Dreaming of the Bones

the Savoy after.
    The launch party yesterday was lovely. It will make next week’s punch-and-biscuit affair at Heffer’s seem even drearier than usual. Daphne will be lurking about hoping not to be noticed, while Darcy bores everyone within earshot with a lecture on the intricacies of deconstructionism. You know what they always say, If you can’t write...
    At least we won’t have Adam mooning about like aforlorn crow, since he’s off do-gooding somewhere in Africa .
    Did you see the piece in the Times? If not, I’ll send you a copy. It seems my work is finally getting the critical attention it deserves, though I think the reviewer could have been a bit better informed.
    Must dash, people waiting.

    Love,
    Lydia

    This time Gemma and Kincaid were left to coo] their heels in the plushly upholstered anteroom of Daphne Morris’s office. They’d left London early in Gemma’s battered Ford Escort, Kincaid having expressed concern over the Midget’s acquisition of a new noise, and they’d made good time to Cambridge considering the Monday morning traffic. Kit had agreed to stay behind with Hazel and the children, without too much protest.
    Daphne’s assistant, Jeanette, still wearing the baggy cardigan Gemma remembered from Friday, informed them that the Headmistress’s schedule didn’t allow time for unexpected visitors, and if they wanted to see her, they’d have to wait until she finished her history lecture.
    But before the appointed hour was up, Daphne herself appeared, looking every inch the headmistress in a navy suit and upswept hair. She ushered them into her office and took a seat behind the massive barrier of her desk. ”What can I do for you this morning?” she asked with the smooth smile and the touch of impatience Gemma imagined she used when dealing with annoying parents.
    ”Did you have a nice weekend?” Kincaid countered as he made himself comfortable in one of the rather feminine visitor’s chairs. ”Relaxing and all that?”
    Daphne merely watched him, but Gemma saw her make an aborted reach for the pen on her desk, then clasp her hands together on the desktop.
    ”I hope so, because we had a very interesting weekend, didn’t we, Gemma?”
    Daphne glanced from Gemma to the darkening bruise under Kincaid’s eye, her unease more evident. ”If this is a social call, Mr. Kincaid, I really must—”
    ”We had a very productive visit with Morgan Ashby, as you may have noticed”—Kincaid smiled—-”once he had calmed down a bit. It seems Morgan felt he had a good reason for disapproving of your relationship with Lydia —beyond the fact that Lydia had been intimate with you.”
    ”Of course we were intimate,” said Daphne with a touch of exasperation. ” Lydia was my closest friend.”
    ”Don’t prevaricate, Miss Morris. You know perfectly well that’s not what I meant, but if you want me to spell it out for you, I will. You had an ongoing sexual relationship with Lydia Brooke. According to Morgan, she bragged about it when they had rows. She must have enjoyed making him feel inadequate.” Kincaid shook his head as if disappointed. ”She didn’t tell you that, did she?”
    ”I don’t know what you mean. I—” Daphne swallowed and clenched her hands together. ”It’s not true. She’d never have told Morgan. She said he tried to bully her into admitting it, but she wouldn’t.”
    ”Do you mean you didn’t have sex with Lydia , or simply that Lydia wouldn’t have shared your secret with her husband?” Kincaid paused, frowning, then added with an air of discovery, ”And if she told him, she might have told others, too—she might even have gone so far as to tell someone who could use it to damage your career.”
    ”No!” Daphne stood up, gripping the edge of her desk. ”You don’t understand. Morgan was a raging paranoid. He imagined things, and if Lydia told him anything it was because he frightened her. They were poison for each other, and he drove her—”
    ”Why did she marry him, then?” asked Kincaid, and Gemma thought of Morgan thirty years ago, dark and dangerously handsome. The intensity of his need for her must have seemed flattering at first, and she doubted Lydia would have had the judgment to see what might lie behind it.
    ”I don’t know,” said Daphne. ”I never knew. All I can tell you is that something happened that summer. Lydia was never the same after that.”
    ”Morgan says it was you who changed Lydia —drove her over the