The Lady, or the Tiger?
Chapter 20: In the Shadow of the Tiger_T
Hearing his slow, heavy, breaths, attesting to the depth of his sleep, Julia had gotten quietly out of their bed, tiptoed around it to turn off William's alarm, and then tiptoed out to wake William Jr. and ready him for the day. The gift she gave the man she loved was only a half an hour of extra sleep, but "William's night had been hard," she reminded herself with a sigh, home late from risking investigating Davies Slaughterhouse, once again after it had closed! That same horrid, reeking place where he had faced death, precariously, painfully, while hanging from a meathook, all of that confronted all over again. And then afterwards, as her psychiatry training would have predicted, he had had disturbing nightmares, undoubtedly triggered by doing much the same thing that he had done back when he and Constable Jackson had gotten caught the first time – back when she was pregnant with William Jr. – her being pregnant again this time only adding to the facts that tightly aligned the associations encountered with his experiences last night to the original trauma.
The half an hour spent, with her beautiful 'Little One' dressed and sent down to the playroom with Claire-Marie to build his Daddy "a surprise" with his 'Never Lego' blocks before breakfast, she sighed, for it was time to wake William.
"Such lovely low light in their bedroom this time of day," she noticed, as she quietly closed the door behind her. William had rolled over, his black hair peeked out of the top of the covers, stark against the white of his pillow.
Her deep breath added fuel to the glow she felt in her chest, and she paused in the warm sensations of being content for the moment. Her eyes glanced to the window. She would see the day, she thought as she pulled her nightgown off over her head, tossing it to the bed as she walked across their bedroom floor, and her naked skin felt the first brush of the colder air waft in all around her.
Her surprised gasp fluttered into the room as she drew the curtain back, "It had snowed!" the sight captured her, the soft pillowy whiteness everywhere, blanketing the ground, striping all the crisscrossed tree branches, fresh and breathtaking, the whole scene rosied by the dawn light.
Her mind imagined playing in that snow, with William and their little son. "A sled," she thought…
Peripheral, just at the corner of her eye, she must have caught his movement, and Julia knew William was 'looking.' Oh, how she loved it when he 'looked,' the thrill charged through her body. She hadn't noticed until that moment, but her hand been lovingly stroking and caring and soothing the tiny baby growing inside of her. She wondered to herself again if the newspaper acclaimed 'bump' was nothing more than her having had worn an unbecoming dress that day, that and her deciding to start wearing looser corsets. She imagined William admiring her shape. A hint of a wicked smile curled on her lips, unnoticed by her husband who was 'looking' elsewhere.
"Oddly fetching, is it not, this little Murdoch Bump?" she broke the silence in the room, tweaking that place directly down low in his primal zone as she turned to him and gave him a seductive wiggle, her bosoms penduously jiggling and bouncing, just a bit behind the motion.
Caught – no denying it, William accepted the unspoken charges, his bedroom eyes lifting to meet hers. Just at the edge, in the back of his mind somewhere behind the delight of heightening arousal, a memory tickled… Similar words, same gesture, from his sultry wife then too, "It's oddly fetching…" he heard her say it, and then the memory landed, "It was the corset!" Yes, the deadly corset, right before it nearly squeezed all of the life out of her, a wave of guilt bolted through him, as William also remembered that HE had not noticed, thus putting her in grave danger, going to get hot chocolate, the unexpected knock at the door of their hotel suite the stimulus that had caused the corset to constrict, HIM happily just walking away from her while she gasped like a dying fish out of water, then being utterly shocked upon seeing her so helpless down on the floor…
Meanwhile, inside her head, Julia was fighting the urge to go to him, to tempt him into making love. She reminded herself as much as her husband, "I'm afraid we do not have time, detective," her tone flirtatious despite the meaning of her words. "The price of the extra sleep, I suppose," she added, intending to lighten the blow with an endearing wrinkle at the corner of her mouth.
She received his nod.
William tossed the covers aside and took a deep breath before rising. He reached up and rubbed his pillow-mushed hair at the back of his head. "The extra sleep was lovely," he said, and then he made her chuckle, for he gave her his full-face-wrinkled 'doubting-it' look, when he added, "Expensive though."
Approaching him, for it was safe now, the two of them in agreement that they would not be indulging this morning, Julia's shadow covered him as she walked across the room to him, as a shadow can do when it is long from the light so low in the sky. Next to him, she held her hand out. He took it and stood before her, then wrapped his arms around her, sternly reminding himself NOT to become aroused, for his gorgeous wife was naked, and they had not… and they usually did, and so it would be tempting.
)
Downstairs, the Murdoch's enjoyed breakfast in their kitchen. The Tiger Rose bloom added cheer to the center of the kitchen table, soft and lush, now two days old, but still beaming its beauty out into the world. William read one of two papers Eloise had brought for him, a tradition he and the housekeeper shared, only more than one newspaper if the headlines were particularly of interest. Eloise was busy in the background, at the stove, readying utensils and such, serving. It was Friday and her employers were Catholic, so there would be no bacon or sausage today. She had decided on French Toast and Fried Eggs. The smells in the air were delicious.
As Eloise placed the maple syrup down on the table, Julia had a thought, taking a quick glance over at William. Her husband seemed wholly involved in reading the paper. There was an inhale, the thoughts beginning to connect in her head, and she found herself feeling grateful for the timing, the syrup reminding her that there would not be any pork today, no bacon with their French Toast. And thus, William would not have to contend with, at least not for today, his possible return of an aversion to eating pork. She wondered if he had thought about it himself, if William had worried about being reminded, in such a specific way, by finding himself nauseated about the thought of eating the meat on his plate, the flesh that he would never be able to unknow, so viscerally, resulted from such a torturous and horrendous end. She remembered then that he had told her he had left his plans for his electric gun invention for her cousin Jonathan… and that thought sent her down a whole other trajectory, about the irony of the astounding coincidences there could be in the world, for Jonathan Ogden was HER cousin, and he was also the same man who owned the vile meatpacking plant in Chicago where William had ended up working undercover while searching for clues in a case… A deep breath…
Eloise interrupted, placing their plates down. Surprisingly quickly, the sight of food on the plate, her mind resumed its quest. William had left the plans for his electric gun with her cousin because he had been devastated by having been the one, the first man, to get the pig on the meatpacking line. William had been the one to put the innocent, unsuspecting, but already frightened, animal's hind foot into the chain that would lift it, upside-down, hoisting it into the air, breaking its bones and ripping open its joints, sending the animal into an agonous and hopeless attempt to free itself, killing William's soul each time with its bloodcurdling screams, and rendering the animal helpless for the slaughter that took too long to come, too long to come. Julia found herself sickened, and dominoing thoughts began piling up behind this one, for she had decided to stop it there, to push the rest of the thoughts away, her final reflection on the matter back to a conclusion, grateful that today was a Friday, and there was not any bacon on those two plates.
Eloise asked her, "Will Master Murdoch be having syrup?" Her mistress' pretty blue eyes lifted out of her thoughts.
The housekeeper held the syrup in one hand, and a bowl of soapy water and a cleaning cloth in the other, the older woman wisely prepared for a 'yes' should it come.
Picturing the answer more than thinking it, Julia saw their little son sitting next to her instead of in his baby high chair, his little feet kicking away as he happily ate his syrupy French Toast with them.
"Yes, but…" she turned to William, "Um…"
He lowered the paper, it occurring to him at that moment that he should share the headlines with her.
"William, could you please get the booster seat you made for William Jr.?" she requested, thinking it was about time to give it a try.
She could see in William's eyes that he had reservations. A twinge of worry surged through her, alerting her that they had moved into potential disagreement territory… "William could be so rigid," her brain reminded. She steeled herself, William seeing her face grow stern and her chin lift into that strong, stubborn position he knew so well.
He exhaled in an effort to bear with, to lessen, the sudden pressure. "Julia…" his tone suggested he was trying for being reasonable, and unfortunately, whenever he did this it made her feel like he was implying that she was the opposite, that she had been overcome by some sort of female hysteria that was threatening to explode. "The boy is not yet out of nappies," William laid out his main line of defense.
Of course, that was true. The toddler sat there at this very moment wearing nappies, and the topic of toilet-training had only recent been such an ordeal, and the pressure in the room ramped up even higher.
Oh dear… Julia put her fork down…
An extra vibration seemed to hum in the air, as if the shadows of the swirling storm clouds were fanning across the ground.
She felt his eyes on her, everyone's eyes on her, as she gazed down at her plate. Julia counseled herself to take a deep breath, the oxygen making more things possible in her mind. She felt it – the compassion re-filling her heart, as the memory fired in the forefront of her mind of their working this whole thing through a few days ago in her office at the University. Julia's eyes lifted to focus on the Tiger Rose in the center of the table. She swore she felt William's eyes follow her there.
Julia swallowed, and told herself to soften, to trust, to trust him. After a deep breath she turned and reached out for his hand. Sitting as they did here at their kitchen table, around a corner from each other, his left hand the one she held, she always – always, found herself awed by discovering his wedding ring, "So rare, a man who chooses to wear one." She remembered that William had mentioned his concern about his decision to wear the symbolic ring when he first put it on his finger – typical of William it was NOT that he was disappointed that other women would know he was taken and therefore would consider him out of bounds for their flirtations… inside, a little chuckle, for SHE was grateful for just that, and if William had thought about it, she figured, HE would have been too. No, it was because he feared "suspects would know he had a wife," and William worried that there was a chance that that "could lead to putting her in danger." He had never said it specifically, but James Gillies somehow seemed omnisciently present in the shadows of such a worry.
"Julia…" William called.
Her striking blue eyes jumped up from his ring on his finger to his big brown eyes.
An apology wrinkle of her face, sorry for getting off track, it warmed them both even more.
William, too, had remembered, with the help of the Tiger Rose, their conversation about William Jr.'s stage of development and their toddler son's toilet-training troubles.
Julia leaned even closer to her husband, her voice low, giving intimacy. "We need to trust, to remember, to have confidence, that our little boy will master many things as he grows up. One is getting out of nappies…" she waited for his nod, grateful that he gave it without reluctance. She went on, elaborating, letting the hopes and expectations of a parent for their child dream forward, "He will learn to read, to write, to ride a bike, to do math… Knowing his father, very complicated math," she giggled. "He will learn to play sports and chess. And William, he will learn all these things and much, much, more in tandem, not necessarily mastering one before he can move on to the other. He will get out of his nappies, and he will master sitting at the table and eating with a fork as well…" Julia saw William's face already moving into the 'admitting-it' wrinkle and she smiled. "These accomplishments will not all be strictly mastered in the order we might expect, and not all at the same time, hmm?" she asked, already knowing his answer.
