Careless In Red (19 page)

But he found that Howenstow matters ultimately brought Helen into his mind, whether he wanted her there or not. The half-finished nursery had to be dismantled. Countryside clothing she’d left in their bedroom had to be gone through. A plaque for her resting place in the estate chapel—for the resting place she shared with their never-born son—had to be designed. And then there were the reminders of her: where he and she had walked together on the path from the house through the wood and over to the cove, where she’d stood in front of pictures in the gallery and lightheartedly commented on the physical attributes of some of his more questionable ancestors, where she’d browsed through ancient editions of Country Life in the library, where she’d curled up with—and ultimately dozed off over—a thick biography of Oscar Wilde.

Because reminders of Helen were everywhere at Howenstow, he’d begun his walk. Trudging along the entire South-West Coast Path was the last possible challenge Helen would ever have undertaken (“My God, Tommy, you’ve got to be mad. What would I do for shoes that aren’t utterly appalling in appearance?”), so he knew he could walk the length of it with impunity, should he choose to do so. There would be not a single reminder of her along the way.

But he’d not counted on the memorials he’d come across. Nothing he’d read about the path prior to walking it had prepared him for those. From simple bunches of dying flowers to wooden benches engraved with the names of the departed, death greeted him nearly every day. He’d left the Yard because he could not face another sudden brutal passing of a human being, but there it was: confronting him with a regularity that mocked his every attempt to forget.

And now this. DI Hannaford wasn’t exactly involving him in the murder investigation itself, but she was putting him close to it. He didn’t want that, but at the same time, he didn’t know how he could avoid it because he read the inspector as a woman who was as good as her word: Should he conveniently disappear from the region of Casvelyn, she would happily fetch him back and not rest till she’d done so.

As to what she was asking him to do…Like DI Hannaford, Lynley believed Daidre Trahair was lying about the route she’d taken from Bristol to Polcare Cove on the previous day. Unlike DI Hannaford, Lynley also knew Daidre Trahair had lied more than once about knowing Santo Kerne. There were going to be reasons behind both of these lies—far beyond what the vet had told him when he’d confronted her about her knowledge of the dead boy’s identity—and he didn’t know if he wanted to uncover them. Her reasons for obfuscation were doubtless personal, and the poor woman was hardly a killer.

Yet why did he think that? he asked himself. He knew better than anyone that killers wore a thousand different guises. Killers were men; killers were women. Killers, to his anguish, were children. And victims everywhere—no matter how foul they might actually be—were not meant to be dispatched by anyone, whatever the motive for untimely sending them to their eternal reward or punishment. The whole basis for their society rested upon the idea that murder was wrong, start to finish, and that justice had to be served so that closure—if not satisfaction, not relief, and certainly not an end to grief—might at least be achieved on the entire event. Justice equated to naming and convicting the killer, and justice was what was owed to those the victim summarily left behind.

Part of Lynley cried out that this was not his problem. Part of him knew that now and forever and more than ever, it would always be.

By the time they reached Casvelyn he was, if not reconciled to the matter, then at least in moderate accord with it. Everything needed to be accounted for in an investigation. Daidre Trahair was part of that everything, having made herself so the moment she lied.

Casvelyn’s police station was in Lansdown Road, in the heart of the town, directly at the bottom of Belle Vue’s course up the town’s main acclivity, and it was here in front of the plain, grey two-storey structure that Bea Hannaford parked. Lynley thought at first that she meant to take him inside and introduce him around, but instead she said, “Come with me,” and she put a hand on his elbow and guided him back the way they had come.

At the junction of Lansdown Road and Belle Vue, they crossed a triangle of land where benches, a fountain, and three trees provided Casvelyn with an outdoor gathering place in good weather. From there they headed over to Queen Street, which was lined with shops like those on Belle Vue Lane: everything from purveyors of furniture to pharmacies. There, Bea Hannaford paused and peered in both directions till she apparently saw what she wanted, for she said, “Yes. Over here. I want you to see what we’re dealing with.”

