Payment in Blood (Inspector Lynley, #2)(45)

“Do you have the necklace?” she asked stiffly.

“I beg your pardon?”

Elizabeth’s hands splayed out against her skirt. “My aunt’s pearl necklace. I gave it to Joy last night. Is it in her room?”

There was a murmur from the group at the fireplace, and Francesca Gerrard got to her feet. Coming to Elizabeth’s side, she put her hand on her elbow, attempting to draw her back to the others. She kept her eyes off the police.

“It’s all right, Elizabeth,” she murmured. “Really. Quite all right.”

Elizabeth jerked away. “It’s not all right, Aunt Francie. I didn’t want to give it to Joy in the first place. I knew it wouldn’t work. Now that she’s dead, I want you to have it back.” Still, she looked at no one. Her eyes were bloodshot, a condition that her eyeshadow only heightened.

Lynley looked at St. James. “Were there pearls in the room?” The other man shook his head.

“But I took the necklace to her. She wasn’t in her room yet. She’d gone to…So I asked him to…” Elizabeth stopped, her face working. Her eyes sought and then fastened on Jeremy Vinney. “You didn’t give it to her, did you? You said you would, but you didn’t. What have you done with that necklace?”

Vinney’s gin and tonic stopped midway to his lips. His fingers, too plump and overly hairy, tightened on the glass. Clearly, the accusation came as a surprise. “I? Of course I gave it to her. Don’t be absurd.”

“You’re lying!” Elizabeth shrilled. “You said she didn’t want to talk to anyone! And you put it in your pocket! I heard the two of you in your room, you know! I know what you were after! But when she wouldn’t let you do it, you followed her back to her room, didn’t you? You were angry! You killed her! And then you took the pearls as well!”

Vinney was on his feet at that, a quick man in spite of the weight he carried. He tried to push aside David Sydeham, who grabbed his arm.

“You dried-up little shrew,” he flared. “You were so goddamned jealous of her, you probably killed her yourself! Snooping about, listening at doors. That’s about as close as you’ve come to having any, isn’t it?”

“Jesus God, Vinney—”

“And what were you doing with her?” Angry colour shot across Elizabeth’s cheeks in patches. Her lips contorted into a sneer. “Hoping to get your own creative juices up by bleeding off hers? Or smelling her up like every other man here?”

“Elizabeth!” Francesca Gerrard pleaded weakly.

“Because I know why you came! I know what you were after!”

“She’s mad,” Joanna Ellacourt muttered in disgust.

Lady Stinhurst broke at that. She spat a response at the actress. “Don’t you say that! Don’t you dare! You sit there like an ageing Cleopatra who needs men to—”

“Marguerite!” Her husband’s voice boomed. It shattered everyone to silence, nerve-strung and brittle.

The tension was broken by footsteps on the stairs and in the hall. A moment later the remaining members of the party entered the room: Sergeant Havers, Lady Helen, Rhys Davies-Jones. Robert Gabriel appeared less than a minute behind them.

His eyes darted from the tense group by the fireplace to the others near the drinks trolley, to Elizabeth and Vinney, squaring off in anger. It was an actor’s moment and he knew how to use it.

“Ah.” He smiled gaily. “We are indeed all in the gutter, aren’t we? But I wonder which of us are looking at the stars?”

“Certainly not Elizabeth,” Joanna Ellacourt replied curtly and turned back to her drink.

From the corner of his eye, Lynley saw Davies-Jones draw Lady Helen towards the drinks trolley and pour her a dry sherry. He even knows her habits, Lynley thought dismally and decided that he had had his fill of the entire group.

“Tell me about the pearls,” he said.

Francesca Gerrard felt for the single string of cheap beads she wore. They were puce-coloured; they argued dramatically with the green of her blouse. Ducking her head, raising a nervous hand to her mouth as if to hide her prominent teeth from scrutiny, she spoke with a well-bred hesitation, as if better manners told her it was unwise to intrude.

“I…It’s my fault, Inspector. I’m afraid that last night I did ask Elizabeth to offer the pearls to Joy. They aren’t priceless, of course, but I thought if she needed money….”

“Ah. I see. A bribe.”

Francesca’s eyes went to Lord Stinhurst. “Stuart, won’t you…?” The words wavered uneasily. Her brother didn’t reply. “Yes. I thought she might be willing to withdraw the play.”

“Tell him how much the pearls are worth,” Elizabeth insisted hotly. “Tell him!”

Francesca made a delicate moue of distaste, clearly unused to discussing such matters in public. “They were a wedding present from Phillip. My husband. They were…perfectly matched so—”

“They were worth more than eight thousand pounds,” Elizabeth snapped.

“I had of course always intended to pass them on to my own daughter. But since I have no children—”

“They were going to go to our little Elizabeth,” Vinney finished triumphantly. “So who better to have nicked them from Joy’s room? You nasty little bitch! Clever to point the finger at me!”