"Very good," he said, and then he put his newspaper down and pushed away from the table. He would go get the riser seat. William Jr. would eat at the table this morning – or at least try.
The detective paused behind his wife's chair and leaned down close to her ear. "He whispered something sweet," Eloise was sure of it, for whatever it was the detective had said to his wife, it rosied the doctor's face.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw as he walked away, Eloise at the stove shaking her head to herself. "The woman was privy to so much," William thought to himself, and then he surprised himself, because he felt an expansion in his heart, and he knew he was grateful for having Eloise in their lives, in their family.
)
His mother had been right, William Jr. was ready for this step. His yummy French Toast cut-up for him on the plate in front of him, a small amount of syrup making it sticky and sweet, he poked each tiny golden piece with his fork and managed to get it to his mouth with surprisingly little mess – for a first-time endeavor.
Satisfied things were going well with William Jr.'s fork-eating at the table experience, Julia asked about the newspaper headlines, and William instantly frowned.
"That bad?" she asked holding in her urge to chuckle.
He took a deep breath…
And she supposed so.
The crinkly sound of the paper opening in front of him prepared her, before he read, "Body Dumper Hacks Both Victim and Detective."
"Ouch," she replied.
He frowned again, then melted into that lovely 'admitting-it' face, erupting her into a warm laugh.
"And the other…?" she asked.
William switched the other newspaper from the bottom to the top. "They went with your idea," he gave her credit. Then he held the paper up for her to read it, which she did out loud…
"Return of Body Dumper Stumps Murdoch," she said, "I see," she agreed making the connection to her use of "stump" as the pun yesterday in anticipation of what was to come.
Julia turned back to William Jr. "You're almost finished, Little One," she encouraged. Then she reached for the damp cloth, readying for the cleaning task to come.
With a sigh, she turned back to William and said with a glance at the newspaper, "I suppose it was to be expected."
He clamped his lips together and nodded. Nothing now to do but prove them wrong, William's mind moved forward.
"Shall we share a cab…" he invited her company, "Surely there will be no bicycling today with the snow."
"Why, that would be lovely, detective," she replied with that flirty lilt that somersaulted his insides.
"Good," he answered.
And so the day began.
) (
Returning from his interviews of the workers at Davies Slaughterhouse, William stopped at the stationhouse front desk to retrieve his messages. The manager at Davies would not be in until the afternoon, so he could not completely rule out any suspicions that Davies Slaughterhouse was involved with their victim until then. William rubbed at his brow, his eyes glancing to his empty office. He had learned that the missing man he had thought might be their chopped-up victim had shown up for work this morning, rendering that line of enquiry a likely dead end. William paused for a second, trying to decide whether he was glad or disappointed about that particular turn of events in the case, his gut feeling relieved to be free of dealing with the vile place, the disturbing memories. "Irrelevant," his logical mind insisted, and he turned back to the facts as they were.
He could see his blackboard through the glass, tilted away from both the bullpen and the window to ensure that the clues he had gathered were not readily available to onlookers, newspaper reporters and such. A flicker of the memory appeared in his mind of the chalky word "Pucker Fish" written on that same blackboard in his own hand… At the time the mistake giving away the murder weapon, the memory re-stirring feelings of regret and momentary stupidity. He pushed himself to move on, wishing he had more to go on…
And with that, he was already halfway to the morgue.
)
William could tell Julia had completed the postmortem as soon as he came into the morgue. She was at her desk and the body… body pieces, waited, covered with a sheet on the morgue slab. He felt a wave of optimism flow through his body. She would have something to show him.
He greeted her, hat in hand, "Doctor," with a nod, "What have you?" he asked. Julia truly was a stunning woman, he noticed as she looked up at him from her desk.
She gathered up her papers and placed them into the case folder and closed it up. Standing as a signal she was ready to begin, William hurriedly took off his coat and hung it on her coatrack, left his hat on her desk, and followed her as she walked him to the body. Out ahead of him down the steps into the morgue theater, she started, "When I examined what we have of his hands, I discovered a break in the neck of the fifth metacarpal… That would be the little finger," she added to make sure he understood. "Of his right hand…" she continued.
William knew there was more and so he simply nodded.
"The injury occurred before he was killed, but just barely, I would think…" Julia's eyes dropped down to William's right hand.
Instantly William felt the remembered sensation of the pain, and Wham, the memory slammed into his mind, tightening his jaw, curling his knuckles. He remembered it all so clearly, Darcy Garland's words, malicious and spiteful in his face, "Now, if she wants to dally with you, detective, I won't stop her. But, if she's going to act like a whore, she might as well be labelled…" It still amazed him the strength of the sweet oozing through his whole body from the satisfaction of knocking that arrogant toff to the ground with a good, solid PUNCH…!
By the time William looked back into Julia's face, his one hand rubbing the exact spot she had described in the victim on his other hand, William knew from the expression on her face that she, too, had made the same association. It caused him to wrinkle a corner of his mouth, for at least a part of him was sorry.
She leaned in close and cupped his cheek. "It had been their first BIG fight," she reminded herself with a sigh, then, so lovely, later that night in his office, talking so much through, spending the night together on his reclining chair.
William clamped his lips together, and then wrinkled his gorgeous face once more, and Julia felt the ache of her heart stretching to fit even more love for him inside of it. There was a little tickle of a reminder that such intense moments as this one tended to become quickly uncomfortable for William Henry Murdoch, and so she took a deep breath and prepared to shift.
Enough of that, he focused back to the stump of an arm on the morgue slab.
Mind to the case, Julia explained, her voice professional in tone, "This is a common fracture seen in professional boxers, detective – the result of punching an immovable object. As our victim here had multiple older fractures of a similar nature, I would venture to suggest that he was a man who spoke with his fists."
"Or he was a boxer?" William offered.
Tentacles of the shared memory instantly charged through them both as a sly smile grew on Julia's face. "You do remember the large and vigorous size of a boxer's arms in that early case, detective," she teased.
He cleared his throat, "Of course, this man lacks the accompanied musculature," he gave, making an effort to avoid her play, to stay on course.
Her peek up at him rang seductive as she said, "Though, not all well-built men are boxers…" her pause gave time for her eyes to drop ever so subtly down to his chest before they returned to meet his and she went on, "I would contend that all boxers are very likely well-built men."
"I concur," he responded, already itchy to get back to the case, "And so, our victim was not likely a boxer, but perhaps a bit of a bully. Um, was there anything else of interest?" he pressed.
Julia frowned.
She saw the reaction, a look of worry on his face, and she knew, with an internal giggle, that William was so focused on the case that he had misinterpreted her disappointment, a disappointment which was with his tedious focus on the case rendering him oblivious of her flirting, and instead was thinking that she had found a disturbing complication with the evidence at hand.
Her voice brightened as she informed, "There was something quite interesting…"
And William perked up.
She shifted the two of them down lower along the assembled pieces of the body, and then lifted the cover sheet away from the bottom left corner to reveal a grayed lower leg, complete with foot, chopped off at the knee. She had left it underside facing up. "Here…" her point guided his eyes to a mark behind what was left of the victim's knee.
William leaned closer and studied the mark intently. "An injection site, doctor?" he asked, impressing her, for it was, but it was an odd one.
"Yes," she replied, and then added the details, "But, if it is, it was made with an unusually large needle. And see here…" they both tilted their heads closer as she circled her index finger around the center of the wound, "All this bruising around it…"
William interrupted her, his wide eyes drawing her to look into his face, "Much like when the hilt of a knife bruises around a stab wound…"
"Exactly," she said, with a breathlessness to her saying it that lured at him, as her big blue eyes caught his and darted back and forth, deepening into his. "Very observant, detective," she complimented.
Inside, her little giggle sparkled as he frowned, her subtle flirtations mere distractions.
She smiled and lowered her attention back to the wound. "The syringe would have been applied with quite a strong force," she shook her head, "I'm not sure… I find I'm a bit puzzled by it, actually. Well, I'm not sure how he could have been so badly bruised by it…?"
William's mind did what it did sometimes, bolting off in multiple directions all at once. There were similarities, feint ones, but similarities nonetheless, between this body and the one dumped on their property months ago - both having strange bruises on their legs. Annoying, the niggles he felt, for he had been unable to make anything significant out of the clue from that oddly-shaped bruise on the first victim's thigh, and he felt a waft of insecurity as he thought to himself that he might fail with respect to this clue as well.
His attention turned back to his wife, trying to push aside his doubts, blaming the newspaper headlines and telling himself they simply did what was necessary to sell papers.
"Perhaps he accidently backed into the syringe?" Julia had gotten to wondering.
"Or maybe he was thrown into it?" William suggested with a face wrinkle. And his mind raced to another memory, of that Stationhouse #5 copper – Constable Townsend, fighting with a fellow constable behind a bar… "Oh yes, the victim – Constable Cooper – "Coop," had confronted Townsend about his raping a young Chinese girl…" And Townsend had flung the man into some glass which had stabbed through Cooper's femoral artery… Amazing, another wound on the victim's leg as the clue! William remembered, it was the killer's efforts at saving the victim – making a tourniquet out of his shoe string, which had left a bruise above the stab wound. That had been the clue that had gotten him caught in the end.
Julia had seen William's expression change. Knowing his mind was elsewhere, she had waited. As William's eyes grounded, him now looking back at her, she added, "The track of the needle angles downward and goes right into the popliteal artery at the back of the knee, ultimately entering the blood vessel at a nearly parallel angle, so that whatever was in the syringe would have entered his bloodstream very quickly…"
William exclaimed, "Cause of death?!"
"Possibly," she answered. Julia puffed up, her pride showing, and told, "The maggots… Um, the same ones we used to determine that the body had been left somewhere warm enough to have flies in the midst of a cold winter…"
William nodded. "Yes doctor, the ones that led me to the horse stables slaughterhouses in the first place," he said.
She smiled and returned his nod, "Yes, detective. Well, the maggots would have ingested whatever was injected into the victim's body…" She smiled seeing that he was impressed. "I've sent some of the maggots along with a blood sample to a colleague at the University. It will probably be a few days…"
"Quite good, doctor," William beamed. His balloon deflated quickly though as he started to summarize the findings in his mind, for there was not much to go on right now, and William Murdoch was not one who liked waiting around for results.
He asked, "Is there anything else?" trying not to show his disappointment because she had more than held up her end. She knew him too well though, and he could tell that she could tell that he was hoping for more, and so he wrinkled a corner of his mouth at her admitting it, and then wrinkled up more of his face to tell her he was sorry.
"I'm afraid that's all," she gave him his answer.
