Mourn not your Dead

habit, Superintendent, and I always put them straight into the jewelry box when I take them off. And I’d worn them just two days before.”
    “Was there anything else missing?” Deveney had his notebook out now, pen ready.
    Frowning, Rebecca rubbed at the end of her nose. “Just some childhood keepsakes. A silver charm bracelet, some school medals. It was quite odd, really.”
    Kincaid leaned towards her. “And you saw no one unusual about the place?”
    “I saw no one at all, Superintendent, unusual or otherwise. I’m sorry, I’m afraid I’ve been a complete bust for you.” She looked genuinely distressed, and Kincaid hastened to reassure her as he rose.
    “Not at all. And it gave me a chance to see the church. It’s quite a gem, isn’t it?”
    “It was built by G. E. Street, the man who designed the London law courts,” Rebecca said as she led them into the corridor. “It’s a lovely example of Victorian church architecture but rather a sad story. It seems he meant it as a gift for his wife, but she died shortly after it was finished.” They had reached the porch, and as they stepped outside she stopped and looked up at the honey-colored stone rising above them. Slowly, she said, “I’ve felt very lucky to have come here, and I’d hate to see anything disrupt my village. One becomes proprietorial very quickly, I’m afraid,” she added with a smile.
    Looking down the hill towards the vicarage, Kincaid said, “You’re the gardener, I take it?”
    “Oh, yes.” Rebecca’s smile was radiant. “It’s my temptation and my salvation, I’m afraid. The place was a wilderness when I came here two years ago, and I’ve spent every spare minute there since.”
    “It shows.” Infected by her enthusiasm, Kincaid found he couldn’t help grinning back.
    “I can’t take all the credit,” she hastened to reassure him. “Geoff Genovase helps me on weekends. I’d never have managed the heavy work without him.”
    Kincaid thanked her again and they turned away, but before they’d gone more than a few steps down the lane she called out to him. “Mr. Kincaid, the dynamics that make a village a functioning organism are really quite fragile. You will be careful, won’t you?”
     
    “THAT EXPLAINS WHY SHE’D MISSED OUT ON THE GOSSIP,” said Kincaid as they walked down the lane. While they’d been inside the sun had dropped in its swift afternoon progress, the light had faded from gold to a soft gray-green, and the shadows stood long on the ground.
    “What does?” Deveney looked up from the notebook page he’d been scanning as they walked.
    “The aunt’s funeral.” Kincaid put his hands in his pockets and kicked at a stone with his toe.
    “What the hell difference does it make?” Deveney asked, sounding a bit frayed. “Do you always go around the mulberry bush like that in interviews? Talk about circumlocution.”
    “I don’t know what difference it makes. Yet. And no, I don’t always waffle on, but sometimes it’s the only way I know to get under the skin of things.” He stopped as they reached the bottom of the lane and turned to Deveney. “I don’t think this is going to be a straightforward case, Nick, and I want to know what these people thought of Alastair Gilbert, how he fit into the fabric of the community.”
    “Well, we’re certainly not making much progress on the vagrant theory,” Deveney said disgustedly. “We’ve one name left, a Mr. Percy Bainbridge, at Rose Cottage. It’s just kitty-corner to the pub, so we might as well leave the car.” As they crossed the road and walked along the edge of the green, he added, “This is our most recent report, by the way, just last month.”
    Rose Cottage might once have been as charming as its name implied, but the canes arching over the front door were bare and sere, and only a few dying chrysanthemums graced the path. Deveney pushed the bell, and after a few moments the door swung open.
    “Yes?” inquired Mr. Percy Bainbridge, wrinkling his nose and pursing his thin lips as if he smelled something distasteful. As Deveney made introductions and explained their mission, the lips relaxed into a simper, and Bainbridge said with fruity affectation, “Oh, do come in. I knew you’d be wanting a word with me.”
    They followed him down a dark, narrow hallway into a sitting room that was overwarm and overdecorated—and smelled, Kincaid thought, faintly of illness.
    Bainbridge was tall, thin, and stooped, with a chest so