the point formed by three intersecting images welling out of my unconscious mind, something else came up and stared me full in the face.
I'd been shot at.
In England, I had enemies; Holmes had enemies; I'd have put an assault down to one of them. But here? Two days after we'd arrived?
Finally, with the sensation of a key's wards sliding into place and an almost audible click, the hard barrier fell away, and I took a step into the hidden rooms of my past.
Where all around me, the walls, the furnishings, the very air shouted at me—
Was it an accident? Or was my family in fact murdered?
Chapter Twenty
Accident, or murder?
With that simple question, the world shifted dizzily on its axis. My father's peculiar will, the deaths of the Longs and Dr Ginzberg, the attempt to assassinate me on the street—all those came together with a clap in my mind. Not that I could see anything resembling a cause, but I had worked with Holmes long enough to see the pattern of a knot forming in the disparate strings around me. Too many deaths, too many coincidences.
Something had happened, Long had said, during the fire of 1906; something that took Micah Long away from his own family during the frantic hours when Chinatown burned, something that changed the relationship between our fathers, an event that may have driven my mother back to England for six years.
An event that, two years after our return, sent their motorcar off a cliff.
And that within four months had extinguished the lives of three individuals in whom various Russells might have confided.
And which, ten years afterwards, caused someone to lower a gun on the only surviving Russell.
The Russell who was currently sitting in a completely exposed position as the sun climbed towards the surrounding hills, with her only weapon buried at the bottom of her valise.
The stupid Russell who hadn't thought to look behind her since giving a token glance to the street outside the St Francis on Sunday morning.
I scrambled to my feet and scurried towards the house as if I'd heard a twig break in the woods. Inside, I locked the terrace door, then went rigid, waiting for a careless motion or uncontrolled breath to betray an intruder. The house was silent, and the only dampness on the stones of the floor was from my own feet. I slipped up the stairs of the bedroom wing and cautiously nudged open my own door, but the room was empty.
I felt slightly more secure with the pistol resting in my trouser-band. I stuffed my possessions into their bags any which way, then went upstairs to bang on the door of Flo's room.
No response: I had my fingers around the knob when I heard a befuddled whimper from within. “Flo, we need to go as soon as we can. I'll get the coffee ready, but you need to wake up now.”
Donny's head had already emerged from the door behind me.
“Something up?” he asked.
“I think I should be back in the city right away. I'm making coffee.”
I had just taken the percolator from the heat when Donny appeared, dressed, combed, and shaved.
“Can you take a cup to Flo?” I asked. “I don't know if she'll come out of her coma without it.”
He looked at me oddly, but did not say anything, just carried the two cups away. Eventually Flo joined us, picking at the toast I laid before her and drowning her sleepiness in caffeine.
When her eyes were somewhat clearer, she fixed them on me. “What's the rush?” she demanded. “I thought we were going to have a nice swim before we go?”
“I just need to be back in the city,” I said, the flatness of my tone brooking no argument.
Flo blinked, and Donny cleared his throat. “Well, then, if you girls want to pack up your things, I'll put the umbrella and chairs back into the boat-house.”
“Never mind them, the Gordimers will take care of everything.”
I stood up. Flo and Donny, after exchanging a glance, did the same. Without waiting to see if they did as I asked, I picked up the key-ring from its hook and walked out of the front door.
The dirt drive to the road had only the Lodge and, up at the road itself, the Gordimers' house. I went to the back door and knocked, knowing at this time of day they would be in the kitchen. Mr Gordimer opened it, dropping his sweat-stained hat over his head as he did so; the odour of home-cured bacon and fried eggs washed over me, making me smile involuntarily as I held out the keys.
“We're off this morning. Thank you for watching over everything so carefully.”
He took the keys from me and passed them over his shoulder to the figure behind him. I greeted his wife, whose stern face softened as she said, “I'm sorry we didn't have a chance to chat, Mary. I hope everything was satisfactory?”
“Absolutely perfect.”
Gordimer gave a sort of rumbling sound preparatory to speech, then came out with, “You'll be selling up?”
“I haven't decided yet. I'll most likely sell the place in the city, it's ridiculous to keep it standing empty, but if you two are willing to go on with the upkeep here I'll hang on to it for a while longer.”
“Of course we're happy to keep it tidy and safe for you,” Mrs Gordimer said, “for as long as you like. And if you want to have your lawyer drop us a line again to say you're coming, we'll put the milk in the ice-box, like always.”
“I appreciate it, Mrs Gordimer. And any of the bigger maintenance jobs that come along, I trust Mr Norbert's good at approving them.”
“Oh, yes, there's never been a problem. Last year when the roof started leaking—no, I'm a liar, it was two years ago now—all I had to do was drop a line and suggest it was a job too big for Willy here on his own and Mr Norbert wrote right back to say we should hire whoever we liked and send him the bills. Willy wanted to do it, of course, but we hired the son-in-law of Mr Jacko—remember him, at the post office? His daughter Melinda married a nice hard-working boy from San Mateo and though of course they live over there, the boy was happy to bring his crew here for a few days and do the job. With Willy to supervise, of course.”
Willy—Wilson, his name was, and the diminutive did not suit him—looked slightly abashed that he had not mounted the assault on the roof by himself, but I was glad his wife had put her veto on his active participation. I nodded my appreciation and made to ease myself back from the door, lest I be caught in the snare of Mrs Gordimer's words for the entire morning.
“Well,” I said, “it's lovely to see you two looking so well, and I'm sorry I can't stay longer. My friends decided that they have to get back, so we'll be off.”
“That is a pity, but I do understand, young people today are so busy. You just leave everything there, I'll pop in later and tidy it all away.”
“That's very good of you, Mrs Gordimer. Perhaps I'll manage to get down again before I leave.” I threw this last down as a sop to distract her, although it was a blatant lie. I had no intention of coming again, not for years. Maybe not ever.
Mrs Gordimer's continued barrage plucked at me, but slowly I moved back, further and further from her range.
However, it was Gordimer himself who stopped me. With another rumble, he summoned the following words: “Had some people here, asking questions.”
My feet, halfway down the steps, stopped feeling their way backward. “People?”
