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Lewis Rand by Mary Johnston

M >> Mary Johnston >> Lewis Rand




Vinie, seated upon the doorstep in the sun, a grey shawl around her
shoulders and her pink chin in her hand, stared at the Ragged Mountains
and wondered when Tom was coming to dinner. A grey cat purred in the sun
beside her. Smut the dog, lying in a patch of light upon the porch
floor, broke out of a dream, got up, and wagged his tail.

"Who do you hear, Smut?" asked Vinie. "_I_ think it ith Mr. Adam."

Adam came through the gate that had never been mended and up the little,
sunny path. He had his gun, and in addition a great armful of holly and
mistletoe, and he deposited all alike upon the porch floor. "A green
Christmas we're having," he announced cheerfully, "so we might as well
make it greener! I thought these would look pretty over your chimney
glass."

"They'll be lovely," answered Vinie. "I just somehow didn't think of
fixing things up this Christmas. I'll put them all around the parlour,
Mr. Adam."

"I'll put them for you," said Adam. "This isn't mistletoe like you get
in the big trees south, and it isn't holly such as grows down
Williamsburgh way--but it's mistletoe and it's holly."

"Yeth," agreed Vinie listlessly. "I don't know which ith the prettier,
the little white waxen berries or the red."

"I like the red," returned the hunter. "That in your hand--bright and
quick as blood-drops."

"No," said Vinie, and let the spray drop to the floor. "Blood ith darker
than that."

"Not if it's heart's blood--that's bright enough. What is the matter,
little partridge?"

"Nothing," Vinie replied, with an effort. "I've been baking cake all
morning, and I'm tired. I reckon you couldn't have Christmas without
baking and scrubbing and sweeping and dusting and making a whole lot of
fuss about nothing--nothing at all." Her voice dragged away.

"You couldn't have it without hanging up mistletoe and holly," quoth
Adam. "I've been a month in these parts, and I've come around mighty
often to see you and Tom. Why won't you tell me?"

Vinie turned upon him startled eyes. "Tell you?"

"Tell me what ails you. Why, you aren't any more like--Don't you
remember that morning, a'most four years ago, when I found you sitting
by the blackberry bushes on the Fontenoy road? Yes, you do. The
blackberries were in bloom, and you had on a pink sunbonnet, and I broke
you a lot of wild cherry for your very same parlour in there. You had
been crying that day, too,--oh, I knew!--but you plucked up spirit and
put the wild cherry all around the parlour. And now, look at you!--you
aren't a partridge any longer, you're a dove without a mate. Well, why
don't you cry, little dove?"

"I don't feel like crying," said Vinie. "There isn't anything the matter
with me. I'm going to put the green stuff up, and Tom's got ever so many
wax candles and two bottles of Madeira, and you'll come to supper--"

"I'll send you a brace of wild turkeys Christmas Eve. I'll shoot them
over on Indian Run."

Vinie shrank back. "You look," exclaimed Adam, "as though you were on
Indian Run, and I had turned my gun on you! Why did you go white and
sick like that?"

He glanced at her again with keen, deep blue eyes. "Now the colour has
come back. Were you frightened over there in those woods when you really
were a bird? Indian Run! It is more than three months, isn't it, since
Mr. Cary's death?"

"December," answered Vinie, in a fluttering voice, "December, November,
October, and part of September--yeth, more than three months. Suppose we
go now and put the holly up?"

"Let's stay here a little in the sun. The holly won't wither. I don't
know a doorstep, East or West, that I like to sit on better than this.
There's a variety of log cabins that I'm fond of, and maybe as many as
four or five wigwams, but I'd like to grow old sitting in the sun before
this little grey house! It isn't going to be long before the sap runs in
the sugar trees and it's spring. Then all the pretty flowers will come
up again and I'll help you draw cool water from the well. Don't you ever
wear that Spanish comb I brought you?"

"I've got it put away. It's lovely."

"It oughtn't to be put away. It ought to be stuck there, dark shell
above your yellow hair. You'll wear it, won't you, Christmas Day?"

"Yeth, I'll wear it, Mr. Adam. Who's coming now, Smut?"

"He hears a horse. Wear the Spanish comb, and Tom shall brew us a bowl
of punch, and we might get in some gay folk and a fiddle and have a
dance. I'd like to stand up with you, little partridge."

Vinie put down her head and began to cry. "It's nothing, nothing! There
isn't anything the matter! Don't think it, Mr. Adam. I jutht get tired
and cold, and Christmas isn't like it used to be. Now I've stopped--and
I'll dance with you with pleasure, Mr. Adam."

