The Bluebonnet Betrayal (13 page)

“No entity or person shall stand in the way of the Society's mission to promote the native hill country landscape or in any way compromise the benefits of said plantings, and any hindrance thereof shall be pursued by the President or Executive Committee regardless of the consequences.”

Article 2, Section 3.5, bylaws of the Austin Rock Garden Society

Pru gave Christopher a sly smile. “Hello, Kit. Does Sonia know you're here?”

He slipped an arm round her waist and pulled her closer. He put his mouth to her ear and murmured, “No one knows I'm here, Ms. Parke. Only you.”

“You'll say nothing?” she breathed.

“I wouldn't dare speak—I've felt the nip of that big yellow bill of hers, and I can tell you it isn't pleasant.”

Pru snorted. “We did well, didn't we? They don't have a clue.”

“I'd say we carried it off—for now.”

Christopher was being generous with that “we.” She was the one unaccustomed to this subterfuge—he had admitted to her that he'd been undercover before. She wasn't sure she liked knowing that; it made her nervous to think he had put himself in danger, regardless of the fact that those situations were in the past. Putting herself in danger never occurred to her—she was only a gardener.

“You almost caught me out,” she said. “With the wine bottles.”

“Did I?” he asked, eyes wide with innocence. “You must be prepared for anything.”

Be prepared—his Boy Scout motto. “I will do,” she said.

Inside their building, they met Mrs. Miller and Boris emerging from the lift.

“Good evening,” the older woman said as Boris yawned. “I'm glad the rain let up.”

“Out for a walk? Let me take him for you,” Christopher volunteered.

“Thank you, Christopher, but we don't go far for last calls and I've a fine bodyguard with me. I can manage.”

“Tomorrow afternoon, Boris,” Pru said to the dog. “You and I will have a good long walk on the Common.”

With a half-bark, half-howl, Boris confirmed the appointment as the lift doors closed.

“Did you see the three of them—a standoff?” Pru asked as she and Christopher sat at the kitchen table over cups of tea. “Damien seems to think that Roddy caught Twyla on the rebound—maybe he thinks he caught her that way, too. On the rebound from Chiv.”

“Chiv's not sold on MacWeeks, that's obvious.”

“Roddy's messed with Twyla's design,” Pru agreed, nodding. “Has done or is trying to do. He wants to replace the old petrol pump with a fruit machine, if you can imagine that.”

“If Twyla objected, and MacWeeks saw her as an obstacle to fame and fortune, what would he do?”

Pru didn't speak, trying to divine the answer from the steam rising above her mug of tea.

Christopher rested his elbows on the table. “Damien—or his company—has put up a great deal of money on this venture. Did he do it to try and get Twyla back? He might not like it if she rejected him. What about Chiv?”

“Poor Chiv. He's really broken up about her death. I'm beginning to believe Twyla was the love of his life.”

“Remorse,” Christopher said. “Someone lashes out in the heat of the moment and regrets it later. It isn't uncommon.”

“So you think this was a crime of passion?”

He drained his mug. “I think,” he said, standing and offering Pru his hand, “that we'll leave it there for the moment.”

Chiv had asked Kit to go with Iris and Teddy to Hereford the following morning—a day trip to collect the first round of arbutus—as many as they could fit into the minivan. It would not put a dent in the number of plants that needed to be transported to London, but it would be a start. Pru had questioned Chiv about hiring actual delivery lorries, but at such a late date, she knew that even if they could find them, the cost would be exorbitant. Chiv had made a comment about the bloody budget and how he would be buggered if he asked Damien Woodford for another farthing, after which he dropped the subject—and so did she.

When Pru crawled into bed, Christopher pulled the covers over them and switched off the light.

“Pru,” he said after a moment.

“Mmm.”

“What about Twyla?”

“She's quiet. I don't think she's gone, but she's willing to give me space to see what we can learn.” She turned to him in the semidarkness. “You know what I mean, don't you?” It wasn't really Twyla, she knew that—it was the Twyla in her head.

“I do,” he said. “And that's good. Sleep well.”

