In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner (Inspector Lynley, #10)(220)

They walked to Barbara's car in Queen's Gate Gardens. Nkata had told King-Ryder to meet him at the Agincourt half an hour from the moment he rang off. “You're there too early and I'm not showing my face,” he had warned King-Ryder. “You just thank your stars I'm willing to negotiate on your own turf.”

King-Ryder was to see to it that the stage door was unlocked. He was also to see to it that the building was unoccupied.

The drive into the West End took them less than twenty minutes. There, the Agincourt Theatre stood next to the Museum of Theatrical History, on a narrow side street off Shaftesbury Avenue. Its stage door was opposite a line of skips serving the Royal Standard Hotel. No windows overlooked it, so Barbara and Nkata could enter the Agincourt unobserved.

Nkata took a position in the last row of the stalls. Barbara placed herself off stage, in the deep darkness provided by a bulky piece of scenery. Although the traffic and the pedestrians outside the theatre had made a din that seemed to run the length of Shaftesbury Avenue, inside the building it was tomb-silent. So when their quarry entered by the stage door some seven minutes later, Barbara heard him.

He did everything as Nkata had instructed him. He closed the door. He made his way to the backstage area. He flipped on the working lights above the stage. He walked to stage centre. He stood pretty much where Hamlet would probably lie dying in Horatio's arms, Barbara realised. It was such a nice touch.

He looked out into the darkened theatre and said, “All right, damn you. I'm here.”

Nkata spoke from the back, where the shadows obscured him. “So I see.”

King-Ryder took a step forward and said unexpectedly in a high, pained voice, “You killed him, you filthy bastard. You killed him. Both of you. All of you. And I swear to God, I'll make you pay.”

“I didn't do no killing. I done no traveling to Derbyshire lately.”

“You know what I'm talking about. You killed my father.”

Barbara frowned as she heard this. What the hell was he on about?

“Seems like I heard that bloke shot himself,” Nkata said.

“And why? Just why the hell do you think he shot himself? He needed that music. And he would have had it—every sodding sheet of it—if you and your f*cking mates … He shot himself because he thought … he believed … My father believed …” King-Ryder's voice broke. “You killed him. Give me that music. You killed him.”

“We need to make ourselfs an arrangement first.”

“Come into the light where I can see you.”

“Don't think so. What I figure is this: What you can't see, you don't hurt.”

“You're mad if you think I'll hand over a wad of money to someone I can't even see.”

“Expected your dad to do the same though.”

“Don't mention him to me. You're not fit to speak his name.”

“Feeling guilty?”

“Just give me that God damn music. Step up here. Act like a man. Hand it over.”

“It's going to cost you.”

“Fine. What?”

“What your dad had to pay.”

“You're mad.”

“Nice little packet of dosh that was,” Nkata said. “I'm happy to take it off your hands. And play no games, man. I know the amount. I'll give you twenty-four hours to have it here, in cash. I'spect things take longer when St. Helier's involved, and I'm an understanding kind of bloke, I am.”

The mention of St. Helier took things too far. Barbara saw that when King-Ryder's back stiffened suddenly as every nerve ending went on the alert. No ordinary yobbo in an ordinary scam would have known about that bank in St. Helier.

King-Ryder moved away from centre stage. He peered into the darkness of the stalls. Warily, he said: “Who the hell are you?”

Barbara took the cue.

“I think you know the answer to that, Mr. King-Ryder.” She stepped out of the darkness. “The music's not here, by the way. And to be honest, it probably never would have surfaced at all had you not killed Terry Cole to get it back. Terry had given it to his neighbour, the old lady, Mrs. Baden. And she hadn't the least idea what it was.”

“You,” King-Ryder said.

“Right. Do you want to come quietly, or shall we have a scene?”

“You've got nothing on me,” King-Ryder said. “I didn't say a damn thing that you can use to prove I lifted a finger against anyone.”

“Somewhat true, that.” Nkata came forward down the centre aisle of the theatre. “But we've got ourselves a nice leather jacket up in Derbyshire. And if your dabs match up with the dabs we pull off it, you're going to have one hell of a time dancing your way out of the dock.”

Barbara could almost see the wheels spinning wildly in King-Ryder's skull as he dashed through his options: fight, flight, or surrender. The odds were against him—despite one of the opposition being a woman—and while the theatre and the surrounding neighbourhood provided myriad places to run to and to hide, even had he tried to flee, it was only a matter of time before they nabbed him.

His posture altered again. “They killed my father,” he said obscurely. “They killed my dad.”

It was when Andy Maiden hadn't materialised at Broughton Manor within two hours that Lynley began to doubt the conclusions he'd drawn from the note that the man had left in Maiden Hall. A phone call from Hanken—informing him of Will Upman's safety—further solidified Lynley's doubts.