A Suitable Vengeance (Inspector Lynley, #4)(131)

Lynley looked at the old man, studying the face that was creased with age and failure, jaundiced by ill health. He saw the stark bones of his chest pressing against his shirt, the ugly nicotine stains on his fingers, the arthritic curl of those fingers as he reached for a bottle of beer on a desk. Let someone else do the telling, he decided.

“We know he was working on a story about a drug called oncozyme,” Lynley said.

St. James followed his lead. “He was spending time in London visiting a company called Islington and a biochemist there called Justin Brooke. Did Mick ever speak of Brooke? Of Islington?”

Cambrey shook his head. “A drug, you say?” He still seemed to be adjusting to the fact that his previous idea about gunrunning had led nowhere.

“We need access to his files—here and in the cottage—if we’re to prove anything,” St. James said. “The man who killed Mick is dead himself. Only Mick’s notes can give us his motive and some sort of foundation to build a case against him.”

“And if the killer found the notes and destroyed them? If they were in the cottage and he pinched them that night?”

“Too many other things have occurred that needn’t have happened had the killer found the notes.” Lynley thought about St. James’ explanation once more: how Brooke tried to eliminate Peter because of something Peter must have seen or heard that evening in Gull Cottage; how he’d taken Deborah’s cameras to get at the film. This second circumstance alone spoke more loudly than anything else in support of the existence of a piece of hard evidence. It had to be somewhere, however disguised. Brooke had known that.

Cambrev spoke. “He kept files in those cabinets”—he nodded in their direction—” and more at the cottage. The police’re done with it and I’ve the key when you’re ready to go there. Let’s get to work.”

There were three cabinets of four drawers apiece. While the business of putting out a newspaper went on round them, Lynley, St. James, Deborah, and Cambrey began going through the drawers one by one. Look for anything, St. James told them, that bore any resemblance to a report on oncozyme. The name of the drug itself, a mention of cancer, a study of treatments, interviews with doctors, researchers, or patients.

The search began through folders, notebooks, and simple scraps of paper. They saw immediately that it would be no easy task. There was no logical manner in which Mick Cambrey had done his filing. It bore signs of neither organisation nor unity. It would take hours, perhaps days, to go through it all, for each piece had to be read separately for the slightest allusion to oncozyme, to cancer, to biochemical research.

They had been at it for over an hour when Julianna Vendale said, “If you’re looking for notes, don’t forget his computer,” and opened a drawer in his desk to reveal at least two dozen floppy disks.

No one groaned, although Deborah looked dismayed and Harry Cambrey cursed. They continued to wade through the detritus of the dead man’s career, interrupted by the telephone just after four o’clock. Someone answered it in one of the cubicles, then stuck his head out the door and said, “Is Mr. St. James here?”

“Salvation,” Deborah sighed, rubbing the back of her neck. “Perhaps someone’s phoning to confess.”

Lynley stood to stretch. He walked to the window. Outside, a gentle rain was continuing to fall. It was hours before dark, but in two of the buildings across Paul Lane lamps had been lit. In one of the cottages, a family sat round a table drinking afternoon tea and eating biscuits from a tin. In another, a young woman cut a man’s hair. She was concentrating on the sides, standing in front of him to examine her work. He sat patiently for a moment, then pulled her between his legs and kissed her soundly. She cuffed his ears, laughed, gave herself to his embrace. Lynley smiled, turning back to the office.

He saw St. James watching him from the cubicle in which he spoke on the phone. His face looked troubled. Contemplatively, he was pulling at his lip. Whomever he was speaking to was doing much of the talking. Only at long intervals did St. James say a few words. When at last he hung up, he spent what seemed like two or three minutes looking down at the phone. He picked it up once as if to make a call, but then replaced the receiver without having done so. At last he came out to rejoin the others.

“Deborah, can you manage for a bit on your own? Tommy and I need to see to something.”

She looked from him to Lynley. “Of course. Shall we go on to the cottage when we’ve finished here?”

“If you will.”

Without another word, he headed for the door. Lynley followed. He said nothing on the way down the stairs. Near the bottom, they skirted two children who were running a collection of small metal lorries along the banister. They stepped past the crowded doorway of the Anchor and Rose, stepped into the street. They turned up the collars of their coats against the rain.

“What is it?” Lynley asked. “Who was on the phone?”

“Helen.”

“Helen? Why on earth—”

“She’s found out about the list of Cambrey’s prospects, Tommy, and about the telephone messages on the machine in his flat.”

“And?”

“It seems they all have one thing in common.”

“From the expression on your face, it’s not cocaine, I take it.”

“Not cocaine. Cancer.” St. James walked towards Paul Lane, his head bent into the rain.