The Skeleton Garden

by Marty Wingate

  “As long as you can do it on your own time,” Pru said to her nephew as she limbed up a strawberry tree in one corner, “because we need you in the garden during the day.” Orlando had pestered her for the last hour about a website for the gardens at Greenoak, thinking—rightly—that she was a softer touch than Simon. “Do we need to give you plant lists or something?”

  “Simon lent me his journals,” Orlando said. “I’m working from those.”

  Simon’s notebooks were barely legible. “You’ll let us see what you’ve done before anyone else does, won’t you?”

  “If you think that’s really necessary.” He nudged a bundle of gray sticks with the toe of his trainer. “Is that plant dead?”

  “Yes, it is necessary,” Pru replied, “and no, it isn’t dead. That’s what lavender looks like in winter.”

  They put away their tools at lunch, and emerged from the potting shed as Martin arrived. Orlando made a beeline for the kitchen, Evelyn’s platter of sandwiches serving as a homing device, but Pru stayed behind and greeted the detective sergeant, who appeared entirely too chipper for someone who’d just got in hot water over poor job performance.

  “Hello, Martin. Were you in to the station this morning?”

  “The station? No, haven’t quite made it there. I’ve had my hands full,” he said, sticking them in his pockets as he spoke.

  “So, you haven’t seen Christopher?”

  “Oh, that’s right, now I remember—he did want to talk. Is he here?” Martin asked, glancing round the yard as if Christopher might materialize on the spot.

  “No, he’s at the station,” she said as they reached the mudroom door. Pru didn’t want to think about Christopher’s mood after spending half the day sitting at a desk waiting. This was police business, not her own, and so she changed the subject. “Have you heard we identified the body—the skeleton? At least, as good as—it’s Will Donovan—a pilot who’d been recuperating in the village from war wounds.” She’d decided to keep quiet about Will being Evelyn’s father—that was, after all, Evelyn’s news.

  Martin took off his coat and draped it over a chair. “I did hear that was a possibility, but I hadn’t realized the identification had been confirmed.”

  Confirmed by nephew, she thought. “Well, of course, the paperwork…” She jumped ship onto a more stable vessel. “Tell me, Martin, how did you arrange the plaque for your dad in church? Only I thought that we might put one up for Will—he was a war hero.”

  “But he wasn’t even from around here, was he? It doesn’t seem appropriate, does it?” he asked. “A plaque to Will Donovan in Ratley?”

  Evelyn pushed open the door from the hall in time to hear the last few words. “Is there to be a memorial for Will?” Her cheeks blossomed pink and her dimples floated to the surface. “Wouldn’t my ma have loved to know that.”

  “Martin was saying he wasn’t sure if we should,” Pru said. “But really, it would be good to give him an ending—not everyone gets that. To be remembered.”

  Martin blushed. “I only thought that, because he had no family here, it wouldn’t matter.”

  Pru smiled at Evelyn who smiled back. “It might matter a great deal,” she said. “Did you know that Evelyn’s mum, Sadie, and Will were sweethearts?”

  “I’ve a snap of them, Martin,” Evelyn said. “Did you see it?”

  “I did, yeah,” Martin said.

  “Your dad and Will must’ve known each other,” Pru said, irritated at Martin’s wan reaction to what she thought was a really good story.

  Martin moved over to the far side of the table and inspected the back of a chair, picking out one thread of the conversation. “I remember Sadie, of course. Still working in the Blackbird when we moved here.”

  Evelyn had paused with a spreading knife in her hand, slices of bread laid out on the table like a checkerboard. She gazed out the window over the sink and said, “Do you know what I’ve been thinking? Why was Jack here so late that evening? At Greenoak, I mean, and just there in the parterre lawn where you found Will. Do you think he knew it was Will?” She shook the pensive look from her face. “But how could he have known that?”

  Pru steered away from talking about the investigation of Jack’s death—and Martin’s ineptitude therein. “Will’s story may be history, but that doesn’t mean we should let it lie. I’m going to ask a few questions. Now that everyone’s been thinking about the war, someone may remember more about him. I know it isn’t part of your investigation, Martin”—and it wouldn’t matter if it was, she thought—“but I’m certainly going to have a nose round.”

