Free The Shadow Cabinet by W. T. Tyler Page B

flattered by Donlon’s guess that she kept horses, she was naive enough for anything. The menu specialties were hand-lettered in a flowery, amateurish script, some in French, and the improvised handicraft made him suspicious. “This is your neck of the woods,” he said. “What do you recommend?”
    â€œSomething quick.”
    Wilson put the menu aside. “What’s McVey want to talk to me about?”
    â€œDiscuss some problems,” Donlon said vaguely. “He’s been in bed with phlebitis; no visitors, no small talk. That means he’s pumped up. He just bought some professor’s library from Johns Hopkins and has been reading his way through it, the poor bastard. He gets goddamned lonely. When I talked to him on the phone, he wouldn’t let go.” Donlon looked up as the waitress put the drinks on the table. “What’d the cook get his degree in?” Donlon asked.
    â€œThe cook? I’m not sure. Why?”
    He handed her the menu. “When in doubt, take the familiar. I’ll have the corned beef sandwich.”
    â€œYou don’t trust us,” she said.
    â€œMake mine roast beef,” Wilson said.
    â€œHe’s English,” Donlon explained.
    â€œAnd you’re Irish, I suppose.” She took back the menus with a smile and strolled away, this time more slowly.
    â€œShe’s not bad at all,” Donlon said, watching her hips as Wilson studied the worm holes in the old pine, trying to decide whether they were made by an auger or a Civil War beetle. He drank his martini in silence. Donlon waited expectantly.
    â€œWhat’s wrong with Appaloosas?” she asked as she brought the plates, not waiting for Donlon’s opening sally.
    â€œNothing, except you don’t quite look the type. Someone tried to interest me once.”
    â€œBut didn’t.” She was bolder now, her shoulders back as she arranged the plates.
    â€œIt’s not much fun,” Donlon said. “You spend your weekends being dragged around at the end of a horse trailer.”
    â€œI’m afraid so.”
    â€œMy pastures are empty,” Donlon said shamelessly. Wilson found himself trying to read the legend on a sporting print half a room away.
    She laughed. “Really? That’s a shame? Where?”
    â€œThe valley of the Shenandoah,” Donlon said sadly, as if it were a refrain from a Confederate campfire song. Donlon had a two-hundred-acre farm in the valley with an old prebellum house he and Jane had been restoring, but he hadn’t been there since the death of his only son, Brian, over a year ago. Wilson was the only one who visited the place. “The high shoe country,” Donlon continued. “Do you know Yeats?”
    â€œA little,” she replied, surprised.
    â€œâ€˜Huntsman Rody, blow the horn,’” he said in a Gaelic lilt. “‘Make the hills reply.’ But Rody couldn’t blow his horn, only weep and sigh.” Smiling mysteriously, he drank from his glass while the waitress watched. The two women in flower club hats were studying them. Wilson felt like crawling under the table. “Do you know it?” Donlon asked. “‘The Ballad of the Foxhunter’?”
    â€œNo, but it sounds very sad.”
    â€œIt is. How about another drink, Haven?”
    â€œNo, thanks, one’s enough. For both of us.”
    Looking sadly at Wilson, Donlon said, “‘The blind hound with a mournful din Lifts slow his wintry head.’” Then, to the waitress: “He says no. Sorry; maybe next time.”
    They finished their lunch. The young woman returned and stood talking with Donlon for a few minutes. Her name was Nancy.
    â€œYou never quit, do you,” Wilson said as they crossed the street to the car. The day had grown darker and the wind was sharp against their faces.
    â€œIf I quit I’d be dead. Anyway, she wasn’t bad.”
    It was always the same