it up? Where and when?”

  “At her home, I would think. Wherever is most comfortable for her—and alone, of course. As for when, I can do it almost anytime. I’ll let her choose. Whoever dreamed up the phrase ‘luxury of time’ obviously never experienced it.” She sighed. “Sometimes it’s anything but a damned luxury.”

  “After police work every day, I can well imagine.”

  Kingston was about to get up, sensing that they’d reached a conclusion, when Emma spoke again. “There’s something I want to give you.”

  Kingston said nothing, thinking it was perhaps a jar of homemade marmalade, scones, something like that. She got up slowly and limped to a carved bureau against a wall on the other side of the room.

  She returned holding a large manila envelope, sat, and placed it on the coffee table. “You don’t have to open it now. I’m going to tell you what’s in it.”

  Kingston frowned. “Mysterious.”

  “When DI Endersby called to tell me about your inquiry and your coming here, I made some notes about the case. It wasn’t that organized, but I found it good therapy of sorts. It gave me something constructive to do on rainy days, other than watching Footballers’ Wives and reruns of The Big Fat Quiz of the Year. I no longer have access to the files, of course, but, as I explained, it wasn’t that complicated. There weren’t hundreds of contacts and interviews, as with some cases. So this envelope contains a summary, if you will, of what I can remember of the case. Names and places are reasonably accurate, but the time frame may be a bit off in places.”

  Kingston was puzzled. Why, if her mission were to convince Letty, once and for all, that the case was closed, probably for good, would she want to hand over such information? What was the purpose?

  “Thank you, Emma, I appreciate that,” he said.

  A trace of a smile appeared. “I can see you’re already wondering why I would go to that trouble.”

  “The thought had crossed my mind.”

  “Well, when Endersby told me about you and your interest in the McGuire case, I did a little bit of sleuthing of my own. I’m sure you know that your reputation’s hardly what you’d call a secret, Doctor—Lawrence. I gave up after wading through the first six paragraphs of your Wikipedia life story. What I’m getting at is this. It’s very clear, and speaks highly of you, that your interest in the case is centered on helping Letty straighten out her life by convincing her to give up trying to find out what happened to her mother. That said, I couldn’t help wondering if there wasn’t perhaps also a mild curiosity on your part, shall we say, about specific details of the case and why it’s remained unsolved. If it might have criminal implications?” She smiled. “Am I wrong?

  Kingston took his eyes off of Emma to glance at Andrew, who had been quietly listening and was looking amused.

  “Not entirely,” he said, looking at Emma again. “It would be out of the ordinary for one to think otherwise, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Maybe. But then I asked myself, if it hadn’t been for that close call you had up in Staffordshire, you might have given serious thought to promising Letty that you would conduct an independent inquiry. But I’m sure that other forces are at work here, urging you and reminding you not to become involved in such situations.”

  Kingston could reply to this innocent-looking yet percipient policewoman only with a forced smile and a shrug.

  Five minutes later, at Emma’s crimson front door, Kingston and Andrew said goodbye and walked up the street to his TR4. The fine weather was holding and the sun was still high in the sky and hot enough to cause an “ouch!” when Kingston gripped the chrome door handle. They took off their jackets and placed them behind the seats and got in the car.

  “Okay, Andrew, now for some fun, something more relaxing,” he said, buckling his seat belt. “The head gardener is a friend of mine—”

  “No surprise there,” interrupted Andrew.

  “—and he’s expecting us. He’ll probably have a pot of tea waiting.”

  “Tea?” Andrew was less than enthusiastic. “Maybe he’ll have beer in the fridge?”

  “You’ll like him. One of the most genuine, good-natured, and inspiring men I’ve ever met.” He started the engine, glancing at Andrew. “There’s also a small matter we need to discuss. “I’ve promised to help him out with a bit of a mystery that concerns his own backyard.”

  Andrew raised an eyebrow. “A mystery, eh? Why am I not shocked?”

  “Here.” Kingston reached into his pocket and pulled out a photocopy of the newspaper clipping and handed it to Andrew. “Take a look.”

  Andrew glanced at the clipping and frowned. He read the headline aloud—“T
wo-Hundred-Year-Old Extinct Rose Shows Up on Alcatraz?”—then took a sideways look at Kingston. “This is the real reason we’re visiting your friend, isn’t it?”

