by Charles Todd
“Seven o’clock then.” He touched his hat to me and walked on.
As I went the rest of the way to The Ironmaster pub, my thoughts busy, I wondered why it was that the Inspector had taken such a dislike to me. Did it mean that by coming here to ask questions, I had made him doubt his own conclusions about the evidence?
Stepping through the pub door, I looked up to see Simon Brandon standing in the small parlor off the main bar, obviously fuming at being kept waiting.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“YOUR MOTHER,” SIMON remarked, turning to see who had come through the door and realizing it was me, “thought you were in London. Mrs. Hennessey thought you had gone on to Somerset.”
“I traveled to Shrewsbury,” I answered, “to speak to people at Lovering Hall. Yes,” I went on, to forestall what he was about to say, “I shouldn’t have. But, Simon, I learned a great deal about the sergeant. And I could see he’d planned very carefully for what he did. If nothing else, it made me feel a little less guilty. There’s no excuse for my part in this business, I know that, but it has helped me come to better terms with what’s happened.”
“And then you traveled to Ironbridge after Shrewsbury.”
“As you see.”
“Bess,” he began in exasperation.
“I know. But, Simon, what else was I to do? I couldn’t sit idly, waiting for what was to come. And I needed to understand . . .”
Glancing around at the busy pub beyond the stairs, he said, “We can’t talk here. Walk with me as far as the bridge.”
We turned to leave, passing a young officer just coming in.
We didn’t speak until we were at the foot of the bridge. Simon, studying it with the eye of a soldier, said, “Impressive, isn’t it? And there’s the water power of the river, passing through that narrow gorge.”
“It’s amazing.” We moved down the sloping side of the hill to where we could watch the water pulsing under the bridge, dark now and secretive. Behind us the town rose steeply. “I don’t know if the fall broke the victim’s neck or if he dangled there until he choked to death,” I went on. “It’s rather a nasty way to die, however you look at it.”
“The killer took a risk.” He turned. “How many windows look down on the bridge? Surely someone was standing in one of them, and saw what happened.”
“Apparently not.” I listened to the rushing water for a moment, then told Simon about the young woman I’d met on the bridge earlier. “She was certain the soldier she saw and the man in the photograph were the same. I think, if he’s brought in, she might still recognize him. Although she’s almost convinced herself that he wasn’t the murderer, that he, whoever he is, came later.”
“He’s an attractive man—Wilkins. His bearing, what one could see of his face, and he’s well spoken. Not what you’d expect in a cold-blooded murderer. It makes it harder for her to accept.”
“True.”
“Are you ready to go home, Bess?” Simon turned back to look at me, speculation in his dark eyes.
“I don’t know what else to do.”
We stood there for a little longer. Then, just as we turned to walk back to The Ironmaster pub, someone came trotting down the street on a large dark horse, calling for Inspector Jester.
“I’m here,” Jester shouted from the street above the main road into town. “Stebbins, is that you? What the hell’s happened?”
“The bay horse has come home,” the man shouted back.
“Wait there, I’m coming down.”
We watched the Inspector make his way down a side lane toward where Mr. Stebbins and his mount stood waiting. In the dark, I could just make out faces. Simon pulled me back into the shadow of the bridge.
“The horse has come home,” Mr. Stebbins repeated, as if Inspector Jester hadn’t heard him the first time. “See for yourself.”
“What condition is he in?”
“Muddy. Hasn’t been groomed at all. But all right. Legs not savaged.”
“Where did he come from?”
“You’ll have to ask the horse that,” Mr. Stebbins said with a bark of laughter.
“I mean to say,” Jester demanded sharply, “any idea where he might have been?”
“None. I went down by the meadow this morning, and it was empty. I came back not a quarter of an hour ago, and there the bay was, big as life. I took him in, brushed him down, and looked him over.”
“Damn,” I heard Jester say.
