Free The Hunt for Sonya Dufrette by R.T. Raichev Page A

uncertainties - he did genuinely believe he was better than everybody else.’
    ‘That was very much the impression he gave when I knew him.’
    ‘I do remember the first time I saw him. I went into his office to borrow a file. He was sitting at his desk, very still, staring straight ahead, his patrician profile tilted ever so slightly upward, as if he were listening to celestial harps lesser mortals couldn’t hear.’ Payne laughed. He looks ten years younger when he laughs, Antonia thought. ‘Then he saw me and looked enormously put out. His face twisted demoniacally . . . Apparently he had a great appetite for byzantine dealings and he engaged in elaborate plotting to eliminate his enemies
    ‘Do you know a Major Nagle?’ Antonia interrupted.
    ‘Nagle? I believe I have heard the name, but no, I don’t know him. I think he left the service altogether. I may be wrong . . . In what way is Nagle important?’
    ‘He was one of Dufrette’s enemies.’
    ‘Really? How interesting . . . Did you get on well with Dufrette? I do hope he was decent to you?’
    ‘As a matter of fact he was. When his daughter disappeared - presumed drowned in the river - his wife Lena became hysterical. She suggested it had been my fault, but he said nothing - nothing at all. When I told him how sorry I was, he shook my hand . . . I was there, you see, when it happened.’
    ‘What’s the puzzle exactly?’
    ‘I believe there is something wrong somewhere in my account of the events leading to Sonya’s drowning. I can’t say what it is but I know it’s there . . .’
    There was a pause. ‘Do you think she was murdered?’ he asked.
    Antonia blinked. ‘I don’t know. I have all sorts of ideas. Some really far-fetched ones. My suspicions keep shifting. A moment ago I even thought Lady Mortlock’s interest in eugenics might have had something to do with it!’
    ‘Elimination of the mental defectives, eh?’
    ‘That sort of thing, yes. Very silly, really. Out of the question. I don’t think Lady Mortlock cared for Sonya, but then she didn’t like children. She’d never had any.’ Antonia pushed the folder towards him slightly. ‘I’d be glad of your opinion. Do you think you could . . .’
    Major Payne said with great alacrity that he would be delighted to read what she had written. He had le goût du policier, he was terribly clever at noticing things, but he had never before been involved in a real-life mystery. He could start now, couldn’t he?
    ‘I’ll order some coffee for you, shall I?’
    ‘Please do. They make damned good coffee here.’ Picking up the folder and without another word, he went up to one of the high-backed armchairs beside the fireplace and sat down. Antonia watched him take out his pipe, a straight-stemmed briar, which he proceeded to fill with tobacco from a leather pouch. He struck a match, puffed away and opened the folder.
    The Sherlock Holmes touch. Le goût du policier. They both shared it. This is not a game, she reminded herself.
    She hoped she was not making a fool of herself.

9
    An Awkward Lie
    The telephone call she had received at half-past nine that morning had been from Mrs Cathcart, Colonel Haslett’s archivist friend, and it concerned the Gresham papers. Mrs Cathcart was going to collect the papers in person; she was coming later in the day, if that would be convenient. She had spoken in a high precise voice. In a cab, she had added with an odd emphasis - she might as well have said she was coming in a chariot. Would Miss Darcy be good enough to have the Gresham papers ready for her? Well packed? Antonia had assured her that she would.
    The Gresham papers formed a correspondence dating back to the late 1890s, and were contained in two wooden boxes painted periwinkle blue, stashed away under Antonia’s table. The letters she had examined lay on a side table in sorted heaps according to sender. The idea had been for her to read gradually through the whole lot and organize and catalogue