A False Mirror ir-9

by Charles Todd

  “We see only the dead on my side of the coin.”

  “Yes, and speaking of the quick and the dead, I’ve released Mrs. Granville for burial. And I’ll do the same for the maid tomorrow. If you have no objections.”

  “None. But I think I might have discovered the weapon used to bring Hamilton down.” He described his search among the boats hauled up for the night.

  “I didn’t examine Hamilton, but I should think you’re right. Heavy enough to do the job. Long reach, no footprints close by, not much blood splattered on one’s coat or shirtfront. But I’m curious, why didn’t someone intent on beating Hamilton within an inch of his life simply finish the job while he was about it? At that stage it would have taken only a few more blows, surely?”

  “He wanted Hamilton to drown. George Reston’s brother drowned in the same place not long ago-in his case too drunk to drag himself away from the water’s edge. I think our killer remembered that and was hoping Hamilton would go into the sea before anyone discovered him. By the time the body came ashore again, it would be so badly battered that no one would suspect he’d been beaten nearly to death first.”

  “Interesting point. You said he. You know the killer, then?”

  “For want of knowing, he.”

  “Quite. Well, I can tell you it wasn’t a boat hook in the surgery. Not enough room to wield one where we found Mrs. Granville,” Hester reminded him. “And she hadn’t been moved from where she fell.”

  “But it must have been something equally practical. We searched and came up empty-handed.”

  “Because the killer-he or she-took it with him when he carted Hamilton off. And a very wise decision, from his point of view.”

  “Then why didn’t he kill Hamilton once he got him out of the surgery?”

  “Do I have to do all your thinking for you?” Hester asked with a crooked smile. “If he left a body lying about, you’d know there was a third person in that surgery. As long as it was likely that Hamilton walked out under his own power, you’ve got a complication.”

  “And so-speaking hypothetically-our killer left him along the Exeter road, where a lorry driver could find him and save his life a second time.”

  “If the killer had learned that Hamilton was not clear on anything and would stay that way, he might decide to leave him alive to take the blame for Mrs. Granville.” His eyes were sharp, his mind leaping ahead. “Did someone find him on the Exeter road?”

  “Actually a lorry driver found him there. That’s all I’m making public, but the truth seems to be that Hamilton walked out of the surgery and took refuge in the cottage that went over in the landslip. But he had an inkling it was in danger and hid himself next in the henhouse of a farmer who’d gone off to market. At nightfall, he tried to walk down the road and passed out.”

  “My God. Then he killed Mrs. Granville.”

  “He’s confessed to it. But it’s possible someone came for Hamilton, discovered he was gone, and before he could get out of there, Mrs. Granville walked into the surgery.”

  “Where is Hamilton now?”

  “For safety, I’ve put him in his bed at the house, with his wife, Mallory, and Mr. Putnam to guard him.”

  “For safety?” Hester frowned. “Aren’t you taking a chance there?”

  “I don’t think Mallory tried to kill him. And I don’t think Hamilton killed Mrs. Granville.”

  “What can he tell you?”

  “Precious little.”

  “Well, neither can I. Mrs. Granville died of that blow on the head, delivered with some force, mind you. And Nan Weekes was smothered as she slept. There’s nothing new in either case.”

  “Hamilton is in a great deal of pain, as you’d expect. This is the sedative Dr. Granville prescribed for him.” Rutledge handed the box of powders to Hester.

  “Are you telling me you don’t trust my colleague?” Hester demanded. “You think he’s out for revenge, for what happened to Margaret?”

  “I’m not suggesting anything. Hamilton is alive at the moment, and I intend to see that he stays that way. I don’t want to discover too late that someone in the house took liberties with what Dr. Granville prescribed. Are these powders likely to do a great deal of harm if swallowed all at once?”

