The drive snaked between two slabs of pasture and into a thick belt of mature trees. The grass borders were uniformly short with precision-cut edges. If it was all the work of the lone raker, he evidently toiled a lot harder when nobody was looking. Every now and then, through gaps in the trees, she caught a flash of rolling countryside, like pastoral snapshots of the world beyond.
To the rear of the house, glimpsed as the drive curved level with the side of the main building, stood more gardens, with an array of terraces and colourful flowerbeds, while lawned areas dotted with shrubs and trees swept down a gentle slope to a thick belt of woodland running into the distance. She drove on and passed to the left of a large, stone fountain with a cherub spouting water in the centre, and another hundred yards took her between lush explosions of laurel, until the drive opened out to a fan-shaped area of gravel in front of the house. In the middle of this stood another fountain dominated by a stone goblet centrepiece bubbling with water. She pulled up to one side of the parking area and climbed out.
Dismissing the front entrance as a door would have undervalued its purpose in life; it was tall, wide, glossy and black, and mounted with enough brassware to sink a tugboat. Come the revolution, thought Riley, if a modern peasant army rolled up here to address the natural order of things, they’d take one look at this solid, gleaming barrier and go home for tea and a re-think.
As if the grounds and house weren’t indication enough of Myburghe’s financial standing, parked a few yards away was a Jaguar in British racing green and a dark BMW 7 series, both polished to a ferocious gleam. Even the tyres had been buffed to their proiginal black, as if the scene had been set for a coffee-table magazine photo-shoot.
On one end of the house an intricate cluster of scaffolding clambered up the stonework like steel ivy, the poles rigged with ladders and planks behind a partial covering of see-through plastic sheeting. Judging from the workmen and the high-pitched whine of power tools sending a fine cloud of dust swirling into the atmosphere, some major renovations were in progress.
Riley counted seven bodies in all. Evidently being an ex-diplomat wasn’t hurting Sir Kenneth’s wallet in any way. She couldn’t see any activity related to a wedding party, but presumed that was all going on at the rear of the house.
She walked up the front steps and located a discreet bellpush. The sound reverberated inside, bringing the approach of heavy footsteps.
The door was opened by a huge man with impressively broad shoulders and a craggy face like a lump of granite. He looked down at Riley and waited for her to speak. He may have been wearing a sober grey suit and shoes with a shine he could have shaved in, but his manner was clearly that of a butler. If so, Riley thought, he was one of a kind.
‘My name’s Riley Gavin,’ she said, passing him her card. ‘I have an appointment with Sir Kenneth.’
‘He’s not available at the moment. May I ask what it’s about?’ The man’s voice carried traces of a northern accent. He appeared to be in his fifties, but the years sat easily on him.
‘I’ve come to do a piece about his daughter’s wedding,’ she explained. ‘My agent made the appointment earlier.’
To her surprise, the butler gave a sly smile. ‘Do me a favour, love,’ he grated. ‘You’ll have to do better than that.’ Without another word, he closed the door with a firm thud.
She stared at her reflection in the shiny paintwork. What the hell was that about? She leaned on the bell again, but there was no answer. She raised her hand, this time to pound on the wood, then thought better of it. Okay, so they’d had a change of heart about an interview. Now why was that? Still, there were more ways than one of picking up on gossip; given the right approach, the folks in the village might have something useful to say.
She walked back to the car, certain that she was being observed from one of the many windows, probably by the gentleman’s gentleman having a quiet chuckle at her expense. She ignored it and drove back down the drive, trying to work out her next avenue of approach. There was always the staff, of course, although she doubted they would talk. Alternatively, she could tap whatever contacts she could find in London to see if there were any whispers about Sir Kenneth circulating the corridors of Whitehall and St James’s, where these things had currency.
As she rounded the final bend in the drive, she found the gateway blocked by a car parked sideways across the opening. A tall, dark figure was silhouetted against the lighter sky, leaning casually against the bonnet. She swore and jammed her foot on the brake, and felt the tyres losing their grip on the loose gravel as the car began to slide. She corrected it in time and jabbed the brake again, bringing the vehicle to a stop against a grass verge as the engine cut out.
When she looked up, the figure had stepped away from the car and was walking purposefully towards her, head down. It was a man and he was holding a heavy stick.
Riley felt the choke of fear grip her throat. She still couldn’t make out his features. She checked her rear-view mirror. The drive behind her was empty, but there was too little room to turn round — and the man was only a few feet away. She ducked her head and scrabbled in the glove compartment, fingers brushing over paper, the car’s information folder and some batteries, before she found a small can of de-icer. It wasn’t Mace but would be painful enough to the eyes to give her a fraction of time to do something — as long as he got close enough for it to be effective.
Then he was alongside and tapping at the window. All Riley could see was a tall frame and a strong hand clasping a heavy stick, like a club. With a sick feeling, she realised she might as well face him down rather than wreck her car trying to get by. She pressed the button to lower the glass a fraction, waiting with her thumb on the button of the spray can as the man bent and peered through the gap.
‘Bit heavy on the brakes, there, weren’t you, missus?’ he commented.
‘Palmer!’ Riley felt a wave of relief wash over her, fighting to compete with the urge to give the familiar, grinning face a blast of the spray for scaring her.
Before she could say anything, he gestured at the car behind him, a muddy Saab 95. ‘Follow me and I’ll treat you to a cream tea.’
‘I don’t want a cream-’ Riley started to protest. But he was already walking away, tossing the stick into the bushes.
********
CHAPTER SIX
Palmer led her on a fast drive to an inn a couple of miles away and pulled into the car park. He climbed out of his car and disappeared ahead of her through the front entrance. By the time she joined him in the dark-timbered lounge, he was flicking through a local magazine, long legs stuck out before him in careless disarray as if he’d been there all day.
‘What the hell is going on, Palmer?’ Riley nearly exploded as she slumped into a well-worn club chair across from him. ‘And what are you doing here? You scared the crap out of me back there!’
A young woman’s head poked out from behind the reception office doorway, then ducked back again when she saw no blood was being shed.
Riley’s initial relief at seeing Frank Palmer at the entrance to Colebrooke House had now given way to a deep suspicion that Donald Brask had once again donned his Mother Hen cap and asked Palmer to keep an eye on her. He’d done it before and it would never have surprised her that an unaccustomed dose of flu in Donald had awoken some temporarily dormant feelings of concern for her wellbeing. Especially if he felt that going after Myburghe was fraught with danger.