"That's right," said Adam. "Now, you dry your eyes, and we'll go into
the parlour and I'll make a fire, and we'll put leaves and berries all
around. Who is it coming by? Mr. Fairfax Cary."

"Yeth," answered Vinie. "He rides a black horse."

The hunter glanced at her again. "Little bird," he thought, "your voice
didn't use to have so many notes." Aloud he said, "He's grown to look
like his brother. I met him in the road the other day and we talked
awhile. He's too stern and quiet, though. All the time we talked I was
thinking of a Cherokee whom I once met following a war party that had
killed his wife. Fairfax Cary had just the same air as that
Indian--still, like an afternoon on a mountain-top. There's no clue yet
as to who shot his brother."

Fairfax Cary, going by on Saladin, lifted his hat to the woman on the
porch. "Yes, he's like that Cherokee," repeated Adam. "Where's he
riding?--to Fontenoy, I reckon. Now, little partridge, let's go make the
parlour look like Christmas."

Vinie rose, and the hunter gathered up the green stuff. She spoke again
in the same fluttered voice. "Mr. Adam, do you think--do you think
they'll ever find out--"

"Find out who shot Mr. Cary?" asked Gaudylock. "They may--there's no
telling. Every day makes a trail like that more overgrown and hard to
read. But if Fairfax Cary is truly like my Cherokee, I'd not care to be
the murderer, even five years and a thousand miles from here and now.
You may be sure the Cherokee got _his_ man. Now you take the mistletoe
and I'll take the holly, and we'll make a Christmas bower to dance in."
He raised his great armful and went into the house singing,--

"Once I was in old Kentucky,
Christmas time, by all that's lucky!
Bear meat, deer meat, coon and possum,
Apple-jack we did allow some,
In Kentucky.

"Roaring logs and whining fiddle,
Up one side and down the middle!
Two foot snow and ne'er a flower,--
But Molly Darke she danced that hour,
In Kentucky!"

The hunter's surmise was correct. Fairfax Cary rode slowly on upon the
old, familiar way to Fontenoy. All the hills were brown, winter earth
and winter air despite the brightness of the sunshine. A blue stream
rippled by, pine and cedar made silhouettes against a tranquil sky, and
crows were cawing in a stubble-field. Cary rode slowly, plodding on with
a thoughtful brow. The few whom he met greeted him respectfully, and he
answered them readily enough, then pursued his way, again in a brown
study. The Fontenoy gates were reached at last, and he was about to bend
from his saddle and lift the heavy latch, when a slim black girl in a
checked gown made a sudden appearance in the driveway upon the other
side. "I'll open hit, sah! Don' you trouble. Dar now!"

The gate swung open, Cary rode through, and Deb appeared beside Miranda.
"We've been walking a mile," she announced. "Down the drive and back
again, through the hollow, round the garden, and up to the glass
door--that's a mile. Are you going to stay to supper?"

Cary dismounted and walked beside her, his bridle over his arm. "I don't
think so, Deb,--not to-night."

"I wish you would," said Deb wistfully. "You used to all the time, and
you most never do now. And--and it's Christmas, and we aren't going to
decorate, or have a party, or people staying!" Deb's chin trembled. "I
don't like houses in mourning."

"Neither do I, Deb."

The colour streamed into his companion's small face. "I didn't mean--I
didn't mean--I forgot! Oh, Mr. Fairfax,--"

"Dear Deb, don't mind. I wish you were going to have a Christmas as
bright as bright! Won't there be any brightness for you?"

"Why, of course," answered Deb, with bravery. "I am going to have a
lovely time. Uncle Dick says I can do what I please with the schoolroom,
and Miranda and I and the quarter children--we're going to decorate.
Unity's going to show us how, and Scipio's going to put up the wreaths.
The quarter's to have its feast just the same, and I'm going to help
Unity give out the presents. I expect it will be beautiful!"

The two walked on, Miranda following. Cary took the child's hand. "I
expect it will be beautiful too, Deb. Sometimes ever so much brightness
in just a little place makes up for the grey all around. Aren't you
going to let me see the schoolroom?"

"Oh, would you like to?" cried Deb, brightening. "Certainly, Mr.
Fairfax. Christmas is lovely, isn't it? Unity says that maybe she and I
will slip down to the quarter and watch them dancing. I'm sure I don't
want parties, nor people staying!"

