The Gate Keeper

by Charles Todd

  An hour later he knew his way around the estate even in the dark. He had found all the doors from the house to the gardens, the kitchen yard, and the terrace. He knew where the family’s motorcar was kept and how the drive and the farm lane twisted and turned.

  He wasn’t certain what he was going to learn, come the morning, but he was prepared. He made his way back to his motorcar and found a village some ten miles away. Far enough that news of his presence wouldn’t reach the Montgomery household before he arrived there himself. The village had only one inn, but after some effort he roused the clerk and was given a room for the night. It was cramped and the fire was pitifully small, but that didn’t matter for the few hours left before dawn.

  The next morning, shaved and carefully dressed, he drove back to Little Tilton. When he reached the house, he remembered something that Robin Hardy had said, that he would have loved the family estate, while his brother saw himself only as a caretaker for it. Had there been the same feeling here, the elder son inheriting by right and not by choice? He had joined the Army . . .

  He would soon know. He was about to tell the present owner that he was not the true heir. And there was proof.

  He lifted the brass knocker and let it fall. Almost in the same instant a woman in riding clothes opened the door to him.

  “You’re early, Sally—but you aren’t Sally, are you, worst luck. Are you here to see Desmond? He’s in the estate room.”

  She was tall, lithe, and accustomed to taking charge. Not attractive, but striking in her own way, with fair hair and green eyes. She led him toward the back of the house to a room at the end of the passage. Throwing open the door, she said, “Darling, your friend is here.”

  Montgomery looked up from the letter he was reading. He was dark with brown eyes and a strong chin. He looked at Rutledge, then frowned.

  “Who are you?” he demanded. “Prue, what is this stranger doing here?”

  She turned to stare at him as well. “Oh dear. I thought it was the man you’d contacted about the new motorcar.”

  Rutledge said easily, “My name is Rutledge. I’ve come to ask you about Vivian Moss.”

  The consternation in their faces told him all he needed to know. They recognized the name, and they knew who she was.

  “Yes, I thought you might remember her,” he said affably, moving into the room and stopping where he could face both of them.

  Prue Montgomery glanced behind her to see if anyone was in the passage, then shut the door and stood with her back against it.

  Montgomery turned to her. “They’ll have brought your horse around. I’ll deal with this man.”

  “We’ll deal with him together.”

  Still watching her face, Montgomery asked warily, “What does she want? Vivian Moss?”

  “Nothing—yet. She sold that book about apples. The one you gave her. Did you know? She needed the money. Too bad she never realized what was behind the handsome leather binding. But I did. And I happen to know where it is at the moment.”

  “Are you from the binders?” Rutledge had all his attention now. “No, you can’t be, you’re not old enough to have been working there at the time. Your father, then. Did he work for them?”

  Prue took a step forward. “Don’t—”

  Ignoring the interruption, Rutledge said, “It occurred to me that you might be interested in seeing it safely back in your hands.”

  “That’s blackmail,” Montgomery blustered, flushing.

  “What an ugly word. I’m simply asking how much proof of her marriage to your brother is worth to you. A simple business transaction.” He gestured toward the ledgers on the shelf behind the desk. “This house and the grounds appear to be rather prosperous. You’ve had the use of them for twenty-some years. Perhaps you’ve developed a taste for living here, and you might be willing to pay well to go on feeling secure. Or if you tell me you’d rather not do business with a stranger, I can offer my services to Miss Moss. She can’t pay me a farthing now, of course, but when her son comes into his proper inheritance, I am sure she’ll be very grateful. I warn you, she may not feel kindly enough toward you to offer you even the same pittance of a pension you gave her.”

  Prue started to speak, but he raised his hand to stop her. “I won’t have it, do you hear?” he told Rutledge. “This is not my fault. Lawrence wanted to be a soldier. He didn’t care tuppence for his inheritance. I haven’t taken anything from him that he valued. He paid with his life for choosing the Army instead of this house. He should have realized that such a hasty marriage left Vivian vulnerable.”