  Hester examined the contents of one of the sleeves of powder. “They’re stronger than the sedative I left for Mrs. Hamilton, when she was upset. Hamilton is dealing with injuries that he’s very likely aggravated by activity. He’ll require more help. I’m satisfied that this medication is safe, but if I were you, I’d make sure no one else had access to it. Dr. Granville told me you’d had to deal with Mrs. Hamilton. I wouldn’t want her to try again and be more successful.”

  “I’ll be certain to dole out the powders as needed. Personally.”

  “A very wise precaution.” He got up and went to his medical bag. “How has she handled her husband’s return from the dead?”

  “Not very well.”

  “No, I thought not. Here. Take these pills with you too. If Hamilton is still having trouble with his memory and the powders seem to leave him more confused than he ought to be, or if he seems to be agitated while taking them, it might be best to have a choice. A little more pain, perhaps, but he won’t be raving. And if you were hard-pressed, one of these would calm his wife as well.”

  Rutledge stood there, watching him work.

  “Inspector?” Dr. Hester was holding out the packet of pills.

  “Oh. Yes, thank you. If you come up with any suggestions for a murder weapon used for Mrs. Granville, we’ll offer you the next opening at the Yard.”

  “I wouldn’t walk in your shoes for any amount of money. I’m satisfied with my own, thank you very much.”

  Rutledge left, driving from Middlebury back to Hampton Regis. He ignored Hamish, who was busy with arguments of his own, and concentrated on the road.

  The glimmer of an answer that had struck him there in Hester’s office had nothing to support it.

  Intuition, he reminded himself, was a very unreliable gift. A burst of brilliance that showered light on one single corner of the darkness surrounding it and left the rest impenetrable.

  But in the hands of an experienced policeman, intuition could sometimes lead to proof. Given a little luck.

  Rutledge made good time to Hampton Regis, considered his options, and in the end went to the telephone closet at the Duke of Monmouth Inn and put through a call to London.

  He had to wait more than an hour in that stuffy little room, shut in with Hamish and his own thoughts, before the call was returned.

  After a while, Rutledge put in another call to London as well. This time to Inspector Phipps.

  When the man came on the phone, Rutledge said, “I’m told you’ve found the Green Park killer.”

  Phipps answered, “Indeed, yes. A man named Berenson and his wife. She lured the victims there because they didn’t know her, and he strangled them. Revenge, as it happened. They’d swindled him in a financial scheme and he wanted revenge.”

  “Berenson?” He didn’t recognize the name.

  “That man Fields, the one you’d had watched-he told us his sister’s husband wasn’t the only one cheated by the dead men. There were four others in on it, Berenson being only one of them. Fields had been of two minds about helping us with our inquiries. In the end, glad as he was to see rough justice done, he realized it would have been a better lesson if both men had lived to be clapped up in prison. I tried to make the Chief Superintendent aware of your role in turning up Fields, but he didn’t like the man and would have gladly seen him taken up instead.” He cleared his throat. “Mrs. Berenson is quite-pretty. And convincing.”

  “You’re certain of your facts?”

  “Oh, yes. We found the garrote amongst her knitting.”

  “And Constable Waddington?”

  “He received a commendation for his part in the arrests. A good man, that. Chief Superintendent Bowles is impressed with him.”

  Rutledge said n
othing. As he’d thought, Waddington had been eager to protect himself.

  Phipps went on. “I’m to appear in court in fifteen minutes. Is there anything else?”

  Rutledge thanked him and put up the receiver.

  Bringing his attention back to Hampton Regis, he went over everything he knew, and still there was no single motive to explain both the attack on Hamilton and the two subsequent deaths. Murderers killed for a reason-out of fear, greed, jealousy, love, envy, or even sheer hatred. And none of these seemed to fit here. Unless he was completely wrong about Stephen Mallory.

  Hamish reminded him, “Ye canna’ judge him on the way he was in France.”

  “I’m not convinced he’s clever enough-”

  The telephone rang at last, making him jump at the loud jangle that seemed to echo around the tiny room, deafening him. He swore.

