A Suitable Vengeance (Inspector Lynley, #4)(58)

Lynley found Peter in the smoking room on the ground floor of the house. Cigarette in hand, he was standing by the fireplace, his attention fixed upon a red fox that was mounted in a glass case above it. A compassionate taxidermist had thoughtfully poised the animal in the act of flight, just inches from a burrow that would have saved him. Other vulpine trophies had not been so fortunately enshrined, however. Their heads hung from plaques fastened intermittently between photographs on the room’s panelled walls. Since the only light came from an arabesque brass chandelier, these latter foxes cast long shadows, accusatory wedges of darkness like reverse spotlights that emphasised a devotion to blood sports which no one in the family had actually felt since before the First War.

Seeing his brother’s reflection in the glass case, Peter spoke without turning around. “Why do you suppose no one’s ever taken this awful thing down from the mantel?”

“I think it was Grandfather’s first successful hunt.”

“Why blood him when you can give him the poor creature as a prize?”

“That sort of thing.”

Lynley noted that his brother had removed the swastika from his ear, replacing it with a single gold stud. He wore grey trousers, a white shirt, a loosely knotted tie—and although the clothes were overly large, at least they were clean. And he had put on shoes if not socks. This seemed cause enough for fleeting gratification, and Lynley briefly considered the value and the wisdom of confronting his brother—as he knew he had to be confronted eventually—at a moment when Peter’s appearance suggested concession, compromise, and the promise of change.

Peter tossed his cigarette into the fireplace and opened the liquor cabinet that was a hidden feature of the mantel beneath the fox.

“This was one of my little adolescent secrets,” he chuckled as he poured himself a tumbler of whisky. “Jasper showed it to me when I turned seventeen.”

“He showed me as well. A rite of passage, I suppose.”

“D’you think Mother knew?”

“I imagine so.”

“What a disappointment. To think one’s clever and to find out just the opposite.” He turned from the fireplace for the first time and held his glass up in a rakish salute. “The best, Tommy. Weren’t you lucky to have found her.”

At that, Lynley noticed his brother’s eyes. They were unnaturally bright. He felt a twinge of apprehension. Stifling it, he merely said thank you, and watched as Peter wandered to the desk that abutted the wide bay window. There, he began to play with the items arranged on the leather-edged blotter, spinning the letter opener on its ivory handle, lifting the top of an empty silver inkstand, joggling a rack of cherrywood pipes. Still sipping his whisky, he picked up a photograph of their grandparents and yawned as he idly studied their faces.

Seeing this and knowing it for what it was—an attempt to construct a barrier of indifference—Lynley realised there was no point in temporising. “I’d like to ask you about the mill.”

Peter replaced the photograph and picked at a worn spot on the back of the armchair that sat before the desk. “What about the mill?”

“You’ve been using it, haven’t you?”

“I haven’t been there in ages. I’ve been by it, of course, to get down to the cove. But I’ve not been inside. Why?”

“You know the answer to that.”

Peter’s face remained blank as Lynley spoke, but a muscle spasm pulled at the corner of his mouth. He made his way to a row of university photographs that decorated one of the walls. He began gliding from one to the next as if he were seeing them for the very first time.

“Every Lynley for one hundred years,” he remarked, “crewing at Oxford. What a black sheer I’ve been.” He came to a blank spot on the wall and touched the palm of his hand to the panel. “Even Father had his day, didn’t he, Tommy? But of course, we can’t have his picture here. It wouldn’t do if Father were able to look down from the walls and observe our wicked ways.”

Lynley refused to allow the honeyed words to provoke him. “I’d like to talk about the mill.”

Peter threw back the rest of his whisky, put his glass on a lowboy, and continued his perusal. He stopped before the most recent photograph and flicked his index finger against his brother’s picture. His nail snapped sharply upon the glass like a slap in miniature.

“Even you, Tommy. You’ve fit the mould. A Lynley to be proud of. You’re a regular swell.”

Lynley felt his chest tighten. “I’ve no control over the kind of life you’ve chosen to lead in London,” he said, hoping to sound reasonable and knowing how poor a job he made of it. “You’ve chucked Oxford? Fine. You’ve your own digs? Fine. You’ve taken up with this…with Sasha? Fine. But not here, Peter. I won’t have this business at Howenstow. Is that clear?”

Peter turned from the wall, cocking his head slightly. “You won’t have it? You drop into our lives once or twice a year to announce what you will and won’t have, is that it? And this is just one of those momentous occasions.”

“How often I’m here makes no difference to anything. I’m responsible for Howenstow, for every person on the grounds. And I’ve no intention of putting up with the sort of filth—”

“Oh, I see. Some local drug action’s going on at the mill, and you’ve placed me at the centre in your best DI fashion. Well. Nice job. Have you dusted for prints? Found a lock of my hair? Did I leave behind spittle for you to analyse?” Peter shook his head in eloquent disgust. “You’re a fool. If I want to use, I sure as hell won’t go all the way down to the mill. I’ve nothing to hide. From you or from anyone.”