by Charles Todd
“I understand that the Captain had spent some time here before 1914. He and Colonel Harris weren’t acquainted then?”
“Charles was in Egypt, I think, the summer my husband died. And Lettice of course was away at school.”
“The wedding arrangements, then. They appeared to be progressing smoothly?”
“As far as I know. Lettice has ordered her gown, and next week she was to go to London for the first fitting. The invitations have been sent to the printer, flowers chosen for the wedding breakfast, plans for the wedding trip made—I doubt if Mark would have objected if Lettice had wished to go to the moon! And Charles doted on her, he wouldn’t have begrudged her anything her heart desired. She only needed to ask. What was there to quarrel about?”
Mrs. Davenant made the marriage sound idyllic, such a piece of high romance that even death couldn’t stand in its way. And yet in the three days since Charles Harris had been found murdered, Lettice had apparently not asked to see Wilton. Nor, as far as he, Rutledge, knew, had Wilton gone to Mallows.
He was about to pursue that line of thought when the sitting-room door opened and Captain Wilton walked across the threshold.
He was wearing country tweeds, and they became him as well as his uniform must have done, fitting his muscular body with an air of easy elegance. The newspaper photographs of him standing before the King had not done him justice. He was as fair as his cousin, his eyes as dark a blue, and he fit the popular conception of “war hero” to perfection.
“Wrap a bluidy bandage around his forehead, gie him a sword in one hand and a flag in the other, and he’d do for a recruitment poster,” Hamish remarked sourly. “Only they bombed poor sods in the trenches, those fine airmen, and shot other pilots down in flames. I wonder now, is burning to death worse than smothering in the mud?”
Rutledge shivered involuntarily.
Wilton greeted Rutledge with a nod, making the same comment that his cousin had made earlier. “You must be the man from London.”
“Inspector Rutledge. I’d like to talk to you, if you don’t mind.” He glanced at Mrs. Davenant. “If you would excuse us?”
She rose with smiling grace and said, “I’ll be in the garden if you want to see me again before you go.” She gave her cousin a comfortable glance, and left the room, shutting the door gently behind her.
“I don’t know what questions you may have,” Wilton said at once, setting his walking stick in a stand by the door and taking the chair she had vacated. “But I can tell you that I wasn’t the person who shot Charles Harris.”
“Why should I think you were?” Rutledge asked.
“Because you aren’t a fool, and I know how Forrest danced around his suspicions, hemming and hawing over my abrupt departure from Mallows on Sunday evening and wanting to know what Charles and I were discussing that next morning when that damned fool Hickam claims to have seen us in the lane.”
“As a point of interest, did you and the Colonel meet on Monday morning? In the lane or anywhere else, for that matter?”
“No.” The single word was unequivocal.
“What was your quarrel about after dinner on the night before the murder?”
“It was a personal matter, nothing to do with this enquiry. You may take my word for it.”
“There are no personal matters when it comes to murder,” Rutledge said. “I’ll ask you again. What were you discussing that Sunday evening after Miss Wood went up to her room?”
“And I’ll tell you again that it’s none of your business.” Wilton was neither angry nor irritated, only impatient.
“Did it have anything to do with your marriage to Miss Wood?”
“We didn’t discuss my marriage.” Rutledge took note, however, of the change in wording. My, not our.
“Then did you discuss the settlement? Where you’d live after the wedding? How you’d live?”
Muscles around his mouth tightened, but he answered readily enough. “That had all been worked out months before. The settlement was never a problem. Lettice has her own money. We’d live in Somerset, where I have a house, and visit here as often as she liked.” He hesitated, then added, “I’d expected, after the war, to go into aircraft design. Next to flying it’s what I wanted most to do. Now—I’m not as sure as I was.”
“Why not?” When Wilton didn’t answer immediately, Rutledge continued, “For reasons of money?”
