by Charles Todd
Mrs. Branch did glance over her shoulder then before saying, “Stay here. I’ll bring it to you.” Using her own foot, she shoved Mrs. Ashton’s out of the way and, before either of us could move, shut the door with what amounted to a slam.
Mrs. Ashton turned to me. “Well. There appears to be a dead hen after all.”
Before I could answer, Mrs. Branch was back with a red hen, limp and very dead.
I inspected it. “There’s no indication that it was killed by a dog,” I said, touching the smooth feathers. “I rather think you’d already decided on this one for your own dinner.”
“It was a dog,” she said stubbornly. “I saw it with my own eyes.”
“You’re a liar,” Mrs. Ashton said, unable to stop herself. “And you know you are. Enjoy your dinner, Mrs. Branch. I shall tell Constable Hood what I’ve just seen. And while I’m there, I shall bring charges against you for falsely accusing Nan. I hope whoever put you up to this has paid you well. You will need it to cover your fine.”
She turned and walked away. Mrs. Branch, looking from me to Mrs. Ashton’s retreating back, said hurriedly, “Here! I may’ve been mistaken about the dog. I saw it through the window. I may’ve been wrong about whose it was. I’ll speak to Constable Hood myself and tell him so.”
“It’s too late,” I said and prepared to walk away myself. “The damage has already been done. You might tell your visitor for me that he has overstepped himself. I saw him over your shoulder just now.”
And I too left her standing there.
“I’ll find you another dog,” she called, her voice anxious. “I swear I will.”
But we didn’t stop or look back.
CHAPTER NINE
CATCHING UP WITH Mrs. Ashton, I said, “I’m nearly sure there was someone else in the house with Mrs. Branch. It’s why we weren’t invited to come inside.”
Mrs. Ashton glanced at me. “Can you describe whoever it was?” There was a note in her voice that told me she was more interested than she appeared to be.
“I can’t. It was the merest glimpse. A shadow moving away, toward the stairs.”
“Constable Hood?”
“That was my first thought. But she didn’t know, did she, that Nan was still at the Hall and safe? It must have been someone else. Who would prefer not to be seen? Do you have any idea?”
She was looking straight ahead now. “I don’t. One of her brother’s friends? Or her son’s? They must look in on her from time to time. And it would be just like one of them not to want to be involved.”
“Why would anyone wish to see Nan put down? Unless it was done to torment Mr. Ashton.”
“I don’t know. Why would someone wish to torment any of us?” There was despair in her voice. “I dare not let my guard down ever, because there’s no way of knowing what will happen to us next.”
I turned to look back at the Branch house. Was there someone at the window watching us, making certain we were gone? I wouldn’t have been at all surprised.
All around me the land was flat, with nowhere for me to stand and wait for whoever was in that house to leave. I tried to recall precisely what I’d seen. But there was nothing to distinguish the figure in the shadows. Perhaps it was a friend, come to buy eggs or borrow a cup of flour. But my first impression had been a man, not another woman standing there, and I wanted very much to know who it was.
Mrs. Ashton was already at the head of the lane, turning toward the abbey wall. She glanced over her shoulder to see what was keeping me. I waved her on. “I think I’ve dropped my little watch. The pin has been loose for some time. I’ll just retrace my steps and look for it.”
“I don’t think you were wearing it this afternoon,” she said.
She was right, it was lying on the dressing table in my room.
“Still,” I said. “I just want to make sure. I won’t go as far as the cottage.”
“I can’t go back there. I’ll walk on, shall I? Will you be all right?”
“Yes, of course.”
She hesitated, and then went on.
Pretending to search for the little watch, I scouted about until she was out of sight, and then, as if giving up, I too walked on.
But when I came to the corner of the abbey wall, I stopped where the spreading limbs of a tree gave me a little protection, and waited.
Half an hour later, I was about to give up my post and return to the Hall when the door of Mrs. Branch’s cottage opened and a man stepped out.
I stood very still, fearing that even at that distance he might spot me waiting.
But he didn’t come my way. Instead he walked down to the water, where the fishing boats had once put in, and stood there, looking out toward the sea.
He wasn’t wearing a cap, but he was in uniform. An officer, I was sure of it. And I could see that his hair was cut like that of an officer. What’s more, there was a noticeable limp in his gait.
I needed to ask Mrs. Ashton or Mark whose son or husband or brother this might be. But Mrs. Ashton hadn’t waited for me.
By the time I reached the Hall, Mrs. Ashton was not in her sitting room. I couldn’t be sure whether she had gone upstairs or out to her private garden. Either way, it was clear she didn’t want company just now.
Mark, on the other hand, was in his father’s study, and I put my question to him.
“An officer?” He had poured himself a glass of whisky, and he took a drink before he answered me. “Why do you ask?”
“I hadn’t noticed anyone else in an officer’s uniform in Cranbourne. Until today. I wondered who he might be. Were there many officers from this village?”
