Garden of Secrets Past

TWENTY-NINE


The next morning, after soaking in a hot bath for twenty minutes, Kingston felt greatly improved, though he couldn’t stop thinking about yesterday’s punishing incident. In the kitchen at eight thirty still in his pajamas, reading the Times and waiting for the toast to pop up, the doorbell rang. He padded along the hallway and opened the door, surprised to see Andrew standing there. Surprised, because Andrew was an admitted late riser known to boast that he didn’t consider dawn to be an attractive experience, unless he was already up.

“Come in,” said Kingston. With the Milton Keynes humiliation uppermost on his mind and his aching shoulder, he’d forgotten that Andrew was taking his Mini in for servicing at nine thirty and Kingston had promised to follow him to Hendon and bring him back home. After that, they were lunching at a newly opened brasserie in Richmond followed by a walk through Chiswick House and Gardens. “Would you like a cup of tea before we leave?” he asked.

“No thanks.”

“How’s your tooth, by the way?”

“It’s fine now. I need a crown, though.” Andrew was sizing up Kingston’s attire. “You hadn’t forgotten, had you?”

“No,” Kingston fibbed. “I wasn’t watching the clock. I’ll be ready in less than five minutes.”

An hour later, when they were heading back to Chelsea in Kingston’s TR4, Kingston decided it was as good a time as any to tell Andrew what had happened in Milton Keynes. He’d barely started when Andrew shook his head and interrupted. “I thought there must be another reason why you were moving like a tortoise with a hangover this morning,” he said.

Kingston chose not to answer right away but eventually continued, keeping his eyes on the road.

From then on Andrew listened silently. Save for several shakes of the head, his expression and posture showed neither surprise nor the usual exasperation. He waited for Kingston to finish before saying his piece.

“What do you expect me to say, Lawrence?”

“That it was stupid of me, that I should never have gone alone, that I should throw in the towel before it’s too late—that I never listen to a word you say?”

“I couldn’t have said it better, except I might have added that you deserved what you got and you’re damned lucky it wasn’t a hell of a lot worse.”

“You don’t have to remind me,” said Kingston, weaving through the everyone-for-himself snarl of traffic at Marble Arch.

Andrew shook his head for the umpteenth time. “I give up. A few days ago, we sat in the garden at Bourne End and agreed—if I recall correctly—that if I were to help you with this damned case, you wouldn’t go off on these trips of yours alone. You assured me that, from now on, we would work to solve it together. Either your memory is failing you, or you must have since decided that it wasn’t such a good idea after all.”

“You’re right. You’re right. I should have waited. My only excuse is that there was a sense of urgency to it—the opportunity to corner this Vanessa Carlson woman while I had the chance. Afterward, I knew I’d made a big mistake going alone. I’ve got a bruised shoulder and a painful shin to remind me.”

“Seriously,” said Andrew, “why don’t you consider giving it up? I know I sound like a cracked record, but why not turn everything over to the police and just walk away from it, go back to leading a normal life?”

Kingston glanced at Andrew and nodded. “I should take your advice, I know, but we’re so damned close to solving it.”

Andrew sighed. “There’s that ‘we’ again. If you ask me, I don’t think you really want me to help you. I’m too old for all this stuff, anyway.” He looked at Kingston, who was keeping his eyes on the Knightsbridge traffic. “And you’re way past it.”

The rest of the trip was spent mostly in silence, both knowing that further discussion about the Milton Keynes incident would serve no purpose.

* * *

The following morning, Kingston was up earlier than usual. He’d been up half the night, unable to erase from his mind the galling events of the last couple of days and driven to distraction by the Winterborne riddle. In the seven or so years that he’d been involved in criminal cases, he’d never felt so frustrated. He sat in the kitchen now, the riddle in front of him and next to it a list that he’d compiled of people’s names, places, incidents, and events mentioned in Veitch’s notes. He’d gone through the list several times but had been unable to find even the remotest connection to the riddle.

