Banks gestured to the waiter that they didn’t require any more drinks. He went away. “Where was Laurence living during this period?”
“Oh, it varied. We’re talking about quite a long time, you know.
1967 to 2004. Though after the Wall came down, he spent less and less time abroad. He had a beautiful house in Kensington. He lived there for over twenty years, when he was in the country.”
“What happened to it?”
“He sold it when the market was good. That was what enabled him to buy the large house in Yorkshire and the little pied-a-terre in Bloomsbury.”
“I thought you said he had no business acumen?”
“Well,” she said with a hint of a smile, “he did get a lot of help.”
“You?”
“He’s my only son. Money soon came to mean nothing to me. I don’t mean that quite the callous way it sounds, but it just kept on rolling in, and it didn’t seem to matter whether I worked hard or not.
What was I going to do with it all? It was one thing I could do for him.”
“What about the Swiss bank accounts?”
“I wouldn’t read too much into all that. I doubt it was a huge amount. Naturally, I don’t know the reality of it, but Dicky once let slip that when you do the sort of job Laurence did, there’s often loose 1 0 6
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money around—payoffs, bribes, hush money, blackmail, God knows what. Most of it is not recorded in any books or bank accounts, and sometimes it’s just, well, just
“Which is?”
“Hand it over to the government, of course.”
Banks smiled. “I can certainly understand why he wouldn’t want to do that. Anyway, we very much doubt that your son was killed for his money. We’re just curious to know as to how he came to acquire such wealth.”
“Well, that’s how. Me and his job.”
“Did Mark know about his past?”
“I would imagine so. They would have had to have him vetted.”
“Others?”
“I very much doubt it. As I said, Laurence could keep a secret. As far as everyone else was concerned, he simply worked for the Foreign Office. A boring old civil servant.”
Banks finished his lemon tea. It was cold and bitter. “What are you going to do now?” he asked.
“Hang around here for a couple of days, try to sort out Laurence’s affairs, then head back to Longborough. Have you any idea when I might be able to make plans for the funeral?”
“Not yet,” said Banks. “It depends on the coroner. There can sometimes be delays if there’s likely to be a trial and the defense requests a second postmortem.”
“In this case?”
“I honestly don’t know,” said Banks. “But I promise I’ll keep you informed.”
Edwina looked at him, a ghost of a smile playing across her lips.
“Just give me back twenty years,” she said.
“Why didn’t you tell me about Laurence before?” Banks asked.
Edwina looked away. “I don’t know. Habit of secrecy? It didn’t seem relevant?”
“You know that’s not true. You know a hell of a lot more than A L L T H E C O L O R S O F D A R K N E S S
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you’re saying. It was the first thing you thought of when we told you what had happened.”
“Are you a mind reader, too? Maybe your colleague’s better off without you. I’d hate to be living with a man who can read minds.”
“Cut the crap, Edwina.”
Edwina laughed and swallowed the dregs of her drink. “My, my, you are a direct young man, aren’t you.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
She lowered her head and whispered, “Why are you asking me this when you know what the answer is already?”
“Because I want to hear it from you.”
Edwina paused for a moment, then she looked around the courtyard before she leaned forward and grasped the edge of the table with a talonlike hand. Her voice was dry and sibilant. “Because I’m not convinced that Laurence had completely retired, and because I’m not sure I trust the people he was working for. There, how’s that for you?”
