Rainbow's End (19 page)

Jury had started pacing back and forth, there on the cold quay. “Macalvie, cut it out. You know and I know there are only two reasons for not solving a case. You either don't have enough information or you do have the information but just can't put it together. That's it. Fini.”

Macalvie shrugged, dug his hands in his trouser pockets.

“Oh, come on, Macalvie. You have to agree with that. If we can't come up with a connection between Fanny Hamilton, Nell Hawes, and Angela Hope, it's either lack of information or inability to think straight.” When Macalvie didn't answer, Jury added, “There are plenty of cases I haven't solved. God, there might
even
be a case
you
haven't solved. Lack of information. Bad thinking. For you, of course, it could only be lack of information. There's nothing metaphysical about it.”

But Macalvie merely shook his head. “Maybe not. Because it's—unfathomable.”

“That's ridiculous. Impossible. And are you saying
this
one is that sort of crime?”

Macalvie snorted. “How could I be saying that, for Christ's sake, when we don't
have
all the available information.” Macalvie yawned. “What point does he have?”

“What? What are you talking about?” Jury's mind was still working at metaphysics.

“Jimmy. You said he had a point.”

That was Macalvie. He never forgot anything, no matter how insignificant. “Let me tell you something you probably won't like—”

“How thrilling.”

“For such a good cop, for someone with such a subtle mind, you sure as hell see things sometimes in simple terms. You don't seem to be able to imagine the possibility that life can be extremely complex—”

“No? What was I just talking about, then?”

“—or that people are slaves to ambivalence. His point was, you can't tell people how to live.”

“The hell I can't. Well, come on. Let's
go
.”

Jury sighed. “You're just like he is.”

Macalvie stopped. “Like Jimmy Landis? Me?” He clapped his hands to his chest. “
Moi
?”

“Yeah,
toi
.”

“And how do you work that out?”

“You're both so scared somebody might die you can't even take your coats off.”

They walked in silence for some minutes.

What Jury was thinking about was the girl, the little sister. How old? Twelve, thirteen. Angela Hope had, apparently, been her family. Now her family was gone. He said, “Two or three days. Four, tops.” Jury looked out over the river. “Because I want the information and I know you're wrong.”

Macalvie was lighting a cigar. When he had sucked in to his satisfaction, he flicked the match toward the river and asked, “Can you leave tomorrow?”

“No.”

The next day, Jury left.

To any casual passerby in the rain who glanced through the windows of Ardry End, Melrose was sure he and his aunt must present the very picture of warmth and conviviality, snug as could be before the fireplace, drinking tea and sherry, the old dog at their feet.

But why would anyone casually pass by in the middle of a dark downpour? He realized he'd been thinking of Miss Fludd for the hundredth time. And would have started in on a hundred-and-one, had his manservant, Ruthven, not been standing over him at the moment, telephone receiver extended, drawing him from dreams of Paris and Miss Fludd. It was a fantasy he'd had a good deal of trouble supporting, even before the telephone's interruption, given that Agatha was beached on the sofa opposite, the tide of the pouring rain not powerful enough to suck her out through the door, despite its having floated her in.

These watery images, however, had led him from Paris and Miss Fludd to Baltimore's National Aquarium and thence to the writer Ellen Taylor. Her book
Windows
lay on the arm of his chair. He had put it down, inspired to pick up his own. Until Agatha's early morning intrusion, Melrose had been having a lovely time, drinking a coffee and writing the next installment of
Gin Lane
and the adventures of Detective Chief Inspector Smithson and his wife, Norma. Smithson and Norma were also seated before a fire, theirs at Gravely Manor; they too were drinking coffee (and Norma, champagne, as always). It pleased Melrose how these two partook of his own pleasures and pastimes.

“
So you see, darling,” said Norma, “that alibi is . . . 
”

What? What about the alibi? Melrose scanned the page before to find out. Couldn't he even keep straight which alibi belonged to
which character? Well, he hadn't, after all, picked up
Gin Lane
since he'd gone to Baltimore. He frowned a little, his mind only partly taking in Agatha's deployment of the fairy cakes, the rest of it on the telephone receiver Ruthven was forcing on him.

