A Place of Hiding (Inspector Lynley, #12)(58)

Then it was over, at least the first part. The interment and the reception came next, both of them scheduled for Le Reposoir. The procession to the property was impressive. It strung all along the Quay, from Albert Pier to well beyond Victoria Marina. It slowly wound up Le Val des Terres beneath the thick winter-bare trees skirting along the steep-walled hillside. From there, it followed the road out of town, slicing between the wealth of Fort George on the east with its sprawling modern houses protected behind their hedges and their electric gates and the common housing of the west: streets and avenues thickly built up in the nineteenth century, Georgian and Regency semi-detached dwellings, as well as terraces that had grown decidedly the worse for wear. Just before St. Peter Port gave way to St. Martin, the cortege turned towards the east. The cars coursed beneath the trees, along a narrow road that gave way to an even narrower lane. Along one side of this ran a high stone wall. Along the other rose an earthen bank from which grew a hedge, gnarled and knotted by the December cold.

A break in the wall made way for two iron gates. These stood open and the hearse pulled onto the expansive grounds of Le Reposoir. The mourners followed, with Frank among them. He parked at the side of the drive and made his way along with everyone else in the general direction of the manor house.

Within ten steps, his solitude came to an end. A voice next to him said,

“This changes everything,” and he looked up to see that Bertrand Debiere had joined him.

The architect looked like hell on diet pills. Always far too thin for his extreme height, he seemed to have lost a full stone since the night of the party at Le Reposoir. The whites of his eyes were crisscrossed with spider legs of crimson, and the bones of his cheeks—always prominent anyway—

appeared to rise from his face like chicken eggs attempting to escape from beneath his skin.

“Nobby,” Frank said with a nod of hello. He used the architect’s nickname without a thought. He’d had him as a history student years before at the secondary modern school, and he’d never made it a habit to stand on ceremony when it came to anyone he’d formerly taught. “I didn’t see you at the service.”

Debiere gave no indication if he was bothered by Frank’s use of his nickname. As he’d never been called anything else by his intimates, he probably hadn’t noticed. He said, “Don’t you agree?”

“To what?”

“To the original idea. To my idea. We’ll have to return to it now, I dare say. Without Guy here, we can’t expect Ruth to spearhead things. She won’t know the first thing about this sort of building, and I can’t imagine she’ll want to learn. Can you?”

“Ah. The museum,” Frank said.

“It’ll still go forward. Guy would want that. But as to the design, that’ll have to change. I talked to him about it, but you probably know that already, don’t you? I know you were thick as thieves, you and Guy, so he probably told you that I cornered him. That night, you know. Just the two of us. After the fireworks. I had a closer look at the elevation drawing and I could see—well, who couldn’t if you know anything about architecture?—that this bloke from California had got everything wrong. You’d expect that from someone who designed without having a look at the site, wouldn’t you? Pretty ego-driven, if you ask me. Nothing I would have done, and I told Guy that. I know I was starting to bring him round, Frank.”

Nobby’s voice was eager. Frank glanced at him as they followed the procession that was wending its way to the west side of the house. He didn’t reply, although he could tell that Nobby was desperate for him to do so. The faint sheen on his upper lip betrayed him.

The architect continued. “All those windows, Frank. As if there’s a spectacular view at St. Saviour’s that we’re supposed to make use of, or something. He would have known there wasn’t if he’d come to see the site in the first place. And think what that’s going to do to the heating, all those great long windows. It’ll cost a bloody fortune to keep the place open out of season when the weather’s bad. I presume you want it open out of season, don’t you? If it’s for the island more than just for the tourists, then it has to be open when local people can get there, which they’re not likely even to attempt in the middle of summer when the crowds are here. Don’t you agree?”

Frank knew he had to say something because maintaining silence in this situation would be odd, so he said, “Mind you don’t put the cart first, Nobby. It’s time to go easy, I expect.”

“But you’re an ally, aren’t you?” Nobby demanded. “F-Frank, you are on m-my side in this?”

The sudden stammering marked the level of his anxiety. It had done the same when he was a boy in school, called on in class and unable to bluff his way through a recitation. His speech problem had always made Nobby seem more vulnerable than the other boys, which was appealing, but at the same time it cursed him to truth at any cost, removing from him the ability that other people possessed to disguise what they were feeling. Frank said, “It’s not a question of allies and enemies, Nobby. This whole business”—with a nod at the house to indicate what had gone on inside of it, the decisions taken and the dreams destroyed—“it’s nothing to do with me. I didn’t have the means to become involved. At least, not as you’re thinking I might have been involved.”