No Shred of Evidence

by Charles Todd

  Hamish, who had been quiet for some time, said, “Aye. But she wielded yon oar with devastating results. And she hadna’ wished to rescue the lad in the first place.”

  If it came down to the fact that Victoria had deliberately killed Saunders, and it could be proven beyond a doubt, where did that leave Kate and the other two women?

  The question bedeviled him all the way back to the village.

  Before going to bed, Rutledge made another search for Barrington’s notes, but he was coming to the conclusion that the man hadn’t been here long enough to put down on paper any of the observations and information he’d collected. But original interviews were missing as well, and that was far more troubling.

  Come to that, he thought wryly, he himself had only jotted down whatever he thought pertinent, but it was a start, enough to write his report when the time came.

  He lay in the comfortable bed, an arm beneath his head, staring at the ceiling and trying to shut out the voice of Hamish MacLeod.

  How important was the damage to the dinghy to this particular case? Had any other boats in the vicinity suffered like damage? Was it a pattern of vandalism that pointed in an entirely different direction?

  Or if it was specific to the dinghy, was it a first attempt to kill Harry Saunders? And because he had been too busy—or the weather had been too unpromising—to take out a boat, nothing had happened. But when the dinghy did go down, it wasn’t out at sea, and there was rescue at hand. Had one of the occupants of the Grenville rowing boat realized that another, far more desperate attempt must be made? And that would point strongly to Victoria Grenville. She was rather headstrong, but would she be that concerned if Harry Saunders’s attentions had turned in another direction? Or if she thought he had flirted with her to cover the true direction his affections had taken?

  But the other young woman had left Cornwall, and apparently nothing had come of any relationship with Saunders over the summer.

  Then why was everyone unwilling to talk about her?

  He could think of several reasons—­she was married, in which case he couldn’t quite see Harry Saunders, with his upbringing, dallying with her. She was someone of importance, seeking a summer away from her usual life and duties. But he didn’t know of any royal princesses, English or European, who might choose a desolate coast of Cornwall as a retreat from their routines. There was one other circumstance that might account for someone needing a few weeks of quiet and rest to regain her strength: a severe illness. That could explain the reluctance to talk about her.

  Rutledge didn’t know of any current cases of Spanish flu to account for that as a possibility. Tuberculosis? He remembered something he’d been told, that the young woman in question had clung to Harry Saunders and seemed reluctant to meet or chat with other ­people. For fear, in her still delicate state, of picking up a chill or other infection?

  “Ye havna’ considered a young widow,” Hamish suggested from a corner of the room.

  “No one has mentioned that she wore black. But it would mean that the square of cloth I found wouldn’t have belonged to her. That’s worth looking into.”

  The next morning he went to speak to the vicar again.

  Toup was just leaving the vicarage, and he said at once, as he opened the door to Rutledge, “Can it wait? I’ve promised a parishioner I’d call.”

  “I’ve come to ask a question. It won’t take very long.”

  Wary, the vicar studied him. “What is it?” he asked after a moment.

  “The young woman who came to ser­vices with Harry Saunders. Was she a widow?”

  “Good God, what put that into your head? You’re making much out of nothing. She was a summer visitor, no more than that, and Harry was kind enough to escort her to ser­vices a time or two. My own duties prevented me from fetching her myself.”

  But it had been more than a time or two.

  “Had she been ill?”

  Exasperated, the vicar said, “All right, if you must know, she had lost her mother in rather sad circumstances, and she thought a change of scene might help her in her bereavement. Is there anything criminal in that? I’d been asked to respect her privacy. She wasn’t up to social calls, nor was she eager to entertain. She just wanted to escape from a houseful of memories for a little while. Now I must go.”

  “Then how did Harry meet her?”

  “We can’t discuss this matter on the doorstep. It’s unseemly.” He led Rutledge into the parlor, offered him a seat, but stood himself by the hearth, as if this would of necessity not take much longer. “The cottage she let for the summer is where he kept his boat. The small one, the dinghy.”

  If Harry had simply done her a kindness, it would explain why he had asked his friends not to talk about her or speculate on an attachment. Certainly he wouldn’t have wished his parents to get wind of someone in particular. And it probably explained why they had come to ser­vices here, and not in Padstow, where she would have been an object of interest in the company of an eligible young bachelor. Or even encountered his parents.

  “I am concerned because the dinghy that belonged to Saunders, the one kept just below that cottage, had been seriously tampered with, enough so that the next time he took it out, it sank under him. That was when Victoria Grenville and her friends claim to have tried to rescue him.”

  The vicar’s exasperation disappeared in a look of sheer alarm. “But my cousin left just before the first of September. Thereabouts. Harry has been out in the dinghy since then. I’ve seen him myself. Who could have done such a thing? Why?”

  “Would Victoria Grenville have done something like that out of sheer jealousy?”

  “My God, I can’t imagine that she would even have thought of such an act. She’s always had her pick of beaux.”

  “Precisely my point. If Harry had been among them, and then a stranger had tried to take him away from her, she might have wanted to teach him a lesson. Not knowing how dangerous it could be.” But he thought she would have known. From the start.