  “That’s not possible, Andrew. I received Clifford’s e-mail only this morning, and we’ve planned this for three days, now. It’s just an extraordinary coincidence, that’s all. In any case, everybody at Belmaris Castle will certainly know about it; the article mentions a homecoming ceremony for the rose having taken place. We would have come here, regardless. I want you to see the gardens. But read the rest of it.”

  As Andrew went back to reading, Kingston smiled, then stabbed the accelerator a couple of times before driving off.

  5

  AFTER READING THE clipping yesterday morning, Kingston had spent an hour or so pondering its implications and scouring the Internet for additional information. There were a number of stories from both sides of the pond—a few providing additional local interest but nothing more. He soon realized that, generally, the media was using the original story by Chambers as the source. He’d purposely waited until now to tell Andrew, knowing that a mysterious back-from-extinction rose would elicit a long sigh, and could also have been a distraction at their meeting with Emma. He kept his eyes on the road while Andrew was reading.

  Kingston parked under an enormous horse chestnut tree in the grassy parking area, then he and Andrew took off on the short walk to the castle and gardens. Yesterday’s storm had long since passed, leaving the skies an unaccustomed clear blue and the air sweet with the fragrance of freshly mown grass. The lawns flanking the wide gravel paths were still beaded with the last drops of rain, and a muffled calm lulled the senses. In every direction, as far as the eye could see, the lush green parkland was speckled with red deer grazing under the black-shaded canopies of towering chestnut, oak, plane, and copper beech trees that had stood for centuries, stoically witnessing history unfold at the castle in their midst.

  On his first visit to Belmaris many years ago, Kingston had taken the recommended guided tour of the castle, finding it educational, impressive, and essential in setting the stage for a walk through the extensive gardens and grounds. His subsequent visits to Belmaris—three or four, over time—had been solely to view the award-winning gardens’ magnificent collection of antique roses. But his hands-down favorite sight was the remains of the fifteenth-century Tithe Barn, used in the Middle Ages to store one-tenth of a farm’s produce for the church. The tableau of the ruined shell of the great stone barn destroyed by Cromwell in the Civil War was abundant with beauty. The high, roofless stone walls followed the path of a long reflecting pool, stocked with carp and draped with living curtains of old climbing roses interwoven with wild clematis and wisteria. In Kingston’s opinion, in the height of summer there was no lovelier floral sight in all of England.

  At the impressive main entrance, Jimmy Cosworth, the head gardener, greeted them with smiles and handshakes. He was a lanky man with wispy silver hair, ruddy cheeks, and a deeply wrinkled face, tanned from forty-plus summers spent nurturing the castle’s gardens as if they were his own, as in a sense they were: central casting’s vision of an English gardener. Easygoing, good-humored, and immediately likable, this kindly man made everyone feel at ease.

  The three sat at a pine refectory table in a small kitchen in the back of the castle used only by the staff. As coffee—alas, no beer—was being poured into thick-rimmed mugs, a roly-poly woman wearing a frilly white apron entered. Wobbling across the room in a determined beeline, she planted a large Cornishware plate of muffins on the table, and after a booming, “There you go, loves, ’ot from the oven,” disappeared as quickly as she’d arrived.

  Kingston gingerly took a sip of the steaming coffee and looked at Cosworth. “So, Jimmy. What do you make of this globetrotting rose of yours?”

  “’Ard to fathom,” he drawled, in his West Country accent, shaking his head. “I don’t know what to make of it. Mrs. Fitzwarren is dealing with all the phone calls and inquiries now, thank God.”

  “The castle’s manager?”

  “She and her husband, Adrian, are the new owners—relatively new, that is.”

  “A climbing rose, right?”

  Cosworth nodded. “And a rambunctious one, at that.”

  “I understand it became extinct in the sixties. Is that correct?”

  “That’s about right, according to our records, anyway. I came ’ere in the mid-eighties and remember being told that the Belmaris rose had been classified as extinct twenty years prior—as you say, sometime in the sixties. It was a big deal at the time, and all the garden staff was provided with information on its pedigree. A conversation piece.”

  Kingston scratched his forehead. “Where in the garden was it growing?”

  “In the Tithe Barn ruins. Well out of reach of the public, fortunately. But if you’re wondering ’ow easy or difficult it would have been for someone to ’ave filched cuttings, I think you know the answer to that.”

  “Impossible to prevent.”

  “Right. When you think about it, growing there for two hundred bloody years, you’d have to be a bit thick to think that some silly bugger with secateurs in ’is pocket won’t snip off a couple of bits while no one’s looking. Even our own people might ’ave been tempted. Though I’d prefer to think not.”

