Watchers of Time ir-5

by Charles Todd

  Blevins was saying as his finger moved to draw a circle south of the farm, “I’ll get word to the villages in that district, tell them to be on the lookout for a Norfolk Gray carrying a large man. If the bastard’s ahead of us, better to let someone else cut him off. And we’ll get on with the search in the town.”

  Pointing to land that marched behind the Randal farm, Rutledge asked, “Who owns that property?”

  “It was the old Millingham estate. The present Lord Sedgwick’s father bought the lion’s share of it, and the Cullens and the Henleys own the rest. Good sheep country.”

  He turned to issue an order to the harassed schoolmaster standing behind him, filling in for the constables, and then went on to Rutledge, “If you’ll have a word with the Vicar, that we think our man is well away from here, he’d appreciate it. Hadley, I want you to join the searchers down the lane past Holy Trinity. I’ve yet to hear a word from them-tell them to send a report! The Inspector here can drive you as far as the vicarage. And, Rutledge, after you’ve spoken with Sims, go directly to Miss Connaught’s house, if you will. Hadley can give you the direction. She has a motorcar-see if you can persuade her to let us borrow it for the next few hours.”

  Rutledge said, “By stealing the mare, Walsh marked his direction. There’s still a possibility that he’ll double back, working his way west until he can find help.”

  “If I were in his shoes, I’d keep going, counting on the head start to see me safe.” Blevins’s eyes met Rutledge’s across the desk. Without words-without the need for words-the message was clear: Walsh wouldn’t have run, if he wasn’t guilty as hell!

  As far as Blevins was concerned, out of the night’s disaster had come one comforting certainty.

  As Rutledge followed Hadley back into the street, he found himself thinking about what Blevins had said-that Walsh would be counting on the miles between himself and Osterley to see him safe.

  Was that true? His mind reviewed the road system he’d scanned on the map. Walsh was no fool. He might well lay a false trail. He’d planned his escape, and while it was a matter of luck that he’d stumbled on Randal’s farm, where a horse could be taken without arousing the household or sending the dogs into frenzies of barking, there must be a dozen farms where the barn was far enough from the house to allow Walsh to break in.

  And the yellow dog must have been an unwitting accomplice, delighted to be set free and not questioning the manner of it.

  Sims was grateful for the news. He looked haggard. “I’m not afraid of Walsh,” he said, and oddly enough Rutledge believed him. “Although Blevins seems to think I was quaking in my shoes for fear I’d be the next victim! And I’m not convinced, somehow, that Walsh is guilty of murder.”

  “Why do you say that? Have you seen him, met him?”

  “No. Which is why I’ve kept my mouth shut. But I’ve had long nights to think about Father James and his death. It seems to me that Walsh took a chance coming back here weeks after the bazaar, expecting to find money at the rectory. Most churches live hand to mouth. It would have been easier to break into a house if he was desperate. Besides, if he was wandering about in the rectory the day of the fair, as Mrs. Wainer claims he was, he’d have seen for himself that there was very little to steal.”

  “He must have assumed,” Rutledge said, echoing Hamish in his head, “that no one would connect his presence at the fair with a theft a good two weeks later.” That was Blevins’s opinion. “Someone at the fair could have calculated, roughly, how much money had been taken in. And there was a last payment to be made on the new cart, before it would be handed over to Walsh.” He was playing devil’s advocate, to give Sims an opportunity to get to the bottom of what he wanted to say.

  Sims took a deep breath. “That’s a tidy assumption. On the other hand-was Walsh that clever? If so, you’ll play merry hell catching him now!”

  “Then who killed the priest?”

  There was a long silence. “I don’t know,” Sims finally answered. “But I have the oddest feeling sometimes. Of being watched. Our festival is in the spring. June. Why would anyone take an interest in the vicarage, if money was all they were after? Look around you-”

  Monsignor Holston had also had the feeling that he was watched.. ..

  Sims was saying, “You’re fairly certain, are you, that what I heard was Walsh chiseling off his shackles?”