  Orlando tumbled through the swing door, drying his hands on his trousers, and said, “Right, Evelyn, all washed up.” The cook nodded him down into a chair as she cut the sandwiches. Pru stepped behind Orlando to get the plates, and Martin found himself wedged between her and Evelyn, until he performed a two-step around the cook, circumnavigating the table and coming out on the other side. He reached for his coat.

  “Will you stay to lunch?” Evelyn asked.

  “Yes, Martin, stay to lunch.”

  All heads swiveled to the mudroom. Christopher had slipped in unheard and stood with the light behind him, like a standing stone, still and solid. His tone, a calm veneer over ice, gave even Pru the shivers.

  Martin’s face drained of all color. “Christopher. I’m to…that is to say, I’m glad you’re here.” His voice cracked. The nerve of him, Pru thought. Who should’ve been where? Christopher’s face was impassive. Martin cleared his throat and continued with energy, but Pru could see beads of sweat on his upper lip. “I’m sorry I haven’t made it in to see you yet today, but I’ve had to track down a few details.” His voice dropped, as if to exclude the other three in the kitchen. “I’ve information we need—I can brief you on it this afternoon.”

  Christopher took off his coat, hung it on a peg, and said, “There’s no reason you shouldn’t stop for a sandwich, Martin. We can talk later. Evelyn, there’s enough for us all?”

  “Chicken and ham or cheese and onion. Sit down, now, the lot of you,” Evelyn said. “I’ll put the kettle on.”

  Martin raced to the end of his sandwich while everyone else—especially Christopher, uncharacteristically loquacious—told stories and jokes and talked about Christmas. Pru thought that it might have at last occurred to Martin that he could be in for a tongue-lashing.

  —

  Simon arrived late to lunch, and after a quick bite, took Orlando off to instruct him in the fine art of planting a shrub. Christopher let Martin have a head start back to the station, and the DS took it, apologizing again before he left.

  “I’m to help sort out the church hall for the fête,” Pru told Christopher, walking him to his car. “Assign the vendor stalls, set up the tea table, test the tombola, get the sign-up sheets ready for the competitions. We’ve a great deal to do before tomorrow.” She kissed him. “First it was Simon, then Peachey. Who will Martin be pointing the finger at now?”

  Christopher played with the car key. “He’d better have something solid.”

  —

  After he left, Pru went upstairs to change from her garden clothes. When she walked back into the kitchen, Evelyn stood studying the table laid with flour, butter, sugar, eggs, and spices and offered only a nod of acknowledgment.

  Pru took her coat and left, finding Polly in the yard, her arms brimming with a quilted garment bag. She stood quite still, staring at the potting shed.

  “Polly?”

  Polly turned her head toward Pru, but her eyes lingered on the shed. “I can see Jack,” she said in a dreamy sort of way that chilled Pru’s blood. “I can just see him standing in the doorway there.”

  Pru’s eyes flitted to the potting shed and its empty door. “You mean now? You can see him right now?” she whispered.

  Her sister-in-law gave Pru her full attention. “Not see, I suppose. But I felt his presence so strong for a moment.” She smiled. “Not to worry, I don’t believe you’re b
eing haunted.”

  Pru thought that if Polly were going to see Jack at Greenoak, it would be in the parterre lawn, where he died. Then she remembered. “He came by,” she said, rubbing her arms to return the warmth to her veins. “Jack came by the Saturday we were cleaning out the shed. He stood inside and we talked. I probably told you that.”

  Polly looked back at the shed. “Perhaps you did.”

  A glitter caught Pru’s eye, and she took Polly’s hand to get a better look at what she wore—a sizable square-cut diamond in a white gold filigree setting. “Wow. Is this Birdie’s? I loved the earrings—thanks for thinking of me.”

  “We deserve a bit of a splash, don’t we?” Polly said, admiring the ring. “Now, about Birdie’s dresses. I’m afraid it isn’t good news for us. You remember how thin Birdie was? Well, when she was young, she was like a rail, size naught, I’d say. I couldn’t get her dresses over my hips.”

  Right, Pru thought, she would go to the dance dressed as a gardener. “Then, what have you got there?” she asked, nodding to the bundle.

