Missing Joseph (23 page)

“Look here,” the man said. “I asked a question. I want an answer. Now. Is that clear? Which of you is from the Yard?”

Lynley took the brandy that St. James brought him. “I am,” he said. “Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley. And something tells me that you're Townley-Young.”

He loathed himself even as he did it. The man would have had no way of determining a thing about him or about his background from a simple examination of his clothes because he hadn't bothered much about dressing for dinner. He wore a burgundy pullover over his pin-striped shirt, a pair of grey wool trousers, and shoes that still had a thin crease of mud along the seam. So until Lynley spoke—until he made the decision to employ the Voice whose every inflection shouted public school educated, blue blood born, and bred to possess a series of cumbersome, useless titles—Townley-Young would have had no way of knowing that he was addressing his questions to a belted earl. He still didn't, exactly. No one was whispering
Eighth Earl of Asherton
into his ear. No one was listing the accoutrements of fortune, class, and birth: the town house in London, the estate in Cornwall, a seat in the House of Lords if he wished to take it, which he decidedly did not.

Into Townley-Young's startled silence, Lynley introduced the St. Jameses. Then he sipped his brandy and observed Townley-Young over the rim of his glass.

The man was undergoing a major adjustment in attitude. The nostrils were unpinching, and the spine was loosening. It was clear that he wanted to ask half a dozen questions absolutely verboten in the situation and that he was attempting to look as if he'd known from the first that Lynley was less
them
and more
us
than Townley-Young himself would ever be.

“May I speak to you privately?” he said and then added hastily with a glance at the St. Jameses, “I mean out of the pub. I should hope your friends would join us.” He managed the request with considerable dignity. He may have been surprised to discover that more than one class of individual could rest at ease beneath the title of Detective Inspector, but he wasn't about to go all Uriah Heepish in an effort to mitigate the scorn with which he'd first spoken.

Lynley nodded towards the door to the residents' lounge at the far side of the pub. Townley-Young led the way. The lounge was, if anything, colder than the dining room had been and without the extra electric fires placed strategically to cut the chill.

Deborah switched on a lamp, straightened its shade, and did the same to another. St. James removed an unfolded newspaper from one of the armchairs, tossed it to the sideboard on which Crofters Inn kept its supply of other reading material—mostly ancient copies of
Country Life
that looked as if they'd crumble if opened precipitately—and sat in one of the armchairs. Deborah chose a nearby ottoman for her own seat.

Lynley noted that Townley-Young glanced once at St. James' disability, a swift look of curiosity that moved quickly on its way to find a place for himself in the room. He chose the sofa above which hung a dismal reproduction of
The Potato Eaters
.

“I've come to you for help,” Townley-Young said. “I'd got the word at dinner that you'd appeared in the village—that sort of news passes like a blaze in Winslough—and I decided to come round and see you myself. You're not here on holiday, I take it?”

“Not exactly.”

“This Sage business, then?”

Comrades in class did not constitute an invitation to professional disclosure as far as Lynley was concerned. He answered with a question of his own. “Do you have something to tell me about Mr. Sage's death?”

Townley-Young pinched the knot of his kelly-green tie. “Not directly.”

“Then?”

“He was a good enough chap in his way, I suppose. We just didn't see eye-to-eye on matters of ritual.”

“Low church versus high?”

“Indeed.”

“Surely not a motive for his murder, however.”

“A motive…?” Townley-Young's hand dropped from his tie. His tone remained icily polite. “I've not come here to confess, Inspector, if that's what you mean. I didn't much like Sage, and I didn't much like the austerity of his services. No flowers, no candles, just the bare bones. Not what I was used to. But he wasn't a bad sort for a vicar, and his heart was in the right place as far as church-going was concerned.”

Lynley took up his brandy and let the balloon glass warm in the palm of his hand. “You weren't part of the church council who interviewed him?”