Deb squeezed her companion's hand, and kept silence from the big elm to
the lilac-bushes. Then she broke out. "But I don't understand--I don't
understand at all--"

Cary, looking down upon her, saw her little pointed chin quiver again,
and her brown eyes swim. "What don't you understand, poor little Deb?"

"I don't understand why I can't go to Roselands. I've always gone the
day after every Christmas, and it is always like Christmas over again!
And now Uncle Dick says, 'Stay at home, chicken, this year,' and Uncle
Edward says he needs me to tell him stories, and Unity begged them at
first to let me go, but when they wouldn't, she said that she couldn't
beg them any more, and that she didn't think the world was going right
anyhow." The tears ran over. "And Jacqueline," continued Deb, in a
stifled little voice,--"Jacqueline wrote me a letter and said not to
come this year if Uncle Dick and Uncle Edward wanted me at home. She
told me I must always obey and love them--just as if I didn't anyhow.
She said she loved me more than most anything, but I don't think that is
loving me--to think I'd better not come to Roselands. She said I was
most a woman, and so I am,--I'm more than twelve,--and that I was to
love her always and know that she loved me. Of course I shall love
Jacqueline always--but I wanted to go to Roselands." Deb felt in her
pocket, found a tiny handkerchief, and applied it to her eyes. "It's not
like Christmas not to go to Roselands the day after--and I think people
are cruel."

"I wouldn't think that of your sister, Deb," said Cary, with gentleness.
"Your sister isn't cruel. Don't cry."

"I'm not," answered Deb, and put carefully away a wet ball of
handkerchief. "I hope you'll like the schoolroom, Mr. Fairfax. It's all
cedar and red berries, and Miranda's and my dolls are sitting in the
four corners. It's lovely weather for Christmas--though I wanted it to
snow."

Major Edward, seated at an old desk, going over old papers, looked up as
Cary entered the library. A fire of hickory crackled and flamed on the
hearth, making a light to play over the portrait of Henry Churchill and
over the swords crossed beneath. An old hound named Watch slept under
the table, the tall clock ticked loudly, and through the glass doors,
beyond the leafless trees, showed the long wave of the Blue Ridge.

"Is it you, Fair?" demanded the Major. "Come in--come in! I am merely
going over old letters. They can wait. The men who wrote them are all
dead." He turned in his chair. "Have you just come in?"

"Yes, sir."

"Unity was here awhile ago. She went through the glass door--down to the
quarter, I suppose."

"I will stay here for a while, sir, if I may. Don't let me disturb you.
I will take a book."

"You do not disturb me," answered the Major. "I was reading a letter
from Hamilton, written long ago--long ago.

"I met Deb in the driveway and we walked to the house together. Poor
little maid! She is mightily distressed because she thinks there's a
lack of Christmas cheer. I wish, sir, that she might have a merry
Christmas."

"We'll do our best, Fair. Unity shall make it bright."

"The servants, too,--I give mine the usual feast at Greenwood, and I'm
going down to the quarter for half an hour."

"The Carys make good masters. In that respect all here, too, goes on as
usual. As for Deb, the child shall have the happiest day we can give
her." He took from a drawer a small morocco case and opened it. "She'll
have from Dick a horse and saddle, and I give her this." He held out the
case, and Cary praised the small gold watch with D.C. marked in pearls.
"The only thing," continued Major Edward wearily, "is that she cannot go
to Roselands. She has cried her heart out over that."

"You declined the invitation for her?"

"Yes. I made Dick do so. She is growing into womanhood. It will not
answer."

"Then, sir, Colonel Churchill must know--"

"He doesn't 'know,'" said the Major doggedly. "Nobody really knows. We
may be all pursuing a spectre. I told Dick enough to make him see that
Deb should not be brought into contact--"

There was a silence. Cary studied the fire, and Major Churchill unfolded
deftly with his one hand a yellowing paper, glanced over it, and laid it
in a separate drawer. "An order from General Washington--the Andre
matter. Deb shall not visit Roselands again. Dick and I are not going to
have both of Henry's children"--The Major's voice broke. "Pshaw! this
damned weather gives a man a cold that Valley Forge itself couldn't
give!" He unfolded another paper. "What's this? Benedict Arnold! Faugh!"
Rising, he approached the fire and threw the letter in, then turned
impatiently upon the younger man. "Well, Fairfax Cary?"

"Is it still," asked Cary slowly, "your opinion that she does not know?"

"She?"

"Mrs. Rand."

