Original Sin (59 page)

But leaving he had noticed Esmé Carling’s blue-bound manuscript on the low table in the reception room and seen her message pinned to the wall. It must have been a moment of panic, but it would quickly have subsided. Esmé Carling had almost certainly left Innocent House before he called Etienne upstairs. Perhaps he had paused for a moment wondering whether to check, and then decided that this was pointless. Obviously she had gone leaving the manuscript and the message as a public proclamation of her outrage. Would she tell the
police that she had been present or keep quiet? On the whole he thought that she would keep quiet. But he had decided to take both the manuscript and the note. Dauntsey was a murderer who thought ahead, even thought ahead as far as the necessity for her death.

Frances slipped in and out of full consciousness, waking to a half-fuddled comprehension, then sinking back as her mind briefly touched reality, rejected its horror, and took refuge again in oblivion. When she became fully conscious she lay for a few minutes, totally still, hardly breathing, assessing her situation in small mental steps as if this gradual acceptance could make reality more bearable. She was alive. She was lying on her left side on the floor of a car covered by a rug. Her ankles were bound and her hands tied behind her back. She was gagged with something soft, she thought it must be her silk scarf. The car’s progress was uneven and once it stopped and she felt the gentle jar as the brakes were applied. They must be halted at a traffic light. That meant they were travelling in traffic. She wondered if she could manage to dislodge the blanket by wriggling, but with her hands and feet tied found that it was too firmly tucked around her. But at least she could vigorously move her body. If they were in traffic it was possible that a passing motorist might look through the window and see the heaving blanket
and wonder. Hardly had the thought come to her than the car started again and moved smoothly on.

She was alive. She must hang on to that. Gabriel might intend to kill her, but he could easily have done so while she lay unconscious in the garage. Why hadn’t he? It couldn’t be that he wanted to show her mercy. What mercy had he shown to Gerard, to Esmé Carling, to Claudia? She was in the hands of a murderer. The word, thudding into her mind, woke the terror which had been lying dormant ever since she had regained consciousness. It swept over her, primitive, uncontrollable, a humiliating wave, annihilating thought and will. She knew now why he hadn’t killed her in the garage. Claudia’s murder, like the other two, was to look like accidental death or suicide. He couldn’t leave two bodies on the garage floor. He had to get rid of her, but it must be in a different way. What had he in mind? Her complete disappearance? A killing which Dalgliesh would have no hope of solving since there would be no body? She remembered reading somewhere that it wasn’t necessary to produce a body to prove murder, but Gabriel might not realize that. He was mad, he had to be mad. Even now he might be planning, thinking, wondering how best to dispose of her. Whether to drive to the edge of a cliff and tumble her into the sea, to bury her in some ditch, still bound, to tip her into an old mine shaft where she would die of thirst and hunger, alone, never to be found. Image succeeded image, each more horrifying than the last. The terrifying fall through the dark air into the crashing waves, the suffocating wet leaves and earth stamped down into her eyes and mouth, the vertical tunnel of the mine shaft where she would slowly starve to death in claustrophobic agony.

The car was riding more smoothly now. They must have thrown off the last tentacles of London and be in open
country. By an effort of will she calmed herself. She was alive. She must hold on to that. There was still hope, and if in the end she had to die she would try to die bravely. Gerard and Claudia, both agnostics, would have died with courage even if they hadn’t been allowed to die with dignity. What was her religion worth if it couldn’t help her to do the same?

She said an act of contrition, then prayed for the souls of Gerard and Claudia and, last of all, prayed for herself and for her own safety. The well-worn comforting words brought their assurance that she was not alone. Then she tried to plan. Not knowing what he had in mind for her, it was difficult to decide on alternative courses of action, but one fact was certain. She couldn’t believe he was strong enough to carry her body unaided. That meant he would at least have to free her ankles. She was younger, stronger than he and could easily outdistance him. If she had the chance she would run for her life. But whatever happened at the end she wouldn’t plead for mercy.

