by Evelyn James
“I see a good heart and a kind soul,” Tommy said softly from the doorway.
Annie and Clara both turned towards him.
“That necklace is damn awful,” Tommy continued. “I was going to take it back, that’s why I shoved it in the sock drawer. It wasn’t what I wanted to buy you at all. What I really wanted to buy you, was this.”
Tommy presented his hand with a cube-shaped velvet box perched on his palm. Annie’s eyes widened. Tommy stepped towards her and sank down on one knee.
“Annie, you are the only woman I want in my life, excluding Clara, of course,” Tommy said.
“I’m just your sister, I don’t count,” Clara grinned, taking a pace back to give them room.
“Annie, I would be deeply honoured if you would marry me,” Tommy opened the box and a diamond ring sat in the cushioned interior. “Unless, that is, you still think I am interested in that terrible Holbein woman.”
Clara kicked him lightly with her foot.
“Don’t spoil it!” She scolded him.
Annie had put her hands to her face and looked like she might faint. After a moment she took a ragged breath through her clenched teeth.
“Oh!” She groaned.
“That isn’t precisely a yes,” Tommy said. “Also, my legs aren’t entirely happy with me kneeling like this. If you could perhaps come to a decision.”
Annie snapped out of her astonishment.
“Get up you silly man,” she grabbed his arm and helped him lever his legs back to straight. “Of course, I will marry you!”
She kissed him on the cheek and Clara cheered. Tommy took the engagement ring from the box and slipped it onto Annie’s finger. It was a dainty, pretty thing, not elaborate but all the more delightful for its understatement. Annie sighed as she looked at it, then she turned to Clara and popped up onto her toes.
“I’m engaged!” She cried.
Clara laughed and hugged her. Then she grabbed Tommy and hugged him too, smiling and crying all at the same time.
“What would I do without you two?” she said, wiping away a tear.
“Life would be a lot simpler,” Tommy teased.
Clara shoved him.
“I don’t need simple,” she declared.
~~~*~~~
The exhibition left Brighton on schedule. The Earl of Rendham was satisfied, though he probably would be less pleased when he read the article Gilbert was working on concerning his ‘new’ fossil discovery. Gilbert was digging deep into the Earl’s archaeopteryx and from what little he had been prepared to tell Clara, it seemed he had come across some disturbing information about the supposedly genuine find. Gilbert thought he was onto something big. Clara was happy to let him deal with the matter. At the end of the day, she had solved the murder and that was that.
Clara watched the lorry that transported the exhibits being loaded from across the road. She saw Wallace Sunderland leading the packing. She had not told anyone about the letters he had written, but upon the understanding that he would desist. She did not feel like losing him his job, not when the Earl was really behind the threats. She had passed all that information to Gilbert too, to do with as he wished.
Then there was Dr Browning. The doctors wanted him to rest, but his life revolved around the fossils in the exhibition and he refused to abandon them. He had discharged himself from the hospital just so he could leave town with the exhibits. Clara watched the weary old man, hunched up over a walking stick as he supervised the loading of the lorry. From time to time he coughed hard and pressed a hand to his chest. Clara did not think he was long for this world. Perhaps, after all, some sort of justice was catching up with him. She did not know if he was a murderer, but it played on her mind that he might be, that she might have been fooled by his façade of homely innocence.
Clara liked to think she had good instincts for people, but in this instance she felt uncertain. Had she been in the presence of a cold-blooded killer and never even realised it? Worse, had she felt sorry for a killer?
Not that it was an excuse for Sam Gutenberg’s actions. It was just a consideration. Sam would hang for killing John Morley, while the possible killer of his father continued to walk free. Though Clara felt the Grim Reaper already had his hand on his shoulder and Dr Browning would soon be facing the only justice they could all expect one day. Death was the great equaliser, as it was said.
Clara turned and walked away. She could not solve an old murder that happened in Germany, but she had solved the riddle of John Morley’s death. That would not bring peace to Ruby, who was lying at death’s door in her brother’s house, but it did mean Harry Beasley was truly free from suspicion. Crazy to think that all this trouble had been sparked by a lot of stones. Who knew that an ancient bird could be the source of so much mischief and heartache? It was truly remarkable what people would kill over. As Clara set off her home, she mused that humanity was truly a complicated creature – the only beings on the planet who would kill over a fossil that had been in the ground millions of years.
Utterly astounding, yet also utterly alarming.
