I climbed through yellow mustard and purple lupine to a point from which I could look down on the house. It was a ruin. Its cracked stucco walls leaned crazily. Part of the tile roof had caved in. I guessed that it had been abandoned when water undermined its foundations. Rank geraniums rioted in the front yard, and wild oats stood fender-high around the Buick.
In the back yard, close against the wall of the house, a broad-backed man was digging a hole. The bright iron of his spade flashed now and then in the sun. I moved down the slope towards him. The hole was about six feet long by two feet wide. Lister’s head, when he paused to rest, cast a jut-jawed shadow at the foot of the stucco wall.
I sat down with the yellow mustard up to my eyes, and watched him work. After a while he took his shirt off. His heavy white shoulders were peppered with reddish freckles. The metal of his spade was losing its brightness. An hour later the hole was approximately four feet deep. Lister’s red hair was dark with sweat, and his arms were running with it. He stuck the spade into the pile of adobe he had dug, and went into the house.
I started down the hillside. A hen pheasant whirred up from under my feet. In the glazed stillness, its wings made a noise like a jet takeoff. I watched the house but there was no response, no face at the broken windows. I stepped over the sagging wire fence and crossed the back yard.
The door hung open on what had been a back kitchen. Its floor was littered with broken plaster which crunched under my feet. Through the bare ribs of the ceiling daylight gleamed. The silence was finely stitched with a tiny tumult of insects. I thought I could hear the murmur of voices somewhere; then the sound of heavy footsteps moved towards me through the house.
I had my revolver ready. Lister came through the inner doorway, carrying a burlap bundle upright in his arms. His head was craned awkwardly sideways, watching his feet, and he failed to see me until I spoke.
“Hold it, gravedigger.”
His head came up, eyes wide and blue in the red sweat-streaked face. His reaction was incredibly quick and strong. Without losing a step he came forward, thrusting his bundle out at arm’s length into my face. I fired as I went down backwards with the burlap thing on top of me. I pushed it off. It was heavy and stiff, like refrigerated meat. One of Lister’s heels stamped down on my gun hand, the other came into my face. The daylight in the ceiling glimmered redly and died.
When my eyes blinked open, sunlight stabbed into them from the open door. One of my arms was numb, pinned under the thing in the burlap shroud. I disengaged myself from its embrace and sat up against the wall. The rumor of insects sounded in my head like small-arms fire between the heavy artillery of my pulse. I sat poised for a while between consciousness and unconsciousness. Then my vision cleared. I dabbed at my swollen face with my usable hand.
My revolver lay on the floor. I picked it up and spun the cylinder: its chambers had been emptied. Still sitting, I dragged the burlap bundle towards me and untied the twine that held its wrapping in place. Peeling the burlap down with a shaky hand, I saw a lock of black wavy hair stiff with blood.
I got up and unwrapped the body completely. It was the body of a woman who had been beautiful. Its beauty was marred by a depressed contusion which cut slantwise like a groove across the left temple. Bending close, I could also see a pair of purplish ovals on the front of the throat. Thumbprints.
Her skin shone like ivory in the light from the doorway. I covered her with the burlap. Then I noticed that my wallet was lying open on the floor. Nothing seemed to be missing from it, but the photostat of my license was halfway out of its holder.
I went through the house. It was a strange place for a honeymoon, even for a honeymoon that ended in murder. There were no lights, and no furniture, with the exception of some patio furniture – canvas chairs and a redwood chaise with a ruptured pad – in what had been the living room. This room had a fairly weatherproof ceiling, and was clearly the one that Lister and his wife had occupied. There were traces of a recent fire in the fireplace: burned fragments of eucalyptus bark and a few scraps of scorched cloth. The ashes were not quite cold.
I crossed the room to the wooden chaise, noticing the marks of a woman’s heels in the dust on the floor. In the dust beside the chaise someone had written three words in long sloping script: Ora pro nobis. The meaning of the phrase came back to me across twenty years or more. Ora pro nobis. Pray for us. Now and in the hour of our death….
For a minute I felt as insubstantial as a ghost. The dead woman and the living words were realer than I was. The actual world was a house with its roof falling in, dissolved so thin you could see the sunlight through it.
When I heard the car noise outside, I didn’t believe my ears. I went to the front door, which stood open. A new tan Studebaker was toiling up the overgrown lane under the eucalyptus trees. It stopped where the Buick had been, and Harlan got out.
I stood back behind the door and watched him through the crack. He approached cautiously, his black glance shifting from one side to the other. When his foot was on the lintel, I showed myself and the empty gun in my hand. He froze in midstride, with a rigor that matched the dead woman’s.
“For heaven’s sake, put that gun down. You gave me a dreadful start.”
“Before I put it down, I want to know how you got here. Have you been talking to Lister?”
“I saw him at noon, you know that. He told me about this place he used to own. I didn’t get out on the street in time to intercept you. Now put the gun away, there’s a good fellow. What on earth happened to you?”
“That can wait. I don’t understand yet why you’re here.”
“Wasn’t that the plan, that I should join you here? I rented a car and got here as soon as I could. It took me a long time to find this place. And no wonder. Are they inside?”
“One of them is.”
“My sister?” His hand grasped my arm. The long white fingers were stronger than they looked, and they were hard to shake off.
“You tell me.”
I took him through the house to the back kitchen. Pulling back the burlap that covered the damaged head, I watched Harlan’s face. It didn’t change. Not a muscle moved. Either Harlan was as cold as the cadaver, or deliberately suppressing his emotion.
“I’ve never seen this woman before.”
“She’s not your sister? Take a good long look.” I uncovered the body.
Harlan averted his eyes, his cheeks flushing purple. But his look came creeping sideways back to the body.
I had to repeat the question to make him hear. He shook his head. “I never saw her before.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“You don’t seriously think I’d refuse to identify my own flesh and blood?”
“If there was money in it.”
He didn’t hear me. He was fascinated by the uncovered body. I replaced the burlap and told him what had happened, cutting it short when I saw he wasn’t interested.
I took him to the front room and showed him the writing in the dust.
“Is that your sister’s handwriting?”
“I couldn’t possibly tell.”
“Look closely.”
Harlan squatted, leaning one arm on the chaise. “It’s not her writing.”
“Did she know Latin?”
“Of course. She taught it. I’m surprised that you do.”
“I don’t, but my mother was Catholic.”
“I see.” Rising awkwardly he stumbled forward on one knee, obliterating the writing.
“Damn you, Harlan!” I said. “You’re acting as if you murdered her yourself.”