Wilton shook his head impatiently. “I’m tired of killing. I spent four years proving that the machines I flew were good at it. And that’s all His Majesty’s ministers want to hear about aeroplanes at the moment, how to make them deadlier. My mother’s people are in banking; there are other choices open to me.” But there was a bleakness in his voice.
Rutledge responded to it, recognizing it. He himself had debated the wisdom of returning to the Yard, coming back to the business of murder. Before the war it had been another facet of the law his father had given a lifetime to upholding. Now—he had seen too many dead bodies…. Yet it was what he knew best.
Then, bringing himself up sharply, he said more harshly than he had intended, “Have you seen Miss Wood since her guardian’s death?”
Wilton seemed surprised that it should matter to Rutledge. “No, as a matter of fact, I haven’t.”
“She apparently has no other family. Under the circumstances, it would be natural for you to be at her side.”
“And so I would be, if there was anything I might do for her!” he retorted stiffly. “Look, I went to Mallows as soon as I heard the news. Dr. Warren was already there, and he said she needed rest, that the shock had been severe. I sent up a message by Mary—one of the maids—but Lettice was already asleep. Warren warned me that it could be several days before she recovered sufficiently to see anyone. I’ve made an effort to respect his judgment. Under the circumstances, as you so aptly put it, there isn’t much else I can do, as long as she’s asleep in her bedroom.”
But she hadn’t been asleep when Rutledge called….
“Dr. Warren has been sedating her, then?”
“What do you think? She was wild at first, she insisted that she be taken to Charles at once. Which of course Warren could hardly do! And then she collapsed. She lost both her parents when she was four, and I don’t suppose she remembers them clearly. Charles has been the only family she’s known.”
Rutledge took the opening he’d been given. “Tell me what sort of person Charles Harris was.”
Wilton’s eyes darkened. “A fine officer. A firm friend. A loving guardian. A gentleman.”
It sounded like an epitaph written by a besotted widow, something Queen Victoria might have said about Prince Albert in a fit of high-flown passion.
“Which tells me absolutely nothing.” Rutledge’s voice was quiet, but there was a crackle to it now. “Did he have a temper? Was he a man who carried a grudge? Did he make enemies easily, did he keep his friends? Was he a heavy drinker? Did he have affairs? Was he honest in his business dealings?”
Wilton frowned, his elbows on the chair arm, his fingers steepled before his face, half concealing it. “Yes, he had a temper, but he’d learned long ago to control it. I don’t know if he carried grudges or not, but most of his friends were Army, men he’d served with for many years. I don’t know if he had enemies—I never heard of any, unless you wish to include that idiot Mavers. As for his drinking, I’ve seen Charles drunk—we all got drunk in France, when we could—but he was a moderate drinker as a rule, and affairs with women must have been discreet. I’ve never heard him described as a womanizer. You’ll have to ask Royston about business matters, I’ve no idea how they stand.”
“You met Harris during the war?”
“In France just at the end of 1914. In spite of the differences in age and rank we became friends. A year ago, when he heard I was coming out of hospital, he brought me to Mallows for the weekend. That’s when I met his ward. If he had secrets, he managed to keep them from me. I saw nothing vicious, mean, or unworthy in the
man.” The hands had come down, as if the need for them as a shield had passed.
This was a better epitaph, but still no help to Rutledge, who wanted the living flesh and blood and bone of the man.
“And yet he died violently in a quiet English meadow this past Monday morning, and while everyone tells me he was a good man, no one seems to be in any particular haste to find his killer. I find that rather curious.”
“Of course we want the killer found!” Wilton responded, coloring angrily. “Whoever it is deserves to hang, and what I can do, I shall do. But I can’t think of any reason why Charles should have been shot, and you damned well wouldn’t thank me for muddying the waters for you with wild, useless conjectures!”
“Then we’ll start with facts. When did you leave this house on Monday morning? Where did you go?”
“At half past seven.” Wilton had gotten himself under control again, but his words were still clipped. “Exercise strengthens my knee. On Monday I followed the lane that runs just behind the church and up the hill beyond, skirting Mallows. I reached the crest of the ridge, went on toward the old mill ruins on the far side of it, which lie near the bridge over the Ware, then returned the same way.”