Major Edward dragged a chair to the corner of the hearth and sat heavily
down. He bent forward, a brooding, melancholy figure, a thin old
veteran, grey and scarred. The fire-light showed strongly square jaw,
hawk nose, and beetle brows. When he spoke, it was in a voice
inexpressibly sombre. "I have seen my niece but three times since
September. If you ask me now what you asked me then, I shall answer
differently. I do not know--I do not know if she knows or not!"

"I think, sir, that I have a clue. The hour when he passed Red Fields--"

Major Churchill put up a shaking hand. "No, sir! Remember our bargain.
I'll not hear it. I'll weigh no evidence on this subject. Enough for me
to know in my heart of hearts that this man murdered Ludwell Cary, and
that he dwells free at Roselands, blackening my niece--that he rides
free to town--pleads his cases--does his work--ingratiates himself, and
grows, grows in the esteem of his county and his state! That, I say, is
enough, sir! If you have your clue, for God's sake don't impart it to
me! I've told you I will not make nor meddle." Major Edward began to
cough. "Open the window, will you? The room is damned hot. Well, sir,
well?"

"I'll say no more, then, sir, as to that," Cary answered from the
window. "I wish absolutely to respect your position. It will do no harm,
however, to tell you that I am going to Richmond the day after
Christmas."

"To Richmond! What are you going to Richmond for?"

"I want," replied the other, with restrained passion,--"I want to ride
from Shockoe Hill at three o'clock in the afternoon, with my face to
Roselands, and in my heart the knowledge that I have been foiled and
thwarted in deep-laid and cherished schemes by the one whom, for no
especially good reason, I have singled out of the world to be my enemy!
I want to feel the black rage of the Rands in my heart. I want to sleep,
the third night, at the Cross Roads Tavern, and I want to go on in the
morning by Malplaquet I want to learn at Forrest's forge that Ludwell
Cary is on the road before me. Perhaps, by the time I reach the mill and
cross the ford, I will remember what it was that I did next, and how I
managed to be on two roads at once."

He turned, and took up from a chair his hat and riding-whip "'Tis no
easy feat," he said, with grimness, "to put one's self in the place of
Lewis Rand. But then, other things are not easy either. I'll not grudge
a little straining." He stood before the Major, holding out his hand--a
handsome figure in his mourning dress, resolute, quiet, no longer
breathing outward grief, ready even, when occasion demanded, to smile or
to laugh, but essentially altered and fixed to one point. "I think, sir,
I will look now for Unity. There is something I wish to say to her.
Good-bye, sir. I shall not come again until after New Year."

Miss Dandridge, mounting the hill from the quarter, and sitting down to
rest upon a great, sun-bathed stone beside the foot-path, heard a quick
step and looked up to greet her betrothed. "It is so warm and bright,"
she said, "in this fence-corner that I feel as though summer were on the
way. The stone is large--there's room for you, too, here in the
sunshine."

He sat down beside her. "You have been making Christmas for the
quarter?"

"I've been telling them that Christmas is to be bright. I have not seen
you for a week."

He took her hand and pressed it to his lips. "Unity, I have been sitting
there at home at Greenwood, thinking, thinking! Page came to see me, but
I was such poor company that he did not tarry long. I rode here to-day
to say something to you--Unity, don't you think you had better give me
up?"

"No! I don't--"

"I do not think it is fair to you. I am not the man you knew--except in
loving you I am not the man who sat with you beneath the catalpa. I am
bereaved of the better part of me, and I see one object held up before
me like a wand. I must reach that wand or all effort is fruitless, and
there is no achievement and no harvest in my life. I may be years in
reaching it. I love you dearly and deeply, but I am not given over to
love. I am given over to reaching that wand. It has seemed to me,
sitting there at Greenwood, it has seemed to me after Page's visit, that
I should give you freedom--"

"It seems to me, sitting here upon this stone," answered Unity, "that I
will not take it! And what under the sun Mr. Page's visit--I will wait
until you are at leisure to love me as--as--as you loved me that day
under the catalpa when you flung Eloisa to Abelard into the rosebushes!
Don't--don't! I like to cry a little."

"I have determined," he said, "to tell you what I am doing. You know
that I seek to discover my brother's murderer, but you have not guessed
that I know his name. It is Lewis Rand whom I pursue, and it is Lewis
Rand whom I will convict of that deed on Indian Run!"

She gave a cry. "Lewis Rand! Fair, Fair, that's impossible!"

"Is it?" he asked sombrely. "Impossible to prove, perhaps, though I'm
not prepared to grant that either, but true, Unity, true as many another
black 'impossible' has been!"