He took a deep breath, and his eyes strayed back to her desk up through the glass windows, to his hat and his coat. He clamped his lips at her, gave her a polite bow, "Very good," he said.
It was amazing that these two could still be awkward…
Julia considered stepping out of character, trying to comfort him…
William thought about letting her…
Boom, he was up the steps, coat and hat in hand, and heading for the door.
"You're welcome, detective," she called after him.
He halted, turned back. "Yes… um, yes. Thank you doctor," he gave. And then he said, "I'll, uh, I'll see you at home… um, for dinner…" making her smile.
"Yes," she answered. And as the big morgue door banged shut and he was gone she thought, "Thankfully still absent of pork," and she washed her hands at the sink and got back to work.
) (
There was something rare about the way the man's mind worked – it completely marveled her sometimes. And so it was that evening when she came to look in on William tucking their little son into bed. Julia Ogden found herself wholly mesmerized as, in the dim light from the little lamp beside William Jr.'s bed, William placed his hands up above the lampshade and the man created a menagerie of magic up on the ceiling for his young son. William Murdoch could make astounding animal shadow puppets, she awed.
She stood there, unseen in the doorframe of William Jr.'s bedroom, and a part of herself told her that she should not be surprised – he was brilliant, and creative, and insightful like none other, and William saw the world in so many different dimensions all at once, some of which she wondered if anyone else in the world would ever grasp. Pendrick… Tesla… Edison…" came to mind. "Perhaps," she thought. But her husband, this man, he was also uniquely masterful with his hands… and, it turns out, his heart.
William was in the midst of telling his son a bedtime story as the animals growled, and talked, and flew and ran and danced and cried and sang and much, much, more up on the ceiling, each shadow puppet morphing into the next one in the story. Julia saw the elephant first, William placing one hand atop of the other, the top one with the fingers creating the long curving downward slope of the elephant's face, and then under it the second hand making the trunk, drooping it low. His bottom thumb opened slightly away from the hand to make the elephant's mouth, and he held two fingers split apart – and behold, up on the ceiling, a magnificent elephant with two perfect tusks! The story he told was of a herd of elephants, led by their wise and grandmotherly matriarch, "going on a journey far and long. So long in fact, that some of the youngest elephants would barely make it that far. Thus, that was the matriarch's dilemma, to decide whether or not it was worth the risk to travel so far to a vaguely-remembered watering hole during such a dry and parched drought."
"But remember, hidden off in the bushes, at the edges…" William alerted that the story would change.
And William Jr.'s eyes grew wide and he ducked down deeper into his blankets, staring off at a specific corner of the ceiling. The story had already told what it was that was hiding there.
And from the moment it appeared, Julia recognized it as being recurring, significant – the tiger.
William told that "the tiger lurked and watched, always contemplative, always learning, with a hint of danger in the air, but also offering insight, insight that was profoundly balanced against the risk of encountering it. The tiger differs from the lion, not only in its stripes, but also in its solitude. Lions are social, their lives built around being a part of the network of their pride, much like the elephants, and the deer with their herds, and the wolves with their packs, and of course, the humans with their communities. Not so, the tiger, who lived most of its life alone, allowing it ample opportunity to surveil, scrutinize, discern, without being affected or swayed by attachments."
And back behind him, Julia wondered to herself if the tiger William described might not have been himself, what William believed he would have been, had he not found her.
She studied his hands, the differences between what he had to do to with them make the elephant notable compared to those needed to create the tiger. William made the tiger by putting one hand on top of the other, the lower hand with its fingers and thumb cupping into a 'C' served as the muzzle and mouth, while the hand above was pressed flat down on top of the lower hand with his fingers crowning it, long and straight. It made the brow and eyes.
The tiger spoke with a whispery hiss, of what it saw, revealing a keen intelligence… "It waited for the littlest, weakest elephant to fall."
"Off in another part of the world," William spared his toddler son from seeing the predetermined fate of the baby elephant, "The mother deer, a doe, hushed her fawn, alert, tingling, weighing the risks of taking her baby into the clearing to graze…"
A quick glance down at William's hands, and Julia saw the differences again. The deer's face was longer and straighter than the tiger's, William making it by placing one hand above the other one once more to be the brow and eyes and a thumb poked out for the forward-pointing ears, but now the bottom hand bent at a right angle at the second joint of fingers resulting in the long snout, leaving the index finger at the end separated from the other fingers for the small mouth.
William's narration went on, "The doe faced a life decision, a decision she faced every day since her little fawn had been born… Should she take the chance with such a little one by her side, it being essential to eat to be able to make milk for her baby son, or should she stay in the safety of the cover of the brush, out of sight of the big, pointy-toothed monsters that sought her baby as their dinner? William changed his voice to be the doe, "Maybe there would be a better chance to graze in the clearing later? Perhaps she should wait…?"
"Again, the tiger watched as the doe struggled with her decision, life on the edge, consequences weighty…" the story unfolded.
Little William Jr. worried, gasping out a faintly whispered, "Oh no!"
William broke character, telling his son, "That Mommy deer knew there was danger, but if she did not, then the baby might starve. You're right, it was a very hard choice to make."
It was the way William Jr. looked back to the ceiling that convinced William to go on, and so the story continued, "Oh, but time had taught the tiger that there were other predators in the forest than just himself, and so he waited, patiently, as the deer silently led her fawn forward into the sunny field, and her shadow, her baby's shadow, appeared on the ground below them. But there were other shadows growing inward from the edges – the wolves."
"No Daddy," William Jr.'s little voice, so quiet Julia could barely hear it, the wishing of it breaking Julia's heart.
The wolf pack worked as a team, and coordinated, they were lethal." William made the figure of the wolf's face up on the ceiling, "The weakest wolf, the runt on the litter, now older and scraggly, always the last to get food, if there was any left, lived his life at the bottom of the pack." The hand position for the wolf seemed quite different from the other animals. William put his hands together as if he were going to clap. The two thumbs were up as the ears, the index fingers bent around each other, making the wolf's forehead and his eyes, under it, his other fingers stretched out straight, long and lean to be the snout. His pinky fingers tightly together and low at the bottom, and the scraggly wolf had a mouth.
"The wolf pack targeted the fawn as the tiger had predicted, for it was vulnerable, inching closer, their shadows almost everywhere coming closer and closer on the ground. The closest wolf, the bravest wolf, the strongest wolf, was the one to receive the wrath of the mother deer as she protected her baby. "The doe reared up…" William's adept hands rushed to change from wolf to deer, "She jumped high, high in the air, slamming down full force on the body of the boldest wolf… the shadow on the ceiling spilled and quivered, changing to become the wounded wolf, "sending it yelping with its tail between its legs back to the safety of the brush. Although that one had retreated, all the others, snarling, and hunched, and slinking, grew closer again to the mother and her little fawn.
"There was nothing left to do, the doe had decided," William's hands made the sharp bend to make the long face of the deer again, "She would lead the pack away from her baby. She turned, she bolted, luring the pack into chasing her, one quick backward buck landing hard into the nearest wolf knocking him back, presenting a hurdle for the others, and she ran, ran as fast as her ancestors' legs could carry her, only wanting to lead them away, away from her cherished son. She called back to him, guiding him to safety… William's voice changed to match the terrified doe again, "Run for the woods!" And her little son ran in the opposite direction, away from the danger, as fast as he could."
"And all the while, the tiger watched," William's bedtime story shifted away from the horrors that would be once more. "The tiger, he would eat today too. His patience would pay off. Because while the wolf pack chased the mother deer, the tiger so easily caught up with the weakest, scraggly wolf at the rear. The scraggly wolf had paused before deciding, sometimes that in itself is enough of a mistake to cost you your life. The lowly wolf had thought to betray the pack, to stay behind and get the fawn for itself rather than uphold its part of the team. The tiger benefitted from his indecision."
The pause was long, and the ceiling paled white, not a shadow in the sky.
William's voice low, spoke again, with a sadness in it that ached, "And then later, the tiny fawn searched everywhere for his mother, his panic growing as more and more time and more and more distance passed without finding her." William's hands, unnoticeably puppeteering, turned the fawn's head left and then right on the ceiling. "Running forward a few steps, calling out for her, at first only quietly, afraid to alert the beasts in the bushes of his presence, William whispered in the voice of the frightened fawn, "Mommy… Mommy," but soon alarm set in until he was screaming her name as loud as he could, "Mommy! Mommy! Where are you?! I'm frightened!" until his throat burned and scratched with the pain of yelling so loudly, and for so long, and still he cried out more…" William's voice lower and scratchy and dry, "Mommy. Mother please, please hear me… Please, Mommy…" the little fawn called, and he begged, and his knees buckled, weak, exhausted, holding back tears for, if he let himself cry he knew he would give up, he would lose hope, he would despair.
"And off in his corner of the brush, even the tiger felt a tear wet his eye and a lump swell in his throat, for the love of his own mother was the only love he had ever known," William shared, his story including compassion and empathy, even for the tiger.
And Julia too, began to cry, for Julia was one of those souls in the world who knew how much it hurt to lose your mother…
"Finally, when the little fawn was so tired he could not take one more step, then, he found her…"
"His Mommy!?" William Jr. hoped.
William went on, not answering, "The baby fawn had found his beautiful doe mother. She was lying on the ground, and she was so quiet and so still. "She's sleeping," the little fawn thought. And he tried, and he tried, but he could not wake her."
"And then, so suddenly, floating upward, like colorful snowflakes, but coming up from the ground instead of down from the sky, seemingly spilling out everywhere in the air…" And then William crossed his hands at the wrists and spread both hands out flat to be the wings, his thumbs crossed as well, making the head and the pointy edges of his thumbs for the two antennae…
Enthralled, Julia secretly watched on from afar at the edge of the show's curtain. But then…
Her breath caught, for when she looked up to the ceiling the image was unmistakable. And William said what she already knew…
"The sky was full of butterflies."
William's butterfly, softly, perfectly, fluttered its wings, and he darted it here and there so unpredictably – the very thing, Julia remembered, the very thing that he had said made him 'uneasy' about them all those years before. The butterfly's antennae wiggled, the rest of its body suddenly still, it looked towards the tiger's corner of the brush…
"And… The butterfly listened for the tiger..." his story explained…
And then the sting of salt burned in Julia's eyes, for she saw that William was taking off his wedding ring, focused and purposefully he put the golden circle between his thumbs, he would use it for something, and a part of her already grasped what it was while yet another part of her was still yet to be surprised, and stuck between the two, it left her breathless off in the background.
Up on the ceiling, up in the celestial realm of William's tale, the butterfly had become a stunning, haloed, angel.
And Julia knew, with such pain wrenching in her heart, that to him, to William, it was the death of his mother unfolding up on that ceiling, and it hurt so much to love him so.
