Thief's Mark

by Carla Neggers

  He threw back his head and moaned. “I haven’t killed anyone.” He stood straight. “Freddy Balfour let Deborah York use the cottage to paint, in secret. She was self-taught. She practiced by copying scenes of Scotland. She used photographs. She had some of her own, and I gave her some, too. I ripped some out of magazines. I looked for anything she might like. Painting was her creative secret, she called it. No one knew.”

  “But you knew,” Cassie said. “Freddy knew.”

  “I meant her family. I don’t think Posey or my family knew, either. I caught her in here one day, by accident. She was painting to her heart’s content. She was embarrassed. It wasn’t that painting was a forbidden pastime, but she’d made such a secret of it—she thought she should have been using her time and energy for more productive pursuits and painting was self-indulgent. When she died...” He shut his eyes, more tears leaking out. He opened his eyes again and pushed his palm over his balding head. “I hid the paintings after she was killed. Any that were here. Deborah didn’t want anyone to know and I couldn’t let—” He gulped, as if he were a tortured teenager again. “I needed to keep her secret. I thought that’s what she’d have wanted. I tucked the paintings in the woodshed. They were mixed in with all sorts of dusty, worthless relics from Freddy. I put them out of my mind.”

  “Until your wife discovered one during renovations and then Henrietta discovered the rest in Davy Driscoll’s rental car,” Colin said.

  “That’s right.” Eugene cleared his throat. “Scotland... I knew Oliver was taken to a Scottish ruin. I knew a ransom demand was made to his grandparents but he escaped before it could be paid. I didn’t want there to be any scandal that would harm Deborah’s memory.”

  “Dear God, Eugene,” Cassie breathed. “You were just a kid.”

  “It’s all right, Cassie. It’s an emotional memory, one I’ve kept to myself for far too long. I’ll tell the police everything.”

  “Where were you when the Yorks were killed?” Colin asked.

  Eugene’s relief at the direct question was almost palpable. “Everyone assumed I was at home in Oxford, but I was here. I’d biked. I did work for Freddy. He was so sick then. I wanted to help, and...” He didn’t finish.

  “And you were hoping to see Deborah York,” Cassie said. “You were in love with her.”

  He looked up at his wife. “I was fifteen, Cassie.” His voice was calmer, more controlled. “I had an enormous crush on her. I suspect most of the boys around here did.”

  “I did,” Nigel mumbled.

  “Deborah was a lovely, generous woman,” Eugene said. “She was also devoted to her husband and son, just as I’m devoted to my wife and boys now. We were all devastated by her and Charles’s murders, but our sense of loss didn’t compare to what Oliver must have felt. It’s easy when you’re hurting yourself to lose sight of someone who is hurting more.”

  “I’m not sure what I feel,” Cassie said. “I’m numb. Too many emotions all at once.”

  “I didn’t kill anyone. I didn’t destroy the paintings. I didn’t know Davy Driscoll was here, searching for them. I don’t know why he wanted them. Deborah York loved her family. I love my family.” Some of the starch went out of him. “I never hurt her, but I can’t shake the notion that I did something to cause her death.”

  * * *

  Martin was having difficulty coping with his irritation with Oliver and Henrietta for what he was convinced was their impulsive, reckless decision to drive to Scotland overnight. He hadn’t heard a peep from either of them since their departure. He’d come to the house with Alfred hoping no one jumped out of the bushes and slit his brachial artery. He no longer tried to convince himself Davy Driscoll had died in an elaborate suicide attempt. It was fanciful, a way of avoiding the truth, whatever it was.

  He hadn’t wanted to find Ruthie in the kitchen, attacking an imaginary spot on the cooker.

  “You’re clever, Ruthie,” Martin said. “You could nick an artery.”

  She didn’t look up from her work. “I could, but I didn’t. I haven’t killed anyone, ever, even to protect my sons.”

  “I was teasing, Ruthie. Are you all right? What’s got in to you?”

