The night had turned treacherous. After he shepherded Alex and the Burke sisters outside, Tony all but lifted Harriet and Mary Burke into the back seat of the Land Rover, which he’d parked behind the Black Dog. When he got in himself he glanced anxiously at Alex, who had greeted him with an expression that suggested the end was near. Her apprehension was palpable.
‘Let’s sit here and talk,’ he said. ‘The car’s still warm and we can add some heat if we have to. I doubt it’ll be so easy to get close to your front door, ladies.’
‘We’re used to it,’ Mary said in a determined voice that reminded him how important independence was to these two. ‘We walked down. It’s not far and we’ve had plenty of experience. We stand or fall together.’
She and Harriet laughed.
Alex kept her face turned from his and stared through the window. The yard behind the pub was dark except for the faint glow from steamed-up windows on to the snow.
‘Mustn’t leave Oliver too much longer,’ Mary said, and when Harriet gave a muffled chuckle, she added: ‘You have to accept what you can’t change, like that wretched cat someone foisted on me.’
Snuffling called attention to Katie in her crate. Bogie was still ensconced in Lily’s care and seemed happy enough, although Tony had seen the dog’s eyes following Alex, who had become his lifeline.
‘You notice young Tony doesn’t leave his dog all alone for hours,’ Mary said. ‘Knows it’s not good for them.’
‘Bring Oliver with you, then,’ Harriet said shortly. ‘You can pull him along in that wheeled grocery bag of yours and take him everywhere you go like that batty Prue Wally and her smelly little poodle.’
Alex did look at Tony then, with a smile he couldn’t miss even in the murky light. He patted her hand and she briefly used her free one to give his a squeeze. Just as quickly, she pulled away to fiddle with her scarf.
‘I already told Alex that some of what we’ve been told sounds peculiar but it does tell us about the lace handkerchief. Or it seems to.’
Tony swiveled toward Harriet. ‘Handkerchief?’
‘This is a bit from the edge of an old handkerchief,’ she said, passing him a folded piece of tissue. He could feel the scrap inside. ‘It was made by Violet May, Winnie Hawker’s mum. Winnie recognized it because Violet invented the pattern. She liked it so much she put it around the handkerchiefs she gave to brides as gifts to use on their wedding days. Something new.’
‘See?’ Mary said. ‘I told you the story gets a bit deep in places.’
‘I think it’s interesting.’ Alex broke her silence.
‘That pattern’s really intricate,’ Harriet said. ‘Violet is in her nineties now. She still makes lace-edged handkerchiefs but they’re much more simple.’
Mary harrumphed and said, ‘If her eyes are like mine she’s got my sympathy. Before we go on with this, I want to ask something about Reverend Restrick. Kev said the police won’t say which hospital he’s in. Don’t you think that sounds as if they’re afraid someone will get in and kill him?’
Tony smiled to himself. In this village everyone was a budding detective. ‘I suppose it could, but it could also be a big leap to think that. Could be the man’s so injured they don’t want a lot of visitors showing up.’
Alex put a fist to her mouth. ‘We shouldn’t talk about what we think too much. You heard the way they were going on in the Black Dog, Mary. You, too, Harriet. If they could settle on a culprit they’d have him in the stocks by now. Then we’d have to make sure they threw rotten fruit and veg at him, not darts from the Black Dog.’
‘Unfortunately our village stocks are missing the top bit,’ Harriet said with a smile in her voice. ‘But you’re right. They were … well, to be honest it was mostly Kev Winslet who was ready to convict the first likely candidate.’
‘Did he have anyone in mind?’ Tony asked.
‘Just a lot of stuff about how he heard the police were saying the man on the hill could be Edward Derwinter, which is silly when he died years ago. And how Edward coming back would mess things up for Leonard and Heather, because of the inheritance.’ Harriet sniffed. ‘We still don’t understand why that boy was sent away. He had a terrible stutter and sometimes he didn’t talk for weeks on end, but that shouldn’t have been a reason to hide him away like that. First he lost his mother and he’d been like her shadow up till she died. He turned very quiet then. And after he saw the little Cummings boy drown, he shut up altogether. If he did try to talk, you couldn’t understand him. We all think old man Derwinter was ashamed of him.’
They were all quiet until Mary said, too loudly, ‘Kev should know better than to sneak around his employers’ place listening for things that are none of his business. Those people have been good to him – they’re good to anyone who works for them.’
Tony could sense Alex’s distress. The past days had been too much for her. His father’s warnings about not waiting too long to tell her about what happened to him in Australia weighed heavily. When was the right moment for something like that? He was almost sure she would believe his side of the story, but he couldn’t be completely certain.
‘Is there more about the lace?’ Alex asked. She swiveled in her seat to look at the sisters.
Neither of them answered, just gazed out of the windows.
‘Is there?’ Alex pressed.
‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you. It sounds outlandish. There’s a little edge of the bride’s initials still on the lawn. Just the very top of the first one, and the second one, but a bit more of the third one. The letters M, then O, then S. There’s a bit more of the S but we’re all sure the first two are M and O from the very top shape.’
Alex shocked Tony by abruptly resting her forehead on his shoulder. ‘How will we ever make something out of that?’ she said.
He stroked her black curls. Alex glanced down, then straightened up quickly. What he felt was more than the reaction of a friend.
‘Any ideas?’ he asked the sisters.
‘Violet’s sure she knows. Maria Olivia Scaduto. Says she could never forget anything that unusual.’
‘And Violet’s in her nineties?’ Tony said.
‘We don’t all go dotty past the fine age of thirty-five, young man,’ Harriet said.
‘Absolutely not,’ Tony said diplomatically – if a little late.
‘She was Cornelius Derwinter’s wife,’ Mary said. ‘That’s where Leonard’s coloring comes from. Italian. Beautiful girl. Only saw her a few times.’
Tony watched ever fatter flakes of snow fluff the windscreen and slide to join the thickening heap on the Land Rover’s bonnet. Inside, the temperature had dropped.
‘That doesn’t make any sense,’ Alex said. ‘Where’s the rest of the handkerchief?’
Mary leaned forward and lowered her voice as if afraid of being overheard. ‘According to Violet, the whole thing was put in Maria’s coffin.’