Page 5 of Murder Will Out
He jabbed his cane in Willow’s direction. “And who in the hell are you?”
Willow tensed. “I’m Willow Stone; Aunt Sue—honorary aunt, no real relation—was my godmother. I saw in a newspaper article that she’d passed, and I’m here for her memorial.”
Geralt regarded her, one enormous eyebrow raised. “So, you’rethe one. Sue’s girl from way back. Heard about you.” He looked at his ostentatiously expensive watch. “Cutting it a little close, aren’t you? Service starts in a couple of hours.”
“You heard about me?” Willow asked. “From whom?”
“From Sue. Believe it or not, we got on very well together.” He paused. “She spoke of you often. Never stopped hoping you’d come back one day. And here you are.” He gave her a sidelong glance. “A little late, but at least you got here.”
The girl’s mouth trembled; in another few seconds, the tears would overflow. Geralt rolled his eyes. “Oh, good God,” the old man said. “You’re going to cry now. I can’t abide crying women; I’d rather they just shout at me.”
“Yeah, I noticed,” she shot back without missing a beat. She sniffled. “I’ll work on it.”
Oh, I like this one, he thought.
With a cynical grin and a small, ironic bow, he said, “See you at the service. There’s a reception afterward, thrown by that antiques dealer who fancies herself a pastry chef. Health inspector’s paradise.” He tossed his cane up and caught it in the middle. “It’ll be a hellscape. See you there, Sue’s girl.” He exited the shop and started back up toward where he had left his state-of-the-art, luxury golf cart parked haphazardly between the bandstand and a tall pine tree.
Willow impulsively followed, calling after the old man. “Mr. Talbot, can I ask—”
He turned back to her, the same sardonic glint in his eye as before, waiting.
Willow said, “A newspaper article I saw said Aunt Sue was getting married, but not anything about who the groom is—was—” She cleared her throat awkwardly. “I feel like I should meet her fiancé, pay my respects…” She trailed off as Geralt Talbot began to chuckle. Within seconds, he had burst into cackling laughter, ignoring nervous looks from passing tourists.
He reined himself in, dabbing the corners of his eyes. “You want to meet the fiancé, you say? A little late for that, Sue’s girl; you already have.”
At Willow’s confused look, he smirked and gestured to the back of the shop. “Her. That foul-mouthed Italian shrew somehow persuaded your normally sensible godmother to marry her, God knows why.” He cackled again. “Welcome to Little North Island. Enjoy your stay.” He turned away and resumed walking.
Willow followed and called after him again. “Mr. Talbot?”
He called back over his shoulder, still walking, “What is it now, Sue’s girl? I have things to do.”
She took a deep breath and asked the question she had been holding inside since she saw the clipping, the question no website had answered. “How did Sue die?”
Talbot stopped abruptly; then he sagged a little and looked down at his feet. He said flatly, “She fell. Doing repairs or something. Must have lost her balance.”
Willow frowned. “Yes, that’s what the newspaper said; I only wondered if—”
“Well, if you read it in the newspaper, it must be true,” he interrupted, and he began to walk again. Then he turned back to Willow. “Come over to my mansion this afternoon after the reception. Beautiful view from the widow’s walk. We can have another little chat.”
The corner of Willow’s mouth twitched. “Yourmansion, sir?”
Another wicked grin; he turned and leaped behind the wheel of the golf cart with a spryness that belied his need of a cane and, with one more blast of the air horn, took off down the road from the village.
Rina retreated downto the sandy strip of beach below the tide line. She left her shoes at the trailhead and walked along the water’s edge, letting the wet sand squish between her toes. Whenshe came to the stone jetty where she and Sue used to watch the sun set over Bald Hill, she brushed the sand off one of the great rocks and sat.
So that was Willow, she thought. The girl wasn’t Sue’s real niece, yet something in Willow’s eyes reminded her so much of Susan that it felt like a fist squeezing her heart.
Since Sue’s death, Rina had often come to this rock, imagining Sue sitting with her, perched on the boulder, arms around raised knees. Rina listened to the lapping water and the familiarclunk-clunkof round cobblestones shifting against each other in the water, picturing Sue listening too—just the two of them, comfortable in each other’s presence. Sue had been Rina’s calm, her stillness; with the image of Sue here with her, Rina felt the knot in the center of her gut begin to release a little.
You were unkind, you know. That’s not like you.
It was very like Sue, Rina thought, even the Sue of her imagination, to wait till she was starting to relax and only then come at her with whatever was really on her mind.
“But—what is she doing here?” Rina retorted as Sue-in-her-mind picked up a flat stone and skipped it across the placid water. “She has no claim on you, no right to decide, now of all times, that she suddenly wants to be family again.”
That’s not the point, and you know it. Or maybe it is the point.
Imaginary Sue managed seven skips; real Sue had rarely gotten more than four, or maybe five on a good day. But if Rina was bringing Sue back in memory, she could have the flat piece of basalt skip as many times as she wanted.