Over here referred to a shop selling sporting goods: both equipment and clothing for outdoor activities. Hannaford did an admirably quick recce of the place, found what she wanted, told the shop assistant they needed no help, and directed Lynley to a wall. Upon it were hung various metallic devices, mostly of steel. It wasn’t rocket science to sort out they were used for climbing.

She chose a package that held three devices constructed of lead, heavy steel cable, and plastic sheathing. The lead was a thick wedge at the end of a cable perhaps one quarter inch thick. This looped through the wedge at one end and also formed another loop at the other end. In the middle was a tough plastic sheath, which wrapped tightly round the cable and thus held the two sides of it closely together. The result was a sturdy cord with a slug of lead at one end and a loop at the other.

“This,” Hannaford said to Lynley, “is a chock stone. D’you know how it’s used?”

Lynley shook his head. Obviously, it was meant for cliff climbing. Equally so, its loop end would be used to connect the chock stone to some other device. But that was as much as he could sort out.

DI Hannaford said, “Hold up your hand, palm towards yourself. Keep your fingers tight. I’ll show you.”

Lynley did as she asked. She slid the cable between his upright index and middle fingers, so that the slug of lead was snug against his palm and the loop at the other end of the cable was on her side of his hand.

She said, “Your fingers are a crack in the cliff face. Or an aperture between two boulders. Your hand is the cliff itself. Or the boulders themselves. Got it?” She waited for his nod. “The lead piece—that’s the chock stone—gets shoved down the crack in the cliff or the aperture between the boulders as far as it can go, with the cable sticking out. In the loop end of the cable”—here she paused to scan the wall of climbing gear till she found what she wanted and scooped it up—“you clip a carabiner. Like this.” She did so. “And you fix your rope to the carabiner with whatever sort of knot you’ve been taught to use. If you’re climbing up, you use chock stones on the way, every few feet or whatever you’re comfortable with. If you’re abseiling, you can use them at the top instead of a sling to fix your rope to whatever you’ve chosen to hold it in place while you descend.”

She took the chock stone from him and replaced it along with the carabiner on the wall of goods. She turned back and said, “Climbers mark each part of their kit distinctly because they often climb together. Let’s say you and I are climbing. I use six chock stones or sixteen chock stones; you use ten. We use my carabiners but your slings. How do we sort it all out quickly and without discussion in the end…? By marking each piece with something that won’t easily come off. Bright tape is just the ticket. Santo Kerne used black electrical tape.”

Lynley saw where she was heading with this. He said, “So if someone wishes to play fast and loose with someone else’s kit, he merely needs to get his hands on the same kind of tape—”

“And the equipment itself. Yes. That’s right. You can damage the equipment, put identical tape over the damage, and no one is the wiser.”

“The sling, obviously. It would have been the easiest to damage although cutting it would have shown, if not to the naked eye, at least to the microscope.”

“Which is exactly what happened. As we’ve discussed earlier.”

“But there’s more, isn’t there, or you wouldn’t have shown me this.”

“Forensics went through Santo’s kit,” Hannaford said. Hand on his elbow again, she began to guide him out of the shop. She kept her voice low. “Two of the chock stones had been seen to. Beneath the marking tape, both the plastic sheathing and the cable had been damaged. The sheathing was cut through; the cable was hanging on by a metaphorical thread. If the boy used either one for an abseil, he was done for. Same thing applied to the sling. He was a dead man walking. A dead climber climbing. What you will. It was only a matter of time before he used the right piece of equipment at the worst possible moment.”

“Fingerprints?”

“Galore,” Hannaford said. “But I’m not sure how useful they’re going to be since most climbers don’t go solo all the time, and we’re likely to find that’s the case with Santo.”

“Unless there’s a print on the damaged pieces that doesn’t exist on any others. That would be difficult for someone to explain away.”

“Hmm. Yes. But that whole bit has me wondering, Thomas.”

“What whole bit is that?” Lynley asked.

“Three damaged pieces instead of only one. What does that suggest to you?”

