Dreaming Of The Bones

“I’d have known you if I’d bumped into you in an alley. She kept photos of you, did you know that? Tucked away in her favorite books, in her office, in her desk. I used to wonder whether she took them out and compared him to you, checking his progress.”

“Bloody hell,” Kincaid breathed, shaking his head. “You knew all along.”

“What?” asked Nathan, stepping between them. “What are you talking about?” He still looked ill, but his face no longer had the flush of fever.

Until that moment Kincaid had completely forgotten Nathan’s presence. “Nathan, why don’t you and Gemma —”

“I didn’t mind so much at first,” McClellan continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “She swore she didn’t know for certain, and I felt generous then. She’d chosen me, hadn’t she? And a child was a child, after all, and I was a civilized, enlightened man.” He laughed.

Nathan touched Kincaid’s arm. “Is he saying Kit’s your son?”

“I didn’t know,” Kincaid said quietly. “Not until a few days ago.” He turned back to McClellan. “What changed, then?”

McClellan shrugged and looked away. “I thought there would be others. A son of my own … a daughter, even. But she was too concerned with her career. ‘Not this year,’ she’d say. There was always some excuse. And all the while she watched him.” He turned his sharp glance back to Kincaid. “I must say it didn’t take her long after I left to think of an excuse to call you.”

“It was no bloody excuse, man!” Kincaid shouted, furious again. “She’s dead, for God’s sake. Don’t you feel anything for her?”

“What would you know about what I feel?” McClellan shouted back. “What I feel is none of your fucking business, so why don’t you just shut the fuck up, okay?” He wiped spittle from his lip with the back of his hand, and his eyes were wet with unshed tears.

Gemma stepped in close to McClellan, separating him from Kincaid with her body. “Look, Ian, why don’t we all start over from the beginning,” she said. “You two standing here blaming one another is not going to get us anywhere.”

“Then let me get on with things,” said McClellan with a weary gesture towards the house. “I’ve a few more boxes to load before I turn the keys over to the estate agent.”

Kincaid stared at him blankly. “Estate agent? “You’re not—”

“Selling up? Did you think I’d come back here, to live in this house?”

“But what about Kit?” said Kincaid, shaking his head in disbelief “He should go back to his school—”

“Who said anything about Kit? I’m going back to France, just as soon as your friend the Chief Inspector finishes checking my visa.”

“But you’re Kit’s legal guardian. You can’t just—”

“Chief Inspector Byrne said he was with his grandparents. I’m sure that’s what Vic would have wanted for him.”

“What Vic wanted? How do you know what Vic wanted?” Kincaid was shouting again. “And you—you raised him as your son. How can you abandon him like this?” Raising his hands in angry frustration, he saw that they were shaking. Oh, Christ, he was losing it. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. For Kit’s sake, he had got to pull himself together. Gemma said something softly, anxiously to Nathan, but the words were snatched by the wind.

Kincaid blinked. Use your head, man. Pretend it’s a case, just another case. He dropped his hands, lowered his voice. “Look, Ian. We need to talk. Why don’t we go inside for a bit?”

“I’ll make us some tea,” offered Gemma.

McClellan seemed to look at her for the first time. He shook his head. “Not in the kitchen. They said she …”

“I’ll bring it to you in the sitting room,” Gemma said. She led him towards the house, and Kincaid and Nathan followed.

“I didn’t know about Kit.” Nathan sounded bewildered. “She never said.”

Glancing at him, Kincaid thought he had the stunned look of someone who’d been punched once too often. Was he wondering what else Vic had kept from him? “Vic was good at keeping secrets. And so, I think, was Lydia. Perhaps that’s one reason Vic was so drawn to her.”

In the sitting room, Nathan perched uneasily on the footstool, while Ian sank into the chair occupied just a week ago by Vic and Kit. The room had the cold, stale smell of disuse and long-dead fires.

For a brief instant, Kincaid tried to imagine the three of them—Vic, Kit, and Ian—together as a family. What arguments had Ian’s jealousy and resentment fueled? And what wounds had Vic kept to herself? “Where were you on Tuesday, Ian?” he asked as he sat down.

“Don’t you start,” said Ian, but without much aggression. “I’ve been over all that with Chief Inspector Byrne. I was in the south of France, where I live with my lover. It was through her parents that the college reached me. I came as soon as I heard.”

The graduate student, thought Kincaid. Ian had found unquestioning adoration from a woman too young to know better, and he was not going to give that up in order to take responsibility for an eleven-year-old boy he didn’t consider his own. “You weren’t even going to see him, were you?” he said in disgust.

“It’s not what you think,” Ian protested. “I didn’t want to upset him—”

“Bollocks! How do you think he’s going to feel when he finds out you couldn’t be bothered—”

“Shut up!” Ian rose half out of his chair. “Just bloody shut up. It’s too close. I can’t bear it. I can’t see Kit without seeing her in him, and I don’t think I can stand that. Don’t you see? I loved her—” He broke off and covered his face with his hands.