“Sadly, no. Let me see. Hobson was killed at Mons. Ford and Aubrey died of wounds on the Somme. Meredith and the solicitor’s elder son, Barry, were killed in the second battle for Ypres. Craig survived a crash but was invalided out. The Vicar’s brother is a chaplain. He’s visited a number of times. The solicitor’s younger son lost a leg at Passchendaele.” He smiled ruefully. “I’m not quite sure how I’ve managed to survive this long.”
Officers led their men in attacks. Easily recognized, easily identified by a sniper or hit with the first round of machine-gun fire. I hadn’t meant for Mark to dwell on his own good fortune. He could so easily have died of his own wounds. But what interested me more was the reference to a solicitor’s two sons, one of whom had died. Groves?
I must have said the name aloud, for Mark answered my question. “No, a man by the name of Snelling. He had chambers here before the war, but he’s retired to Brighton to be nearer his younger son.”
Clara came into the study just then, and there was no opportunity to ask Mark any more questions.
“I heard about Nan,” she said, going to the hearth to pet the spaniel. “Silly man, Constable Hood, to think she could do such a thing.” Nan rolled over, and Clara rubbed her stomach. Nan sighed with pleasure.
“What’s this about Nan?” Mark asked, his voice sharp. “Tell me.”
I did, reluctantly. Mark’s face was dark with anger. “I’ll have something to say to Constable Hood.”
“No, please don’t,” Mrs. Ashton said, coming into the room. “She’s safe, nothing happened. Let it go.” Catching my eye, she gave me a straight look, and I knew she didn’t want to tell him about Mrs. Branch. “It was all a mistake, anyway.”
Mark glanced from his mother to me and back again. “If you’re sure. I don’t like this. They’re growing bolder, more personal with each attack.”
“We won’t stop it by complaining to Constable Hood.”
“That’s true enough,” Clara put in. “I think he’s hand in glove with whoever it is.”
But Mark was still angry when we went in to dinner.
Could it have been Alex Craig in the Branch cottage this afternoon? He had no love for the Ashtons. Still, I’d only seen him in dusty cor
duroys and a flannel shirt, even on the street today. But he must have his uniform still. And he limped, just as Mark did.
I glanced toward Mrs. Ashton at the foot of the table.
Mark was right about the boldness of the attacks. And he wasn’t even aware of the figure of the hanged man.
Surely she would speak up now. But she didn’t.
Sleepless that night and unable to make myself comfortable in that comfortable bed, I got up a little before six in the morning, dressed, and went down to Philip Ashton’s study. Books lined the shelves, and after lighting the lamp, I walked along them, looking for something to read. For the most part the subject matter was history, voyages of discovery, biographies, poetry—the classics—and atlases and maps. Even a few books in Greek—Homer, Aristotle, Plato, Euripides, Sophocles, Socrates—the sort of titles a well-educated man would possess. But I persisted, preferring something lighter that would keep my attention until breakfast was served at eight.
I found what I was looking for on the middle shelf near the window. Dickens, Jane Austen, Wilkie Collins, and other authors. I took out Pride and Prejudice, went to sit by the lamp, and opened the book to chapter one. I’d read a dozen or so pages before I drifted into a light sleep. I don’t know how long I might have slept there, but the book slid from my fingers and went down on the floor with a thud. It woke me, and at first I wasn’t sure where I was. Then, remembering, I reached down for the book and lifted it.
A folded sheet of stationery fell out and drifted to the floor. I picked it up and, out of curiosity, unfolded it.
It was part of a letter, a middle page, because there was no salutation and no signature. More importantly, no date.
In regard to the question you raised, I can find out nothing of interest. If there is a fault, it’s ambition. But that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, is it? Much depends on how that ambition is expressed. And you will know more about that than I do. I am sorry I can’t give you more. I do know how worried you have been and how much you were counting on what I could discover. Sadly, far too little.
The following paragraph contained a brief account of a visit to a friend who had been ill for some time.
I realized, looking at the sheet in my hands, that this could have been abstracted from a letter without making it obvious that a page had been removed. And then this sheet had been put into a book that neither Philip Ashton nor his son would be likely to pick up and read. Hidden, in fact, where no servant would be likely to stumble over it either.
But who had written the letter? And to whom? This was a woman’s hand, I thought. The little flourishes were more feminine than masculine. And when was it written? Before the war? Later? Who was the subject of the inquiry?
It was the sort of letter a mother might receive if her son had formed an attachment to a young woman who was not suitable, and she’d asked a friend for confirmation of her suspicions. But Mark had been in love with Eloise for some time, and her background was known.
Then who would Mrs. Ashton be seeking information about?
Was it Lucius Worley? That was my next thought. But was I right? The answer in this letter had been carefully worded to give nothing away. If Mrs. Ashton had been worried enough about the man to make inquiries, surely she would have told her son what she had learned? Or encouraged him to look elsewhere for someone to represent her husband.
I remembered Mrs. Ashton’s expression at the window when she had called out to someone in the night.
She was searching for answers. Proof. And so she might not have been certain enough of her facts to do anything about it. It appeared she’d asked a friend for help, rather than her own family. I wished I knew when this letter had arrived. When this search had begun.
But why an outsider rather than her own husband or her son?
And why, after all that had happened, had she kept her suspicions to herself?
