Every Secret Thing (32 page)

Even in her shocked state, Jenny felt that she was missing something, some small understanding that had passed between the men.

‘Right,’ said Roger, as he pocketed the letter. ‘Right. I’m off to see the old man, anyway. I’ll break the news.’ He took one final, disbelieving look into the room, as though his mind could not accept what it had seen there. ‘Poor Manuel.’ And then, more practically, ‘This won’t do the company any good either, you know.’

Jenny Augustine smiled very faintly. She said, ‘That was Roger. For a man so addicted to gossip, he always did try to steer clear of a scandal. He needn’t have worried, though. None of the papers took notice of Garcia’s suicide – they had a more important death to write about.’

And I remembered, then, why April 6
^th
had seemed such a familiar date. ‘Your father’s.’

‘Yes. He died that night. When I got home that evening, I could see that he was getting worse. His lungs were filling up with fluid, and the nurse was wanting him to go back in the hospital, but he was stubborn.’ Lifting the chin that was so like her father’s, she said, ‘So he died in his bed, in his sleep, like he wanted to die. And everyone forgot about Garcia. Everyone, that is, except Andrew. It troubled him, I know, because the two of them were friends. I think he felt that he could somehow have prevented it. And then, of course, his wife died, and that really did him in; so he went home.’

I asked her, ‘What happened to Cayton-Wood?’

The question appeared to surprise her a little. ‘Oh, he went home, too, back to England, but not till the summer. After the Allies had landed in Normandy. I heard he was killed in an accident – sailing, or something like that. Men that handsome seem to bring bad luck upon themselves,’ she said.

She would have said more, I felt sure, but the dog barked. Not a single bark, but the sharp burst of high-pitched yelps that signalled an intrusion. Jenny Augustine reached down and laid her hand firmly on the terrier’s head. ‘Quiet.’ Into the silence we both sat and listened.

The knock came again, clearly audible this time, and once again the dog replied.

‘Were you expecting anyone?’ I asked.

She shook her head.

There were no windows in the room that we were in, but in the darkened front room, down the hall, I found that I could edge the blind away from the window frame just enough to see a thin slice of the street and the black-railinged steps leading up to the door. There were cars in the street – I saw one, double-parked, with a driver inside, headlights on, engine idling. And on the steps a man was standing on his own. I couldn’t really see his face, until he moved to knock again. The lamplight caught the light brown hair; the harder lines of nose and jaw.

A face I knew.

I eased the blind back into place with care. Jenny Augustine was sitting where I’d left her in the other room, the dog curled like a wire spring between her feet. The years had settled round her once again with unforgiving firmness. She looked old, just as my grandmother had looked that afternoon, when…

‘I don’t think that we should stay here,’ I said, taking charge. ‘Is there a back way out?’

I only hoped the people at the front door didn’t know about the lane. I wouldn’t have known that it was there, myself – there wasn’t any indication from the street that any lane or alleyway ran up behind the houses, and at any rate, it didn’t run the full length of the block, but dead-ended at the high wood fence surrounding Jenny Augustine’s back yard. It was a narrow, almost squalid, little lane, with solid wooden fences rising close at either side to block the light that angled downwards from all but the highest house windows, and the air hanging thick with the smells of bare dirt and bagged garbage.

It was dark, and I was trying to be quiet, but the uneven ground wasn’t easy to walk on. Now and then I hit a patch of brick, or stone, that made me stumble. It must have been even more difficult for an elderly woman. And she’d brought the dog, impatient on its leash, which didn’t help.

The dog’s paws scrabbled in the dirt, its snuffing nose and panting breath so loud to my own ears that I felt sure we’d be discovered. Then it stopped, and crouched, and all the hair stood stiffly up along its backbone as it growled.

Ahead of us, against the iron gate that marked the lane’s far end, a man stood out in silhouette.

I’d already pushed Jenny Augustine into the shadows, flat up to the fence, with myself pressed close beside her, when the gate creaked open, slowly, and the man came through. The dog growled again, low. I willed it to silence.

The man moved towards us, but cautiously; half blind, as we were, in the dark.