In the meantime she must try to prevent her limbs from becoming too stiff. Her hands, wrenched behind her back, were tied with something soft, perhaps his tie or socks. He would not, after all, have come prepared for more than one victim. But he had done the job efficiently. She could not wriggle free. Her ankles were as strongly if more comfortably tied. But even bound she could tense and relax the muscles of her legs, and to make even this small preparation for escape gave her strength and courage. She told herself, too, that she mustn’t lose hope of rescue. How long would James wait before he discovered she was missing? He would probably take no action for an hour, imagining she was held up in the traffic or the underground. But then he would ring number 12 and, getting no answer, would try Claudia’s Barbican flat. Even then
he might not be seriously worried. But surely he wouldn’t wait more than an hour and a half. Perhaps he would take a taxi to number 12. Perhaps, if she were lucky, even hear the sound of the running engine in the garage. Once Claudia’s body was found and Dauntsey’s absence known, all police forces would be alerted to intercept the car. She must hang on to that hope.

And still he drove. Unable to see her watch she could only guess at the time and had no idea of the direction in which they travelled. She didn’t waste energy wondering why Gabriel had killed. That was fruitless; only he could tell her that, and perhaps at the end he would. Instead she thought about her own life. What had it been but a series of compromises? What had she given her father but a timid acquiescence which had only reinforced his insensitivity and contempt? Why had she come so meekly into the firm at his bidding to be trained to take over contracts and rights? She could do the work well enough; she was conscientious and methodical, punctilious about detail; but it wasn’t what she had wanted to do with her life. And Gerard? In her heart she had known his sexual exploitation for what it was. He had treated her with contempt because she had made herself contemptible. Who was she? What was she? Frances Peverell, meek, obliging, gentle, uncomplaining, the appendage of her father, her lover, the firm. Now when her life might be nearing its end she could at least say, “I am Frances Peverell. I am myself.” If she lived to marry James, she could at least be offering an equal partnership. She had found the courage to face death, but that, after all, was not so difficult. Thousands, including children, did it every day. It was time she found an equal courage to face life.

And now she felt curiously at peace. From time to time she said a prayer, mentally spoke the lines of a favourite poem, looked back on moments of joy. She even tried to doze
and might have succeeded if the car hadn’t suddenly jolted her mind awake. Gabriel must be driving over rough country. The Rover lurched, rolled, struck potholes, bounded from side to side, and she rolled with it. And then there was another stretch, but less uneven, probably, she thought, a country track. And then the car stopped and she heard him open his door.

In Hillgate Village James glanced at the carriage clock on the mantelpiece. It was 7.42, just over an hour since he had rung Frances. She should have arrived by now. He did again the quick calculation he had been making during the last sixty minutes. There were ten stations between the Bank and Notting Hill Gate. Allow two minutes per station, say twenty minutes for the journey, and fifteen to get to the Bank. But perhaps she had missed Claudia and had had to ring for a taxi. Even so the journey shouldn’t have taken sixty minutes, not even in the rush hour and in central London, not unless there had been an unusual hold-up, roads closed or a terrorist alert. He rang Frances’s flat again. As expected there was no reply. Then once more he tried Claudia’s number, again unsuccessfully. That didn’t surprise him. She might have driven straight on to see Declan Cartwright, or had a theatre or a dinner engagement. There was no reason why Claudia should be at home. He switched on the radio to the local London station. Another ten minutes passed before there was the news flash. Travellers were warned of a hold-up on the Central Line. No reason was given, which
usually meant an IRA alert, but four stations between Holborn and Marble Arch were closed. So that was the explanation. It could be another hour before Frances arrived. There was nothing to do but wait in patience.

He paced the sitting room. Frances was slightly claustrophobic. He knew how much she hated using the Greenwich foot tunnel. She disliked travelling by underground. She wouldn’t be trapped there now if she hadn’t wanted to hurry to his side. He hoped that the lights were on in the train, that she wasn’t sitting there unfriended in total darkness. And suddenly he had an extraordinarily vivid and disturbing image of Frances, abandoned, dying, in a dark enclosing tunnel somewhere far from him, unreachable and alone. He thrust it out of his mind as a morbid imagining and looked at the clock again. He would wait half an hour and try to get through to London Transport and find out if the line was open, how long the delay was likely to be. He went over to the window and, moving behind the curtains, stared down on the lighted street willing her to appear.

