Sophie Medina: Ghost Image Part 13

11.

Ryan walked me to my car after a detour through Jefferson's rooms, the beautiful suite he called his Cabinet and his sanctum sanctorum. I told him I was leaving tomorrow night for a week in London and had written to the general information address at the Chelsea Physic Garden, asking to meet with someone to discuss the Fairbairn letter.

"The person you want to see is Zara Remington, the curator. She's good people. I can write her on your behalf, if you'd like. In return, I'd like to be kept in the loop of anything you find out."

"Fair enough," I said. "So, what about you? Do you have any ideas where these seeds might be?"

"No, but I certainly intend to start looking."

"And in return, you'll keep me in your loop." I gave him a bright smile. "If you find anything, I'd like to be the photographer who gets the first pictures. I owe it to Kevin. It's his story, you know."

He nodded. "Now I understand why he was keeping this so quiet."

I got in the Mini and rolled down the window. "If someone killed him, he wasn't keeping it quiet enough."

He looked startled. "I suppose you're right."

"Be careful."

He reached through the window and patted my shoulder. "You be careful, too."

Sole Brothers Shoes was located on Columbia Road, the main commercial drag in the colorful, noisy heart of Adams Morgan. Years ago the store had been an elegant French patisserie called Avignon Freres, in the middle of a largely immigrant Hispanic community. The Sole Brothers, whose surname was Weinstein, had managed to keep the Old World emporium charm when they renovated the place, and now the shoe store had become as popular a destination spot as the bakery had once been. That they were closing for a morning for "a private event" was a big deal, and as one of the brothers told me, "The good publicity don't hurt us, neither. Everybody in the neighborhood has been in, buyin' shoes and showin' their support. Plus, we've had a bunch of donations. We got at least another two hundred bucks for you just in the past three days."

The children arrived in s.h.i.+fts beginning at nine o'clock, by grade, the littlest ones first, or else we figured the store would turn into a mob scene. Grace, Tommy, and I had arrived earlier, along with every teacher in the school and the entire staff of Sole Brothers. Though I would have loved to take pictures as souvenirs for the kids, I left my camera at home. Not everyone was in the country legally and we didn't want to scare any of the parents away. The goal was for every child to leave the store with a new pair of shoes.

My phone rang halfway through the third wave of kids, the fifth and sixth graders. I had been reaching for a shoe box on a high shelf for a ten-year-old girl with a sweet smile and big dark eyes who looked enough like me that we could have been related. I answered the phone and looked down to see who was calling. A D.C. number I didn't recognize.

"Hey," a male voice said, "it sounds like you're in the middle of Union Station. I hope I'm not catching you at a bad time."

"Who's this?"

"Sorry," he said. "It's David Arista."

I handed the box to the little girl and walked to the end of the aisle where the shoe sizes were too big for any of the kids so it was quieter.

"Actually, I'm in a shoe store," I said, "and I'm kind of busy. What can I do for you?"

"I never get in the way of a woman on a shopping mission," he said with a grin in his voice. "Especially when it involves shoes. I'll be brief. My friend at the Arts and Industries Building is willing to meet us next week and you can photograph the inside of the building to your heart's content. I was just wondering what day would work for you."

I leaned against the end of a tall shelf and closed my eyes. "Thank you, but unfortunately I'm not available next week."

"Sophie?"

I looked up. Grace stood at the end of the aisle and beckoned me. I held up a finger to indicate I'd be a moment.

"You're not free any day next week? Can't you rearrange something?" he was saying. "He's making an exception to let you in. I'm not sure I can pull this off again."

"It's very kind of you, but I won't even be in the country. I'm going to London for the week. What about the following week?"

He made a noisy, unhappy sound. "I got the mountain to come to Mohammed, but I'll see what I can do. You'll have e-mail while you're away, right?"

"Yes. I'm really sorry, but I've got to go."

"All right. Cheerio. I'll let you get back to your Jimmy Choos and Manolo Blahniks. Sounds like they're giving them away if that din is anything to go by. Where are you, anyway?"

"It's a private event and actually they are giving them away," I said. "Goodbye, David."

I joined Grace, who said, "We're almost done. The older kids knew exactly what they wanted, so once that big line at the cash register is finished, that's it. I thought we could stick around and tidy up so the place doesn't look like a war zone and then I'll buy you lunch."

"Yes to everything, but I need to pa.s.s on lunch. I haven't packed for London, plus I'm going to try to make five thirty Ma.s.s at the cathedral before Tommy comes by to take me to Dulles."

"You have a sweet brother."

"I know. He was going out to Middleburg anyway since he's on spring break and the house will be empty. He figured he'd get a lot of uninterrupted studying done."

