The whites of Darcy’s eyes flashed as he looked from side to side. His hands clenched into fists.
“Lie down on the ground,” said Kincaid slowly. “Put your hands behind your back. If you don’t do as I say, now, I will shoot you.”
For a moment, Darcy stood, and Kincaid tensed, preparing for the recoil of the gun.
Then Darcy dropped heavily to his knees. “I need help, medical attention,” he said. “He shot me. I’m injured.”
“Down!” Kincaid shouted, his anger and frustration breaking on a rush of adrenaline. “I don’t care if you bleed to death, you son of a bitch. Do you understand that?” He motioned with the gun, and Darcy lowered himself to the ground with a groan. “Gemma-”
She’d reached Darcy. “I’ve got a scarf.” Quickly, she knotted his hands together, then ran to Nathan.
Kincaid heard her whisper, “Oh, dear God, please…” as she knelt beside him.
“Is he breathing?”
“I think so. Yes.” She struggled to lift Nathan’s head from the water. “But he’s covered with blood-”
There was a racking, retching cough, then Nathan’s voice gasping, “His. It’s his. I shot him.”
Then Kincaid heard the screech of tires and the slamming of car doors, and a moment later he saw the flicker of torches moving through the trees. Lowering the gun, he said, “It seems the cavalry has arrived.”
“I didn’t know how much I wanted to live until he had his hands round my throat,” said Nathan, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper. They sat round the table in his kitchen, he and Adam, Kincaid and Gemma, drinking herbal tea.
The medics had dressed the worst of his cuts and abrasions, but he’d refused to go to hospital. “I thought I wanted to die,” he continued after a sip of tea. “I thought I’d shoot him, then shoot myself. But I failed on both counts.”
Gemma touched her slender fingers to the back of his hand. “You didn’t fail, Nathan. You didn’t need Darcy’s death on your conscience. And it wouldn’t have made Vic’s death, or Lydia’s, any less a waste.”
“We all failed,” said Adam. “We failed ourselves, and we failed Darcy. He wasn’t always so wicked. I don’t think he meant to kill Verity. But she refused him, and he couldn’t control his temper.” Pausing, he eased his finger between the clerical collar and his neck. “We’ll never know what he might have become if we’d held him accountable for what happened that night.”
“You will hold him accountable now,” said Kincaid.
After a preliminary assessment, the medics had taken Darcy to Addenbrooks, accompanied by police guard. He’d suffered considerable blood loss from the shot embedded in the right side of his face, neck, and shoulder, but he’d been protesting his innocence and threatening legal action even as they closed the ambulance doors.
“Your testimony will be essential to the prosecution’s case.” Kincaid looked from Nathan to Adam. “But it will mean revealing your own parts in the cover-up of Verity Whitecliff’s death, regardless of the personal consequences.”
“I think we’ve had quite enough of secrets,” said Adam.
Nathan looked up at them, his eyes dark. “What chance have you of getting a conviction on nothing but our word? There won’t be any evidence left of how Verity died or that he killed her.”
Kincaid glanced at Gemma. “We can only recommend to the Crown Prosecution Service, but my guess is that they’ll charge him with Vic’s and Verity’s deaths, and use Lydia’s for evidence of system in Vic’s case. We’ve the best chance of finding physical evidence in Vic’s case, and in Verity’s the court can rule based solely on the testimony of witnesses. And that means you and Adam.”
“I’ll do whatever it takes,” said Nathan, then he shook his head. “If I’d only known what Vic suspected…”
“We’re all going to have to live with our ifs,” Kincaid said heavily, and rose. “I’d advise you to get some rest. You’re going to need it.”
They said good-bye to Nathan and Adam at the door. When Kincaid shook Nathan’s hand, he felt the kinship of those who pass through the eye of the same needle. They had loved Vic, and she was gone.
He followed Gemma slowly to the car and handed her the keys, suddenly too exhausted to drive. Climbing in beside her, he slumped in his seat, but before she could start the engine he reached for her hand and held it between his.
“I thought you were going to shoot him,” said Gemma, turning to him.
“So did I.”
“I daresay he deserved it.” She searched his face. “Why didn’t you?”
He thought for a moment, trying to formulate an answer in words. “I’m not sure,” he said finally. “I suppose because it would’ve meant accepting violence as a solution.” He traced his fingers lightly over Gemma’s, then looked up into her eyes. “And then what would have separated me from Darcy?”
Cambridge
1 September 1986
Darling Mummy,
I have been in a black hell this past week, railing against fate for taking you from me, railing against you for not letting me cling to false hope. Until now I’d begun to believe I’d been tested in my life-I’d even been smug enough to think Yd endured more than my share and that Yd emerged with some sort of fire-forged honor.
But when your news came I found nothing had prepared me for this, that the courage I’d taken such pride in was a mere travesty, and I thought I could not bear it.
I woke early this morning to find frost on the windowpanes and the first crisp hint of autumn in the air. I dressed and went out, compelled by an urgency I didn’t understand, and walked until I reached the river meadows. It was you who taught me about the healing power of walking-about the magic in the harmony of breath and stride that opens the connection between heart and mind.