“He was raised here, this bay. And he came home again. I’d never have guessed it. I thought he were gone for good.”
“Yes, well, we still don’t know if the killer took him. But my guess is that he must have done. And the horse came back on his own, as soon as he had the chance. It could mean that the killer hasn’t got very far. Could you backtrack the bay?”
“There were muddy prints coming up from the south. But a mile on, he was on grass, and I lost him. Did you put out that query about the bay?” Stebbins asked. “I’m still of a mind to see that bastard in a cell.”
“Of course I did. No one has seen it. At least if they have, they don’t know we’ve been looking.” He reached up and gently slapped the bay’s neck. “All right then. I’ll make a report. You can come in tomorrow and sign it.”
“I’ll be pleased to.” Mr. Stebbins wheeled his mount. “I’m that glad he’s back. A good horse. I hated losing him.” He trotted back the way he’d come, throwing up a hand in farewell.
Inspector Jester watched him go. When it was too dark to see horse or rider, he turned back the way he’d come.
I started to go after him, but Simon held me back.
“But I want to question him,” I said quietly, so that my voice didn’t carry above the sound of the river. Why hadn’t Inspector Jester told me about the missing horse, when I’d asked about bicycles?
“You don’t need to, Bess. The killer must have found that horse in the meadow, unattended, and used him to put as much distance between this place and wherever he was heading as he could. What else can Jester tell you?”
More to the point, what else had the Inspector not told me?
As if he sensed that we were there, Inspector Jester turned, scanning the bridge and then the slope where we were standing. I thought for a moment that he was going to come down to see who was there. But he must have decided that there was no one after all, for he turned again and continued on his way up the lane. We could watch him as far as the next street above, Church Street, I thought it must be, and then he rounded a corner and disappeared.
“He had promised to take me to the train at Coalport, tomorrow morning,” I said. “I don’t think he cared for me being here.”
“You’ll be gone long before morning. My motorcar is behind the pub. We’ll leave as soon as you can pack your things. Bess, it’s not wise to be here. Or anywhere that Sergeant Wilkins has been. You don’t want the connection between the two of you to continue being observed. Here or in Shrewsbury.”
I could see his point. The words guilt by association passed through my mind.
It had been foolish to come here. Or to the hospital outside Shrewsbury. And yet, and yet, I was glad I had. Just as I’d told Simon.
Deciding it was safe enough, Simon led me back to The Ironmaster, and while I packed my belongings, he settled my account.
As I came down again and he took my kit from me, the owner’s wife smiled. I had the oddest impression that she thought we were young lovers eloping, for she said, “I hope you’ll be safe. You and your young man.”
I answered that with a smile, neither agreeing nor denying the impression. If that was the tale she told about my being here in Ironbridge, so much the better.
Simon went out the rear of the pub to fetch his motorcar, and the owner’s wife leaned forward to say softly, “I was young once.”
I remembered the Inspector, then, and said, “I nearly forgot. Inspector Jester is coming in the morning to drive me to Coalport to take the train back to Shrewsbury. Could you tel
l him, please, that my family sent someone to bring me home? I shouldn’t want him to think I’d gone away with any stranger.”
“Of course not. I’ll see he’s told.”
But precisely what she would tell him I couldn’t be sure. As long as he didn’t take it into his head that Simon was the Sergeant Wilkins the police were searching for.
We drove in silence until we’d left Ironbridge well behind us. Simon was heading south, I could tell that. Soon we came to the meadow where the bay was quietly grazing now. It was too dark to get down and look for the tracks Mr. Stebbins had mentioned, but I was willing to believe they were there.
“Are you going after Sergeant Wilkins?” I asked hopefully.
“Not exactly. By horseback he could go in any direction, he needn’t follow the road. But it will do no harm to drive on and see what happens. What did he do, after he lost the horse? Or set it free? He’s in no condition to walk very far, is he? There could be some fresh news that hasn’t reached Jester’s ears. Yet.”