  Polly’s eyes shone, and she squeezed the garment bag. “All is not lost. Come on, I’ll show you.” They made their way through the kitchen—Evelyn, her head buried deep in a pantry shelf and talking to herself, paid them no heed—and up the stairs. “I stopped at Kitty’s,” Polly continued, “because I thought if anyone could wear one of Birdie’s dresses, it would be young Jemima. Kitty and I got to talking, and next thing you know, Jemima and I are up in the attic pulling down an old trunk.”

  Pru closed the bedroom door as Polly unzipped the bag and drew out her treasures—two dresses made of a rustly fabric, one green, one navy blue. Pru held up the blue frock; it had pearly buttons and a generous skirt. “My God,” Pru said, “these are Kitty’s? Are they silk?”

  “They were Kitty’s mum’s—and yes, silk tea dresses.” She rubbed the fabric between her fingers and said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “They’re made from a German parachute—can you believe it? Kitty doesn’t remember how her mother got hold of it, but she does recall her mum dyeing the fabric and sewing the dresses. Make do and mend, they said during the war—she made do quite well, I’d say.”

  They stripped and tried on the dresses, Pru the blue one, and Polly the green.

  Pru twirled in front of the mirror. The skirt wasn’t completely full, but it did have a good swing to it.

  “Kitty’s mum was more generous with the fabric than was usual,” Polly said. “Scrimping was a way of life during the war, but when you have the luxury of an entire parachute at your fingertips, I suppose you need to take advantage of it.”

  “Anything else in that attic treasure chest of Kitty’s?”

  Polly pushed her glasses up with the back of her hand. “She’s found something for Evelyn—not a dress. Something she wants to give her in person.”

  —

  After Polly left, Pru spent a few minutes looking through a box and found a pair of Mrs. Wilson’s shoes. They had thick heels that were probably on the matronly side, but would serve their purpose. On the way to the kitchen, Pru hummed a big-band tune from the ’40s to get herself in the mood. “Ev, I’ll be at the church hall to…”

  Evelyn was buttoning up her coat; several full shopping bags were on the table in addition to the pensioners’ meals.

  “Are you off already?” Pru asked.

  “Albert will make early deliveries to the pensioners,” Evelyn said, “and I’ll be back later for my own baking. Right now, I’m off to Kitty’s. The doctor told her not to stir about for a few days, and she was going to withdraw from the cake competition.” Evelyn thrust her chin in the air. “I won’t let it happen, so I’m going to lend a hand.”

  Chapter 37

  Pru walked to the church hall—down the lane past Kitty’s to the gap in the hedge just before Stan’s farmhouse, the footpath across the field, and out onto the road. She turned right and headed up to the already-bustling church hall, just past the Blackbird, and spent a couple of hours at it—setting out teacups and saucers, pricing prints from a local artist, and shifting the weavers’ looms. At last, everyone took a collective deep breath and exhaled. Christmas fête sorted.

  On her way back, she stopped in the pub and was met with the familiar and comforting scents of wood, polish, beer, and—something new—an undertone of mothballs. War memories had been made manifest and were now laid out on the tables running along the front wall—photos, billeting orders for evacuees, ration books, a dented kettle, and pieces of old uniforms. Ursula Whycher stood at the end of the display, carefully adjusting the sleeves of a brown jacket that had a badge sewn onto its pocket. Pru felt as if she’d walked into a scrapbook.

  “Ma’s been at it for days,” Dick said in response to Pru’s whistle of amazement. “She’s a dab hand at decorating.”

  Ursula looked over her shoulder and smiled, high color on her cheeks that made an eye-popping contrast to her tangerine hair. “This brings back such memories from when I was young. We had an air station near us in Norfolk, and I remember those boys in their uniforms.”

  “It’s fantastic, Ursula,” Pru said.

  The barman smiled broadly and nodded toward a clip on one of the pump handles. “You can see we’re ready here at the bar, too. Just put this on an hour ago.”

  Pru admired the new addition to the beers on tap. “Spitfire—there’s a proper bitter, Dick. I’ll have a half.” Dick pulled her half pint, and Pru settled on a stool. “Is all this from the cellars?” she asked, nodding to the tables of memorabilia. “I don’t remember seeing that much.”