Tommy left, telling me he'd see me later, and Grace and I stuck around with several of the teachers to restock boxes that had been left in piles like snowdrifts and pick up tissue paper and cardboard shoe inserts flung about like haphazard decorations. It was just after twelve thirty when we left, both on foot, since I lived about twenty minutes from the store and Grace's house was around the corner. We exchanged hugs at the intersection of 18th Street and Columbia Road, where we went in different directions.

"What can I bring you from London?" I asked.

"I'd love some tea from Fortnum and Mason, if you have time. Any kind of tea, as long as it's English."

"I'll have plenty of time. It's a pleasure trip."

"By the way," she said, "I meant to tell you. Two things. I'm still covering the story on Kevin and I checked in with my contact in the medical examiner's office this morning. They haven't done the autopsy yet."

"Will you let me know if you hear anything?"

"Of course."

"You said two things."

"You'll have company from home while you're in London. I saw a story on the International Press Service wire this morning. Archduke Orlando, Victor's father, is in the hospital recovering from pneumonia. There was a picture of Victor with Yasmin Gilberti entering St. Mary's Hospital with a scrum of photogs around them. Yasmin's turned into quite a little media sensation."

So that's what Ursula's secretary had meant when she said Yasmin and Victor were called away on family business.

"How's his father doing?" I asked. "I knew he was too frail to come to the party the other night, but I didn't realize he had pneumonia."

"I think it came on suddenly. Apparently he's not doing well at all."

"I'll write Victor and tell him I'm thinking about him."

She gave me another hug and crossed Columbia Road. When I was halfway down 18th Street, I thought of Ursula's neighbor's remark the other night, that Ursula wished the older prince would die before the wedding so Victor would inherit his father's t.i.tles and his share of the family fortune. It had been a snide, snarky comment, but maybe there had been some truth in it.

Yasmin would marry a wealthier, more t.i.tled man and her wedding would be even more important in European royal society. And now neither Ursula nor Yasmin had to worry about Kevin doing or saying anything that might interfere with that wedding.

If it's an ill wind that blows n.o.body any good, maybe the Gilberti women considered Kevin's death and the archduke's illness to be a fortunate turn of events.

But I hoped they didn't.

Though I have ama.s.sed enough air miles for an upgrade on the first commercial trip to the moon thanks to work-related travel, I am still fascinated by the off-kilter view from an airplane window as cars, buildings, cities, lakes, and even mountain ranges shrink to the size of toys like the quick reverse zoom of a telephoto lens. Harry gave me the window seat on our flight from Dulles to Heathrow on Sat.u.r.day night; he travels first cla.s.s, a sublime luxury. We took off just after ten p.m., and before long, dusky shapes melted into deeper shadows until there were only constellations of bronze and silver lights, ghost images of cities and towns and dark-edged coastlines below. After a while even those faint winking lights vanished into the depthless void of a moonless night as we turned away from Nova Scotia and headed over the North Atlantic.

Harry ordered champagne for both of us without asking me because that's the way he is. If my handsome white-haired stepfather, a traditional Southern gentleman with a moonlight-and-magnolia sense of chivalry, could wrap his arms around the women in his life-my mother, my half sister, Lexie, and me-and keep the wicked world at bay, he would do it.

He touched his champagne gla.s.s against mine. "You're welcome to come to Lingfield on Monday to watch the Winter Derby with me, kitten. The horses run on artificial turf. It ought to be a good race. You'd meet some nice people. What do you say?"

I smiled. "Thanks, Harry, but if you don't mind, I'd prefer to stay in London. See some friends, revisit old haunts."

Though Harry knew about Kevin's death, he didn't know I'd been at the monastery that day, nor did he know anything about the book, Asquith's, or my visit to Monticello yesterday. I also hadn't told him that while we were waiting at the gate at Dulles I'd received a disturbing e-mail from Zara Remington, the curator at the Chelsea Physic Garden. According to the time stamp, she'd written me at two a.m. London time.

I would very much like to meet you when you're in London. Though the garden is closed at this time of year, by exception we're open tomorrow, Sunday, for a sale of lilies in antic.i.p.ation of Easter. The sale will be finished by half three, so I can be available to see you at 4 pm. I hope this suits your schedule, but in light of the information you shared with me in your e-mail as well as further correspondence with Ryan Velis, I believe time is of the essence. I shan't let anyone know you are coming and would advise you to be similarly circ.u.mspect. Please let me know if these arrangements suit you.

I'd written her right back and said I'd see her Sunday at four and didn't plan to share that information with anyone. That included Harry. If he found out any of this, he'd insist on going with me.

"Whatever you want to do, sweetheart," he said to me now. "I just want you to have a good time."

"It's London. I'll have a wonderful time."

