A Great Deliverance - By Elizabeth George Page 0,72
the oak hall. "Name of Allcourt-St. James." She threw open the door. "Here's more company for us!" she announced.
Barbara was intensely aware of the photographic quality of the scene. A fire burned brilliantly, hissing as the flames devoured the coal. Comfortable chairs were gathered round it.
At the far end of the room, touched by shadows, Deborah St. James was bent over a piano, leafing through a family album with delight. She looked up with a smile. The men rose to their feet. And the picture froze.
At his tone, Barbara looked at him, and it came with a sudden jolt of recognition. How ridiculous that she hadn't seen it before. Lynley was in love with the other man's wife.
"Hi there! That's kuva nice-lookin' suit," Hank Watson said. He extended his hand to Lynley. It was fat, slightly sweaty, like shaking hands with a warm, uncooked fi sh. "Dentistry," he announced. "Here for the ADA convention in London. Tax write-off to the s-k-y. This is JoJo, my wife."
Somehow the introductions were muddled through.
"Champagne before dinner is my rule," Mrs. Burton-Thomas said. "Before breakfast as well, if I have my way. Danny, bring the juice!" she shouted, in the general direction of the doorway, and a few moments later a girl came into the room, burdened with an ice bucket, champagne, and glasses.
"What line-a work you in, fella?" Hank asked Lynley as the glasses went around. "I thought Si here was some sort-a college professor type. Gave me the jumping hee-haws when he said he was a dead-body man."
"Sergeant Havers and I work for Scotland Yard," Lynley responded.
"Say-hey, JoJo-bean. Did you hear that, woman?" He looked at Lynley with new interest.
"You here on the baby gig?"
"The baby gig?"
"Three-year-old case. Guess the trail's kinda cold now." Hank winked in the direction of Danny, who was putting the bottle of champagne into the bucket of ice. "Dead baby in the abbey? You know."
Lynley didn't know anything, didn't want to know anything. He couldn't have answered if his life depended upon it. He found that he didn't know what to do with himself, where to cast his eyes, what to say. He was only conscious of Deborah.
"We're here on the decapitation gig," Havers responded politely, miraculously.
"De-cap-i-ta-tion?" Hank crowed. "This is one jumping area of the country! Don't you think so, Bean?"
"Sure is," his wife said, nodding in solemn affirmation. She fingered the long strand of white beads she wore and looked hopefully in the direction of the silent St. Jameses.
Hank hunched forward in his chair, dragging it closer to Lynley's. "Well, give us the poop!" he demanded.
"I beg your pardon?"
"The p-o-o-p. The verified, certified poop." Hank slapped the arm of Lynley's chair.
"Who did it, fella?" he demanded.
It was too much. The appalling little man screwing his face up in excitement was too much to bear. He was wearing a saffron polyester suit, a matching shirt in a floral print, and round his neck hung a heavy gold chain with a medallion that danced on the thick hair of his chest. A diamond the size of a walnut glittered on his finger, and he flashed white teeth made even whiter by his burnt-sienna tan. His bulbous nose flexed its nostrils blackly.
"We're not entirely sure," Lynley replied seriously. "But you fit the description."
Hank stared at him, bug-eyed. "I fit the description?" he croaked. Then he peered at Lynley closely and broke into a grin. "Damn you Brits! I just can't get the hang of your humour! But I'm gettin' better, right, Si?"
Lynley finally looked at his friend and found him smiling. Amusement danced in St. James's eyes. "Absolutely," Si replied.
As they drove in the darkness back to the lodge, Barbara studied Lynley furtively, realising that until this evening it had been entirely unthinkable to her that a man such as he could ever have been unsuccessful in love. Yet here on the outskirts of the village was the undeniable evidence of that fact: Deborah.
There had been at the hall a horrified moment with the three of them staring at one another before she had come forward, a tentative smile on her face, a hand outstretched in greeting.
"Tommy! Whatever are you doing in Keldale?" Deborah St. James had asked.
He'd been at an absolute loss. Barbara saw it and intervened. "An investigation," she replied.
Then the horrible little American had thrown himself into their midst - it was a merciful intervention, really - and the other three began to breathe evenly once more.