It was a day of rain, rocks, and mud—it was the morning letdown after an enjoyable evening. Christopher had left early and they'd agreed on no contact during the day—too easy for someone to notice a text, email, or call on a phone. The absence of Kit, Iris, and Teddy diminished their number and affected their spirits. None of the women seemed much interested in work, and everyone moved at a slug's pace. Sweetie had apparently made up with Skippy and spent a lot of time under the Aussie tarp with him. “Welcome to Oz” looked nearly complete—Skippy could lounge as much as he liked.

Forde strolled onto the site—he still wore his ARGS sweatshirt, but had pulled a clear mackintosh on over it. “Forde,” Pru called him over as she squinted through the rain that ran down her face. “You left early last night—you missed Damien Woodford. But I suppose the two of you stay in regular contact, don't you?”

“I'm not at liberty to discuss the details of our negotiations,” Forde said.

“Certainly not, and I wouldn't dream of asking.” Pru glanced down at Forde's feet. “Well, look at that—I see you've located the necessary steel-toed boots. That's good. You wouldn't mind giving us a hand, would you?” Pru saw Chiv throw her a look over his shoulder. “Some of the others have gone off for the day to bring back the first load of plants.”

“The bluebonnets? Are they bringing them back?”

“Not yet.”

Forde checked his watch. “Mind you, helping out is just the thing I wish I could do today, but unfortunately…I only stopped to ask if there's been any news about what happened to Ms. Woodford.”

“No one's told us anything,” Pru replied. A burst of indignation aimed mostly at French flared up in her chest, causing her to add, “Twyla was quite concerned, you know—about the bluebonnets.” Bluebonnets, the only thing Forde was able to focus on.

“Was she? Did she tell you about it?” Forde asked.

“She told me enough.”
She told me next to nothing
. “I'd say we're in for a shake-up before this is all over. Of course,” Pru said, frowning, “I thought we'd be sorting it out together—Twyla and the whole crew.”

Forde wiped the rain out of his eyes and looked round the site. A myriad of tiny streams ran across the bare dirt toward the roadway to join a larger muddy stream. “Well,” he said, “if there was a problem, I'm sure Ms. Woodford would leave no stone unturned to find the truth.” Forde giggled, but stopped when he saw Pru's glare. His face turned red as a beet and he stumbled through an apology.

After Forde left, Pru looked round her. “Where is everybody?”

Chiv, his entire attention on the wall, jerked his head toward the canteen as an answer, slinging rain off his hood in the process. Pru watched as he rotated one stone this way and that until, instead of rocking, it shifted into place and sat snugly as if it had been made for that purpose. He started on the next one, and Pru gave up on getting anything more from him. She turned her attention elsewhere, and located KayAnn and Nell huddled at the corner of Main Avenue with their backs to the ARGS site. Pru marched toward them. Nell caught sight of her and elbowed KayAnn, who stuffed an object hastily into her pocket. They both turned to face Pru.

“We thought it was lunch.”

“What is it you're doing? Do you have some fixation on forklifts or Moroccan water features or hornbeam hedges? Are you spies sent from the
Daily Mail
to watch the
Telegraph
garden?”

The women frowned at her. “Somebody has a telegraph in their garden?” Nell asked.

“Don't be silly, Nell,” KayAnn said. “Nobody would put a telegraph in a garden. We're not doing anything wrong, Pru.” She huffed. “Oh, all right, here's the deal. Nell wants to—”

“KaaayAyynn!”
Nell cut her off. “You promised!”

KayAnn barely missed a beat. “We'll get back to work now.”

“No,” Pru said. “Go on to lunch. Ivory and Rosette must already be there.”

The women exchanged glances. “They're both waiting? We'd better get on over, then. Come on, Nell.”

“Will Ivory really be president now? Is that what she's been wanting?” Pru asked. Something in the way KayAnn and Nell had snapped to reminded her of those earlier remarks about Ivory's official status.

The two women looked at each other, the ground, their hands. Finally, Nell said, “That's what a vice president does, right? Becomes president? And Ivory—well, it's only that she's waited a long time for it.”

“And Rosette,” Pru asked. “Is she sergeant at arms?”

KayAnn sniggered. “No, but she sure knows how to keep her students in line.”