He topped up his tea—his third cup—and glanced at his watch. In seven minutes, not a second more or less, Mrs. Tripp would be at the front door and, as was his practice, he would make himself scarce for a while.

Hearing the doorbell at the appointed time, he pushed aside the papers and went to let in his ineffable and indispensable charlady. She was starting to busy herself in the kitchen, picking up his breakfast plate, asking if he’d finished with his tea, when, out of nowhere, a thought struck him.

“I’ve been trying to solve a riddle of sorts, Mrs. Tripp,” he said, picking up the two sheets of paper. “Perhaps you’d care to take a look at these. I’m trying to find a connection between the riddle and something on the list—a person, a place, an incident, anything. You may spot something I’ve overlooked.” He handed her the papers. “You know that old saying about being too close to the forest to see the trees?”

“Oh, yes, I do.” She beamed. “I’d be more than pleased to take a look. I must say I’m not very good at puzzles, though, and if you can’t solve it, I don’t know who can.”

Kingston had a last sip of lukewarm tea and took his teacup to the sink counter, leaving her to study the riddle. He thought about going to his study but had a feeling that it wouldn’t be long before she handed the papers back to him—and he was right.

“Sorry, Doctor.” She looked genuinely disappointed that she’d been unable to help. “It really is a strange riddle, isn’t it?”

Kingston sighed. “It certainly is.”

“The Walpoles? Weren’t they politicians?”

“They were, yes. Back in the eighteenth century.”

“And Thomas Gray? Would that be the poet Thomas Gray?”

“Indeed,” Kingston replied.

A brief moment of silence followed. Then, to his amazement, Mrs. Tripp gazed up at the ceiling, as if straining her memory, and started to recite Gray’s Elegy, in a voice that had a poignancy that was unfamiliar to him.

“The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea,

The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,

And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

“Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,

And all the air a solemn stillness holds…”

* * *

Her voice trailing off, she regarded Kingston with a pleased look on her face.

He was shocked momentarily by her recollection of the poem and her eloquent recital. “That was amazing. Wonderful,” he said.

“We learned it in school,” she said. “Didn’t you?”

“I did—I suppose we all did back then—but I certainly can’t remember it like you. Can you recite the entire poem?”

Now she looked bashful, as if she wished she hadn’t got carried away. “I don’t think so. It’s awfully long, you know. It is lovely, though. For me it’s still the most beautiful poem ever written.”

“I would have to agree.”

“Did you ever visit Stoke Poges?”

“I should have, but living in Scotland most of my life, I never had the opportunity.”

“It was written in the churchyard there. He lived in the village—”

Kingston held up his spread hands, as if to say Stop.

A few seconds of silence passed, while Kingston was frozen in thought and Mrs. Tripp looked most bewildered.

Then, slowly, Kingston moved his hands up to clasp his head on either side, and a smile spread across his face.

“Mrs. Tripp, I do believe you’ve done it,” he said, now clearly elated.

“Done what?”

“Solved the riddle.”

She regarded him, a blank expression on her face. “I did?” she said.

“I’m almost certain. What’s the title of the poem?”

She frowned and looked at him as if to say What kind of question is that?

“The title?” he said.

“Why, it’s Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.”

He was about to hug Mrs. Tripp but thought better of it; she might think he’d lost his mind. Instead he gave her a huge smile and said, “You’re brilliant, Mrs. Tripp.” He knew that would embarrass her, which it did.

“I believe,” he continued, “I’m almost sure, in fact, that the churchyard mentioned in the riddle is not really a physical churchyard at all. It refers to the poem. ‘Sealed in Gray’s poem’—that’s what it means.”

“Well, goodness me,” said Mrs. Tripp, beaming. “I’m glad I was of help.”

“You don’t know just how much.” He was about to say that it would mean a nice raise, when he bit his lip. He would give her a generous bonus, he decided, if it turned out that he was right.