No Mark Upon Her Read Free Page A

another few
minutes.
    The sound of voices in reception made him look
round. It wasn’t the big, sandy-haired Craig, however, but Milo Jachym, the
women’s coach, having a word with Lily. He was dressed in rain gear, and had a
purposeful set to his small, sturdy frame.
    “Milo,” Freddie called, standing and crossing the
dining room. “Are you going out?”
    “Thinking about it. We might have an hour before
the next squall line moves through.” Zipping his anorak, Milo looked out of the
reception doors. Following his gaze, Freddie saw that a few patches of blue were
breaking through the gray sky to the west. Milo added, “I’d like to get them off
the ergs and onto the water, even if it’s a short workout. Otherwise they’ll be
moaning the rest of the day.”
    “Can’t blame them. Bloody ergs.” All rowers hated
the ergometers, the machines that were used to simulate rowing and to measure a
rower’s strength. Workouts on the ergs were physically grueling without any of
the pleasure that came from moving a boat through the water. The only good thing
that could be said for an erg workout was that it was mindless—you could drift
into a pain-filled mental free fall without ramming your boat into something and
risking life and limb.
    Milo grinned. “Never heard that one before.” He
turned back towards the crew quarters. “I’d better get them out while it
lasts.”
    Freddie stopped him with a touch on the arm. “Milo,
did you have a chance to speak to Becca? I was hoping you might have been able
to talk some sense into her.”
    “Well, I talked to her, but not sense.” Frowning,
he studied Freddie. “I think you’re fighting a losing battle there. You might as
well give in gracefully. And why are you so sure she can’t win?”
    “You think she can?” Freddie asked, surprised.
    “There’s no woman in this crew”—he nodded towards
the crew quarters—“or any other I’ve seen in the last year that could out-row
Rebecca at her best.”
    “But she’s—”
    “Thirty-five? So?”
    “Yeah, I know, I know. And she’d kill me if she
heard me say that.” He imitated Becca at her most pedantic. “Redgrave was thirty-eight, Pinsent, thirty-four, Williams, thirty-two
. . . And Katherine Grainger won silver at thirty-three
. . .” Freddie shrugged. “But they had medals behind them.
She doesn’t.”
    “She has the same capacity for crucifying herself.
Which is what it takes. As you very well know.”
    “Okay,” Freddie admitted. “Maybe you’re right. In
which case, maybe I’d better apologize. But she won’t return my calls. When did
you talk to her?”
    “Yesterday. About half past four. She was taking a
boat out. She said she’d rack it herself when she came in.” Milo frowned. “But
come to think of it, I don’t remember seeing it when I went out to check the
river conditions this morning. Maybe she took it out at the cottage.”
    “Not likely. She’d have to have used the neighbor’s
raft.” It was possible, though, Freddie thought. But, still, she’d have had to
carry the shell through her neighbor’s garden to put it in her own, and she had
no ready place to store the boat. And why do that when she kept the Filippi
racked here?
    Unless she felt ill and couldn’t make it all the
way back to Leander? Though that didn’t sound like Becca. The uneasiness that
had been nagging him ratcheted up a notch. He checked his watch, decided Angus
Craig could bugger himself. “I’m going to check the racks.”
    “I’ll come with you.” Milo paused, eyeing Freddie’s
navy jacket and blue-and-pink-striped Leander tie. “You’ll get soaked, man.
There’s a spare anorak by the bar.”
    But Freddie was already heading out the doors. The
first-floor reception area opened onto an outside balcony with a staircase
leading down from either side. Freddie took the left-hand flight, towards the
river and the boatyard. The rain had slowed to a drizzle, but by the time he
reached the boat