  The voice on the other end of the line, apologetic for taking so long to find the information he needed, made Rutledge sit up in the narrow-seated chair and listen with concentration.

  Gibson had paid a visit to the person Rutledge had named, and that led to a bank in Leadenhall Street. What he had to report was enlightening.

  It came down to money, as it so often did.

  But not quite in the way he’d expected.

  29

  Rutledge walked up the hill to Casa Miranda. The sun was strong now, and he thought he heard a blackbird singing somewhere in the distance.

  “Wishful thinking,” Hamish told him sourly. Yet spring came in this part of England long before it touched the Highlands, and in the air today was the scent of warm earth, mixed with the salty cast of the sea.

  When he climbed the stairs to the room Hamilton was using, he found the man awake, propped with pillows. Lines of pain etched his face, but he said briskly, “On Malta the heat is already building. There’s so much white stone, you see. It holds in the warmth. Even the soil is white in the summer. Limestone.”

  “Do you miss it?”

  “In the way you miss anywhere you’ve put down roots, no matter how temporary they may be. It was a lovely house too. A marquis had let it to me, while he was in England. There was a porch, glass enclosed, where I took most of my meals. I could look out across the rooftops toward the Co-Cathedral and the Grandmaster’s Palace.” He sighed. “But you haven’t come, I think, to hear me praise Malta.”

  “Where is Mrs. Hamilton?”

  “In her bed. It’s all been rather much for her. But she’s young, she’ll recover her balance. I’m just afraid of what’s been lost. An innocence that was her greatest charm, and a sense of self that was absolutely absorbing to me. I could-almost-recapture my own youth, watching her.”

  “And Mr. Putnam?”

  “He excused himself for a quarter of an hour to return to the rectory for a change of clothes.”

  “Has Bennett come to see you?”

  “Mallory brought him up while Putnam was still here. He wanted to know about Exeter. I told him that my memory remained hazy at best, that I thought very likely I was continuing to run a fever.”

  “It could be true.”

  “It was. I remember how cold the wind blew as I was walking along that road. I couldn’t stop the chills that racked me. I wasn’t sure where I was going, only that somehow I had to get there.” He hesitated. “Have you told Felicity about Miranda?”

  “I’ll leave that to you. When you feel you can.”

  “Miranda was afraid of me, wasn’t she?”

  “I think, rather, she wasn’t prepared for reminders of the past. She had shut that door. And it’s best left shut.”

  “I would have married her, blind or not.”

  “The blindness worried her more than it did you.”

  “What will you do about Mallory? Do you really believe he wasn’t my assailant? I won’t press charges, you know. It will only make for more gossip and keep the memory of these past few days alive.”

  “You’re a forgiving man.”

  “No. A realistic one. Deep in my core there’s a molten ball of jealousy. But it serves no purpose. And he’s suffered as much as I have.” He shifted his leg. “I hope you’ve brought something to ease this ache. Else I’ll be drunk as a lord by teatime.”

  Rutledge found one of the pills that Dr. Hester had given him. “This should help. I’ve got stronger sedatives as well.”

  “This will do. I can tell you, I’m not eager to find myself in a helpless stupor while murderers climb through the windows.”

  Rutledge thought the man in the bed was more afraid of the outcome than he was willing to admit. But he laughed, as Hamilton was expecting him to do, as he offered him a glass of water. Then he said soberly, “I’ve found the killer, I think. If I’m right, by morning you’ll have your house to yourself again, and it will be finished.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. But we shan’t stay in Hampton Regis, you know. It’s time to turn my back on the sea. And I expect Miranda Cole will be happy to learn I’m not as near to Exeter as I was.”

  “I expect she will.”

  He left Hamilton then, running into Mr. Putnam in the doorway. “I’ve just brought a few things,” he said, “to tide us over. I went to Mallory’s cottage and fetched fresh clothes for him.”

  “Well done. I’ll need to speak to you later. Certainly before dinner.”

