Keeper's Reach (11 page)

13

Near Stow-on-the World, the Cotswolds,
England
Friday, 8:00 a.m., BST

Finian had breakfast in his room. Ruthie Burns set a tray on a small round table in front of the windows. “A lovely morning, isn’t it? Spring’s in the air, I can tell you.” She stood back from the steaming food. “Here you go now, Father. Boiled eggs, toast, grilled tomatoes and mushrooms and a nice pot of tea. That will do you for whatever adventures Mr. York has in mind, don’t you think?”

“I do indeed.”

“Can I get you anything else?”

“This is perfect, thank you.”

“It’s almost warm enough to open windows. I’m ready for spring. The hillsides soon will be covered in daffodils.”

“What a sight that must be.” Finian helped himself to a bit of mushroom. “How is Mr. Hambly today?”

She sniffed. “Not right as rain, I can tell you that.”

She insisted on pouring tea before she withdrew. She seemed to enjoy having company in the house. Finian didn’t want to disappoint her by doing too much for himself, but he was used to being on his own. He sat at the table, relishing the sunlight streaming through the windows. He had opened the drapes before Ruthie had arrived and could do the job for him. He noticed a garden past the terrace, its established beds, fountain and statuary calling up images of times long past—times, he thought, that were no quieter than now.

He ate his breakfast, as delicious as it looked. He hadn’t seized the moment to go to London out of a sense of priestly or brotherly duty, or even for fun in the big city. He had seized the moment out of mad curiosity, because he’d known about Aoife O’Byrne’s show and Oliver York’s fascination with her. Finian supposed his curiosity was the natural product of his friendships with FBI agents, but he wouldn’t blame Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan for his own decisions, good or bad.

After breakfast, instead of heading down the hall to find his host, Finian stepped outside, inhaling deeply the brisk morning air. Vines and branches drooped from trellises and trees, awaiting the return of spring. Raindrops glistened on an ornate, evergreen-painted round table and chairs set up on the yellow-stone terrace. The sun would soon dry the raindrops, but Finian had seen the forecast. Clouds and rain would move in again before nightfall. He would appreciate the sun while it lasted. The brutal Maine winter was an experience, but he was glad to get a break from the relentless cold, the nor’easters that brought wind, snow, sleet and freezing rain. He had learned to dread the words
wintry mix
in the forecast.

He crossed soft, wet grass to a black iron gate. Unlatching it took some doing, but he finally got it to creak open. He suspected it hadn’t been used in a while. He stepped onto a pebbled path, his sturdy walking shoes suited to the conditions. He passed a stone fountain, a chipped statue of a graceful angel and mulched, carefully tended beds. Busy with the girls and work, he and Sally had only managed pots at their cottage in the Kerry hills but had dreamed of planting gardens. He’d wanted to hire a landscaper but she’d wanted to do the work themselves.

Ah, Sally.

Sometimes, still, his heart ached for her, but no longer did it undermine the peace he felt, the acceptance that his kind and loving wife had gone to God.

He went through another gate and found himself face-to-face with a gray-haired man in a worn jacket unzipped over a wool sweater. “You must be Father Bracken,” the man said. “Martin Hambly. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to greet you last night.”

He didn’t look as if he were in any condition to greet a guest now. His quiet formality stood in stark contrast to his ashen, ragged look. Being up and about was clearly costing him, but Finian greeted him with a smile. “A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Hambly. I was sorry to hear about your fall. How are you feeling this morning?”

“Dodgy but better than at this time yesterday. Ruthie is seeing to you? If there’s anything I can do...” His voice trailed off, and he looked as if only pride were keeping him from grabbing hold of the fence to steady himself. He smiled feebly. “Apologies.”

“Is there a doctor I can take you to in the village?” Finian asked with concern.

“I’ll rally. A passing moment. I decided fresh air would be therapeutic.”

“The sun is irresistible.”