William's voice, too, sounded choked-up as he told, "And then the angel said to the doe's little baby boy, "Know, my Little One, that you never walk the Earth completely alone, that I will always be here with you… To me, you are the most precious boy in all the world…"
And Julia's mind whispered it to herself – "His grandmother – She's William Jr.'s Grandmother Mary."
Up on the ceiling, William turned the guardian angel, "The angel remembered the edges of the brush and what was concealed there. She saw the boy was scared, and she encouraged, "Do not dread encountering the tiger, Little One, for the tiger has learned much from intently observing the creatures in the world, and thus it is that all of the animals need the tiger, because it is only when one faces the tiger that what is truly most important, what it is one is living his life for, what it IS that makes his life meaningful, can be revealed to him. Treasure what you learn each time you meet the tiger," she told her Little One down below. "Live an inspired life, a life that is full, full of growing and stretching and helping and loving and caring, and know you are never alone, never, for you will always have me, up here in Heaven, looking down over you." And then, before her shadow dimmed away like a shadow does when it gets lost behind a cloud, she offered her final guiding message, "Don't forget to notice the changing shadows, the lengths, the angles on the ground. They can tell you what is coming, and they can guide you to find the source of the light in your life." And with that, the guardian angel was gone from the little boy's sight, but he knew, he would always know, she was watching over him."
And there, William ended his story, bringing his hands down from above the lampshade, slipping his wedding ring back on his finger. He sat down next to William Jr. on the bed and tucked his blankets in around him. "And so, my Little Man, it is time for you to say, "Good night," he said, and he leaned over and gave his son a kiss.
"Goodnight Daddy," the sweet little voice the last thing Julia heard as she ducked away, stepping out of sight. Holding back her emotions, holding at bay her tears, she rushed away a few steps down the hall before, quietly, she found the hallway wall with her back and melted backwards into it, overcome. Then, hand over mouth to quiet it, she yielded to her crying. Julia let the swell of emotions roll through her, while in the back of her mind she knew she must decide, decide whether to tell William or not that she had seen, that she had heard him tell his tale…
William stepped out into the hallway, catching sight of Julia standing there. Their eyes met. "She's crying," he told himself, "She saw." He pulled William Jr.'s bedroom door to leave it opened just a crack and he approached her.
The light in the hallway was dim, but still she saw it so clearly, William wrinkled the corner of his mouth, and it was simple, between them there were no secrets.
Julia's face wrinkled into her crying and she whispered, as she melted into his arms, and her lips moved close to his ear, "That was beautiful, so beautiful." And she felt his arms, strong, reliable, warm around her, absorbing the shock of her soft and unexpected tears.
William found himself speechless, and so he offered comfort, and connection, with a kiss at her ear. Tenderly he shushed her, "Shh… Shh."
Julia's whispers squeaked as they breathlessly rushed to tell, "You were the little fawn. You told your son your story, William…" she sniffled, "The doe died trying to protect him, like your mother protected you that day, when you were just a boy. And the butterflies, our wedding ring and your angel…"
"Shh," he finally quieted her, and they stayed together, embracing there in their hallway upstairs just outside their sleeping little toddler son's bedroom, for a while. Confused by her powerful reaction, he reminded himself that she was pregnant again, making sense of it enough to do nothing but love her for the strength of her feelings, easing his urge to take away her pain, to remove what was fretting her so.
)
Both in their bedclothes, William and Julia talked through the day, the case, and intermittently they made plans for tomorrow – their favorite day of the week – Saturday. Julia sat at her vanity brushing out her hair, looking to her husband, already under the covers in bed, sharing with his reflection in the mirror. William had frowned with admitting he had come to a deadlock in the case. His questioning of the manager at Davies Slaughterhouse had only served to solidify his suspicions that no one at the slaughterhouse was involved with the murder or the dumping of the body on their property. He sighed and rubbed stressfully at his brow with admitting that he thought it best to wait for the results from the samples she had sent to the University to be analyzed.
He saw her smile in the mirror. "Well, I must admit that I find myself glad of it, William, that we will have time to ourselves this weekend." There was a hint of something being held back and it piqued his interest.
"Julia?" he asked. Oh, there was a definitely a look… and it stirred him, that lovely butterflies feeling in the stomach, a mix of anticipation and worry…
Trying to be nonchalant, Julia returned her eyes to her own reflection and resumed brushing her fiery hair. "I bought a sled today," she told.
"Oh," he replied. In his head he was thinking, "That's nice. It will be fun. William Jr.'s a good age to try his first…" But then the slight curl at the corners of her mouth in the glass and he felt the little somersault. It was that devilish, Mona-Lisa smile, and he alerted himself to get ready…
Sexy, her quick glance, touching his gorgeous brown eyes and then pulling away…
"I think I'll wear trousers all day tomorrow. They're perfect for sledding, and then we can have lunch at that restaurant close to the Park… after," she said.
In the mirror, he raised an eyebrow at her.
The Inspector's voice barked his lecture at him inside his head, "I know you've married a firebrand and she's the persuasive type, but you're her husband. What you say goes. Wear the trousers for once, man!" he wrinkled a corner of his mouth at himself, unknowingly, as he thought, "Ironic… 'trousers…"
"Husband…" Julia's scolding voice interrupted him. She pushed away from the vanity and turned to face him in the bed. "If God meant for women's legs to be stuck together, he'd have made us live in water where we could move like dolphins, like some sort of…" her hands flipped about, frustrated, "Well, like a mermaid, I guess. Even worse, to live on land like a dolphin, unable to lie flat out to minimize friction and swim forward, but instead having to stand straight upright and do little more than hop from place to place," she sarcastically complained. "That is much what it is like," she insisted, "to do anything more than stroll along in a dress," she added.
For his part in the matter, William had let his imagination move forward and he had imagined his beautiful wife's curves in trousers. He liked it. "Come here," he said, growing lustful.
Whew, his expression, his tone, had quite on effect on her insides.
Being Julia Ogden though, she sought a way to keep the upper hand on their flirtations. She grabbed a hold of the skirts of her nightdress and pulled them snug around her thighs…
A look William did not mind at all, her waist small, her hips wide…
And then she hopped, her rendition of being a dolphin on land, over to the bed, losing her balance and falling happily into him.
"You make a beautiful hopping dolphin," he said, with barely a chuckle, for his red-blooded male mind was quite distracted by the 'beautiful' part…
"Soon to be a whale," she commented, settling in on top of him.
And William reminded himself about her concerns with her losing her sexy shape and becoming overly large with being pregnant. He had noticed that such worries had seemed to replace her more common one about her appearance, that of fretting over the state of her hair.
"A beautiful whale then," he attuned, with his voice so lustful and deep and grumbly and close to her ear that it seemed to resonate inside of her in such a way that it erupted her insides into scrumptious hot melty magma, and any hope of thinking, talking, teasing, swirled away with the delight of it.
William reached up to her from below and kissed her, and as his kisses could sometimes be, this was a phenomenal kiss. The blood rushed away from her brain so quickly she was not even sure how he ended up on top of her, she was only heart-thumpingly grateful that he was. It grew wildly passionate, William's hands taking liberties seemingly everywhere all over her succulent mushy jiggly body all at once. Julia's womb longed and yearned and hankered for him so that it twisted and wrung and burned with the sudden desire. The tiniest moan pined in her throat, seeming to set William on fire. His kissing, his taking, grew feverish, and each drop of Julia's body rose up to him like the tide waters under the forces of the turning of the Earth as it faces towards the pull of the Moon lift it up to drench over the land.
It ached, when he regained control of himself and broke off the kiss.
From up above her in the golden lamplight…
"He is gorgeous," she noticed…
He said, out of breath, his heart pounding at his own chest with the sudden and demanding arousal, such that it brought him to need to swallow to pull off sounding restrained and to be able to get back to their earlier conversation as if nothing had happened between them, "I see your point…" he almost chuckled with the need to clear his throat, "about the restriction of movement of skirts vs. trousers," he admitted with a wrinkle at the corner of his mouth. Then he took one of her rebel curls in his fingers, averting his eyes to it, and he added, "And it is good to see your accompanying me to Church on Sundays has opened your mind to God's ways…" His eyes caught hers, mischief and seriousness dancing together in the twinkle she saw there. He went on, "It is true, God made both men and women in his image, and He made them both with two separate legs."
Underneath him, Julia struggled with the inner conflicts tugging her this way and that. All she wanted in the world was for this luscious man to make love to her – now, please now... But also, she was becoming aware that his need for her to more wholeheartedly accept religion… the apprehension inferred in the thought forced a sigh, "HIS religion. It felt burdensome." And a part of her worried that her having this feeling signaled that troubles were brewing for them ahead.
And then, like the flip of a switch, she chose the more primal path.
Sultry, she seduced at him, "May I suggest, my strikingly handsome husband, that we take advantage of the way God made us…" Julia reached down underneath him to shift and then scrunched and lifted her nightgown, her eyes staying lustfully tight to his so that she could see them darken with the wanting, and then she tugged at the string of his pajama bottoms…
Delicious, as she pushed and shoved at the cloth, hungry to free him.
Her breath humid as she continued, adjusting herself underneath him, she whispered, "For you, and only you, William, I spread my…"
And his groin throbbed with such junglish need that he did not hear the rest of whatever it was that she said. He was gone, completely, uncontrollably, gone.
And Julia tried to finish her thought as William's kiss, William's shadow, mounted nearer, "We have a responsibility as a married man and woman to fornic..."
Oh, they would fornicate alright, like a hurricane and a tornado and a volcanic eruption and an earthquake and a tsunami all wrapped into one, and any other forces of nature, or acts of God for that matter, as well, for their love was immensely strong, and sometimes such a strong love can shake the world.
) (
After breakfast, their Saturday starting out cozy and lazy, William and Julia dressed for their first sledding adventure with their little son. As her husband watched on, Julia bubbled with joy as she thought about how lucky she was to have him, how fortunate she was that he could be thrilled by her rather bold nature, that a man such as William Henry Murdoch, a traditional man, a modest man, could let go of his concerns with upholding society's expectations. It seemed even more than let go, actually. William seemed to authentically enjoy her rebelliousness, she marveled. Interrupting the train of thought, a memory from the night before appeared in her mind, of his hand shadow puppets and his telling of that beautifully sad story on William Jr.'s ceiling. His life had made him who he was, and she was grateful for every bit of it.
It was probably that connection – between William's bedtime story centering around his mother's death, and Julia's out-of-the-blue question.
"William?" she said, stepping closer to him, "I've been thinking about the baby's name…"
"Mm," all he said, closing the gap between them and taking advantage of the opportunity to get his hands on her, taking a hold of her hips…
William was liking the trousers.
