The Crocodile's Last Embrace (8 page)

“Indeed,” said Inspector Finch, who’d just arrived. “Pardon me for intruding, but I’m trying to find out more about our friend Stockton. I’m making the rounds of several social functions in the hope of speaking to as many people in one place as possible.” He gestured with one hand towards Mrs. Postlewaithe. “I’ve asked our hostess and she’s agreed to let me disturb the party for a few moments, provided I don’t let the children hear about this.”

“Perhaps I’d better see that they keep out of the way,” said Beverly. “Jade, will you come with me?”

“Miss del Cameron should stay here, if you please, Lady Dunbury. I’d like to speak with her, too.”

Jade caught Hamilton’s smirk, as if he’d been vindicated in thinking the woman mentioned in the papers was Jade. Finch noticed. “I need to speak with Miss del Cameron about a strange parcel she received. Perhaps, since it came through the post, Mr. Hamilton, I should interview
you
as well.”

Hamilton colored and coughed. “I don’t handle the posts myself, Inspector. You should know that. And I don’t know anything about the man who went off the Limuru Bridge, so if you’ll excuse me . . .” He touched his cap and made a slight bow to Emily and to Jade before drifting off to a more amiable group.

Finch ignored him. “Then you knew this Stockton, Mr. Holly?” he asked.

“Never met the chap,” said Holly. “I only supposed that he and I were partners in the same mine. Rather a surprise actually. I didn’t know there was another investor when I came in on it.”

Dr. Dymant cleared his throat to cut in. “If you’ll excuse me as well, Inspector, I don’t have anything to tell you and I must get back to town. I’ve an appointment at three o’clock to see about a possible office space and that just leaves me time to make my excuses to our hostess.”

He bowed to Emily, nodded to Jade, and left. Emily hesitated only a second before accompanying him to his automobile.

“Well, I seem to have lost some of my audience,” said Holly. “I trust you won’t desert me, Jade.”

“If you have any news for me, Inspector, you can find me
after
you’re finished talking to Mr. Holly. Come on, Biscuit, let’s find Bev.”

“I say,” said Holly as Jade hurried off.

She found Beverly directing the two oldest girls, Helen and Mary, to set up their archery target on the lawn, away from the party.

“Is Uncle Steven talking about his gold mine again?” asked Mary.

Jade nodded. “Yes, he’s very excited about it.” She looked over her shoulder to see him accost yet another victim. This time it was Dr. Mathews, who’d just arrived, apparently looking for Finch. He wore a belted tweed jacket and motoring gloves, a golf-style cap on his head. Mathews was listening politely as Holly expounded on his good fortune, his voice gaining in volume until Jade could overhear snippets of the monologue. Words like “collateral” and “nugget” reached her. The volume increased as Holly, Finch, and Mathews all joined her.

“You didn’t hear this part, Jade. I was just telling the doctor here and Finch what a stroke of luck when a chap named Waters came into my bank. Wanted a loan for equipment. Naturally I was intrigued. Interesting fellow. A bit taciturn at first. Actually travels with a parrot. Tragic about that other fellow, Stockton, but I should think my shares will be larger now.”

“Uncle Steven!” scolded Mary. She put her hands on her hips and shook her head. “This is
my
birthday party and I do not want to hear any more about your silly mine. Will you please help us bring out our archery target? It is in the garden hut.” She turned to Jade and Beverly, her eyes wide with anticipation. “Oh, wait until you see it. Helen and I made it ourselves. It’s really splendid.” She scampered off with her uncle and Helen to fetch it. Finch moved on to speak to someone else.

“Mr. Holly is quite enthusiastic, isn’t he?” commented Mathews with a chuckle.

“That’s the polite way of putting it,” said Jade. Biscuit wound himself around her legs, impatient after having sat so long in one place. Jade reached down and stroked his head after extricating him from his leash.

“Such a beautiful cat,” said Mathews. “May I pet him?”