  “No, no, this is ridiculous, Inspector. And it would do immeasurable harm even to speculate on such a suggestion.” Toup was as agitated as Rutledge had ever seen him. “It was all a dreadful accident. It must have been, Trevose notwithstanding.” He turned. “Really, I must attend to my parishioner. I refuse even to give these speculations my attention.”

  He was ushering Rutledge out the door, distracted and upset. “I must be on my way,” he said again, closing the door behind them. And with a nod, he was gone.

  Rutledge watched him walk away.

  Something was unsettling the vicar. He didn’t know what it was.

  He wondered if the living at St. Marina was in the gift of the Grenville family. If that was the case, it was likely that Toup was torn between his duty to the law and his concern for the family that had brought him here.

  Rutledge could see this inquiry ending with Victoria being tried as a murderess. A clever KC could connect her to the dinghy’s holes, and when that attempt to kill Saunders had failed, when her friends had happened on the scene and wanted to rush to Saunders’s aid, it could be claimed that she had resorted to the oar. Right or wrong, it could easily happen.

  When it did, it was going to be difficult to disentangle the other three women from the repercussions of what she had done.

  There was not much he could do to change that fact.

  And then, out of nowhere, came a new direction.

  12

  From the vicarage Rutledge went into Padstow, intending to send his response to the Yard.

  He worded it carefully, that response, for he didn’t want to hear later that it had been twisted out of context.

  Inquiry proceeding. Have not located original statements to compare with later ones. Families have arranged for counsel. They are not without influence. Meanwhile, there is one piece of evidence that so far can’t be e
xplained. Early resolution expected.

  It also told the eager telegrapher nothing in the way of useful gossip. He had all but snatched the sheet from Rutledge’s hand, once he discovered the message was addressed to Scotland Yard.

  Rutledge walked on to the harbor, looking out at the larger craft that had belonged to Harry Saunders. After studying it for a time, he engaged a boatman to take him out to it.

  The wind off the estuary was strong, and Rutledge had had to remove his hat or else watch it sail away onto the water.

  When he reached the Sea Lion, it was swinging at anchor, sleek in the watery sunlight with sails furled and covered with canvas, the paint in good condition, and everything tidily in its place. He went up the rope ladder dangling over the side, and swung himself onto the deck.

  It was as if the owner had just walked away. Rutledge went over it with care, from the small cabin to the wheelhouse, and then down to where there was a good-­size engine. From there he found his way into the bilge, but if someone had tried to damage this boat, Rutledge was unable to find any signs of it.

  But why risk interfering with this boat, where you might well be seen from the harbor, when damaging the dinghy had served just as well? The summer visitors were gone from where it was kept, and there was only one cottage still occupied. Easy enough to wait until one man had left for the day, and you could take your time with the task. And the waterman who had taken Rutledge out to the Sea Lion confirmed that the dinghy was the usual way Saunders reached the larger craft.

  “Only once did he ever use one of us, and that was the first day, when he took ownership. He brought the dinghy back in three hours later, and soon after found a place to bring it ashore.” The waterman grinned, scratching a grizzled chin. “The bank overlooks the water, you know. He wouldn’t want to be seen playing truant, now would he?”

  Rutledge agreed, and when he was taken back to the harbor, he paid the old man his fee, then crouched on the harbor wall just above him and asked a last question.

  “Anyone else wanting to be taken out to her? Before Saunders had his accident, perhaps.”

  The man shook his head. “Nay. If he wanted friends to come aboard, he rowed them out himself. But it wasn’t a boat for that sort of thing. There was never any gossip about that. A quiet sort, Saunders. Not one for carrying on. I’ll say that for him.”

  “Did he ever bring a young woman here to see her?” He gestured to the boat.

  “Nay. Not that I ever heard. And he’d be a fool to take her aboard, now wouldn’t he? Wouldn’t do much for her reputation, without a maid or a brother or the like to play chaperone.”

  “You liked Saunders, I take it?”

  “I did. He didn’t choose himself a fancy craft to lord it over the rest of us. He got one he could handle himself. And he never needed the lifeboat out to rescue him. As have some who shall not be named.”

  “Any trouble in Padstow with someone tampering with boats?”

  “Tampering? Never heard of any such foolishness.”

  Rutledge thanked him again, rose, and with a last look out beyond the harbor at the mast of Saunders’s boat, walked back to where he’d left his motorcar.

  One more detail dealt with. He toyed with the idea of running out to the cottage again, but it could tell him nothing more. And the dinghy couldn’t speak, confiding to him who had done such damage.

  Pausing briefly at the salvage yard, he asked the owner to return the dinghy to its usual mooring. Constable Pendennis and the owner of the yard were now his witnesses to what had been done to it. Better to let the person who had made the holes wonder if they’d been discovered. Then he went to fetch his motorcar.

  He needed to question Trevose again, but he knew that was not likely to give him a straightforward answer. The time would be better spent interviewing Sara Langley or Victoria herself. Preferably in that order.

  Coming into the village, Rutledge noticed that ­people were collecting near the entrance to the police station, standing there staring, and there was a carriage pulled up just beyond, a small boy holding tightly to the reins and rubbing the nose of the horse.

