chapter 24

Sonia parked on a well-worn patch of mud that served as O’Dowd’s driveway—well, used to be his driveway, she thought—feeling slightly guilty having thought it. There was a quick dip and a hole, followed by two weary splashes of mud before the Bentley’s tires rode over a grassy hummock almost black with oil. The grass was uncut and spotty at best. Turning into the driveway, she hoped she wouldn’t get stuck before she had a chance to straighten the steering wheel. Maybe if I had a wider tire, but that’s too much money, she reminded herself. Money was always an issue with her. The War Widow they called her. She knew what her father would say; he’d say it’s nothing more than an extravagance.

Nigel looked through the Bentley’s window and over the edge of the door at the muddy path opening up in front of him. He shook his head slowly as he opened the door a crack, looked down and slammed the door closed again.

She waited.

“Tell me.,” he said, turning to look at her and straining to regain his composure. “Was there that much traffic out there on the road, that it made you think this was the better place to park?” He pushed the door open again and she leaned across to have a look. She smiled, wondering how far he’d get before he sank into the mud. She reached behind her seat and took out a pair of well-worn boots.

“So naturally, you have boots?” he said, stepping into the mud. “Of course you have boots. Why wouldn’t you? I mean, it doesn’t matter where you park then, does it? Not if you have boots.”

“You have boots,” she said, looking at him briefly. She shook her head and smiled as she bent down to untie the laces of her shoes. “I know you have boots. I’ve seen them. You wear them when you ride your motorcycle in to town—and you always drive your motorcycle—”

“Ride.”

“What? Oh, ride. I understand now. It only helps me remember that you wore them this morning. You chose to take them off. So tell me how this is my fault?”

“You could’ve told me we were coming out here—”

He slammed the door in frustration.

Sonia looked up, sweeping her hair out of her eyes, and turning to look at the farmhouse. Nigel was coming around to the from of the Bentley, a dark shadow in the brilliantly bright day. But looking at Nigel as he negotiated the mud pit, she thought, It’d be funny if he fell.

The house itself was so typically English countryside, though; idyllic was the word that crossed her mind. There were vines twisting through old, gnarly timbers that had probably weathered a century’s worth of storms. There was an herb garden where she could smell a dozen different scents, but still couldn’t name a single one. There was a broken carriage laying off to the side held together by dust and cobwebs. One of its wheels was on the ground, the grass between the spokes long and brittle with the season. It came off as the sort of scene she supposed he’d seen in the Brit.

Water colours of a Rustic Nature.

“I didn’t know we were coming out here; not until we actually got here,” she said, sitting up and trying to sound firm—rather than the alternative, which meant laughing out loud. “Besides, you figured it out before I could even tell you where we were going.”

“We haven’t seen another automobile in hours—”

“Please. We haven’t even been on the road for an hour.” She smiled, trying to make light of it before standing up and pulling her tunic down.

“Now, do you know what you’re going to say?” she asked.

“How would I know what I’m going to say, when I don’t even know why we came here in the first place?”

She opened the rear door and reached inside, picking up her hat and brushing it clean with her sleeve. She put it on the Bentley’s roof and proceeded to tie her hair up, looking about at the lush green countryside and wondering if this was the life she was meant to have? She could’ve easily lived a life like this she knew, and began pushing her hair it into a hairnet she kept in her tunic.

When she was done, Nigel was staring at her.

“Why are you staring at me like that?”

“I didn’t realize there was another way of doing it.”

“Even if there isn’t, stop it.”

“I was painting you in my mind’s eye.”

She smiled, putting her hat on.

“You’re very sweet.”

She looked down at the mud, surprised to see it wasn’t as thick and soupy on her side of the automobile.

“I think you know what I’m trying to say,” Nigel said, and she watched him sinking into mud almost up to his ankles. She tried not to laugh, and for a moment she was afraid he’d pull his foot out too fast. She could see it now, his shoe would slide off and she’d never hear the end of it.

Nigel asked again, looking at her and almost losing his balance in the process. “What makes you think I should be the one to say something?”

“I thought this was your case?” she asked.

“How did you come to that conclusion?”

