But I don’t think so. I think they let me run, so the odds are good I’ll get off this bus somewhere in Nevada or Utah or Colorado. What then for Mary Stokley’s bright boy and, more importantly, what fate awaits Camera Guy? Shutting my eyes, I picture Sal at the Oscar podium, golden totem in hand.
My heart tells me that Tim Wolfe is out there somewhere, watching this with a smile. Wherever you are, Tim, this is for you!
Stabbing a Marlboro between my lips, I flip a notebook page and scribble:
Tight closeup of a dusty, yellowing Priority Mail envelope, abandoned on a bottom shelf. The camera pulls up and away, revealing that the envelope sits in the very last aisle of a dead-letter depository the size of Penn Station.
And every couple of years, Sal stirs from troubled sleep, long past midnight, to briefly wonder whatever happened to that unreliable asshole, Tim Wolfe.
Like a son that one, before he almost cratered my career by no-showing some studio bigwigs. What gall, and after I’d moved heaven and earth to promote the ungrateful little prick!
Wherever you are, Tim, I hope you get the cancer.
I’m doodling on the notebook cover — wheels within wheels — when Bible Woman finally reaches up and clicks off the light. The dark bus rolls on in silence.
I wait five minutes, then retreat to the tiny restroom. The neon light flickers as I study a gaunt face in the scarred metal mirror. The dark eyes are haunted, sunken and bloodshot. The left one has developed a tic.
“Who are you?” I whisper.
Camera Guy suggested that Timmy Stokley was erased years ago, while “Tim Wolfe” was never more than a name scrolling by on a screen, unseen by an audience already halfway to the lobby.
So who’s left in the mirror? Some homeless bum, soon to be pushing a shopping cart, or found dead along a stretch of rural blacktop?
Maybe.
My life’s been abandoned, left behind with a desperate note and two cans of film, their unviewed images dangerous enough to kill for.
But Jay Max was nuts, right? Maybe his viewfinder framed nothing more dangerous than herds of Disneyland tourists. And maybe doors without peepholes are a good thing, keeping voyeurs like me ignorant of all the scary monsters lurking on the other side, just waiting to be invited in.
Maybe.
But I still haven’t learned my lesson, not really. As I lean back and shut my eyes, the old curiosity starts to gnaw, an incurable itch under my skin.
With a long night ahead, I’m left to ponder that third can of film, tucked deep in the pocket of my jeans, bound for points east and unknown.
Parson Pennywick and the Whirligig
by Amy Myers
© 2007 by Amy Myers
Art by Ron Bucalo
Some Amy Myers fans may be unaware that she also writes as Harriet Hudson, a pseudonym she reserves for sagas and historical fiction. Of course, many of her Amy Myers mysteries — like this one — also have historical settings. Ms. Myers has two new books coming out in the U.S. this year: Murder and the Golden Goblet (Severn House) and Tom Wasp and the Murdered Stunner (Tekno Books).
“Music, Mr. Primrose, if you please,” roared Squire Holby, and our village fiddler seized his instrument. “Parson Pennywick, lead the way.”
I obeyed all too eagerly and hastened out of the house to the lawns of Diplock Hall. It was a pretty sight that summer evening, with lamps already flickering even though it was not yet dark. The lawns were to be our dancing floor, and the scythes and rollers had clearly been busy that day to make them so smooth.
Our squire has regular Evenings of Conviviality, as he calls them, but tonight’s was of greater importance than usual. His generosity is well known in our Kentish village of Cuckoo Lees. His jovial figure brings cheer where there was gloom, he has a heart for the misfortunes of others, and his tables groan with splendid food... no wonder, for his cook is sister to my own housekeeper, my dear Dorcas.
Nevertheless, I feared that conviviality had now vanished from the evening. Despite the squire’s valiant attempt to mend fences, they were already smashed beyond hope of recovery, and I worried about what the evening might still bring.
“I’ll send a gig for you, Caleb,” the squire had said to me after matins on Sunday last, when I had hesitated over the invitation. Riding home over our uneven country paths after one of Squire’s gatherings holds little pleasure for elderly parsons of fifty years and more, especially one whose horse has grown old with him. “What?” he continued, as he saw my doubt, “Not have the parson present to hear my Evelina betrothed to young Mr. Dacres of Ten Trees? Zounds, man, unthinkable.”
For the said parson, it had also been unthinkable that the lovely Evelina might be leaving Diplock Hall and Cuckoo Lees. I had known her all her life, and the sight of her in the spring of life cheered any day. As the years pass and one’s own spring is far behind, one needs such reminders of youth. Then I had reproached myself for selfishness. Ten Trees lies but in the next parish, although it is not one of my own five benefices.
But Thomas Dacres? I had heard nothing against the young man, nor his father William, a solid enough gentleman of great wealth. But Thomas’s mother, a lady known for her kind heart, died some years ago, and when William remarried it was not wisely. It was said that riches alone had been Constance Dacres’s reason for marrying the ageing widower.
I had reluctantly agreed to attend this evening, but asked doubtfully: “Do you think the marriage will take place, Squire?”
Squire Holby came straight to the point. “That witch interferes over my dead body. William Dacres has sanctioned the match, and even she cannot gainsay that.”
“That Constance Dacres is a witch, I do not doubt,” I replied, “but only through her power over men’s baser desires.”
The squire grew purple — with rage, I then thought. “She’s an evil wanton, and there’s plenty in Cuckoo Lees who’d agree with me. But as for this marriage, it should suit her well. Her power over William will be complete when Thomas leaves Ten Trees for Weldon House.” This was a delightful but small house, he explained, on the Ten Trees estate.
“And that is Thomas’s property?”
The squire looked uneasy. “It will be on his marriage, as will a large settlement from his mother. I’ll not be able to do the same by Evelina, more’s the pity. Of course, Weldon House...”
“Yes, Squire?” I urged him when he paused. I feared there was worse to come.
There was. “My Evelina said the witch — I crave your pardon, Caleb — Mrs. Dacres would have the Widow Paxton live there to rid her from Ten Trees. The house is small, however, and would not house three.”
I was aghast. The Widow Paxton was the first Mrs. Dacres’s mother, of whom William Dacres was very fond. She is an old lady, not long for this world, and needed the comfort of Ten Trees. “But you have William’s blessing for the marriage?” I said firmly.
“I do, and—” the squire regained his usual optimistic joviality — “never fear over Constance Dacres. Who could not love my Evelina?”