“A good point,” I agreed
“You’ll need your dinner.”
“I’m not particularly hungry. And I’d rather not go back to Shrewsbury.”
He said nothing, watching the headlamps picking out the road ahead. Eyes gleamed at us from the grassy verge, where spring’s bountiful wildflowers had gone to seed.
“He lied to the Sister tending him at the hospital,” I said after a time. “Sergeant Wilkins. She thought he was ashamed of having to sit in the presence of the King. But he wasn’t fit for crutches yet, much less a cane. The more bandages, the more people understood why he didn’t rise. That was what she believed. But what he was really doing was making it impossible for anyone in London to imagine he could walk away from the hotel with impunity. He wanted everyone to think he was helpless.”
“Do you think he killed this man in Ironbridge?”
“I don’t know. It could be convenient to blame a man already missing and in trouble with the Army. On the other hand, the woman I spoke to brought the photograph she’d seen to the police. That must have satisfied everyone that it was the sergeant.”
“Is her testimony trustworthy?”
“Inspector Jester couldn’t have found a finer witness. I do wish I knew more about Sergeant Wilkins. Whether he only planned as far as killing Henry Lessup, or if he knows what he’ll have to do next to survive.”
Simon was silent.
Finally I asked, “You met him. You’re a good judge of men. Is he a deserter? A murderer?”
Simon answered slowly. “The man whose record I looked up doesn’t appear to be either. In France he acted with bravery and without considering the danger he himself was in. He could well have died. Given his wounds, he probably should have died. It’s possible that since he didn’t, he felt the time had come to deal with whatever was on his mind. Or perhaps this is the first time he could actually reach his victim.”
“Do you know anything about a Sergeant Henry Lessup? The dead man? You’ve been involved in all sorts of Army matters. Have you ever come across him? If he never went to France there must be a reason. Clerical work? Supply? Logistics? Training?”
I could see, in the glow of the headlamps, that Simon was frowning. “I’ve never run into him. The Colonel might have done.”
“He was on extended leave.”
“Odder still. Are you sure?”
“It’s what the Inspector told me.”
I could tell this was troubling Simon. After a time, he shook his head. “Never mind. I’ll find him.”
“I wish I could have spoken to his sister. She must know more.”
Now we had to concentrate on where the sergeant and the bay horse had parted company.
Easier said than done. We couldn’t ask outright. And so we concocted a story, Simon and I, that we hoped wouldn’t travel back to Inspector Jester’s ears. It had taken us half an hour to work out the details so that we wouldn’t be caught out in an obvious lie.
We stopped at the fourth village south of Ironbridge. It was an arbitrary choice, but it was outside the twenty-mile radius that the Inspector had set. I was window dressing. My role was to sit in the motorcar, staring straight ahead, while Simon spoke to the local constable.
He was searching for his brother, who had stepped off a train heading to Worchester and disappeared.
“A head wound,” I heard Simon tell the constable. “Sometimes he doesn’t know where he is. Or even who he is.” He went on to describe this imaginary brother, his height, coloring, and rank.
“Why do you think he might have come this way?” It was invariably the next question. “It’s a long way from Worcester.”
“We’ve been scouring the countryside for days,” Simon answered. “My brothers and I. I’m taking our sister back to London. It’s unlikely he came this direction. On the other hand . . .” He shrugged. “We’re nearly out of hope.”
But in each village, the constable shook his head. No sign of a stranger, no sign of our “brother.” Which told us that either Sergeant Wilkins had never come this way, or that if he had, he’d left no trace. No strangers, no stolen food, no stolen horse or bicycle or any unsolved robberies. Nothing that would draw the attention of the police.
We varied the story a little, as needs must. But the answer was always the same.
It was a little after ten o’clock when Simon said, “I don’t think we should wake up the constable in this next village. At this hour he just might become suspicious.”