Julia wrapped her hands up around his neck and a more devilish part of her imagined William doing what she figured he was wishing for, giving in to his urges and reaching around to squish and mold and squeeze at her supple, tight, trouser-covered backside. The thoughts tweaked her womb, but she made an effort to move past the temptations.
She inhaled to begin to speak, "I know we were planning on the names Susana and Lionel, for your sister and my father, but…"
And William's brain chased after her meaning, a bit soupy from being distracted by his temporary lust…
Julia had gone on to ask, "Well, what do you think of… Mary?" Her blue, blue eyes searched his face.
He was taken, and typical of William when he was overcome by emotion, he seemed wholly unable to speak.
Julia would. "Mary is a lovely name, William. And I know your mother has been on your mind lately, hmm?" she asked, bringing her fingers to his cheeks.
He cleared his throat and replied, his voice still scratchy with having been touched, "I would like that."
"Good," she answered and leaned in to give him a quick kiss.
Thinking that the naming of their children should be more equal, he suggested, "It's just…" with a start, and then finding he needed to push himself to finish, he said, "Well, maybe because we named our son after me… uh, well, maybe we should name our daughter after you…"
"Julia Jr.!?" she laughed.
William hurried to explain, "I know it's not traditional, but we have a modern marriage… And if it's a boy – we could name him Julian, after you…?" so expectant, he waited.
Sometimes this man just astounded her, and Julia found that she herself felt caught for a moment, stuck, unable to think, let alone speak.
Nervously, a little chuckle sounded, and she said, "It seems we have BOTH been thinking about names."
Then she took a moment to reflect, turning her thoughts to what it was that SHE truly wanted. The answers came quickly, and her stance grew more solid. Her look became direct, decided, and she said, "I love the name Mary…"
William nodded. Inside his heart singing. He was happy for it.
"And, I must say, if we have a boy, I don't want him to be named after me, or after my father. I want him to have his own name." Her expression opened as she checked William's eyes, wondering if she had upset him.
It was a subtle, his nod. He was with her.
"Daniel," she told her wish, "I've always loved the name Daniel."
William's hands tucked into her hair, "Well then, Daniel it shall be," he smiled, a big reassuring, warm, lovely smile.
And then a part of him nearly bent in half secretly laughing to himself, because his pregnant wife, looking so amazingly sexy in her new trousers, reached up to her head and declared, "William! My hair!"
And with that, the Murdoch's, the missus-half of the pair in wildly rebellious trousers, but with perfect hair, and a little 'Murdoch Bump,' took their young son out sledding in the Park and then out to lunch. It was a wonderful, wonderful day.
)
With the baby tucked into bed hours ago, William and Julia finally made it upstairs to undress and get ready for bed themselves. Julia removed her trousers. As William unbuttoned his shirt, he found himself looking for the bulge of the baby growing inside of her. A part of him interrupted with the absurd thought that "she might want to wear the trousers to Church tomorrow!" Shoving at the troubling thought, "she wouldn't…" William suggested, "Perhaps, after Church tomorrow, we can come home and change, and then go sledding again. The snow will soon be gone."
Her expression worried him, his mind reconsidering the likelihood of the 'trousers to Church' possibility. Whatever it was, it charged the air around them with a silent, static, crackling…
Julia blew out some the pressure she was feeling, and seeing it, William's face began to lock in place, mixing together his self-protective brand of 'bracing and rigid' with 'deer-in-the-trainlights' stunned.
"William," she started slow and calm, but then decided it best to just say it, so she blurted it out, "I have been so tired with the baby coming now… and I, uh…" Julia grew taller with the decision, "I would prefer to stay at home. You could go… with William Jr. …?"
Just at the end, her tone had risen into a question, and the Earth trembled a bit with waiting for William Murdoch to react.
"Me…?" he asked already shaking his head no, "Without you?!" his arms opened wide exaggerating the question.
"Yes," she answered… And he saw it, that defiant chin of hers jutting out.
It loomed ahead, unavoidable. They were going to have fight.
It was odd in a way, because once the fact of it was accepted, there was a sort of relief, each one choosing their weapons, becoming wholly engaged in the battle, forgetting about the regret.
It was the way William leaned into her as he said it as much as the words themselves, that told that he would not be bending on this one. He had righteousness on his side, and he would dig in and stand up for it. "People will think you only went to Mass all this time so that we could go to a Catholic orphanage for an adoption," he accused.
Wow, so stubborn…
Her chin held high, eyes on fire, hands firmly to her hips, she leaned just as much back into him…
The word 'firebrand' swirled through his brain and then evaporated away.
"I never claimed otherwise, William – and YOU know it!" she steamed. "I'm exhausted from carrying around…" she stepped back and shoved her belly forward, her eyes… his eyes, down to see the, quite small yet, baby bump, "And from feeding, and growing, YOUR child, your child William Henry Murdoch, every second of the day inside of me, and now I'm going to get huge, and, and… All YOU had to do was enjoy the pure ecstasy of your…" Julia's fingers held up to show the small gap of air between her index finger and her thumb, "your tiny, tiny, little miniscule part in it, and now all the women still want you, and, and…"
William's mind had raced backward to the conversation that the two of them had had over hot chocolate when he had told her about his conversation with Father Clements, about the negative responses the priest had been getting in advocating for their adopting a child from a Catholic orphanage… But he was unable to search further, now distracted by feeling insulted and hurt by her sarcastic complaints about his role in making their baby… babies… And swirled around in the mix of mush in his brain there were splatters of memories of the waitress – and then the FIRST waitress… and all those flirtatious young ladies in her University class…
She had decided in that second – He was sleeping on the couch. Her eyes lifted up to the top of their closet. The extra bedding was up on the shelf…
William followed her glance. And, although he instantly accepted it – a part of him was glad for it even, it infuriated him that SHE got to be the one to decide his fate! William's face pinched tight with determination. "Julia…" his tone of calmness was betrayed by the subtle quivering of his voice.
So quickly the bedding was shoved into his arms. "I suppose you had not noticed, William…" her tone rang superior and judgmental, "I have never been one to be swayed by what 'PEOPLE' think. Though I'm not surprised that such a fine, upstanding man as yourself is." She hurried over to the bedroom door and opened it for him. "Out!" she instructed.
And William felt as if he had fallen off the precipice, as if he was dangling, tossed about like a piece of paper on the breeze, any sense of control gone completely out the window. He stared back at her, eyes wide, stunned. Deer-in-the-trainlights had won out in the end.
"Out William," she said calmer but stronger, ducking her chin downward and looking up at him.
He swore he saw steam flowing out of her nostrils as she exhaled and stood there waiting for him to go. His feet moved him through the door. Out in the hallway, he turned back to face her, exiled, and the anger seemed to resurface. "Fine," he said. "And I will not be going to your… tuxedo function, toff… party… thing…"
Immediately she accused, "You're just doing that to spite me!" chin back up, venom resurging in her eyes.
"Perhaps," he considered her point in his head, and then blew out the steam of the pressure through his pursed lips. "Sorry," he gave with his customary wrinkled corner of the mouth look, only to receive the slammed bedroom door in his face… Three seconds later, the door opening, him still standing there immobile, flabbergasted by how quickly things had erupted into utter chaos, and her arm stuck out through the opened crack to toss his pajamas at him. Ironically, in order to give the door a second, proper, slam, she had had to open it wider, and for a brief moment William thought she was reconsidering. He leaned in towards her only to receive the second slammed door in his face.
William looked to the baby's room, waiting for the crying... Tying to slow his heart, he exhaled with relief for the silence, only to be alerted by the door in front of him opening again… and despite all evidence to the contrary, again he felt his heart open and hope. His shaving kit, that was what it was. Julia shoved it onto the top of his pile. His brain told him to speak…
Slam. Then slam. Then slam. And then, as if another instrument in the orchestra had been written into the symphony, William Jr.'s crying trumpeted in from down the hallway. From the other side of their bedroom door, William's nerves jumping inside of his outwardly stoic body with anticipating that the slamming would resume, Julia yelled, "You and your BIG Catholic family. You go!"
With her eyes fixed on the flat wooden surface of the door, she sat down on their bed. "Damn it!" she said, her use of the unacceptable curse only walloping her gut and her head with another flare of emotion. Julia swallowed down the swelling tears, holding them at bay. Perhaps she was over-reacting again, because she was pregnant… making her impatient… prickly? she considered, her hand to her belly. She had wanted him to understand, to see that she was feeling strained, and to agree that the demands on her were high, and to agree that she needed the opportunity to relax, to have at least half-a-day NOT to have to interact with 'people,' NOT to have to work at always saying the right thing, NOT to have to dress the right way, NOT to have to be something she was not. She felt her anger vise-gripping her jaw, fiercely tight and rigid once more, as the hurt and the helpless rage sunk in. In the quiet, she could hear her deeper thoughts. The feeling was sickening, that quiet, that ear-buzzing stillness. And it wobbled and rippled on the surface, like it was riding the waves of her settling mind, attempting to form, to solidify, and the pain from the thought was unbearable, "He's ashamed of me…" and she pushed it away before she could wholly identify it, confirm it, accept it as true.
Julia spoke to her baby in her womb, concerned that that tiny, innocent, sweet, little baby was feeling the overwhelming torrents of her state. Her voice so tender it could soothe a troubled soul, she said, "You have a Catholic father, Little One…" then sighed, "I guess you are Catholic too. Your Daddy takes his Faith very seriously, it's a part of who he is." Those tears threatened in the backs of her eyes again as the train of thought shifted. "I wonder why he ever wanted to marry me at all?" she thought, and as human nature does, a question tossed out is a question tried to answer, and the answer to this one came immediately – "Because YOU were THE ONE for him." She fought it, just some romantic poppycock. He would have been happier with his little schoolteacher, his beloved Liza, or even Enid Jones. He would have had himself his big Church-going Catholic family. But… she knew, knew he would not have been happier with them. The truth hovered unspecific in her awareness but sprung from being grounded in the knowing that we are all happiest when we are growing, and Julia wholeheartedly knew that SHE made William grow… and perfectly matched with that, he did the same for her, although… and inside she chuckled with the delightful flavor of it, his 'making her' was so much more subtle than hers of him. Even now, hurt and angry as she was, she could not deny that.
She rubbed her belly a minute longer. This little conundrum they found themselves in, it was a bit thorny. There was definitely going to be some growing necessary to get out of this one, and likely, it was going to be the kind of growing that alters something deep, something that hurts down to the bone and then, hopefully, heals stronger.
