A Perfect Death (6 page)

‘Look, I think there’s something I should tell you.’

‘I’m all ears. Go on.’ There was no mistaking the fact that Bright suddenly looked worried. Very worried.

‘Those letters my wife received. They threatened to burn her to death.’

For once Gerry Heffernan was lost for words.

‘Look, I didn’t take it seriously. I thought they were
just trying to scare me. They’ve done it before to other developers … made stupid threats. They never carry them out. They’re
just a bunch of losers.’

‘But a woman was burned to death on your land.’

Jon Bright’s initial confidence had vanished. He looked terrified. ‘You think someone mistook the dead woman for my wife?’
he said almost in a whisper.

‘I think you’d better tell me when you last saw Donna … sir.’

Walter Fitzallen single-handedly transformed Tradmouth from a minor fishing community into an international port. He must
have been a forceful man, dynamic as any modern entrepreneur, and it is said that power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.

I digress, however. Perhaps Fitzallen’s power is luring me, turning me from my intended path even after all those centuries.
It is Stephen de Grendalle’s story that concerns me. Stephen’s and Jeanne’s.

Contemporary manorial records indicate that Stephen de Grendalle spent ten months in south-west France in 1209–10 ‘with the
Earl of Leicester driving heretics out with force’. Presumably this means that he joined the crusade launched by Pope Innocent
III against the Cathars of the Languedoc and led by Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester (a place he never visited), whose
more famous son, also Simon, caused King John’s son and successor, Henry III, so much trouble. King John’s relationship with
Pope Innocent was hardly good and his sister, Joan, had married Raymond, Count of Toulouse, a supporter of the Cathars. Nevertheless
some sources indicate that some of
John’s English subjects who were not inclined to fight in the Holy Land saw a trip to France to persecute the Cathars as an
easier way to gain salvation. Perhaps de Grendalle fell into this category. Or perhaps he truly believed in what he was doing.
After eight hundred years, we can never know his true motives. However, we do know that the whole enterprise ended in tragedy
and death.

(From papers found in the possession of Professor
Yves Demancour)

Gerry Heffernan wished the DNA results would come through. If he knew for sure that the young woman who’d been burned to death
on the site of Jon Bright’s proposed development was Donna, Bright’s missing receptionist, he’d be able to make a proper start.
But he still had the uneasy feeling that Donna might be leading him up a blind alley. He could be getting it all wrong.

On the other hand the Pure Sons of the West had threatened to burn Bright’s wife to death and it would surely be too much
of a coincidence if the two things were unconnected.

He sat in his glass-fronted office at the side of the incident room, staring at the calendar on his wall. Wesley would be
back in a couple of days. In his absence he had come to realise how much he relied on his logical way of thinking a case through.
He had sensed a tension in the Peterson marriage so he’d encouraged Wesley to take a break in the French sunshine. He’d almost
bullied his inspector into booking the flights to get away from the stresses of
work. But now he was starting to regret this act of charity.

A sharp knock on his door made him jump. He looked up and saw Rachel Tracey through the glass. There was a keen and satisfied
expression on her face, as though she had important news to impart. She pushed the door open and placed a sheet of paper on
his desk.

‘Good news, sir. Or at least it’s good for someone.’

Gerry tilted his head, awaiting the verdict.

‘The DNA results have come back. Whoever was burned to death in that field, it wasn’t Donna Grogen. Looks like we’re back
to square one.’

‘Not necessarily. I spoke to the property developer who’s bought the field. Some clowns called the Pure Sons of the West have
been threatening to burn his wife to death. I’ve got someone checking them out.’

Rachel sat down and leaned forward. ‘I’ve heard of them. They’re a fairly new organisation – if you can dignify them with
that title – dedicated to purging the West Country of all second-home owners. They started in Cornwall but word has it they’re
spreading to Devon.’

‘How come they haven’t come to our attention?’

‘They have in parts of Cornwall, like I said. Only so far round here they’ve confined themselves to ranting in a few selected
pubs.’

‘All mouth, you mean.’

