Original Sin by P. D. James Read Free Book Online

feel at home if Mrs Jackson stopped wearing it now.'
    Ackroyd wasted no time in coming to the purpose of the meeting. As soon as they were alone he said: 'Lord Stilgoe had a word with me last week in Brooks's. He's my wife's uncle, incidentally. Do you know him?'
    'No. I thought he was dead.'
    'I can't think how you got that idea.' He prodded at his bean salad irritably and Dalgliesh remembered that he resented any suggestion that someone he knew personally could actually die, and certainly not without the prior knowledge of himself. 'He isn't even as old as he looks, not eighty yet. He's remarkably spry for his age. Actually he's publishing his memoirs. The Peverell Press are bringing them out next spring. That's what he wanted to see me about. Something rather
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    worrying has happened. At least his wife finds it worrying. She thinks
    he's had a direct threat of murder.'
    'And has he?'
    %Vell, he's received this.'
    He took some time in taking the small oblong of paper from his wallet and passing it over to Dalgliesh. The words had been accurately typed on a word processor and the message was unsigned.
    'Do you really think it wise to publish with Peverell Press? Remember Marcus Seabright, Joan Petrie and now Sonia Clements. Two authors and your own editor dead in less than twelve months. Do you want to be number four?'
    Dalgliesh said: 'More mischievous than threatening, I should have thought, and the malice directed against the Press rather than Stilgoe. There's no doubt that Sonia Clements' death was suicide. She left a note for the coroner and-wrote to her sister telling her that she intended to kill herself. I don't recall anything about the first two deaths.'
    'Oh, they're straightforward enough, I should have thought. Seabright was over eighty and had a bad heart. He died from an attack of gastroenteritis which brought on a heart attack. Anyway, he was no loss to Peverell Press. He hadn't produced a novel for ten years. Joan Petrie killed herself driving to her country cottage. Accidental death. Petrie had two passions, whisky and fast cars. The only surprise is that she killed herself before she killed someone else. Obviously the poison pen dragged up these two deaths as make weights. But Dorothy Stilgoe is superstitious. She takes the view, why
    publish with Peverell when there are other publishers?'
    'And who is actually in charge now?'
    'Oh Gerard Etienne. Very much so. The last chairman and managing director, old Henry Peverell, died in early January and left his shares in the business in equal parts to his daughter Frances and to Gerard. His original partner, Jean-Philippe Etienne, had retired about a year previously, and not before time. His shares also went to Gerard. The two older men ran the firm as if it was their private hobby. Old Peverell always took the view that a gentleman inherited money, he didn't earn it. Jean-Philippe Etienne hadn't taken an active part in the firm for years. His moment of glory, of course, was in the last war where he was a hero of the Resistance in Vichy France, but I don't think he's done anything memorable since. Gerard was waiting
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    in the wings, the crown prince. Anc now he's well on stage and we're likely to see action if not melodrama-' 'hoes Gabriel Dauntsey still run'the poetry list?' 'i'm surprised you need to as1<, Adam. You mustn't let your PaSSion for catching murderers pOt you out of touch with real life. Yes, he's still there. He hasn't written a poem himself for over twenty years. Dauntsey's an anthology poet. The best is so good that it keeps reappearing, but I imagine most readers think he's dead. He was a bonber pilot in the last war so he rust be well over seventy. It's time he retired. The poetry list at peerell Press is about all he does novadays. The other three partOers are Gerard's sister Claudia Etienne, James de Witt, who's been with the firm since he left Oxford, and Frances Peverell, the last of the Peverells. But it's Gerard who runs the firm.'