St. Just had an hour until his train to Cambridge, and no desire to sit in the waiting room, reading yet another newspaper, or resuming his copy of Baudolino. The case was closed, or as closed as cases ever get, via a combination of high- and low-tech means. Man's best friend meets the age of technology.
"You did all right by us, Cambridge," Moor had told him, dropping him off at the train station. "Even if you're not from Scotland Yaird."
St. Just had smiled. He was going to miss Moor and Kittle. They'd walk their days under Scottish skies, and he'd probably never see either of them again.
Portia he'd not seen again. He'd spent most of what was left of the night at the police station and slept until noon the next day. By the time he awoke, all his former suspects had departed.
Including Portia, who had already claimed a prior, urgent appointment. That was probably even true. She'd said she would call him. There was… a "situation"… she needed to sort out first. She didn't elaborate. He hadn't dared ask. He clung with hope to the word "first." He'd give her a week, he'd decided, and then call her.
A wedding party was arriving as he and Moor left the castle. He hoped it was an omen.
Desmond, the weakest link, had indeed broken down under interrogation, as St. Just had known he would. Once the pair of them were separated, he'd described in detail Annabelle's role in the crime.
She had remained steadfast, loudly proclaiming her innocence and demanding a lawyer. He'd let the Scots work on her. Not his pigeon.
Walking aimlessly now about the streets near Waverley Station, he came to an antique shop. On closer inspection, it seemed to be more of a junk shop. In the window was a Teddy Bear that looked like the survivor of some horrible nursery experiment. Several experiments.
He'd had a similar toy as a child. Hadn't everyone? It was hard to imagine growing up without that small comfort, but of course by the many thousands there must be children who went without.
What next caught his eye in the window was a set of pastels. The wooden box was labeled "Sennelier Landscape Wood Soft Pastel Set." It would be years before he would come to realize they made another set in a different range of colors called Seascape, and yet another called Portrait. But he was drawn to these Landscape ones-with their rich, deep range of color, the deep blues and bright reds-like a bird drawn to a bright object.
There were fifty of these little crayonlike objects laid in two rows in their specially made wooden box. None of them appeared to have been used. Wait-the blue drawing stick, the one of the deepest shade of blue, the one nearly a match for Portia's eyes and her velvet dress-that was a bit worn at one end. He walked into the store and, leaning into the display, picked that one out of the box.
Who would buy a fancy set of colors like this and give up after trying only one? Intrigued, he picked up the entire box, looking for the price. Seventy pounds they wanted. Good Lord. But the set was nearly new, he told himself. And the colors, such amazing colors…
Drawing was something he'd always done instinctively, usually when sitting, half-listening, in some interminable meeting, or otherwise held captive. He drew to record scenes the way another man might use a camera to take snapshots on vacation. He'd not had formal training, apart from one evening course, and he hadn't repeated the experience-he told himself his gift didn't amount to a major talent and he didn't want to start taking it all too seriously.
He'd never had the least inclination to pick up a paintbrush. Black on white was his metier. If he saw this, as others did, as support for his reputation for lucid, cut-and-dried reasoning, he would be the last to acknowledge it. He'd leave the Freudian interpretations to those who liked that kind of thing.
But… he'd have these pastels. He carried the box to the aged man behind the antique desk that served as a checkout counter. Black and white had its place, but until that moment St. Just had not known how much he felt the need of color in his world.
He felt a surge of confidence. He would see Portia again and, this time, he'd win her over.
He'd return to Cambridge and he'd call her right away. Who had a week to waste? Maybe he'd try to call her from the Waverley station.
Or maybe he'd write. Anyway, he'd woo her, the old-fashioned way, no matter how big a fool he made of himself in the process.
Whatever it took.
