Aunt Dimity Digs In (17 page)

The words were muffled but intelligible, and they made sparks fly in my suspicious mind. Damp meadows, I mused, were known to be hard on aging joints. Perhaps our little pitcher had overheard her grandmother and Christine Peacock discussing a certain event that had taken place outdoors, in secret, on Sunday night?

I bit my tongue to keep myself from asking the obvious questions. I was willing to do many things for the Buntings, but the list did not include tricking a little girl into ratting on her grandmother.

“If you promised your gran that you wouldn’t tell,” I said, “then you’d better keep your lips locked tight.”

“I’ve got to go help Emma,” Rainey said, bouncing back to life. “We’re putting pots of ’santhemums by the vicar’s back steps. See you later!”

Leave it to Emma to combine security with botany, I thought, as Rainey dashed toward Saint George’s Lane. A maze of flowerpots would add a touch of charm to the library steps—and make it trickier than ever to negotiate them in the dark.

Dick Peacock had gone into the pub, taking Grog and the burlap-swaddled sign with him. Opening time was eleven A.M., so I would have the publican and his wife all to myself for a couple of hours. I gave the tin a last-minute polish with the hem of my cotton blouse, then walked over and knocked on the door.

Christine Peacock answered my summons. She was a tall woman, in her mid-fifties, with a fair complexion, bright blue eyes, and shoulder-length silvery white hair. Chris was nearly as big around as her husband, but she carried her weight easily and wore what she pleased. Today she’d donned a pair of plaid shorts and an eye-popping cherry-red T-shirt.

“Good morning,” I said.

“We aren’t open till eleven,” said Dick, joining his wife in the doorway.

“I know,” I said. “I just stopped by to say hello. I haven’t been into the pub for a while, so I thought I’d just . . . stop by . . . to say . . .” I cleared my throat, disconcerted by the Peacocks’ blank stares. “I was in . . . last year sometime,” I offered weakly. It wasn’t the sort of place a pregnant woman frequented. “I’m Lori Shepherd, Bill Willis’s wife.”

Christine’s cheeks flamed. She gave Dick a look that should have taken the back of his head off, and snapped, “Dick’s sorry. Aren’t you, dear?”

“I am,” said Dick.

“And if he ever serves that pig’s swill to your husband in my pub again—”

“
Your
pub,” Dick said, affronted. “
Pig’s
swill?”

“Flavored meads, I ask you . . .” Christine tossed her head. “It’s as bad as the banana wine you made last summer.”

I swallowed hard. “Banana wine?”

“An unsuccessful experiment,” Dick admitted, with great aplomb.

Christine turned to me. “We’ve apologized to Bill. I’m glad you stopped by so we could apologize to you, as well.”

“Thanks, but there’s no need,” I assured her. “I know how hard it is to resist Peggy Kitchen’s suggestions.”

Dick nodded sagely. “Like trying to resist a tidal wave.”

“In fact,” I said, thinking on my feet, “I’ve come here to apologize to you. Derek Harris told me what a nuisance my husband was the other night, so I baked a little something.” I held up the tin of lemon bars. “Peace offering?”

“Accepted.” Dick practically snatched the tin from my hands, then held the door wide. “I was just sitting down to a fresh pot of tea. Care to join me?”

My life had changed considerably since I’d last stepped foot inside the pub, but the pub hadn’t changed one bit. The gleaming mahogany bar had polished brass beer pulls, an overhanging framework filled with spotless glasses, and a set of rear-wall shelves resplendent with bright bottles—but there the splendor ended. The rest of the pub still looked as shabby, dim, and dusty as it had when Bill and I had last stopped in for a drink.

The Peacocks had furnished the place with rickety chairs and a dozen or so scarred wooden tables lined up before a hideous banquette covered in protective plastic and upholstered in lime green-and-orange brocade. The back wall featured a beautiful walk-in hearth, but a patron would have to be very drunk indeed to draw a chair up to it, because the space in front of the fireplace formed the flyway for the dartboard.

In the middle of the wall above the banquette—at a safe distance from the dartboard—hung a framed photograph of Martin, the Peacocks’ only child, standing straight and tall in his army uniform. I’d never met Martin, but rumor had it that his bedroom had been turned into a shrine, that not so much as a particle of dust had been disturbed since he’d packed his bags and reported for duty twenty years ago.

