A Fearsome Doubt ir-6

by Charles Todd

  Rutledge, driving out into the square, said, “No-!”

  Dowling said, “Be sensible, man, we need them. Adams carried Burke to the crossroads, and he’ll be staying there, with another man.”

  But where would Hamish sit-!

  Rutledge fought down sheer panic, reminding himself that it was an illogical reaction. Hamish lived in his head, however often the voice seemed to come from just behind his shoulder. And yet he was so accustomed to the reality of Hamish in the seat behind him that he couldn’t breathe at the thought of men crowding him out, sending the dead Scot to jostle with Dowling for space in front. Rutledge had lived in dread for three years that he would turn one day and come face to face with the voice whose owner he never saw, that no one heard, that was the Nemesis in his mind It took a formidable act of will to accept Dowling’s proposition.

  They found the young constable, Weaver, his face shiny with nervous sweat, standing at the gate to the doctor’s surgery, and even as they drew up and the constable stepped into the motorcar, Pugh came running out his door, bag in hand, to join him in the rear seat.

  Dr. Pugh was a slim man in his fifties, with a high forehead and an air of competence. “I’ve had to put off the rest of my patients,” he said. “I hope this isn’t a mad scramble for nothing. Weaver says Adams didn’t see the body.”

  They drove quickly out of Marling, and at the crossroads-where Harry Bartlett had been killed the night Rutledge was driving Elizabeth Mayhew home from the Hamiltons’ party-he could recall clearly the German’s face in his headlamps, eyes wide and alarmed. Where was Hauser now?

  Burke nodded to the two men manning the block across the road, and climbed into the motorcar beside the doctor. Rutledge could feel the springs dip under Burke’s weight, and he felt, too, the claustrophobic sense of humanity crowding in around him, cutting off escape and air, thrusting Hamish into the forefront of his brain.

  Burke was saying, “-It’s not likely we’ll find our man at the cottage, sir; by now he’s more than likely well on his way to wherever it is he goes to earth.”

  “That’s as may be,” Dowling answered sharply. “But this is the closest we’ve been to him. We’ll make the best of it.”

  Silence fell, and the sound of the motor was clear in the fading light, a reminder of speed. But not fast enough to satisfy Rutledge, as Hamish grumbled incessantly from the direction of Sergeant Burke’s lap. Rutledge drove grimly, increasing his speed in spite of the wet and rutted road.

  He had passed fields, several farms, and was coming up on the small stand of trees that led to Brereton’s cottage when Dowling said, “We ought to pull up here. No need to spoil whatever prints may be there.”

  Rutledge stopped the car, and waited as they all alighted. As the cool air blew through the open vehicle, he could feel relief sweeping over him as if a veil were being lifted. The chiding voice in his head subsided, and he shook himself like a dog, half a shiver, half a shudder.

  Getting out to follow the others, he kept his eyes on the road. Among the wagon tracks, droppings, imprints of tires, and the footprints of a man in heavy boots, there was nothing of interest. Their killer would have been too clever to leave his mark in the mud when he could walk on the grassy verge-he’d already shown himself to be careful and elusive… adept at escaping detection.

  Rutledge caught the other men up as they turned in the gate. The bicycle was gone, and he pointed this out to Inspector Dowling.

  “Then he’s well ahead of us, I’m afraid,” Dowling answered with a sigh.

  The door was ajar, apparently the way Adams had left it in his haste to report to the police. A neat stack of firewood covered with a tarpaulin stood to the east of the house, and Adams must have looked in to ask for his money after delivering it.

  As they began to push the door wider, Lucinda came to greet them, her tail high as she made a sound of welcome. Sergeant Burke scooped her up and held her against his chest as he stepped into the cottage.

  The room was not wrecked, as Rutledge had expected, but there were unarguable signs of a struggle-books scattered, a lamp and chairs overturned, a table on end, and what appeared to be blood drying in front of the hearth; Lucinda had stepped in it at some point: her prints led across the patch and back onto the bare floorboards.

  There was also a smear of blood on one wall and streaks on an overturned chair, drops scattered here and there as dark spots on polished surfaces and the floor.