He considered this. He said thoughtfully, “Only one bad piece was needed to send him to his death. But he was carrying three. You might conclude that the killer didn’t care when it happened or if the fall even killed him since he could have used the damaged chock stones quite low on an upward route and not used the sling at all.”

“Any other conclusions?”

“If he generally abseiled first and climbed back up afterwards, you might conclude that three pieces of damaged equipment indicate the killer was in a hurry to do away with the boy. Or, as difficult as it might be to believe…” He pondered a moment, wondering about the final likelihood and what that final likelihood suggested.

She prompted him with, “Yes?”

“Damaging three pieces…You might also conclude the killer wanted everyone to know it was murder.”

She nodded. “Bit mad, isn’t it, but that’s what I was thinking.”

IT WAS THE SHEER madness of love that had made Kerra want to get out of the hotel and onto her bike. She’d changed into her riding kit because of it and she’d determined that twenty miles or so would be sufficient to clear her head of the thought of it. A twenty-mile ride wouldn’t take her terribly long, either, not if the weather continued to improve, and not for someone in her condition. On a good day, with the weather cooperating, she could do sixty miles with one hand tied behind her back, so twenty was child’s play. It was also highly necessary child’s play, so she’d made herself ready and headed for the door.

The arrival of the police officer had stopped her. It was the same bloke as the previous night, Constable McNulty, and he had on his face such a lugubrious expression that Kerra knew the news would be bad before he uttered it.

He’d asked to see her parents.

She’d told him that was impossible.

They’re not here? he’d asked. It was a logical question.

Oh, they were at home. Upstairs but unavailable. You can tell me what you’ve come to tell them. They’ve asked not to be disturbed.

I’m afraid I need to ask you to fetch them, the officer said.

And I’m afraid I have to refuse. They’ve asked to be left alone. They’ve made it clear. They’re finally resting. I’m sure you understand. Have you any children, Constable? Because when one loses a child, one reels, and they’re reeling.

This wasn’t exactly true, but the truth would hardly garner sympathy. The thought of her mother and her father going at each other in Santo’s bedroom like randy adolescents made the contents of Kerra’s stomach curdle. She didn’t want anything to do with them just now. Especially she didn’t want anything to do with her father, whom she was growing to despise more and more with each passing hour. She’d despised him for years, but nothing he’d so far done or failed to do held a candle to what was going on at the moment.

Constable McNulty had reluctantly left the information once Alan had come out of the marketing office where he’d been reviewing a commercial video. Alan had said, “What is it, Kerra? May I help?” and he sounded firm and sure of himself, as if the past sixteen hours were continuing to transform him. “I’m Kerra’s fiancé,” he told the policeman. “Is there something I can do for you?”

Fiancé? Kerra had thought. Kerra’s fiancé? Where was that coming from?

Before she’d been able to correct him, the cop had given them the information. Murder. Several pieces of Santo’s kit had been tampered with. The sling and two chock stones as well. The police were going to want to interview the family first.

Alan had said the expected: “You aren’t supposing one of the family…?” and managed to sound perplexed and outraged simultaneously.

Everyone who knew Santo would be interviewed, Constable McNulty told them. He appeared rather excited about this, and it had come to Kerra how tediously boring the policeman’s life must be in Casvelyn in the off-season, with three-quarters of the summer population gone and those who remained either in their houses huddling against the Atlantic storms or committing only the occasional minor traffic violation to break the monotony of a constable’s life. All of Santo’s belongings would need to be examined, the constable told them. A family history would be constructed, and—

That had been enough for Kerra. Family history? That would certainly be illuminating. A family history would show it all: bats in the belfry and skeletons in the closet, people who were permanently estranged and people who were just permanently strange.

All of this gave her another reason to ride. And then came Cadan and the conversation with Cadan, which left her feeling blamed.

After her words with him, she fetched her bike. Her father met her outside, Alan coming out behind him with an expression that said he’d passed along the information about Santo. So Alan didn’t need to mouth the words he knows although that’s what he did. Kerra wanted to tell him he’d had no right to tell her father anything. Alan wasn’t a member of the family.