This was not the lane where Hickam claimed to have seen the Colonel and the Captain having words. “Did you hear the shot that killed him? Or sounds of the search—men shouting or calling?”
“I heard no shooting at all. I ran into one of the farm people on my way home, and he told me what had happened. It was a shock.” He stirred suddenly, as if reminded of it. “I couldn’t really believe it. My first thought was for Lettice, and I went straight to Mallows.”
“Did you meet anyone during your walk?”
“Two people. A farmer’s child who had lost her doll and was sitting on a stump crying. I spoke to her, told her I’d keep an eye open for the doll, and asked if she knew her way home. She said she did, she often came that way to pick wildflowers for her mother. Later I saw Helena Sommers. She was on the ridge with her field glasses and didn’t stop, just waved her hand.”
“What about the Colonel’s man of business, Royston? He went down to the stables looking for Harris and got there just as the horse came in without its rider. In time, in fact, to direct the search. Do you think he’s honest? Or is there the possibility that the meeting he was expecting to have with the Colonel at nine-thirty might have been one he had reasons to prevent?”
“Do you mean, for example, that Royston may have been cheating Charles, embezzling or whatever, had been caught, and expected to be sacked at nine-thirty, when Charles came in?” He frowned again, considering the possibility. “I suppose he could have reached the meadow ahead of Charles, shot him, and made it home again before the horse arrived in the stable yard. Assuming he took the shortcut over the stile and the riderless horse stuck to the track. But you can’t count on horses, can you? Not if they’re frightened.”
Rutledge thought, No one has mentioned a shortcut—
“But Charles never spoke to me about any trouble with Royston,” Wilton continued, “and of course there’s the shotgun. He hadn’t taken one from Mallows. Forrest checked those straightaway.”
“I’ve heard someone say that it would have been less surprising to hear you were the victim, not Harris.” Across the room Rutledge saw Sergeant Davies stir as if to stop him from betraying Lettice Wood.
But Captain Wilton was laughing. “You mean Lettice’s other suitors might have had it in for me? I can’t see either Haldane or Carfield lying in wait to murder me. Can you, Sergeant?” The laughter died suddenly and a shadow passed over the Captain’s face. “That’s foolishness,” he added, but with less conviction.
Rutledge left the questioning there and took his leave.
Mark Wilton waited until he had heard the front door close behind the two policemen, then sat down again in his chair. He wondered if they had spoken to Lettice, and what she had said to them. What would she say to him, if he went to Mallows now? He couldn’t bring himself to think about Charles Harris’s death, only what difference it might make. He closed his eyes, head back against the chair. Oh, God, what a tangle! But if he kept his wits about him—if he was patient, and his love for Lettice didn’t trip him up, it would all come right in the end. He had to believe that….
As Rutledge and the Sergeant let themselves out, they saw Mrs. Davenant coming toward them with a basket of cut flowers, roses and peonies with such a rich, heavy scent that Rutledge was reminded of funerals.
“I’m sending these to Lettice, to cheer her a little. Have you talked with that man Mavers? I wouldn’t put anything past him, not even murder! We’d be well rid of him, believe me. He was haranguing people in the market square on Monday morning. Nobody really paid any attention to him—they seldom do. Making a nuisance of himself, that’s all he thinks of!”
Rutledge thanked her, and she went back to her flowers, humming a little under her breath in quiet satisfaction.
As the car pulled away from the gate, Hamish said unexpectedly, “The Captain’s a right fool! And too handsome for his own good. If a husband didn’t want him dead, a woman might.”
Ignoring the voice, Rutledge turned to Davies and said, “Where can I find Daniel Hickam? We might as well talk to him and get it over with.”
