Believing the Lie - Elizabeth George [263]
Her final words were, “So all along, Alatea apparently thought I was talking about this Raul Montenegro while I thought we were talking about the reporter from The Source. I suppose it wouldn’t have mattered much, except for the fact that I told her he was in Windermere— at least I think that’s where he went when he dropped me here after Lancaster— and when I told her that, she simply panicked, obviously thinking I meant Montenegro. Nicholas panicked as well.”
Lynley added a packet of sugar to his coffee. He stirred it, looking thoughtful all the while. Indeed, he looked so thoughtful that Deborah understood something she should have recognised earlier.
She said to him, “You know what’s actually going on with these people, don’t you, Tommy? I expect you’ve known from the first. Whatever it is, I wish you’d told me. At least I could have refrained from blundering in and doing whatever it is I’ve now managed to do to them.”
Lynley shook his head. “Actually, no. I think I’ve known less than you since I’d not met Alatea before today.”
“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?”
“She’s quite…” He seemed to search for a better word, perhaps a more accurate one. He lifted his fingers as if to say that any choice he made would not do her justice. He settled on, “Rather amazing, actually. Had I not known about her before going to see her, I would never have believed she began life as a man.”
Deborah felt her jaw loosen with the surprise that swept through her. She said, “What?”
“Santiago Vasquez y del Torres. That’s who she was.”
“What do you mean was? Is she impersonating…?”
“No. She had surgery, financed by this bloke Montenegro. His intention, apparently, was to have her play his female lover in public to maintain his reputation and social position but, in private, to make love to her as a male to a male.”
Deborah swallowed. “Dear God.” She thought about Lancaster, about Lucy Keverne, about what she and Alatea Fairclough could have and must have actually planned between them. She said, “But Nicholas… Surely he knows?”
“She hasn’t told him.”
“Oh surely, Tommy, he’d be able to tell. I mean… Good heavens… There’d be signs, wouldn’t there? There’d be marks of incisions, scars, whatever.”
“In the hands of a world-class surgeon? With all the tools at hand? With lasers to deal with potential scarring? Deborah, everything would be altered. Even the Adam’s apple can go. If the man’s appearance was feminine to begin with— because of an extra X chromosome perhaps— then the shift to female would be even simpler.”
“But not to tell Nicholas? Why wouldn’t she have told him?”
“Desperation? Worry? Fear of his reaction? Fear of rejection? With Montenegro looking for her and apparently having the funds to go on looking indefinitely, she would need a safe place. To achieve it, she allowed Nicholas to believe what he wanted to believe about her. She married, giving her the right to remain in England once she came here.”
Deborah saw how this fitted in with what Tommy and Simon had come to Cumbria to do. She said, “Ian Cresswell? Did she murder him? Did he know?”
Lynley shook his head. “Consider her, Deborah. She’s something of a masterpiece. No one would know unless there was a reason to delve back into her past, and there was no reason. For all intents and purposes, she’s Nicholas Fairclough’s wife. If anyone bore looking into with regard to Ian’s death, it would have been Nicholas. As things happened, we didn’t need to go that far because Simon was right from the first and so was the coroner. There’s not a single sign of Ian Cresswell’s death being anything other than an accident. Someone may have wanted him to die. His death might have been a convenience to more than one person. But no one orchestrated it.”
Deborah said, “And now that terrible reporter’s going to write his story about this surrogacy situation and Alatea’s photo will be in the paper and I’m responsible. What can I do?”
“Appeal to his better angels?”
“He works