I carefully replaced the page in the book, and put the book back on the shelf. Then I went through all the Jane Austen titles, looking for more hidden pages. But this was the only one.
Had someone come in as Mrs. Ashton was reading her letter, forcing her to hide the page? Very likely she could have read the rest of the letter to anyone without giving away her query.
It was a problem I couldn’t quite unravel. But it was beginning to worry me. Surely she would do anything to help her husband’s cause. Surely she wasn’t planning to do anything foolish with whatever information she had.
No one was in the best of spirits that morning. A sea mist had rolled in, draping everything in long tendrils of wetness that seemed to cling to everything.
Restless, I walked into town, not toward the square but toward the church towers I could see above the bare trees. The man delivering the milk touched his cap to me and went on his way as I turned into the gate through the low stone wall around the churchyard.
The board told me that this was the Church of St. Anne, and that a Mr. Gardener was the Vicar. Looking up, I saw that the towers were lost in the mist. The rectory stood next to the church, set back to one side of the churchyard, and it loomed like a ghostly edifice until I was close enough to realize it was a pretty stone house with flower pots by the door and a knocker in the shape of a lamb. I smiled as I lifted the knocker to let it fall against the plate.
A housekeeper answered the summons, and I asked if the Vicar was receiving callers.
He was.
I followed her into the hall, and down a passage to a closed door that led into the rectory parlor.
It was a large room with dark furniture and antimacassars and a Sansevieria that was thriving in the light from a pair of windows. The mantel was marble, with blue tiles surrounding the hearth. There was money in this living, apparently, and I wondered if it had come from the powder mill.
The door opened a moment later and a tall, thin man stepped into the room. He had a kind face, but his chin was weak, and I wondered if I’d made a mistake in coming here.
“Good morning, Sister. Which of course is an expression of hope rather than a description of the day.”
“Indeed,” I said, smiling, as he gestured to a chair and took his own seat.
“And what brings you to the Vicarage? Is all well with Mrs. Ashton?”
So he knew who I was. But to my knowledge he had never come to the house while I was visiting, not even the day Philip Ashton was taken into custody, when presumably the man’s wife would be in dire need of comfort.
“She is a strong woman with a strong faith,” I said. “She believes her husband will be exonerated.”
“I have kept him in my prayers every day. And Mrs. Ashton as well.”
“Then you don’t believe that Philip Ashton deliberately killed all those men in his employ?” I asked bluntly.
“I find it hard to believe he could do such a thing. And yet the police have seen fit to take him into custody.”
“The police are sometimes wrong.”
“That’s true.”
I couldn’t tell whether he was guileless or devious. Or if he was trying to sit astride the fence and not alienate any of his parishioners, whichever side they were on.
“Can you tell me who is behind this campaign of slander and accusation that has caused the family so much grief? I know two things already: that people willingly lie to make trouble, and that there must be someone who persuades them to do it. A man, I think. Possibly even an officer. But I’m only a visitor in Cranbourne. I can’t find the source without help.”
“I don’t know,” he told me, and I thought he was probably telling the truth. “I’ve tried to speak up on their behalf, but no one listens to me. When people are angry and hurt, they’ll believe anything that makes them feel better. The explosion was only two years ago. Many are still grieving. It’s easy to use that grief to make someone hate.”
“The Army has looked very
thoroughly into the possibility of sabotage. They didn’t find a shred of evidence to support that. But surely in their search for answers, they’d have found something to connect Philip Ashton to the fire, and they’d have made an example of him. Instead they concluded that it was an unfortunate catastrophe.”
“I know. I’ve talked with the officers the Army sent down to Kent. I’ve spoken with Captain Collier, their liaison in Cranbourne, who knew the men who were killed. No mention was ever made of Philip Ashton’s role in events.”
I couldn’t be sure what he was telling me. “You’re saying that the Army wasn’t interested in simple murder?”
“I’m saying that they were satisfied that it wasn’t sabotage. By anyone.”
There I had to agree. Not by Germans, and not by Philip Ashton.
“Then what are we to do?”
“I don’t know that there is anything we can do. For one thing, Philip Ashton refused to defend himself when the first rumors began to fly. He seemed to think it would all blow away of its own accord. And so the whispers grew louder. I think we’ve reached a point where he must stand trial to answer his accusers once and for all.”
“Is that why you haven’t been to call on Mrs. Ashton, to offer comfort?”
He flushed slightly. “Mr. Ashton asked me not to take sides in the matter.”
“I hardly think visiting a frightened woman is taking sides. What if he can’t prove that all these accusations are false? If worse comes to worst, will you call then?”
“God will provide an answer, Sister.”
“You hear confessions. Has anyone come to you and admitted to persecuting the Ashtons?”
“I couldn’t tell you if they had. But the truth is, I don’t think anyone trusts me. They don’t confide in me. Not even in the confessional. Either that or they feel they have nothing to confess.”
So all his efforts to appear unbiased had gone for nothing. But then he was the Vicar, and like the squire and the doctor, high in the hierarchy of any village. Socially he stood with the Ashtons. And people knew that.