  “Certain enough. We found the chains in the church. You identified the tools as yours, and the latch on the shed door was broken,” Rutledge reminded him. “It seems clear that Walsh came looking for a shed or outbuilding he could break into. And the church was a perfect place to hammer off the chains. No one lives close enough to hear the racket. Except perhaps for you.”

  “Yes, well, from what you say, he’s running now and not likely to hang about in Osterley.” He rubbed tired eyes. “All right, thanks. Tell Blevins if he needs me, I’m available. I won’t sleep anyway after all this excitement.”

  “I must be going. I’m to make sure Miss Connaught is safe. Blevins has been trying to see that all the people living alone are warned.”

  A wry smile crossed Sims’s face. “Yes, go by all means. I’ll be fine.”

  But as Rutledge walked out the door to the car, he heard the bolt shot home behind him.

  Hamish said, “Was the laughter real-or his imagination, yon Vicar?”

  Rutledge answered silently. “I don’t know. Shock can play strange games with the mind. On the other hand, it’s easy to hear what you expect to hear.”

  “Aye. Well. He heard something.”

  Priscilla Connaught lived in the house at the edge of the marshes, lonely and isolated, where the wind bent the trees and shrubs into Gothic shapes and the grasses rustled like whispers. The walk to the front door was dark, flowers leaning dry seed heads and wilting blossoms over the path. Rutledge could hear the seeds crunching underfoot. Out on the marshes, a bird called, low and forlorn, like a desolate soul looking for solace.

  Hamish said, “This is no’ a place for a woman alone!”

  But Rutledge thought that it must have appealed to Priscilla Connaught, who carried secrets with her and preferred to use her life as a weapon against a man she hated.

  He knocked loudly on the wooden panels, and then pitching his voice to carry, he called, “Miss Connaught? It’s Ian Rutledge. From Scotland Yard. Will you come down, please? I’d like to pass on a message.”

  A light came on in a window on the first floor, and he stepped back so that it would fall on his upturned face. A curtain twitched, and he could feel her eyes. Hat in hand, he stood there and said again, “It’s Ian Rutledge.”

  After a time another lamp was turned up, and another, tracing her progress through the house. The front door opened a crack. “What do you want?”

  There was something in her voice that struck him. A resistance, as if she was prepared to turn him away. He thought for an instant that there was someone else in the house with her, and then realized all at once that she was braced against his next words.

  He said, warily, “Inspector Blevins asked me to come and see that you were safe. Walsh has escaped, and we’re trying to make certain that he’s not still hiding in Osterley-”

  “Escaped? How? When? ” Her surprise seemed genuine.

  “In the middle of the night. We’ve tracked him east of town, but it’s as well for you to be aware of the danger.”

  “But you said he’d killed the priest!” she cried. “How could you let him go?”

  “We didn’t offer him the key, Miss Connaught. He escaped.” Rutledge was tired, and in no mood to mince words. “Have you seen or heard anything-”

  She cut across his words, saying quickly, “I can’t stand here in the night air-I must go-”

  “Are you all right?” he asked again. “Would you like me to search the house, or the grounds, to be sure?”

  “I don’t care what you choose to search. Where did you say he was last seen, this man Walsh?”

 
“We’ve found evidence that he was moving east of Osterley. Toward Cley, or possibly south in the direction of Norwich. There’s a horse missing from Tom Randal’s farm out on the east road. Inspector Blevins would be-”

  “Where is this farm, for God’s sake?” she demanded impatiently.

  He told her, adding, “Inspector Blevins has asked-”

  But she was gone, the door slamming shut in his face. He could hear her behind the door, a scream of outrage, as if Walsh’s escape had been designed to torment her. And then silence.

  He stood for a time on the walk in front of the house. He saw the lights turn off, and then the twitch of the curtain in what must be her bedroom. He turned, knowing that she must be watching, and walked back to the car. Winding the crank, he found himself debating with Hamish what to do.

