Rainbow's End (16 page)

It was obvious their curiosity had completely overridden any delicacy in the matter and they were nodding even before his lengthy (for Macalvie) explanation was finished. At the phrase “morgue shot” Jury could feel the little frisson of anticipation pass down the table.

But he went on: “We're wondering if this woman might have been known to Mrs. Hawes. Angela Hope, an American from Santa Fe. If each of you could look at it separately, before you confer, it would help. I'm not really expecting any of you to identify her. But if there's anything about her that you associate with Helen Hawes . . . ”

As instructed, the three passed the photo from one to another. They did not speak. Their eyes did not meet. More impressive still, Jury thought, they did not flinch. Gertie, Ruth, and Vi were used to detail, to a microcosmic view of life, if their long application to the elaborate stitchery of rondels and cushions and chasubles was any evidence. They could also follow instructions, and could also bring a great deal of concentration to bear on a subject. Having studied the photo, they looked off in different directions—toward the Lady Chapel, a tomb opposite, down the nave. Finally, they demurred. Apologetically, they shook their heads, almost in unison. No, they couldn't think of any connection between this dead woman and their fellow tapister Nell Hawes. Macalvie told them he appreciated their help and if they did recall anything, they had his card.

As Jury and Macalvie turned to leave, Vi asked if they'd talked to Annie Landis.

Macalvie said he hadn't. “Is she a tapister, then?”

“Yes. And she'll be at home, I expect.” Vi gave Macalvie the address, then paused, looking sad. “She's taken a bad turn. It's really a shame.”

“ ‘Bad turn'?”

The three of them bent their heads over their embroidery. They might have been praying. Again, Vi said, “See, she's just recently got her lab report. Well . . . ” Her voice trailed off.

Vi stopped speaking and Gertie picked it up. Her head still bent with the others, red silk wound about her finger like a thread of blood, she added, “We always set our clocks by Annie. I recall the gentleman who takes care of the cathedral clock—well, I recall his looking up the nave to see Annie Landis come in one morning and then cast his eye up to the clock and say, ‘Good Lord, two minutes off!' Yes, we set our clocks by her. Time and tide and Annie Landis. That's what we said and what we say.”

Jury smiled over this rather poetic turn of phrase, yet mildly shocked by this reference to what might be present, or what might be past. It was as though Annie were already gone. He looked at Macalvie slowly folding a stick of gum into his mouth; he seemed to be reflecting on Vi's news and Gertie's words.

After some silence, Macalvie finally said, “Thanks for your help, ladies.” His eye swept down the little row. “Come on,” he said to Jury. He walked away, past the great clock, and up the nave.

Jury followed. Outside the cathedral entrance, he asked, “To where?”

“Annie Landis's house.”

As he followed him to the parked car, Jury protested. “But if she's ill, really ill, Macalvie—”

“Probably she'll be glad of the company.” Macalvie yanked open the car door.

“
Company
? Macalvie, we don't exactly fall into that warm and comfortable body of well-wishers known as ‘company.' ”

Over the bonnet of the car, Macalvie gave Jury an affectedly crooked smile. “Maybe
you
don't. Not with
that
attitude.”

What? thought Jury. “What ‘attitude'?”

Climbing into the driver's seat, Macalvie called, “You coming? You staying?”

Jury got in, slammed the door. “You're a treat, Mad Dog.”

“Now I
know
you talked to Rush.” Macalvie slammed the gear into reverse and the tires spit gravel.

JURY HAD
never seen Exeter's waterfront before, its old quay and canal, its new condos. The river from here stretched all the way to Topsham (Macalvie had told him), passing weirs and warehouses, discos and pubs along the way. Much of the waterfront was built more or less into the side of a cliff, a high rise of red sandstone with part of the city wall above it.

Annie Landis's cottage was set back near the top of stone steps that twisted and turned up the cliffside. It was whitewashed, neat and narrow, and Macalvie was about to let the dolphin door knocker drop when they heard raised voices from within. One raised voice, actually, a man's, answered by the subdued voice of a woman.

