Reach of Destiny

Untitled Part 42

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

Late Tuesday Night

Murdoch hauled himself up the staircase to his rooms, juggling a stack of mail, a report he needed to finish and a sandwich he needed to eat. Crabtree had been prescient after all: He had gone after Rocco Perri -- a 'big fish' -- and it pulled them all under. The operation at Canada Wire had obviously been tipped off. Rocco Perri escaped justice. There was no one to arrest and try for forty-four murders. He, Crabtree and Brackenreid only stopped arguing the finer points of the whole disaster after the victim's body was unearthed and Crabtree positively identified him as the man he'd been following: John Salt. It was also obvious Salt had been throttled.

He stumbled at the top of the stairs. Exhausted was too generous and benign a word for how he was now. The adrenaline ran out hours ago, leaving him spent and hollow. The explosion might or might not have been meant to kill him, but it was certainly set to cover the murder of John Salt, their direct connection to Rocco Perri. Why Salt was killed, who killed him and why the evidence was left behind or did not go up in flames was a mystery.

A building was destroyed. The mayor and control board were screaming bloody murder. The Chief Constable demanded an accounting from him. Lawsuits were in process. His job was in jeopardy. The inspector's too.

His head pounded, making these truths jab at him with each heartbeat.

His vision blurred and his usually logical mind raced in circles to nowhere -- when his thoughts weren't racing headlong toward Julia Ogden. Today's debacle wasn't bad enough -- he almost killed her in the process. His litany of sins was staggering.

He ground his teeth against the headache. All because I failed. Spectacularly.

He just about got to his bedroom when balance and surface tension in the stack in his hand gave way to the other laws of physics. One letter postmarked from the U.S. slithered out and hit the floor. His body registered the sender even before his conscious brain read the return address, heat quickly reaching his ears with prickles. His mouth went dry just looking at the fine Spenserian script he knew so well. He hesitated, his heart thudding, before drawing in a ragged breath, stooping to pick it up. His fingers trembled. Slowly he opened it.

A thin gold band fell from the envelope. Then a silver chain with a pendant slipped through his fingers, along with his last shreds of self-possession.

Dear William:

Why are you still holding on to me? I have not heard anything from my solicitor that you initiated divorce proceedings. As sorrowful as I am, I have to do what my conscience tells me the truth is -- it is time to let go. Release me. Release yourself. I know Catholics do not believe in reincarnation, but perhaps if it was not to be for us in this life, we can find each other in the next one, and try again.

You are in your rights to seek divorce. In the whole seven and a half years of our marriage, do you know I have counted it up? We were only together about eighteen months. You went away to the war so soon after we wed, and were gone three years; I have been gone another three.

You are a decent, honourable man. We both changed, but I was the one who fell out of love with you. I came to understand why you could not give affection if I could not give you love. You were never the problem, I was. I bear all the responsibility. You can prove desertion. But if you won't, then I shan't wait anymore either. I can obtain a divorce here in Nevada. It will not be easy, but it will let me let go of the past and live a full life again.

Please, William. I care for you, I do, I need for you to know this. It is the truth as well. If things had been different, if there had not been that awful war, if all those people had not died from the Spanish influenza, if we had not been separated...I think we could have tried to make it work.

So many things taught me how fleeting life is, how fleeting is happiness. For now, in my life, I must be true to myself and rejoin the living. I have recently met someone who wants to start a family with me. That is why I need to move on, away from the past, into a future of my own. If you ever loved me, and I know you once did, let me go -- for my sake and for yours.

With hope you will do this last thing for me,

--Liza

He read the salutation again. Dear William...Oh, Liza. Of course, you want a family. Deserve one, too. He dug into the wound, the pain releasing an animal sob from somewhere deep in his soul, the last tiny fragment of hope tearing away.

Too late...I am too late.

Tears collected in his eyelashes and ran down to his chin. He'd known this had to be coming, didn't he? Calling himself the worst sort of fool for feeling so shocked and unmoored by the obvious.

The great Detective Murdoch -- Who could not pick up on a clue if it bit him...

Shaking his head, he bent to pick up Liza's wedding ring from the floor. So small. So light. So much meaning.

Setting his jaw, he placed it with the silver horse pendant next to his own wedding ring on the highboy.

What does it say about me, he thought, that I am not more upset?