“How?” she laughed. “It’s what you’ve been saying all along; like you’re relaying the Rules of Order, so to speak. You said you were on it—that it was your case—you even told me the exact moment they called you about the break in. You were very specific as far as that went.”

“Which means nothing now, does it?”

“You should be the one telling her,” Sonia said again.

“Oh, that’s just grand,” Nigel replied with a slow shake of his head. “Now you’re telling me it’s my case? Yet, ten days ago, you were telling me it should be your case. You wanted to tell that fat detective—what was his name?”

“Biles.”

“Yeah, Biles. I’ll bet you he thought it was his case.” He was silent for a moment. “Can’t say I’ll miss the man, as I didn’t know him. So him dying like that, does that mean we’re back on the case? He can’t have gotten very far if he died a day or two after getting here.”

“Have you two got it all sorted out, yet?” Claire called out, startling them both. “Don’t you have nothin’ better to do, than bicker and complain outside my window? Tell me you see the window’s open.”

“Mrs. O’Dowd?” Nigel called out.

“I told you, we weren’t married,” she called out of the window.

“Do you mind if we come in?” Sonia asked.

“Just mind the step comin’ in,” she said. “It’s a bit of a drop, as Mr. O’Dowd liked to say.”

Sonia could hear the tremor in her voice—faltering even as she said it.

She forced a smile as she stepped into the cramped kitchen, looking at her and forcing a weak smile. How was she expected to ask? She’d confronted death on so many levels, but had yet had to confront someone in the face of it. There was light, but it was soft, almost muted, coming in through the window above the sink where it crossed the wooden floor before splaying itself up against the side wall. Sonia hoped she was up to answering questions—but she was also thinking their stopping by to see her might’ve been a mistake. What could she tell them she hadn’t told everyone else? And what if they’d come, and she was despondent?   

She remembered how she’d crumbled when she first heard about her husband. The last thing she wanted was Claire crying all over her shoulder and bringing up those memories again. Some things are better left forgotten, she told herself—maybe not forgotten, but at least buried in the back of your mind.  

Claire was standing behind a large table—something new since the last time she’d been here—and began wiping her hands on her apron as Nigel stepped onto the landing.

“Mind the step,” Claire said, one hesitant hand in motion, then relaxing.

The air was thick, heavy with the aroma of fresh baked meat pies, a light dusting of flour reminding her of an early frost at dawn. She remembered how the last time they were here Claire fed Nigel one of her pies. The room was just as cramped then as it was now, the air still heavy with the aroma of meat slowly stewing. There were more than a dozen pies sitting on various surfaces—all of them waiting to be delivered, no doubt.

“How’s the pie business?” Nigel asked, grinning as he stepped down off the landing and around Sonia.

“It’s the only thing that keeps me going,” Claire said, trying to smile but failing miserably.

“What about deliveries?” Sonia asked.

“There’s a boy what comes around. He can drive the truck, so I let him. He’s fourteen and I’m happy to pay him handsomely. It inspires him to work harder. Artie said he was going to teach me how to drive when he gets back. Probably a good thing to know under the circumstances, but I think I’ll keep the boy on.”

“You said: Back?” Nigel echoed. “Isn’t he here? Artie? Mr. Spencer, I mean?”

“He’s gone.”

“Gone?” Sonia asked.

“Off to London,” she replied, and pulling three pie shells out of the oven, lay them on the table in front of her. She turned to a blackened pot simmering on the back of the stove, stirring it slowly before turning to face them.

“Did we catch you at a bad time?” Nigel asked.

“A bad time?” Claire smiled. She leaned back against the counter, beside the stove, and looked at the two of them. “That depends on why you’re here.”

“Just a few questions we thought you could help us with,” Sonia offered.

“Questions? What sort of questions? I’ve pretty well had it with all your questions,” she added, and turned her attention to the three pie shells she’d taken from the oven. “No one wants to have anything to do with me because I’m a woman, and as such, have no rights. No rights? What does that even mean? I’m not allowed to answer on my own behalf, even though the will says it all belongs to me. But I’m a woman, and have no rights. Does that sound right to you?”

She was looking directly at Sonya.

“No,” was all she said.

“That’s what Artie said. He went there to meet with the Suffragettes—”

“Why? They’ve already won the vote,” Nigel pointed out.