  “But you took advantage of her. And when you discovered she’d had your brother’s child, you did nothing about it. The courts might see this matter differently. Her son’s old enough now to understand what you did. Have you asked him whether he might wish to bear his father’s name? He uses Eric Moss at present. He’s just come down from Oxford, and there’s a mountain of debt. Do you have a son?”

  He directed that last question to the woman.

  “Yes,” she snapped. “He chose Cambridge. All the Montgomery heirs have gone there.”

  “Sadly Eric didn’t know that.” So Prue was Desmond’s wife . . .

  She flushed, but he thought it was with anger and not shame. Turning to her husband, she said, “You can’t trust this man. You know that, don’t you? He’ll be back for more, and then even more, till there’s nothing left for Julian.”

  He turned on her. “I should never have told you about this, Prue.”

  “Then you shouldn’t have come home and got drunk after that dinner party. You sat there in the drawing room, drinking whisky after whisky, until the whole sordid affair came spilling out. I can’t believe you’ve kept it from me all these years. If they hadn’t been talking about that godforsaken book at the dinner table, would you never have told me? If you’d wanted to keep the marriage lines away from her, why not simply burn them?”

  “I couldn’t. What if at some time in the future, I’d needed to produce them? He was my elder brother, in spite of everything. My sister loved him. I’d done my duty, I’d given the lines back to his widow. Even if she wasn’t aware of it.” He glared at her. “And you told me that there must be a dozen such books on apples. Well, you were wrong, weren’t you. This was the book I’d given Vivian. Or this man wouldn’t be here.”

  Ignoring that last, she went back to her first concern. “And when, pray, would you ever need to produce her marriage lines? I remind you that you have a son of your own.”

  This was clearly a sore subject between man and wife. His conscience and her fear for her own child. Rutledge made an attempt to redirect the conversation.

  “You can quarrel over what happened later. We were discussing the future, not the past.”

  “Why should you care what happens to Vivian Moss and her son? Are you related to them? Is that why you’re here?” Montgomery demanded.

  “No, I’m just aware of a piece of information that might in some quarters be valuable. I’m asking what I ought to do about it.”

  He could feel the rising tension in the room. And Hamish was already warning him that he had gone too far. He could see that Montgomery had one of the desk drawers open, but he was too far away to look inside. Was that where the man kept his revolver?

  He answered Hamish silently. He can’t kill me here. Not in the house. Not in front of his wife. Not where the servants might hear.

  Montgomery said, “You’ve come here without any warning. I need time to think. I can’t make a rash decision. And I don’t care for threats.”

  “Go to the police, if you like,” Rutledge said, smiling. “I don’t mind. I’ll lose what I came for, and you’ll still lose this house. But Miss Moss might still be grateful enough to reward me.” He looked from one to the other. “I think you’ll have made the worst of the bargain.”

  “Desmond?” his wife said sharply. “This is getting out of hand, don’t you see?”

  “Leave this to me, Prue. Stay out o
f it,” he warned her again. He turned back to Rutledge. “Give me twenty-four hours. I can’t think like this, I tell you, it’s not fair to me.”

  “Why should I wait? I have the upper hand now.”

  “Look, whoever you are, for one thing I don’t keep large sums here in the house. For another, I prefer to consider my choices. For all I know, you’re bluffing. And I’m no fool, understand me there. I’ll see proof before you see a ha’penny.” Montgomery was recovering from his initial shock and starting to think more clearly. “My wife is my witness, she will swear that I’ve admitted to no wrongdoing this morning. And we will be believed, because Constable Wiggins looks up to this family. Take it or leave it. Twenty-four hours. Where are you staying? I may need to reach you sooner.”

  “Ah, but that’s my little secret,” Rutledge said brightly. “Twenty-four hours. Not a second longer. Meanwhile, if you try to cause me any trouble at all, you’ll pay dearly. I’ll see that the evidence in my possession goes directly to the police. And I’d rather you didn’t contact Vivian Moss. I haven’t decided just how much I intend to share with her. I see no need to make her aware of her situation at this stage.”