‘Something like that. In Cornwall they’ve issued veiled threats to burn down second homes but nothing’s actually happened
yet.’

‘So threatening to burn Jon Bright’s wife alive is rather a departure from the norm.’

‘Especially if they’ve carried out the threat.’

‘As far as we know, Bright’s wife’s still alive and kicking.’

Rachel raised her eyebrows. ‘Are we absolutely sure of that, sir? Her husband hasn’t reported her missing but if he’d killed
her, using these Pure Sons of the West as a scapegoat, he would keep quiet, wouldn’t he?’

‘You do have a suspicious mind, Rach.’

‘Well, has anybody spoken to her?’

Gerry Heffernan had to agree that Rachel had a point. If it wasn’t Donna Grogen who had died in that fire on the site of Jon
Bright’s proposed development, then it had to be someone. And Mrs Bright was as good a place as any to begin.

Some instinct made Wesley Peterson keep the printouts of Nadia’s e-mails in his pocket. For some reason he couldn’t quite
fathom, he didn’t like the idea of leaving them lying round his hotel room. But Pam thought he was being too cautious. Conspiracy
theories belonged in the pages of fiction. Nadia, whoever she was, was probably overimaginative and was seeking reassurance
that her mother hadn’t chosen to commit suicide. If they ever found out the truth, it was bound to be a disappointment, Pam
had told him as she gave him a lingering kiss in their hotel bathroom.

It was their last afternoon. Tomorrow they’d fly back home and although Wesley wouldn’t have admitted it to Pam, he was quite
looking forward to seeing
the children again and getting back to work. For one horrifying moment, he even realised that he was missing Gerry Heffernan.

They had decided to drive out in their hire car to Minerve, where, according to the guidebook of the region that Wesley had
bought on their arrival, a hundred and forty Cathars had been burned for their faith in 1210. Pam always believed in seeing
everything she could. And besides, the mention of a Jeanne de Minerve in Nadia’s e-mails had intrigued them both.

Pam led the way up the narrow streets of the little walled town, its ancient stones and terracotta roofs glowing golden in
the strong sunlight. As they made their way towards the candela, the only part of the Cathar castle that still stood defiant,
the effort of walking in the heat made Wesley realise that the rich food, red wine and idleness of the past week had taken
their toll on his body. He perched on a wall of tumbled grey stone with his arm round Pam, admiring the breathtaking view
of the dramatic limestone gorges and thick wooded landscape. It must have once been an exceptional defensive position but
now it was just stunningly beautiful. Yet somehow he still preferred Devon.

Pam wandered off to take some pictures so Wesley took the opportunity to reread Nadia’s e-mails, alert for any clues and hints
about her life and relationships. There were mentions of someone they referred to as M. Rowe had told the waitress at the
restaurant that he had worked for Sir Martin Crace. At the time, Wesley had suspected this was a bit of name-dropping but
it
was always possible that Rowe had once had some tenuous link with the great man.

Everyone knew about Sir Martin Crace. He had developed drugs for the AIDS epidemic in Africa and paid personally for their
distribution. With his wealth he had started a charitable foundation, building schools and hospitals in developing countries.
The government consulted him about welfare policy yet he had famously refused a peerage and liked to be known as a man of
the people. Rumour had it that the holy grail of many tabloid editors was to discover some dirt on Crace. But so far all their
efforts had failed and he remained widely regarded as a secular saint and a national treasure in the making.

It was difficult to know what connection Ian Rowe could possibly have with this paragon of virtue. After glimpsing a little
of the life Rowe led in Carcassonne, Wesley was sure they would move in entirely different circles.

Unless Nadia was the link. As he sat there he began to go through in his head everything he actually knew about Nadia. He
knew that she lived in Neston and worked for a professor at Morbay University who had once worked in Toulouse. And he had
found the address of a Professor Yves Demancour at Morbay University in Rowe’s house. Nadia had mentioned an Yves in her emails,
an Yves who had a dirty little secret, and someone called Jeanne de Minerve who was taking over her life – presumably something
to do with her research. But the e-mails gave little away, apart from the fact that she was sure her mother hadn’t killed
herself and that she was
trying to discover the truth about her death. And that she suspected there might be someone who didn’t want that truth to
come out.

