Trophies (17 page)

"Of course. And we'll need fingerprint
samples from both of you, as well, although we found damn-all along
those lines." Wingate wrote in silence for a moment, then looked up
again, this time at me. "Yesterday you told me you own a number of
handguns. Do you own a silencer?"

So no one in the area had reported hearing
anything. "No. You know, when I went to the gallery last night, I
noticed one of the streetlamps being repaired."

He was already nodding. "Shot out." He made
another note. This time, when he looked back up, the glint in his
eye spoke of long consideration. "Ms. Ellandun here informed me
yesterday that following the war, you were diagnosed with
post-traumatic stress disorder. Is that true?"

I didn't give Patty the look of betrayal she
deserved. "Yes. It is."

"With a diagnosed mental illness, how did you
get a Class A LTC?"

I yanked my wallet from my pocket, pulled out
my FID and LTC cards, both of which pre-dated my diagnosis, and
tossed them atop the blue pad. "I've never been confined and never
needed it. And that's the defining factor."

He stared at them, wrote down the specifics,
then handed them back. His expression was neutral. "And if you ever
were?"

Behind me, I heard the rustle of cotton cloth
against metal. "The Army might have something to say about that,
Detective."

Some emotion, not quite unease but not
certainty, either, invaded Wingate's careful neutrality. "I'm not
certain Federal regulations would supersede in this case, Colonel
Holmes."

"Possibly not," Sherlock said, his voice
mild, and left it at that.

I shot a smug glance at Patricia, just as she
glanced sideways at me from beneath drooping lashes. No. Under no
circumstances would I play that game, not even to amuse her. All
right, so Wingate was good-looking enough to irritate me and
obviously successful at whatever he did. The male dominance
competition I had subconsciously begun was summarily over.

"Look," I said — and I'd have said anything
at that moment, just to stop her game from continuing. "Have you
received the forensics report yet? Or the ballistics?"

Instantly, I knew I should have phrased that
differently. I should have made it a casual, curious question.
Instead it sounded remarkably like a demand, and I decided then and
there I'd never visit police headquarters with Patricia ever again.
Behind me, not even Sherlock's uniform moved. I didn't need to see
his face to interpret that.

And Wingate treated it like a demand, with
the long stare it deserved. Again I felt heat in my face.

"No." He returned the pen to its stand. "And
we don't share that information with the public, in any case."

"Because I might be a suspect?" I was stupid
enough to ask.

He met my stare head-on.

"Because at this point, you are a
suspect."

seventeen years earlier

Aunt Edith met our flight at Logan Airport.
My first impression of her, in the waiting area near baggage claim
and customs, was of a small, graceful woman, barely taller than
myself at that age, her black hair in its old-fashioned chignon
just softening into grey around her temples. The lines of her face,
neither as stern as my father's nor as gentle as Uncle Preston's,
nevertheless called to mind distorted images of both men,
especially the active brows above the family's signature green eyes
and the tautness around the mouth. I noticed that, when Father bent
to kiss her cheek, she neither glanced aside nor closed her eyes,
as if she didn't trust him. I found the thought vaguely satisfying;
perhaps she and I did have something in common.

My father greeted, she then turned to me.
"How do you do, Charles." Her voice was quiet and cultured, more
nasal than I was accustomed to, and her English accent had strayed
into the middle of the Atlantic Ocean somewhere.

I took the usual precaution of clearing my
throat. "How do you do."

"I hope you'll enjoy your stay in
Boston."

Father shifted. I glanced up in time to see a
wariness in his eyes, quickly hidden. "That's not precisely the
purpose of this exercise."

She didn't look at him, I noticed. "Hubert
and I have never had any children, so the house may be rather quiet
and boring for you. I hope you'll forgive us that."

I looked at her before answering. She didn't
avoid my gaze, her own steady and unblinking. I could read neither
compassion nor judgment in her expression, only acceptance, and
something deep inside my soul began to thaw.

"Do you have a copy of Shakespeare?" I
asked.