And now at last Daniel was on the A12 and the road was clearer. He kept within the speed limit; it would be disastrous if he were caught by a police patrol. But Dauntsey would be equally careful not to attract attention, not to be held up. To that extent they were driving on equal terms, but he had the faster car. He planned how best to get ahead once his quarry was in sight. In normal circumstances Dauntsey would almost certainly know the car, would probably recognize him even at a glance, but it was unlikely that he knew he was being followed. He wouldn’t be watching for a pursuer. The best plan would be to wait until the road was busy then take his chance to overtake in a stream of traffic.

And now for the first time he remembered Claudia Etienne. It horrified him that the possibility of her danger hadn’t occurred to him in his concern to get to Dauntsey and warn him. But she would be all right. He had last seen her when she proposed to go home and she must be safe now. Dauntsey was ahead of him in his Rover. The only risk was that she had decided to visit her father and might even now be on her way to
Othona House. But that was one more reason for getting there first. There was no point in trying to stop Dauntsey, to overtake him, wave him down. Dauntsey wouldn’t stop unless forced to. Daniel needed to speak to him, to warn him, but in calmness, not by ramming his car. The last scene of this tragedy was to be played out in peace.

And then at last he caught sight of the Rover. They were now nearing the Chelmsford bypass and the traffic was building up. He waited his moment and then joined the stream of cars in the overtaking lane and shot past.

Esmé Carling must have had a few very bad days after the news of the discovery of the body. She would have expected the police to arrive with questions about the notice pinned to the board, the discarded manuscript. But he and Robbins had come with their harmless questions about an alibi and the alibi had been provided. She had kept her nerve admirably, he had to give her that. Never once had he suspected that there was more to learn. And after that? What thoughts had gone through her mind? Had Dauntsey telephoned her first or had she got in touch with him? Almost certainly the latter. Dauntsey would have had no need to kill her if she hadn’t told him that she’d actually seen him walking downstairs carrying the vacuum cleaner. He, too, must have had some very bad moments. He, too, had kept his nerve. Esmé Carling had said nothing and he must have thought he was safe.

And then would have come the telephone call, the suggestion that they should meet, the implied threat that unless her book was published she would go to the police. The threat was, of course, baseless. She couldn’t go to the police without revealing that she, too, had been in Innocent House that night. She had as strong a motive for getting rid of Etienne as anyone. But she was a woman whose mind, ingenious,
scheming, devious, a little obsessional, had its limitations. She was not clear-thinking nor was she highly intelligent.

How exactly, he wondered, had Dauntsey enticed her to that meeting? Did he say that he knew or suspected who had killed Etienne and that together they could arrive at the truth and enjoy a joint triumph? Had they reached at least a provisional understanding that she would remain silent and he would return the manuscript and the paper and ensure that her book was published? She had told Daisy Reed that Peverell Press would have to publish. Who else but one of the partners could have given her that assurance? Had he presented himself in that brief conversation as her defender and saviour, or as a fellow conspirator? They would now never know unless Dauntsey chose to tell them.

One thing was certain: Esmé Carling had gone to that interview without fear. She hadn’t known who the murderer had been but she was confident she knew who it couldn’t have been. She had been the visitor in Etienne’s office when the call came through and, at first, had waited for him to return. Then, growing impatient, she had gone up to the little archives room, glimpsing Dauntsey carrying down the vacuum cleaner as she was about to leave Miss Blackett’s office. Outside the door she had seen the snake and heard the voice. Someone inside the room was speaking. The door was not substantial and she probably realized that it wasn’t Etienne’s voice. When the body was discovered, she could be certain that Dauntsey at least was innocent. She had seen him herself walking down the stairs while Etienne was still alive and in the little archives room talking with his killer.