looked out the windshield to see the narrow road ahead filled with sheep. One came up to his window and briefly pressed its nose against the glass, and it was eye to eye with him. “Where are we?” he asked.
“In the middle of a flock of sheep,” Sarah replied. “They have the right of way in the country.”
“I mean, where are we?”
“Halfway there. You hungry?”
Oddly, he was. “Yes.”
“There’s a pub round the bend; we’ll have a ploughman’s lunch.” She drove on when the sheep had passed, then turned into a picturesque country pub. They went inside, picked up their lunch—bread, cheese, and sausage, and a pint of bitter each, then made their way into a rear garden and sat down.
Stone drank deeply from the pint. “There, that’s better,” he said.
“The bitter will set you right,” Sarah said.
“That’s the second time today I’ve been told that.”
“And we were both right, no?”
“Yes, you both were. What do you know about Lance Cabot?”
“I told you already—not much.”
“Remember everything you can. Anything ever strike you as odd about him?”
“Only that he seems to fit in awfully well with English people. People I know don’t even seem to regard him as a foreigner.”
“Have you ever seen him with anyone you didn’t know?”
She thought. “Once, in a London restaurant, I saw him across the room, dining with a couple—man and woman—who looked foreign.”
“What kind of foreign?”
“Mediterranean.”
“That’s a big area.”
“Turkish or Israeli, perhaps.”
“Describe them.”
“About his age, well dressed, attractive—the woman, particularly. She was quite beautiful, in fact.”
“Could you hear them talking?”
“No, but they didn’t seem to be speaking English. I couldn’t read their lips, and I’m quite good at that, even from a distance. I don’t know if I told you, but as a child I had some sort of flu or virus that resulted in a sharp hearing loss. My hearing came back after a few months, but during that time I became adept at reading lips. Most people couldn’t tell I was hard of hearing.”
Stone nodded in the direction of a young couple sitting on the opposite side of the garden. “Tell me what they’re talking about.”
Sarah squinted in their direction for a moment, then giggled. “She’s lying to him,” she said.
“How?”
“She’s saying they were just friends, that they never slept together, and he believes her, but she’s lying.”
“How do you know?”
“I can just tell.”
“You’re a woman of many talents,” he said.
“I thought you already knew that.”
“I had forgotten how many.”
“Don’t worry,” she said, “I’m going to remind you.”
Chapter 25
THEY DRESSED FOR DINNER AND DINED in a smaller room than last time, at a round table, the heavy curtains drawn to shut out the night, in the English fashion. Stone didn’t understand why the Brits did that; he enjoyed the long summer twilights.
The talk ranged through politics, sport, and the relationship between the English and the Americans. Stone noticed that Lord and Lady Wight, during this part of the conversation, seemed to feel that Lance was on their side of things, while Stone and Erica occupied the other. It was as Sarah had said; the Brits were very comfortable with Lance, considering him one of their own. Stone couldn’t figure out why.
Port was served with Stilton at the end of the meal, and Stone sipped warily from his glass, his hangover having only just disappeared. At some invisible signal, the ladies rose and left the room. Stone nearly went with them, but Lance signaled him to stay.
“Over here, the ladies go somewhere, and the gentlemen stick around for cigars,” Lance explained, lighting something Cuban.
Stone despised cigars—smoking them or smelling somebody else smoking them.
Wight did not light a cigar, but sniffed at Lance’s. “My doctor has taken me off them,” he said. “Bloody cruel, if you ask me.” He looked at a pocket watch from his waistcoat. “If you gentlemen will excuse me, I’m turning in early. My respects to the ladies.” He got up and left.
They sat quietly for a moment, Stone playing with his port, Lance puffing his cigar and staring at the windows, as if he could see through the thick drapes and out into the night.
“You asked me a strange question the other day,” he said finally. “I’d like to know why.”
“About Hedger?”
Lance nodded almost imperceptibly.
“I have a lot to tell you about that,” Stone said.
Lance waved the cigar, as if motioning him onward.
“Last week a man showed up in my office, recommended by Woodman and Weld, and introduced himself as John Bartholomew.”
Lance shot him a glance.
“I take it you understand the significance of that name,” Stone said.
Lance shrugged slightly.
“He told me that he was concerned about his favorite niece—his dead sister’s child—that she had run off to England with someone of whom he suspected evil things. He retained me to come over here and see if I could disentangle the girl from the clutches of this ogre. Normally, I wouldn’t take on such an assignment, but he had passed muster with Woodman and Weld, and they had urged me to help him, so I came.”
“And how did he expect you to deal with this ogre?” Lance asked, blowing smoke in Stone’s direction.
Stone waved it off with his napkin. “I told him up front that I would not participate in harming him, and that I would not kidnap his niece. He said he would be content if I could get the ogre put into jail.”
Lance laughed, choking on his cigar smoke. “And how did he expect you to do that?” he was finally able to ask.
“He told me that you were supporting yourself by smuggling drugs into Britain—on your person, no less. I had a police contact; when I confirmed Bartholomew’s charges, I intended to put him onto you.”
“And now that you have been unable to confirm this information, what are your intentions?”
“I have none. I resigned from Bartholomew’s employ yesterday.”
“Oh? Why, pray tell?”
“I discovered that he had been lying to me.”
“And how did you do that?”
