In The Presence Of The Enemy by Elizabeth George Read Free Book Online Page B

St. James and Helen were in the house, she shot the door closed and bolted them in. She said, “In here,” and led them to the right, across terra-cotta tiles, into a sitting room where a briefcase stood open upon a side table next to a chair, spilling out manila folders, pages of typing, news cuttings, telephone messages, documents, and pamphlets. Eve Bowen snapped its lid down without stopping to shove its bulging contents into place. She picked up a thick green wineglass, drained it, and poured more white wine from a bottle that rested in a bucket on the floor. She said, “I’d be interested in knowing how much he’s paying you for this charade.”
    St. James was nonplussed. “I beg your pardon?”
    “Luxford’s behind this, of course. But I can see by your expression that he hasn’t yet made you aware of that fact. How wise of him.” She took the seat she had apparently been sitting in prior to their arrival and directed them to a sofa and chairs that resembled enormous umber pillows sewn together. She rested her wineglass in her lap, using both hands to hold it against the trim, matchstick skirt of her suit.
    This was black, pin-striped. Seeing it, St.
    James recalled reading an interview with the Junior Minister shortly after she’d been tapped by the Government to serve in her current position as Undersecretary of State for the Home Offi ce. No one would find her drawing attention to herself in the manner of her female colleagues in the Commons, she had asserted.
    She saw no need to plume herself in scarlet in the hope of distinguishing herself from the men. She’d let her brain do that for her.
    “Dennis Luxford is a man without conscience,” she said abruptly. Her words were brittle, her tone cut from glass. “He’s the maestro conducting this particular orchestra. Oh, not directly, of course. I dare say snatching ten-year-olds off the street is probably beyond even his willingness to stoop to skulduggery.
    But make no mistake, he’s playing you for a fool, and he’s trying to do the same to me. I won’t have it.”
    “W hat gives you the impression he’s involved?” St. James lowered himself to the sofa, finding it surprisingly comfortable despite its amorphous nature. He adjusted his bad leg to an easier position. Helen stayed where she was, standing at the fireplace near a collection of trophies displayed in a niche, the better to observe Ms. Bowen from a spot in the room where she wouldn’t be conspicuously doing so.
    “Because there are only two people on earth who know the identity of my daughter’s father.
    I’m one of them. Dennis Luxford is the other.”
    “Your daughter herself doesn’t know?”
    “Of course not. Never. And it’s impossible that she could have found out on her own.”
    “Your parents? Your family?”
    “No one, Mr. St. James, save Dennis and me.” She took a measured sip of her wine. “It’s his tabloid’s objective to bring down the Government. At the moment, he finds himself with the right set of circumstances to crush the Conservative Party once and for all. He’s attempting to do so.”
    “I don’t follow your logic.”
    “It’s all rather convenient, wouldn’t you say?
    My daughter’s disappearance. A putative kidnapping note in Luxford’s possession. A demand for publicity in that note. And all of it falling directly on the heels of Sinclair Larnsey’s shenanigans with an underage boy in Paddington.”
    “Mr. Luxford wasn’t acting like a man in the midst of orchestrating a kidnapping for the tabloids to exploit,” St. James noted.
    “Not for the tabloids in the plural,” she replied. “For the tabloid in the excessively singular. He’s hardly going to let the competition scoop his own best story.”
    “He seemed as intent as you are upon keeping this quiet.”
    “Are you a student of human behaviour, Mr.
    St. James? Along with your other talents?”
    “I think it’s wise to make an assessment of the people who ask me for help.