“I was. I dissented.” Townley-Young's ruddy cheeks grew momentarily ruddier. That the apparent Lord of the Manor had held no sway with the council on which he was undoubtedly the most important member went leagues to reveal his position in the hearts of the villagers.

“I dare say you don't especially mourn his passing, then.”

“He wasn't a friend, if that's what you're getting at. Even if friendship had been possible between us, he'd only been in the village for two months when he died. I realise that two months count for two decades in some arenas of our society these days, but frankly, I'm not of the generation that takes to calling its fellows by their Christian names on a moment's notice, Inspector.”

Lynley smiled. Since his father had been dead for some fourteen years and since his mother was nothing if not decidedly given to breaking her way past traditional barriers, he sometimes had occasion to forget the older generation's reliance upon the choice of name as an indicator of intimacy. It always caught him off-guard and amused him mildly to come up against it in his work. What's in a name indeed, he thought.

“You mentioned that you had something to tell me that was indirectly involved with Mr. Sage's death,” Lynley reminded Townley-Young, who looked as if he was about to embellish upon his nominal theme.

“In that he was a visitor on the grounds of Cotes Hall several times prior to his death.”

“I'm not sure I follow you.”

“I've come about the Hall.”

“The Hall?” Lynley glanced at St. James. The other man lifted one hand fractionally in a don't-ask-me gesture.

“I'd like you to look into what's been happening out there. Malicious mischief being made. Pranks being pulled. I've been trying to renovate it for the past four months, and some group of little hooligans keep getting in the way. A quart of paint spilled here. A roll of wallpaper ruined there. Water left running. Graffiti on the doors.”

“Are you assuming that Mr. Sage was involved? That hardly seems likely for a clergyman.”

“I'm assuming someone with a bone to pick with me is involved. I'm assuming you—a policeman—will get to the bottom of it and see that it's stopped.”

“Ah.” As he felt himself bristle beneath the final, imperious statement—their relative positions in an ostensibly classless society brushed aside in the man's exigent need to have his personal problems resolved post-haste—Lynley wondered how many people in the immediate vicinity felt they had serious bones to pick with Townley-Young. “You've a local constable to see to things of this sort.”

Townley-Young snorted. “He's been dealing”—the word heavy with the weight of Townley-Young's sarcasm—“with this from the first. He's done his investigating after every incident. And after every incident, he's turned up nothing.”

“Have you given no thought to hiring a guard until the work is finished?”

“I pay my bloody taxes, Inspector. What else are they to be used for if I can't call upon the assistance of the police when I have a need?”

“What about your caretaker?”

“The Spence woman? She frightened off a group of young thugs once—and quite competently, if you want my opinion, despite the ruckus it caused round here—but whoever's at the bottom of this current rash of mischief has managed to do it with a great deal more finesse. No sign of forced entry, no trace left behind save for the damage.”

“Someone with a key, I dare say. Who has them?”

“Myself. Mrs. Spence. The constable. My daughter and her husband.”

“Any of you wishing that the house go unfinished? Who's supposed to live there?”

“Becky…My daughter and her husband. Their baby in June.”

“Does Mrs. Spence know them?” St. James asked. He'd been listening, his chin in his palm.

“Know Becky and Brendan? Why?”

“Might she prefer it if they didn't move in? Might the constable prefer it? Might they be using the house themselves? We've been given to understand they're involved with each other.”

Lynley found that this line of questioning did indeed lead in an interesting direction, if not exactly the one intended by St. James. “Has someone dossed there in the past?” he asked.

“The place was locked and boarded.”

“A board is fairly easy to loosen if one needs entry.”

St. James added, obviously continuing with his own line of thought, “And if a couple were using the place for an assignation, they might not take lightly to having it denied them.”

“I don't much care who's using it and for what. I just want it stopped. And if Scotland Yard can't do it—”

“What sort of ruckus?” Lynley asked.

Townley-Young gaped at him blankly. “What the devil…?”

“You mentioned that Mrs. Spence caused a ruckus when she frightened someone off the property. What sort of ruckus?”