  Of Brereton, alive or dead, there was no sign.

  But most telling was a bottle of wine spilled on the table and running down to puddle on the edge of a bit of carpeting. Two glasses sat next to the bottle, one of them still a quarter full.

  As Sergeant Burke, putting down the cat, moved heavily toward the other rooms calling Brereton’s name, Dr. Pugh saw the wine and went over to lift it, sniffing the contents.

  “Laudanum?” Rutledge asked.

  “I shouldn’t be surprised, but I’ll have to test it to be sure.” The doctor put out a finger as if considering tasting the wine in the glass, then prudently changed his mind.

  Dowling was squatting by the pool of blood on the hearth. Weaver, following Burke, looked rather green.

  Rutledge said, “Judging by the blood we’ve seen so far, how seriously wounded was Brereton?”

  “It would depend on where the wound was located. Not an artery, of course, there’s no pattern to show that. Still-” Pugh turned to walk on into the kitchen and stopped short. “Look. It would appear someone dragged himself across the floor here!”

  Burke was already examining the drying streaks. “But they stop just outside the kitchen door there,” he pointed out. “And Mr. Brereton’s body isn’t in the house.”

  Rutledge stepped around the doctor and looked at the smears. Were they drag marks, where something heavy had been pulled toward the door? Or had someone crawled, half dragging himself, toward the only means of escape?

  “The question is,” he said, “where’s Brereton? Trying to hide in the woods-or already half buried in the leaves somewhere out there? Would the killer have taken the time to hide a corpse? Or was he interrupted by Adams arriving on the scene, and Brereton got away?”

  Inspector Dowling, scanning the trees beyond the garden, said, “We’ll need a score of men to search out there.”

  Sergeant Burke reminded his inspector, “We can’t wait for a search party. He might be bleeding to death right now.”

  Dr. Pugh said, “I’ll make a cursory search.” With the constable at his heels, he stepped beyond the smears and out the door, moving along the grassy path that bordered the small kitchen garden and the herb bed. Stopping at a garden shed, Pugh peered inside, pulling the door open only as far as needed. He looked up again at the men in the kitchen, shaking his head. Taking care to observe where he put his feet, he moved rapidly toward the boundary of the cottage and the beginning of the wood. “Nothing so far,” he called to the watching men. “I can’t see anything to indicate there’s been a body dragged along here. Still-even if Brereton had passed out, he might have come to his senses and managed to walk away under his own power.”

  Burke stepped back into the house. “The odd thing is,” he said, “that this attack happened well before dark today. Not like the others. Sir, should someone be sent along to Mr. Masters’s house, to be sure there’s been no trouble there? It’s little more than a mile by the road.”

  “With servants in the house, Sergeant, they shouldn’t be in immediate danger. Our priority right now is Brereton. Unless there’s a path that Brereton might have taken through the woods, trying to reach help?”

  Burke shouted the question to Weaver, still searching, and got the reply “No, sir, no path that I can see.” Unsatisfied, Burke said, “I’ll just have a look on my own, sir, as it’s getting on toward dark.”

  Rutledge crossed to the sink in the kitchen and saw that there were no dishes waiting to be washed up, possibly indicating that Brereton cleared away after his luncheon. And t
he stove was banked. But then Brereton often dined with the Masterses rather than make his own evening meal. The buffer between Raleigh’s temper and his wife’s anxiety… A high price for a good dinner.

  He tried to picture the scene as it might have occurred. Had Brereton answered the door, expecting to find Adams arriving with the wood? And instead was greeted by someone else standing there, smiling and expecting to be invited in?

  Hamish said, “You canna’ tell. The fire’s no’ lit, he may have been in the garden, clearing out a place for the wood.”

  Rutledge called to Dowling, who was inspecting the rest of the house. “How trustworthy is this man Adams?”

  “Completely, I’d say. Church sexton, thirty years a farmer. His sister is the housekeeper to the rector. I’d as soon believe Sergeant Burke was a murderer.”

  Lucinda came to rub against Rutledge’s legs, recognizing a familiar scent.

  “She’s verra’ calm,” Hamish said.

