Stevie’s heart gave a leap. Could she write after all? If she could their problems would be solved. Her hopes were dashed when she glanced toward the table and saw no sign of letter writing paraphernalia. The sewing table had been rearranged since her last visit. A man in a silver frame looked out at her; a handsome man with a smooth young face and prominent cheekbones, dressed in naval uniform—her husband?

‘You remember who we are, Mrs Hardegan?’ Fowler asked as she settled once more into the easy chair by the window.

She glanced up at him, a shadow of contempt falling across her sharp features. Stevie sat down on the footstool and took the soft bony hand in hers. ‘I’m afraid we’ve got some bad news.’

Mrs Hardegan pulled her hand away, leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. ‘The boy, our boy ... he’s dead,’ she said.

Stevie and Fowler exchanged glances. ‘You already knew?’ he asked.

Her eyes flew open. ‘Of course we didn’t know!’

‘We’re sorry for your loss,’ Stevie murmured. ‘I’ve spoken to a social worker. She’ll be in contact with you.’

‘We’ve brought you some flowers.’ Fowler produced the daffodils from behind his back and waited for a thank you that never came. Stevie caught Fowler’s eye. Was he really expecting thanks at a time like this? she wondered.

‘I’ll put them in water,’ he said, hurriedly moving to the kitchenette.

Mrs Hardegan shot Fowler a sceptical look and tossed her head with a humph. ‘Dead flowers.’ Then to Stevie she said, ‘They killed him, didn’t they? Just like they did the other boys.’

‘Yes, we think so.’

‘No surprises there, we saw it coming, we told him. Lie down with dogs and you get carrots.’

‘Can I get you anything ... brandy?’ Fowler asked. He’d put the flowers in water in the sink and was heading toward the liquor cabinet.

‘No, get us this.’ Mrs Hardegan pointed to her sewing basket, which Fowler dutifully lifted from the table.

‘No, not that, stupid boy!’

‘This?’ Stevie said, extracting the tapestry from beneath the basket and handing it over. A mess of tangled wool, it was almost impossible to see which side of the tapestry was which. ‘We know Ralph was involved with Jon Pavel’s activities,’ Stevie went on, ‘and we think we now know what those activities were. They were bringing girls over from Thailand to work against their will as prostitutes.’

‘Snoodle pinkerds — we told you that.’ Mrs Hardegan didn’t look up, carefully pierced the fabric with her needle, her face a lined study of concentration.

Stevie frowned. ‘Snoodle pinkerds? You mean girls—prostitutes?’

The soft expulsion of breath said yes, of course that’s what she meant.

‘Is there anything else we should know about this? Can you tell us anything at all about the people who killed Ralph and Delia?’ Stevie asked.

Mrs Hardegan finished her stitch and looked thoughtfully at the picture on the table. Finally she said, ‘The Japs killed him.’

‘Bloody Japs, bloody Japs!’

The sudden racket made Stevie clap her hand to her chest. She’d forgotten all about that damned bird hanging in its cage in the far corner of the room.

‘Cover up our feathered friend,’ Mrs Hardegan commanded. Fowler placed the blanket over the cage. The parrot gave a squawk of protest and fell silent.

‘But it’s still our fault,’ Mrs Hardegan continued. ‘We couldn’t help it, couldn’t love him—no wonder the boy turned out like he did.’ She paused, her mouth was turned down but Stevie could see no evidence of tears in the age-washed eyes. ‘We’ll tell you soon what happened, we’ll tell our story, but only when we’re ready. You must have hours and minutes.’

Hours and minutes: patience. This was something Stevie found to be in very short supply. ‘But Mrs Hardegan, please, tell us. Do you know who killed your son?’

‘The Japs did—didn’t we just tell you that?’

Stevie looked toward the parrot cage, waiting for the nerve-grating echo, but it remained silent, thank God, cage gently swinging from the roof beam. She’d better steer the conversation to smoother waters. ‘The baby, Joshua, what can you tell us about him?’

Mrs Hardegan began another laborious stitch. Fowler sighed, put his hands in his pockets and started to pace to and fro. Stevie bit her lower lip. ‘Fowler...’

‘They stole him,’ Mrs Hardegan said at last.

Fowler stopped pacing and met Stevie’s eye.

‘And when the boy found out about it,’ Mrs Hardegan continued, ‘he went quite mad. He was always stupid, only a poor uneducated peasant, but nice, we liked him despite all that. But then stupid turned to mad.’

‘What boy, Mrs Hardegan? Jon Pavel? Skye? Ralph?’ Stevie asked. ‘No, that boy.’ The old lady pointed to the Pavel house with the tip of her needle.

‘Delia Pavel, you mean Delia Pavel went mad?’

Mrs Hardegan stabbed the needle into the tapestry and left it there, as if she’d had enough of her sewing. ‘He came to us and told us what the boys were doing and then that boy of mine said yes they were when we asked him. And then we went mad too.’

With a rush of excitement, Stevie sprang up from the footstool and began to speak rapidly to Fowler. ‘Maybe Delia didn’t know the baby was illegally adopted—although with the upstairs bedroom as it was, she had to have an idea of her husband’s other activities. Somehow she found out that the baby was stolen and the knowledge tipped her over the edge. The madness must be the depression Skye suspected Delia of having and the reason for the house being kept in such a mess. Delia must have confided her fears to Mrs Hardegan, telling her about Ralph’s involvement in her husband’s illegal activities, which Ralph later admitted to his mother when she questioned him.’ No wonder the old lady had had a stroke, Stevie added silently.

Mrs Hardegan nodded her head; all her words had escaped her now. The news of her son’s death had taken its toll, despite her efforts at hiding it. She put her tapestry back on the table and sank back into her chair.

‘Mind waiting for me in the car?’ Stevie said to Fowler. ‘I won’t be long.’

Fowler hesitated before nodding a sombre goodbye to the old lady. He was about to move when she held up a finger. ‘No, wait where you are,’ she commanded. ‘You are to come back another time. We have some books belonging to the boy and we want you to take them to his parents.’

‘I can get them now if you like, it’s no trouble, I’ll be seeing them at the funeral.’ Fowler made as if to move toward the book-crowded hallway.

‘We said not now. Later. You will have to take them to that place, where they live, that place with all the dust and woolly animals. It’s a long drive but you will do it.’

Fowler said he would. They watched him as he opened the back door and stepped into the garden, shoulders sagging under his creased suit jacket. Mrs Hardegan looked at Stevie and let out a breath. ‘Stupid is as stupid does. But not a bad boy.’

Stevie agreed, tried again to clasp the old woman’s hand. This time she didn’t pull away. ‘Are you going to be all right?’ she asked. ‘Can I get you anything, anyone I can ring? A priest maybe?’

‘We’ll miss the boy.’

Skye, Delia or Ralph?

Stevie didn’t ask.

Stevie called in at the deli and paid the girl Leila for the DVD. Fowler curled his lip when she climbed back into the car and tossed Gone with the Wind into his lap. ‘What you watching this crap for?’ he asked as he held the cover up to the interior light.

‘It helps me relax. Don’t you have a favourite movie you watch over and over again, something you can just veg out to?’

He shrugged. ‘I’ve watched Saw 3 a few times, I guess.’

Right.

After dropping Fowler back at the hospital for his car, she returned to her mother’s house, read to Izzy for a while and then settled on the couch in front of the TV. She’d had little sleep over the last few nights, her mind spinning like a hamster on a wheel even when she did get the opportunity. Tonight she was asleep before Scarlet and Rhett could fall into their first clinch.