  “I shall have to give Dr. Granville a little of my time tonight. We’re choosing the readings for Margaret’s ser vice. And the music. She was very fond of the choir.”

  “By all means, take as long as you need. I’ll be here to spell you.”

  “You know now, don’t you, who is behind all this?” The rector, holding his belongings and Mallory’s in his arms, looked into Rutledge’s face and then away again. “I didn’t think you did this morning, in spite of the dramatic conclusion with that dreadful boat hook.”

  “I was as in the dark as everyone else,” Rutledge confessed.

  “Will you at least tell me what I am to expect?”

  “There’s not much God can do, now, Mr. Putnam. It’s a matter for the law.”

  Rutledge found Mallory, morose and alone, in the sitting room. He raised his head when Rutledge came through the doorway.

  “It’s you,” he said, as if he’d been expecting Felicity Hamilton to find him and offer him anything but the silence in which she’d been wrapped since early morning.

  “Where will you go when this business is over?”

  “Back to Dr. Beatie for a time, to work my way through everything that happened here. After that, abroad, possibly. It’s my turn for exile.”

  “You could still marry happily and put this far behind.”

  “What became of the girl whose photograph you carried with you in France?”

  Rutledge hesitated. “She’s living in Canada now. It didn’t work out for me any more than it did for you and hundreds like us.”

  “I watched Felicity change in just the few days we were shut in here together. I’ve got much to answer for. I understand now how she could have changed so much in three years. We didn’t think about that, in France. We believed England was there, that it would always be just the same as it was when we left. More fools we.”

  “We were too busy staying alive.”

  Mallory took a deep breath. “Do you know yet who’s behind this?”

  “I’ve a very good idea.”

  “I’d like to kill him with my bare hands and save the hangman his trouble.”

  “Do you still have Hamilton’s revolver?”

  “I put it back in the drawer, where I’d found it.”

  “I’d keep it with you tonight. I want you to prepare yourself a pallet on the floor, the far side of Hamilton’s bed. If anyone comes through that door, and you have any reason to worry, shoot first and ask questions later.”

  “Felicity is likely to come in there. I can’t risk shooting her.”

  “Lock her in her room.”

  “She’ll be furious with me!”

 
“Better furious than dead. Will you do as I say?”

  “I don’t have any choice. But you’d better tell Hamilton why I’m armed. He’s likely to have something to say about that.”

  Shortly afterward, Rutledge left the Hamilton house and walked down the hill into Hampton Regis. From a vantage point well out of sight, he waited outside the rectory for an hour and a half.

  At last he saw Dr. Granville leave, carrying his medical bag and walking briskly in the direction of the Mole.

  Rutledge had made sure that Putnam was safely ensconced at Casa Miranda, and now, with Granville gone, the rectory was empty.

  He walked up the drive, cast a glance over his shoulder, and tried the door. It was unlocked.

  Inside, the rectory echoed its Victorian roots, a small house that had grown into a three-story collection of passages and rooms and dead ends to house a growing family. The rector used only a small part of the first floor, meeting his needs with a room in which to sleep and another for what appeared to be an overflow of books from his study. Furnishings in the rest of the bedchambers were sheathed in dust covers.

  Granville had been given the guest room, newly aired. Rutledge, putting his head around the door, saw the doctor’s valise standing under the window and a pair of shoes set neatly by the wardrobe. Granville’s possessions held no interest for him, and he withdrew, continuing his search.

  But Putnam’s belongings did. He scoured the rector’s bedroom and the adjoining dressing room, which had been converted into a bath. Then he went down the steps and repeated his search on the ground floor. He ended in the plant room.

  Rutledge had just put his hands on what he’d been searching for when he heard the hall door of the rectory open and then footsteps in the hall. He put the hammer back into the wooden box with the rest of the rectory tools, exactly as he’d found it, and got to his feet.

  Hamish, warning him with a sharp word, added, “He’s away up the stairs.”