We got a few restless hours of sleep before they turned on the cabin lights and the flight attendant began serving breakfast. Harry had booked us at the Connaught-more luxury-and someone from the hotel met our flight at Heathrow, shepherding us to a waiting black Bentley that zipped along the motorway, eventually winding its way onto the quiet streets of Mayfair on a chilly, gray Sunday morning.

"I forgot to pack gloves. It's a lot colder than it was at home," I said to Harry as the chauffeur pulled into Carlos Place and stopped at the gla.s.s-fronted hotel entrance. A doorman in a black top hat and a smart camel overcoat opened the car door.

"Welcome to the Connaught, Mr. Wyatt, Ms. Medina."

Another doorman held the front door as Harry and I walked into the paneled lobby, where a fire burned in a small gas fireplace and the air smelled faintly of the fragrant pink and magenta roses that spilled out of a crystal vase next to the spiral staircase. A grandfather clock chimed eleven as a woman in a navy suit came toward us, holding a clipboard.

She, too, welcomed us to the Connaught in a faint Eastern European accent that I couldn't identify. "Your rooms are ready and your registration has been taken care of. You're on the fourth floor, and James, your butler, is waiting for you. He can bring you coffee or tea, if you wish, and he would be happy to unpack your bags, which are already in your room." She led us over to an elevator across from the registration desk.

When Nick and I lived in London, we occasionally stopped into the Connaught for drinks, and once I came to afternoon tea with a couple of girlfriends. But I'd never stayed in this small jewel of a hotel, and I already felt as though we were guests at a friend's posh country home. Our rooms, furnished in understated British opulence, overlooked Carlos Place and a shallow infinity pool in which two bare-branched London plane trees grew.

"That fountain is called Silence," James said as we stood at the window in Harry's room after he'd brought coffee for Harry, English breakfast tea for me, and a basket of warm scones, jam, and clotted cream on a heavy silver tray. "Every fifteen minutes a mist comes up from the base of the trees and then vanishes after fifteen seconds. At night when it's lighted, it's quite magical. But those plane trees . . ." He chuckled and shook his head. "A right mess when they're in bloom. Just ask the doormen."

James left after a.s.suring us he was available to indulge our every whim and we a.s.sured him we could unpack our own bags.

"What are your plans, kitten?" Harry set his empty coffee cup on the tray and pulled a credit card from his wallet, holding it out to me. "Why don't you go shopping? Early birthday present from your mother and me."

I closed his hand around the card. "The trip is an early birthday present and Christmas and every other holiday. Thanks, Harry. I'm just going to walk, see the sights."

He grinned. "You certainly didn't inherit your mother's shopping gene. You going to get together with anyone?"

"I called Perry DiNardo, my old boss from IPS, before I left home. He's in Istanbul but he's flying back to London tonight. We're going to meet up for lunch tomorrow. What about you? What are you going to do?"

"I might rest my eyes," he said. "Just a quick nap. Then I'm having lunch with an old friend in Covent Garden. He used to come out to Middleburg to hunt when he was with the British emba.s.sy in the sixties . . . you're welcome to join us, you know."

I kissed him. "Thanks, but if I'm not there you can talk about horses and hounds and hunting to your hearts' content. I can entertain myself . . . I'll probably just take a nostalgia tour of all the old special places."

"If that's what you want, then. Have fun." Harry knows when I'm lying, but he gave me the look that said he'd stay out of my business and respect my privacy. "What about tonight? Will you be free for dinner? I could ask James to make a reservation at the seafood place down the block. Drinks downstairs first in the Coburg Bar. What do you say?"

"That would be perfect, but if you mean Scott's, it might already be booked for this evening. That restaurant is always crowded."

Harry flashed a roguish smile. "Sweetheart, you're staying at the Connaught. If I asked James to arrange it, he'd find a way for us to have tea at Buckingham Palace."

I laughed. "Of course he would. What was I thinking?"

After living in London for more than a dozen years, I believe I'm ent.i.tled to call it home, or at least, I still feel I belong here. The doorman held the door for me and tipped his hat as I stepped outside, asking if I needed a cab or a map or directions to a particular museum or shop. I thanked him and told him I knew my way around, setting off down Mount Street and through Mayfair with its elegant banded buildings of red brick and white stone, luxury shops, quiet mews, and discreet clubs and businesses like a kid who has been turned loose in the toy store.

Let me just get it out of the way that I believe, as Samuel Johnson did, if you are tired of London, you are tired of life. As an adopted daughter of the South-Harry's grandfather and great-uncles fought with Lee and Stonewall-I grew to love Southern culture and its tradition-steeped ways, which is why I probably slipped into life in London so easily. They had a lot in common. I love this city's vibrancy and rich history, the green parks and flower-filled gardens, royal palaces and picturesque squares, the Globe Theatre, the erudition of the Times, the culture of Radio 4, dry British wit and understated humor, the pageantry of Trooping the Colour, strawberries and cream at Wimbledon, Christmas lights that turn the city into a fairyland, and bonfires on Guy Fawkes Day. I find comfort in putting the kettle on for a cup of tea, cab drivers and shopkeepers who call me "love," Big Ben chiming the hour, and I tear up when I hear a choir singing "I Vow to Thee, My Country" in Royal Albert Hall on Remembrance Day.