  In the end, he drove off, then left his car down the road, out of sight in a bank of thick shrubbery. On foot, now, he had barely reached her road when he heard the sound of a motorcar coming from the direction of the marshes. There were no lights.

  Standing in deep shadow, he waited. The motorcar was small and there was only a driver to be seen, silhouetted against the clouds out to sea. A woman’s profile, stiff beneath a cloche hat. He watched as she came to the intersection with the main road. Without hesitation she turned out into it, gunning the motor with angry force. The tires screeched in the grit of the road, and then the car was gone, speeding east-toward Cley.

  Rutledge thought, If she finds him before Blevins does, she’ll kill him if she can. For taking away her vengeance.

  Hamish answered, “Aye, she drives yon motorcar like a spear!”

  But there was little chance of her overtaking Walsh. She’d exhaust herself first, and go home. Still, it was his duty to stop her, bring her back to Osterley, and ask Mrs. Barnett to keep an eye on her.

  Time was running out, and time just now was very precious.

  “It’s a gamble, either way,” Hamish agreed. “If she runs afoul of Walsh, there’s trouble. For her and for you. If Blevins canna’ stop the Strong Man, and Walsh kills again while you’re distracted by this woman, it’s on your head.”

  It was a gamble.

  Rutledge made his choice. The most certain outcome of a night of turmoil was losing Walsh. Once the man was safely out of East Anglia, he had every prospect of staying free. He must have laid plans Striding through the darkness back to his own car, Rutledge’s mind outpaced his feet. What would he himself do, in the Strong Man’s shoes? How would he use this one carefully crafted opportunity?

  Hamish answered, “Aye, it was well done, his escape. I canna’ believe he’d leave the rest to chance.”

  “No.”

  Walsh had apparently been a friendly and popular showman, whatever darker shades of his nature lurked beneath the smiling surface. The success of his act had depended on pleasing the public. “Step up, ladies, and test the Strong Man for yourselves… See, here’s a bench, and all you have to do is seat yourselves at either end… Don’t be afraid, you’re as safe as a babe in arms, I won’t drop you.. .. Who’ll wager a bob to see if the Strong Man can pull this carriage as well as any horse… All right, lads, who among you wants to lift the Strong Man’s Iron Hammer…”

  There must be colleagues he could turn to, someone who would offer him temporary shelter, money to move on-and silence. It was, by necessity, a closed fraternity, this showman’s world. People who traveled from place to place to earn their living put down no roots, and counted on the goodwill of their own in place of family. Many of them had had scrapes with the law, and they’d believe Walsh when he claimed he was innocent. The police were a common enemy.

  A closed fraternity also meant that not even the redoubtable Sergeant Gibson at the Yard had a ghost of a chance to trace him once Walsh disappeared into it. Big as he was, he could still vanish. The key was to stop him before he reached that safety.

  Rutledge bent to turn the crank and then got behind the wheel of his motorcar. But if the object of this exercise was to block Walsh’s escape, the question became How? Cutting across country as he was, he could be anywhere.

  Hamish said, “What precipitated his escape?”

  “At a guess, he chose tonight because Franklin was on duty-young enough and naive enough to be gulled. Innocent or guilty, men of Walsh’s ilk don’t rely on justice to set them free. Blevins and his people made no secret of the fact that they were eager to see Walsh hang. Or- perhaps he wanted to find out for himself that Iris Kenneth was alive.”

  “No man would choose to die by the rope,” Hamish reminded him.

  Rutledge turned west. It was instinct and not reason that guided him now. Somewhere before Hunstanton on the north coast, Walsh must pick up the road to King’s Lynn. Key to the rest of England.

  Inland from the coast road were a hundred hills and meadows that would provide better cover. But on the other side of the coin, estates like Lord Sedgwick’s and villages like East Sherham would block Walsh’s path, forcing him slightly north… toward the road.

  Hamish was swift to remind Rutledge that he was counting on unadulterated luck.

