A Suitable Vengeance - By Elizabeth George Page 0,88
were my favourite as well. You still are, in fact." "Really?" "Absolutely." They came to the gatehouse and entered the garden as the wind picked up, tearing at the heads of roses, sending a shower of petals into their path. Although the rain began to beat against them aggressively, they didn't hurry their pace. By the time they reached the doorway, they were both quite wet. "Mummy will shout at us now," Sidney said as St. James closed the door behind them. "Shall we hide?" "We'll be safe enough for now." "I'll not let her beat you." "I know that, Sid." St. James led his sister towards the stairway, taking her hand when she hesitated and gazed around, clearly confused. "It's just this way," he urged her.
At the top of the stairs, he saw Cotter coming towards him, a small tray in his hands. At the sight of him, St. James gave a moment of thanksgiving over to Cotter's ability to read his mind. "Saw you comin'," Cotter explained and nodded at the tray. "It's brandy. Is she .
. ."He jerked his head towards Sidney, his brow furrowing at the sight of her. "She'll be all right in a bit. If you'll help me, Cotter. Her room's this way." Unlike Deborah's room, Sidney's was neither cavelike nor sepulchral. Overlooking a small, walled garden at the rear of the house, it was painted and papered in a combination of yellow and white, with a floral carpet of pastels on the floor. St. James sat his sister on the bed and went to draw the curtains while Cotter poured brandy and held it to her lips. "A bit o' this, Miss Sidney," Cotter said solicitously. "It'll warm you up nice." ^ She drank cooperatively.
"Does Mummy know?" she asked. Cotter glanced warily at St. James. "Have a bit more,"
he said. St. James rooted through a drawer, looking for her nightdress. He found it under a Sidney-like pile of jerseys, jewellery, and stockings. "You must get out of those wet things," he told her. "Cotter, will you find a towel for her hair? And something for the cuts?" Cotter nodded, eyeing Sidney cautiously before he left the room. Alone with his sister, St. James undressed her, tossing her wet clothes onto the floor. He drew her nightdress over her head, pulling her arms gently through the thin satin straps. She said nothing and didn't seem to realise he was present at all. When Cotter returned with towel and plaster, St. James rubbed Sidney's hair roughly. He saw to her arms and legs and the muddy splatters on her feet. Swinging her legs up on the bed, he pulled the blankets round her. She submitted to it all like a child, like a doll. "Sid," he whispered, touching her cheek. He wanted to talk about Justin Brooke. He wanted to know if they had been together in the night. He wanted to know when Brooke had gone to the cliff. Above all, he wanted to know why. She didn't respond. She stared at the ceiling. Whatever she knew would have to wait. Lynley parked the Rover at the far end of the courtyard and entered the house through the northwest door between the gun room and the servants' hall. He had seen the line of vehicles on the drive - two police cars, an unmarked saloon, and an ambulance with its windscreen wipers still running-so he was not unprepared to be accosted by Hodge as he quickly passed through the domestic wing of the house. They met outside the pantry.
\ "What is it?" Lynley asked the old butler. He tried to sound reasonably concerned without revealing his incipient panic. Upon seeing the cars through the wind-driven rain, his first thought had run unveeringly towards Peter. Hodge gave the information willingly enough and in a fashion designed to reveal nothing of his own feelings in the matter. It was Mr. Brooke, he told Lynley. He'd been taken to the old schoolroom. If the manner in which Hodge had relayed the information had been fleeting cause for hope - nothing could be terribly amiss if Brooke hadn't been taken directly to hospital - hope dissipated when Lynley entered the schoolroom in the east wing of the house a few minutes later. The body lay shrouded by blankets on a long scarred table at the room's centre, the very same table at which generations of young Lynleys had done their childhood lessons before being packed off to school.