David Hockney-the modern British painter who decamped to California-says there's nothing wrong with photographers as long as you realize we see the world through one eye, or as he says, we're a bunch of momentarily paralyzed Cyclops. To me that implies that we miss a lot, or worse, we see the world flattened out in two dimensions, not fully formed in three. London, and Britain, for that matter, have their share of warts, which I'm not blind to-an ingrained cla.s.s structure that can be stultifying, free socialized medicine that is worth what you pay for it, overly boiled vegetables, and more descriptive ways to describe rain and gray weather than any other country on the planet. I will never understand why the British celebrate so many days with the limp, uninspired t.i.tle of bank holiday, and am still baffled by the illogical grammar of collective nouns and matching verbs so that it's correct to say, "England are winning the match."

I know they return the favor with their aversion to our loud go-big-or-go-home swagger when we travel, our gun-toting culture and accompanying violence, which scares them, the staggering cost of our health-care system, our mindless fascination with people who are famous for no logical reason, and our belief that we are at the epicenter of world politics yet most of us probably couldn't correctly fill in a map identifying the countries of the United Kingdom if our life depended on it.

But as I walked down the Sunday-quiet streets, London felt as familiar and welcoming as catching up with an old and well-loved friend. I took the side streets until I reached New Bond Street, where I lingered in front of Asquith's window and wondered if Bram had come to any conclusions about the value of Kevin's copy of Adam in Eden. At Fortnum & Mason on Piccadilly I bought tea for Grace and my landlady from a gentleman in a morning coat who called me "madam" and afterward spent half an hour roaming the floors of Hatchards bookstore, running my hand over the dust jackets of books I hadn't seen in any bookstore at home, like a lover who has been told it's the end of the affair. A pub lunch at the crowded, noisy King's Head-a pot of tea to warm my hands and then fish and chips with a pint of Fuller's-while a television blared the Chelsea versus Spurs match. When I left, Chelsea were winning.

Eventually I gave in to the sharp, cold sting of English weather and bought a pair of forest-green knit gloves and a matching cloche at a shop on Regent Street after I walked down to the outdoor market at St. James's Church, where I would have found something offbeat and cheaper, until I realized it was Sunday so it was closed. By then it was time to take the Underground to Sloane Square and make my way to my meeting with Zara Remington, about a twenty-minute walk through the quiet residential streets of Chelsea. The wind had picked up again, buffeting me and whipping the last dry autumn leaves around my feet like small cyclones. I turned up the collar of my coat, glad for the hat and gloves.

Zara Remington hadn't given me any instructions other than to show up at the garden at four o'clock, so I first tried the visitors' entrance, a locked wrought-iron gate in the middle of an ancient brick wall on Swan Walk. No one was at the kiosk inside the garden, so I walked around the corner to Royal Hospital Road and rang the bell at the staff entrance.

A slender dark-eyed man opened the door. Early thirties, maybe, with curly brown hair that ringed his face, giving him an innocent, angelic look. Though he was staring directly at me, one eye was focused at something off to my right. "I'm sorry, miss, the garden's closed. I'm afraid the Easter lily sale has finished."

"I know," I said. "I have a four o'clock appointment with Ms. Remington."

"Today?" He looked at me with interest. "And you are-?"

"Sophie Medina."

"How do you do? Will Tennant. Why don't you come in and I'll let her know you're here?" Will Tennant opened the door wider and called over his shoulder, "Zara, Sophie Medina is here to see you."

I stepped into a long, narrow anteroom dominated by a wall map of the Chelsea Physic Garden in the 1800s. Below it a wooden table held brochures and information sheets in neat piles. In a corner, the shade was pulled down at an information window across from a door with a STAFF ONLY sign.

A woman whose light brown hair was silvered with gray and done up in a windblown bun walked through a door at the far end of the hall. She wore Wellingtons and a quilted jacket over a tweed blazer and jeans as though she'd just come in from walking her spaniel across the moor. Her clothes smelled of the fresh chill of outdoors and Easter lilies, but more to the point, she didn't look happy to see me.

"Thank you, Will," she said, her tone an unmistakable dismissal. He nodded, giving me another curious c.o.c.keyed look before he left through the door she had just used. Zara Remington turned to me and added in a brisk voice, "We're just finis.h.i.+ng up with the lily sale in the gift shop. I need a moment with Will, but if you'd care to have a look around the garden, I'll join you shortly."

"Thank you."