Viridian Tears (19 page)

“What?” Eden frowned, torn between waiting for Emily to spit out whatever it was and just clicking on BBC Salisbury herself to see what the local news was. “Do tell me Emily, before I become tempted to make you the next guest of the cryomation chamber.”

“Sorry. It’s just so exciting. And of course there are ramifications for us, too.” She slipped off her coat. “Assuming they use us, of course, but why wouldn’t they seeing as we’ve just done her husband.”

“For the love of Mary, Emily. What’s happened?”

“It’s Shirley Burbridge. She’s been killed dead. Stabbed in her own home. It’s all over the news.”

Chapter 20

Meinwen was already working on the computer when she heard Winston’s tread on the stairs. “Morning, handsome.”

“Is it still morning?” He yawned, stretching his arms above his head and knocking several horse brasses off the overhead beams in the process. “Sorry.” He gathered them and hung them higgledy-piggledy, the intricacies of hanging brasses having thankfully passed him by. “So…if it’s still morning do I get breakfast?”

“You can have anything you care to prepare.” Meinwen picked up her mug from the right of her laptop and passed it him. “A nettle coffee would be very welcome, too.”

“Sure. I walked right into that one, didn’t I?” His grin turned into another yawn, the dressing gown he was wearing riding up his arms as he stretched. Meinwen could see a myriad of cris-crossed lines over his skin as if he’d been drawn by a comic artist who’d crosshatched to illustrate shadow.

“What are those?” She caught his wrist and pulled him closer to study the marks. They went all the way up his arm and onto his chest and back. “What on earth? They look like cuts or something. Were you abused as a child?”

“Not exactly.” He pulled away and covered the scars. “They’re a tribal thing, so I’m told. A legacy of my real parents.”

“I thought your mam was a Haitian Catholic?”

“She was, but I was adopted. She and my dad took me from the agency. Lettie, too. We’re not actually blood relations, though we grew up together and she’ll always be my sister.”

“So what are the marks from?”

He scowled. “I don’t want to talk about them. Just give it a rest, will you?” His voice had become louder and harsher. He must have realized it because he placed both hands together, as if in prayer, and touched them to his lips. “Look. I’m sorry, right? It was a long time ago and I really don’t want to talk about it. You were right to mention them. Blimey, if I saw you were covered in scars I’d want to know what happened to you as well.” He put his hands on either side of her head and kissed the top of her fading red curls. “Honestly, I appreciate the concern. I will tell you about them but some other time, okay?”

“Of course.” Meinwen took one of his hands and kissed the palm. “There’s no hurry.”

“Fantastic.” Winston put down her mug to rub his eyes, then yawned again. He dropped his hand to scratch his scrotum, oblivious to Meinwen’s discomfort. He picked up her mug. “Coffee, yeah?”

“Nettle coffee. It’s in the pot. It lighter than normal coffee. It looks a bit like…”

“Piss, I know.” He wandered toward the kitchen, paused and turned back. “Incidentally, and I realize how embarrassing it must be I didn't ask this first, but where are my clothes?”

Meinwen smiled, shook her head and returned to the computer. “They’re in the drier. I put them through a boil wash this morning to try to get them clean.”

“Really? Thanks” He clattered about in the kitchen for a few minutes and Meinwen pottered on the internet. She could find nothing more about the key or the box it might open, nor the sigil of John Stearne. She eventually went to the website of the Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle and emailed them about the symbol. She asked if there were any of his possessions still in existence and that she was interested in his history.

“What are you doing?” Winston put her coffee on the drinks mat and leaned in, looking at the screen. He smelled of motor oil and sex and the cheesy scent of unwashed socks.

“Trying to find out more about that key.” She returned to the image search but nothing stood out. “I’ve contacted the Witchcraft Museum so it’ll be a case of waiting for them to return my enquiry.”

“What are your plans for today?”

“I really have to go to the shop this afternoon but I might take a detour to the canal first.”

“Where the old man found the key?”

“Yes. There might be a clue to where the lock is. Maybe it’s actually in the canal.”

“Then it will have been lost forever.”

“You need a shower, love. I hate to be the one to say it but you whiff worse than a cat fart.”

“Sorry.” Winston lifted his free arm and sniffed the pit. “I suppose I do. Breaking my routine, see? It’s not good for me. Mind if I use yours?”

“Be my guest.” She watched his bum as he went to the stairs. “Literally.”

Winston headed upstairs, shedding his robe when he reached the top. Meinwen was glad she’d caught the floor show rather than turn back to her monitor screen, but she took the opportunity to perform an internet search on ritual scarification and spent several minutes reading about tribes in Ethiopia and Papua new Guinea.

When the shower stopped she printed out a picture of the key, folded it into her handbag and powered down her laptop. She had an email facility on her phone, so she’d be able to see when the museum replied. In the meantime she’d check in with the local place and see if there were any records of him there. Laverstone had only a tangential relationship with the witch trials of the seventeenth century and that was to accuse and board an old woman because James Aquinas, the local landowner at the time, had his eye on her house and expansive land. He accused her of being a witch and confiscated her property. The Watermans were all the same. They’d been selfish old coots for centuries, whatever they called themselves. She really wasn’t set up to have men staying over. They cluttered the house, complained about the lack of red meat in the fridge and invariable missed the toilet, leaving their scent in the bathroom like a dog at a lamppost.