  “Yes, I thought you were out for yourself, damn you,” Montgomery said trenchantly.

  “Well,” Rutledge said reasonably, “if I don’t look out for myself, who will?”

  Prue Montgomery stayed where she was by the door. “I believe you’re wrong, Desmond, to deal with him. There must be some other way around this.”

  “The choice isn’t yours, Prue. It’s mine. I was convinced that without the marriage lines, she would never dare to confront me. And I was right about that. I just never counted on someone like this man coming along. How did you find out what was behind the binding?”

  Rutledge laughed. “I’ve Stephen Wentworth to thank for that. He had no idea what he possessed. I was far more curious than he was. And my curiosity was rewarded tenfold. The rear door of his shop has a latch a child could open. When you came to search the shop, you didn’t get in, did you? No, I thought not.” It was a wild guess—that the night he’d chased a figure through the schoolmistresses’ back garden, the killer was looking for the book. It hadn’t satisfied him that Wentworth and Templeton were dead.

  He started toward the door, and after a moment Mrs. Montgomery reluctantly moved out of his way. He paused on the threshold, on the point of taking one of the little carvings out of his pocket, then thought better of it. They were connected to two murders, and he was wary of pushing Montgomery too far. It was one thing to appear to be blackmailing him about his inheritance, and quite another to indicate that he could send this man to the gallows. He said, “I never thought I’d make my fortune in such a fashion. Your wife is right, you’d have been wiser to destroy the marriage lines. As it happens, I’m very glad you didn’t. But I’d be curious to know what it was—other than the inheritance—that made you so willing to cut your brother’s son out.”

  He saw the look in Montgomery’s eyes. A burning jealousy that the years hadn’t dimmed.

  “My brother had a number of talents. He could have made his living with any of them. I had none, and there was only the inheritance from an uncle for this younger son. Hardly more than a pittance. It was so unfair.”

  “What sort of talents?”

  “He was a damned fine soldier. He had a good head for business, he could have made his way in any firm in the City. He was always carving something or other. He might even have made a living selling them. Especially the birds. They were perfect down to the last feather. My parents wanted me to study for the church. I’d have hated visiting the sick and holding the hands of the dying or baptizing screaming babies. The Army would have been even worse. I was damned lucky to survive the last war.”

  Prue Montgomery interrupted him. “You’re telling him too much.”

  But Rutledge said, “If you envied your brother as much as you say you do, I’m surprised you didn’t rid yourself of him.”

  “South Africa did that for me. And I did give his widow her marriage lines. I can’t help it if she didn’t know where they were. And a pension.”

  “How fine of you,” Rutledge commented sardonically, in spite of himself. He turned and started down the passage to the main door.

  The space between his shoulder blades felt all too vulnerable, but he didn’t look behind him until he had reached the outer door and stepped through it. Glancing back as he closed it, he saw Montgomery standing in the passage outside the estate room. And his fists were clenched as he watched Rutledge go, his face taut with fury.

  It wasn’t very sensible to spend the night in Little Tilton. He was tired from lack of sleep the night before. On the other hand, a room in the larger of the two pubs in the village might tempt Montgomery to do something rash. The book on medieval apples and a pair of wood carvings were hardly sufficient proof of murder, not in a courtroom. Montgomery might lose his inheritance when the book came to light, but he’d deny that the carvings had been done by his late brother, more famous for his birds. Even Vivian Moss’s testimony wouldn’t be enough—she hadn’t seen those carvings for twenty years, and Montgomery and his wife could swear they’d been sold as well, long ago.

  Would Prue Montgomery stand by her husband, if he was accused of murder? In the hope that she and her son would be better off if he could be cleared? Could she go on living with a man who was accused of murder, whether it was proven or not? Or divorce him after he was cleared, and ask for a sizable settlement?