  His first thought was that in his absence Pendennis had managed to bring in the accused.

  He threaded his way through the crowd and left the motorcar at the inn, then ran lightly back to the station. Heads turned again as he approached, eyes wide with curiosity and alarm.

  Making his way to the door of the station, he stepped inside. “What’s happened?” he called to the constable. “Why are there so many ­people outside there?”

  From where he was standing in the passage, Pendennis pointed toward the single cell at the end of the corridor. “The doctor’s with him now. One of the Terlew lads, taking the cow back to pasture, found him when one of the dogs began scratching at the underbrush around an old stone. He was lying there. It doesn’t look good.”

  “He?” Rutledge asked, rapidly readjusting his first concern. “Who is it?”

  “Vicar.”

  “But I saw him. Not an hour or more ago. He was on his way to call on a parishioner.” The man had been upset. “What is it? His heart?”

  Pendennis shook his head. “He was set upon. Savagely beaten.”

  “The vicar?” Rutledge asked. “By whom?”

  “Nobody knows. Doctor says he won’t be telling us anytime soon. He’s unconscious still. And having trouble breathing. Broken ribs, Doctor says. It’s a good thing the lad didn’t try to move him. And his mother didn’t know what to do. She sent the lad to me, and a half dozen of us went out and brought him back on a stretcher. He’s lost a lot of blood, Doctor says. Some of it internally.”

  Rutledge thanked him, and walked on down to the cell. Dr. Carrick was working on the man lying still on the prisoner’s cot. His shirt was off, and the doctor, with the help of another man, was wrapping his ribs with tape. Then the doctor moved to one side, to look at a leg, and Rutledge saw the vicar’s face.

  It was bloody, swollen, unrecognizable. Rutledge drew in a breath. He had seldom seen such a savage beating.

  The leg was broken. They began to splint it while Toup was still unconscious, then moved on to an arm. But it wasn’t broken, just badly bruised, a muscle torn.

  Rutledge waited until Dr. Carrick straightened his back, looking down at his patient while taking a break.

  “Who did this, do you know?” Rutledge asked quietly. “Has he spoken?”

  Carrick shook his head. “Not even when the boy found him. He’s not said a word that anyone knows of. He ought to be dead. He’s a frail man to begin with.”

  “How many, do you think? How many did it take to do this?”

  “No idea. But I’d start looking, if I were you. He wasn’t robbed. And he was wearing his collar. Whoever it was knew he was a priest. Whoever it was is dangerous.”

  “Quite,” Rutledge said grimly, and turned to leave.

  Carrick stopped him. “He couldn’t have crawled far. If he could crawl at all. You might find the weapon there. If you don’t, then I’d put a curfew on this village.”

  With Pendennis at his side, Rutledge went out to speak to the growing crowd of onlookers gathered around the entrance to the ­station.

  He was bombarded with questions about the vicar’s condition.

  “Dr. Carrick is still examining him. His injuries are quite severe. I want to see your hands. Hold them up, all of you.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, the men in the crowd did just that, and ­people turned to look at the hands thrust forward.

  Rutledge examined them one at a time, but he found no bruising, only the calloused palms of men who worked for a living.

  “Very good. Now I want volunteers to fan out in groups of three or four, searching for whoever did this. He may be armed with something, we don’t know yet. But he will have bloody hands, blood on his clothes. If he’s already
washed them, or changed his clothing, examine his knuckles for bruising, and his tools for blood. If he’s suspicious at all, bring him to me and let me question him. You know the countryside; you’re the ones who will find a hiding place I might overlook or speak to someone who has noticed a stranger. If it isn’t a stranger, it’s one of you. Knock on every door. Look at any male over the age of twelve. Be certain you’ve missed no one, the man in the byre, the lad bringing in the cows for milking, the farmer working in the field. Ask if anyone has been behaving strangely. But hear this, and I will brook no argument about it. If you find him—­or them—­you will bring whoever it is to me. Whole, and untouched. I want to see if the vicar fought back. I want to see the evidence for myself. And if you batter this suspect, I will have no proof of anything but your stupidity. I want this man, I want him badly. But Vicar would tell you that he must be taken into custody and tried. And I agree with that. Let a judge decide his fate, not set him free because of what one of us has done. Do I make myself clear?”

  There was a growl of agreement. And then the men in the crowd began counting themselves off in groups of four or five, debating among themselves just where each would search. Rutledge watched them sort themselves out. Pendennis circulated among them, coordinating the search. Some of them might have been Chapel men, but they all knew Toup, and they were all for finding who had done this to him. Then with a nod toward Rutledge, they set off.

  He had little hope of their finding the person or persons who had attacked the vicar, but these men could search a wider area faster than he could, and search it more thoroughly. It was the only chance he had.

  One of the women still standing there in front of him said, “What can we do?”

  “Sandwiches,” another put in. “And tea. They’ll be hungry and dry when they get back.”

  “The Pilot,” another said. “They’ll be coming in there first.”

  And a dozen of the women hurried away to see to it.

  The rest began to move on, whispering among themselves as they went, dismay still there in their faces.