Dark Room

'Are you sure about that, sir?'

'Yes,' he said simply. 'She's rather a fine person, you know. I've always admired her courage.'

THE NIGHTINGALE CLINIC, SALISBURY-10:00 A.M.

The telephone rang in Jinx's room, fraying her nerves with its jangling peal. She pushed herself out of the chair and reached reluctantly for the receiver. 'Hello,' she said.

'It's your father, Jane. I'm sending the car to collect you.' Fear ripped through her like burning acid. What did he know? There'd been no mention of Meg and Leo in the papers or on the television news. Her fingers clenched involuntarily round the receiver, knuckles whitening under the strain, but her voice was calm. 'Fine,' she said, 'send the car by all means, it's no skin off my nose. I never wanted to be here in the first place. But I'm not coming home, Adam. I'll tell the driver to take me back to Richmond, and if he refuses to do that, then I'll call a taxi and go to the station. Is that what you intended to achieve by this phone call?'

There was an ominous silence at the other end.

'Leave things as they are or I promise I'll discharge myself.' Her voice hardened. 'And this time, you'll lose me for good. Do you understand, Adam? I'll take out an injunction to prevent you coming within a mile of my house.' She slammed the receiver down with unnecessary force, and sank onto the edge of the bed as the strength seeped like sawdust from her knees and thighs. She felt the beginnings of a headache sawing away behind her eyes, and squeezed her temples tightly with shaking fingers.

The flash of memory that burst in her brain was blinding in its clarity. Meg on her knees, begging ... please ... please ... please... She looked in confusion on her friend's terrified face, felt a corresponding rush of terror drive her own heart into a frenzy, before nausea sent her staggering into the bathroom to retch in agony into the lavatory. Shaking violently, she lowered herself to the tiled floor, and as she laid her cheek on the cold ceramic, she clung in desperation to the fact that, despite all her friend's faults, she had loved Meg Harris.

But it was an hour before the shaking stopped.

THE WHITE HART HOTEL, WINCHESTER-10:10 A.M.

'We know very little about your daughter,' said Superintendent Cheever to the Reverend Harris and his wife. 'As I explained, we had some difficulty finding you. There is almost nothing of a personal nature in Meg's flat, and we can only presume she was in the process of moving out of it.'

He had balked at driving them to the police station and the sterility of an interview room, opting instead for a small upstairs parlor in a hotel near the mortuary, where Fraser and a WPC could sit unobtrusively in the background taking notes. He had abandoned the flamboyance of silk bow tie and silk handkerchief in favor of somber black, and he looked to be what he really was, an ordinary man in ordinary surroundings, unthreatening and rather kind. Mrs. Harris sat hunched in an armchair near the half-open window, a cup of tea, untouched, on the table next to her. Her husband sat on a hard chair beside her, clearly unsure whether to comfort her or leave her to come to terms with her grief alone, holding his own grief in check for fear of making things worse for her. Cheever felt sorry for both of them, but he reserved his deepest sympathy for Meg's father. Why was it, he wondered, that men were expected to disguise their feelings?

'She was going on holiday with Leo,' said Charles quietly, 'but she didn't say anything about moving out of her flat. Not to me anyway.' He looked irresolutely at his wife.

'She didn't tell you anything, Charles, because she knew you'd disapprove.' Caroline mopped her red-rimmed eyes. 'She had an abortion ten years ago. She didn't tell you about that, either, did she? And why not? Because you'd have ruined her life for her.' She crumpled the handkerchief between her palms. 'Well, it's ruined anyway, but it might not have been if she'd been able to talk to you as a father instead of a priest. Everything had to be kept secret in case you preached at her.'

Her husband stared at her, the planes of his face bleached white with shock. 'I didn't know,' he murmured. 'I'm sorry.'

'Of course you're sorry. Now,' she added bitterly. 'I'm sorry too. Sorry for her, sorry for the baby, sorry for me. I'd like to have been a grandmother.' Her voice broke on a sob. 'It's such a waste. It's all such a waste.' She turned to the Superintendent. 'We have a son, but he's never wanted to marry. He wanted to be ordained like his father.' Her eyes filled again. 'It's such a terrible waste.'

Cheever waited while she fought for control. 'You implied that you knew Meg was moving out of her flat, Mrs. Harris,' he said at last. 'Could you tell us about that? Where was she going?'

'To live with Leo. He had a house. It made more sense for her to move in with him.'

'Do you know where the house is?'

'Somewhere in Chelsea. Meg was going to give me the address when she came back from France. Don't Leo's parents know?'

Frank sidestepped the question. 'They're very shocked at the moment.'

There was a painful silence.

'Have you met Sir Anthony and Lady Wallader?' Cheever asked next.

Caroline's mouth puckered tragically. 'We never even met Leo,' she said. 'How could we have met his parents? It was all so quick. We had an invitation to Jinx's wedding sitting on the mantelpiece, and then Meg phoned to say Leo wanted to marry her instead.' She shook her head in disbelief.

Charles stirred on his chair. 'She rang on the Saturday morning,' he murmured quietly, 'the eleventh, I believe, and I was rather upset by the news. I wondered what sort of a man Leo was to abandon his fiancee so close to the wedding in order to take up with her best friend.' He lifted his hands in resignation. 'She told me that she'd known Leo far longer than Jinx had, and that he'd only proposed to Jinx because of some silly row they'd had. 'He wanted to spite me,' she said.' He paused for a moment. 'I forget sometimes that she's a grown woman-was a grown woman,' he corrected himself, 'and yes, I can see now that I tended to preach, but it was so clear to me that this man was not to be relied upon, and I'm afraid we had a terrible argument about him. I said his behavior was neither mature nor honorable, and that if he was prepared to treat Jinx so shabbily, then Meg would be wise to have nothing more to do with him.' His voice faltered slightly. 'I'm afraid she hung up on me and we never spoke again, although I believe Caroline tried later the same day.' He turned to his wife. 'That's right, isn't it?'

She wrapped her arms about her thin body and hugged herself tightly. 'You know it is. You were listening.' She gave a shuddering sigh. 'She wouldn't hear me out either, but at least we didn't scream at each other. I said, why had she never mentioned him before if she'd known him so long? And she said there were a million things she'd