  “Yes, I’d observed that as well,” Rutledge answered him thoughtfully. “But then whatever happened here is over. There’s nothing to frighten her now-no loud noises, no angry, raised voices.”

  Burke, coming back through the kitchen door, reported, “If there’s a path, I can’t find it.”

  Dr. Pugh, following him, added, “There’s no sign of Brereton-and I called out, identifying myself. Weaver is still searching, but the light has gone, and it’s dark under the trees.”

  Cleaning his feet on the scraper by the kitchen door, he walked back into the sitting room and shook his head as he studied the signs of struggle. “I’ve met Tom Brereton. He’s come to me on Mrs. Masters’s behalf a number of times, and I know of course about losing his eyesight. All the same, he was a soldier, and I’d say he was well able to defend himself. Unlike the other victims, who had to deal with crutches. Hurt, of course-there’s the blood in the sitting room. Still, even assuming he drank any of that drugged wine, he must have inflicted some damage of his own. But where is he now?”

  Rutledge said, thinking aloud, “We don’t know how badly his attacker was hurt, do we? Brereton might well have turned the tables and gone after him. ”

  Sergeant Burke was making notes, a rough diagram of the house, then the sitting room sketched in and an X marking the location of each visible bloodstain. He said, “Mr. Brereton’s a clever man. He would have come directly to Inspector Dowling and reported the identity of his assailant. My guess is, he was dragged into the kitchen while Adams was stacking the wood, and then was carried off to hide the body.” As Weaver walked back into the house, Burke added, “We’ll have to have that stack of wood taken down. Weaver? Get on it, man!”

  Dowling, coming back into the sitting room, nodded. “I agree.”

  But Hamish, who had spent the last ten minutes arguing in Rutledge’s head, did not. “He talked to you about the wine,” he reminded Rutledge. “He would ha’ been suspicious as soon as he saw it.”

  Rutledge, standing to one side, was reviewing his last conversation with Brereton in light of Hamish’s adamant stand.

  He had wondered then if Brereton in his roundabout fashion was making a confession. If the man was already contemplating disappearing, would he have staged his own death?

  It would have had the opposite effect. Another murder would have galvanized the police into furious action. It would be far simpler to say that he needed more specialized eye care and to make arrangements with Raleigh and Bella Masters for the care of the cottage and of the cat.

  No, very likely Brereton was what he seemed. A victim. But why in the daylight? Rutledge came again to that question, and Hamish answered it.

  “Here it’s as isolated as anywhere on the road. And I canna’ believe he’d open his door after dark, but in the daylight he would-he did when you called. He had all his limbs, aye, but he was going blind. Nearly as bad as losing a leg-if the murderer canna’ abide the sairly wounded…”

  But why would Hauser come here and slaughter Brereton? Was he truly searching for Jimsy Ridger, or had that been a ruse from the start?

  Rutledge walked through the house again, looking with care at the scene in the sitting room.

  Dowling was searching now for the weapon, poking about behind the furniture, looking in the hearth.

  Brereton would have let the German into the house, if Hauser had used Elizabeth’s name. Yet the bottle of wine would have put him instantly on his guard. He himself had told Rutledge that wine was key to the investigation.

  Unless Elizabeth had sent Hauser to Brereton, surely against Hamilton’s orders to stay out of it, and Brereton, jealous, himself had brought out the wine.

  “He fetched Raleigh Masters’s medicines for Mrs. Masters. Laudanum for pain and the moodiness…” Hamish suggested.

  Rutledge turned to Dr. Pugh. “Did you prescribe laudanum for Mr. Masters?”

  Pugh, watching the drawing Burke was completing, said, with some surprise, “Dr. Talbot in London prescribed it, among other drugs. It was agreed I’d see that the supply was replenished as needed. Going back to Harley Street so frequently was difficult for Mrs. Masters-sadly, her husband sometimes refused to allow it.”

  Brereton-victim-or murderer? Either way, Melinda Crawford would be distressed. She had intended to remember Brereton in her will, because of his approaching blindness. Pitying him, as she had once pitied Peter Webber’s father and taken the tired ex-soldier to his house in her carriage.