At Pru's raised eyebrows, Nell added, “We took a class from Rosette years ago—that's how we got into the society, because she could see how interested we were in plants.”

Here's a bit of news she hadn't come across yet. “Rosette's a teacher? Did she teach with Twyla?”

“Rosette teaches environmental science at the junior college,” Nell said. “She knows loads about native plants and stuff. She made us all go on a field trip, remember, KayAnn? God, I thought we were going to drive all over Texas to look at every single bluebonnet in existence. She loves them. This was all her idea.”

“Hang on,” Pru said. “Rosette came up with the idea of doing a garden at Chelsea?”

“No.” KayAnn shook her head. “That's all Twyla—the whole Chelsea Flower Show thing. But the idea to use bluebonnets—that was Rosette's. And Twyla wanted to do it for her, because, well, you know. And anyway, you like to do what she says if you can, because”—KayAnn leaned forward and confided—“Rosette can be kind of scary sometimes.”

“Safety First! 1) Wear goggles when using a chain saw. 2) Keep your pruners sharp. 3) Do not leave tools lying on the ground. 4) Flip-flops are not appropriate footwear for working in the garden. These tips courtesy of Nell and her broken big toe.”

Tips and Trends, from
Austin Rocks!
the e-newsletter of the Austin Rock Garden Society

The women clumped off, Nell pausing to retie one of her boots. Pru returned to Chiv. “We're not good for much today, are we?”

“Ah, it's all right. We should've taken the day off.”

“What's happened to Roddy?”

“Don't care. The longer he stays away, the better,” Chiv replied.

“That was quite a scene last night.”

Chiv gave her a brief look. “He's got to own up to it eventually.”

Pru thought the actual topic of the argument among the three men had been Twyla. “Why won't you just tell me what he's done?”

“It isn't for me to say.”

“And so, whatever it is, you'll let him get away with it?”

“It'll catch up to him, I've no doubt.” Chiv waved a hand. “Look, he might be up at the Cadogan Arms—his favorite escape these days. Do you know it?”

“Yeah, I do. Think I'll pay him a visit.”

Cafés along Lower Sloane Street were jammed, but when Pru turned up the lane to the mews, things quieted considerably. The Cadogan Arms held only a handful of people—perhaps the fact that they didn't do food kept the teeming masses away. She found Roddy at one of the settles, slumped against the wall. He'd pulled his flannel shirt round him like an old lady with her cardigan. In front of him, a collection of empty bottles of tonic—individually sized—set up in a lineup except for the last one, which lay on its side, a fallen soldier. Although the glass in front of him was empty but for a slice of lemon, the smell of gin sat like a cloud over the table.

“Roddy.” He didn't stir, and so she repeated his name, louder.

He lifted his head, squinted and blinked, his glasses askew. His hair had crossed the line from “fashionably unkempt” to “in great need of a comb.”

“Pru?” he asked in a hoarse voice.

“We've missed you, Roddy—let's go back and get to work, shall we?”

“She's gone, Pru—she's left us. I can barely believe it.” He reached for the empty glass and it skittered out of his grasp as if of its own accord.

Pru sighed. “Mind if I join you? Why don't I get us a drink?”

He sat up a bit straighter. “Oh yes, thanks. That would be grand.”

Pru went up to the bar and returned in a couple of minutes.

“Coffee?” Roddy asked.

“Coffee.” She plonked the mugs down on the table and sat across from him. “What's up, Roddy? Why aren't you at the garden?”

“I needed a bit of time, that's all.” He clasped the hot mug with both hands and took a sip. “I'm holding on to the Singapore contract by a thread.”

“Why is that?”

“Why else—this business. I had suggested early on that the Singapore people set my name up for a daily search online—couldn't hurt, I thought, for them to see how often my name was mentioned along with the Chelsea Flower Show. And then this was put on the wire. Now they're ‘reassessing their options'—and you know what that means.” He frowned into his coffee. “It's gone all wrong.”

“Are you blaming Twyla's murder for your inability to hold on to a contract?” Pru asked, sitting on her hands, afraid if they were loose she just might give Roddy a slap.

