66. Wriggling Metal
Liam called Edwin Pike's number as they strode down the corridor to the rear lot. Sally only heard half the conversation, then less as they pushed outside. To her surprise, the rain had abated. The sky was still a swirling gray, but the wind had dropped too.
Still, the lot was waterlogged, and everything dripped and trickled.
"We're in the eye," Liam said, phone down by his side.
"Not a tropical storm," Sally murmured, looking out at a darkness on the horizon, over the rooftops of Rye. "There's no eye."
"And that was a figure of speech," Liam said, heading toward the squad car. "Pike's based in Lydd. He said he'd check his records and make some calls."
"Huh," Sally said, watching the shadow on the sky. It seemed to be spreading, like a great eyelid closing over the world. "I think there's worse to come."
"Forecast agrees," Liam called, already across the lot. "Pike's waiting."
Sally got in and they drove away, pushing back through the media scrum who were now milling in the street. Tania Brown's team were ready, and broke toward their vans.
"Company," Sally said.
"Let them follow. They can hang around outside Pike's house. He'll happily lecture them on Saxon buckles and his damaged Mesolithic display case."
Sally snorted, but the humor didn't cut deep. A strange mood was coming over her, like the feeling in the air before lightning strikes. A disconnectedness. A calm.
Liam talked as he drove and she surfed the words, barely registering the content. Liam was working it through out loud, everything they knew, the whole of the trail from the reactor's missing CCTV and the Crab Shack's blind eye to Roarke Rook, Heraclitus, Cagen, Meeks, Spate, Bledd and Reg.
Secrets in the surf, washing to shore. She thought again of what Mercer had said. A storm that knew no season. The rags of time. They were poetic sentiments, beautiful even.
"Rags of time," she said, interrupting Liam's low drone as they circled down on the coast road. The sea had calmed somewhat, though the blacktop still ran with thick skins of water. "Is that a British figure of speech?"
"Rags of time? Not really. Not standard."
"Knows no season," she said. "How about that?"
"Haven't got a clue what that means. Why?"
"Something Jack Mercer said. You think it's a poem?"
"Could be. That guy's been living with the death of Richter, and his DCI, for 30 years. I don't doubt that'd make anyone reflective."
"Right." Sally went back to drifting. Liam resumed his recitation of evidence. Sound Mirrors. Lighthouses. Owlers. Nia Mensah.
Something clicked in Sally's head. For a moment she didn't quite know what it was, and remained motionless, waiting for the memory to float in on the slow tide.
She was standing at the black wall of Prospect Cottage, reeling from the tiny statuette with cockle shells for eyes, reading the poem nailed there.
She brought up her phone and ran a search.
The Sun Rising by John Donne. Published 1633, nearly 400 years ago.
She scanned the lines, some familiar, some less so: the unruly sunne, peeping on lovers, school boys and sour prentices, court huntsmen and country ants.
The final lines of the first stanza tripped her, though, and she halted to reread them carefully.
'Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.'
"They are quotes from a poem," she said, lifting her head. "The Sun Rising by John Donne."
Liam looked her way. "OK. Nice detecting. And?"
"That's the poem written on the wall of Prospect Cottage."
"Huh." He thought for a few moments. "OK. Well, it's a famous poem."
She kept reading. The next stanza was new to her, not something she'd seen on the wall.
'Thy beams, so reverend and strong
Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
But that I would not lose her sight so long;
If her eyes have not blinded thine,'
Sally stopped reading and looked up. "Now it's talking about blinded eyes."
Liam glanced back at her. "What? The poem?"
"Yeah. Right here." She read out the lines. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Liam chewed on that as they left the coast road and turned north up toward Lydd. "I don't know. I remember this poem from school, barely. One of those you deconstruct endlessly, until it barely means anything anymore and all the punch is gone. Like explaining a joke."
"It's pretty plainly about blinding eyes, though."
"Is it? Hmm, let me think." He chewed his lip. "I think it's about the guy saying his lover is hotter than the sun? Something like that. Like, her eyes are so bright they eclipse all light? Or all he needs to do is blink and the sun is eclipsed."
Sally looked at the lines again. "I'm getting strong Heraclitus vibes."
"All of Dungeness is Heraclitus vibes, Sally. The whole marsh too. It's all in flux. Look at this crazy storm. It's here, then it's gone, now it's coming back."
"True."
Sally read on, coming to the closing lines:
'Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear, All here in one bed lay.'
The words sent a shiver through her. Half of this ancient poem might be gibberish, but she immediately grasped the idea of yesterday's kings all lying in one bed.
"They're all dead and buried," she murmured.
"The kings?"
"The kings, the paupers, these school boys and sour 'prentices, whatever they are. They're all dead."
"Hakuna matata," Liam said. "The circle of life."
Sally looked at him.
"What? It's a poem, Sally, a really famous one. But OK. You're saying this blinded eye reference, it might have influenced the killer?"
"I think it's possible."
"All right." A few moments passed. "Does knowing that help us any now?"
Sally took a moment to consider then sighed. "Probably not."
"I can quote poems too," Liam said softly. "Something about going gently? Old people not dying easy. About rage and dying light."
Sally snorted. "Nicely paraphrased. That's Dylan Thomas."
"I got it from the movie 'Interstellar'. Very Heraclitus."
Now she smiled. "Order and chaos."
"Right on, sister. And, here we go."
The sign for Lydd lay ahead. Liam checked his GPS and pulled off the main road onto a residential lane. It was lined with dour-looking one-story cottages, all uniform in bright red brick, with square windows and square gardens laid to grass. Few cars sat in driveways, no garages.
"All retirement homes," she said.
"The tide comes in, the tide goes out," Liam said, craning past Sally to count the door numbers on the right-hand side. "Here it is, 53."
He parked and they got out. The black line in the distance had risen higher in the sky, like a reverse sunrise.
"The storm's nearly back," Sally said, pointing.
"Busy old fool," Liam countered, and started up the driveway.
A lace curtain in the window twitched and the door opened before Liam could knock.
There stood Edwin Pike, somehow seeming more diminutive than when they'd seen him at the museum, but still dressed and coiffed immaculately.
He wore a pressed white shirt, buttoned tight around his neck, with a sharp navy necktie featuring golden insignia Sally guessed to be from his local Rotary club.
A silk navy waistcoat and pressed khaki slacks completed the ensemble.
He met them with a warm smile. "Officers Rogers and O'Connell, welcome. I must say, I am surprised to see you. I've been following your endeavors." His smile dampened. "The tragedy on Dungeness beach. Please accept my deepest sympathies for your lost colleague."
He reached out and took both of their hands. Sally felt a knot welling in her throat. His earnestness was overwhelming.
Liam cleared his throat and answered first. "Thank you, Mr. Pike. Now, if we could discuss the matter of Reginald Rook's schooling? We are pressed for time."
"Of course, of course!" Pike bustled, his eyes twinkling. "I've laid out biscuits. I think you are going to find this quite fascinating. Please, come in."
He turned and started backward, a fast shuffle over his gray carpet. He wore burgundy slippers that made a soft shushing sound.
"Now that's raging against old age," Liam said softly.
Sally could only nod in admiration. Pike was in his late 70s and hadn't let standards slip one iota. She wiped her feet on the mat, took off her shoes and stepped gingerly inside.