“It's Superintendent Jury, my lord.” Ruthven sounded self-satisfied, even smirky. He knew that Agatha's presence meant any conversation with Mr. Jury would be conducted in code. Ruthven was very fond of Richard Jury, whom he referred to as “a gentleman of the old school,” and who, despite being titleless, somehow (in Ruthven's estimation) made up for Melrose's having given up his earldom, his duchy, his marquessry.

Melrose listened for a few moments; then he said, “
Again
? Good Lord, but we just got back. . . . Hospital?
Wiggins
is in hospital? . . . What sort of accident? . . . Nothing serious? For Sergeant Wiggins, everything's serious. . . . Oh, all right, if you won't tell. . . . Yes, I'll stop in and see him. . . . I was going to London anyway. . . . Uh-huh. . . . Merchant—wait a moment, let me get a bit of paper—” He looked about the end table, when Agatha, in one of her rare moments of helpfulness, handed him a small silver notebook, the cover adorned with a crest. It looked familiar, somehow. “Go on. . . . ” Melrose wrote as Jury talked. “Gabriel Merchant. . . . The Crippses? You're joking. . . . I remember. Ah! Lady Cray. I should be glad to see her again. . . . Slocum, Beatrice . . . the couple in the Tate, right? But if you've already talked to them . . . How could there be any relation between . . . No, I don't have a facsimile machine—why would I have one of those? I can barely manage dialing a telephone. . . . All right, send it express. I'll get it before I leave. What do the telephone numbers have to . . . Commander Macalvie . . . Well, isn't he always?” Melrose laughed, then stopped laughing when he realized sheer surprise had him repeating what Jury was saying while Agatha was sitting there, all ears and fairy cakes. Lord, wouldn't he ever learn to take calls
outside
when she was in the room? So he sat there for the few moments remaining, stony-faced while Jury told him why he was nipping off to the States. Again. And they'd been back for only a week. Finally, they said their goodbyes.

“What was all that about?”

He was saved from answering at all while she trod on her own question. “And you didn't tell me you were going to London!”

“It's my annual visit to Mr. Beaton.”

“Who on earth is he? I've never heard of him.” Which fairly well settled Mr. Beaton's existence.

“My tailor. Was my father's tailor. And
this
—” Melrose held up the silver notebook—“I believe was my mother's.”

Wide-eyed, Agatha asked, “Whose?”

“M-U-M's. Lady Marjorie's. You do remember Lady Marjorie, the Countess of Caverness?”

Agatha settled for telling him not to be silly; she certainly wasn't settling for the truth.

He sat there brooding for some moments over Jury's call, until pulled from his reflections by his aunt's voice, together with the sudden appearance, at the long window, of Mr. Momaday, emblazoned in a flash of lightning. Mr. Momaday was the new groundskeeper; he stood outside now like a skeleton in a Barbour jacket, drenched.

Melrose went to the window, threw it up, and got a lashing of rain on his face. He listened to Mr. Momaday's guttural vowels and watched his rather violent gesticulations.

“Close that window, Plant!” yelled Agatha. “It's raining!”

What a brilliant sleuth. To Momaday he said, “Yes, yes, I understand.” Melrose didn't but he slammed down the window anyway.

This did not, however, deter Mr. Momaday, who apparently assumed Melrose was as conversant with him through a pane of glass as anywhere else. Mr. Momaday's mouth kept working.

“Whatever is that Momaday person on about? He's quite crazy. I told you that when you hired him.”

Agatha hadn't, of course, told Melrose any such thing. She was delighted to have someone new to order about the house and grounds. Melrose had hired this groundskeeper, not to manage his pheasant and grouse, but to manage the occasional hunter who came poking about his property. Momaday roamed around in his green Barbour jacket and gumshoes, shotgun broken over his arm, looking purposeful and doing nothing. But that was, of course, what Melrose wanted him to do: nothing. Nothing but project a sense of danger. He had been hired from amongst several candidates precisely because he was fairly useless and would, therefore, leave both Melrose and muskrat alone. Mr. Momaday looked the part, too: gaunt and with a sort of cuneiform skull, a forehead permanently formed into runnels. And Mr. Momaday also had supplied the unexpected bonus of keeping Agatha out of the drawing room and in the
copse, for now she had someone new for whom she could fashion fresh hells.