)
Downstairs, William sat in the moonlight on the end of the couch, the windows of the living room south-facing, through them the shadows from the paler white-glow loomed on the floor. Plenty of time now, he chased after remembering their conversation over the hot chocolate that night. He had told her what Father Clements had said, that 'people' in the Catholic orphanages thought poorly of their perspective parenting, the whole ordeal, he remembered regretfully all over again, a testament to their – but more largely HER – lacking morals. "SHE wanted to keep working, so THEY used contraceptives and chose to adopt rather than have a child of their own…." the misperceptions replayed in his mind.
He was holding his breath, lips tight, everything about his body language resisted. It had been unsaid – that was the truth of it. But, he had to admit it was more than likely implied, that Julia chose to attend Sunday Mass, chose to become active in their sharing of his Faith, because it would improve 'people's' image of her – of them, as potential parents. An undefinable sense of loss permeated downward, heavy.
Guilt set in and his face wrinkled with acknowledging it. He had been wrong, wrong to think there was something more to it than that. And the profound ache that that acknowledgement caused inside of him burned so that he felt dizzy. And William Murdoch began to cry.
) (
The misty early morning light told that it was a Sunday morning and they had time before rising to dress in their Sunday best and hail a cab to William's Catholic church across town for the later Mass. Julia stood at the foot of the bed and she spied William gazing down at her chest, and she looked down to see what it was that had so captured his attention. Her breath caught with the sight of herself in her nightgown, the first two buttons at the top unbuttoned, jiggly, delicious cleavage bulging out. Oh my, it did look good! She looked back at him, a little embarrassed, surprised, and so, so quickly she saw the sparkle of lust in his darkly-pooled eyes, and like wildfire her arousal spread.
WHAM, they were making passionate, luscious, mountainous, pounding love on the bed. Her womb torqued with tormented desire… "William!" breathless, she pleaded, "Please! Please don't stop!" she sensed the monumental wave was so close. "Oh! Oh!" her cries erupted into his ear. And then, how the world imploded with the forceful succulence of it, William's moan in her ear, so sweet the soupy warm ripples and the wishing they would never, never end.
Limp and spent and out of breath and heart thundering, she felt her body weak and heavy underneath him. Then the blaring alarm lurched in her head – THEY WOULD BE LATE!
There was a mad rush to dress themselves, the baby, to put on their shoes and their coats. Running up the church path, the service had begun, and the warmth of the crowded congregation hit their faces as they stepped in the back doors and halted in an effort to be quiet, to remain unnoticed. Holding to the rituals, William led them to the Holy Water… "Shh," she shushed William Jr. while trying to slow the wild racing of her heart. They searched for three seats together in the pews… Still standing at the back, she saw William look down at her chest, and she looked to see what it was he was staring at… A heart-stabbing panic struck her – SHE WAS STILL IN HER NIGHTGOWN. Julia's eyes jumped to William's face as she rushed to button the top buttons. And she had to fight with all her might not to give in to the devastating hurt of seeing his shame. "I'm sorry William!" her voice squeaked through her whispers and William dashed to move close in front of her, covering her with his body so no one could see. A woman gasped, and everyone in the Church turned! And the din of judgmental conversations thundered in her head. "Out! She had to get out!" and she pounded against William's grasp to free herself, to run, to get away, to get all those eyes off of her, her arms, her fists, striking, thrashing…
The motion of the twitches woke her. Up – she sat up. Just a dream. Astounding the pounding of her heart in her chest. Just a dream. And somehow the creepy feeling of being in her nightgown flooded through her and she was up out of the bed and dressing with barely another thought.
)
When William had come upstairs to dress he had heard William Jr. up and playing in his room. Stepping into their bedroom, he found that Julia was dressed for church, her hair up, wearing a beautiful dress. He had asked her about it, thinking she would NOT be joining him. He had done so, he thought, without revealing the pounding hope he felt that she had changed her mind, that she had realized that it was a part of who they were…
Julia told her husband that the issue remained unresolved between them, and as such she felt it was best that she continued attending Sunday Mass until they had worked it through. It brought some relief, unsaid, between them, but expressed when William had blown out a big exhale through pursed lips, as he tended to do when the pent-up pressure inside of him had found release. To himself, he had thought, to his own later shame… "At least people won't know…" and then he had wrinkled a corner of his mouth at himself, thinking, "at least not yet," and that thought fired in his brain at the same time as the memory of the slamming door in his face and Julia's voice sarcastically stinging him with the accusation that he cared more about what "People' thought than he cared about her…" and a part of him had to admit that he DID care about what they thought. And the gurgling, swirling nausea of being unsettled between fear and dread and shame and sorrow sickened him, and he had taken a deep breath, and he had made himself soldier on.
The mood between them was businesslike, odd-feeling, to be so when they were not at work. William Jr. noticed, was troubled by it, at one point during the cab ride home from church wondering, "Daddy Mommy kiss?" Julia had scooped him up into her lap and said, as she pulled his black curls away from his ear and gave him a soft kiss, "Not now, Little One."
Once at home, upstairs changing, William suggested that they go back to park with the sled, reasoning that the snow would melt away soon.
"No, you take him," she had said.
The flare of the burn swept through him, William pushing aside the wishing once more. "Julia," he returned, "The sled was your idea, you bought it. If don't want to be with me, then YOU should take him."
She frowned, then sighed. "Let's both take him," she said, her tone impatient, refilling with the surge of her anger. And she was too annoyed, too bothered, to look inward and try to figure out why she felt so irritated – she just did, "damn it…!" her brain bellowed the profanity inside her head with her teeth gritted so tightly the sweetness of the pain wrenched and echoed deep into her jaw. Unable to wholly control herself, she slammed drawers and flung clothing about as she put on her more casual skirt…
Such blinding steam in her head when he had the nerve to ask her, "I thought you were going to wear trousers?"
Slam!
She quipped, "What…!? And have people talking about your wife's morals? We can't have that, William, now can we."
Deer-in-the-trainlights… Deer-in-the-trainlights.
That night, William Murdoch slept, again, on the couch.
) (
Monday morning came. Eloise came in to find the detective shaving in the downstairs bathroom. The older housekeeper felt her heart drop, for it always hurt her a bit when the detective and the doctor were in the midst of having an argument. She reminded herself that a 'good' marriage is meant to have rifts and ripples and bumps, and theirs was most definitely a 'good' marriage, it was one she envied, actually.
The family sat around the kitchen table, William Jr. on the riser-seat next to his mother, seeming to have mastered, already, eating at the table somewhat properly. The father of the family read the newspaper. The mood was, as expected, stiff.
In the center of the table, the Tiger Rose was drooping, a fallen petal under it in its shadow. Eloise took it away.
Julia congratulated herself for keeping her interactions warm and cheery with their little son. She noticed, almost peripherally, feeling an apprehension to wholly looking, that William was writing… doodling something, in the margins of the paper. "I wonder if it's his thoughts on the case," her mind suggested. It surprised her that the tension, the disquiet, could actually heighten, but it did inside of her with remembering that they were dealing with the SECOND body to be dumped on their property, and it being a so grossly chopped-up one at that, and the press being rabid after William for not solving it all over again…
She lifted her cup of coffee to her lips, peeked his way. Before taking her sip, she asked, nonchalantly, "Something about the case?"
"No," all he said.
William folded up the paper and put it aside. "We should get going…" he said, and for the first time in so long, he looked at her. "It's too messy to bike, with the melted snow," he pinched his lips tight, "Shall we share a cab?"
"Yes. Yes, of course," she answered.
)
Sitting alone in the cab, on her way to her class at the University, Julia found the first long, quiet period of time to think that she had had all day. She had not seen William once, there being no reason to contact him for the case. Truthfully, she dreaded terribly going home tonight, and having to deal with it. Her anger reared up again, this time she examined it more thoroughly. She was disappointed with him. She had expected him to understand, to choose her… A memory came. It was from that awful conversation – "more of a 'talking to' really," she corrected herself, from the Inspector, back when she had been running for election. Indignation and raging fury fired up inside of her all over again as she reheard their conversation from that day in her head, the Inspector calling her into his office and insisting, "Now that you're married, Doctor, the world sees you differently. You're his property, and whether you like it or not, your actions are his actions." She remembered she had resisted the Inspector's view, reminding her now of her younger self's gumption with which she had fought wearing a corset after her mother had died, not willing to see herself, not willing to see herself and William, as the Inspector had been trying to force her to. She had argued with him that she and William did not see their marriage that way, she contended that the Inspector himself knew that. But it had been in vain, because his message had gotten through to her in the end, and she had dropped out of the election, disappointing Emily, disappointing the other women – infuriating and alienating Lillian Moss… disappointing herself.
"There was hurt there, and plenty of anger," she thought, for she had given up her dreams and aspirations for him – "well at least some of them" … and then it came, the thought, with a haunting tone, "Perhaps he had done the same for her… long ago." And her hand rose to guard her womb and the Little One growing inside of it, and she remembered those pools of tears in his beautiful eyes when she had told him she was sterile… And she remembered too, going to his Church to meet with Father Clements, and trying, so hard, to balance who she was with being what it was necessary for her to be to wholly embrace ALL of William, facing head on then, not the first time, the challenge of fitting with his Faith. She cynically giggled to herself, "not the last time either, it seems."
Then, out of left field, the thought came, as a newspaper headline – "Toronto's Favorite Couple." She shook her head at herself with the awe of it. There was so very much to the making of 'them,' it was all so complicated and it hurt her head, and her soul ached with missing him, with missing being 'them…' Bordering, faltering, dropping into intolerable, Julia pushed the thoughts away. Back to work. Back to work. "Today, they have an exam," she thought, grateful for not having to lecture, to teach, tonight. She sighed and then frowned, for she predicted…
And it would turn out that she had predicted correctly…
…That all the pretty young female students would want to talk about would be William and his future lecture.
)
Julia got home later than usual, having told herself it would be best if she stayed in her office to grade the students' exams. The greeting between William and Julia had been minimal, as he came to her in the foyer while she took off her coat. She informed him that she intended to enjoy Eloise's plate of dinner, set aside and waiting for her in the kitchen, and she thought to herself that she would also have a glass of wine, and she notified him that she would be busy working on grading exams. Basically, she wanted him to leave her alone.
He did so without a word, going back to read by the fire in his recliner.
)
The tension in the house was high as the time ticked passed when they would normally go to sleep, William not wanting to assume he was sleeping, either in the bed, or, on the couch, so he waited, reading in the living room. Julia answered him eventually, signaling that he would be sleeping on the couch by bringing out the bedding that Eloise had put away, and putting the pile, complete with his pajamas and shaving kit, on the couch.
He put his journal down and stood. His inhalation alerted her that he would speak, and it sent a chill of anxiety through her.