As St. Just was handing over his credit card to the store owner, Elsbeth Dowell, Florie's replacement at Dalmorton, was carrying a stack of freshly laundered sheets down one of the labyrinth hallways of the castle. Elsbeth, only months out of school, was proud of this, her first real job, and determined to do well. She liked stately Dalmorton, with its proud history and glamorous present; she knew Donna Doone to be a fair employer.
The door to one of the turret rooms-in fact the police's "Incident Turret"-suddenly opened of itself.
That's odd, she thought. Those doors each weigh a ton.
She peered inside.
Suddenly she dropped the sheets, and screamed.
Her screams seemed to have no effect on the two women in gauzy white dresses who stood before her, smiling, and beckoning her towards them. The women were both as transparent as cellophane. "Just like they was sweet wrappers," as she told Donna later, handing in her notice. She could see through both of them to the gray castle walls behind.
One of the women wore a voluminous gown, medieval in style, with long sleeves and a veiled headdress; the other a modern dress with spaghetti straps, short and clinging and low-cut. It might almost have been a white silk slip.
She had long, flowing, white-blonde hair.
It was well over a year since the Dalmorton murders, with Cambridge heading into an unseasonably warm June. As St. Just walked along Trinity Street past Heffer's, his eye was caught by the name Joan Elksworthy on a book in the display window.
He stepped inside for a closer look. He hefted the book off the display; it was a good-sized hardback with a glossy pink-and-black cover, edged in a tartan pattern of similar colors. A dark, looming castle dominated the illustration. Joan's name appeared in large, bold type over a title in still-larger type: Death at Dalmorton. Leafing through the pages, he saw what Joan had written was a nonfiction, "eyewitness" account of Kimberlee's murder. One of the store clerks, just walking past, told him it was one of their more popular items.
Of course St. Just had to have a copy. He remembered his last conversation at the castle with Mrs. E., just before he left for the police station with Moor and Kittle.
"Poor Kimberlee," she'd said. "I'm sure she never saw it coming. We all need to protect ourselves-some more than others-from knowing what our nearest and dearest really think of us, don't we? How could we go on living otherwise-without those blinders on?"
"A bit cynical, that, don't you think?"
"Not at all, Inspector. I'm just a realist."
Taking the book to the checkout desk, he also noticed that What Jesus Ate by Sarah Beauclerk-Fisk, a name from one of his previous investigations, was apparently still selling briskly, judging by its prominent display. He picked up the book and smiled, deciding to buy it, if for no other reason than old times' sake. He'd never get around to reading it, but maybe he could give it to someone as a gift. Or maybe he could start a collection: books by murder suspects. It was then the name Magretta Sincock on yet another book on the best-seller table caught his eye. Another hot pink and black number. He picked up the book and turned it over to read the jacket copy: "A refreshing and daring departure for the Queen of Romantic Suspense: hip, witty, irreverent. Most of all: cool. This season's must-have accessory for your beach bag."
Really. Somehow, that didn't sound like Magretta, and, as he scanned the pages, he began to recognize pieces of the manuscript the Scottish police had managed to retrieve from Kimberlee's sodden laptop. He turned the book to look at its spine, and saw the distinctive Deadly Dagger Press logo.
He barked out a laugh, causing nearby browsers in the sanctuary-like atmosphere of the store to turn their heads and frown at him in disapproval. She'd stolen it from Kimberlee, of course. Magretta must have copied the computer file onto a memory stick or a CD-despite her poor-little-me claims of no experience with technology-and only then thrown the laptop out of the window, thinking that would destroy it.
As it was, it came so very near to being lost.
The police only cared about the will they'd also found on the laptop, not the manuscript. The will in which Kimberlee had left everything to her husband, Desmond. The will she hadn't yet had time to change, despite advice from her solicitor-in a document also on the laptop-to do so as a preliminary step to divorce.
And now Magretta was claiming the novel-minus, of course, the parts she didn't want to see the light of day-as her own.
He wondered what, if anything, he should do about it.
Portia will know, he thought. I'll ask her.