“Let me introduce you to him first.” She showed Mathews how to hold out his gloved hand in a relaxed fist, palm down, for Biscuit to sniff. “Biscuit, friend.” Biscuit looked at the glove and at Dr. Mathews before gently butting his head on the knuckles. “That should do it, Dr. Mathews.”

He extended his fingers and reached for the broad head, his fingertips barely skimming the top of Biscuit’s fur. “He’s very soft.”

“I’m not sure you’re actually making contact, Doctor. You don’t need to be afraid. He won’t bite a friend.”

“Ah, yes, of course,” said Mathews, and he slowly lowered his hand until it rested on Biscuit’s head before lightly stroking it. “Very nice.”

“There was someone here at the party earlier who thought he knew you, Dr. Mathews,” said Beverly. “You can’t have missed him by more than a quarter of an hour. He’s a new medical doctor come to treat the Indian population.”

“Oh?” asked Mathews.

“Yes, his name is Dr. Dymant. Landrake Dymant,” said Beverly. “Do you recall him?”

Mathews’ brows furrowed as he puzzled over the name. “Cannot say that I do. He said he knew me?”

“He said he was a year behind you in medical school,” said Jade.

“Ah, well, that would explain why I don’t recollect him. One tended to stay within one’s own ranks, you know. Still . . .” He closed his eyes as he tried to recall a name or face. “Yes, I think I do remember someone by that name. Cornish, as you’d expect with a surname like Dymant. Tall fellow, slender, dark. Very penetrating blue eyes.”

Beverly laughed. “Just the opposite, Dr. Mathews. Shorter than you by several inches, straw brown hair, beard, brown eyes, strongly built chest. But he
did
sound Cornish.”

“Ah, possibly a brother or cousin, then, of the man I knew.”

Emily joined them, accompanied by Mr. Lippincott, a clerk in the land office. His thick spectacles gave him a serious, scholarly appearance, especially with his graying temples. Holly returned at that moment with the girls, a big straw lion in his arms. At least, Jade assumed it was a lion, with the mass of straw protruding at all angles from the head end. A red heart was pinned just behind the shoulders, or what passed for them. Holly set it down with a sneeze and dusted the loose straw from his coat. Mary and Helen giggled as they adjusted the wooden limbs supporting the straw beast while Holly hurried back towards Jade.

“Lippincott,” Steven Holly called, “you’re just the man to tell me about this gold mine. I’m sure you’ve seen the papers that Mr. Waters filed.”

“I don’t recall, but then I don’t always handle the mining paperwork,” Lippincott said.

“That’s quite enough, gentlemen,” said Beverly. “The girls are going to demonstrate some of their woodcraft skills for us.”

She took a whistle and lanyard from the pocket of her dress and blew it once to gather the girls together. It also served to gain everyone else’s notice. Conversations ceased or dropped to a murmur as people speculated on what was about to transpire. The girls clustered around Jade and Beverly, each taking a turn at petting Biscuit.

“Girls,” Beverly said, “get your bows. Mary, you may bring out the arrows.” When the girls ran off in various directions to fetch their weapons, Beverly addressed the adults. “Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, in keeping with the Girl Guide manual, the Ivy Leaf Patrol has been working hard to gain a wood-lore badge. They’ve studied tracking and bird identification—”

“And how to bring down an ox with a stone,” said Clarice Chivell’s father. He had made the trip into town with his wife just to see his daughter, who boarded at school, as did Helen.

A round of laughter followed his little joke. Jade noticed that Lady Northey didn’t join in and her smile looked pinched and forced.

“Yes, indeed. David defended his flock with a sling, and the girls are learning its value, too,” said Beverly.

Jade knew that Beverly was referring to the biblical David and not her former beau, but at the mention of his name, she shuddered. Perhaps it was the crowd and the noise, but all through this party she’d fought the urge to bolt for safety, sometimes imagining she saw shadows out of the corners of her eyes. She caught Dr. Mathews’ concerned look and fought for self-control.