I held my breath. My heart thumped at my ribcage and my legs ached to move, but I stayed like a statue until I felt I’d have to either scream or run as a release – and then the man suddenly stopped, and half turned to the wall. Metal scraped on metal, and a garden door swung open, and the man was gone.

A neighbour. Not a threat. And anyway, he hadn’t seen us.

I counted to ten, to be safe, and was about to leave the wall when I heard noises, soft and furtive, overhead. Looking up, I saw the ragged outline of an overhang of shingles on the roof of someone’s shed, butting up against the fence’s other side. I froze, in fear. I remembered Guy telling me what the police knew about Grandma’s murder – ‘They figure the shooter was up on the roof of the neighbour’s garage, at the back of the lane.’

Jenny Augustine moved at my side, and I stretched out my arm to hold her still. Looking up, I waited, while the noises came again, more marked, this time: a stronger thump, a scuffing sound, and, suddenly, the short-lived, banshee shriek of fighting cats. The sound, so close above me, made my heart bolt upwards, even while it calmed my fears.

And then the dog barked, and I snapped back into motion, coming free of the wall and guiding Jenny Augustine behind me down the lane, before all the noise gave away our position.

We stopped a minute on the dark side of the iron gate that opened onto Prospect Street, halfway between 33
^rd
and Potomac. I peered out, making certain there was no one standing waiting at the corner, before cautiously pushing against the black bars. The gate squeaked on its hinges, I couldn’t help that, but I caught it before it clanged back into place, and I eased it gently shut.

Our escape plan was hazy, at best. I just wanted to get us away from the quiet streets, back to the busy ones, and so I let Jenny Augustine lead me away from Potomac. We circled round, back down to M Street. There were definitely more people here, walking round us on the sidewalk, talking, laughing – but I still felt too exposed. Every set of approaching headlights, every car that passed us by, seemed somehow sinister.

I wanted to get indoors, out of sight of searching eyes, but we had the dog.

‘Max!’ Jenny Augustine said, on a note of frustration. I turned. She was tugging the leash of the dog, who’d dug in with all fours on the red-bricked paved sidewalk, refusing to budge. To me, she explained, ‘When my husband was alive, he used to stop here for a coffee, on their morning walk. It’s remarkable what animals remember. Max, come
on
.’

I looked around, taking notice for the first time of exactly where we were.

A gap between the buildings on the sidewalk opened here into an upscale pedestrian alley, with what appeared to be a long arcade of shops along one side, warmly lit bow windows jutting out from dark brick walls, and columns, fancied up by hedges and a row of the old-fashioned-looking lampposts that were such a feature of Georgetown.

This, I knew, was more than what it looked to be – it was, in fact, an entrance to the giant and expensive three-floor mall of Georgetown Park. Inside, we would have been able to find some measure of anonymity, and safety…if we hadn’t had the dog.

But still, I conceded, the dog hadn’t done badly, stopping us here. Because facing the row of shop windows, along the little alley, were the rounded green awnings of Dean and Deluca’s, the gourmet food and coffee shop. And down the alley’s centre was a row of outside tables for those customers who liked to drink their coffee out of doors.

Safety in numbers, I thought. We could make ourselves part of the crowd, less conspicuous.

We found a table in the middle of the open alley, not too close to any of the lampposts, so it fell more in shadow than light, partly screened by a square-trimmed yew hedge in a planter behind. My chair faced the main part of Dean and Deluca’s, a long, glassed-in gallery, like a greenhouse, built on the side of the red-brick main building, with cane chairs and marble-topped tables and slowly revolving fans moving the air above tables of people, not one of whom took any notice of us. Even the table of women directly beside us seemed far too involved in their own conversation to even be aware that we were there.

The dog settled down with a stretch and a yawn at his mistress’s feet. She asked, ‘What now?’

‘I don’t know.’

We sat for some minutes in silence, both thinking.

A man came and sat at the next table over, in my line of vision. An old man, about Deacon’s age, very tall and loose-jointed, and wearing the same kind of overcoat Deacon had worn. I made a point of looking at his face, the way I should have done with Deacon – really looking, at the kindness of his features, and the downturned eyes beneath the winging eyebrows, and the
still-full
head of thick white hair. I knew that I would never see this man again, and yet I went on looking at his face, as though by doing that, I somehow could atone for what I’d failed to do with Deacon.

