Writ on Water (23 page)

Rory snorted. “Wrong again—you really do have lurid tastes. Anyway, though I am no expert on this matter, I believe that the bonfire trick only works with ocean vessels on certain stretches of rocky coastline.”

“So, no pirates?”

“No. We did some shipping though, and grew some hemp in the eighteenth century,” Rory said kindly.

“Hemp! Don't be ridiculous. No one got rich on hemp. . . . I think maybe your forefathers routinely looted the museums of Europe,” Chloe went on, rejecting the other story as boring and therefore spurious. “Do you have any great thieves back there in the old family tree? A seventeenth century cat burglar? Or maybe one of your ancestresses was a mistress to Charles the Second and made off with the royal jewels!”

Chloe made certain not to look to her right as they headed for the family necropolis. Instead, she focused on the stands of wild rosy columbine that were beginning to bloom and kept her back to the slave cemetery where the yellow police tape fluttered in the timid breeze.

“Almost certainly we do have thieves in the family—and I believe there was one lady who had a connection with the Stuart lecher. But I wouldn't know the details. I'm just the gardener. Ask MacGregor about our history. I'm sure that he'd be only too happy to entertain you with family yarns. He would probably give you a leprechaun and a cat burglar, even a pirate or two, if you really want them.”

Chloe couldn't see Rory's face but she could hear the lingering smile in his voice as he fit the key into the lock and pushed the gate wide.

“So, who did the alchemist's tomb? I only saw the back of it but it looked Roman, if I am thinking of the right one. Was it done by Gaspari? Or Sammartino?” she asked casually, pushing through the remaining creepers, which Rory had not pulled aside. They were in close enough proximity as she passed through the portal that Chloe could smell the soap Rory had bathed in. It was an appealing herbal concoction that reminded her of a florist's shop.

“No, that one is a Massari. The Gaspari is closer to the outer wall,” he said, letting down the green curtain behind them.

“Hm . . . Massari, is it? That rolled easily off the tongue. You are a fraud, you know,” she told Rory. “And I'm on to you now.”

Rory froze in the act of shutting the gate behind them. “What do you mean?” he asked, his voice suddenly neutral.

“I mean that ‘
I'm just the gardener
' routine. Give it up. You have nothing in common with Joe Six-pack who pushes a lawnmower for a living. The average man on the street wouldn't know a Mas-sari from fettuccini alfredo. And you like opera as well as the blues. That's hardly the music of the modern masses.”

Rory relaxed. “I just have a good memory for Greek and Latin names. Goes with the territory.” He turned his head and smiled at her.

It wasn't his best smile, being slightly forced, but Chloe found herself answering it anyway. They were both still very tense and had to make allowances for moments of awkwardness. At least he was warming up again.

“So how come there are no ossuaries here? You seem to have every other sort of burial option covered.” For one instant her mind flashed on the horror in the slave cemetery, but she immediately pushed the thought away. She could not afford to get spooky now that she was again among the dead. They were friendly enough spirits here in the Patrick family boneyard, but it was most unwise to call ghosts—even kind ones—when you might be left alone with them. It was doubtful that Rory
could stay all day. They were bound to quarrel again eventually and then he would abandon her.

The thought made her a little sad.

“Why bother? We have plenty of space for everyone in the family. And outsiders are not welcome.” Rory started down an east-running path. “Can you actually imagine the Patrick patriarchs spending eternity in some crowded, common grave like the regular hoi-polloi? We put up the occasional cenotaph to our famous or patriotic neighbors in town to appease the tourists. That's democratic enough.”

“You have a point. An ossuary would be far too common an end for any Patrick.”

“Far, far too common.”

“So, I guess this attitude toward the hoi-polloi means you never had any socialists in your family? No friends to the common man?”

“Not a one. We all enjoyed our luxuries too much to embrace any fashionable—and certainly not any
unfashionable
—political causes. We looked after our own, servants or family, but that was it.”

