I turned to follow Thumper, who had now reached the woods and was looking back at me. The cornerstone of my wild flight of fancy was what Lord Belfrey had told me. And how much were his impressions to be relied upon? He was a young man at the time, not overly fond of his much older cousin, perhaps determinedly eager to condemn the marriage. To base so much on one glimpse of Eleanor, halfway up a staircase at that, had to be implausible. Wasn’t it clear that his lordship was obsessed with her memory, and that he-rather than Giles-had been driven mad by desire, in his case for an illusion that had transferred itself to a portrait and possibly to me? I wished I could talk my thoughts over with Mrs. Malloy, but that was out of the question at this time.
I caught up with Thumper as he was nosing around some nettles on the edge of the ravine. “Be careful,” I warned, “you’ll come out in blisters.” He gave me a tender look, took a couple of steps toward me, then turned tail to plunge into the brush. A succession of barks indicated his wish that I follow him, but I had no desire to descend a treacherous slope, especially when the opening he had used was too narrow for me to get through without gashing myself or twisting an ankle.
Some barking, then silence. I stood waiting, rubbing my arms-the breeze had picked up and the clouds had thickened, making for fewer, smaller patches of blue. But was that what had made me shiver? I felt the prickling of the skin, the cold stealth of fingers down my spine that accompanies that sense of being watched from a hidden vantage point by someone… or something… exuding menace. Eleanor’s ghost? But even if that were credible, why would she have it in for me? An answer formed. A ridiculous one. Lord Belfrey might have fallen in love at first sight, but to believe that Eleanor had been struck by the same bolt of lightning, dazzled by the same stardust, swept up in the same whirlwind of wonderment, was a stretch even for me. Then, if not Eleanor, who? Something shifted, a soft settling sound… a foot replacing itself after slipping? Why didn’t I call out, requesting the watcher identify himself? Because common sense (not all that common in my case) said there was no one at Mucklesfeld who would wish me harm. It could be a trespassing fauna hunter or, even more likely, a rabbit or squirrel.
I heard Thumper coming back, and following the sound of his greeting I came to the wide gap in the wall, responsible presumably for last evening’s tragedy. I had a brief, sharp glimpse of a broad track of flattened branches and brambles before he came lolloping along with a bunch of multicolored flowers in his mouth. Oh, my goodness! I thought, as he sat down in front of me with the look of proffering his heart along with the bouquet. They’d be the ones Tommy placed in remembrance! An irreverent part of me wanted to laugh. Nerves, of course. It suddenly occurred to me that I could be seen by those gathered on the drive, but when I looked around what I saw was a swarm of backs, the movement, including equipment, being toward the house. Evidently the arrival scene had been completed without a hitch.
“Naughty boy!” I scolded with less heat than required, because I hated to see the sorrow fill his eyes. “Take them back this minute.” I didn’t expect him to do as told. The thought of descending to the place where Suzanne had met her death, seeing the tree the car had hit, was not pleasant, but it would be unkind not to return the flowers, leaving them in a mangled heap for Tommy to come across. He had been nice to me, cured my headache; and with chubby schoolboy gallantry he had saved Livonia from the clutches of the Metal Knight. I hesitated. Again that intense feeling of being covertly watched. Thumper also hesitated, before turning and to my amazement wending his way back down into the ravine, to return brief moments later absent the flowers.
“Wonderful boy,” I praised while bending to knot Lord Belfrey’s tie, which I had forgotten I was holding around his collar, before setting off down the drive, there being no reason now not to use it to reach the road. We had just passed through the gates when I realized he still had something in his mouth. Inserting fingers and gently prying his teeth apart, I pulled out something flat, irregularly shaped, and about two inches in size. On closer inspection this proved to be a piece of broken-off plastic. “Very nice,” I told a pleased Thumper. “I’ll keep it as a souvenir of you.” I’d do nothing of the sort, of course, but to have tossed it aside would have been hurtful to his feelings, even if my parents hadn’t brought me up to believe that littering was a deadly sin, worse than any of the others, although they could never recall what they were.
Thumper took amicably to the tie as we proceeded down the road bounded on our near side by Mucklesfeld’s wall and by more woods on the other. It was a good-sized road with a crossing a short way down, but very little traffic. We came to a Norman church surrounded by an iron-fenced cemetery. It reminded me of St. Anselm’s, which Ben and I attend fairly frequently (meaning if we don’t oversleep or decide that a leisurely breakfast in bed would be nice). We passed nobody during the five or so minutes it took us to reach the village. Grimkirk looked to be more pleasant than its name. There was the familiar juxtaposing of half-timbered Tudor buildings, with sharply peaked roofs and narrow latticed windows, converted into boutiques and bakeries, and the modern wide-glass-fronted shops, banks, and electrical appliance showrooms. All of which make up the usual English high street. After crossing at the only traffic light in sight, I stopped a middle-aged woman in a head scarf and winter coat. A mistake. She had that blind, bustling stare of the morning shopper who is adding sausages and that nice sharp Cheddar-and mustn’t forget the vinegar-to her shopping list. Understandably startled, she asked me to repeat my question.
“You don’t happen to recognize this dog?”
“What dog?”
“This one,” pointing down.
“No.” Remembering the pork pie to have on hand in the fridge, in case the son and his wife showed up unannounced like they often did at teatime. “Why?”
“He’s a stray and I’m trying to return him.”
A smile appeared. “Well, isn’t that kind of you! Wish I could help you, dearie. Always been fond of animals, I have, but can’t have a dog or a cat because our Ted’s allergic. Why don’t you ask at the sweetshop, two doors along? One of the girls that work there might know something to help you.”
I took her advice, and feeling I couldn’t leave Thumper outside, took him in with me. The woman behind the counter, with the rows of large, enticingly filled glass jars on the shelves behind her, hadn’t been a girl in a very long time. But her ornately piled and puffed white hair, stuck through here and there with sparkly topped pins, the heavy makeup, and the exceedingly tight black top made clear that she was still vigorously fighting the battle against Time.
Had there been other customers, she might not have immediately noticed Thumper, sitting like an obedience champion.