I said quietly, ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Augustine, for getting you into all this.’

‘Don’t be silly.’ She drew her coat closer around her, to keep out the cold. ‘This is the most excitement I’ve had in years.’ Her smile was dry, and brief, as though she’d fallen out of practice. She looked me over. ‘Seems to me that Andrew knew what he was doing, when he got in touch with you.’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘You’re a fighter. After everything that’s happened, you’re still here, still trying to get to the truth.’

‘It’s my job.’ But I knew, in this case, it was more than that. So did she.

She asked, ‘What will you do with the truth, when you find it?’

‘I really haven’t thought that far ahead. His nephew—’

‘James?’

‘Yes. He thought Deacon got in touch with me so I’d bring the story out into the open. You know, make it public.’

‘A book, then.’ She nodded. ‘Well, when the time comes, you make sure you come see me. I have some connections in publishing.’

It was touching, I thought, that she had so much faith in me. I hadn’t even gotten to the end of Deacon’s story, yet. I’d never tried to write a book. And frankly, it remained to be seen whether I’d be able to get us through tonight alive.

We’d have to start, I thought, by getting coffee. We couldn’t sit here any length of time without at least an empty cup in front of us, it wouldn’t look right. I took out my wallet and counted the change.

Jenny Augustine asked, ‘What’s that for?’

‘We need coffee.’ I explained why; then I stood. ‘I’ll be as quick as I can. Will you be all right out here, alone?’

‘I have Max,’ she said, patting the dog at her feet. ‘Don’t worry. No one is going to molest an old woman in a place like this.’

Behind her, the elderly man at the next table over was turning a page of his newspaper, and the four women beside us were still busy talking and laughing. It looked like a safe enough place, for the moment.

The line at the counter was short, and I kept a watchful eye on Jenny Augustine the whole time I was waiting, only turning my back for the minute it took me to pay the cashier. But a minute was all that it took. When I turned back to look, she was gone.

Panicked, I pressed my way back through the tight maze of tables and chairs to the place where I’d left her. The coffee from one of the cups I was holding sloshed scaldingly over my wrist, but I paid no attention. I looked towards M Street, my frantic gaze searching the faces of strangers.

And then the familiar voice suddenly spoke, at my shoulder. ‘Here, let me help you with those.’ Matt Jankowski reached over to take the two coffee cups from me. ‘Is this where you’re sitting?’

I don’t believe I even felt surprised that he was there, and not in Portugal. In a fatalistic kind of way, it almost seemed inevitable.

I faced him, and in a calm voice that sounded nothing like my own, asked, ‘Where is she?’

Matt said, ‘She’s with a friend of mine. A friend of hers, too, as it happens. You don’t need to worry.’ He pulled out a chair for me; set down the cups. ‘Here, drink your coffee. You look cold.’

I felt cold. I crossed my arms over my chest, tightly, tucking my hands under, close to my body, so Matt wouldn’t see they were shaking. But I didn’t sit.

‘Look,’ he said, ‘if you’re
that
cold, we don’t have to stay out here, you know. There’s a restaurant a few blocks away where they make a great steak. Have you eaten yet?’

That did it. Here I was, practically frozen with fear for my life and the life of the woman I’d failed to protect, and he had the audacity to stand there speaking normally, as if we were old friends and there was nothing wrong. It was too much to bear in silence.

‘If you think I’m going anywhere with you,’ I told him evenly, ‘you’re crazy. I’m not moving. I’ll stand here all night, if I have to, so whatever you’re supposed to try to do to me, you’ll have to do it here. And I can tell you now, I’m going to scream. I’m going to make the biggest scene I can, if you so much as touch me.’

And after this brave speech, I stopped for breath, and waited.

It was the expression on his face, really, that made me start to doubt myself. He looked as if I’d hit him with a hammer.

‘Christ,’ he said at last, and sat, and drank his coffee back as though he wished it were a double Scotch. ‘Is that what you’ve been thinking? All the time we spent together, you’ve been thinking I’m a murderer?’