But we didn’t have to. The constable was walking his rounds as we came down the High Street, and he nodded to us as Simon slowed the motorcar.
“Odd that you should ask,” the man said, lifting his helmet to scratch his balding head. “One of the farmers spotted a bay horse out on the road one morning as he was going to market. This was ten days ago, I should think. No bridle, no saddle. It looked as if it had run off. He tried to coax it close enough to catch, but the bay was shying away. Finally it just took off across the fields, and as the farmer was driving a cart, there was no way he could follow. No one has said anything about seeing it since. But you said your brother stepped off a train.”
Simon smiled. “I’m afraid so. Much as I’d like to think . . . but I doubt he could remember how to ride.”
“Sad. Sorry I can’t help you. But there it is.”
Thanking him, Simon let in the clutch as he took off the brake, and we drove sedately away.
“What do you think?” he asked when we were out of hearing and around the bend in the road.
“We’ve found the bay.” I’d been feeling the tension of the search, tired and more than a little depressed. Now my fatigue had vanished. I was revived, excited. “Simon, he got this far—and farther. He must have been near his wits’ end, weary and hungry and in pain. He could very easily have fallen off the bay, too tired to stay awake. But where is he now? What’s become of him?”
“He could be dead somewhere. In a copse of trees, in a hedgerow, an unharvested field.”
“Then we’ll never know if it’s Sergeant Wilkins—or if the murderer is someone who had a grudge against the victim in Ironbridge and just caught up with him finally.” I could feel my spirits plummeting again. “And I can’t clear my name and reputation.”
Still, against all odds we’d found a trace of the bay horse. I ought to be grateful for even such a small triumph.
But the next question was—where had this triumph led us, if we couldn’t find the man we were after and determine once and for all if it was Sergeant Wilkins or a complete stranger?
We weren’t as lucky in the next village. It was silent, windows dark and no one about, not even a dog following a scent. I smiled, thinking that he would have been better off than we, because he could sniff the ground and know where to go.
Driving on, we found the next village just as dark.
By now it was well after eleven, and we’d been at this for hours.
We found a small inn where there were r
ooms to be had, just a short distance from the local constabulary. A sleepy clerk came out of the unlit nether regions and greeted us with surprise.
“We’re accustomed to lorry drivers and commercial travelers,” he said apologetically. “Still. The rooms are clean—the sheets as well.”
It was all that mattered. He led us up stairs that creaked with every step and down a dark, stuffy passage. The first door he came to opened into a fairly narrow room, and Simon shook his head. The next was wider, the high ceiling making it seem even larger. The bed was Victorian, massive and ornate, the washstand and chairs much simpler. A window looked out on the street, and the clerk walked across to draw the curtains while I tested the bed. Simon glanced at me, and I nodded. He put my kit on one of the chairs and the clerk shut the door, wishing me a good night as he handed me the heavy key.
I could hear them across the passage, and then the door shut. Simon was satisfied as well.
I had slept in worse places, cots beneath dripping canvas, the ruins of a convent, and even under a sky filled with stars. I bathed my face and hands in the cold water on the washstand, found my nightdress, and climbed up into the high bed. The mattress was lumpy but comfortable enough. When I closed my eyes, I could still feel the motion of the motorcar as we’d traveled over the rough roads between villages. But that was all I remembered.
Simon insisted that I have breakfast in my room the next morning, because the common room was busy with commercial travelers. We set out shortly afterward, but we hadn’t gone more than two miles when I saw a man standing by the side of the road with a pair of hens in a coop and a basket of cabbages at his feet.
“He’s waiting for someone to take him to market,” I said, having seen this many times at home in Somerset. Then a thought occurred to me. “Simon? If Sergeant Wilkins is without a horse now, he can’t expect to get very far on foot. He must be searching for someone, a farmer or a lorry driver or the like, to take him wherever he’s heading. Or as near to it as he can manage.”
“A very good idea.”