A Finer End

“Did she come to see you the next night, determined to confront you about the attempt on Winnie’s life? Did you have drinks in the garden? And when you realized what she knew, did you ask her to look at something in the stream? Did you—”

“No, wait,” interrupted Jack. “I’ve just remembered! We were looking for Faith that evening. I rang you and asked you to check the farmhouse, as Garnet didn’t have a phone, and you said you would go.”

“I did.” Simon had stiffened in his chair. “There was no one there, and I came home again. As for the evening of Winifred’s accident, I had a speaking engagement in Bristol, in front of two hundred people, if anyone bothered to check. I left shortly after Winifred’s visit and didn’t return until midnight. You are all mad, utterly mad.”

“But—” Kincaid stared at him. “Simon, when you went to the farmhouse that evening, was Garnet’s van in the yard?”

“Yes, but there was no one in the house. I knocked and called out.”

“Bloody hell. I’ve been a fool. Simon, forgive me. Gemma—we’ve been blind. It was never Winnie who was in danger.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

On more than one occasion, we who live upon [the Tor’s] flank have been called upon to minister comfort and consolation to those who have actually seen what they went to look for.

—DION FORTUNE,

FROM GLASTONBURY: AVALON OF THE HEART

IT SEEMED TO Gemma that she had never been so tired. She had listened to Kincaid’s exchange with Simon Fitzstephen with a growing sense of unreality, as if she were becoming physically detached from her body. Now, as they sped back towards Glastonbury, she was having difficulty following Kincaid’s logic. “Are you saying you think Fiona Allen’s husband might hurt her?” she asked.

“I don’t know. But I do think Bram fits into this and somehow that it’s connected to the death of little Sarah Kinnersley. When I saw her photo in that news clipping, I knew she seemed familiar—and then tonight at Simon’s it came back to me: it was the face of the child in Fiona’s painting.”

“The painting … it seemed almost as if the beings—angels?—were protecting the child.…”

“Bram and Garnet were lovers at the time Sarah was killed. The Kinnersleys were so devastated by their loss that they walked away from their property—Buddy mentioned Garnet bought it ‘for a song.’ Buddy also said that after little Sarah Kinnersley died, everything changed. Bram left Garnet. He married Fiona.”

“Left Garnet because she knew the truth? Was Garnet an accessory in Sarah’s death?”

“In the notes she left in the kitchen, she wrote that Faith was her redemption, and that bringing Faith’s baby into the world would be a child’s life for a child’s life. But I think she came to feel that wasn’t enough, that in order to counteract what was happening to Faith she needed to take some kind of direct action.”

“She confronted Bram—”

“I’d guess she told him she wouldn’t keep his secret any longer, that it was time for him to make retribution by telling the truth.”

“And Winnie?”

“Garnet told Faith she had an appointment that evening. I think she’d set a meeting with Bram, perhaps at the very spot where Winnie was struck.”

“And at the last minute Garnet found she couldn’t go through with it—and Winnie just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Gemma finished. “The next day, when Garnet learned of the accident, she guessed who had been responsible.”

“Then did she go to him? Or did he come after her? Simon said that when he went to Garnet’s that evening, her van was still in the yard. I’m guessing that Bram went to the farmhouse sometime after Nick left.”

“You think he drowned her in the house? But there was no sign.”

“No.… Do something for me, would you? Ring directory inquiries, get the number for Buddy—Charles Barnes.”

Gemma complied and, when the number began to ring, handed the phone to Kincaid.

“Buddy? It’s Duncan Kincaid. You know the spring on Garnet’s property? Is there any standing water? A pool above the house. Right. Oh, and Buddy, one more thing: On the night Sarah Kinnersley was killed, do you know where Garnet was? Did she have a car?” He listened a moment longer, then said, “Okay, thanks. I’ll explain later,” and disconnected.

“She was with Bram Allen,” stated Gemma.

“And he would have been driving. Garnet had no car at the time.”

“I still don’t understand why you’re worried about Fiona …”

“Because I think that, like Andrew with his sister, there’s one person Bram would do anything to protect from the knowledge of his crime.”

The lights still shone in the Allens’ house, and when Kincaid rang the bell, Fiona opened the door immediately. “Bram,” she said, “—have you seen him?”

“He’s not here?”