A Suitable Vengeance

They walked along the corridor that ran the length of the body of the house. At its eastern end, the day room door was closed, and when Lady Asherton opened it, the room’s sole occupant got to his feet, crushing out his cigarette in an ashtray.

“Have you found anything?” Roderick Trenarrow asked.

Lynley hesitated in the doorway. He was all at once aware of the fact that his clothes were wet. Great oblongs of damp caused the wool of his trousers to adhere scratchily to his legs. His shirt clung to both his chest and his shoulders, and its collar pressed damply to the back of his neck. Even his socks were soaked, for although he’d worn gumboots down to Penberth Cove, he’d removed them in the car and he’d stepped directly into a substantial puddle of rainwater when he’d parked in the courtyard upon their return.

So he wanted to leave. He wanted to change his clothes. But instead, he forced himself forward and went to the bent-wood cart next to his mother’s desk. A coffee pot sat on it.

“Tommy?” his mother said. She had sat upon the least comfortable chair in the room.

Lynley took his cup of coffee to the sofa. Trenarrow remained where he was by the fireplace. A coal fire burned there, but its warmth did not cut through the clammy weight of Lynley’s clothes. He glanced at Trenarrow, nodding in acknowledgement of the question he’d asked, but saying nothing. He wanted the other man to depart. He couldn’t imagine having a conversation about Peter in front of him. Yet he knew that any request on his part for some privacy with his mother would be misinterpreted by both of them. Clearly, as on the previous evening, Trenarrow was there at her behest. This was no social call which he had designed to lead to seduction, and the concern on Trenarrow’s face, when he looked at Lady Asherton, gave evidence of that.

It appeared he would have no choice in the matter. He rubbed his forehead, brushed back his damp hair. “No one was with the boat,” he said. “At least we couldn’t see anyone. They might have been below.”

“Has anyone been called?”

“The lifeboat, you mean?” He shook his head. “She’s breaking up too fast. By the time they got there, she’d be gone.”

“Do you think he was swept overboard?”

They were speaking of her child, but they might have been discussing the replanting of the garden that would have to be done after the storm. He marvelled at her calm. She maintained it only until he replied, however.

“There’s no way of knowing. Whether he was below with Sasha. Whether they were both swept overboard. We won’t know anything until we find the bodies. And even then, if they’ve sustained enough damage, we might only be left with inferences and not a lot more.”

At that, she lowered her head and covered her eyes. Lynley waited for Trenarrow to cross the room to her. He could feel the other man’s need to do so. It was like a current that snapped in the air. But he made no move.

“Don’t torture yourself,” Trenarrow said. “We don’t know a thing. We don’t even know yet if it was Peter who took the boat. Dorothy, please. Listen to me.”

Lynley remembered with a pain that rushed and receded. Trenarrow had always been the only person who used his mother’s real name.

“You know he took the boat,” she said. “We all know why. But I’ve ignored every sign, haven’t I? He’s been in clinics having treatment. Four clinics now and I wanted to believe that he was over it. But he’s not. I knew that the moment I saw him Friday morning. But I couldn’t bear to face another round of addiction, so I simply ignored it. I’ve actually begun praying that he’ll find his way on his own because I don’t know how to help him any longer. I’ve never known. Oh, Roddy…”

If she hadn’t said his name, Trenarrow probably would have maintained his distance. But as it was, he went to her, touched her face, her hair, said her name again. Her arms went round him.

Lynley looked away. His muscles ached. His bones felt leaden.

“I don’t understand it,” Lady Asherton was saying. “No matter what he intended by taking the boat, he would have seen what the weather was like. He would have known the danger. He can’t have been as desperate as that.” And then gently pushing herself away from Trenarrow, “Tommy?”

“I don’t know,” Lynley said. He kept his tone guarded.

His mother got to her feet, came to the sofa. “There’s something else, isn’t there? Something you’ve not told me. No, Roddy”—this as Trenarrow made a move towards her—“I’m all right. Tell me what it is, Tommy. Tell me what you’ve not wanted me to know. You argued with him last night. I heard you. You know that. But there’s more, isn’t there? Tell me.”

Lynley looked up at her. Her face had become remarkably calm again, as if she had managed to find and draw upon a new source of strength. He dropped his eyes to the coffee cup that warmed the palm of his hand.