All The Colors Of Darkness by Peter Robinson

 

Detective Inspector Annie Cabbot caught the call.  A man had been found hanging from a tree near a scenic overlook.  When she inspects the scene, she is fairly sure that this is a suicide.  It's never really clear why an individual kills themselves but it's her job to determine the cause.  Her supervisor, DCI Alan Banks is on a well deserved vacation.

Annie soon determines that the man is Mark Hardcastle who is a set designer for the local community theatre.  She can't find next of kin but he did have a relationship and she is told Mark basically lived with his partner so she goes to notify him.  But when she gets to Laurence Sibert's house, a bigger puzzle awaits.  Laurence is lying on the floor of his study, bloody and dead.  

Annie calls Alan back from his vacation since this case will be very public.  Two men are dead and no one knows that much about them.  Laurence is obviously wealthy but it's unclear what his occupation was.  It turns out that much of his money came from his mother and her successful business.  Did Mark kill Laurence and then himself out of remorse? Was one or the other of the men starting a new relationship?   Did someone else kill both of them?

When Alan arrives and he and Annie investigate, several things come to light.  Laurence had been a government worker but the office he worked for was M-16.  Did that prior life have long shadows that reached his current one?  Mark was working on setting up a new theatre group that would pretty much gut the existing one.  Did that play a role?  Alan starts to believe that this was a very cunning murder where the men's minds were manipulated after Alan and his girlfriend watch a Shakespeare play.  Is he right?

This is the eighteenth Alan Banks novel.  As always, Alan is the intellectual policeman, interested in classic literature and all kinds of music, especially classic and folk.  His partner, Annie, is ambitious and determined to make a name for herself.  The two work well together with all the time pressures and directions from above.  This novel is recommended for mystery lovers.