The very edges of her mouth relaxed and
curled slightly. "Of course."

"Then I'll be fine."

Father shifted again. "You've done nothing
but read and ride this week past."

This time, neither of us looked at him. A
flock of tourists filed past, a babble of Middle European voices
drowning our conversation, then they were gone and the moment — a
dangerous one, I suddenly realized — was past as well.

What Father didn't know wouldn't hurt us.

The whispers regarding Aunt Edith were the
stuff of family legend. Somehow — and no one would even whisper
about this — long before I was born, she disgraced herself so
thoroughly she could not remain in Britain. Although barely of age
at the time, she'd married Hubert Hunter, twenty years her senior,
because (it was whispered) of all her suitors, he was the only
American citizen, a tenured professor at Harvard, and therefore the
only one guaranteed to take her across the ocean. And although I
didn't consider it until I was older, it's also possible he was
then the only one who still wanted her.

At this, our first meeting, I caught a
tantalizing whiff of something wild and uncanny in the
undercurrents of her level gaze that not only made me wonder if
those old whispers carried some truth in their dregs, but which
also called to those night-time stirrings within myself.

In the Cambridge house, all the parlor
windows were open. The scent of roses flooded the room from the cut
bouquet in the gleaming silver vase upon the coffee table, flowers
in mixed shades of red and yellow similar to those blooming in the
garden outside. It was an intoxicating aroma, like something from
Titania's train, and I found myself breathing deeply to pull that
something inside me. All sorts of possibilities existed in such
magical surroundings, whereas the Wiltshire house smelled so empty
and sterile.

Aunt Edith poured the tea; Uncle Hubert, whom
I had not yet met, was lecturing at the university and would join
us later. I turned from their wedding photograph, which hung aslant
on the far wall beyond the sideboard, and sat on the shorter of the
two white damask sofas so I could watch both my newly-met aunt, who
sat on the longer one across from me, and my father, who filled in
the third side in a lonely blue armchair.

Father glanced at me as I sat down and he
seemed to come to a decision. He accepted the first cup from her,
in a rosy delicate china cup and saucer with gold rims, and leaned
his forearms onto his knees to shield it between his hands.

"Edith," he said, and his voice was
surprisingly humble, "why does Charles steal?"

I felt myself redden. There it went, right
out the open windows, any chance of friendship with her, too.

But Aunt Edith didn't appear surprised at the
question. She poured the second cup for me, and I scooted over on
the sofa to accept it. She also took a moment to give me sugar and
some biscuits before turning back to my father. By the time she did
so, I was comfortable and he was flushed.

"Why don't you ask him?" She lifted her
eyebrows and her own cup in the same motion. "Don't you believe
he's capable of answering for himself?"

Father shifted. He stared at the Persian
carpet beneath his feet and I saw the toe of one soft black loafer
start to trace the brilliant patterns of blue and white before he
stilled it. "Of course. But he claims he can't explain it to
me."

I hadn't tried. I hadn't wanted to.

Aunt Edith paused in her turn. To my
surprise, she stared at Father rather than at me. "Charles steals
as revenge. He feels other people have stolen from him all his
life, so he's getting even."

Her simple words hung in the air above the
cut roses rather like a second scent. At the same time, they
reached into my soul and shifted some fundamental magnetic pole
deep within. North became south, black became white, and bad became
good.

In that moment, although I remained probably
more than half an ass, I no longer identified with the mundane
Bottom. I closed my eyes and gulped in the roses' heady aroma. It
was pure magic.

Father shifted yet again, set down his cup
and saucer, and glanced desperately about the room as if seeking
some weapon that could avert a tragedy. "No one has ever stolen
anything from Charles." His voice sounded breathless. He turned to
me. "Has anyone?"

She had phrased it so perfectly, it was a
shame he just couldn't see it. I nodded.

"When? Who? What did they take?"

I glanced at Aunt Edith, instinctively asking
permission from the person I now knew understood me to my bones,
better than I understood myself. She nodded and sipped her tea, not
even raising her eyebrows. Just as instinctively, I knew which
example to throw in his face.