“Discharging a shotgun. Got the little beasts' parents in a snit over that.” He gave another snort. “Let their lads run about like hooligans, they do, this lot of parents in the village. And when someone tries to show them a touch of discipline, you'd think Armageddon had begun.”

“A shotgun's rather heavy discipline,” St. James remarked.

“Aimed at children,” Deborah added.

“Thesearen't exactly children and even if they were—”

“Is it with your permission—or perhaps your advice—that Mrs. Spence uses a shotgun to carry out her duties as caretaker of Cotes Hall?” Lynley asked.

Townley-Young's eyes narrowed. “I don't particularly appreciate your efforts to turn this round on me. I came here for your assistance, Inspector, and if you're unwilling to give it, then I'll be on my way.” He made a movement as if to rise.

Lynley raised a hand briefly to stop him, saying, “How long has the Spence woman worked for you?”

“More than two years now. Nearly three.”

“And her background?”

“What of it?”

“What do you know about her? Why did you hire her?”

“Because she wanted peace and quiet and I wanted someone out there who wanted peace and quiet. The location's isolated. I didn't want to employ as caretaker anyone who felt compelled to mingle with the rest of the village on a nightly basis. That would hardly have served my interests, would it?”

“Where did she come from?”

“Cumbria.”

“Where?”

“Outside of Wigton.”

“Where?”

Townley-Young sat forward with a snap. “Look here, Lynley, let's get one thing straight. I came here to employ you, not the opposite. I won't be spoken to as if I'm a suspect, no matter who you are or where you're from. Is that clear?”

Lynley placed his balloon glass on the birch side table next to his chair. He regarded Townley-Young evenly. The man's lips had flattened to broom-straw width and his chin jutted out pugnaciously. If Sergeant Havers had been in the residents' lounge with them, she would have yawned widely at this point, flipped her thumb towards Townley-Young, said, “Get this bloke, will you?” and followed that up with a less-than-friendly and more-than-bored “Answer the question before we have you in the nick for failure to cooperate in a police investigation.” It was always Havers' way to stretch the truth to serve her purposes when hot on the scent of a piece of information. Lynley wondered whether that approach would have worked with someone like Townley-Young. If nothing else, it would have afforded him a moment of pleasure just to see Townley-Young's reaction to being spoken to in such a way and with such an accent as Havers'. She didn't have the Voice by any stretch of the imagination, and she generally made the most of that fact when confronted with someone who did.

Deborah moved restlessly on the ottoman. Out of the corner of his eye, Lynley saw St. James' hand move to her shoulder.

“I realise why you've come to see me,” Lynley said at last.

“Good. Then—”

“And it's one of those unfortunate quirks of fate, that you've walked into the middle of an investigation. You can, of course, telephone your solicitor if you'd prefer to have him here while you answer the question. Where, exactly, did Mrs. Spence come from?” It bent the truth only partially. Lynley gave a mental salute to his sergeant. He could live with that.

The question was whether Townley-Young could do also. They engaged in a silent skirmish of wills, their eyes locked in combat. Townley-Young finally blinked.

“Aspatria,” he said.

“In Cumbria?”

“Yes.”

“How did she come to work for you?”

“I advertised. She applied. She came to interview. I liked her. She's got common sense, she's independent, she's fully capable of taking whatever action is necessary to protect my property.”

“And Mr. Sage?”

“What about him?”

“Where was he from?”

“Cornwall.” And before Lynley could press the point with a further question, “Via Bradford. That's all I recall.”

“Thank you.” Lynley got to his feet.

Townley-Young did likewise. “As to the Hall…”

“I'll be speaking to Mrs. Spence,” Lynley said. “But my suggestion is to follow the keys and to think about who might not want your daughter and her husband to move into the Hall.”

Townley-Young hesitated at the door to the residents' lounge, his hand on the knob. He seemed to be studying it because he kept his head bent for a moment and his forehead was creased as if with thought. He said, “The wedding.”