  Hamish said, “Aye. One soldier will trust another. Brereton would find it easier than most to walk a distance with a man on crutches, and then offer him a drink to pass the time.”

  It was falling into place.

  Rutledge felt an urgent need to find Elizabeth Mayhew and make certain she was safe.

  Dowling had finished his search. Rutledge said to him, “I’m going back to Marling. Is there anything or anyone you need to be brought back here?”

  Dowling turned to Pugh. “Doctor, are you ready to go back?”

  “I’ve already missed my afternoon hours. I’ll stay until we are sure Brereton doesn’t need me.”

  “Weaver’s just finishing up. I’ll send him with you, Rutledge. He can find us some six or a dozen men to walk through the wood back there. They’ll need to bring lanterns, oil, all the torches they can lay hand to. If Mr. Brereton’s out there somewhere, the sooner we find him the better. Alive or dead.”

  The young constable was silent most of the way back to Marling. Tired and grubby from unstacking the wood, he picked at a splinter in the palm of his hand, looking up once to say to Rutledge in disbelief, “We’ve not been away more than an hour!” After a bit he added, “I was glad not to uncover him amongst the wood. The others were asleep, like. Not bloody. Do you think he’s dead, then?”

  Rutledge, busy with his own thoughts, had no wish for conversation. But he said, remembering Janet Cutter’s son George, who had not liked touching dead bodies, “I wish I knew.”

  He dropped Constable Weaver at the police station and then drove on to Elizabeth Mayhew’s house.

  She greeted him with open hostility.

  “He’s not here. I don’t know where he is. Lawrence made me promise I’d not try to contact him. I ought to hate you.”

  “No,” he said, with more gentleness than he felt. At least she was safe-“You know I haven’t had much choice in any of this.”

  “You can’t blame duty for callousness.”

  He let it go. “Elizabeth. Tom Brereton’s missing-”

  Her face tightened with shock. “What do you mean -missing?”

  “Just that. The cottage is empty, there’s furniture overturned, blood everywhere, and no sign of him. Or of whoever came to call on him. And there’s a bottle of wine on the table. Most of it spilled out onto the floor, but there’s probably enough left to tell us if anything has been added to it.”

  “Because of his blindness? But I thought only amputees were being killed!” Her hands covered her mouth. “I don’t understand-have you come for
Gunter again-because of Tom?”

  “I’ve come on my own. Inspector Dowling is still at the cottage, and they’re searching the wood that lies behind it. The problem is, we don’t know anything at this stage, but people will start pointing fingers soon. And it would be much better if I found Hauser myself, rather than wait for Dowling to do it. Time’s short, you see, and the longer it takes to catch up to him, the more suspicious it will look.”

  “I tell you, Lawrence forbade me to speak to him-”

  “Then I’ll go find Hamilton.”

  “Take me with you!” Before he could argue, she ran for her coat and came back again, pulling it on with urgency.

  Hamish reminded him, “Better under your eye!” It was true.

  As they got into the motorcar, Elizabeth said, “Ian, I’m sorry. Lately we’ve been at each other’s throats, and I think it’s worry, and the strangeness of all of this business.”

  And the fear, he thought but didn’t say aloud. She wouldn’t hear a word against Hauser, in her foolish certainty that he was all she believed him to be. But beneath that determined defense was, Rutledge knew, the niggling fear that she could be wrong.

  When he didn’t at first respond, she went on. “I love you dearly, I always have. I always will. But I’m not Richard’s wife any longer. We can’t go back to that old comfortable life again-and you can’t protect me from the consequences of his death. I have to make my own way.” Then she added forlornly, “It’s just that nothing seems to be working out the way it should-nothing seems to be right- ”

  Lydia admitted them to the Hamilton house, startled by Rutledge’s grimness and the pallor of Elizabeth’s face. She led them to the room that Hamilton used for his study and, after a nod from her husband, went out again, shutting the door behind her.

  Without preamble, Rutledge said, “Do you know where I can find your client?”

  “He said he was going to Maidstone. Something about searching there for a relative’s grave.”

  Jimsy Ridger’s, more than likely. Or looking for any of Ridger’s surviving family, who might have that damned cup?