“But you were. I have very good hearing. It’s lucky you chose the profession you did. You would have made a very poor Indian scout.”
“I quite agree.”
“Of course some leaves are very numerous and noisy this late in the year, at least until the first rain. Then they go soft and cling to the earth until they are a part of it again.” Mr. Hyatt’s face was almost hidden by a crudely woven straw hat, the kind the Mexican pickers used. “It was that unseasonal rain in late July that prevented her from being found sooner. The leaves became soft and pliant and clung to her. And the earth claimed her for its own without us even knowing about it. You said it well at the funeral. Would you repeat it for me, please?”
“Of dust we are made and to dust we shall return.”
“Yes. Yes, even the koi here can’t live forever. But how they do try. In Japan where they are passed along from generation to generation like heirlooms, koi are much admired for their longevity and courage. One requires the other, you know. It isn’t easy to grow old. I believe the record among koi is two hundred and twenty-eight years. The magoi here, the black fellow, is already older than I am.”
“I can’t see him.”
“He’s lying at the bottom, perhaps sleeping, certainly not thinking. They’re very stupid, actually. Some people think that because they will come to the side of the pool when you clap your hands and offer them food that they are trained. Not so. They’re only eating. Watch.” Mr. Hyatt clapped his hands, then brought from his pocket some bits of what looked like dog kibble. He tossed them into the water. The brighter-colored koi came immediately to eat. Then the magoi appeared and the others moved aside to make way for him.
“Some people might think,” Mr. Hyatt said, “that they are showing respect for their elders in the Oriental tradition. Nonsense. He is simply bigger than they are. Notice the slow grace with which he moves, as if he had all the time in the world. And certainly he has a great deal, perhaps another hundred years. And what for? It doesn’t make sense. He serves no useful purpose in the scheme of things, his brain is minimal. Nature has made some dreadful errors, allowing valuable human beings to die so young, and this creature to go on and on.”
The black magoi ate a couple of pellets of food. He was as large as a turkey and had a fat sad face with two drooping whiskers on each side of his O-shaped mouth. In the center of his forehead was a spot the exact size and color of a five-dollar gold piece. The old man looked at the magoi bitterly as though he were begrudging it the years that had been taken from Annamay.
Michael said, “The fishpond at the palace is empty.”
“Yes. I emptied it myself. Raccoons ate all the goldfish. They’d get the koi too but the water is too deep. A raccoon must have water shallow enough for him to stand upright in order to catch fish.”
“Mr. Hyatt—”
“Useless,” the old man said. “Not even beautiful unless you count the gold piece on his head. All creatures become useless as they grow old. Someone should have an answer.”
“Perhaps there isn’t one.”
“You should work on it, Michael.”
“I’ll try,” Michael said. He hesitated to bring up the subject of the palace door’s being open, but decided it was necessary. “I found the door of the palace open, Mr. Hyatt.”
“You don’t mean actually open, do you? You must be referring to the fact that the Sheriff’s Department removed the seal some time ago.”
“The door was open.”
“That’s impossible. I locked it myself the day I emptied the fishpond.” The old man sounded calm enough but his hands had begun to tremble. “Did you look inside?”
“Briefly.”
“Was there evidence of an intruder?”
“Some leaves and dirt had been blown in by the wind. Whether anything is missing I don’t know.”
“Someone broke in,” the old man whispered. “Someone broke into my Annamay’s palace.”
“It’s more likely that you forgot to lock it, Mr. Hyatt.”
“No, no. I did not. People are always accusing me of forgetting this and forgetting that and sometimes they are correct. I do forget things now and then. But never, never would I forget to lock the palace.” He shook his head so vigorously that the straw hat slid down his face and fell on the grass. He didn’t seem to notice. “It is my most important duty. My son, Howard, thinks up all kinds of duties for me because he thinks they will make me happier. And I do them because that makes him happier. It is a game we play, pretending I am still of some value in this world.”
“That’s not the way—”
“Please, Michael, don’t argue the point. It would be a waste of time. I have done more thinking about this business of age than you have, perhaps more than you’ll ever have a chance to. My son and daughter-in-law love me, true. But if I died tomorrow I would leave no noticeable gap because I have no real place in the world, no real duties to perform. My only real duty is to keep the palace as Annamay left it. I allow no one in, not even Dru. Dru used to come sometimes and peer into the windows as if she thought Annamay might be in there hiding from us all. She knows better now. She was at the funeral.”
“The lock on the door is a simple one,” Michael said. “Nearly anybody could pick it.”
“Do people no longer respect a locked door?”
“I’m afraid not, Mr. Hyatt.”
“The world has become a rough place. Perhaps it is better that Annamay never found that out. To her every day was sunny, every stranger was her friend.” He put the battered straw hat back on, pulling it well down on his forehead so Michael couldn’t see the moisture in his eyes. “We’d better go and have a look at the palace. It must be kept as Annamay left it.”
Mr. Hyatt rose unsteadily from the redwood chair, refusing Michael’s offer of an arm to help him.
“Don’t,” he said sharply. “Don’t start treating me the way Howard does. I’m not decrepit. Indeed, only the other day I helped an elderly woman across the creek. I felt like a boy scout again, especially when she offered me a bouquet of flowers.”
“Did you know the woman?”
“I’ve seen her.” He nodded in the direction of the villa. “She lives over there and they say she is quite mad. But they say things about everyone. Who is to judge?”
“In this case a judge,” Michael said. “She has been declared incompetent by the court.”
“Incompetent to do what?”
“Handle her own affairs. Financial affairs, I presume.”
“Bless you, Michael. I know hundreds and hundreds of people who are incompetent to handle their own financial affairs. Pillars of society, politicians, educators, they bet on commodities like racehorses and can’t tell a stock from a bond. But are they declared incompetent? No indeed… They are reappointed, reaffirmed, reelected.”
“Miss Firenze’s incompetence goes beyond financial matters, I assure you.”
“You’ve seen her, talked to her?”
“Yes.”
The two men had begun walking toward the palace but now Mr. Hyatt stopped and grabbed Michael by the arm. “Did you ask her about Annamay?”
“Yes.”
“Did she know anything?”
“No.”
“No one knows anything. A little girl disappears and her body is not found for months. This is incompetence. Why doesn’t the court do something about this kind of incompetence?” He lowered his voice. “You and Howard are working on the case, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“I heard you talking last night when I passed the guest cottage and the windows were open.”
The previous night had been cold and Michael distinctly recalled Howard’s closing the windows on both sides. But if Mr. Hyatt chose to remember it another way there was no use correcting him.