“If you're going to London, you can stop in at Harrods and get me some of their Norfolk ham.”

“If you want ham, go to Norfolk. I'm not going to Harrods Food Hall. I wouldn't surface for days.” He looked at his manuscript page again, frowning. What alibi? He couldn't remember so he drew a pig. The ham was doing more to inspire him than his own imagination.

The moving pen supplied Agatha with fresh ammunition: “Are you still writing that silly mystery thing?”

“No.” Melrose went on writing.

She sighed and finally sat back on the sofa. “What's Martha cooking for our dinner?”

Our
? “Haggis. And some mashed turnip. Washed down, I think, with a single-malt whisky.”

“
Haggis
? Good Lord, you don't really eat that stuff. I don't believe it.”

“I eat and drink and recite Mr. Burns's ode to a haggis. That might be the name, actually: ‘To a Haggis.' ‘Cut you up with ready slight—' ” here, Melrose pretended to wield a knife—” Trenching your gushing entrails bright—' ”

“That is absolutely disgusting!”

“You won't care to join me, then? It does get a bit, well, like a revenge tragedy when Ruthven stabs the skin.”

“
You could, you know, make an appointment,” said Norma. “After all, Jonah has never met you.
” Yes! That was an excellent idea! And “Jonah” was a popular name, he thought, with psychiatrists.

“A nasty, low dish.” Agatha, apparently still on the haggis, shuddered. She surveyed the wasted tea table and said, “I'll just have Martha wrap me up a few of those cakes to take with me. I'm sure she's got more in the kitchen.” She raised her eyes and said, “I don't know what you think you're writing, Plant.”

Melrose didn't answer. He had drawn a fountain and was now settling a little statue near it. Unable to think of anything that Smithson might tell a psychiatrist, he was drawing little pictures on the manuscript page. This garden gnome was no doubt inspired by Trueblood's absurd plot to get through the doors of Watermeadows.

The voiceover of Agatha thrummed on, but he ignored it, returning to thoughts of the Fludds and Watermeadows. Miss Fludd
clearly could not be living at Watermeadows alone, unless . . . Could she have come in advance of Lady Summerston? Perhaps as a paid companion, or something like that? Oh, surely, the girl would not be working in that capacity. Damn it! How could he have been so stupid as not to ask her anything? What a remarkable conversation. Not a moment's worth of practical exchange of information in it—

“Since you've come back from the States, there's no question but what you've changed, Plant; I really think it too bad.”
Thrum, thrum, thrum.

Melrose found he had doodled in three chickens by the fountain. He turned his gaze to his ceiling, an Adam ceiling that he found soothing, its elegant spirals and garlands almost soporific, and wondered why he hadn't thought of the extremely simple overture of inviting the Fludds (assuming “Fludd” was some sort of family name) over for tea. Surely, it would be a neighborly thing to do; Watermeadows was, after all, the property next door to his—although the acres and acres of land in between must have put the distance at perhaps half a mile. Still—

“What are you doing?”

Melrose looked up. The thrumming, he noticed had stopped, like the sudden cessation of a vibrating string. “Hmm? Oh, I'm just making a list for Momaday.”

“List? What sort of list?”

“Things we'll need.” Melrose sketched in the tiny snout of a pig. He had had little to do with pigs, true, but he quite liked them, he decided. This one had a pot belly, like one of that Korean lot. Or was it the Vietnamese pigs? “Feed, fertilizer. Probably a tractor.”

“What? Why would you need a tractor?”

Melrose drew a fence around his farm animals. “It's for the farm. Or farmling, perhaps. I don't want to overextend myself. We'll need the tractor to turn over the loam. Loam.” He repeated the word, liking the sound of it. Earth had such nice words connected with it: “soil,” “loam,” “moss,” “moor” . . .

“You must be mad! This is Ardry End! Why, it's . . . it's a manor house!”

“No, it isn't.”

“It would be if it were a bit larger.”