Martin’s hands were trembling visibly, and he licked his lips, as if to keep himself from groaning aloud. Swelling and bruising on his neck disappeared under a bandage and his jacket collar. “I thought I might walk down to the dovecote where I fell, but that’s a bit optimistic, I’m afraid,” he said. “I can get back to my cottage without collapsing.” He gave a look of pure distaste. “I hate to be a bother.”

“I can walk with you—”

“No, no. Thank you, Father. I’ll manage on my own. It’s good for me. It was a rough night, but I’d have died in my chair if there were anything seriously wrong with me. I’m much improved this morning. Good to be back on my feet.”

“Is there anything I can do?”

“I would like to thank the woman who helped me. She might have stayed at the pub last night. I remember little of my fall and its aftermath, but I remember her. If you happen to see her, would you give her my regards? She’s American—young, with dark, curly hair and more energy than I could drum up when I was eighteen never mind sixty-two and bloodied. She handled herself well in an unexpected situation.”

Finian would say it had been an emergency, not merely an “unexpected situation,” but he was struck by the similarity of the description of Martin’s rescuer with the woman asking about Aoife in the London gallery on Wednesday.

“This woman urged me to get medical attention, too,” Hambly added, matter-of-fact. He touched a hand to his neck, his eyes half-closed. He shivered, almost like an involuntary shudder. He made an attempt at a smile. “Every minute is better, I assure you. A walk and sunshine do help.”

Not enough, Finian thought. “You look as if you could drop here on the ground. Can I help you get back to your cottage?”

“I’ll manage, thank you. Again, my apologies.”

He staggered down a gentle hill toward a stone wall. Finian noticed a honey-stone cottage through a gap in the stone wall, tucked amid bare-limbed trees and shrubs. He waited, watching the Englishman until he reached the cottage and disappeared inside.

Oliver York grunted, approaching Finian from the main house. “Hambly is bloody stubborn, but I don’t have to tell you. You’ve seen for yourself.”

“Stubbornness can be a positive trait.”

“Not when a head injury is involved.”

Oliver was dressed in a heavy wool sweater, faded corduroy trousers and muddy wellies. He put his hand on a waist-high stone sculpture of Celtic knots and spirals. “I should pound this thing into dust. It’s an early work. Total mess.”

“I rather like it,” Finian said.

“You would with all the Celtic symbols. I was going to do a cross, but I decided it would look too much like a tombstone marking the spot where we buried the dog.” He nodded toward the cottage. “Martin’s avoiding me. Did you notice how he got wobbly once he spotted me?”

Finian smiled. “He was wobbly before he saw you.”

“He’s frustrated that he can’t remember the details of his fall, but it doesn’t occur to him that’s a good reason to see a doctor—not to mention the gash on his neck and a night in the elements. Lucky he didn’t die of exposure. Imagine explaining
that
to the local police. Worse yet, to our FBI friends.” Oliver drew his hand from the sculpture. “I have a stonework studio in the dovecote where Martin fell. I’ve hardly stepped foot in it this winter. I plan to shut it down. Martin can turn the entire dovecote into a potting shed. A puttering shed, my grandfather used to call it. My grandmother loved it there.”

“Did you show your studio to Wendell Sharpe when he visited?”

“Now, why would I do that?”

So innocent, Finian thought. He knew, however, that Oliver had taunted Wendell Sharpe by sending him a small stone cross after each art theft, claiming the theft as his work. The stones were inscribed with a Celtic cross depicting a traditional, rudimentary image of Saint Declan, one of Ireland’s patron saints, and his bell, which legend said had led him to the south Irish coast, where he had established a monastery and performed miracles.

Few people knew about the crosses. The Sharpes, of course, and the FBI, if only because Emma was both a Sharpe and an agent. And Aoife O’Byrne, because she had received one herself. It had ended up in the hand of a dead woman in Boston last fall. Finian hadn’t seen Aoife since then. From his momentary encounter with her in London, he would guess she had recovered from her ordeal in Boston.

“Do you believe Martin’s fall was an accident, Oliver?”

He narrowed his gaze, as if the sun were in his eyes, studying his guest, debating his answer. “No,” he said at last.