“Don't,” he whispered. “I can't bear to even hear the words ‘Twyla's murder.' I don't know how I'll go on. There I was, longing for us to be together again, to build my garden side by side with her—and then to have her snatched away as if—” He choked up as two fat teardrops streamed down his cheeks.

“Her garden with your name on it.”

“At her insistence. She needed me—I was a known quantity to the acceptance committee. And she knew how important it was to my career to have this Chelsea garden—she was quite generous that way.” He began searching his pockets until Pru pulled a clean tissue out of her bag and handed it to him. He blew his nose.

“Chiv says—”

“Oh, Chiv says, Chiv says,” Roddy snarled. “She left him—it was over and done with. She came to me.”

And then she left you and went to Damien
.

“I loved her—even after she took up with Woodford.” Roddy heaved a great sigh and studied the dregs of his coffee. “It broke my heart to give her up. But I understood that she needed to go back to the States—her sister and father, she had a responsibility to them. We talked about it. She asked me to go along, and I would've—really—but
Texas
.” He shrugged off the word. “If it had been New York, well, that would've been an entirely different matter.”

A heartfelt declaration of love—tainted only by ambition.

“Come on, Roddy, let's go back to the grounds. Everyone will be waiting for us.”

No one was waiting for them—the garden had cleared out except for Chiv, working on his wall. He gave Roddy a scowl, but spoke to Pru.

“I let them go. I'll stay around until the others come back from Hereford with the plants—you can go on now.”

“I've come back to work. But, Roddy, you can leave.” She didn't know why she'd even forced him to walk back with her. Roddy had turned sullen on the way to the grounds until—just as they approached the London gate—a sly smile had appeared on his face. Pru didn't like it.

“That isn't a good idea, Pru,” Roddy replied. “You won't want to be caught here alone with Chiv when Iris arrives. Mightn't be good for your health. Isn't that right, Chiv?”

“You heard her, MacWeeks, shove off.”

“You'd best steer clear of Chiv,” Roddy continued with a gleam in his eye. “Else you could end up the way of Annabelle Dawson.”

Chiv leapt out of the trench and shoved Roddy with both hands, sending him tumbling backward over a pile of stones.
“That was an accident!”

Pru jumped and thought to go to Roddy, but before she did he scrambled up, straightening his glasses, and dusted himself off. He stayed on the far side of the pallet, but continued the taunt. “Have you not heard this cautionary tale, Pru? Annabelle worked at Chiv's nursery. Until one day, cycling home from work at the same time as ever, she was hit by a lorry from A. Chiverton Gardens right there in the lane. Lucky for the driver of your lorry that Annabelle didn't make a fuss. Did you go to visit her in hospital, Chiv? Or were you worried your lorry driver—Iris—would finish her off if she found out?”

Roddy flinched as Chiv dived for him. Pru grabbed one of Chiv's arms and pulled him back. “Stop this,” she snapped.

“Go, Roddy—now,” she said, keeping hold of Chiv, who put up no protest. She could see crews on nearby sites eyeing them. A security guard was approaching. Pru didn't think they needed another incident—no matter how minor—drawing attention to the ARGS site.

Roddy straightened the cuffs on his flannel shirt. “We'll need to get the ephemerals over soon. I've given you all the sources—have you sorted that out?”

“Have you sorted out telling those Texas women what you've done?”

“Monday,” Roddy said curtly, and left toward the Bull Ring gate.

Chiv kept watch on Roddy's disappearing figure for a moment before he spoke. “She was an intern out from Oaklands College. Four afternoons a week. Half the time Iris was there.”

And the other half she wasn't,
Pru thought.

“That's all it was. She was just a girl who wanted to learn how to take heeled cuttings.” Chiv sat down, feet in the trench and hands on his thighs. “It was late afternoon—the hedge cut off the sun and everything was either light or dark. Iris didn't drive the lorry too often—and she'd forgotten to put in her cushion that helps raise her up to see the road.”

“Annabelle went to hospital?”

“She wasn't badly hurt.” Chiv cursed in the direction Roddy had left. “It's no good dragging up the past, it won't help anyone. Look, Pru, MacWeeks is only trying to make trouble. Iris had nothing to do with what happened here.” He pulled off his gloves and slapped them against one palm. “She wouldn't have done that to anyone. She couldn't have.”