Dick ushered me to the table directly beneath Martin’s portrait, where a teapot, cup, and saucer had already been arranged, then bustled off to fetch an extra cup and saucer. Grog snuffled amiably around my sneakers as I sat on the banquette, but Christine went behind the bar, where she appeared to be conducting an experiment.

Before her sat a row of ten pint-sized beer glasses. Seven were filled to the brim with what appeared to be pale ale, but the first three held a frothy red liquid. As I watched, Christine lifted a small plastic bottle and squeezed a drop of food coloring into the fourth glass. She stirred it with a swizzle stick, contemplated the result, then added another three drops.

“Here we are,” said Dick, returning to the table. “I hope you don’t mind gentian tea. I’ve been taking it for my gout.”

“Do you make it yourself ?” I asked, eyeing the teapot suspiciously.

“Good heavens, no,” said Dick. “I got it from that Morrow woman, the one who hired old Miss Minty’s cottage. She says there’s nothing in it but nature’s goodness.”

“Miss Minty’s cottage?” I said as Dick filled my cup. “I thought Mrs. Morrow’s place was called Briar Cottage.”

“ That’s true enough,” Dick conceded, “but it was old Miss Minty’s cottage when I was a little lad. I suppose I’ll call it that until my dying day, whatever the deed books may say.”

As Dick spoke, Mr. Farnham’s words came back to me:
It’s always been Peacock’s pub and it’ll always be Peacock’s pub.
Was I in the presence of that rarest of rare breeds, a native villager? I looked at Dick with fresh interest.

“Mr. Peacock . . .” I began.

“We’re Dick and Chris to you,” called Christine from the bar.

“And I’m Lori,” I replied. I watched while Dick loaded his gout-relieving tea with six teaspoonfuls of sugar, then began again. “How long have you lived in Finch, Dick?”

“Fifty-nine years,” he answered. “My whole life, that is. Only time I left was when I joined the army. That’s when I met Chris.”

“Our Martin’s in the army,” Christine informed me, pointing to the photograph that hung directly above my head. “He’s followed in his dad’s footsteps.”

“Our Martin’s done better than his dad ever did,” said Dick proudly. “I hoped he’d come home one day to help me and his mother run the pub, but the army’s done so well by him that I’ve stopped expecting it.” Grog rested his jowly muzzle on Dick’s shoe, and Dick reached down to pat him on the back. “Couldn’t ask a rising star like Martin to settle in a quiet place like Finch, now, could we?”

“Maybe we could,” Christine said, bending over her array of glasses.

A flicker of pity lit Dick’s eyes as he looked over at his wife. “I suppose we can try,” he said quietly. “Chris has some new ideas.”

“Is that why you’re fixing up the pub?” I asked. “I thought it was a general cleanup campaign, what with Sally Pyne renovating the—”

Christine snorted. “Sally Pyne wouldn’t know a good idea if it bit her on her big fat bum. She thinks more about her waistline—what there is of it—than about what’s good for the village.”

“Now, Chris,” Dick remonstrated, “if Sally wants to dress her place up Roman, it’s her business and none of ours.”

“It’s her business going down the drain,” Christine snapped. “She’s a fool if she thinks Dr. Culver’s going to bring tourists to Finch.” She sniffed disparagingly. “Him with his old hole in the ground.”

“He might discover something important,” Dick pointed out.

“Roman ruins?” Christine mocked. “What’s Finch need with Roman ruins? There’s Cirencester and Chedworth and Crickly Hill not forty miles from here,” she went on, listing three of the Cotswolds’ better-known archaeological sites. “You think Dr. Culver’s grubby hole can compete with them?”

“You’ve got to start somewhere,” Dick reasoned.

“ That’s what I’m doing,” said Christine. “But I’m not looking backward, like Fat Sally. I’m looking ahead.” She lifted one of the glasses of ale and examined it closely before adding another drop of food coloring. “What color would you say Mars is, Lori?”

I blinked, jarred by the abrupt change of subject. “ The planet Mars?” I asked.

“ That’s right.” Christine leaned her chin on her hand and stared at me fixedly. “What color would you say Mars is? Looking at it from the ground, I mean, with your own two eyes.”

“Well . . .” I scratched my head. “I supposed I’d describe it as a . . . a glittery garnet-red. On a clear night,” I added hastily.

