A Suitable Vengeance (Inspector Lynley, #4)(50)

“Did you see her place the call? Could you see the call box itself?”

Mrs. Swann put the questions together and reached a quick conclusion. “You can’t be thinking Nancy killed Mick? That she slipped off to her cottage, chopped him up, then came back nice as nice to serve up the lager?”

“Mrs. Swann, can you see the call box from the school grounds?”

“No. What of it? I yanked the lass out myself. She was crying. Said her dad was dead angry that she’d borrowed some money and she was trying to set it to rights with him.” Mrs. Swann pressed her lips together as if she had said all that she would. But then a bubble of anger seemed to grow and burst within her, for she went on, her voice growing fierce. “And I don’t blame Nancy’s dad for that, do I? Everyone knew where any money would go that Nance gave to Mick. He’d pass it right on to his ladies, wouldn’t he? So full of himself, little worm. Got too big in his head when he went to university. Bigger still with his fancy writing. Started thinking he could live by his own rules, didn’t he? Right there in the newspaper office. He got what he deserved.”

“In the newspaper office?” St. James queried. “He met with women in the newspaper office?”

She flipped her head in a vicious nod towards the ceiling. “Right above stairs, it is. Has a nice little room in the back of it. With a cot and everything. Perfect little love nest. And he flaunted his doings. Proud of them all. He even kept trophies.”

“Trophies?”

Mrs. Swann leaned forward, resting her enormous breasts on the bar. She gusted hot breath in St. James’ face. “What d’you say to ladies’ panties, my lad? Two different pairs right there in his desk. Harry found them. His dad. Not six months out of hospital, poor man, and he comes on those. Sitting there real as real in Mick’s top drawer and they weren’t even clean. Oh, the screaming and shouting that went on then.”

“Nancy found out?”

“Harry was screaming, not Nance. You’ve a babe on the way, he says. And the paper! Our family! Is it all for nothing so you can please your own fancy? And he hits Mick so hard I thought he was dead from the sound he made when he hit the floor. Sliced his head on the edge of a cabinet as well. But in a minute or two, he comes storming down the stairs with his father just raving behind him.”

“When was this?” St. James asked.

Mrs. Swann shrugged. Her outrage seemed spent. “Harry can tell you. He’s right above stairs.”



John Penellin rolled up the Ordnance Survey map, put an elastic band round it, and placed it with half a dozen others in the old umbrella stand in his office. The late morning sunlight streamed in the windows, heating the room to an uncomfortable degree, and he opened the casement and adjusted the blinds as he spoke.

“So it’s been a fairly good year, all way round. And if we let that north acreage lie fallow for another season, the land can only benefit from it. That’s my suggestion, at any rate.” He resumed his seat behind the desk, and as if he had an inflexible agenda to which he was determined to adhere, he went on immediately with: “May we speak of Wheal Maen?”

It had not been Lynley’s intention to go through the account books or to engage in a detailed discussion of Penellin’s management of the estate, something he had been doing with great facility and against growing for a quarter of a century. Nonetheless, he cooperated, knowing that patience was more likely to encourage a confidence from Penellin than was a direct enquiry.

The entire appearance of the man suggested that an unburdening of his heart was more than in order. He looked whey-faced. He was still wearing last night’s clothes, but they gave no evidence of having been slept in, thus acting as testimony to the fact that Penellin had probably never been to bed. Part of what had kept him from sleep was depicted on his body: His fingers were still lightly stained with ink from having his prints taken by Penzance CID. Evaluating all this, Lynley ignored the real purpose of his visit for a moment and followed Penellin’s lead.

“Still a believer, John?” he said. “Mining in Cornwall is well over one hundred years dead. You know that better than I.”

“It’s not reopening Wheal Maen I want to speak of,” Penellin said. “The mine needs to be sealed. The engine house is a ruin. The main shaft’s flooded. It’s far too dangerous to be left as it is.” He swivelled his chair and nodded towards the large estate map on the office wall. “The mine can be seen from the Sennen road. It’s only a quick walk across a bit of moor to get to it. I think it’s time we tore the engine house down completely and sealed the shaft over before someone decides to go exploring and gets hurt. Or worse.”

“That road isn’t heavily trafficked at any time of year.”

“It’s true that few visitors go down that way,” Penellin said. “But local folks use the road all the time. It’s the children I worry about. You know how they are with their playing. I don’t want any of us having to face the horror of a child falling into Wheal Maen.”

Lynley left his seat to study the map. It was true that the mine was less than one hundred yards from the road, separated from it only by a dry stone wall, certainly an insufficient barrier to keep the public off the land in an area where countless footpaths led across private property, through open moors and into combes, joining one village to another.