Quiet Neighbors (31 page)

“Me too,” said Jude. “But her faith has never wavered.”

The Plexiglas bubble was gone and the hair-like needles were driven out of her completely. Jude felt as if she was floating high above the earth looking down on them all and could see everything. “She ran a book club. For the community, she said. Really, it was so she could get into everyone's houses. She killed them, Lowell.”

Lowell shuddered and put his hand on Jude's knee. “Did she set the fire?” he said.

“Of course she did. I heard her on the street in the fog and she hurried away. She left the note, she set the fire, and then she nearly blew it. The next morning when we came back here with the firemen she was halfway across the lawn to come and cluck about it when she realised she hadn't been to the shop yet and she shouldn't know! She's not as sharp as she was.”

“Did Jackie phone her?” Lowell said.

“I suppose so,” said Jude. “We can ask.”

“And did Jackie guess in '85 and then keep quiet?”

“We can ask that too.”

They were silent for a moment and then, “Oh!” Lowell covered his mouth with his hand. “Did she kill Inez?”

“No,” Jude said. “No, I believe what she said to me today. It was too late by the time she knew anything. But I could never work out why she would keep the secret. Why she would let Miranda go with the baby and keep quiet. I know now. She didn't want any trouble. She had got away with murder five times and she didn't want police and press sniffing round. This was only ten years later, remember. It's thirty years
now
and she's been hiding in her house since the news broke. Don't tell me that didn't surprise you.”

Lowell spent a moment or two thinking hard, his eyes moving back and forward, gathering facts, checking memories, matching questions and answers. Then he clapped his hands, almost crying with relief, whooping with it.

“Shut up!” came Eddy's muffled voice through the wall. “You're disgusting.”

Lowell only laughed louder. He jumped out of bed.

“Where are you going?” Jude asked him.

“To phone the police!” he said. “To get this straightened out at last after all these years! To clear my family name.” He stopped to kiss Jude once on the head, a rounded smack that was still ringing in her ears when he'd gone.

She had made him so happy. She hadn't even realised he felt guilty, that he
cared
about his family name. She lay back and stared up at the ceiling. Of course it was better that the truth was out. And it was good for Lowell to be able to remember his father again without—what did he call it, a stain? But she was sorry. She had felt they were a better match when he was the son of a killer.

She had even imagined that one day she'd be able to tell him and he'd be able to forgive her. Now, seeing how happy he was to have the weight lifted, she wasn't so sure. Maybe it was hers to take to the grave. Hers and Raminder's, anyway.

If Max had only fallen off the wagon for the first time, Raminder wouldn't know. But since it was the fourth time, she'd be quite familiar with him dropping onto the bed on his face and letting his head hang down, airways clear. She can't have thought of it when she saw him lying there for the last time, but she'd certainly thought of it since.
No regrets, no complaints,
she'd said. And Tom and Bernie? Of course they checked the house. Of course they saw their old pal Max lying there drunk, with his wife at the bottom of the stairs. And they left him … like that.

So it wasn't Jude's fault alone. But it was her hand. She had reached out and turned him over onto his back to look at his face. And then she had walked away, out of the room, out of the house, out of the country. She had left behind everything she'd ever felt for him. All the love and hate. She had left behind her clean job and her safe flat and her sensible life, and now she had Lowell and Eddy and the baby and Liam and Terry and Maureen and Jackie and Bill, and she would see Inez laid to rest and Mrs. Hewston brought to justice, and she would replant the muddy wreck of the asparagus bed and learn how tend to roses. She would get the stock online and look over the accounts and put LG Books to rights. She would live a life. Not filthy, not ludicrous, not chaos. But probably perplexing. Probably permanently perplexing.

She could hear Lowell coming back up the stairs, still talking. He must have made the call with Eddy's mobile. She would keep it to herself, and let this good man be happy. She would accept what the world had just laid at her feet and she would let the memory go. She reached out and picked up the O. Douglas, thinking perhaps it wasn't too sweet after all. It would do quite nicely. For tonight, anyway.

the end

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank: Donna Andrews, Frankie Bailey, Terri Bischoff, Kevin Brown, Leslie Budewitz, Jessie Chandler, Mathew Clemens, Laura DiSilverio, Cari Dubiel, Barb Fister, Audrey Ford, Beth Hanson, Julie Henrikus, Wendy Keegan, Louise Kelly, Catherine Lepreux, Jessie Lourey, Jim and Jean McPherson, Neil McRoberts, Gin Malliet, Karen Maslowski, Katie Mickshl, Erin Mitchell, Lisa Moylett, Nicole Nugent, Lori Rader Day, Martha Reed, Eileen Rendahl, Sarah Rizzo, Hank Phillippi Ryan, Sarah Shaber, Susan Shea, Spring Warren, Beth Wasson, Molly Weston, Dina Wilner, and Simon Wood, who have all helped me get through this year, fraying at the edges but never quite unravelling completely.

Extra special thanks to Judy Bobalik, Clare O'Donohue, Risa Rispoli, and Terri Bischoff (with a very different hat on). They know why.

Facts and Fictions

Wigtown is a real place in Scotland and the streets in this book are real streets. There is a cemetery and a harbour and a bowling green. There is even a big house where Jamaica House is imagined to be. And there are
lots
of bookshops and a wonderful literature festival every autumn (www.wigtownbookfestival.com). But none of the specific businesses or other houses in
Quiet Neighbors
are based in reality and none of the characters are related in any way to real individuals, living or dead. Todd Jolly's cottage isn't there, in case anyone goes looking.