He said it as he rubbed his brow, "I think we should talk."
She huffed, "William! There's nothing to talk about. I am going to continue to go with you to Church to keep our 'precious reputation…' so snidely, she had said those words, "…from being sullied. And all the while you and I both know you disapprove of my motives… of me, even though you were always aware of who I am, and my reasons for doing…" her eyes darted away, weakening, "For doing what it is you've always wanted, from the start. And I can't bear knowing I disappoint you, and so…" She shrugged, and he saw the tears hinting in her eyes, "And so, since you can't love me the way I am…"
That hurt! William immediately began shaking his head, whispering "No, no, no" in his head…
Julia backed away as he moved closer. She looked away, began to turn, her voice low, she tried to finish, "And so, this is what we'll have to do…"
He took her shoulders in his grasp, his hold soft with his fingers, but so pleading with his eyes. His voice had become dry with the fear. "Julia, nothing you could ever do would make me not love you," he said. "And," he added, "I don't disapprove of you either…" But he found it had halted there, before he would say that he was not disappointed, and he tried to decide if it was because he was disapp…"
She cupped his cheek, and her eyes yielded to the salty call of crying, joining with his. "I know, William," she nodded. "I know you love me, but we are NOT alright right now." She dropped her hand away from his face and stepped free.
She sighed, so heavy. They had arrived at a stalemate. They would have to wait until there was a shift. She gave him the corner-of-the-mouth wrinkle…
It made him, too, release a burdened sigh. He turned away from her and began to prepare the couch for the night.
"Good night," she said.
"Good night," he replied.
As she stepped out of their living room, leaving him there behind her, Julia felt the stress would surely give her another restless night. The yearning for a whiskey warmed in response to the thought. Before she would go upstairs for the night, she walked through the kitchen to the dining room to pour herself a drink… That's when she spied it there – the newspaper, the newspaper William had been reading this morning,over on the window-seat behind the kitchen table. She took it with her upstairs, planning to read it as a distraction, wondering what it had said about the case.
)
Snug in her nightgown, as snug as she could be without William in bed with her, she placed the paper and glass of whiskey down on her night-table and slipped under the covers. She added his pillow to hers behind her and took a deep breath. The whiskey would feel good, she thought, and she opened the paper, seeking the page he had written on.
"It was a drawing," she gasped to herself. He hadn't actually written anything at all.
The picture he had drawn was stunning. Simple, just back and forth squiggles, varying in places by length and width, creating a ghostly yet movingly realistic image. It was him, walking alone – his homburg atop… Julia's eyes dropped down to where William's feet hit the ground, his shadow – angling slightly away underneath him as he walked, long in front of him as if made from low light. She followed it to the small outward pokes at each side of his homburg at its end. And her eyes drifted over to see, so slight, next to his shadow, there was a hint of a misty… It was her shadow, she discovered with a speechless whisper inside her head, her shadow, next to his – her bun in her hair, her arm linked to his. Her shadow was so feint, so dim, starting out darkest at the base on the ground, above it only emptiness, void, where her feet, next to his, should have been. And the hint of her shadow lessened away, getting lighter and lighter as her eyes moved down the softer and softer pencil shading towards the bottom of the newspaper page. Julia swallowed away a wave of emotion as she noted to herself that William had drawn the shadows turned towards each other while mid-step, to look, face to face, his shadow looking into hers, but her shadow had become so dim by the time it had reached where her head would have been that there was nothing there, and it broke her heart because she saw it so clearly in the little drawing he had made in the margin of the newspaper, William's shadow found no gaze in return. Alone, it was… HE was, all alone. It felt as if her heart had been completely squashed under the sadness. Surely, this impasse needed to be mended. A big sigh escaped her chest, propped up there in their bed without him, him downstairs struggling to sleep, alone, on the couch, Julia was overcome with despair, for truthfully, truthfully, she did not see how to fix it.
) (
William rose early this third morning, no longer expecting to have been in their bed instead of on the couch. Every ounce of him drained weary with needing to endure further, missing Julia, so that he was sure he could not take it another day, pretending to be functioning when all he truly felt was despondent.
A flicker of a thought lightened him, "Today the results of the tests Julia sent out to the University should came back." It was enough, he folded the blanket aside and stood. He would face the day.
) (
Hanging up the phone at her desk in the morgue, Julia caught herself smiling, just for a lingering moment. "He would be happy. There was a clue!" she thought with a spring in her imaginary step. Immediately, she picked up the phone and called him, somehow keeping it a secret from herself that the pleasant feeling would fade. They were still fighting, "well, not really fighting, but not together either," the thoughts reminded.By the time she heard the movement on the other end of the line, just before he would speak, before he would say, "Detective William Murdoch," into the phone, she reassured herself that she could trust their professionalism. She fixed her posture in her chair, assuming the role of pathologist. Still, it caught her by surprise, the ache that burned inside of her upon hearing his voice in the phone.
Only a few minutes later, as she heard the big door bang shut behind him, and his footsteps coming closer as he walked along the long passageway towards her office, she felt jumpy, and she wished, for a second, that she had thought to put out the body parts to serve as something between them, something to focus their attention on, to help with the discomfort, to help with their act… at least the part of it that was an act – that they were nothing more than detective and pathologist reviewing evidence in a case.
Improvising, she spread the report from the lab, and her subsequent notes from the phone calls, out on an edge of her desk, and she hurried to be standing when he rounded the corner. She was in the process of straightening out her skirt when their eyes met. Synchronous, nervous, they greeted each other…
"Doctor…"
"Detective…"
Their professional titles spilled out into the space between them at the same time.
Uncomfortable with the blunder, William clamped his lips together and nodded. "What have you?" he said, followed by a deep breath.
Julia gazed down at the papers spread out on her desk and stepped closer. "Well, detective, we had two tests, one from the maggots found on the body…" their eyes touched as she paused and lifted her head, "Um, well, uh, just a reminder that there really shouldn't have been any maggots at all, it being too cold this time of year for flies."
He nodded. It was interesting that his edginess, William finding himself becoming impatient with her wasting time, helped him to feel more in control… "Thank you," he adjusted, realizing he was about to sound patronizing, he changed the words as they came out, "I knew there was a reason I went to… Yes, you recommended stables and slaughterhouses."
"Of course," she replied. She would move past the delay, sorry for it, but certain it was best just to move on. "Both tests provided the same result," she started getting back on track.
He nodded, excitement building, getting the same results through two different pathways strengthened the conclusion…
"Basically, our victim did have a drug in his system, and the maggots nearest to the injection site that we found behind his knee had the highest concentration of the drug, suggesting that that was the way it was introduced into the body…" Julia knew she needed to hurry. Her husband would not be able to hold out much longer – What was the drug? Was it the cause of death? What effects would it have had on him? How quickly would he have succumbed to it? She imagined all these questions flaring at once inside his quick brain.
Her pace picked up, hurrying her report, "Fortunately, the colleague I had analyzing our samples was familiar with some of the most innovative surgical techniques being studied throughout the world. A part of her wanted to cite the sources, but she reminded herself of his eagerness and she let the impulse go. "It turns out that the drug in our victim is being studied for use in rendering the patient unconscious…" She frowned, she needed to correct that, "Immobile rather, during surgical procedures. If given in a large enough dose, it is fatal…"
William's brain began to imagine questioning doctors, surgeons, researchers… maybe even Julia's colleague…?"
Julia had continued, "Ironically, it was discovered by anthropologists studying South American indigenous societies…"
She heard him huff. Her own annoyance emerged into the picture. "It's relevant, William," the emotion had pushed her to step out of the role, she sighed, "Detective," she corrected, tucking her chin down and leaning back, annoyed with herself. She took a deep breath and began again, "They, the aborigines, use it for hunting. It's shot by blowing a small arrow, more just a pointy stick, through a thin tube of bamboo, sending it, with the tip dipped in the poison, into the prey. Curare, they call it…"
Deep inside William's brain, there was a twitch… a twitch or two. He noted them, experience having taught him not to push them away, he decided to wait for them to present themselves more clearly. He focused harder on what Julia was telling him.
She had gone on, "It has a tranquilizing effect, but it paralyzes the muscles without the victim losing consciousness. In many ways it sounds like an awful way to die. If the dose is high enough to kill, and it was for our victim…" She looked him in the eye for a second, and upon seeing him so interested was reminded, and so she added the more formal, "…detective."
He nodded.
She looked back at the papers, "Well, if the dose is high enough, then your diaphragm cannot contract and your breathing stops, your heart stops, and you just fade away, die, without being able to make a sound. It sounds truly awful…"
She watched him. He felt her eyes on him, his own eyes, staying down. William released a big sigh.
He was about to ask if there was more…
Julia added, "It's intriguing, um… the chemistry…" suddenly realizing she had let her own enthusiasm pull her away from relevance to the case, the recognition stirring her into uneasiness for a moment, she went on, feeling like it was getting too hot in the room, "Only if the drug gets into the blood does it affect the victim. Um, well, like with a poison dart or an arrow, or an injection, like in the case of our victim. If it's taken orally, it's harmless," her voice betrayed her marveling, "because curare compounds are too large to pass through the lining of the digestive tract to be absorbed into the blood. That's why the South American hunters can eat their curare-poisoned prey safely."
An electric jolt charged through her as she considered his expression, his reaction – triggered by the conflict she saw there, the twinkle in his, very noticeable at this very moment, big brown, extremely gorgeous, eyes, suggesting he was fascinated, and at the same time that not so subtle frown at the corners of his mouth telling that she had annoyed him by getting off track. The net result was an extended gazing between them.
William broke it off, asking her, "So doctor, you believe he was given a large enough dose to be the cause of death?"
"I do," she answered, glad to be back to the case. "Um, detective… Something else to consider, if I may…"
"Of course," he nodded.
"Um, if you'll remember, the injection site on our victim was, uh, bruised and over-sized," she said, "I'm thinking about how he would come to be injected there, and with such an unusual force, and uh… Well, it got me thinking of the natives hunting the animals… you know, with their blowguns…"
He nodded, and he felt it zinging inside, she was getting somewhere. This woman was amazing…
"Well, it reminded me, um, there must be a way to shoot a drug into a man – like your electric gun shooting electricity into him, the one you invented to catch the killer that was after you… remember, the racehorse's names in that game – and you were the 'Artful Detective,' and that 'Wild-game Hunter,' that came after you. And you had that gun you invented…"
"The weaponized capacitor!" he declared the invention's name. William's fingers touched up to his neck – remembering a stinging pain there before his brain caught up with the memory. "The Pendrick Arrow," he said it as if in a daze, knowing she would be lost. "They shot some sort of dart into my neck…" his big eyes held firmly to hers, "I was out almost immediately."