“I don’t know, sir. He lives in his mother’s cottage at the edge of the village—just ahead there, that ramshackle one beyond the straggling hedge.” He pointed to a swaybacked cottage so old that it seemed to be collapsing of its own weight, a bit at a time, and leaving in doubt whether it would go first in the center or at the walls. “She’s dead, and he’s taken over the place, doing odd jobs where he can to earn his food.”
They stopped by the hedge and went to knock at the door, but there was no answer. Davies lifted the latch and peered inside. The single room was dark and cluttered, but empty.
“He must be in town, then.”
So they drove on into Upper Streetham, and saw Laurence Royston coming from the post office. Sergeant Davies pointed him out, and Rutledge looked him over.
He was in his late thirties or early forties, already graying at the temples, neither plain nor particularly attractive, but he carried himself well and had that appearance of solidity which people seem instinctively to trust, whether trust is justified or not. His face was square, with a straight nose, a stubborn chin and a well-defined jaw set above a heavy neck and broad shoulders.
Rutledge blew his horn and Royston turned at the sound, frowning at the unknown man in the unfamiliar vehicle. Then he noticed Sergeant Davies in the other seat and came over to them as the car pulled into a space between two wagons.
“Inspector Rutledge. I’ve taken over the Harris case, and I’d like to talk to you if I may.”
Royston stuffed the mail he was carrying into his coat pocket and said, “Here?”
Rutledge suggested the bar at the Shepherd’s Crook, half-empty at this time of day, where they ordered coffee from Redfern. When he’d gone, Royston said, “I’ve never had such a shock in my life as Charles’s death. Even when I saw the grooms holding his horse, and blood all over the saddle, I thought he was hurt. Not dead. I thought—I don’t know what I thought. My God, the man came through two wars with hardly a scratch! There’s the Boer musket ball in his leg still, and a German sniper got him in the left shoulder in France, but even that wasn’t particularly serious. I never imagined—” He shook his head. “It was horrible, a nightmare you can’t accept as real.”
“You were expecting to meet the Colonel that morning at nine-thirty?”
“Yes. For our regular discussion of the day’s work. He liked to be involved when he could. My father told me once that he felt Colonel Harris had had a difficult time deciding between the traditional family career in the Army and staying at home to run Mallows. And you could see that it might be true. So when he was there I kept him informed of everything that was happening.”
“Why did you go down to the stables?”
“There was nothing set for discussion that you were glad of an excuse to postpone?”
Royston looked up from his coffee with something like distaste on his face. “If anything, I’d have been glad to postpone going into Warwick. I had an appointment with my dentist.”
Rutledge smiled, but made a mental note to check on that. “How long have you worked for the Colonel?”
“About twenty years, now. I took over when my father died of a heart attack. I didn’t know what else to do; Charles was out in South Africa. When he got home, he liked the way I’d managed the estate and asked me to stay on. It was a rare opportunity at my age, I was only twenty. But I’d grown up at Mallows, you see, I knew as much about the place as anyone. Charles could have found a far more experienced man, but I think he was glad to have someone who actually cared. That was the way he did things. He looked after his land, the men serving under him, and of course Miss Wood, to the best of his ability.”
“And you’ll go on running the estate now?”
Royston’s eyebrows shot up. “I don’t know. God, I hadn’t even thought about it. But surely Miss Wood will inherit Mallows? There’s no family—”
“I haven’t seen the Colonel’s will. Is there a copy here, or must I send to his solicitors in London?”
“There’s a copy in his strongbox. He left it there, in the event he was killed—with the Army, I mean. It’s sealed, of course, I don’t know what it says, but I see no reason why I shouldn’t give it to you, if you think it will help.”
“Why would anyone shoot Colonel Harris?”
Royston’s face darkened. “Mavers might’ve. He’s the kind of man who can’t make anything of himself, so he tries to drag down his betters. He’s run on about the Bolsheviks for nearly a year now, and how they shot the Czar and his family to clear the way for reforms. I wouldn’t put it past the bastard to think that killing the Colonel might be the closest he could come to doing the same.”