The two fresh-faced constables rang DCI Fletcher, and DI Timothy Peel was soon flying along the A3052 in an unmarked car, siren howling, grille lights flashing. Arriving at Wickham House, he donned the requisite protective gear and took control of the crime scene. His first stop inside the house was the victim’s office. He was troubled by the lack of evidence of a struggle, which suggested the victim knew his killer. He was more troubled, though, by the fact that the property’s elaborate security system had been switched off, which implied the killer possessed knowledge of the manor’s inner workings.
Fortunately the plate-recognition camera located approximately a mile from Wickham House was working just fine that morning, andat 6:07a.m., which just so happened to coincide with the estimated time of death, the camera snapped a photo of a Ford Fiesta that had been reported stolen the previous evening in Swindon. A vehicle search undertaken at Peel’s directive revealed that in the intervening two hours and fifteen minutes, the Ford had passed three more plate-recognition cameras—one west of Exeter, one in little Launceston, and a third near Truro.
It didn’t take a genius to see that the driver of the vehicle, whoever he was, and for whatever reason, was headed straight for the western tip of the Cornish Peninsula. Peel requested a helicopter from the National Police Air Service and, in his capacity as a newly certified AFO, a Glock 19 pistol. Before boarding the helicopter he placed a last phone call, mobile to mobile. As was frequently the case, the call failed to connect. The cell service out there was for the birds.
59
Gwennap Head
The guest room was upstairs in what was once an attic. It lacked the opulence to which Alice was accustomed, but it was nicer than her old digs at Wormwood Cottage, and from the little window next to the double bed she could make out the towering Wolf Rock Lighthouse rising from the sea. She slept soundly for the first time in months and finally wandered downstairs to the kitchen around nine o’clock. Gabriel made her a breakfast of tea and toast and muesli. She declared it positively divine.
They had arrived at the cottage in the dead of night, and now, in the cold light of morning, she was able to consider it properly for the first time. The kitchen was a real kitchen, not some epicurean showplace ripped from the pages of a magazine, and the large drawing room was at once comfortable and yet refined in every way. There were paintings on the walls, monographs on the shelves, faded carpets on the rustic wood floor. It was quite obviously the home of an artist—a warrior poet, she thought. If only she had married someone like him instead of Edward. Her life might have looked like this.
“Who was your decorator?” she asked.
“My wife.”
“She has exquisite taste.”
“In most things,” he said. “I was her one inexplicable mistake.”
She gave him a disapproving look. “I’m sure you have countless lovers.”
“Only one,” he said, and pointed toward a large seated nude of a woman with riotous dark hair. She was intoxicatingly beautiful.
“Is that her?”
He nodded.
“And the artist?”
“Fortunately she only poses for me.”
When she had finished her breakfast, he led her on a proper tour of the house. Like many old homes in the English countryside, he said, it seemed to have a mind of its own. He showed her which cabinets contained the pots and pans and which the dishes and glassware, where she could find clean bedding and bath towels, and where they kept the Wellies and the torches and the candles and the matches. He taught her how to set and disable the security alarm, gave her the password for the Wi-Fi network, and showed her the places in the house where the cellular service was the most reliable.
“As a general rule,” he explained, “it’s hit-and-miss out here in West Cornwall except for in the largest towns and villages. If I were you, I’d stay off the phone entirely. It will significantly reduce your chances of being found out.”
“How long can I stay?”
“That depends on your tolerance for Cornish winters.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“You can stay here as long as you like, Alice.”
“And the rent?” she asked.
“A single peppercorn, payable at your convenience.”
“Edward would be horrified.”
“I’m not a terribly business-minded person.”
“Neither was Edward, as it turned out.”
Lastly he took her to his studio. It was the one part of the property he asked her to avoid. With the exception of his wife and children and two employees of London’s most respected art shipping company, only one other person had set foot there.
“And who was that?” she asked.
