she looked up and saw him standing at the bottom of her garden. As her face came into the sunlight, he saw that she was considerably older than he’d first thought, well past middle age, perhaps.
“Hullo,” he called. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I’m looking for someone called Burne-Jones.”
Coming forward, she rested her hands on the rusting, wrought-iron gate and examined him. “My name is Burne-Jones. What can I do for you?” Her face was pleasant and open, and her eyes, although on close inspection surrounded by a network of fine lines, were a bright and inquisitive blue.
Kincaid slipped his warrant card from his jacket and presented it. “My name’s Kincaid, with Scotland Yard. I’ve some questions about the house”—he gestured back towards the way he had come—“and the people who stayed here during the war.”
“The war?” She frowned and took the card from his hand, scanning it carefully before handing it back. “What could you possibly—” Pausing, she looked back at the cottage, then seemed to come to a decision. “Right. Come in, Superintendent. I was about to make coffee.
“It’s just that I’ve a deadline,” she explained, looking back over her shoulder as he followed her into the house. “When I’m a bit stuck on something, I work it out in the garden.”
As they entered the front room of the cottage, he saw that the worktable set against the front window held a computer monitor and keyboard, and that a good portion of the pleasant room was filled with well-stuffed bookcases. “Are you a writer, Miss Burne-Jones?” he asked, taking in the comfort of the room, with its squashy, chintz furniture, worn Aubusson carpet, and robin’s-egg-blue walls. A large, new television and VCR were positioned to one side of the fireplace.
“A freelance political journalist. And you can dispense with the awkwardness—I’m Irene. Just have a seat and I’ll be back in a moment,” she added as she disappeared through a door he thought must lead to the kitchen. But instead of sitting, he had a look at the bookcases.
Irene Burne-Jones’s taste in reading matter was wide-ranging, with a concentration in British history and political biography, and he gathered from the number of volumes on him that she had a particular fondness for Winston Churchill.
He had removed William Manchester’s
“Second nature. My parents own a bookshop,” he answered, returning the volume to its spot and taking a seat in the armchair.
“I’m not sure I’d have liked that,” Irene replied. “Taking books for granted, that is. My parents weren’t great readers, so I found books a revelation.” She added a dash of cream to her coffee and sat back, regarding him curiously. “Now, tell me how I can help you.”
“Did your family own the Hall during the war, Miss Burne—Irene?” he corrected himself.
Irene shook a cigarette from the packet of Dunhills on the table and lit it thoughtfully. “It belonged to my aunt Edwina. There were no surviving Haliburtons, so when she died she left the estate to my father, and upon his death it passed to me. I’m afraid our family has suffered the attrition of spinsters and childless marriages until I’m all that’s left of it.” The glance she gave him was wry and not the least self-pitying.
“And you sold it?”
“What else was I to do?” she said. “The very idea of living there was preposterous. This was in the mid- seventies; I had my life and my career in London, and the upkeep on the place had become prohibitive. You know what happens with these old houses. I kept the cottage as a weekend retreat—my lover at the time was married, so it came in quite handy.…” She gave him an amused glance, as if checking to see if she’d shocked him.
Suddenly wishing he’d known her a quarter of a century ago, he smiled at her, and she went on, “Then a few years ago I decided I’d had enough of the city and moved down here full-time. With a fax and a modem it’s not really necessary to be in the middle of things these days.”
“I believe your aunt Edwina had a boy staying here during the war, her godson. His name was William Hammond.”
“William?” Irene stared at him. “Why do you want to know about William? Has something happened to him?”
“You knew him?” Kincaid asked, his interest quickening.
“Well, of course.” Irene took an impatient drag on her cigarette. “I spent two and a half years of the war here myself, evacuated from London when our house was bombed. We were inseparable … William, Lewis, and I,” she said more softly. Then, raking Kincaid again with her bright blue glance, she ground her cigarette out in the ashtray. “Tell me what’s happened to William.”
“You won’t have seen it, then,” Kincaid said, with a gesture at the stack of unread papers. “It’s his youngest daughter, Annabelle, who had taken over as managing director of the firm. She’s been murdered.”
“Murdered?” Irene exclaimed. “How awful for him. But I don’t understand what that has to do with the Hall.”
Kincaid reached for his coffee before asking, “Did you mean Lewis Finch, a moment ago?”
“Yes, of course. But how would you know that?” Irene frowned. “And what has Lewis to do with William’s daughter?”
“He was having an affair with her, for a start.”
“Lewis? And William’s daughter?” She sounded astonished. And perhaps a bit amused? “Well, I’ll be damned.”
“Annabelle Hammond not only had a relationship with Lewis, she sought out his son and seduced him— although I don’t imagine he gave her much argument.”
“She was beautiful?”
“Yes. But it wasn’t only that. She was a very strong personality, used to having her way.”
