The Devil's Feather - Minette Walters [22]
I ran my tongue nervously across my lips.
“The alternative is to call me on my private line”—he tapped the card—“this one. I live five minutes away at the western end of the village. If I’m at home, I’ll come out…if not the call will be diverted to the clinic. Just give your name and ask for me personally, and the receptionist will put you straight through.”
Why was he making up excuses to go? It was only twenty minutes since he’d talked about playing golf. What had he guessed about me? What was he planning to do?
He knew I wasn’t Marianne Curran, I thought, but did he know I was Connie Burns? My bureau chief, Dan Fry, had told me he’d released a photograph to the international press, but he’d promised it was an old one, taken when I first joined Reuters. Shorter hair, rounder face, and ten years younger. I folded the card into my palm. “Thank you.”
Peter nodded. “I’m leaving you in good hands. Jess’s only weakness is that she assumes everyone is as capable as she is.” He turned towards her so that I couldn’t see his expression or his hands, and I wondered what he was signalling. “Take it gently, eh? You know where to find me if you need me.”
I LEARNT LATER that it was my mention of Zimbabwe that had jogged Peter’s memory. The Times had run a piece the day after my abduction which gave details of my childhood in Africa and my parents’ enforced decision to quit the farm. He felt it was too much of a coincidence that an author with the same background, and roughly corresponding to Connie Burns’s description, should turn up in Winterbourne Barton showing signs of acute anxiety. He confirmed it by searching archive coverage on the Internet when he got home, where he learnt that my mother’s name was Marianne.
Jess had no such recognition. All she could see was a similarity in looks between me and Madeleine. Tall, blue-eyed, blonde and pushing forty. Even my name—Marianne—was similar. When she felt more comfortable with me, she said my only saving grace was that I didn’t appear to have Madeleine’s vanity about my appearance. Even in extremis, Madeleine would have been at the face powder long before she reached the boiled lobster stage. She would certainly never have allowed Peter to see her looking less than perfect.
“She was all over him like a rash when he first came to Winterbourne Barton. My mother said it was embarrassing. Madeleine was twenty-five and desperate to get married, and she wouldn’t leave Peter alone.”
“How old was he?”
“Twenty-eight. It was fifteen years ago.”
“What happened?”
“He conjured a fiancée out of a hat.” She smiled slightly. “Madeleine threw a few tantrums, but it was Lily who was the most upset. She adored Peter, said he reminded her of the family doctor when she was a child.”
“In what way?”
“Breeding. She said doctors were a better class in those days. I told her it was a pretty stupid criterion—all I’m interested in is whether Peter knows what he’s doing—but Lily trusted him because he’s a ‘gent.’ ”
It was part of Peter’s charm, I thought, secretly sympathizing with Lily. “He gives a good impression of knowing what he’s doing,” I said cautiously, waiting to have my head bitten off. Jess’s ambivalence about Peter meant I had no idea what she really thought of him. Any more than I knew what he thought of her. She’d hinted several times that she didn’t trust him over Lily’s Alzheimer’s, suspecting Madeleine’s hand behind his willingness to leave Lily to cope alone.
“He bloody well ought to know what he’s doing,” she said sarcastically. “He’s a qualified doctor.”
“Why are you so hard on him?”
She shrugged.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“Nothing…apart from fancying himself something chronic.”
I smiled. “He is quite attractive, Jess.”
“If you say so.”
“Don’t you like him?”
“Sometimes,” she admitted, “but Winterbourne Barton’s stuffed with women who find him irresistible. They’re all in their seventies and their favourite pastime is massaging his ego. You’ll be at the back of