"But--but--No one thinks--no one suspects. Fair, Fair! are you not
mistaken?"

"No. Nor am I quite alone in my conviction. And one day the world that
suspects nothing shall know."

There was a silence; then, "But Jacqueline," she whispered, with
whitening lips. "Jacqueline"--

"She chose," he answered. "I cannot help it. She took her road and her
companion."

"And you mean--you mean--"

"I mean to bring him to justice."

"To break her heart and ruin her life--to bring down wretchedness,
misery, disgrace! Oh!" She caught her breath. "And Deb--and Uncle Dick
and Uncle Edward--Fair, Fair, leave him alone!"

"You must not ask me that."

"But Ludwell would--Ludwell would have asked it! Oh, do you think he
would have endured to bring woe like that upon her! Oh, Fair, Fair,--"

Cary sprang to his feet, walked away, and stood with his back to the
great stone and his face toward Greenwood. He saw but one thing there,
the graveyard on the hill beneath the leafless trees. When he came back
to Unity, he looked as he had looked beside the dead, that day on Indian
Run.

"We are alike, Ludwell and I," he said, "but we are not that much alike.
I am little now but an avenger of blood. I shall be that until this
draws to an end." He came closer and touched her shoulder with his hand.
"Take me or leave me as I am, Unity. I shall not change, not even for
you."

"But for tenderness," she cried, "for mercy, for consideration of an old
house, for Jacqueline whom your brother loved as you love--as once you
said you loved--me! For just pity, Fair!"

"On the other side," he answered, "is justice. Don't urge me, Unity.
That is something your uncle has not done."

"Uncle Edward?"

"Yes."

There was a silence; then, "I see now," said Unity slowly. "I haven't
understood. I thought--I didn't know what to think. Uncle Edward,
too,--oh me! oh me! That is why Deb is not to go to Roselands." She
considered through blinding tears a little patch of sere grass. "But
Jacqueline," she whispered,--"Jacqueline does not know?"

Cary looked at her. "Do you think that, Unity?"

Unity stared at the grass until the tears all dried. "She knows--she
knows! That was a heart-breaking letter to Deb, and I couldn't--I
couldn't understand it! She does not ask me there--does not seem to want
to meet--I've hardly seen her since--since--And when we meet, she's
strange--too gay at first for her, and then too still, with wide eyes
she will not let me read. And she talks and talks--she talks now more
than I do. She's not truly Jacqueline--she's acting a part. Oh,
Jacqueline, Jacqueline!"

"Be very sure," he said, "that I have for her only pity, admiration,
yes, and understanding!"

"But you intend--you intend--"

"To bring Lewis Rand to justice. Yes, I intend that."

From the quarter below them came the blowing of the afternoon horn. The
short, bright winter day was waning, and though the sun yet dwelt upon
the hill-top, the hollow at its base was filled with shadow. Unity rose
from the stone. "I must go back to the house. I promised Deb I would
read to her." She caught her breath. "It is the Arabian Nights--and he
gave it to her, and she's always talking of him. Oh, all of us poor
children! Oh, I used to think the world so sweet and gay!"

"What do you think," he said, "of the one who turns it bitter?"

She looked at him with pleading eyes. "Fair, Fair, will you not forego
it--forego vengeance?"

"It is not vengeance," he answered. "It is something deeper than that. I
don't think that I can explain. It seems to me that it is destiny and
all that destiny rests upon." He drew her to him and kissed her twice.
"Will you wait for me, wait on no other terms than these? If you will,
God bless you! If it is a task beyond your strength, God bless you
still. You will do right to give it up. Which, Unity, which? And if you
wait for me, you must go no more to that man's house. If you wait for
me, my brother is your brother."

"I will never give up Jacqueline!"

"I do not ask it. But you'll go no more to that house, speak no more to
the man she most unhappily wedded. That is my right--if you wait for
me."

She turned and threw herself into his arms. "Oh, Fair, if it is only he
himself--if it is only that dark and wicked man--if you do not ask me to
stop loving her, or writing to her, or seeing her when I can--"

"That is all--only to speak no more to that dark and wicked man."

"Then I'll wait--I'll wait till doomsday! Oh, the world! Oh, the thing
called love! Don't--don't speak to me until I cry it out."

She wept for a while, then dried her eyes and tried to smile. "That's
over. Let us go now and--and read the Arabian Nights. Oh me, oh me, if
we are not merry here, what must Christmas be at Roselands!"