“Now they need to focus on Women’s Rights, rather than just the one Right.”

“I suppose we’ve let the cat out of the bag now, haven’t we?”

“Is that supposed to be humour, or wit?” Sonya asked, and watched Nigel flush in the soft light.

“I apologize for that,” he said, trying to look serious. “I meant no disrespect.”

“I’ve done nothing but answer questions since it happened,” Claire mumbled. She looked at Sonya. “Reggie might not’ve been the best of men, but he was the best man for me—here in my little corner of the world.”

“There’s no doubt he was good for you.”

“So what do you want to ask?”

“When did you first hear he’d been killed?” Nigel asked.

“Some inspector from Scotland Yard came out to question me.”

“Do you have a name?”

“I’ve forgotten—just as I’ve forgotten him.”

“Why’s that?” Sonia asked.

“Stories about what he said Reggie was like before the War—with gangsters and arrests—and he may have been all those things, I won’t deny it. But he didn’t go back, did he? That’s got to account for something. He was done with that life. It was the War what did it to him.”

“I haven’t heard the stories,” Sonia admitted.

“Let’s just say he wasn’t the nicest boy in the sandbox. But that’s just it, isn’t it? He was a boy. He signed up and went over there thinking it’d all be over in six months. He was only eighteen. He was there for three years before he got wounded. Three years,” she added with a slow shake of her head. “Can you imagine what that must’ve been like?”

“All too well,” Sonia admitted.

“Really?”

“I was a nurse. Whatever he told you, it was probably worse.”

“Three years?” Nigel said with a slow shake of his head.

“And were you there as well?”

“Motorcycle dispatch.”

“Dispatch?”

“A lot of us went there thinking we’d make a difference.”

“And? Do you think it did?” Claire asked.

“I’d like to think it did—I mean, we won, didn’t we? But looking back? I doubt if anything anyone did, could count toward making a difference. I doubt if you could say it mattered when it was all over.”

“Reggie liked to think it did.”

“That’s what was good in him,” Sonya nodded. “It probably explains why he came here in the first place.”

“He came here because he could. He was left this place by some old relative he barely remembered. It was a chance to start over again. He was done with whatever that other life was. This was something he’d built himself. He was a good farmer. And now he’s left it to me.”

“I suppose everyone’s screaming because you two were never married?”

“You could say that,” she said, trying to hide an embarrassed smile.

“Where’s Artie?” Nigel asked.

“I told you: London. Why?”

“You’d think he’d be here for you.”

“Would you? And why would you think that?”

“He and Mr. O’Dowd were close friends, weren’t they?”

“He’s off to London to see what he can make of things as far as a solicitor is concerned, because that’s what a good friend would do. He has an uncle he feels may be able to help. His sister is not without her own friends, and through her, he’ll contact the Suffragettes, because that’s what a good friend would do. Oh, and he says he has acquaintances, of whom several are newspaper owners as well,” she said. She was filling the last of the three pies and placing it beside the two others on the table.

“And why does he feel he has to do all that?” Nigel asked.

“Do you not understand the simpler concepts involved with friendship?” Claire asked.

“I’m sorry? What?” Nigel seemed taken off guard by the question.

“Why do you find it so difficult to believe someone like Artie, someone who went to war with men below him on the social scale, but heads above the rest when it came to heart; why do you find it so hard to believe him? This is the second time you’ve come here asking about him. Is it any wonder he doesn’t have a lot of confidence in you two?”

“What exactly does he think he can do, that we can’t?” Nigel asked.

“Find out who did it for one thing.”

“And if he does?” Sonia asked, “what does he plan to do?”

“He wouldn’t tell me, now then, would he? And I didn’t ask,” she added.

“He’s interfering with an ongoing investigation—”

Claire barked out a quick laugh.

“An ongoing investigation? Do you mean Scotland Yard’s? Or are you two thinking you can solve it? Because, like I said, he doesn’t have a lot of confidence in you. Can you blame him?”

“So he’s going to solve it himself?” Sonia stated.

“I have a feeling he’ll get more answers than you will.”

“And why do you think that?”

“He doesn’t have to follow the letter of the law, does he?”