The argument proceeding inside and very near the front door seemed to turn on whether he was leaving or staying. Or rather, it was clear he was leaving and she wanted him to stay.

“Just down the pub, for God's sake; just to stop with my mates for a drink.”

Her voice, much less distinct, said something to the effect that “a” drink was likely to stretch for hours and after all, she'd just got this bad news—

“Mum . . . you can't always be expecting—”

“Tea.” The voice was plaintive.

“No, I don't want any tea. Can't you understand? It's
my
life.”

Funny, thought Jury, I got the impression it was, at this particular point, hers. He watched Macalvie fold another stick of gum into his mouth in that ruminative way of his. Jury had finally realized that Macalvie did this when something upset him, something that for one reason or another, he wasn't permitting to show.

The door opened with a yank. They were looking into the angry face of a young man, who bore an astonishing resemblance to the woman behind him. If they'd been mother and daughter, only the years that separated them would have kept one from taking them for twins.

“Oh. . . . Who're you?”

The question was not belligerent but genuinely inquiring as he looked back over his shoulder at his mother. “Somebody for you,
Mum. I'll see you tomorrow.” And he smiled and took the steps fleetly, several at a time.

She shook her head, her hands turning an embroidery hoop round in her hands. The piece of linen stretched across it was shot through with brilliant strands of silky thread. That Annie Landis had been weeping, copiously, was evident. “Ravaged by tears” was a phrase Jury had seldom had occasion to use; in her case, though, it was the first thing he thought of. Annie Landis looked as if some heavy object had struck her, landing with terrific force. Everything about her seemed askew—the neckline of a cashmere sweater yanked to one side; a leather belt drooping across one hip; a wave of soft reddish hair rising upward like a flame from her temple. She looked lopsided, out of alignment, like a reflection in a divided mirror.

And there was no doubt in Jury's mind that that was just the way she must have felt.

Macalvie took his identification out, told her who they were, apologized for the intrusion, and explained what they wanted. “We'd like to ask you a few questions about Helen Hawes. It won't take long.”

Her eyes refocused on Macalvie, then shifted to Jury. “Nell? Ah. Poor Nell. Come in.”

The three of them then stood in the front parlor in much the same way they had stood in the hall, arranged awkwardly just inside the door; they could have sat on the sofa or on the floor—that was what her vague gesture toward the interior of the room implied. Her hand, still holding the hoop, moved in an aimless way toward a couple of armchairs with cretonne slipcovers, their large pastel roses fading into a monochromatic blur.

Annie Landis looked like that too, rather: skin that must have been rose and ivory, once; hair, gold-tinged; eyes the color of young grass. And though only the ghost of those colors remained now, blending into the pale beige of the sweater and skirt, Annie Landis had the sort of looks time might try to erode, but would never succeed in doing.

“You wouldn't,” said Macalvie, his hand tilting toward his mouth in the gesture of one drinking, “happen to have a cuppa, would you?” Jury had never before heard Macalvie ask a witness for anything. Wiggins, yes; the sergeant was always conniving and maneuvering as close to the tea and scones as possible.

Instantly, Annie Landis's face and form underwent a transformation, seeming almost magically to straighten out, to realign themselves. What had looked like an image dispersing in water now recast itself into the appearance of a very attractive woman. “Oh, yes, indeed I do. As a matter of fact, I've just made some.”

She was an Englishwoman after all; first and foremost she could produce a cup of tea and certainly for the Devon and Cornwall Constabulary—not to mention Scotland Yard. She left, her step almost brisk, and while Macalvie whistled behind his teeth and ignored Jury, there came from a kitchen the rattle of cups and tinkle of glass. In less than two minutes she was back, rolling before her a double-tiered butler's table, set out with Spode and a blue glass plate of iced cakes and biscuits. Clearly, this is what she'd got ready for her son.

“That your son who just left?” asked Macalvie, echoing Jury's thought.

She had sat herself down to pour the tea. “Yes, it was. Jimmy.” She was even smiling a little now. If there was anything more calming than this ritual, Jury couldn't imagine what it was. He thanked her as he accepted a cup adorned with a transparent slice of lemon.