  “I have a question,” Andrew said, looking across the table at Cosworth.

  Kingston wondered what kind of question he could possibly ask. Roses were not one of Andrew’s particular interests.

  Cosworth nodded. “By all means.”

  “Who—what authority—decides whether and at what point a rose is classified as extinct? If, as you say, they’re so easy to transplant from cuttings, how can anyone possibly know that a rose has disappeared from the planet forevermore?”

  Cosworth frowned. After a moment of thought, he replied, “To tell the truth, Andrew, though I’ve spent most of my adult life gardening, I’ve never given that question too much thought. Guess that’s because I spend more time tending to the living plants in front of me than thinking about what isn’t there. You’re right, though,” he said, nodding. “And it’s a fair question.” He paused and reached for a muffin. “How can we be so sure? Well, the short answer is, we can’t. It’s the word ‘extinct’ that’s the problem. It’s a semantic problem. A lot of historians, growers, plant authorities, and so on use the word to signify that a plant or seed is no longer commercially available or not generally known to exist for purposes of propagation. This doesn’t mean that somewhere in the world there’s not more than one Belmaris rose growing in obscurity, as it were, admired and nurtured by its uninformed owner who hasn’t the foggiest idea of its provenance or rarity, just thinks it’s pretty. So the idea of a bunch of rose experts and botanical authorities decreeing a plant extinct isn’t really accurate. ‘Become a rarity’ might be a better way of putting it.” He looked at Kingston. “What do you think, Lawrence? You know a lot more about these technical things than I do.”

  “I think your explanation is spot-on. I would only add that many native plants, somewhat like endangered animals, are suffering serious threats to their survival. As our planet undergoes changes with population density, industrial development, overharvesting, deforestation, habitat loss, and so on, more plants are being pushed toward extinction in the true sense of the word, and no longer will their species be found anywhere in the wild. However, there’s a distinction when it comes to roses. What makes them different is that, while they’ve been growing in the wild in many parts of the world since time immemorial, much of that time they’ve also been cultivated and hybridized by man. In fact, references to Chinese floriculture date back to the eleventh century B.C., and Chinese floral encyclopedias indicate that by the fourth and fifth centuries A.D., rose culture was widespread in China. I’d venture a guess that under controlled and ideal conditions, using advanced propagation techniques and technology, rose cultivars today now number in the many thousands worldwide. So Jimmy is correct. It�
��s not accurate to state that any given rose is truly extinct.”

  Andrew still appeared a little perplexed. “So if, as you say, the possibility exists that there could be any number of this particular rose growing in different parts of the world, one could have easily been growing in the States, somewhere out of the public’s eye, for many years. If nothing else, that would account for the transcontinental question.”

  “That’s true,” Kingston said. “But when and how it ended up on Alcatraz remains a big puzzle. One way or another, it had to cross the Atlantic and then another twenty-five hundred miles overland across the North American continent.”

  Andrew didn’t look altogether convinced and simply nodded.

  “Who was the head gardener when you first came to Belmaris, Jimmy?” Kingston asked.

  “Hmm.” Cosworth’s watery eyes looked up to the ceiling. “That would be Arthur Purseglove. Otherwise known as Percy. Quiet sort of bloke, but ’e was a bloody encyclopedia when it came to plants. What ’e didn’t know wasn’t in any book I know of. Why do you ask?”

  “Nothing, really. I was wondering if he’d seen the rose in bloom.”

  “He must ‘ave.” Cosworth nodded. “’E was ’ere for twenty-five years before me.”

  As the three drank and polished off the muffins, their conversation gradually drifted away from the rose to the gardens and life in general, finally petering out after Jimmy announced that he would soon retire—“throw in the trowel”—as he put it. After handshakes outside the kitchen door, Kingston and Andrew headed to the gardens. They’d gone only a dozen steps, when Kingston heard Cosworth shout his name. He stopped and looked back.

  “Lawrence, I’ve just remembered someone else who probably saw the rose growing ’ere,” Jimmy said. “Reginald Payne. Local bloke, used to ’ang around a lot when I first came ’ere. ’E’s a bit of a cagey sort, but ’e knows ’is stuff when it comes to gardening, that’s for sure. ’Aven’t seen ’im in quite a while, come to think of it. As a matter of fact, I believe ’e was quite chummy with Graham Stewart Thomas at one time.”