"You."

His jaw dropped and his eyes glazed. It was
priceless.

"I — I don't—"

"How much time have you spent with him,
William?" Aunt Edith paused and sipped her tea. "You and I both
know how dangerous a father's lack of attention can be."

I followed her example. For the first time, I
understood the mechanics of true power.

"I'm right here. No one has stolen me." His
flush had gone deeper and stubborn anger was replacing the
desperation in his expression.

An icicle stabbed me in the heart. Despite my
new understanding, I remained beneath my father's thumb. If he
wished to ruin this, too, for me — if he insisted I return to
Wiltshire with him rather than remain here in exile — then I could
not fight him.

Aunt Edith set her cup down. She tugged a
tiny lace handkerchief from her pocket and used it to dab her lips,
rather than the napkin on her lap. Then she slid it out of sight,
poured herself a fresh cup, and turned back to face Father.

I followed her gaze and stifled a gasp.
Father's face had been wiped of color more thoroughly than her lips
had been of crumbs. Something, it seemed, had shifted within him,
as well, and he looked sick and betrayed.

"You see, that's why Charles never bothered
to attempt an explanation." Her voice was very gentle. "It's no
use, William. You're from two different worlds, and you may as well
attempt taking the mountains to the moon. Now, I suggest you retire
before dinner. I know how traveling disagrees with you."

It was a dismissal and there was no way he
could evade it, only fight it if he chose. He stared at her, his
face frozen as if lifeless. A breeze sighed through the windows,
wafting that incredible scent about the room. Without another word,
he rose and left. We sat in silence, and I listened to his
footsteps stomp up the stairs. Aunt Edith took up her cup and
sipped, her face impassive and wilder than ever, as the door
upstairs closed.

I was no longer certain what I felt for my
father. But my feelings for Aunt Edith had crystallized. I'd found
my role model. "Why did you try to explain?"

She considered me from beneath level
brows.

"I did it so he'll fuss, and mess his hair,
and shuffle his feet, and mutter under his breath the entire time
he's here. I did it so, when he goes home, he'll carry on, and
forget his court dates, and take the wrong book from the shelf, and
drink far too early in the day, and scandalize your mother into
asking what will the neighbors think. I want him to consider this,
and ponder, and worry, and stew, and think about it even when he
thinks he's not." She set down her saucer, took up the teapot, and
warmed up my cup, meeting my gaze over the china. "Perhaps next
time he comes up against someone he doesn't understand, he'll think
first and act later." She returned the now empty teapot to the
tray. "I do hope you'll enjoy Boston, Charles."

I didn't need to think. "Yes, I believe I
shall."

We finished the tea and biscuits in silence.
Our pact was formed and there was no more need for serious
communication between the Ellandun family black sheep.

There wouldn't be for another nine years.

current time

"It's got to be the garret," I said.

By the time Sherlock, Patricia, and I
returned from our fruitless visit to the police station, Bonnie had
arrived. We found her and Caren giggling themselves silly in the
parlor, with coffee mugs, an urn, and tea biscuits scattered across
the gleaming table. I was glad they at least were using coasters
beneath the mugs, but wished someone hadn't pushed that urn and the
cordless phone quite so close to the silver vase. Bonnie, it had to
be Bonnie, who knew what her housekeeping was like, I'd never
visited her home and Sherlock, who had, wasn't saying; but I knew
Caren was too civilized to let anything near that marked Paul
Revere.

When we strolled in, Bonnie was speaking. "So
there he was, lying on his back in this slimy mud, slim jimmy stuck
down the front of his pants—"

Oh, no, not that story.

"—hi, Robbie — as the car door opened right
over his head—"

Caren and Bonnie fell into a fresh fit of
giggles. I felt resentful heat growing in my face. Again.

Sherlock sprawled onto the sofa next to
Caren. "You gotta admit," he said to me, "you did nearly wet your
britches that time."