“Trust Audley.” Chief Inspector Andrew nodded at Colonel Butler.
“Jesus Christ!”
“Ssh!” Colonel Butler raised his hand and nodded encouragingly at Benedikt. “Tell us, Captain. And don’t be put off just because of anything I’ve said.”
That was the final incentive Benedikt needed.
“If you wanted me to look at them, I thought they might want to look at me, Colonel. So I prepared my belongings for them.”
“Fair enough.”
“They opened the car—and they opened all my baggage. They went through everything.”
Andrew frowned. “But you came straight here—?”
“I’m in a multi-storey car-park. And it only took a minute to check, Chief Inspector. Because I set it up to be checked—and it had been searched—”
Butler gestured to stop him. “Professionally?”
This time Benedikt frowned. “They did not leave obvious traces—
there were no marks on the locks, or anything crude . . . But they dummy1
had plenty of time, while I was going round the Chase—”
“Not Audley.” Colonel Butler nodded to Andrew, then came back to Benedikt. “Opening things up delicately is not one of his skills—
it’s a skill he has always been at pains not to acquire. So he had someone else with him who could do it, that’s all.”
Benedikt stared at him. If it had not been Audley ... it had never occurred to him that it had not been Audley. But . . . Rebecca Maxwell-Smith would not possess that sort of expertise, and neither Old Cecil nor young Bobby fitted the tfill, any better than did the friendly landlord of the
“What else?” The Colonel prodded him.
What else, indeed!
Yet it still required an effort. “There are no signs to Duntisbury Royal, Colonel. Would you believe that?”
“Signs?”
“Signposts. . . . On the main road there are many little side-roads, all with signs naming villages—even naming farms. But there is no sign ‘Duntisbury Royal’ on the signpost on the main road.”
“So how did you get there?”
“I asked the way. There is a petrol-station near the turning— it is the only such place for several miles, and therefore the obvious place at which to inquire.” Benedikt paused. “But later on, when I returned, I examined the signpost. There was an arm on the post, but it has been cut off with a wood-saw.”
Butler nodded slowly. “So you asked the way.”
dummy1
“So I asked the way. So I was expected.”
“Expected?”
“Along the way, perhaps ten minutes, I was delayed by a farm tractor, manoeuvring on to the road a trailer. And behind me there came a Land Rover, boxing me in.” He paused again.
“You mean, the petrol-station attendant warned them that you were coming?” Butler cocked his head. “Why should he do that?”
“So that I could be examined . . . scrutinised.”
“By whom?”
“There were two men in the Land Rover. Their windscreen was so dirty I could not make them out, but they could have studied me easily enough. But also by David Audley, certainly.”
“Audley was there?”
“He arrived there. And he came up to the car to look at me closely
—to hear me speak, perhaps.”
Chief Inspector Andrew shook his head. “But you said you met him ... at the Roman place?”
“I was introduced to him there. I was directed to him there, the second time. But the first time ... we were not introduced.”
“So he wanted to know more about you?”
“By then he knew more about me, I think. At the public house I explained why I had come to Duntisbury Royal. But he wanted to know more than that—yes.”
Colonel Butler rubbed his chin, and in the silence of the little stone cell Benedikt could hear the slight rasping sound of the blunt dummy1
fingers on the invisible stubble.
“And what did he make of you, Captain Schneider? You said you made no mistakes?”