Macalvie had his own cup balanced on the cretonne arm and was munching on one of the cakes. Then he reached for a biscuit. “He live with you, does he? Jimmy, I mean.”

She shook her head. “No, he doesn't. He hasn't done for a few years now. Young people need to have space to themselves. It's tiresome living with parents.” Her tone held no rancor. She handed the plate of cakes round again.

Macalvie helped himself to another and commented on their richness. Macalvie, who ordinarily didn't seem to have the time to say “hello” or “goodbye,” was comfortably settled back in his armchair, sipping and chewing. It was Jury who reintroduced the subject of Helen Hawes.

“Nell, yes. We called her Nell, not Helen.” She paused for a moment, her teacup held aloft as if she meant to drink, but she didn't. Instead, she set it down, gently, and gathered the cashmere sweater around her, as if the room had suddenly grown chilly. “That was so sudden.”

“We understand she had a history of heart disease, though.”

“No, not exactly. I mean, heart ‘disease' isn't the same as heart ‘trouble,' is it? It wasn't the sort of thing that should have caused that reaction. Although I expect it could.”

“What?” Macalvie asked. “What ‘sort of thing'?”

Annie Landis picked up her cup again, then replaced it. “I was used to Nell's heart episodes. I think it's called ventricular fibrillation. And she took medicine for it, had done for several years. Occasionally, she'd forget or would stubbornly refuse to have it refilled. Nell could be stubborn like that. ‘Oh, I'm right as rain; what do I need this stuff for?' I'd tell her the reason she was ‘right as rain' was because of that ‘stuff.' If she didn't take it, she'd become ill. But she seemed to be fine as long as she wasn't without it. And she wasn't”—here Annie Landis looked brightly at Macalvie—“without it, was she? The vial was right there in her purse.”

Jury smiled at her. “You're observant, Mrs. Landis.”

“Yes. Most of us are, you know, in the society. Perhaps it comes of doing all of that close work.”

Macalvie shifted in his chair. “There's not much doubt it was her heart. Coroner's report put death down to that. Have you had thoughts?” For Macalvie, that was an incredibly lachrymose question.

“Of course.” She leaned her head on the wing of her chair and all but closed her eyes. “That day. Five of us were sitting at the table, the one near the quire where we always sit and do our work. Nell said she was tired of stitching and wanted to have another look at the rondels, that she hadn't really seen all of them along the west nave. She left her purse there and it was open; that's how I knew she had her medicine with her, because the little bottle rolled out. And so she walked away.”

“That's the last you saw of her before she was taken ill and collapsed?”

Annie Landis nodded. “I find it peculiar. Well, I expect you do too, or you wouldn't be here.” Her smile lingered on Macalvie's face and moved to Jury's.

There was a silence. Then Macalvie, who seldom revealed information about any case, surprised Jury by asking, “You've read about the body of the woman found at Old Sarum?”

She frowned. “Yes.” Again, she looked from Macalvie to Jury. “Are you saying there's a connection?”

Macalvie looked up at the ceiling, apparently considering. “Mrs. Hawes spent a holiday in the States fairly recently.”

“Several months ago she did. She liked to travel. Every two or three years, just about, she'd go abroad. Europe, usually. Three or four times to America.”

“The Southwest.”

“The last time, yes, to the Southwest. That was back in October . . . no, it was November, I think. Nell always liked to travel in months when it wasn't so touristy and wasn't so expensive.”

November, thought Jury. The same month in which Fanny Hamilton had gone to the States. “Did she talk about it? Did she meet anyone in particular? Did she seem her usual self when she came back? And since then?”

“Do you think something happened in the United States? I believe she went to—Arizona, possibly. Yes, she mentioned—wait a moment, what was the area?” Annie Landis frowned mightily, trying to remember. “It sounded more like an intersection than a state. . . . Oh, yes. Four Corners. Where four states came together. I think she said you could stand there and put your foot in all four states. Utah, Arizona . . . New Mexico? I forget the fourth.” She shook her head. “Well, that's all I recall her mentioning. Nell really didn't chatter about things the way a lot of us do. Well, the way I tend to do.”