A Finer End

“And then he came to Glastonbury and fell in love with a girl pregnant with another man’s child?” Kincaid snorted. “Sounds like someone’s idea of a cosmic joke. But I doubt Faith would find it amusing.”

“That might explain why Nick would kill Garnet, but not why he would have struck Winnie. Unless”—Gemma frowned—“unless we’ve got it the wrong way round. What if it was Winnie who found out about Nick—isn’t that more likely, with her connections?—then Garnet saw Nick hit Winnie. So he was forced to silence her.”

“You’re leaving out one thing,” Kincaid objected. “Nick doesn’t have a car. His bike could not have caused Winnie’s injuries.”

“Perhaps he borrowed a car—or stole one.”

“That’s a possibility we should check.”

The rain fell in sheets now, and the traffic ground to a halt behind a long tailback. Kincaid glanced uneasily at his watch.

“What is it?” Gemma asked.

“We’re not going to make Glastonbury by five, in this downpour. But I asked Jack to pick Faith up at the café, if we weren’t in time.”

“But she was expecting you—”

“Jack promised he’d be there at the stroke of five. She’ll be fine.”

But as the minutes passed, Kincaid could sense Gemma’s growing tension. She sat quietly, eyes fixed on the road, as if she could hurry the car. As they neared Glastonbury, the rain fell even more heavily and the sky grew black. He drummed his fingers on the wheel as they crawled behind a lorry.

But at last they zigzagged their way through the village of Pilton, and the final clear stretch of road lay before them.

Then his cell phone rang.

It was Jack on the line, sounding frantic. “She’s gone. Faith’s gone. She told Buddy she didn’t feel well earlier this afternoon, that she was coming home. Then he began to worry about her, and rang me. No one’s seen her since she left the café.”

“Where are you?”

“At the house. I rang Nick at the bookshop, but he hasn’t heard from her either.”

“Wait there. She may ring you, or show up at the house any minute. And you don’t want to leave Winnie alone. We’re almost in Glastonbury—we’ll find her.”

“It’s Faith, isn’t it?” Gemma said as he disconnected.

“Missing since midafternoon. Told Buddy she was going home.” He swore under his breath, but he knew it was his own lack of foresight he was cursing. Why the hell hadn’t he been more careful? “Where could she have got to?”

“The farmhouse.” Gemma said with certainty. “Duncan, she’s gone to Garnet’s farmhouse.”

As Kincaid pulled the car over, Gemma grabbed her torch from the door pocket and jumped out. Fumbling open the gate latch in the rain, she ducked under the crime-scene tape and ran across the muddy yard. The sight of the kitchen door standing ajar made her blood run cold. She stepped inside and looked round, fearing the worst.

The butter-colored cat sat on the kitchen table, blinking at her, and then, beyond that, in the midst of the chaos left by the police, she saw a huddled form on the floor.

“It’s Catesby!” Kincaid exclaimed, behind her. “Dead?”

Andrew Catesby had fallen on his back, half under the table, but even in shadowed light Gemma could see the ugly swelling on his temple. A heavy frying pan lay on the floor nearby, as if it had been dropped.

She could hear his breathing, raspy and labored, and when she felt his wrist his pulse fluttered beneath her fingertips.

Kincaid was already dialing 999, and once he’d requested medical help he left a message with Control for DCI Greely.

“Faith must have been the connection all along, not Garnet,” he said as he squatted beside her. “Jack said she’d gone to public school—Andrew must have been her teacher. And the father of her baby. That day you found him here, he must have been looking for Faith.”

“She protected him all this time. Was it Andrew who tried to kill Winnie, then, because she’d guessed? And then murdered Garnet in case Faith had told her?”

“We may never know,” Kincaid said grimly. “Unless Faith can tell us. Where the hell is the girl? If Andrew attacked her, she could be hurt. You stay with him. I’ll search the house.”

Gemma glanced at the open door, thinking furiously. She knew with unshakable certainty that Faith was no longer in the house. She knew, too, where she had gone, and that she must go after her.

She also knew that she could never explain her conviction to Kincaid, and that he would forbid her to make that climb alone in the dark. But they couldn’t both leave Catesby. “Right,” she replied. “You have a look.”

It would take Kincaid a very short time to search the small house, and Andrew Catesby’s breathing had not worsened. When Kincaid disappeared down the corridor, she slipped quietly out the back door.

The rain had diminished to a fine mist, a soft touch against her face. “Bloody hell,” she muttered, realizing Kincaid must have the car keys. Looking up at the Tor’s black bulk rising behind the house, she considered going straight up the hill, then dismissed the plan as more foolhardy than the one she was already contemplating. The lane it must be, then.