“Who is he?” Lynley asked.
“Mark Foo,” McNulty said.
“Thank you, Constable,” Bea Hannaford said. “Very dramatic, very grim, always illuminating. Now get back to work. Mr. Priestley’s fingers await your ministrations.” And to Lynley, “I’m going to want a word with you. With you as well, Sergeant Havers.” She jerked her head in the direction of the door.
She took them to a badly appointed interview room, which seemed to have been used mostly as storage for more paper products until the present investigation. She didn’t sit. Nor did they. She said, “Tell me about Falmouth, Thomas.”
Taken up by the events of the day, Lynley was genuinely confused. “I was in Exeter,” he told her. “Not Falmouth.”
“Don’t be coy. I’m not talking about today. What do you know about Daidre Trahair and Falmouth that you haven’t been revealing to me? And don’t either of you lie to me again. One of you went there, and if it’s you, Sergeant Havers, as Dr. Trahair apparently suspects, then I reckon there’s only one reason you took yourself on that little side trip and it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with taking orders from me. Am I correct?”
Lynley intervened. “I asked Barbara to look into-”
“As amazing as it sounds,” Bea cut in, “I’d already worked that out. But the problem is that you’re not directing this investigation. I am.”
“That’s not what it was,” Havers said. “He didn’t ask me to go there. He didn’t even know I was on my way here when he asked me to look into her background.”
“Oh, is that the case, is it?”
“It is. Yeah. He got me on my mobile. In my car. I expect he knew that bit of it, that I was in my car, but he didn’t know where I was or where I was going and he had no idea I was going to be able to go to Falmouth at all. He just asked if I would look into a few details concerning her background. As it was, I could go to Falmouth. And as it wasn’t far out of the way from where I was heading-which was here, of course-I thought I could go there before-”
“Are you mad? It’s miles and miles out of the God damn way. What is it with you two?” Bea demanded. “Do you always go your own way in an investigation or am I the first of your colleagues to be so honoured?”
“With due respect, ma’am,” Lynley began.
“Do not call me ma’am.”
“With due respect, Inspector,” Lynley said, “I’m not part of the investigation. Not officially. I’m not even an”-he sought a term-“an official official.”
“Are you trying to be amusing, Superintendent Lynley?”
“Not at all. I’m merely trying to point out that once you informed me I’d be assisting you despite my own wishes in the matter-”
“You’re a bloody material witness. No one cares about your wishes. What did you expect? To go merrily on your way?”
“Which makes it even more irregular,” he said.
“He’s right,” Havers added, “if you don’t mind me saying.”
“Of course I mind. I bloody well mind. We’re not playing fast and loose with the chain of command. Despite your rank,” she said to Lynley, “I’m running this investigation, not you. You are not in the position to assign activities to anyone, including Sergeant Havers, and if you think you are-”
“He didn’t know,” Havers said. “I could have told him I was on my way here when he rang me, but I didn’t. I could have told him I was under orders-”
“What orders?” Lynley asked.
“-but I didn’t. You knew I’d be here eventually-”
“Whose orders?” Lynley asked.
“-so when he rang, it didn’t seem that irregular-”
“Whose orders?” Lynley asked.
“You know whose orders,” Havers told him.
“Has Hillier sent you down here?”
“What do you think? You could just walk out? No one would care? No one would worry? No one would want to intervene? Do you actually think you could disappear, that you mean so little to-”
“All right, all right!” Bea said. “Retire to your corners. My God. Enough.” She took a steadying breath. “This stops here. And now. All right? You”-to Havers-“are on loan to me. Not to him. I can see there were ulterior motives involved in the offer to send you to assist, but whatever those motives were you’re going to have to deal with them on your own time, not on mine. And you”-to Lynley-“will from this moment be straightforward with what you’re doing and what you know. Am I being clear?”
“You are,” Lynley said. Havers nodded, but Lynley could see that she was hot under the collar and wanting to say more. Not to Hannaford, but to him.
“Fine. Excellent. Now let’s take Daidre Trahair from the start and this time let’s not hold anything back. Am I also being clear on that?”
“You are.”
“Lovely. Regale me with details.”
Lynley knew there was nothing more for it. “There appears to be no Dairdre Trahair prior to her enrollment at her secondary comprehensive at thirteen years of age,” he said. “And although she says she was born at home in Falmouth, there’s also no record of her birth. Additionally, parts of her story about her job in Bristol don’t match up with the facts.”
“Which parts?”
“There’s a Daidre Trahair who’s a vet on staff, but the person she identified to me as her friend Paul-he’s supposedly the primate keeper-doesn’t exist.”
“You didn’t tell me that part,” Havers said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Lynley sighed. “She just doesn’t seem…I can’t honestly see her as a murderer. I didn’t want to make things more difficult for her.”
“More difficult than what?” Hannaford asked.
“I don’t know. It seems…I admit there’s something going on with her. I just don’t think it has anything to do with the murder.”
“And are you supposing you’re in any condition to make that sort of judgement?” Hannaford said.
“I’m not blind,” he replied. “I haven’t lost my wits.”
“You’ve lost your wife,” Hannaford said. “How do you expect to think straight, see straight, or do anything else straight after what’s happened to you?”
Lynley backed away, one step only. He wanted an end to the conversation and this seemed as good a start to that conclusion as any he could come up with. He made no reply. Havers, he saw, was watching him. He knew he had to make an answer of some sort or she’d answer for him, which he would find unbearable.
He said, “I wasn’t hiding facts from you, Inspector. I wanted time.”
“For what?”
“For something like this, I suppose.” He’d been carrying a manila envelope and from it he brought out the photo he’d taken away from Lark Cottage in Boscastle. He handed it over.
Hannaford studied it. “Who are these people?”
“They’re a family called Parsons. Their son-the boy in the picture-died in a sea cave in Pengelly Cove some thirty years ago. This picture was taken round that time, perhaps a year or two earlier. Niamh the mum, Jonathan the dad. The boy is Jamie and the girls are his younger sisters. I’d like to do an age progression on the picture. Do we have someone who could do it for us quickly?”
“An age progression on who?” DI Hannaford asked.
“On everyone,” Lynley replied.
DAIDRE HAD PARKED ON Lansdown Road. She knew her proximity to the police station didn’t look good, but she had to see and, in equal measure, she needed a sign that would tell her what she was meant to do next. Truth meant trust and a leap of faith, but that leap could land her directly in the deadly mire of betrayal, and she’d had quite enough of betrayal at this point in her life.
In the rearview mirror, she saw them come out of the police station. Had Lynley been alone, she might have approached him for the conversation they needed to have, but as he was with both Sergeant Havers and Inspector Hannaford, Daidre used this as a sign that the time wasn’t right. She was parked some way up the street, and when the three police officers paused in the station’s car park for a few words together, she started her car and pulled away from the kerb. Intent upon their conversation, none of them looked in her direction. Daidre took that as a sign as well. There were those, she knew, who would call her a coward for running just then. There were others, however, who would congratulate her on having sound instincts towards self-preservation.