for this weather.â
He led the way up the garden, fishing in his jacket pocket for the keys.
âItâs good of you to ask me to stay,â said Gibbons, slinging his duffel over one shoulder. âThat place they had me staying in was positively depressing.â
âAre the rest of the Scotland Yard team still there?â asked Bethancourt. âDamn this lockâoh, wait, Iâve got the wrong key.â
âNo,â answered Gibbons. âMine was the last room open at that B and B, and besides, they had to come up with something better than that for a detective superintendent. Someone high up pulled strings and got him a suite at the Best Western. They didnât have anything else open, so I understand the rest of the team is camping out in the sitting room.â
âIâd really rather not invite them here unless you think it necessary,â said Bethancourt, finally succeeding with the door.
âWhy the devil should you?â said Gibbons ruthlessly. âYouâre my friend, not theirs.â
âThank God,â said Bethancourt mildly. âI donât know what my mother would have said if I had turned the place into a police headquarters. Here we are thenâdoesnât look like it flooded.â
âCarpetâs dry,â agreed Gibbons, maneuvering with his duffel a little awkwardly in the narrow hallway in order to close the door. âDoes it flood often?â
âYou have no idea,â said Bethancourt darkly. âHere, letâs leave the luggage till later and search out a drink. Itâs Christmasâyouâd think my father would have the bar fully stocked, just in case. Let me get a light on. . . . There we go.â
âCan I put the electric fire on?â asked Gibbons as they entered the drawing room. âItâs chilly.â
âBy all means,â replied Bethancourt, making for the drinkscabinet standing in one corner. âAs I thought,â he said, opening the doors, âthe pater stocked up. What will you have?â
âIs there scotch?â asked Gibbons, who from previous experience knew that the Bethancourtsâ taste in whisky ran to expensive single malts.
âThereâs a twenty-five-year-old bottle of Bowmore,â said Bethancourt. âWill that do?â
Gibbons sighed in pleasure. âVery nicely,â he said, sinking into a very comfortable armchair and stretching his feet toward the glow of the electric fire. The drawing room was very elegant, meant for entertaining, but it was comfortable, too, and infinitely preferable to the B&B he had come from, which had smelled like cabbage.
âI think Iâll join you,â said Bethancourt, pulling out a couple of crystal glasses. âSo howâs this new murder shaping?â
âI havenât got very far yet,â answered Gibbons. âThere was no identification on the body, so weâre not even sure who the victim was. The medical examiner confirms that she was strangled and puts the time of death at sometime after seven on Christmas Eve.â
âQuite a nasty Christmas present,â remarked Bethancourt, handing him a glass and collapsing into a second armchair. âCheers.â
âCheers. Ah, thatâs good,â said Gibbons, savoring the taste of the liquor on his tongue. âWhere was I?â
âThe medical examiner,â prompted Bethancourt.
âRight,â said Gibbons. âWell, he puts her age at about twenty-five, and she was apparently in perfect health before she was murdered. She struggled with her attacker, so weâre looking for a reasonably strong specimenâour victim was a tall woman. She took a couple of punches to the head before she was killed, so itâs possible she was unconscious when she was strangled. Anyway, the murderer used somethingâpossibly a scarf or a cloth belt, the doctor said.â
âIt sounds fairly
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