“But today we have a treat. The girls are going to demonstrate their newest skill, archery. Bear in mind that they’ve only had one lesson, but I believe with practice we shall have a set of proficients. Girls, are you ready?”

The patrol stood ramrod straight in a line, bows in one hand and quivers of arrows slung over their backs. Jade saw a larger bow, the one she’d used to demonstrate with, leaning against a tree.

The parents and family friends gathered behind Beverly to watch the girls. Helen, as the patrol’s senior member, announced that Mary would have first crack at the target, since it was her birthday. Mary stood thirty feet from the straw lion, nocked her arrow, and assumed the proper sidewise stance. Jade noted with approval that she kept her left elbow slightly flexed and the wrist gripping the bow straight. Mary drew the arrow’s fletching to her cheek and let fly. The arrow pierced the dummy’s head and exited the other side.

Cries of “Bravo” and “Well shot” followed. Mary made a slight bow before returning to the end of the line. One by one, the younger girls took their turn, some standing closer to the target. They hit the dummy in the rump, the nose, and the leg, but none pierced the heart. As far as Jade could see, the parents couldn’t have been prouder anyway, and each girl received her share of applause and accolades.

“That will teach old simba to attack our girls, won’t it?” said Mr. Gault after his daughter, Lily, landed an arrow on the target’s nose.

Helen, who shot last and hit the straw cat in the hindquarters, walked up to Jade holding the large bow. “If you would please demonstrate for us again, Lieutenant Jade,” she said with a salute.

Jade took the bow with a smile while Beverly shooed everyone farther back, explaining that Jade would shoot from where she stood at nearly one hundred feet. Mary handed Jade an arrow and stepped aside, joining Helen. Jade thought she detected a knowing look pass between the girls and dismissed it as troop pride in their instructor.

Jade turned sideways to the target and drew back her bow, her fingertips barely grazing her cheek. She took one deep breath, held it, and released the arrow. It flew true and struck the paper heart dead center.

Polite applause followed, but Jade paid it no mind. All her attention was focused on the paper heart. It pulsed softly, as though the arrow had brought it to life. She could almost hear it, beating in time with her own. The red shifted in a creeping mass until it coalesced into thick blood and dripped onto the ground just as Jade dropped her bow.

—The Traveler

“JADE, ARE YOU ALL RIGHT? Jade!” Beverly’s voice came from a distance like a memory, one of an abandoned basement, a bloodstained scarf, and David’s cryptic ring—the ring that held the clue to his father’s murder. Jade looked at her hands, expecting to see that ring there. It took Finch’s hand gripping her elbow to snap her back to the present.

“It’s just paint,” he whispered. “Nothing to be alarmed at. Only the girls having a lark, it seems.”

Dozens of voices chattered around her. No one else seemed to notice her reaction. A few mothers with hands over their open mouths expressed shock over such a horrid stunt. Others tittered and most of the men laughed outright. The girls, watchful of their parents’ reactions, suppressed giggles or openly expressed their delight in the joke.

It’s a good one at that.
And now that she’d picked up her bow and walked over to the target, Jade saw that the spreading red puddle was nothing more than paint.

“Mary! Helen! Was this your idea?” she asked.

They nodded. “Yes, but Uncle Steven helped,” admitted Mary. “We couldn’t think what to use to hold the paint until I remembered those bags made from a goat’s stomach that the natives use for carrying milk. Uncle Steven bought one for me.”

“Were you surprised, Miss Jade?” asked Helen.

“Very.”

“You’re not angry, are you?” asked Helen. “You looked . . . well, rather queer just then.”

“I’m not angry and I’m fine. But I don’t believe that Lady Northey appreciated the joke.”

The girls looked past Jade to the governor’s wife and paled. “Oh, dear,” said Mary.

“I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” Jade said as Beverly approached Lady Northey. “I’m sure your leader will smooth things over, but in the future, you might think twice before doing anything like that again.” She saw how downcast each of them looked and smiled at them. “If it’s any consolation to you, it’s a trick much like I used to pull when I was a girl.”