  Her shoulders slumped but she kept at the cooker. “Nigel’s been hurt. Paramedics checked him over. He’s with the police. They let him call me. I told him to tell them everything he knows,” Ruthie said, as if Nigel he were still thirteen. “I never knew. He could have told me. Dear God. He could have told me.”

  Martin went still. “Told you what, Ruthie?”

  “Nigel knew Bart Norcross has been dead all these years. He saw his grave on the Kershaw farm a week after Deborah and Charles were killed. He thought...he was just a boy, Martin. He thought it was clothes buried there.”

  Martin couldn’t speak at first. All he could think to do was to go to Ruthie. “Dear Ruthie. Oh, love.” He took her by the elbows and turned her to him, embraced her. “Nigel was just a boy. He’s a man now, a good man. He’ll get through this. We all will.”

  “I never knew. He never told me.” She fought back sobs. “He was thirteen, Martin. Thirteen.”

  “We didn’t take into consideration the impact of the tragedy thirty years ago on the young people in the village,” Martin whispered.

  “I just wanted to protect my boys.”

  “I know, Ruthie. There were different levels and kinds of loss and trauma, but everyone here was forever changed.”

  She nodded, returned to her cleaning.

  A few minutes later, Emma and Colin arrived with DI Lowe. The DI reported that Cassie’s father in the US had identified the people in a photograph Driscoll had stolen from him and left with Finian Bracken.

  DI Lowe nodded to Colin, who continued. “Cassie’s father identified Freddy Balfour, Posey, their nephew Tony and Freddy’s young granddaughter, Henrietta. It’s been years since the photograph was taken,” Colin added, “but that Tony Balfour isn’t the Tony Balfour who’s been living in the Kershaws’ cottage on the old Balfour farm.”

  Martin could hardly breathe. “Then it’s not Bart Norcross in the grave.”

  22

  Southern Highlands, Scotland

  The stunning Scottish landscape was awash in sunlight, a contrast to Oliver’s last visit to this quiet spot in the Highlands above Pitlochry. He drove in silence on a narrow, winding road, descending to a loch, its still waters glistening on the late spring morning. Henrietta had insisted he sleep. He hadn’t wanted to, but she was inflexible when she was certain she was right. “You don’t want to see this place ragged,” she’d said. “Tilt your seat back and close your eyes. You’ll thank me later.”

  He hadn’t thanked her, not because he wasn’t grateful but because he was preoccupied. For the past few miles, he’d had to stop himself from reliving his escape along this very road. He’d run until his sides had ached and he’d been panting so hard he thought he would die, and then he’d dipped among the trees on the side of the road. He’d been terrified his captors would find him by his shadow.

  “Are you sure we’re on the right road?” Henrietta asked. “I don’t remember hearing about a golf course.”

  “What?”

  “Look there, Oliver.” She pointed up ahead. “That’s a tee.”

  “There was no golf course here thirty years ago. This road’s been improved considerably since then, too.”

  “I saw a sign for a castle hotel up ahead.”

  “The castle was abandoned then. An American with Scottish ancestry bought it ten years ago and invested millions to turn it into a five-star hotel. I read about it. I knew it was in the area, but I didn’t think it was this close.”

  “This must be its golf course.”

  Oliver glanced at her. She had her back to him as she looked out her window. He noticed snarls in her hair. He doubte
d she’d slept during his nap, but she’d dozed on the drive up from the Cotswolds. He trusted so little about himself right now but he trusted that he couldn’t imagine life without her. She’d always been there, rambling through the village on her visits with her aunt. Whether five or thirty-five, Henrietta Balfour had been a constant in his life. She was smart, funny, coping with her own ambitions, demons and secrets.

  And pretty, he thought. He’d noticed that about her before, many times, but not in the same way he did now.

  The road narrowed as it curved past the sparkling loch, the golf course sprawling above its banks. His grip tightened on the wheel, involuntarily, in reaction, he knew, to being here, remembering.

  “It’s not a surprise the area’s changed in thirty years,” Henrietta said. “But a castle hotel resort does make your escape from mad killers a bit more difficult to imagine.”

