“How can you possibly-”
“Because I know you. Because I’ve watched you. Because I’ve seen the story play out over and over. Dellen in need and who’s there to help her but a willing male of whatever age because it never bloody mattered to you, did it? Just that you had him, whoever he was and whoever he belonged to…because what you wanted and when you wanted it was more important than…” Kerra felt her hands begin shaking. She pressed the card to her mother’s face. “I should make you…God. God, I should make you…”
“No!” Dellen squirmed beneath her. “You’re mad.”
“Even Santo can’t stop you. Santo dead can’t stop you. I thought, ‘This will get through to her,’ but it didn’t, did it? Santo dead-my God, Santo murdered-didn’t make a ripple. Not the slightest diversion in what you planned.”
“No!”
Dellen began to fight her, clawing at her hands and her fingers now. She kicked and rolled to get away, but Kerra was too strong. So she began to scream.
“You did this! You! You!” Dellen grabbed at her daughter’s hair and eyes. She pulled Kerra down. They rolled on the bed, seeking purchase among the mass of linens and covers. Their voices shrieked. Their arms flailed. Their legs kicked. Their hands grasped. They found. They lost. They grasped again, punching and pulling as Dellen shrieked, “You. You. You did it.”
The bedroom door crashed open. Footsteps hurried across the room. Kerra felt herself lifted and heard Alan’s voice in her ear.
“Easy,” he said. “Easy, easy. Jesus. Kerra, what’re you doing?”
“Make her tell you,” Dellen cried. She had fallen to her side on the bed. “Make her tell you everything. Make her tell you what she’s done to Santo. Make her tell you about him. Santo!”
One arm holding Kerra, Alan began moving towards the door.
“Let me go!” Kerra cried. “Make her tell the truth.”
“You come with me,” Alan told her instead. “It’s time that you and I had a real talk.”
BOTH OF THE CARS, similar to those that had been reported in the general area on the day of Santo Kerne’s death, were standing at one side of LiquidEarth when Bea and DS Havers pulled up at the erstwhile Royal Air Station. A quick glance through the window showed that Lew Angarrack’s RAV4 held a surfing kit along with a short board. Jago Reeth’s Defender held nothing as far as they could see. It was pitted with rust on the outside-the salt air was murder on any car in this part of the country-but otherwise it was as clean as was possible, which wasn’t very clean at all, considering the weather and the likelihood that he had to keep it parked outside. It did have floor mats and on both driver’s side and passenger’s side there was plenty of dried mud for their consideration. But mud was a hazard of life on the coast from late autumn through the end of spring, so its presence in the Defender didn’t count for as much as Bea would have liked.
Daidre Trahair being God-only-knew-where at this point, taking another jaunt over to the surfboard maker’s establishment had seemed the logical next move. Every lead needed to be followed up, and both Jago Reeth and Lewis Angarrack were eventually going to have to explain what they were doing in the general vicinity of Santo Kerne’s fall, no matter that Bea would have vastly preferred to have Daidre Trahair to the station for the thorough grilling she so richly deserved.
Bea had taken a call from Thomas Lynley on their way out to the old air station. He’d gone from Newquay to Zennor, and he was on his way to Pengelly Cove again. He might have something for her, he said. But that something required additional nosing round the area from which the Kerne family had sprung. He sounded unduly excited.
“And what about Dr. Trahair?” she had asked him sharply.
He hadn’t yet seen her, he said. But then, he hadn’t expected to. He hadn’t actually been keeping an eye open for her, as a matter of fact and if he was being honest. His mind had been on other things. This new situation with the Kernes-
Bea hadn’t wanted to hear about the Kernes, this new situation or otherwise. She didn’t trust Thomas Lynley, and this fact cheesed her off because she wanted to trust him. She needed to trust everyone involved in looking into the death of Santo Kerne, and the fact that she couldn’t made her cut him off abruptly. “Should you see our fair and gamboling Dr. Trahair along the way, you bring her to me,” she said. “Are we clear on that?”
They were clear on that, Lynley assured her.
“And if you’re intent on following up on the Kernes, then do keep in mind she’s part of Santo Kerne’s story as well.”
If the Angarrack girl was to be believed, he noted. Because a woman scorned…
“Oh yes. How true,” she’d declared impatiently, but Bea knew there was some truth in what he was saying: Madlyn Angarrack wasn’t looking any more unsoiled than the rest of them.
Inside LiquidEarth, Bea introduced DS Havers to Jago Reeth, who was sanding the rough edge of fiberglass and resin on one rail of a swallowtail board, which he’d stretched between two sawhorses. These were thickly padded to protect the board’s finish, and Jago was taking care to be gentle with his sanding. An enormous cupboard emanating warmth stood open at one side of the room with additional boards loaded within it, apparently awaiting his attention. LiquidEarth seemed to be having a profitable preseason, and business was continuing to boom, if the noise from the shaping room was anything to go by.
As before, Jago wore a disposable white boiler suit. It masked a lot of the dust that covered his body but none of the dust that covered his hair and his face. Any exposed part of him was white, even his fingers, and his cuticles formed ten Cheshire smiles at the base of his nails.
Jago Reeth asked Bea if she wanted Lew or himself this time round. She said she wanted them both but her conversation with Mr. Angarrack could wait a bit, so as to allow her to talk to Jago alone.
The old bloke didn’t appear disconcerted by the idea of the police wanting to talk to him, alone or otherwise. He did say he thought he’d told them all he knew about the Santo-and-Madlyn affair, but Bea informed him pleasantly that she generally liked to make that determination herself. He gave her a look, but he made no comment other than to tell her he would go on with his sanding if that wasn’t a problem.
It wasn’t, Bea assured him. As she spoke, the noise from the shaping room died. Bea thought Lew Angarrack would join them, then, but he remained within.
She asked Jago Reeth what he could tell her about his Defender being in the vicinity of Santo Kerne’s fall on the day of his death. As she spoke, DS Havers did her bit with notebook and pencil.
Jago stopped sanding, glanced at Havers, then cocked his head as if he was evaluating Bea’s question. “Vicinity?” he asked. “Of Polcare Cove? Not hardly, I don’t reckon.”
“Your car was seen in Alsperyl,” Bea told him.
“You count that as near? Alsperyl might be near like the crow flies, but it’s miles and miles by car.”
“A walk along the cliffs would take you from Alsperyl to Polcare Cove easily enough, Mr. Reeth. Even at your age.”
“Seen on the cliff top, was I?”
“I’m not saying you were. But the fact of your Defender being even remotely in the area where Santo Kerne met his death…You can understand my curiosity, I hope.”
“Hedra’s Hut,” he said.
“Who’s what?” Sergeant Havers asked the question. Her expression said she thought the term was some sort of expletive peculiar to Cornwall.
“Old wooden shack built into the cliffs,” Jago explained to her. “That’s where I was.”
“May I ask what you were doing there?” Bea said.
Jago seemed to consider the propriety either of her questions or of giving an answer. “Private matter,” he finally said. He applied himself to his sanding again.