"William?" she asked, her expression becoming scrunched up with worry, her voice taking on its characteristic squeak.
He would try to explain, "Remember, I flew it, Pendrick's airplane. The American's were trying to steal it – Alan Clegg had taken it from Meyers…" the memories came pouring back, "Julia! It was Meyers who shot me with the dart, well, Meyers' man. I remember it was a chemical I'd never seen anything like before…"
"Do you think this whole thing is spies, William? Meyers and Clegg and that lot?" Julia had begun to be horribly worried. She knew, she had always known, "Cases ramped-up whenever these devious, powerful, slimy, sneaky, sly…" she stopped herself from thinking of more and more adjectives to describe the men she'd come to know in that dark and dangerous realm of espionage. A part of her always feared, and she only just realized it now, that they would recruit William, for his incredible brains and his courage and his cool demeanor under pressure. She exhaled, telling herself, "He'd make an awful spy… too good at heart..." The thought made her smile. And Julia stood there, with the fear, and the admiration, and the cherishing of him, and a part of her reminded that they needed to make up… but there was a bump up against her pride and the hurt of not meeting up to his rigid moral standards. And then, the image of the doodle, his shadow drawing, that she had spotted in the margins of the newspaper last night flashed into her mind, and it tore at her heart, for, "He was suffering too…"
And there was warmth there, for a second, in their looking into each other.
Then William said, already placing his hat to his head, "I'll talk to the Inspector. We'll need to find out if Terrence Meyers is in town…"
"Of course," she gave, dampened.
He clamped his lips together and he gave her an endearingly winsome, and sweetly awkward at the same time, tip of the hat, and William turned on his heel and left. Julia let her eyes drop to the floor, somehow caught by the sight of the shifting of his shadow on the floor as he opened and stepped out the door, only the loud bang as it shut behind him snapping her out of it.
It felt like she thought it in her heart – she needed to go see Father Clements.
)
The Sun was glowing low in the sky, the pink and golden light setting an ethereal and nuanced mood in the morgue. Julia had just returned from her inquiries into local hospitals and universities that were studying anesthesia for surgeries, her own quest into finding who, if anyone, was using the curare-like drug they had found in their victim. She was deep in thought, for she had also gone to speak with Father Clements, and there had been a shift in her heart. She was reaching to hang her coat when she saw them waiting for her on her desk – ROSES! Roses for her, on her desk – He wanted to make up too! There were only four flowers instead of the customary dozen, two yellow ones and oppositely placed to those two, two others that were a deep, deep, almost-black, purple. She knew them, "Black Baccaras," her head thought it, as she stepped closer. She was so excited she didn't even notice she was holding her breath.
She slowed herself down, took a deep breath… even though there were only four roses, "Mm, the scent," of roses flooded the back of her nose, mere millimeters from her brain, and soared her inside. Before she would touch, she paused there, releasing a big exhale, trying to think. She recognized the symbols, the colors, the numbers, they were significant. Yellow – for them… Two – their wedding, it meant the two of them together, and the Black Baccaras…" the puzzle tickled at her… The image of William's drawing, penciled in the margin of the newspaper, appeared in her mind… "Shadows… The two dark roses were their shadows," she gasped. She knew his note would mend, if not the troubles in her mind, then those in her heart, for it already had, even before she had read it…
"All those cutting words and slamming doors,
and now it feels like my shadow
keeps looking for yours.
And all I want is for you to see,
WE are the reason, Julia,
the reason I strive to be."
His note was simple. And there was no denying it – their gravity towards each other, their love, was strong. Folding the little note back into its envelope, she thought back to her conversation with Father Clements, and she found herself dwelling for a moment on how grateful she was that a man such as Father Clements was William's – was their – priest. He was keenly insightful… "He would have made an excellent psychotherapist," she figured, with a secret chuckle. A swelling of tears flared upward taking her by surprise, remembering the moment she had yielded to the priest's care and found herself in tears, sharing with him what was devastating her the most, the deeper reason that she was keeping William at bay. She quickly swallowed away the memory.
A deep breath trying to ground back into the moment, she asked herself, "Now, what was it had been thinking about? Oh, yes, Father Clements being a psychiatrist." Julia smiled, she truly believed she had never met anyone with as much authentic compassion as the young priest.
As a practitioner, Julia shook her head, thinking back to how he had done it. "It was masterful, Socratic in method," for Father Clements had asked much more than he had told. He had helped her to discover the most important things in all the muddle and mess of her emotions… He reminded her of the first time she had come to see him. He had asked her why she had come to the Church that day. There was an implication in the question, a suggestion, that her motives had not changed. And then she had just known, with a sort of 'click' inside of her heart, that she would continue going with William to Church BECAUSE it made him happy, and that was a good enough reason. Father Clements had helped her remember how much she treasured William's happiness. And she recognized that sometimes, when they are fighting, her concerns, and probably William's as well, became too enthralled with winning, and defending, and because of that she didn't see, they couldn't see, in the heat and fury of the battling between them, what it was that mattered most.
So, she had decided, and now, standing here with his flowers in this warm, low light, she felt how right it was deep in her core, in her soul. It was not for William because he demanded it, or even requested it. No, she would do it for him because she loves him, and she loves to see him happy, and her going with him on Sundays makes him truly happy.
Her mind jumped to William's concerns about what 'people' would think, and the heat of her tears loomed once more. That had been what had collapsed her, she remembered, feeling that William was ashamed of her – it had hurt so badly it buckled her knees… And yet, telling Father Clements, just the simple act of telling him, seeing in his face that he grasped the wounding inside of her, had helped to heal it. No one could have convinced her better… Well, perhaps the Inspector or George…? But Father Clements knew William in a different way than anyone else, somehow deeper, and the religious man's promise reassured her completely, his promise that he knew William, and it was not possible for William to feel shame when it came to her. The way Father Clements saw it, William's instinct, his call, being who he is, was to protect. She saw that now. It was not that he was standing in judgement and finding her lacking or shameful. Rather, it was fear, fear that others – 'people,' would hurt her, and yes, would hurt him too, because they thought badly of her. William, William, did not think badly of her, she knew that now.
He had merely been guilty of wanting something so much that he did not see the truth as prominently as the dream. If William was guilty of anything, it was of being blinded by the two of them, by his family, getting so close to what he wanted, so deeply it had become subconscious, BOTH OF HIS WORLDS AS ONE. Losing that stung so much, having that, or in this case thinking he had had it, and then realizing he did not, had made him feel betrayed, duped, somehow. That was the hurt behind, under, his striking out at her. Father Clements had made it clear today that HE had been the one to suggest to William that she attend Sunday services to help with their efforts at adopting from Catholic orphanages, and in doing so he had helped remove some of her defensiveness. He had validated her sense of self as honest and true and sincere with the man she loved, and it had made her feel whole. It was unsaid between them, but Julia believed Father Clements had never been under the illusion that she would wholeheartedly embrace BEING a Catholic. It still surprised her that William had, at least on some level, hoped for it to be true. A deep sigh, Julia was getting closer to what felt like conclusions. Father Clements, she reasoned, had suggested that she attend Sunday Mass with William because he believed she was a good person. This was the same reason he had allowed their marriage in his Church. He said today that he was more convinced than ever that he had made the right choice – that their marriage was one of the happiest, most nurturing, "inspiring… he had said inspiring," marriages that he had ever seen.
A troubling jab entered her thoughts, and Julia stood there feeling the chill of wondering whether Father Clements would still think so well of her if he was aware of her choice to have an abortion – a choice she still did not regret making? A familiar ache thumped in her heart, for she felt it, she doubted he would.
"Still," her thoughts moved to rescue her, Father Clements had said that he could see that she was a good mother to William Jr… "Wise," she realized now, he had explained that "it was God who would decide whether He would bring us a child to adopt. It would happen IF GOD FELT IT WAS RIGHT." He had smiled and looked down at her belly and said, "Perhaps he found a different way." Father Clements said he had suggested she come to Sunday Mass because he believed "only good could come of it." And so, she felt a sense of happiness with her getting to the bottom of it all, she would go until she was too uncomfortable with the pregnancy, and she had stopped working in the morgue… and probably for a while after the baby was born as well. She would resume attending Mass with him when the baby is old enough – "We'll have to get Claire-Marie to work Sundays…" her mind began to consider the details… She would tell him when he came home. She blew out the sudden flare of pressure with the thought, "IF he comes home…" for she still had not heard whether or not Terrence Meyers was milling about in Toronto, whether or not this case was one of THOSE intense and puzzling and terrifying cases, and her subconscious warned of the encroaching shadows.
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The detective had not spent the night on the couch, the housekeeper was happy to note to herself the next morning. Eloise smiled as she clicked on the kitchen light. There, in the center of the table, roses!
Eloise didn't notice, but it was really roses – AND their shadows.
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The tale of The Lady, or the Tiger centers around dilemmas. When one's choices are opposed, it can feel as if you are confronting a man-eating tiger inside of you. William Murdoch felt this way sometimes. For William, his Catholic Faith was like his shadow, it would always be there. The challenge was fitting the other guarantee in his life – Julia Ogden, with it. In many ways, he found it felt like he had to choose… to choose when he had learned of her abortion… to choose when he had learned she could not have children because of it. But with the turning of the pages of this chapter, William had come to see that there are TWO sources of light in his life – it had to be so, for he had two shadows on the ground. One of those lights was his Catholic Faith, and the other was his Lady, and for William Murdoch, that Lady was Julia. William knew in his deepest self, that he would never choose.
But when it comes to shadows, there was another noticing that should be garnered.
Don't forget the guardian angel that had come into William's imagination that night as he told his bedtime story to their little son, using animal shadow puppets on the ceiling, and the angel his intuition had sent him had provided a foretelling with her advice – to notice the changing shadows, the lengths, the angles on the ground. He already knew, he had always known, that he could use the shadows on the ground to find the sources of light in his life, thus his recent grasping of embracing both his Faith and his Love. Perhaps it was this subconscious reminder from his angel that had helped him come to see it more clearly.
But, so too, the angel had told of another important aspect of shadows, "Shadows can tell what is coming." And so now, the angel had alerted William, at the level of his very soul, that he was in the shadow of the Tiger, through his own premonition, as told through her, as told to himself, deep in his bones, somewhere below what he was consciously aware of, that there were dangers in the wind. If he had asked himself, if he had asked his Lady, he would have known. The shadow that hovered at the periphery far-off on the horizon, unseeable if you looked straight at it, it was the case, the case that had gone unsolved for so long. He would soon have no choice but to face the flesh that made the shadow. Surely it was coming… The Tiger.
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