  Yet Rutledge had the strongest feeling that if he drove as far west as the turning for Burnham Market, and then began to follow the tangle of roads that led back to the east from there, he might just have that stroke of luck…

  The sky was lighter now; he could no longer see his face reflected in the dark windscreen. And-thank God-never Hamish’s.

  He scanned the horizons, eyes only half on the road.

  A horseman silhouetted against the horizon wouldn’t attract much attention. But Walsh would be no ordinary horseman. He was a huge man on a large, heavy mount, blundering through fields and across plowed land, depending on his sense of direction to keep him heading west. He risked stirring up sheep and their guardian dogs-and eventually someone was bound to see him.

  The marshes on Rutledge’s right were dark expanses of grass and shadow now, caught for an instant in his headlamps and then gone. A badger ambled along the road, picked out by the light, and scuttled into the underbrush around a small clump of trees. A night bird swooped across his path, and eyes followed his passage, gleaming for the space of a heartbeat, and then vanishing in the grasses. This was no place for a man… and Walsh hadn’t been bred to the marshes. They would be a barrier.

  He would avoid them.

  Another seaside town ghosted into view, straggling along the main road, rising out of the marshes before turning toward the vanished sea.

  A uniformed constable stood at the turning, watchful and alert. The message from Blevins, then, had traveled this far west. Rutledge raised a hand, slowing so that the man could see he had no one else in the vehicle. Except Hamish…

  The constable saluted as Rutledge passed.

  The early morning was cool, but he was grateful for the freshness of it, keeping him awake. The tires bumped on the uneven surface of the roadbed and clattered over a small bridge. Buildings loomed and then were gone, trees spread heavy branches over the road, casting deep shadow. From time to time he saw other constables walking the streets or, a straggle of men with them, cutting across country toward outlying farms, poking into hay bales, searching outbuildings, scanning the ground with torches for tracks.

  Ahead was the turning Rutledge was watching for. A church marked it, stark against the sky, malevolent and dark and secretive, huddled beside the road.

  Hamish said, “Yon church is no’ a comfort in this light. Small wonder that half the world is superstitious! The night changes shapes and conjures specters in the shadows.”

  Rutledge thought, Better them than you… He could drive past the rest of them, secure in the knowledge that they wouldn’t follow He headed south now, then turned a little east, passing through village after village, his eyes scanning the fields and peering into the light mist that was rising in the shallow valleys.

  A horseman could pass unseen in its folds. He stopped and scanned the white sea. Later, wishing for his f
ield glasses, he studied one valley with care, but there was only a cluster of thornbushes along a stream, in the haze bent like the backs of hiding men. From time to time there were other constables stationed at crossroads, or climbing through the sheep toward an outbuilding on the side of a hill.

  Wending his way from road to road, still following his instincts, Rutledge traveled in a zigzag back in the direction of Osterley. Down this road-turning here-only to turn back again-all the while searching, making the connection and deciding as he ran through sleeping villages where that war-honed intuition might carry him next.

  It required patience, and a mind focused and determined. Tiring, he stopped once and rubbed his eyes with cold fingers, wishing for a pot of tea and twenty minutes of rest. His nerves, tautly stretched to their limit, kept him awake at the same time they drained his reserves of energy.

  And all the while, Hamish doubted Rutledge’s intuition and his decisions.

  If Rutledge was wrong-if Walsh had gone directly south-then Blevins’s counterparts would be in need of every man available to widen their own search. But were they having any better luck?

  And when full daylight came, what were Walsh’s chances then? How close would he be to Norwich, if that was his goal?

  Thinking of Norwich brought Monsignor Holston to Rutledge’s mind. A priest who searched for shadows outside his window as night drew on, and listened to the creaking of his house, afraid of something he couldn’t identify.

  Like Sims…

  What would Monsignor Holston feel if he knew that the man accused of killing Father James was on his way to Norwich? Fear? Or acceptance But there were no horsemen riding out in the dawn in this part of the county, save for a farm boy kicking the sides of a horse twice his size as he made his way across a stream.