Elizabeth George - Payment in Blood

Stinhurst might have been mildly disciplining a fractious child. But there was absolute reality behind his words, and in the space of time that it had taken to hear them, Lynley saw the alternatives, a legal minuet with the man’s attorney or a momentary compromise that could well be used to purchase some truth. It had to be done.

“Step outside, Sergeant,” he told Havers, his eyes unwavering from the other man.

“Inspector…” Her voice was unbearably restrained.

“See to Gowan Kilbride and Mary Agnes Campbell,” Lynley went on. “It will save us some time.”

Havers drew a tense breath. “May I speak to you outside, please?”

Lynley allowed her that much, following her into the great hall and closing the door behind them. Havers gave rapid scrutiny to the left and right, wary of listeners. When she spoke, her voice was a whisper, fierce and angry.

“What the hell are you doing, Inspector? You can’t question him alone. Let’s chat about the procedure you’ve been so bloody fond of throwing in my face these last fifteen months.”

Lynley felt unmoved by her quick fl are of passion. “As far as I’m concerned, Sergeant, Webberly threw procedure out the window the moment he got us involved in this case without a formal request from Strathclyde CID. I’m not about to spend time agonising over it now.”

“But you’ve got to have a witness! You’ve got to have the notes! What’s the point of questioning him if you’ve nothing written down to use against…” Sudden comprehension dawned on her face. “Unless, of course, you know right now that you intend to believe every blessed word his sweet lordship has to say!”

Lynley had worked with the sergeant long enough to know when a conversational skirmish was about to escalate into verbal warfare. He cut her off.

“At some point, Barbara, you’re going to have to decide whether an uncontrollable factor such as a person’s birth is reason enough to distrust him.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? I’m supposed to trust Stinhurst? He’s destroyed a stack of evidence, he’s sitting smack in the middle of a murder, he’s refusing to cooperate. And I’m supposed to trust him?”

“I wasn’t talking about Stinhurst. I was talking about myself.”

She gaped at him, speechless. He turned back to the door, pausing with his hand on the knob.

“I want you to see to Gowan and Mary Agnes. I want notes. I want them precise. Use Constable Lonan to assist. Is that clear?”

Havers shot him a look that would have withered fl owers. “Perfectly…sir.” Slamming her notebook shut, she stalked off.

When Lynley returned to the sitting room, he saw that Stinhurst had adjusted to the new conditions, his shoulders and spine releasing their wire-tight grip on his posture. He seemed suddenly less unyielding and far more vulnerable. His eyes, the colour of fog, focussed on Lynley. They were unreadable.

“Thank you, Thomas.”

This easy shift in persona-a chameleon passage from hauteur to gratitude-was a glaring reminder to Lynley that Stinhurst’s lifeblood flowed not through his veins but through the aisles of the theatre.

“As to the scripts,” Lynley said.

“This murder has nothing to do with Joy Sinclair’s play.” Lord Stinhurst gave his attention not to Lynley but to the shattered front of the curio cabinet next to the door. He left his chair and went to it, retrieving the disembodied head of a Dresden shepherdess from the remaining crumble of broken porcelain that still lay inside, heaped upon the bottom shelf. He carried it back to his seat.

“I don’t imagine Francie yet realises that she broke this piece last night,” he remarked. “It’ll be a blow. Our older brother gave it to her. They were very close.”

Lynley wasn’t about to play hunt the thimble through the man’s family history. “If Mary Agnes Campbell found the body at six-fi fty this morning, why did the police not log your call until seven-ten? Why did it take twenty minutes for you to phone for help?”

“I wasn’t even aware until this moment that twenty minutes had elapsed,” Stinhurst replied.

Lynley wondered how long he had rehearsed that response. It was clever enough, the type of nonanswer to which no further comment or accusation could be attached.

“Then why don’t you tell me exactly what happened this morning,” he said with deliberate courtesy. “Perhaps we can account for the twenty minutes that way.”

“Mary Agnes found the…Joy. She went immediately for my sister, Francesca. Francesca came for me.” Lord Stinhurst seemed to be ready for Lynley’s next thought, for he went on to say, “My sister was panicked. She was terrified. I don’t imagine she thought to phone the police herself. She’d always depended upon her husband Phillip to be the master of any unpleasant situation. As a widow, she merely turned that dependence on me. That’s not abnormal, Thomas.”

“And that’s all?”

Stinhurst’s eyes were on the porcelain head he held gingerly in his palm. “I told Mary Agnes to gather everyone into the drawing room.”

“They cooperated?”

He looked up. “They were in shock. One doesn’t really expect a member of one’s party to be stabbed through the neck during the night.” Lynley raised an eyebrow. Stinhurst explained, “I had a look at the body when I locked her room this morning.”

“You were fairly clear-headed for a man who’s just encountered his fi rst corpse.”

“I think one ought to be clear-headed when there’s a murderer in one’s midst.”

“You’re sure of that?” Lynley asked. “You never considered that the murderer might have come from outside the house?”

“The nearest village is five miles away. It took the police nearly two hours to get here this morning. Do you really see someone coming in on snowshoes or skis to do away with Joy during the night?”

“Where did you place the call to the police?”

“From my sister’s offi ce.”

“How long were you in there?”

“Five minutes. Perhaps less.”

“Is that the only call you made?”

The question clearly took Stinhurst off guard. His face looked shuttered. “No. I telephoned my secretary in London. At her fl at.”

“Why?”

“I wanted her to know about the…situation. I wanted her to cancel my engagements on Sunday evening and Monday.”

“How farsighted of you. But all things considered, wouldn’t you agree that it’s a bit odd to be thinking about your personal engagements directly after discovering that a member of your party has been murdered?”

“I can’t help what it looks like. I just did it.”

“And what were the engagements that you had to cancel?”

“I’ve no idea. My secretary keeps my engagement book with her. I merely work off the daily schedule she gives me.” He concluded impatiently, as if in the need of a defence, “I’m out of the office frequently. It’s easier this way.”

Yet, Lynley thought, Stinhurst did not have the look of a man who required that his life be arranged round elements that made it easier and more liveable. So the last two statements wore the guise of both fencing and prevaricating. Lynley wondered why Stinhurst had even made them.

“How does Jeremy Vinney fit into your weekend plans?”

It was a second question for which Stinhurst seemed unprepared. But this time his hesitation bore the quality of thoughtful consideration rather than evasion. “Joy wanted him here,” he answered after a moment. “She told him about the read-through we were going to have. He’d been covering the renovation of the Agincourt with a series of articles in The Times . I suppose this weekend seemed like a natural extension of those stories. He phoned me and asked if he could come along. It seemed harmless enough, the possibility of good press prior to the opening. And at any rate, he and Joy appeared to know each other quite well. She was insistent that he come.”