Then somewhere in that clear space between field and sky, I saw my anger for what it was.
Losing you means I must grow up, at last, and I’ve been kicking and screaming like a child unwilling to come into the world.
I saw that Yd underestimated the strength and capacity of your love for me, but that you had not done me the same disservice. You thought me equal to the task before me, and so I must be.
Why are the old truths so simple and so hard to learn? Love is a two-edged sword-it can be no other way. I will be forever blessed by your love, and forever diminished by your loss.
Lydia
The air under the yews felt cool and damp against Kit’s face. It had a musty, humic odor that reminded him of the way the mud smelled when he dug in the riverbank, but his flash of pleasure at the thought quickly faded. There didn’t seem much point now in wanting to be a naturalist.
Tess whimpered and pulled at her lead, but Kit stood fast, not yet willing to move from the dimness of the tunnel. He carried the books Nathan had lent him, and it felt to him as if returning them would sever his last connection with the village.
Mrs. Miller had brought him to the cottage that morning to help him pack up the remainder of his things, then had agreed to return for him after he’d visited Nathan. Colin had offered, awkwardly, to come with him, but Kit refused. He’d wanted a few minutes alone to say good-bye to the cottage.
When they’d driven away, he stood for a long while in the front garden, gazing at the house, memorizing its lines and imperfections, then he’d kicked the estate agent’s sign as hard as he could. It wasn’t fair. Nothing was bloody fair. How could his dad bear the idea of some other family living in their house? And how could his dad leave-
Kit stopped at that point in the well-worn groove of his thoughts. He didn’t want to think about his dad anymore. Giving a gentle tug to Tess’s lead, he stepped out into the sunlight of Nathan’s back garden.
Nathan knelt at the edge of the knot bed, digging in the earth with a trowel. He looked up, smiling, as Kit and Tess came across the grass. “Hullo, Kit. Is this your dog, then?”
“Her name’s Tess,” said Kit, dropping to his knees beside him.
/> “She’s lovely,” said Nathan, scratching her rough coat and the pink insides of her ears. “Why don’t you let her have a run in the garden?” he suggested. “It’s secure enough.”
“What are you planting?” asked Kit as he unhooked Tess’s lead and watched her bound across the grass towards the robins feeding near the hedge. “They’re not very pretty.”
Nathan sat back on his heels, resting the trowel on his knee as he looked at the bedraggled row of herbs. “No, I suppose they’re not. I was ill, you see, and I dug them up. But my friend Adam came along afterwards and put them in water for me. They’d have died if he hadn’t.”
Kit frowned. “Why did you pull them up, if they weren’t dead?”
Nathan reached out and smoothed the soil round the last herb with the palm of his hand, then said, slowly, “I planted these for your mother. I thought that if I pulled them up, I wouldn’t miss her so much. But I was wrong. Sometimes it helps to remember.”
Kit stared at him with a flash of adult understanding. “You loved my mum, didn’t you?”
“Yes. I did.” Nathan watched him carefully. “Do you mind?”
“I don’t know,” said Kit, for his brief spasm of jealousy had been replaced by the thought that Nathan, at least, might understand how he felt. “No… I suppose not.” He looked again at the neat row of plants, then held out the plastic carrier bag. “I brought your books back.”
Nathan glanced at the bag but didn’t reach for it. After a moment, he said, “I want you to have them. We can talk about them when you come to visit. Will you come to see me?”
Kit watched Tess happily rooting about at the bottom of the garden, felt the heat from the midday sun soaking into his hair like warm honey, and for an instant, in that bright place, he felt his mother’s presence a little nearer.
He nodded.
CHAPTER 22
He wears
The ungathered blossom of quiet; stiller he
Than a deep well at noon, or lovers met;
Than sleep, or the heart after wrath. He is
The silence following great words of peace.
RUPERT BROOKE,
from a fragment of an elegy
found in his notebook
after his death
Kincaid and Gemma stood at the end of the bridge over the dike at Sutton Gault, the expanse of the East Anglian sky stretching gray and limitless above them. Below, the forensics team worked carefully in the soft ground at the water’s edge. They’d begun yesterday, under Adam Lamb’s direction, but the failing light had forced them to postpone until this morning.
“I’ve brought you some coffee,” said the local inspector, crossing the grass towards them with two steaming polystyrene cups. “Why don’t you go in and have some lunch while you wait?” He gestured over his shoulder at the neat pub tucked in the hollow of land below the road. “It’s early enough you might get in without a booking. Folks come all the way from London for the food here, believe it or not; it’s that good.”
“Some other time, thanks,” said Kincaid. “I think we’ll just wait here for now.” Coppers became callous enough over the finding of bodies-he couldn’t count the times he’d grabbed a take-away en route to a crime scene-but lingering over a posh lunch while the forensics lads dug for Verity Whitecliff’s bones didn’t seem right to him. It had become a personal matter.