Chloe wondered if that wasn't the literal truth. She hadn't found a single reference to a Patrick dying while serving as a soldier in a war. She would have thought that the usual pride and a thirst for valor would have infected some of the younger, more romantic males of the tribe, especially during the War between the States, but apparently in their civic pride they were as different from the average man as it was possible to be.

However, she had a feeling that whatever the differences to the common man, Patricks did have their full share of familial pride and that it could be damaged. Having Claude on the run from the police had to be weighing heavily on MacGregor's spirits, and possibly making him speechless with fury. He certainly had not spoken to her much in the last few days. She hadn't seen him except for the minutes she was questioned by Sheriff Bell.

The picture of MacGregor with an axe flashed across her brain and she wondered uneasily what he would do if Claude were eventually found and arrested for Isaac Runyon's death. It seemed possible that his reaction to the indignity would be so strong that he might actually die of shame.

Chloe caught an unexpected glimpse of tomb forty-six's crocketed roof showing through the thinning trees, and suddenly recalled the strange moss that she had intended to show Rory on their next visit to the cemetery.

“Wait!” she called, glad for the distraction. “There was something over here that I wanted to show you.”

“What?” Rory returned immediately to her side. He seemed unusually alert and his voice a bit sharp as he questioned her. “What is it?”

“Just some moss. It isn't anything important,” Chloe began. “It looked a lot like your Borneo moss, the one you showed us in the hothouse where the break-in hap—”

“Where is it? Which tomb? Or is it in a tree?” he asked hopefully.

Chloe smiled at the abrupt questions.

“Over on Calvin and Edana's place, number forty-six. It sprouted right after the rainstorm and was growing like a house afire. Every hour it spread another couple inches. I took some pho—” But she was talking to air. Rory's passion for moss was apparently alive and well, for he had reversed course as soon as she mentioned Calvin and Edana, and was walking rapidly toward tomb forty-six.

It was probably just as well that she hadn't mentioned her extracurricular photography. She had forgotten for a moment that she had taken those photos the same day as finding the body, and there was no point in starting his mind down that particular path.

Chloe shrugged off her renewed unease and followed after Rory. She was rather curious to see how the moss was faring now that warmer, drier weather had returned.

“Moss growing at this time of year?” Rory muttered. “Perhaps some spruce fir or filamentous fungi . . . but even if a
lycopodiam lucidulum
—”

“Your conversation sometimes leaves a little to be desired,” Chloe complained. “And it is too hot for racing about with this equipment if all you are going to do is speak Latin and grumble to yourself. Anyway, it isn't spruce fir moss. I've seen lots of that. This looked just like that hairy Borneo stuff. I was even wondering if Roger might have
gotten into the greenhouse after the break-in and brought some spores out here in his coat. You know how he likes tomb forty-six, and all the moss is growing down low.”

“It's possible,” Rory said shortly. “But very unlikely. Roger never comes out to Botanics unless MacGregor brings him. And MacGregor rarely comes around anymore. I've seen him more this last week then in the entirety of last year.”

Thinking back to the small jagged hole punched in the hothouse glass, Chloe was inclined to agree with Rory's assessment. The cat would have been cut to ribbons trying to fit in that small space. It was also a long distance from the house for the bowlegged cat to travel on foot.

Though, he might have followed if Claude ever went to visit. The cat surely adored that ratfink.

They rounded the corner of tomb forty-six and Rory stopped. In the two days since she had been there, the honeysuckle had made great inroads on the granite sepulcher. But the path to the door was still sufficiently clear that they could both see the long strands of moss that were turning a sickly yellow on the stone sill and dark wood panel.

“Oh! It's dying,” Chloe said with disappointment. “I thought for sure that it would make it. It looked so healthy two days ago—just like those pots in your greenhouse.”

Rory grunted and kneeled by the narrow sill. He gently fingered the sickly strands that had
laced over the lower door. He soon abandoned the moss and ran a finger over the dark wood of the door itself. He leaned in and sniffed it. After another long moment, he pulled away from the tomb and wiped his hands on his handkerchief.