Pru flashed on the morning they found Twyla. At that time, Pru hadn't realized the depth of Chiv's feelings, but picturing the moment again, she recognized his shock and grief at the sight of Twyla's body. And now, suddenly, she remembered the first thing he had said.
“Where is Iris?”

Chiv threw his gloves on the ground. “You go on,” he said.

“No, I'll stay. I could sand the boards. I could sort stone. Give me something to do.”

Chiv shook his head. “I won't stay much longer myself. It's all right.”

A debriefing—that was what Pru needed. Her head overflowed with bits of information she needed to tell Christopher. He would sift through and help her pick out the salient points. But he wouldn't be back for a few hours, and so she must continue to stew about the things she had learned and try to make sense of them. She thought about stopping in the Cadogan Arms for a pint, but couldn't be sure that Roddy hadn't circled round and made it back there to work through the rest of that bottle of gin. Instead, she took a minor detour and arrived at the Daylesford café on Pimlico and chose an enormous scone to accompany her tea, after which she went off to seek the solace of Boris and a walk on the Common.

“You wouldn't think bluebonnets would cause so much trouble,” she told the dog. After three turns round the Common, Pru and Boris had landed on a bench across the road from the Turnham Green Underground station and near a tall stand of hazel and holly with a rowan tree at the back. The walk had done her good, and now she was in a contemplative mood. The paths that crisscrossed the Common were full of dogs and walkers, and in the open spaces, couples, students, and the occasional shirtless old man lay flat out in the sun.

“Did you know we were in danger of losing the bluebonnets forever at one point? But no more. Now, not only are there new plantings along roads, but they've naturalized back into their native environment, blooming each year, setting seeds that germinate and grow into new bluebonnets.” A bumblebee droned past her ear, heading for a nearby wisteria. “All thanks to your relatives,” she called after him. “Pollinating insects save the world.”

Boris sat in front of Pru, listening attentively, except his eyes kept darting from her face to her jacket pocket, where she carried one last dog treat. When he spoke up with a throaty comment, Pru gave him the biscuit. He bit it in half and settled down on his belly to finish it off. “Twyla knew—we talked about it. We won't stand for someone fooling around with our bluebonnets.”

The dog growled and Pru jumped. He had his eyes on the shrubbery about ten feet away and his nose working the air. “What is it?” she asked. The dog growled again and sat up. He strained against the lead.

Pru saw a flash of blue through the leaves—the blue of an ARGS sweatshirt. “Hello?” she called. At that instant, a gray squirrel crept out from beneath the holly, nose to the ground. Boris's growls exploded into barks. He leapt after the squirrel, launching Pru off the bench. The leaves rustled; the blue disappeared.

“Wait!” Pru shouted. The squirrel bounded off to the left. Boris galloped in pursuit, dragging Pru with him, away from the holly and the flash of blue. Down the path they went, dodging dogs and walkers and mothers and strollers, then striking out across the grass to another stand of shrubs into which the squirrel had vanished. Pru looked back as they ran, scanning the crowds of people seeking the bluebonnet sweatshirt she knew she had seen.

“Boris, stop, please,” Pru panted. Boris slowed for only a moment, caught sight of his target leaving cover, and they were off again, coming at last to an abrupt halt in front of the fellow who lived in the ground-floor flat.

“Boris, my lad,” he said, setting shopping bags on the ground to greet the dog. Boris plopped down, tongue lolling out the side of his mouth.

“Here,” Pru wheezed, thrusting the lead into the man's hands. “Could you mind him for a moment? I've just seen someone…” It was all the breath she had.

“Will do,” the fellow said. “You all right?”

She nodded and ran to where they'd started, circling round to the back of the shrubbery where she'd seen the blue, and then plunging herself into the stand, holly leaves scratching her face and hands. It was empty—not even a squirrel left. She came out the other side and walked to the curb, studying the people pouring out of and surging into the entrance to the Underground across the road.

No ARGS sweatshirt, no bluebonnet color in sight.