  He smiled. “Are you minimizing my ordeal?”

  “Not at all. Just imagining what it was like here before the eighteenth hole was put in.”

  “I was allowed to look out the window when we got to this road.” He slowed the car, nodded to the loch. “It was dark but I saw stars reflected on the water. I thought they were actual stars shining in the lake, shining up through the water. I thought they were a message from my parents in heaven.”

  “I’m sorry, Oliver.”

  No irony in her tone now. He shrugged. “Of course there were no stars in the lake. It was just starlight. It helps to be here. The lake is real. The road. The hills. Different, yes, but I didn’t make them up.”

  “Where did the priest find you after your escape?”

  “Somewhere near what’s now the ninth hole, I imagine. He’s since died. He was elderly then. I was suffering from mild hypothermia. I’d have died if not for his morning walk.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t die.” Henrietta was silent for a moment as they passed another sign pointed to the castle hotel. “Takes an edge of drama off the story of an eight-year-old boy left in a remote Scottish ruin, doesn’t it?”

  “If I’d been kidnapped today, instead of trudging in the bleak, cold rain, I could have slipped into the hotel and had tea and kippers.”

  “I can’t believe you’ve never returned until now.”

  Oliver frowned at her as if she’d gone mad. “Why would I have returned?”

  She considered his question. “Out of sight, out of mind, was it?”

  “Never out of mind,” he said. “Maybe that’s what I hoped would happen if I didn’t come back.”

  He didn’t continue, concentrating as the road curved away from the loch. Remembering. He could hear his rapid breathing and whimpers as a boy. Running, grief-stricken, terrified, exhausted, freezing and utterly determined. He’d wanted to get to the police. He remembered that now. His parents had told him to get to the police in an emergency.

  “You think you missed something that night, or forgot something due to the physical and emotional trauma you experienced.” Henrietta turned to stare out her window again. “It’s difficult to interview small children after a violent event even with proper training.”

  “You’ve done it?”

  “Yes.”

  It was a whisper, perhaps not meant for him to hear.

  He pulled into a dirt parking area on the side of the road. The golf course had veered off on the opposite side of the road, up toward the castle hotel. Here tall trees shaded both sides of the road. Oliver turned off the engine and got out of the car. Henrietta followed, silent, and met him by a footpath on the edge of the parking area.

  He pointed to a small sign with an arrow pointing up the path. “Directions nowadays.” He could hear the hollowness in his voice, memory bleeding through his resolve. He looked down at his feet as if he expected to see the shoes he’d been wearing that night. Little-boy trainers. He forced himself to turn to Henrietta. “We can pretend we’re tramping through Scottish ruins on a romantic getaway.”

  “Only the weather and scenery are romantic, Oliver. Nothing else about this is.”

  He slipped his hand into hers. “I’ve taken you for granted all these years. Never again.”

  “I’m not going to hold you to that under the circumstances.” She squeezed his hand and let it go, smiled, and then nodded to the path. “Shall we?”

  They took the path to the ruin, uphill through dense trees. It ended in a clearing where the skeletal remains of a small church stood among graves marked by carved headstones. Three Celtic crosses stood on the edge of the clearing, at the crest of the hill. The ground was uneven, the grass tended if tall now in the June morning sun. A low stone wall lined with trees bordered the clearing on three sides.

  “It must be popular for visitors to the hotel,” Henrietta said. “Have a wander to a proper Scottish ruin after breakfast. I wonder if it was part of the castle grounds at one time. I suppose it must have been.”

  Oliver walked across the churchyard, imagining the faithful coming here hundreds of years ago—imagining himself arriving with Davy Driscoll and Bart Norcross. “We didn’t come up a path,” he said. “Driscoll dragged me out of the back of the car. No. It was a van. He didn’t carry me. He shoved me through trees. The other man...” He paused, shutting his eyes, then opening them again, needing the sunlight, the green trees and grass, the wildflowers poking up among the graves. “I didn’t have as much to do with Bart Norcross. I remember he threatened to kill me if I didn’t do as they said.”