He glanced up at Pam. She had her guidebook out again. ‘Did you know that on the twenty-second of July, twelve hundred and
ten, a hundred and forty Cathars were burned to death on a huge pyre?’

‘I do now,’ said Wesley, putting the e-mails back into his pocket. ‘No mention of a Jeanne?’

‘No. No mention of a Jeanne.’

As they walked back to their car they passed a monument, a rough stone pierced with the shape of a dove. Wesley paused and
read the words. Simple words in Occitan, the ancient language of the region. ‘
Als Catars
’: to the Cathars. He turned away, suddenly feeling a chill despite the burning heat.

Neil Watson had had enough of his desk. He had read everything he could get his hands on about the site on the outskirts of
Queenswear but now he wanted to have a look at what he was dealing with. The theory was all very well but it was the practical
aspect of archaeology that made his pulse race a little faster.

But something was puzzling him. There were references in the records he had to an excavation of the site in the 1980s and
normally he would consult the plans and findings of the previous dig before deciding what course of action to take. But he
had a problem – rather a large one – because the records of the 1980s dig appeared to be missing. It was always possible that
someone had put them in the wrong place, of course,
but it still struck Neil as strange.

He forgot his troubles for a while and settled down with a juicy set of aerial photographs, taken a few years ago during a
rare drought, in which the outline of a high status house and its outlying buildings could be seen quite clearly. To Neil
it looked like a typical early medieval house with great hall, solar wing and kitchens. There were many such houses dotted
around the country but those that still stood had usually been extended and improved over the centuries, so that it took a
leap of imagination to envisage their original form with their central hearth and privacy only for the lord and lady, if they
were lucky.

He stared at the dark outline against the parched green of the field. The outbuildings – the business end of the medieval
house – were quite clearly visible along with various enclosures for the estate’s animals. But there was one shape that rather
intrigued Neil – a small round circle near the main house.

Then he smiled to himself. He knew what it was – in fact he’d dealt with one before, a few years ago, around the time Wesley
was working in London as a detective sergeant in the Met’s Arts and Antique Squad. If he wasn’t mistaken it was a dovecot.
But the intensity of the mark in the grass was puzzling.

He launched into another search for the records of the old dig. But there was still no sign of them. It was a bit of a mystery
and yet he was sure it was one he could easily solve. The world of archaeology was a fairly small one.

*

Jon Bright might have dismissed the threats from the Pure Sons of the West as posturing nonsense but now the situation had
changed. A woman had been burned to death and the matter had suddenly become deadly serious. And, because of this, Gerry Heffernan
decided that a few words of warning were called for.

He decided to take Rachel along with him because she had the knack of putting people at their ease, as well as an excellent
ear for lies and evasions.

Gerry was rather surprised to discover that the Brights lived in a tastefully converted barn just outside the village of Stokeworthy.
Somehow his imagination had conjured up a neo-Georgian mansion with a forest of pillars and a brace of BMW 4x4s parked on
a sweeping gravel drive. But instead the drive was stone flagged and a bright-red Mini Cooper was stationed outside the detached
garage.

For a moment Gerry thought the woman who answered the door, holding a sink plunger like a sceptre, was the cleaner, but when
they identified themselves she introduced herself as Sheryl Bright. She was in her forties, still attractive, with mousy brown
hair pulled back into a pony tail. Her jeans emphasised her long, slender legs but a large checked shirt concealed the rest
of her figure.

She looked rather surprised to see them on her doorstep. Gerry, who always favoured the element of surprise, hadn’t warned
her of their visit. But she didn’t look particularly worried, and he thought this was rather strange. If he lived in an isolated
property and someone had threatened to burn him alive, he’d
be in a locked room with a bottle of something strong, a phone and a shotgun, if one was available.

‘Sorry about all this,’ the woman said, as she led them to the drawing room. She turned, waved the sink plunger vaguely and
gave the chief inspector a lopsided smile. ‘Don’t suppose you’re any good at unblocking sinks?’