“Perhaps the police should have a look at his injury.”

“But I could be wrong,” Oliver said, as if Finian hadn’t spoken. “We have a ram who likes to escape.”

“As rams are wont to do,” Finian said.

“You and your brother grew up on a farm. Do you ever wish you’d stayed on the farm, Finian?”

“There are days.”

“It seems like a simpler life, but it isn’t. This farm covers its costs but I doubt it will ever turn a profit. Fortunately I don’t need it to. I can’t imagine if I did since I have no head for farming. I’m happy we can employ people who love it.” He stood back from the statue and looked out at the rolling fields. “I like the views here. They comfort the soul.”

“This was your grandparents’ home,” Finian said.

“Yes.” Oliver squinted into the sun. “They took me in. They did the best they could with me after my parents were killed.” He spoke quietly, keeping his gaze on the gentle hills. “I followed Martin everywhere in the months after their murder. He never once told me to buzz off. He was steady and uncompromising. He taught me to get on with it. Do the work, live my life. He refused to let me give in to self-pity. The British stiff upper lip and all that, I suppose.”

“He seems like a good man.”

“We never spoke of the investigation. My grandparents left it to the police and saw no benefit to supplementing their efforts.
Interference
, they called it. Discovering the perpetrators of my parents’ murder and my torment wasn’t their job. For them, there was no such thing as closure. There was only carrying on. It was a matter of will, and perhaps of faith, too.”

Finian touched raindrops glistening on a Celtic knot on the sculpture. “They sound like good people,” he said.

“The best. After they were gone, I had the means to hire private investigators, and I did. Martin didn’t dissuade me. He simply asked me what I expected to accomplish. It was a sincere question, and he was deliberate about saying ‘expected’ rather than ‘hoped.’ I had no answer.”

“Have you ever taken time to mourn your parents’ death?”

Oliver shifted his gaze to Finian. “I mourned my parents in the ruins of the Scottish church where their killers left me.” A coldness had come into his voice—an emotional distance that, Finian suspected, kept the small, terrified, traumatized boy inside him at bay. “I knew they were dead. I knew what had happened to them. Even at eight, I had no doubt, no illusions. I was never in denial.”

“Then you cried for them,” Finian said.

“Ha. Tears. As if they equal mourning. Have a good sob and all will be well.”

“Does that mean you didn’t cry?”

Oliver smirked. “So asks a priest, a man who himself has suffered terrible loss. You don’t fool me, Father Bracken. You know there is no cure for my grief, by willpower, faith or the arrest and conviction of the perpetrators. My grief is with me every moment of every day, no matter that I do get on with my life.”

“It’s a part of you.”

“It’s a permanent injury to my soul. I live with it as I would an amputated limb.”

Finian nodded and stepped back from the sculpture. “Yes. I see that you do.”

Oliver pointed at him, then laughed, an unexpected, cheeky laugh that lit up his eyes. “Touché, my friend.” He made a face. “Can you wear that priest getup for a walk into the village, or do you have sweats and tennis shoes tucked in your bag? I thought we could wander to the pub and see if anyone there knows anything about this woman who rescued Martin yesterday.”

“I have good walking shoes. I can leave whenever you’re ready.”

“Excellent. I’d like to find this woman and thank her myself.” Oliver scooped up a small clump of sodden plant debris and tossed it into the garden. “I’ll meet you at the side door in fifteen minutes.”

He eased off back toward the house.

Finian lingered by the Celtic sculpture. He admired traditional Celtic symbols more than he understood them. He felt at home and himself when he saw them on a cross, a work of art, a bit of jewelry. He had visited Trinity College in Dublin to see the Book of Kells, a priceless medieval illuminated manuscript that was arguably the greatest example of early Celtic Christian art in existence. The sculpture didn’t compare, but it wasn’t supposed to.

He reminded himself that he and Oliver York weren’t friends. Oliver had few, if any, real friends, apart from Martin Hambly and the rest of his staff.