  “Awful memories for anyone never mind an eight-year-old.” Henrietta nodded toward the trees on the opposite side of the clearing. “There’s another road. It must come round from farther up the road where we turned.” She touched Oliver’s elbow. “We have company.”

  He could see a small white caravan parked through the trees. “Before he died, Driscoll said he lived at the ruin. I thought he was speaking metaphorically.”

  “Most people don’t speak metaphorically, Oliver.”

  He supposed she had a point.

  A path of pounded grass went through a small opening in the wall to the narrow road. He could feel Henrietta wanting to shoot past him and go first, but he took the lead. This was the route his kidnappers had taken that night. They’d parked where the caravan was now.

  It was an old caravan—crooked, dinged and rusted. Henrietta peered into the cab. “Just a lot of rubbish,” she said, standing back.

  Oliver edged to the main door at the back of the caravan. He expected to have to use his skills to break in, or suggest Henrietta use hers, but he saw that it was ajar.

  Tony Balfour burst out of the caravan. “Don’t come near me.” He leveled a pistol at Oliver. “I’ll shoot. I’ll defend myself. You’ve both lost your bloody minds.”

  Henrietta eased in closer. “Tony? What’s going on?”

  “He killed that man, Henrietta. He wants to blame me. Don’t let him fool you. Don’t believe his lies.”

  “What are you doing here?” Oliver asked him.

  “Reed Warren told me he was Davy Driscoll. He told me if anything happened to him, I was to come up here. I’d find answers. He said you killed your mum and dad that night. He was going to see you and tell you—so you could make peace with yourself.” Tony steadied the pistol. “He was afraid you’d kill him when he told you the truth, and you did.”

  “Davy Driscoll was a liar and a manipulator, Tony,” Henrietta said. “Here. Give me the gun and we’ll sort this calmly.”

  “There’s no sorting this. I’m getting out of here. I tried. I did right by Posey, and you, and the Kershaws, but you’ll never let me be a real Balfour. I’ll retire somewhere else. Maybe go back to America.”

  “Is that the weapon you used to kill my parents?” Oliver asked.

  “It’s the weapon you used to kill your parents. I didn’t kill anyone. I wasn’t anywhere near Lo
ndon that night. Or here. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time for that fellow’s confession. I didn’t know what to do.”

  “I’m sure you didn’t,” Henrietta said. “Go on, then. Leave me here with a killer.”

  “Sorry, love,” Tony said, taking a backward step. “I thought you’d beat me here.”

  She sighed. “We shouldn’t have rested, Oliver. Tony got ahead of us. You did tell me you didn’t need to sleep.”

  “It’s not your fault,” Oliver said.

  “I know that. I was right. You did need sleep.”

  “She’s something, isn’t she?” Tony grinned, but his gun didn’t waver and there was no amusement or affection in his eyes. “A true Balfour.”

  “Unlike you,” she said.

  “I won’t shoot unless I have to. I’ll have a head start and disappear. That’s all I want.”

  “Who are you going to pretend to be this time?” Oliver asked.

  “Don’t follow me. I’ll shoot you if you do.”

  Henrietta leaped at him without warning, and Oliver pounced, kicking the gun from Tony Balfour’s hand. It dropped to the road, slid on the dirt and rock. Tony was tall and fit, but he lacked Henrietta’s MI5 experience and training and Oliver’s black belt in karate. They overpowered him, twisted his arms behind him.

  Oliver scooped up the pistol and pointed it at Tony. “There must be something in the caravan we can use to tie him until we get the police here,” he said to Henrietta.

  “Don’t leave me alone with him,” Tony said. “He’ll kill me.”

  She looked up at Oliver. “We don’t need to tie him. We can keep the gun on him until the police arrive. I’ll call them now. Don’t move, Tony. I’m not in the mood to tackle you again, and I really don’t want Oliver to have to shoot you.”