As the inspector scrambled down the steep bank to rejoin the team, Gemma moved nearer to Kincaid. She’d wrapped her hands round the hot cup to warm them, for the wind that whipped along the top of the dike was vicious. “I keep thinking of what it must have been like for them that night, burying her. I’ve even dreamt of it.”
Kincaid glanced at her. She’d replaced the bloodstained scarf she’d used to tie Darcy’s hands with a new one in dull plum, and the color made her hair blaze in contrast. “It must have seemed a nightmare,” he said. “But all their suffering doesn’t excuse their silence.”
“No,” she answered softly, so that he had to bend his head to hear her against the wind. “But she didn’t go unmourned… and the truth will be told.” Frowning, she added, “I’m not sure I’d have Dame Margery’s strength.”
He thought of their visit to Margery Lester the previous afternoon. She’d received them in her dove gray drawing room, as impeccably dressed as when they’d seen her last, but she looked impossibly fragile, as though she’d aged years since that day a mere week ago in Ralph Peregrine’s office. Since then she had borne the news of her friend Iris Winslow’s brain tumor, as well as her son’s arrest for murder.
While the police had not found Kincaid’s missing case notes, they had discovered a small enameled box containing digoxin tablets in Darcy’s possession. When questioned, he claimed he carried them in case his mother should need them.
“Was your son in the habit of keeping your medication for you, Dame Margery?” Kincaid asked, when they’d refused her offer of tea or sherry.
“I have never asked him to do so,” she said carefully, disguising a tremble in her hands by folding them in her lap.
“Have you ever known him to carry your medication?” Kincaid said, narrowing it down.
“No. No, I have not. It’s not like nitroglycerin, Mr. Kincaid, to be used in the event of pain. Digoxin is taken on a regular basis.” She spoke calmly, evenly, and yet Kincaid knew she must be aware of the implications.
“Dame Margery, have you noticed any discrepancies in your prescriptions lately?”
She looked away. “Yes. I had to have my last bottle replaced several days earlier than usual.”
Gemma made a small movement of surprise.
Margery turned to her. “Did you think I would lie, Miss James? That would be pointless-the chemist’s records will tell you the same thing-and it would be wrong. I will not deliberately discredit my son, nor will I protect him.” Her hands clenched in a spasm, and she looked at them in unexpected appeal. “Did I fail as a mother? Would my son have turned out differently if I had put him before my work?”
“Dame Margery-”
She shook her head. “You can’t answer that, Mr. Kincaid. No one can. It was unfair of me to ask.” Gazing through the French doors at the early roses in her garden, she said quietly, “He was a lovely child. But even then he liked his own way.”
After a moment, Margery unclasped her hands and fixed her direct gaze on them. She sat as still and straight as when they had come in, and in her eyes he saw a formidable determination. “I’m going to finish Victoria McClellan’s book,” she said. “I will not allow her work to be wasted… regardless of the personal… difficulty. She and Lydia deserve to be heard. And Verity…” For the first time, her voice wavered. “I owe a debt to Verity I can never repay.”
Gemma’s touch brought Kincaid back to the present. “Will you tell Kit about Lydia and Verity?” she asked.
Nodding, he said, “I suppose I must. He deserves to know why his mother died.”
“Duncan.” To his surprise, Gemma slipped her arm through his as if she didn’t mind who saw. “What are you going to do about Kit?”
He looked out into the flat distance, saw endless changing possibilities he could neither predict nor control. He could only feel his way, action by action, circumstance by circumstance, into new and uncharted territory. “I’ll ring him every day if I can. See him as often as possible. Then, when he’s had time to get used to me…”
“You’ll tell him the truth?”
“Yes. No secrets. And we’ll go from there.”
Gemma tightened her grip on his arm. After a moment, she said, “It frightens me a bit. It will change things between us. For better or worse, I don’t know. Maybe it will just be different.”
He grinned at her. “It scares the hell out of me.”
A shout came from below. The inspector beckoned to them, and they began the precarious climb down the bank. When they reached the bottom, they picked their way to a dry tussock near the excavation site and squatted to see what the foren
sics specialist held in his gloved hands.
“You were bang on,” he said, looking pleased with himself. “Human scapula. And there’s more. But the decomposition’s quite advanced. It’s going to be a job getting her out.”
The fragment of bone looked too small, too delicate to be human, thought Kincaid, and the leaching soil had stained it the color of old ivory.
Gemma reached out, her fingers hovering over the bone as if she might caress it. She looked up at him. “It seems Lydia was the voice of vengeance, after all.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
An Agatha and Macavity nominee, Deborah Crombie received international acclaim for her first four mysteries, A Share in Death, All Shall Be Well, Leave the Grave Green, and Mourn Not Your Dead, which are being published in Great Britain, Germany, Italy, and Japan. She grew up in Dallas, Texas, and later lived in Edinburgh and in Chester, England. She travels to Great Britain yearly to research her books and recently lectured at St. Hilda’s College, Oxford. She now lives in a small north Texas town with her husband, daughter, cocker spaniel, and four cats, and is at work on the sixth book in the Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James series.
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