A Suitable Vengeance - By Elizabeth George Page 0,90

night, with no one the wiser until Brooke's body was found. If he had killed him. If Brooke had been murdered at all. Lynley forced himself to keep in mind the fact that they were calling it an accident. And surely the crime-scene men knew what they were looking at when they made their observations at the site of an untimely death. Earlier in the morning, the thought of Peter having stolen Deborah's camr eras in order to sell them and purchase cocaine had been repellent, a cause for disbelief and denial. Now it was welcome.

For how likely was it that his brother had been involved in both the disappearance of the cameras and Justin Brooke's death? And if his mind was focussed on his body's need for cocaine, why pause in his pursuit of the drug to eliminate Brooke?

He knew the answer, of course. But that answer tied Peter to Mick Cambrey's death, a death that no one was calling an accident.

"We'll be taking the body now." The plainclothes sergeant had come to join them. In spite of the rain, he smelled heavily of sweat and his forehead was oily with perspiration.

"With your permission."

Lynley nodded sharply in acquiescence and longed for liquor to soothe his nerves. As if in answer, the schoolroom doors opened and his mother entered, pushing a drinks trolley on which she'd assembled two urns, three full decanters of spirits, and several plates of biscuits. Her blue jeans and shoes were stained with mud, her white shirt torn, her hair dishevelled. But as if her appearance were the least of her concerns, when she spoke, she took command of the situation.

"I don't pretend to know your regulations, Inspector," she told Boscowan. "But it does seem reasonable that you might be allowed something to take the edge off the chill.

Coffee, tea, brandy, whisky. Whatever you'd like. Please help yourselves."

Boscowan nodded his thanks and, having received this much permission, his officers occupied themselves at the trolley.

Boscowan strolled over to Lynley and St. James.

"Was he a drinker, my lord?"

"I didn't know him that well. But he was drinking last night. We all were."

"Drunk?"

"He didn't appear to be. Not when I last saw him."

"And when was that?"

"When the party broke up. Round midnight. Perhaps a bit later."

"Where?"

"In the drawing room."

"Drinking?"

"Yes."

"But not drunk?"

"He could have been. I don't know. He wasn't acting drunk." Lynley recognised the intention behind the questions.

If Brooke had been drunk, he fell to his death. If he had been sober, he was pushed. But Lynley felt the need to excuse the death as an accident, whatever Brooke's condition last night.

"Drunk or sober, he'd never been here before. He wasn't familiar with the lay of the land."

Boscowan nodded, but nothing in his manner suggested conviction. "No doubt the postmortem will tell the tale."

"It was dark. The cliff's high."

"Dark if the man went out in the night," Boscowan said.

"He could have done so this morning."

"How was he dressed?"

Boscowan's shoulders lifted, a partial acknowledgement of the accuracy of Lynley's question. "In his evening clothes. But no one's to say he wasn't up until dawn with one member of the party or another. Until we have a time of death, we can be certain of nothing. Except the fact that he's dead. And we're certain of that." He nodded and joined his men by the trolley.

"A thousand and one questions he's not asking, St. James,"

Lynley said.

The other man listed them. "Who saw him last? Has anyone else gone missing from the estate? Who was here at the party? Who else was on the grounds? Is there any reason why someone might want to harm him?"

"Why isn't he asking?"

"He's waiting for the postmortem, I should guess. It's to his advantage that this be an accident."

"Why?"

"Because he's got his man for Cambrey's murder. And John Penellin couldn't have killed Brooke."

"You're implying there's a connection."

"There is. There must be." A blur of movement on the drive outside caught their attention. "Jasper," St. James noted.

The old man was trudging through puddles, heading towards the west wing of the house.

"Let's see what he has to say," Lynley said.

They found him just outside the servants' hall where he was shaking the rain off a battered sou'wester. He did the same to an antique mackintosh and hung both on a wall peg before he struggled out of dark green gumboots that were caked with mud. He nodded curtly at Lynley and St. James, and when he was quite ready, followed them back to the smoking room, where he