The God of the Hive - Laurie R. King [37]
“I have to assume that Brothers is somehow related to the sharpshooter. And if he has two assistants—one on Orkney, one in Thurso—he could have more.”
“Which requires that you keep your heads down for a time.”
“Until I meet up with my companions and we pool information, I cannot know who, or why. Or, I will admit, even if.”
Goodman walked, head-down with the stick across his shoulders, leading me in a wide circle through the untouched woodland as I told my tale—although since I was forced to leave out many of the details so as not to enmesh him in danger, I found it was a story I would mistrust myself, were I to hear it.
At the end, I described the rapid disintegration of the aeroplane mid-flight, and said, “Captain Javitz brought it down in the clearest patch he could see, although it proved not quite clear enough. And you know the rest.”
Back now where we had started, Goodman sat down on a fallen tree, studying the rambling structure on the far side of the clearing: tree in front, shed behind, a glimpse of orchard at the back. After a minute, I sat beside him. Even with a clear head, the meadow resembled the dwelling-place of some mythic creature. Could there possibly be a deed somewhere with Robert Goodman’s name on it? I thought it more likely that the aeroplane had delivered us to another world, one in which official land deeds and telegraph lines did not exist.
“The whole story sounds terribly alarmist and melodramatic, I know. But short of giving you all the details, and the names”—which would absolutely guarantee that you did not believe me, I mentally added—“it’s the bald truth.”
“Good. So you won’t be leaving momentarily?”
“Not if you don’t mind having us, for two or three more days.” If nothing else, I owed it to Javitz to let his leg heal before moving him.
“Good,” he repeated, adding, “‘Dull would he be of a soul who could pass by/A sight so touching in its majesty.’” I stared, then followed the line of his gaze: A hundred feet away stood a magnificent stag, its antlers each showing six or seven points. The creature’s liquid eyes studied us with as much interest as we studied him. Majesty was the word.
Which was, again, that of Wordsworth. “‘Westminster Bridge’?” I asked.
He looked at me as if I were mad. “No, red deer.”
And so saying, the little blond man set out across his meadow, causing the stag to leap away and me to grin at my companion’s retreating back. The stripped sapling rested across his shoulder like a rifle barrel. Or the first support for a child’s swing.
I thought it safe to leave the two men with the child for a bit longer—indeed, Estelle seemed happier with either of them than she did with me—and the walk had begun to loosen my sore muscles, so I skirted the edge of the meadow and followed what looked like an overgrown horse-track to the west. In twenty minutes, I came to the house that explained the estate.
A square, unfussy Georgian box of a house in the middle of an abandoned garden, weeds growing through the gravel of its drive. The boards across all the ground-floor windows and some of the upper storeys suggested that it was vacant. I circled it, seeing no sign of life.
A broken gutter-pipe had been recently repaired, although not painted—and I thought this might explain Goodman’s presence. A country estate whose family did not wish it to deteriorate entirely would want it cared for; permitting this odd sort of man with a love for simple things to make a home nearby was a sensible precaution.
Although he was an unusual sort of caretaker, I reflected as I turned back towards the meadow. His accent and education spoke of the officer class, but his skills confirmed his claims of ambulance service. One might assume that some physical shortcoming had disqualified him from active service, but he showed no signs of infirmity now.
One of the small objects on Goodman’s wall of decoration was a bronze Croix de Guerre. It could have belonged to anyone, of course—he had not personally worn any of the twenty-three horse-shoes on the wall either—but I suspected