Elizabeth George - In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner

“But this is life.” Samantha placed a comforting hand on her uncle's shoulder. “What we're doing here, at the manor, every day. This is life, Uncle Jeremy.”

He straightened from the sink, reaching in his pocket as he did so, bringing out a neatly folded handkerchief and honking into it before he turned to her. Poor man, she thought. When had he last wept? And why were men so embarrassed when they finally broke with the force of a reasonable emotion?

“Want to be part of it again,” he said.

“Part of it?”

“Life. I want life, Sammy. This”-he made a gesture towards the sink-“this runs away from everything living. I say enough.”

Odd, Samantha thought. He suddenly sounded so strong, as if nothing stood between him and his hope for sobriety. And just as suddenly she wanted that for him: the life he imagined for himself, happy in his home, occupied and surrounded by his darling grandchildren.

She could even see them, those lovely grandchildren still unconceived. She said, “I'm so glad, Uncle Jeremy. I'm so terribly terribly glad. And Julian… Julie'll be so delighted. He'll want to help you. I know he will.”

Jeremy nodded, his gaze fixed on her. “You think?” he said hesitantly. “After all these years… with me… like this?”

“I know he'll help,” she said. “I just know it.”

Jeremy straightened his clothes. He blew his nose noisily once again and folded his handkerchief back into his pocket. He said, “Y’ love him, don't you, girl?”

Samantha shuffled her feet.

“You're not like the other. You'd do anything for him.”

“I would,” Samantha said. “Yes. I would.”

When Lynley arrived in Padley Gorge, the search of Maiden Hall was in full swing. Hanken had brought six constables with him, and he'd deployed them economically as well as thoroughly. Three of them were searching the family's floor, the residents’ floor, and the ground floor of the Hall proper. One was searching the outbuildings on the property. Two others were searching the grounds. Hanken himself was coordinating the effort, and when Lynley pulled to a stop in the car park he found his fellow DI smoking moodily beneath an umbrella near a panda car as the family-floor constable made his report.

“Get out with the others on the grounds, then,” Hanken was instructing him. “If there's been any digging round here, I want you lot on it like hounds down a foxhole. Understand? And mind you dig up that new road sign at the bottom of the drive.” The constable trotted off in the direction of the slope that fell away towards the road. There Lynley could see two other policemen pacing along evenly beneath the trees in the rain.

“Nothing so far,” Hanken told Lynley. “But it's here somewhere. Or something related to it is. And we'll find it.”

“I've got the waterproof,” Lynley said.

Hanken raised an eyebrow and tossed his cigarette onto the ground. “Have you indeed? That's good work, Thomas. Where'd you find it?”

Lynley told him about the thought process that had led him to the skip. Under a week's worth of rubbish from the hotel, he'd found the rain gear by relying upon a pitchfork and the patience of the dustmen who'd arrived just behind him to collect the skip's contents.

“You don't much look like you've been doing some skip-trolling,” Hanken told him.

“I showered and changed,” Lynley admitted.

The rubbish in the skip-piled up on the waterproof for nearly a week-had ultimately protected it from the rain, which might have otherwise washed away any evidence left upon it. As it was, the plastic garment hadn't been touched by anything other than coffee grounds, vegetable peelings, plate scrapings, old newspapers, and crumpled tissues. And since it had been turned inside out anyway, even these had only smeared its insides, giving it the appearance of a discarded tarpaulin. Its exterior had been largely untouched, so the blood splatters on it remained as they had been on the previous Tuesday night: mute witnesses to what had occurred inside Nine Sisters Henge. Lynley had bundled the waterproof into a supermarket carrier bag. It was, he said, in the boot of the Bentley.

“Let's have it, then.”

“First,” Lynley said with a nod at the Hall, “are the Maidens here?”

“We don't need an ID on the rain gear if it's got the kid's blood on it, Thomas.”

“I wasn't asking professionally. How are they taking the search?”

“Maiden claims he's found some bloke in London who can do a lie detector on him. Runs a business called Polygraph Professionals, or something like that.”

“If he's willing-”

“Bollocks,” Hanken cut in irritably. “You know that polygraphs are worth sod all. So does Maiden. But they make one hell of a delaying tactic, don't they? ‘Please don't arrest me. I've got a polygraph organised.’ Bugger that for a lark. Let's have the waterproof.”

Lynley handed it over. It was turned inside out, as it had been upon his discovery of it. But one of its edges was exposed, where the blood made a purple deposit in the shape of a leaf.

“Ah,” Hanken said when he saw it. “Yes. We'll get this over to forensic, then. But I'd say everything's over bar the shouting.”

Lynley didn't feel so certain. But why? he wondered. Was it because he couldn't believe Andy Maiden had killed his daughter? Or was it because the facts truly led elsewhere? “It looks deserted,” he said with a nod at the Hall.

“Due to the rain,” Hanken told him. “They're inside though. The lot of them. Most of the guests're gone, it being Monday. But the Maidens are here. As are the employees. Except for the chef. He generally doesn't show up till after two, they said.”

“Have you spoken to them? The Maidens?”

Hanken appeared to read the underlying meaning, because he said, “I haven't told the wife, Thomas,” and then transferred the waterproof to the front seat of the panda car. “Fryer!” he shouted in the direction of the slope. The family-floor constable looked up, then came at a trot when Hanken gestured him over. “The lab,” he said with a jerk of his head towards the car. “Drive that bag over for a work-up on the blood. See if you can get the job done by a girl called Kubowsky. She doesn't let grass grow, and we're in a hurry.”

The constable looked happy enough to be out of the rain. He removed his lime-coloured windcheater and hopped into the car. In less than ten seconds he was gone.

“Exercise in going through the motions,” Hanken said. “The blood's the boy's.”

“Doubtless,” Lynley agreed. Still, he looked towards the Hall. “D'you mind if I have a word with Andy?”

Hanken eyed him. “Can't accept it, can you?”

“I can't get away from the fact that he's a cop.”

“He's a human being. Governed by the same passions as the rest of us,” Hanken said. Mercifully, Lynley thought, he didn't add the rest: Andy Maiden was better than most people at doing something about those passions. Instead, Hanken said, “Mind you, remember that,” and strode off in the direction of the outbuildings.

Lynley found Andy and his wife in the lounge, in the same alcove where he and Hanken had first spoken to them. They weren't together this time, however. Rather, they sat, silent, on the opposing sofas. They were in identical positions: leaning forward with their arms resting just above their knees. Andy was rubbing his hands together. His wife was watching him.

Lynley obliterated from his mind the Shakespearean image that was invoked by Andy's attention to his hands. He said his former colleague's name. Andy looked up.

“What're they looking for?” he asked.

Lynley didn't miss the pronoun or its implication of a distinction between himself and the local police.