Echo

'Is that better?'' she asked him.

'Can't you tell?'

'Not really. I'm so used to it.' She took the chair opposite. 'Are you going to tell me who Billy was?'

The tic was working furiously at the corner of her mouth, and he wondered why she was so agitated and why she looked so deathly pale. Whatever he may have told Harrison, it would take more than Barry's chance sighting of her with Nigel de Vriess to give credence to the Streeters' theories of conspiracy to murder. She had impressed him as a woman of cool composure, and he was puzzled by her lack of it now. The paradox was that he found her infinitely less attractive in despair-so much so that he wondered why he had ever lusted after her-but a great deal more likable. Vulnerability was a quality he recognized and understood.

'His name was Peter Fenton. You probably remember the story. He was a diplomat-believed to have been a spy-who vanished from his house in nineteen eighty-eight and was never seen again. Not as Peter Fenton, anyway.'

She didn't say anything.

'You don't seem very impressed.'

She pressed her hands to her lips for a moment, and he realized that her silence owed more to the fact that she couldn't speak than that she didn't want to. 'Why did he come here?' she managed at last.

'I don't know. I hoped you would tell me. Did you or James know him?'

She shook her head.

'Are you sure? Do you know everyone James knew?'

'Yes.'

Deacon took the Mail Diary piece on de Vriess from his pocket and handed it to her. 'Billy read that three weeks before he ended up dead in your garage. Let's say he went to Halcombe House with the intention of getting Amanda Streeter's address out of Nigel because he didn't know you were calling yourself Amanda Powell, or that you lived and worked within a mile or so of where he was dossing.' He thought for a moment, and, in the absence of an ashtray, tapped ash into his palm. 'The fact that he arrived here meant Nigel must have told him how to find you, which makes your lover a bit of a bastard, Amanda. Firstly, for giving out your address to the first drunken bum who asks for it, and secondly, for not telling you to expect a visitor. He didn't, did he?'

She licked her lips. 'How do you know Billy read this?'

Deacon lied. 'One of the men at the warehouse told me. So what's it all about? Why should Peter Fenton be so intent on finding Amanda Streeter? And why would Nigel help him? Did they know each other?'

She rubbed her temples with trembling fingers. 'I don't know.''

'Okay, try this. What might Peter have known about you that sent him chasing after you when he read your name in the newspaper? Maybe he had something on you and Nigel, and Nigel wriggled out by persuading him it was you he needed to talk to?'

She withdrew into her chair and closed her eyes. 'Billy never spoke to me. I didn't know he was here until he was dead. I don't know who he was, or why he came to my house. Most of all, I don't know why-' She fell silent.

'Go on.'

'I feel ill.'

Deacon glanced towards the window. 'Tell me about Nigel,' he prompted. 'Why would he give your address to Peter without telling you he'd done it?'

'I don't know.' She gave a troubled shake of her head. 'Why do you think he knew him as Peter Fenton? It was Billy Blake who died in my garage.'

'Okay. Why give your address to Billy?'

'I don't know,' she said again. 'What sort of man was he?' Her eyes opened wide, and Deacon feared she was about to vomit.

'If you mean Billy, he was a fine man.' He took a handkerchief from his pocket. 'I find it's easier to hold on,' he said with a faint smile, 'but you know where the lavatory is if you need it.' He waited till her gagging ceased. 'A psychiatrist who had three sessions with him described him as half-saint, half-fanatic. I've read a transcript of part of their interview. Billy believed in the salvation of souls and the mortification of the flesh, but he felt himself to be personally damned.' He studied her for a moment. 'From my own experience of him, through the medium of Terry Dalton-a youngster he befriended and cared for-I'd say Billy was a man of honor and integrity despite being a drunk and a thief.'

'Why should any of that make him want to come here?''

Deacon got up and went to the window to toss his cigarette butt into the garden. The air that blew in was sweet and clean and smelled faintly of the sea. He turned back into the cloying atmosphere of her spare, minimalist surroundings and he began to understand why her car was always parked in her driveway, why she drenched the rooms in rose-scented spray, and, ultimately, why six months after Billy's death she had been so desperate to find out who her uninvited guest had been. He had had an inkling of it once before, but hadn't believed it. He held the back of his hand to his nose, and he saw recognition in her eyes because he was reacting the way she had expected when he first entered the house. 'What did you do to him, Amanda?'

'Nothing. If I'd known he was there, I'd have helped him as I helped you.'

She had put on a hell of a performance for Harrison in the last few hours, but was she acting now? Deacon didn't think so, but then he was no judge. 'Why did you lie to Harrison about me and Barry?' he asked, opening all the windows to let in the freezing air. Anything was better than the sweet, sickly smell of death.

She shook her head, unable to cope with the sudden switch of direction.