The big man loosened his grip on himself. “It’s not as big a day as Christmas, Easter or the first of July, but we sell quantities of turkeys and hams for the third weekend in May.” He lumbered behind his desk and sagged down on the well-worn swivel chair, simultaneously waving Rhona to the visitor’s wooden chair.
If the neatly labelled hooks for invoices and receipts, the annotated wall calendar, and the clearly marked loose leaf notebooks lined up on the bookshelf meant anything, Staynor valued order. A collection of china, metal and plastic bulls and steers crowded a plate rail encircling the room. On the otherwise bare desk, a magnificent china bull pitcher stuffed with pens and sharpened pencils drew Rhona’s eye.
The two sat in a silence that stretched like a rubber band and increased in tautness as it lengthened. Staynor snapped the tension. His lips widened into a caricature of a smile, but his gaze didn’t meet Rhona’s. Instead, as if unable to fix on any object, his eyes moved constantly. “ ‘I hated him for he is a Christian’,” he rumbled while his eyes fixed first on one object then on another.
This was not what Rhona had expected.
Staynor’s smile disappeared. His features drooped, along with his body, and he slumped in his chair. He pursed his mouth and twisted his hands, as if imitating Lady MacBeth.
This wasn’t getting them anywhere. Time to shock him.
“Did you kill Paul Robertson?”
Staynor, relentlessly scraping his hands together, shook his head.
“Was your wife having an affair with Reverend Robertson?”
Staynor’s strange smile reappeared when his hands stilled. He leaned forward without meeting Rhona’s eyes. “ ‘The devil having nothing else to do went off to tempt my Lady Poltagrue. My lady, tempted by a private whim, To his extreme annoyance, tempted him,’ ” he recited in a hoarse whisper before he relaxed. His eyes lit up. “The poets know it all. There’s nothing new. Richard the Third, ‘He clothed his naked villainy; with odd old ends of holy writ. And seemed a saint when most he played the devil.’ Was that Paul, or wasn’t it?”
This was one weird man. How did he interact with his customers? Surely he didn’t whisper riddles and quotes when he sold hamburger and pork chops?
Staynor straightened up and spoke in a normal voice. “You’re surprised, aren’t you? You figured since I was a butcher I’d be an illiterate oaf? I wasn’t always a meat chopper. There’s no law against a butcher learning a thing or two about something besides veal cutlets and rack of lamb. Ever since Chaucer, writers have commented on the villainy of the clergy. Recently I’ve savoured the knowledge—Paul was one in a long line.”
Had he been toying with her? Playing the part of a demented man.
“Henry Fielding was acquainted with men like Paul. He said there was, ‘not in the universe a more ridiculous nor contemptible animal than a proud clergyman.’ ” Staynor jerked upward as if an invisible giant had pulled a string. “More to the point, Fielding said there was one fool at least in every married couple.”
After this burst of enthusiasm, the invisible giant released the cord, and Staynor’s vertebrae telescoped. “That’s the important quote. My wife chose to have affairs. Paul wasn’t the first—he won’t be the last. Paul didn’t take her. Women aren’t sides of beef a man can steal. They have to want to go, or they don’t go. I was the fool, and I suppose I hated him because he made me look foolish. Adultery’s not new. It’s not worth killing or being killed for. Shakespeare covered that too; ‘I pardon that man’s life. What was thy crime? Adultery? Thou shalt not die: die for adultery. No. The wren goes to’t, and the small gilded fly / Does lecher in my sight. Let copulation thrive.’ I don’t think I’d agree that it should thrive, but it’ll exist. It isn’t worth murder.”
Staynor produced a facsimile smile. “Are you familiar with Auden’s poem about a man who knifed another for holy reasons?” He answered his own question. “You probably aren’t. I’ll give you a bit. ‘He stood above the body, He stood there holding the knife, And the blood ran down the stairs and sang: ‘I’m the Resurrection and the Life’. They tapped Victor on the shoulder. They took him away in a van; He sat as quiet as a lump of moss saying, ‘I am the Son of Man’ / Victor sat in the corner Making a woman of clay; Saying: ‘I’m the Alpha and Omega, I shall come to judge the earth one day.’ ”
His face reflected his astonishment. “Where did that come from? You’ll think I’m as crazy as he was.” At the word “crazy”, Staynor covered his face with his massive hands.
Rhona waited.
After a time, Staynor dropped his hands and spoke in a normal tone. “What else can I tell you?”
“When your wife’s affair with Robertson began, and how you found out?”
Staynor hunched down and mumbled, “Don’t know. How did I find out? She told me.” His lips barely moved. “Telling me gave her a charge.”
“What did you do?”
Staynor flung his head from side to side like a tormented animal, like a caricature of the bulls ringing the room.
“Do. Why would I do anything?” His voice rose, and he continued to shake his head. “Do! I didn’t do anything.”
“Did your wife want a divorce?”
His head steadied. “No.”
“Where were you in the pack when the race began?”
The change of topic disconcerted him. He peered about the room as if searching for the answer on an imaginary prompt board. “In the middle. Remember the Bible tells us to ‘Run with patience the race that is set before us.’ ”
Rhona couldn’t connect the two things.
As if he’d read her mind, Staynor continued, “You must think I’m strange. I can’t help it. I have a photographic memory. Things I read imprint themselves and pop out at the strangest times. My friends ignore it. It’s like having a twitch or Tourette’s syndrome. Are you familiar with Tourette’s?”
Although she nodded, he continued.
“People who are perfectly sane but swear or shout at inappropriate times. They can’t help it. My quotes drive Sally nuts. I try not to do it, but . . .”
It was a relief having a relatively normal exchange. “You said you weren’t always a butcher. What did you do before?”
“I taught high school English.”
“I would have thought that with your passion for literature, teaching would have been the perfect job for you. Where did you teach? Why did you give it up?”
Staynor’s eyes again roamed the room. Although he didn’t answer immediately, Rhona didn’t repeat the question. Obviously, she’d touched on a sensitive topic.
He stared at the floor. “My uncle left me the shop. It was time for a change, ‘The very whirling wheel of change, which all mortal things doth sway’.”
Quotations again. He hid behind them when he didn’t like a topic.
“Where
