And it’s sirens the police seem set on condemning. Two have already suffered in the wake of Connor’s death. I meet Jude’s gaze and hold it. “They’re worth a look.”
He gives me the slightest nod in return. “Very well.”
My mother turns back to us. She raises her eyebrows, and I say, “I’ve invited Jude over, if that’s all right. We’re going to have a look through Da’s trunk.”
For a moment she regards me, dark eyes searching my face. I can’t tell what she’s thinking, and the obscurity needles me to the point of frustration. But when she glances at Jude, it’s with a smile. “You know you’re always welcome, Mr. Osric.”
Jude inclines his head, cheeks pink. In that instant he is once again the little boy who planted flowers alongside me in our garden, rolled marbles across our kitchen floor. He and my mother maintain a stream of small talk as we head for home. I let their conversation wash over me, distracted as I realize this marks Jude’s first real visit since the day of my father’s funeral. We pass a cluster of trees, and the shingled roof comes into view, then green shutters, spotless white siding. My mother opens the door, and we move into the entryway.
Jude hangs his wool coat and cap on one of the wall hooks. The line of fabric against our wallpaper is quite the picture, Jude’s coat hanging like it belongs there.
My mother disappears into the kitchen, and I lead Jude down the hall, into the drawing room. It’s crowded with furniture: a threadbare sofa and odd chairs, end tables and a dusty old piano. Paintings cover the walls, and a hooked rug obscures the hardwood floor. Jude looks about the space as though it’s new to him—or like he’s trying to find some difference made in the years of his absence—but it’s the same as it always was.
It’s peculiar to think he must have as many memories here as I do in the lighthouse.
My father’s books are kept in a large trunk tucked between the wall and the writing desk. A stamped plaque bears his name: GAVIN ALEXANDER. It’s held together with brass fittings, and I pry up the heavy clasp, lifting the lid back.
Large leather-bound volumes take up most of the space inside, journals and loose bits of paper crammed in the gaps. Jude settles himself on the rug as I start pulling out volumes. Taking the topmost one off the pile, he cracks it open. “Going to take a while to sort through all this,” he says. “What exactly are we looking for?”
I sit back. Numerous parts of this murder don’t make sense to me, but the false blame makes the least of all. The killer could’ve disposed of Connor’s body out at sea, buried him in the remote north of the island. Instead, they orchestrated the whole thing to mirror siren kills.
“They wanted him found.” I look to Jude. “Perhaps it’s not important who was killed but that someone was. The killer could’ve framed the sirens to undermine the ban. It’s likely that same person gave Russell those cans of poison. They may want the Council to crack down on the siren population again.”
Jude swallows. His gaze falls back on the book in his hands. “That’s awful, Moira.” He says it like I didn’t know it was.
“It’s murder,” I reply. “What did you think it would be?”
Jude doesn’t meet my eye. He flips through thick, yellowing pages, but his mind seems elsewhere. “That night in the pub,” he begins, “I said… I told them you thought Connor was murdered. Just not murdered by me.”
I press my fingertips to my father’s trunk. I can hear the blood rushing in my ears. “Did you, now?” I say, voice low.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “I wasn’t in my right mind.”
Gabriel Flint could’ve followed us from the pub that night. I’d seen Warren Knox there as well. I mention this to Jude and watch his brows knit together.
“I don’t know, Moira,” he says finally. “Part of me doesn’t even want to picture it.”
“Would you rather it be someone else?”
“That’s not what I meant.”
Lowering my gaze, I pick at a worn thread on the rug. “Eve mentioned another thing.” I look up to meet his eye. “She said Connor wished to speak with you. Did he…?” I falter. “Did he come by the lighthouse?”
A long pause stretches out between us. After what seems like an age, Jude turns over my words as though he doesn’t quite understand them. He says, “Speak with me?”
“Yes.”
His gaze cuts away.
“She said Connor knew something. Something secret.”
At that Jude blanches, but still he says nothing.
“Jude?”
Looking back he asks, “What sort of secret?”
“Eve didn’t know.” I tilt my head to the side. “He could’ve been going to tell whoever he met on the beach. Perhaps that someone didn’t like him knowing what he knew.”
Jude sits very still, the line of his mouth pressed thin. The ticks of the grandfather clock in the corner become the loudest thing in the room.
“He didn’t,” he says at last. His voice is raw and rasping. “He didn’t come to the lighthouse.”
It’s so obvious he’s withholding something, I’m inclined to push him.
Yet his expression keeps me from it.
I haven’t seen Jude look like this since the day he saw the washed-up bodies of his family. He’d stood among the crowd on the beach, ashen and motionless, the same bone-deep terror in his eyes. Back then my father took him by the shoulder, turning him away.
Don’t look.
The only way I can think to remedy it now is to move on entirely.
I say, “All right,” and pretend not to notice the breath of relief that hisses out between his teeth.
Digging a hand into the trunk, I pull out a leather journal. It’s faded, stiff when I open it, my father’s handwriting familiar and comforting. An inscription marks the first page, an old island rhyme.
A flash of silver under sea, where siren song hath taken me. Absent of color, absent of light, absent of all that I knew in life. Bolt the latch and watch the waves, pray sirens do not take me tonight.
My father and Llyr Osric would spread out large maps of Twillengyle, jot things down in notebooks, trek across the moors no matter the weather. I remember watching them, wondering, a small hand pressed to the plate-glass window.
Jude must be following my train of thought. Some color has returned to his cheeks, and he stretches out on the rug. “We’re getting like them,” he says, staring up at the ceiling. “This… This is something they would do.” I study his expression as he speaks, but he seems neither pleased nor disturbed by the notion.
Biting my lip, I pile more books between us. I’m ever so careful not to touch the one Jude mustn’t open, the letter between its pages conveying what he mustn’t know.
I ought to burn it really. I should have years ago, the very moment I found it—but the idea of destroying yet another piece of Jude’s family is a task I can’t easily stomach. I may be heartless in many respects, but my blood doesn’t run that cold.
Jude gets to his feet suddenly, his eyes on the doorway. I turn to follow his gaze. My mother stands there, hand on the frame, her apron dusted with flour. She says, “Just wondering if you’re staying for dinner, Wick.”