Dead Men's s Boots

Lucas Seaforth died thirty years back, and the brothers all perished in various accidents and drunken brawls, so Myriam’s generation is the last there ever was.’

‘Ruth never married?’ I asked.

Mallisham pursed his lips. ‘Nope,’ he said. ‘She still lives out there, on the farm. The only Seaforth left. And she’s seventy years old, so she’s left it a little late to think about starting a family. But then, when you look at the kind of marriage Myriam made, you can understand her feeling a mite c£eellefhary about getting spliced herself.

‘Tucker Kale was a drunk, and a nasty drunk at that. There’s some people who say he bought Myriam off of Lucas Seaforth, cash down. I doubt it was that simple, but Lucas was a farmer and Kale ran the feed store, so I’d guess there was more of commerce than of love about the whole thing. I knew the man pretty well – my house is only half a mile from where the feed store used to be – and speaking personally, I wouldn’t have given him a kitten if my cat dropped a litter of ten.

It’s certain that he beat Myriam, and he liked to show her up in front of people, too. He was the kind of polymorphous sadist who can take his recreation intellectually as well as physically.

‘So he was another brick in the wall, so to speak. But Myriam was damaged when he got her. Her own family had already given her more hurt than anyone should ever have to take.’

He spoke with a weary finality that made me ashamed my own interest in Myriam Kale was so tangential. ‘How long were they married?’ I asked, conscious of Juliet’s scary stillness on my left-hand side.

‘Seven years, give or take.’

‘And then he was killed in a car crash.’

Mallisham shrugged. ‘If you like.’

‘If I like?’

‘Well, I told you a person’s good name was kind of an issue around here.’ He got up, pushed his chair back and went across to one of the bookcases, where he started scanning the box files with his face thrust right up close to them, holding his glasses up out of the way of his eyes as he squinted at the writing on their spines.

‘That’s what they said at the time. And sure enough, the man was found dead in his car, which was kind of a wreck, But it was kind of a wreck when he bought it, and when he drove round town in it. I didn’t ask any questions because at the time there didn’t seem any reason to doubt that things happened that way. But a long time later, after Myriam became such a celebrity and all, I took a look at that autopsy report myself.