Free A Letter of Mary by Laurie R. King

destroy them out of discretion, and so disappears the most beautiful, the most immediate breath of life, irrecoverably for ourselves and for others.

    — Goethe

    EIGHT

    theta

    Saturday morning dawned clear, but I did not witness it. Long hours later, the growing strength of the light outside penetrated even the north-facing room I was in and tugged at my brain, and I began to crawl towards consciousness. I rolled over to greet the occupant of the other side of the bed and nearly fell out onto the floor. Holmes was missing. This in itself was not unusual, but that the other half of the bed seemed to be missing as well woke me. I raised myself up on my elbows and surveyed the room.

    For a moment, my surroundings fell on a blank mind. This was my old room, the north garret room in the house dominated by my aunt, my only refuge from her presence. This was my old narrow bed. Why was I here? Where was Holmes?

    Holmes. Beds. Gutted mattresses. Upturned bookshelves and Dorothy Ruskin. I flung back the bedclothes and found my watch. Nearly eight o'clock! Ignoring yesterday's unsuitable clothes, I pulled old friends from drawers and wardrobe, jabbed pins into my hair, and ran downstairs, to find Patrick frying bacon on the old black cookstove.

    "Good morning, Miss Mary," he said, using his name for me since I was fifteen. "I drove Mr Holmes over to the cottage at first light. He asked would you please take some hot coffee when you go, and my camera. The thermos bottle is on the table," he added. "I'm just making you some bacon sandwiches, and Tillie boiled up some eggs before she left. Give me a ring if you need anything else," he shouted after me.

    If anything, the cottage looked worse by light of day. Holmes had used his hours well, though, and when I came in, I found various chalk marks on the floor and walls in preparation for the police photographer. I greeted him with a greasy sandwich, and we found two relatively undamaged chairs.

    "Has Lestrade rung yet?" I asked.

    "He should be here in an hour or thereabouts. They received another telephone call, from one of Miss Ruskin's friends at the British Museum who had seen the police notice, but Lestrade agreed to keep the case in his hands until he'd seen me."

    "He'll hold back from notifying the sister?"

    "He was unhappy and sceptical, but he said he would not give it to Cambridgeshire until he'd seen the body and heard what I had to say."

    The body. Life achieving a distance from the ugly fact of violent death. The thought must have shown on my face.

    "Best to keep the mind clear, Russell. Emotion can confuse matters all too easily."

    "I know." I pushed it away and waved my sandwich at the room. "How could Lestrade be sceptical with this?"

    "Unfortunately, it looks like simple burglary with a touch of vandalism thrown in."

    "Burglary? Oh God, what did they take? Not your violin? And the safe?" The violin was a Stradivarius, bought ages before from an ignorant junkman at a ridiculously low price. The safe, well hidden, held a number of small valuables and appallingly toxic substances.

    "No, the violin they took from its case and threw down, before ripping out the lining of the case. A scratch is all. They missed the safe. They did get your mother's silver, Mrs Hudson's jewellery, and some treasury notes that were in a drawer. Fortunately, the vandalism was not too vicious, mostly throwing things about."

    I brushed off the crumbs and swallowed the last of my coffee from a cracked cup.

    "To work, then. Shall I take a few photographs before I start putting things away?"

    "Lestrade might appreciate it. You'll have to give them to him to develop, though. Not much has survived of the darkroom."

    Seventy-five minutes later, I had restored a quarter of the books to their places, dragged two disembowelled chairs out into the garden, nailed up a piece of wood across the broken kitchen window, and was starting on the baseboards when the inspector's car drove up.

    "Where do