CHAPTER XXXV

THE IMAGE


The murderer of Ludwell Cary unlocked the green door of the office in
Charlottesville, entered, and opened the shutters of the small, square
windows. Outside was a tangle of rose-stems, but no leaf or bloom. The
January sunshine streamed palely in, whitening the deal floor and
striking against a great land map on the wall. Upon the hearth had been
thrown an armful of hickory and pine. Rand, kneeling, laid a fire,
struck a spark into the tinder, and had speedily a leap and colour of
pointed flames. He rose, opened his desk, drew papers out of
pigeon-holes and laid them in order upon the wood, then pushed before it
his accustomed chair. He did not take the latter; instead, after
standing a moment with an indescribable air of weary uncertainty, he
turned, went back to the firelit hearth, sat down, and, bending forward,
hid his face in his hands.

A cricket began to chirp upon the hearth, then the branch of a sycamore,
moved by the wind, struck violently against the low eaves of the house.
Rand arose, put his hands to his temples, and moved away.

There were law-books on the shelves, and he took down one and fell to
studying statutes that bore upon a case he had in court. He read for a
time with a frown of attention, but by degrees all interest flagged. He
turned a page, looked at it with vagueness, and turned no more. His chin
fell upon his hand, and he sat staring at the patch of sunshine on the
floor. It was like light on water--light on Indian Run.

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Murder One closing so did we commit this crime?
Articles published by guardian.co.uk Books

Poetry Workshop creature features

For many years my local corner shop displayed a large sign in its window telling local residents to "use us or lose us!" It always looked a rather toothless threat to me. After all, if I didn't use them, what difference would it make to me if they weren't there? And surely a corner shop, one that had been there for years, would have enough customers to survive without recourse to such apocalyptic warning? But it didn't and was soon converted into flats.

This community shop was destroyed not so much by the pressures of the supermarkets or people's commuting patterns, but simply by customer apathy. It's something to think about as crime writers and readers across the world mourn the imminent passing of Maxim Jakubowski's celebrated Charing Cross Road bookshop in London, Murder One.

Apathy is a strange word to connect to a bookstore that thrives on passion. It's noticeable when you walk through the door, when you speak to the friendly, knowledgeable staff, when you look at the shelves and see the vast range of titles on offer. This isn't your regular kind of bookstore: the first time I visited spent a whole lunch break looking up and down, from floor to ceiling from table to table; it was an hour that changed my perception of both crime writing and of bookselling.

Murder One was – and for a few weeks will remain – a shop that took crime seriously. Not in the sense that it intellectualised it, or made unsubstantiated claims for its importance, but in the way that it treated crime writing with the respect it was due. With a genre that has so many off-shoots, branches and sub-genres, it took a shop of Murder One's calibre to show just how diverse, interesting and mentally stimulating crime could be – far more than the guilty pleasure I had, until then, considered it.

Thanks to judicious recommendations, enticing table displays and hours of foraging among the stacks, I discovered writers that I would never have picked up, let alone read. You could always get the latest blockbuster, but delve a little deeper and you'd find books that were not stocked anywhere else, novels that, like the perfect crime, were hidden from public view. The Martin Beck novels by Sjöwall & Wahlöö – probably my favourite sequence of novels in any genre – were introduced to me via Murder One, as were Kem Nunn, Sue Grafton, and Henning Mankell. It's also the staff of Murder One who piqued my interest in the inimitable Fred Vargas, and I can't thank them enough for the introduction.

Inclusive and without snobbery, Murder One amply demonstrated that the best bookshops are places not just of commerce, but of community; places that make feel you belong. It's the kind of store that bibliophiles dream about: well-stocked, well-staffed and shabby enough to lose days browsing within. It's just unfortunate that such shops don't have enough paying customers to keep them afloat, or that these customers visit all too infrequently – something of which I'm certainly guilty.

These kinds of shops are facing a long, bloody battle – and one which, without significant reinforcements, they are likely to lose. As we hear of the travesty of another brilliant independent going down, we'll mourn the loss, wring our hands and damn Amazon and the supermarkets and Waterstone's. Yet perhaps the most important detail we'll probably keep under wraps: the last time we actually spent any money there.

Murder One closing its doors for the final time is undoubtedly a .38 shell for independent bookshops, but whether it's body blow or a warning shot all depends upon us, the consumers. No one, no matter how iconic or established, can exist on fond memories alone: just ask Woolworths. Use these shops now, because it doesn't take a master sleuth to deduce what will happen if we don't.

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