A Dangerous Collaboration (Veronica Speedwell #4)(67)

She turned her attention to her plants, saying nothing more, her mouth set in a stubborn line.

“If someone murdered her,” I finished. “We must acknowledge the possibility that this might have happened. And if it did, who stood to benefit from her death?”

She remained silent, refusing to answer. Just then, Stoker strode into the garden.

“Good morning,” he said. “I know casual visitors are not meant to be here, but I heard voices.”

She turned in obvious pleasure, her mouth going slack when she saw the bruises on his face. “Stoker! What on earth has happened?”

“I was sleepwalking,” he told her. “A family affliction. My brother suffers from it as well.” The lie was a smooth one but it would never have fooled anyone more worldly than Mertensia Romilly.

“I have arnica in the stillroom. It will help with the bruising,” she told him.

“I am very grateful to you,” he replied.

She flushed and I rose, knowing a cue to leave when I saw one. “I should be getting on,” I murmured.

“A moment, Veronica,” she said. Her face was illumined with a sort of vitality that made her almost attractive. “You ought to see the glasswings.”

“The glasswings,” I repeated dully. My heart began to thud within my chest. “Are they here?”

She nodded, leading us to a nearby bush. “They were feeding earlier upon the lady of the night. The caterpillars eat her leaves and the grown butterflies—what do you call them?”

“Imagoes,” I replied. “Or imagines, if you prefer.”

“Imagoes, then. They feed upon the blossoms. The flowers are only open at night and they are already beginning to close. But if we are still and quiet, they may return.”

The three of us seated ourselves upon the grass, sharing the last bread roll companionably as we waited. The sky grew overcast as the minutes stretched into long passages of time. The small stars of the jasmine blossoms, mistaking it for dusk, began to fold in on themselves like maidens at prayer, closing their petal-hands together and nodding gently upon the vine. Oddly, the scent of them grew stronger as they faded, almost as if, knowing they were about to slumber, they sent out an invitation borne on the wind to come before it was too late. My head grew heavy with the fragrance of the lady of the night as it wrapped its tendrils around me, holding me fast and coaxing me into a state of torpor. I could not have moved even if I wanted to, so somnolent was I. Mertensia seemed similarly affected, her head nodding quietly upon her breast as the last bit of roll slipped from her fingers and onto the grass. A nimble squirrel leapt out to claim it and scurried back again into the shadows. Stoker stretched out upon the grass, his hands laced behind his head as his lids drooped.

My own eyelids were low when I saw the first flutter of movement. It was a suggestion, nothing more. A wisp of something upon the wind, dancing just out of the range of my perception. I snapped my head up, forcing my eyes open wide. And there it was, a glasswing, the size of a man’s hand, flapping lazily towards the Cestrum, alighting as elegantly as a queen upon the blossom. I could not breathe, could not speak, and even if I had the power, I would not have roused Mertensia or Stoker. For that moment, the glasswing was my own private little miracle.

As I watched, transfixed, another came into the little glade, moving with the same slow majesty. Another came behind, and yet another, until the shrub was full of them, their wings of clear cathedral glass fluttering languidly against the dark green of the vines. Each stood perched upon a single creamy blossom, drinking deeply, the black veins of their wings stark against the white flowers. Almost against my will, I rose and moved towards them, my footsteps noiseless in the damp grass underfoot.

They did not notice, or if they did, they did not care. They continued to drink, sipping nectar like Olympian gods. On impulse, I put out my hand, brushing gently against the vine. It shuddered lightly, upsetting the nearest glasswing. She hovered in the air, just above my fingertips, as if deciding whether to grace me with a gesture. She alighted upon my upraised hand as if bestowing a favor, her wings beating double time in case she had need of a hasty retreat. But after a moment she slowed them, walking forwards on legs as slender as lines of ink upon a page. She crept up my arm, until she reached my shoulder, perching there and spreading her wings to catch the rays of the changeable sun. For a moment, she was gilded by the flame, a perfect living jewel, and the beauty of it was more than I could bear. She would exist for so short a time, but her existence brought something irreplaceable to the world. Perhaps her beauty was all the greater for the fact that it was fleeting.

Without warning, she gave one great flap of those heavy wings and was gone, disappearing over the iron gates upon the salty sea wind. Her friends followed soon after, each taking its leave of the little glade like nuns retreating after vespers. I watched until the last of them had risen over the gates, disappearing from sight.

“Magnificent, aren’t they?” I had not heard Mertensia come to stand behind me.

I nodded, careful to keep my back to her until I had composed myself.

“Come back whenever you like,” she told me softly. “There is a spare key in the stillroom if you want to let yourself in.”

“That is very kind,” I replied.

“It isn’t kindness to give a thirsty man water,” she said. “It is human decency.”