  It was likely a matter Desmond Montgomery was considering even now. And it would be imperative to rid himself of Rutledge. A fourth murder to end the threat against his inheritance? A small price to pay, surely.

  Hamish said, “No one saw you at the house. It was Mrs. Montgomery who opened yon door. No’ the maid. And likely she’d say naught, for her son’s sake.”

  “He thinks I have that book in my possession. He’ll need to bargain with me to get his hands on it, before he tries anything. Once he’s destroyed it, he’s safe from Vivian Moss as well.”

  “I wouldna’ count on it,” Hamish said darkly. “Ye ken, the book isna’ important if ye do na’ know its secret.”

  But Rutledge had come to the end of the drive, and had to make a decision now.

  “In for a penny, in for a pound,” he said, and turned back into Little Tilton. “You may be right. He may decide to find a solution quickly. It would be a chance worth taking, if he thinks he can get away with it. If I haven’t connected him with the murders yet, he knows I soon will, and that will spur him on. Before his wife hears about them.”

  “He’ll keep killing you fra’ his wife. Until he’s drunk too much again.”

  “Which means he won’t leave the house until he’s certain she and the staff are asleep. I ought to get some rest while I can.”

  People were hurrying toward their work, and he realized it was Tuesday. They glanced curiously at him as he passed, and he thought this would only complicate matters for Montgomery. Would he wait and pay off the stranger—then ambush him on an empty road well away from the village? It was how Wentworth had been murdered.

  Worth remembering that, he thought.

  There was no one in the pub at this hour, but he found a woman in the kitchen preparing a chicken for roasting. She wiped her hands on her apron and went with Rutledge to the bar.

  “There’s but the two rooms,” she told him. “They’re not very fine.”

  “It’s no matter,” Rutledge said. “I’ll only be here one night.”

  “Will you be wanting breakfast in the morning, before you leave?”

  He hadn’t thought that far ahead. “Yes. Yes, I think so.”

  “I’ll leave a note for Teddy, then.” Opening a drawer, she handed him a key. “I doubt it works,” she said. “We don’t generally lock our doors. Through that door you’ll find the stairs. First room on the right.”

  “Does it look out on the street?”

  “That’s on your
left, that room. It’s not as large. And there’s no difference in price.”

  “All the same, I think the front room will suit me better.”

  “Your choice,” she said. Excusing herself, she hurried back to her hen.

  He took the narrow stairs two at a time and opened the door into the front room.

  It was small, he saw, with a narrow bed, one chair, a washstand, and a wardrobe that took up most of one wall. What’s more, the front walls slanted inward at shoulder level. He could feel his claustrophobia clutching at his throat as he shut the door. A child, he thought, would be hard-pressed to find this room comfortable. Walking to the window, he parted the curtain and realized that this was one of the dormers above the pub door.

  He was about to turn away when he heard the sound of hoofbeats. He waited, and Mrs. Montgomery came into view, trotting down the center of the High. She was a superb horsewoman, he saw, moving with the horse so perfectly that they were the epitome of grace. Except for her face, which was set and angry.

  Apparently she and her husband had had words after Rutledge left. And her husband looked to have won.

  When she was out of sight, he went down to the motorcar, took out his valise and a torch, then moved the vehicle to the far side of the street, where he could see it clearly from his window. And anyone showing an interest in it.

  A wrecked motorcar could kill as easily as a revolver, if not as surely.

  He went upstairs and settled himself for the long wait to come.

  Hamish was restless, leaving Rutledge with a thundering headache.

  “If he comes,” he reminded Rutledge, “and you’ve found your murderer, ye’ll have no excuse. Ye’ll have to return to London.”

  “I’m aware of that.”

  “Yon bride and groom will be returning soon enough fra’ the wedding journey.”

  “They can’t stay in Paris forever,” he retorted irritably.

  “Aye. It will be verra’ different now.”

  “I’ve managed before. I can manage again.”

  “Oh, aye? Weil, we’ll see. Ye ken, if Montgomery doesna’ miss when he shoots, you willna’ ha’ to find oot.”