She emptied the tumble drier and took the clothes up to Winston. Her cottage was a small bungalow with a bedroom and en-suite bathroom in what would have been the loft. There was no door on the bathroom and she stood watching him as he dried himself, alternatively hidden and revealed by the towel. Tilting her head to one side she caught a hint of a pattern in the scars covering his back. Like a magic eye picture that suddenly resolved into a three-dimensional image, she realized what she was looking at. “It’s an eye.”

“What?” Winston turned off the water.

“Your back. It’s an eye, like the eye of Sauron, looking into the abyss.”

“Out of it, more like.” He rubbed his hair with the towel, not caring his penis was on full display. He grinned as he caught her staring. “It’s like they say. If you’ve got it, flaunt it. Didn’t you see enough of it last night?”

“It was dark last night. I didn’t see it at all.” Meinwen swallowed, mindful of her determination to get on with her day despite the benefits of tarrying. “I just felt it a few times.”

“With more than your hand, too.” He dried off his face and hands then moved down to his chest, groin and legs. “Is there something you wanted?”

Meinwen sucked back a gobbet of drool. “I brought up your clothes.” She turned away from temptation and scurried down the stairs.

“What’s your hurry?”

“Too much to do. I never indulge my carnal desires in the morning. It sucks the day away.”

“I thought you said the morning was already over?”

“It was a white lie. It’s just after nine. I’ve been up since six so it feels like the afternoon to me.” She had to raise her voice for him to hear her from the kitchen. She cut bread and put it under the grill then put three eggs to poach in boiling water.

Her phone bleeped and took a moment to look at it. The museum in Boscastle had replied already. The refused to commit themselves but agreed it was ‘similar’ to the sigil used by John Stearne. Could they see the original for authentication?

She frowned. A train to Boscastle would more than likely take her all day despite it being less than a hundred miles. Getting back the same day would be impossible. She checked the toast and managed to turn it over before it burned. In the saucepan, the poached eggs hardened.

She took a deep breath to call Winston. “Breakfast…”

He appeared at the doorway.

“…is ready.”

“Eggs?” He sat at the table and reached for the salt and pepper. “I don’t think I’ve had eggs for breakfast since Letitia left. Not home made, anyway.”

“Just don’t get used to it.” She sat on the other chair with her single egg. “I don’t generally cook for anyone, and especially not breakfast.”

“Thanks, love.” He smiled over a laden fork, his eyes bright in the shadows of his face.

“What are your plans for today? You said yesterday you hadn’t much work on.”

“I haven’t.” He chewed the mouthful he had before he spoke again. “I’ve got that fuel system I was working on last night and a front wing that needs replacing and spraying but other than that…” He shrugged. “Why? You want to do something?” He reached for the bread. “Got any jam?”

“Has a witch got jam? Are you trying to insult me?” Meinwen laughed. “Top right-hand cupboard, next to the window…There…The rosehip is really nice.”

His hand hovered over the pink-tinged jar before settling on a darker one. “Blackberry. Our mum used to make this.” He came back to the table to open it. “Cor. Sniff that.” He began to spread it on unbuttered bread. “Magic. I say our mum used to make this but what I really mean is she used to buy it from the church bazaar. A god-fearing woman, she was, though she was happy to lend her faith to the production of soft fruit in summer. Not that it ever worked for our garden.”

“I didn’t know you even had a garden.”

“I don’t. Not anymore. Dad used to grow stuff. Potatoes and cabbages and yams but when he went I couldn’t be bothered to look after it all and paved over most of it. There are still a few bushes and I grow some herbs in pots.”

“That’s nice.” Meinwen finished her plate and slid it to one side. She cupped her hands around the mug. “What sort of herbs do you grow?”

“Ah, the usual.” He looked suddenly shifty and the penny dropped.

“Oh.” She nodded, trying to look saintly and worldly at the same time. “Those sort of herbs.”

“You don’t mind, do you? It’s not against your religion or anything?”

She laughed. “No, of course not. The opposite, probably. Many of the people I come across indulge in smoking cannabis. Just don’t let Inspector White catch you. I have quite a good relationship with him and if you got arrested…”

“You’d come flying to my rescue?”

“No. I’d deny all knowledge of you.”

“Thanks a bunch.”

“I run an emporium of pagan wares which, to the eyes of the police, is one leafy tee-shirt away from being a head shop. They’d close me down if they could, much to the delight of the local Christian Women’s association. Me losing the shop would be the second best thing to happen to them, short of me burning at the stake.”

“Don’t even joke about that.” Winston finished his slice of bread and jam and reached for another. “Why were you asking if I was busy, anyway?”

“I had a reply from the Museum of Witchcraft. They won’t commit themselves but they’re desperate to see the key in person.”

“But you haven’t got it.”

“Which is why I’ll need the rest of the morning to get it off Joseph. You could finish those jobs in your garage and give me a lift to Boscastle.”

“That’s miles away.”

“Sooner we get off the better, then.” Meinwen grinned as she rose and began to clear the table.

Chapter 21

Meinwen opened the car door and slid out, then turned to face back into the car. “Thanks for the lift.”

“No problem.” Winston’s smile flashed quicker than a camera. “Take care of yourself, yeah?”

“I always do.” She took a step backward, ready to close the door. “See you later?”

“Ah, sorry. I can’t.” His smile this time was non-committal, a tightening of the jaw and a careless hand, “I promised a mate, you know?”