above it displaying Killian’s butterfly collection, each specimen carefully pinned to its backboard. A neat, handwritten paper data label beneath each detailed when and where it had been obtained. Enzo noted that with Killian’s usual attention to detail, they were arranged in taxonomic order.
“What’s in the filing cabinet?”
“All his entomological records. Photographs in plastic sleeves arranged in date order in clip folders, and all his leather-bound notebooks. He noted every insect he ever caught. All described and identified. Or not. Apparently around one million insects have already been officially identified, but they think there may be as many as five million that have not. That seems to be the appeal for the amateur, that you could actually discover a previously unidentified species of insect.” He caught her eye and she smiled. “Which would leave me quivering with apathy, I’m afraid.”
Enzo laughed. “Is it worth my while going through them?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Only you can judge that. But no one else has ever found anything of interest among them.”
“Did the police look at all this stuff at the time?”
Jane sighed and folded her arms. “Well, they did. But not very carefully. I’m afraid they didn’t take my account of Papa’s phonecall very seriously. I think they just thought I was some hysterical woman, distraught by the murder of her father-in-law and the death of her husband, and that I was exercising an overactive imagination.” She blew air out through pursed lips, exasperated still after all these years. “They were so keen to pin it on Kerjean, they simply took Papa’s calls as an affirmation that he knew the man was coming for him.”
Enzo regarded her with interest. “And what do
you
think, Mrs. Killian?”
“Oh, God, don’t call me that. It makes me sound like some old dear. It’s Jane.”
Enzo grinned. “Okay, Jane.” He paused. “So do you believe that it was Kerjean who did it?”
She shook her head. “I really don’t know. Everyone on the island seems to think so. I went to his trial. I sat in court day after day and listened to the evidence, and watched him in the dock. And I have to say, if I’d been on the jury I wouldn’t have convicted him either.” She looked down and scuffed at the floor with the toe of her high top. “But, you know, even if the evidence had been compelling, something about it wouldn’t have felt right. I don’t know how to explain that.” She looked up and met his eye very directly. “It just didn’t fit, somehow, with the call I got from Papa that night.”
Enzo nodded thoughtfully, then turned back to the work desk. “So what was it here that I should see?”
“Oh, yes.” She snapped out of a reverie that had propelled her back in time through nearly half her lifetime. “The poem.” She nodded toward the wall above the rows of display cases.
A piece of poetry, handwritten in a careful script, was pressed behind glass in a fine, black frame. Enzo canted his head to one side and looked at it in confusion. “It’s hanging upside down.”
“That’s exactly how it was when I got here. The poem’s been there for years. I never paid it much attention. But it was always hung the right way up before.”
Enzo reached for it. “May I?”
“Of course.”
He lifted the frame from the wall and saw that it had simply been turned the other way round and re-hung, as if Killian had wanted to draw attention to it.
“It was a favourite of his. I have no idea why. He wrote it out himself to frame and hang on the wall.”
Enzo adjusted his reading glasses and scanned the lines.
This day relenting God
Hath placed within my hand
A wondrous thing; and God
Be praised. At his command,
Seeking his secret deeds
With tears and toiling breath,
I find thy cunning seeds,
O million-murdering Death.
I know this little thing
A myriad men will save,
O Death, where is thy sting?
Thy victory, O Grave?
The
“What’s in the filing cabinet?”
“All his entomological records. Photographs in plastic sleeves arranged in date order in clip folders, and all his leather-bound notebooks. He noted every insect he ever caught. All described and identified. Or not. Apparently around one million insects have already been officially identified, but they think there may be as many as five million that have not. That seems to be the appeal for the amateur, that you could actually discover a previously unidentified species of insect.” He caught her eye and she smiled. “Which would leave me quivering with apathy, I’m afraid.”
Enzo laughed. “Is it worth my while going through them?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Only you can judge that. But no one else has ever found anything of interest among them.”
“Did the police look at all this stuff at the time?”
Jane sighed and folded her arms. “Well, they did. But not very carefully. I’m afraid they didn’t take my account of Papa’s phonecall very seriously. I think they just thought I was some hysterical woman, distraught by the murder of her father-in-law and the death of her husband, and that I was exercising an overactive imagination.” She blew air out through pursed lips, exasperated still after all these years. “They were so keen to pin it on Kerjean, they simply took Papa’s calls as an affirmation that he knew the man was coming for him.”
Enzo regarded her with interest. “And what do
you
think, Mrs. Killian?”
“Oh, God, don’t call me that. It makes me sound like some old dear. It’s Jane.”
Enzo grinned. “Okay, Jane.” He paused. “So do you believe that it was Kerjean who did it?”
She shook her head. “I really don’t know. Everyone on the island seems to think so. I went to his trial. I sat in court day after day and listened to the evidence, and watched him in the dock. And I have to say, if I’d been on the jury I wouldn’t have convicted him either.” She looked down and scuffed at the floor with the toe of her high top. “But, you know, even if the evidence had been compelling, something about it wouldn’t have felt right. I don’t know how to explain that.” She looked up and met his eye very directly. “It just didn’t fit, somehow, with the call I got from Papa that night.”
Enzo nodded thoughtfully, then turned back to the work desk. “So what was it here that I should see?”
“Oh, yes.” She snapped out of a reverie that had propelled her back in time through nearly half her lifetime. “The poem.” She nodded toward the wall above the rows of display cases.
A piece of poetry, handwritten in a careful script, was pressed behind glass in a fine, black frame. Enzo canted his head to one side and looked at it in confusion. “It’s hanging upside down.”
“That’s exactly how it was when I got here. The poem’s been there for years. I never paid it much attention. But it was always hung the right way up before.”
Enzo reached for it. “May I?”
“Of course.”
He lifted the frame from the wall and saw that it had simply been turned the other way round and re-hung, as if Killian had wanted to draw attention to it.
“It was a favourite of his. I have no idea why. He wrote it out himself to frame and hang on the wall.”
Enzo adjusted his reading glasses and scanned the lines.
This day relenting God
Hath placed within my hand
A wondrous thing; and God
Be praised. At his command,
Seeking his secret deeds
With tears and toiling breath,
I find thy cunning seeds,
O million-murdering Death.
I know this little thing
A myriad men will save,
O Death, where is thy sting?
Thy victory, O Grave?
The
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