  “Mostly it’s from folks in the village trolling their attics.”

  “We’ve nothing from Stan,” Ursula said, rearranging three photos until she was satisfied. “I didn’t want to push him, caught up as he is with Jack and all.”

  “So you haven’t been poking around in the cellars yourself, Dick?” Pru asked.

  Dick picked up a bar towel and began polishing a brass handle. “I didn’t need to—you and Polly and Jack did a fine job of it. Martin wanted to help out, too. He’d heard about you discovering that other room, and so I let him down a couple of days later—he came round during my dinner break. It was that evening…when Jack died.”

  “Martin didn’t seem that interested in the war to me,” Pru said.

  “I think it stirred up memories of his dad, and he was thinking about how it was when Jimmy was still alive.”

  —

  Pru crossed the field on her way home and came out of the gap in the hedge and into the lane. She’d seen little of Stan lately, and here was his farmhouse, so she turned away from Greenoak and walked into the yard, bare but for a few pieces of farm equipment and one leafless rose bush near the door that held on to a spray of fat red hips.

  “Hello, Stan,” Pru said when he came to the door, “I’m not bothering you, am I? Just thought I’d stop and say hello.”

  “You’re welcome, Pru,” Stan said, standing back for her to enter. “I’ve let the lads finish in the barn and come in early to get my account books ready for Polly. Come through now.”

  Stan’s farmhouse was larger than Kitty’s cottage, but inside it appeared as if he inhabited only a couple of rooms. She followed him down the hall, passing several closed doors and walking on a carpet runner that displayed bright red and blue tapestry at the edges, but was worn to threads in the center. Stan’s kitchen looked a relic of the 1940s—a wooden dresser with an open plate rack, tiled countertop, a twin of the dented kettle in the Blackbird’s exhibit. The microwave and collection of plastic containers—stacked and ready to return to Evelyn—were the only modern touches. The wooden chair Pru sat in squeaked and swayed slightly.

  “How are you, Stan?” she asked, accepting a cup of tea and reaching for a chocolate digestive.

  He nodded a reply. “I knew he wouldn’t be with us much longer, and that was hard enough to take. But why this? And why are there no answers? I’ve heard nothing from Martin.” Stan stared int
o his tea.

  This, she thought hotly, this was the human face of Martin’s shoddy police work. “Christopher’s taken over the investigation,” Pru said. “He’ll find out.”

  “Has he? Well, that’s good.” He patted her hand. “How did you find yourself at this end of the lane today?”

  “Just on my way home from getting ready for tomorrow. You should see the war mementos Ursula has set out at the Blackbird. You didn’t have anything yourself to lend for the display?”

  Stan took another biscuit and dunked it in his tea. “I hadn’t had time to think about it. But I wonder now, if Ursula put out those papers of Jack’s.”

  Pru thought of the pub tables crowded with memories. “What did Jack have?”

  Stan tapped the uneaten half of his biscuit on the edge of the saucer. “I don’t really know, just something he came across about the war. I got the idea Jack was holding them for someone else.” He set down the biscuit to gesture with both hands. “There was a packet of them and they were all folded up like a letter. We were talking about them the evening before he died. I thought perhaps he’d lent them to Dick or Ursula to put out.”

  “Well, she didn’t mention it, but I’ll take another look.”

  “Martin knew about them. He was quite keen to see them—said it’s important to know everything about Jack’s last days. But I don’t know where they are.”

  They were quiet for a moment, except for the crunching of biscuits. “Stan, did you hear about Will Donovan?”

  “Kitty told me—can you warrant it, that he’d be found here after all this time?”

  “Do you remember him?”

  “I do—although the place was swarming with soldiers during the war, what with the airfield down the way. But I remember he had some time on his hands, recovering from a wound, and when I saw him I’d badger him about his plane and flying. He didn’t seem to mind. After a few months, he was gone. No one had a good thing to say about him after that. Except Sadie. She’d take the head off anyone who said Will had deserted. Easy to see why when Evelyn came along. Oh, and Jimmy—there’s another one who wouldn’t say a bad word about Will. It was Kitty’s dad, Len Wheeler, who couldn’t stop talking up Will for being a coward.”