“Oh, that’s lovely, that is,” said Christine. “We can put that in the brochure, Dick.
Red Planet Special—a glittery garnet-red ale with a taste that’s out of this world.
It’s got a ring to it.”

“It does,” Dick agreed, his gaze fixed on the bottom button of his black brocade waistcoat.

I looked from his face to the row of red, frothing glasses. “Are you developing a new beer?”

Christine stood tall and squared her shoulders. “We’re developing more than that, aren’t we, Dick? Show Lori the new sign I’ve painted.”

Dick hefted his large frame from the chair and trudged dutifully to the sign, which he’d left just inside the doorway. He took a penknife from the pocket of his waistcoat and cut the brown string that held the burlap covering in place. He gave me a brief, embarrassed glance as the burlap fell away, and I was assailed by an awful premonition.

“What do you think?” Christine asked. “That’ll do the trick, eh? That’ll bring the crowds in, and then our Martin’ll have a
reason
to come home.”

The Peacocks’ new pub sign depicted two faces on a dark ground. One face was slightly larger than the other, but apart from that, they were identical: hairless, triangular, and delicate, with enormous eyes, plug holes for nostrils, and thin slits for mouths. They wore dark-brown hoods, and their skin was painted a pale shade of greenish-gray.

“The Green Men . . .” I murmured, reading the pub’s new name aloud.

“That’s right,” said Christine triumphantly. “That’ll fetch more tourists than Roman ruins
or
the Harvest Festival. We’ll have ’em hanging from the rafters once word gets out that aliens have landed in Finch!”

16.

“I tried to tell your husband about it when he was here the other night,” Christine said as Dick returned to the table. “ To see if I’d need to swear before a judge that I’d seen the little buggers. But he was too far gone by then to listen.”

“Christine,” I said gently, “are you absolutely sure about what you saw?”

“Positive.” Christine came out from behind the bar and pulled another chair up to our table. “I’d taken Grog out to do his business late Sunday night,” she began. “The old boy’s been having plumbing troubles, so he has to go out more often than usual.” She leaned forward, with her elbows on the table. “Grog and me were walking along the river, down by the vicarage meadow. There was a full moon rising, but it was still behind the trees and the ground mist was as thick as slurry. Grog had just finished lifting his leg when it happened.” She paused dramatically and leaned in even closer. “Never seen anything like it before in my life. The mist over the vicarage meadow lit up all swirly and bright, like headlamps in the fog, but these lights”—she pointed upward—“were coming from the sky.”

“From the sky,” I echoed solemnly.

“That’s when I saw ’em,” Christine continued, “just for a minute, mind. They were lit up from behind, then they were gone—poof—lights and all. I think they found out I was watching and hoped to lure me closer, so they could suck me up into their ship and perform experiments on me.”

I decided that a knowing nod would be my best response. Dick stared at his hands and said nothing. As his wife had become more animated, he’d become more subdued. He hadn’t once looked over at the new sign.

“Did you hear anything?” I asked.

Christine frowned. “I thought I heard a sort of chuffing noise just before the sky lit up, but it was hard to tell, with the river so near and all.”

“You must have gotten close enough to see their faces,” I said.

“I did not,” Christine declared. “I got out of there as fast as Grog could trot. Came straight back to the pub and locked the door behind me. Aliens can be dangerous, you know. I’ve read all about ’em.”

“But if you didn’t see their faces,” I said, looking past her at the sign, “how do you know what they looked like?”

“Everyone knows what aliens look like,” she replied. “The papers are full of ’em.”

The papers were full of something, I thought, and it wasn’t aliens.

“It all happened just before midnight,” Christine continued.

“
Before
midnight?” I repeated.

“About fifteen minutes before,” Christine said. “I know, ’cause I looked at the clock when I came in. I tried to rouse Dick, but he was dead to the world.”

“Chris told me about it next morning,” Dick said quietly, “and took me over to have a look at the vicarage meadow.”

“And there it was,” Christine crowed. “A circle of bent grass, where the alien ship had landed.”

“It must’ve been an awfully
small
alien ship,” Dick put in, “because the circle wasn’t more than ten feet across.”

“Size doesn’t matter,” Christine insisted. “ They’ve got
powers.
” She folded her arms obstinately. “I know what I saw, Richard Peacock. What’s more, I know that we’re going to make a packet out of the little green buggers when word gets out that they’ve been to Finch. Our Martin’ll have a good job waiting for him here. He’ll
want
to come home.”