‘I did. He said I should take my next leave there. Do me the world of good, he said.’ He drained his whisky. ‘Get the poisons out of my system.’
Kathy smiled. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said I didn’t think it would be that easy.’ He got to his feet, buttoning up his raincoat. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Show me.’
‘Show you?’
‘Yeah. I’d like to take a look.’ ‘But it’s dark.’
‘All the better. It was dark when it happened, wasn’t it? Whatever it was.’
Kathy followed him out to the street. He had opened the passenger door of his Granada for her and was getting in behind the wheel on the other side. Reluctantly she got in beside him.
She directed him back through the dark lanes towards Stanhope. When they arrived at the house he pulled into a space in the front car park.
‘They’re probably still at their evening meal in the dining room,’ she said. ‘We can have a look round the rest of the house.’
‘I don’t want to go inside,’ he said. ‘Show me this temple.’
‘There won’t be much to see …’ But he was already getting out of the car.
‘What about a torch?’ she asked. ‘Do you have one?’
He ignored her, moving off between the trees towards the west wing. She followed. As they came to the building she pointed out features that were barely visible in the dark. There was the flight of stone steps leading down to the access door to the basement, from which Petrou might have come if he had walked from the gym directly to the temple. Here was the gravel path, one branch leading round the end of the west wing and up the rise towards the temple.
Tanner barely spoke, occasionally giving a grunt. His feet crunched on the gravel as he led the way. It was so dark that, even though their eyes had partially adjusted, they were almost at the foot of the temple steps before they could make out the dark mass of the building in its dense grove of foliage.
This is how it would have been. It was a night as dark as this, no rain till dawn, but heavy cloud cover, mist forming in the hollows.
Kathy watched the black outline of Tanner mount the steps. He was almost invisible between the columns. He muttered something.
‘What?’ she said.
‘Come here.’
She went up the steps and found that he had parted the tape that the SOCO team had left across the front of the building to keep people out. She couldn’t see what he had used to cut it.
‘You got the key?’
‘Yes.’ She felt in her pocket and brought it out. ‘Open it up.’
She did as he said, easing the door open. It scraped on the threshold, and the sound echoed in the cavernous interior. ‘Go on.’
The darkness was so intense that moving forward felt like diving into black water. She took short steps, conscious of the sound of Tanner’s breathing close behind. He had a smoker’s wheeze, which she hadn’t noticed before.
It seemed to take an age shuffling down the nave towards the rail over the organ. All the time Kathy was thinking how stupid this was. Why hadn’t he brought a torch if he intended coming here? The darkness was so heavy, so pervasive, that it was hard not to become disoriented, to feel panic. When they reached the end she seized the rail with relief, feeling her heart pounding, and said, ‘There’s a rail in front of you. Wait here and I’ll go downstairs and turn on the light.’ She sensed him just inches away, unseen.
She groped her way to the top of the spiral stairs, banging her shin once on a chair, then descended quickly and found the switch. After the darkness, the feeble organ light seemed remarkably bright.
‘So,’ Tanner said when he joined her, ‘describe it for me.’
While she did so he strolled around, hands in pockets.
‘Where were the things you found on the ground? The whip and mask?’
She showed him and he crouched over the spot.
‘What did Pugh make of them?’
‘Nothing yet. He said they looked clean, unused. But he won’t know till they get the tests done.’ He stood up, thinking, silent.
Marooned together in that dimly lit pit in the darkness, Kathy had a sudden impulse to confide in him, to ask his opinion about the possibilities that had begun to form in her mind. But just as she was about to speak he turned his face towards her, and the chill of his expression choked the words in her throat. Then without speaking he strode away to the foot of the stairs and disappeared. She waited for a few moments to let him reach the top and then switched off the light. The darkness struck her blind and she hesitated before following him up the stairs. But waiting didn’t bring any relief, and she began to climb.
She didn’t know what had happened to him. She could hear no sound when she reached the top, no footsteps, no breathing. She shuddered and strode out, risking the chairs, judging the paces to the centre of the nave, then turning and making out the faint grey blur of the doorway at the far end. She moved towards it as fast as she dared, reaching it with a sigh of relief. Still no sign of him.
‘Sir?’ she called into the darkness.
Nothing. She closed the door behind her, stepped out into the night and hurried down the steps. Her eyes were fixed on the lights of the house across the lawn, when she suddenly became aware of a dark shape coming at her from the bushes to her right. She half turned as a hand came out of the darkness and grabbed her right upper arm hard. She was swinging round, about to scream, when she heard Tanner’s voice.
‘You didn’t lock the door.’
She froze, knowing he had intended to frighten her. His face was close, and she could smell his smoker’s breath.
‘You should lighten up, Kathy,’ his voice different, a hoarse whisper. ‘You take things too seriously. Just relax.’
For a moment she was convinced he was going to do something — hit her or kiss her, she wasn’t sure which — then his hand released her and his shadow slid silently away across the lawn. All her muscles were rigid and she began to shiver. What the hell does he want? She turned and paced back towards the temple, restraining the impulse to run. At the steps she stumbled, banging her head against one of the stone columns. She swore and forced herself to calm down, take her time. After locking the door she thought, / can’t face driving back to the pub with him. But when she returned to the car park she saw that his car was no longer there.
The receptionist looked up in surprise.
‘Oh! I thought you’d gone.’
‘So did I,’ Kathy said. ‘I had some trouble with my car. Could you get me a taxi, do you think?’
‘Certainly.’ She peered at Kathy’s forehead. ‘You’ve had a scrape.’
‘I bumped into something nasty.’
‘Would you like Dr Beamish-Newell to look at it for you?’
‘No,’ Kathy said, too quickly. ‘No. Thanks for the thought. Just order a taxi, please.’
7
Gordon was looking sickly pale, his brow crumpled with anxiety.
Brock cleared his throat. ‘How about a break?’
Kathy nodded. She looked over at the window and was surprised to see sunlight reflecting off the snow on the branches of the trees outside. Brock was on his feet, stretching, rubbing his hand through his beard. ‘It’s lunchtime,’ he announced. ‘I’ll get something organized.’
‘Can we help?’ Kathy offered, and they followed him out of the room, by a series of twists and bends in the passageway, to a small kitchen at the back of the house. Kathy heated tinned tomato soup on the stove while Brock gathered some things on a tray — cold meats, cheese, a pork pie, pickles and mustard, oatcakes and bread.