“It is
weberi,
isn't it?” Chloe asked, confident of her identification now that the moss was filled in.

“No. It's . . . a
lucidulam
.” Rory turned to stare at her. His lips twisted into a smile, and he held her eyes as he said steadily: “It is not the Borneo moss. It couldn't be. There is no way for that moss to get here. Anyway,
weberi
doesn't like granite. I told you that. It wouldn't grow there even if Roger carried the spore out here.”

Chloe's breath stopped, and for a moment she was unable to look away from Rory's face. Something inside her twisted at his overly sincere gaze. She prayed that her complexion neither flushed nor paled, and that Rory didn't notice the sudden trembling in her legs.

Weberi
didn't like clay pots either. He
had
said that. It grew on wood and had to be deliberately cultured in a manmade growing medium if it was to thrive on terra-cotta pots. That's what Rory had told them the day she and MacGregor went to Bontanics.
Weberi
might grow on its own on the ancient panel door of the mausoleum, but it would never have started accidentally on the stone sill. Not unless someone had smeared it with yogurt or some other medium. Rory was lying to her.

And that, she thought grimly, pretty much answered
her question about whether to confide in Rory about her photos.

“Oh, really?” She swallowed to ease the dryness in her mouth and willed her lungs to work. She added lamely, “Well, it was pretty a couple of days ago. I thought you would want to see it.”

Rory continued to stare at her. He smiled, but underneath she knew he was angry maybe not at her but at something or someone.

“Have you photographed it at all?” he asked casually, causing Chloe's heart to thunder. “Maybe when it was just sprouting? I'd like to see any pictures you have.”

Chloe felt as sickly as the yellowing moss.

“Photographed it? It didn't occur to me. I'm sorry. Would you like me to take some photos now? It would only take a minute to load up the camera.” Chloe was amazed at how calm she sounded as she evaded his question.

He was silent a beat and then said: “No, that's all right. Maybe later. We should get on with your work.”

“Okay, whatever you want. Shall we go on to two-twenty-nine now?” she asked. “Or would you like to stay here and . . . take a sample of moss or something? Maybe clear it off of the door before it does any damage . . . I can easily go on alone.”

“No. I don't need to take samples of this moss. I know what it is. Just a common moss. And it's fine on the door. It's dying quickly and won't hurt anything.”

And it made the tomb look antique and neglected—just like the antiqued pots. But Rory didn't add this.

“Okay,” she said again.

Unable to preserve her calm any longer while facing Rory's gaze, Chloe turned around and started back down the path to the alchemist's tomb. She felt weak-kneed and had a stupid urge to cry, so she was proud of the fact that her legs carried her without a single stumble and not one tear overflowed.

Of course Rory didn't need to take samples of the moss. He already knew it was
weberi
and that it shouldn't be there.

What frightened and hurt her was that he had felt the need to lie about it. Why lie unless it was important? Maybe it was making leaps of logic, but an untruth about this moss and how it came to be in the cemetery didn't fit in with the neat explanation for Isaac's death that MacGregor—and her conscience—were trying desperately to construct. She didn't know exactly what this meant, but she was certain that somehow the break-in
was
connected to Isaac's death. And it also meant that, even after all they had gone through, Rory didn't trust her enough to confide in her about this matter.

Suddenly, in spite of the air temperature being in the mid nineties, Chloe had a crop of goose-flesh growing on her arms, and it was spreading faster than Borneo moss.

“Are you feeling well, Chloe?” Rory asked,
coming up behind her so close that she could again smell his soap. He put a hand on her arm and turned her around.

Under other circumstances, she might have been tempted to look him in the eyes, to ask to be taken into his arms and held again. His embrace had been heaven two days ago when she had been frightened. Now she just wanted to get away.

“You look rather pale. Do you want to go back to the house and have a rest?” His concern sounded quite genuine, but Chloe didn't know if she could trust it. Her welfare was not his top priority. Botanics, Riverview and MacGregor—and maybe Claude—came first.