by Rennie Airth
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Part One
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Part Two
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Part Three
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Part Four
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Epilogue
PRAISE FOR River of Darkness
“River of Darkness starts off as a genteel British whodunit
but soon escalates into a suspense thriller. . . . However,
Airth’s novel has an added psychological assurance and a
tension-packed elegance. It’s up there with the works of
P. D. James and Ruth Rendell. High praise indeed.”
—Pauline Mayer, The Cleveland Plain Dealer
“[Airth] writes with arresting authority and compassion . . . a major talent.”
—Dick Adler, Chicago Tribune
“Rennie Airth’s first novel is that rare combination, a historical thriller in which both the history and the fiction are top quality, a book as suspense-filled as it is literary.”
—Betsy Willeford, Newark Star-Ledger
“River of Darkness . . . is a mystery thick with atmosphere and even psychoanalysis. . . . Pay close attention to detail—the author did.”
—Susan Hall-Balduf, Detroit Free Press
“Skillfully shifting focus between the detective’s search and the killer’s plot to strike again, the gifted Airth builds suspense from elements that, with fascinating period authenticity, give the book the feel of a Christie or Du Maurier mystery.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred)
“All the familiar elements of suspense writing are given an unusual and satisfying twist in this grim and fascinating thriller—the initial volume of a promised series. . . . A fine, frightening piece of work. One looks forward to meeting Inspector John Madden again soon.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred)
“This first novel by South African-born Airth will definitely leave readers wanting more. . . . Readers who are looking for smart, well-plotted psychological mysteries will be delighted.”
—Booklist
A PENGUIN MYSTERY
RIVER OF DARKNESS
Rennie Airth was born in South Africa and worked as a foreign correspondent for Reuters for many years. River of Darkness was inspired by a scrap-book about his uncle, a soldier killed in World War I. Airth lives in Italy and is at work on a second Madden novel.
PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
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New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England
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Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue,
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Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road,
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England
First published in Great Britain by Macmillan Publishers Ltd 1999 First published in the United States of America by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Putnam Inc. 1999
Published in Penguin Books 2000
Copyright © Rennie Airth, 1999
All rights reserved
Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reprint the following works: “Picnic July 1917” by Rose Macaulay. By permission of the Peters Fraser & Dunlop Group Limited. Excerpt from “Sick Love” by Robert Graves. By permission of Carcanet Press Limited. Excerpt from “Aftermath” from Siegfried Sassoon Collected Poems 1908-1956, Faber and Faber. By permission of George Sassoon.
Airth, Rennie, 1935-
River of Darkness/Rennie Airth.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-101-11869-6
I. Title.
PR9369.3.A47R58 1999
823—dc21 99-19824
http://us.penguingroup.com
To the memory of
my mother and father
Acknowledgments
I would like to express my thanks to Sue Lines, Assistant Curator, Royal Military Police Museum, Roussillon Barracks, Chichester, and to Major P. E. Atteridge, AGC (RMP), for their valuable assistance.
I’m back again from hell
With loathsome thoughts to sell;
Secrets of death to tell;
And horrors from the abyss.
Siegfried Sassoon, “To The War-Mongers”
Part One
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Wilfred Owen, “Anthem for Doomed Youth”
1
The village was empty. Billy Styles couldn’t understand it. They hadn’t seen a living soul on the road from the station, and even the green was deserted, though the weather was the kind that normally brought people out of doors. The finest summer since the war!
The newspapers had been repeating the phrase for weeks now as one radiant day followed another, with no end to the heat wave in sight.
But here in Highfield, sunshine lay like a curse on empty cottage gardens. Only the headstones in the churchyard, crowding the moss-covered stone wall flanking the road, gave mute evidence of a human presence.
“They’re all at the house,” Boyce said, as though in explanation. He was an inspector with the Surrey police, a thin grey man with an anxious look. “Word got around this morning.”
Boyce had come to the station to meet Inspector Madden and Billy. In a chauffeured Rolls Royce, no less! Billy wanted to ask who’d sent it, but didn’t dare. With less than three months experience in the CID he knew he was lucky to be there at all, assigned to a case of such magnitude. Only the August bank holiday, combined with the heavy summer-leave schedule, had brought it about. Scotland Yard had been thinly manned that Monday morning when the telephone call came from Guildford. Minutes later Billy had found himself in a taxi with Madden bound for Victoria station.
He glanced at the inspector, who was sitting beside him staring out of the car window. Among the lower ranks at the Yard, Madden was reckoned to be a queer one. They hadn’t met before today, but Billy had seen him striding down the corridors.
A tall grim man with a scarred forehead, he seemed more like a monk than a policeman, the young detective constable thought. An impression that gained strength now each time the inspector’s glance fell on him. Madden’s deep-set eyes seemed to look at you from another world.
He had a strange history—Billy had heard it from one of the sergeants. Madden had left the force some years before after losing his wife and baby daughter, both in the same week, to influenza. The son of a farmer, he had wanted to return to the land. Instead, the war had come, and afterwards he’d returned to his old job with the Metropolitan Police. Changed, though, it was said. A different man from before. Two years in the trenches had seen to that.
They had cleared the village, leaving the last cottage behind. Rounding a bend in the road, the chauffeur braked. Ahead of them, blocking the narrow country lane and facing a set of iron gates, a crowd had gathered. Whole families were there, it seemed, the men in shirtsleeves and braces, the women wearing kitchen aprons and with their hair tied up in scarves and handkerchiefs. Children stood hand in hand, or else played together on the dusty verges. A short way down the road two little girls in coloured smocks were bowling a hoop.
“Look at them,” Boyce said wearily. “We’ve asked them to keep away, but what can you expect?”
The chauffeur blew his horn as they drew near and the crowd parted to let the car through. Billy felt the weight of their accusing stares.
“They don’t know what to think,” Boyce muttered. “And we don’t know what to tell them.”
The drive beyond the gates was lined with elms, linked at their crowns like gothic arches. At the end of it Billy could see a house built of solid stone, clothed in ivy. Melling Lodge was its name. Madden had told him. A family called Fletcher lived there. Had lived there. Billy’s mouth went dry as they approached the gravelled forecourt where a fountain topped by a Cupid figure, standing with his bow drawn, sprayed silvery water into the bright sunlit afternoon. Blue uniforms stirred in the shadows.
“We brought a dozen men down from Guildford.” Boyce nodded towards a police van parked at the side of the forecourt. “We may want more.”
Madden spoke for the first time. “We’ll need to search the land around the house.”
“Wait till you see the other side.” Boyce groaned. “Woods. Nothing but woods. Miles and miles of them.”
Madden’s glance had shifted to a group of three men standing together in a shaded corner of the forecourt. Two of them wore light country tweeds. The third sweated in a double-breasted serge suit. “Who are they?” he asked.
“The old boy’s Lord Stratton. Local nob. He owns most of the land hereabouts. That’s the Lord Lieutenant with him. Major General Sir William Raikes.”
“What’s he doing here?” Madden scowled.
“He was a weekend guest at Stratton Hall, worst luck.” Boyce pulled a face. “He’s been raising merry hell, I can tell you. The other one’s Chief Inspector Norris, from Guildford.”
As Madden opened the car door, Raikes, red-faced and balding, came striding across the gravel.
“About time,” he said angrily. “Sinclair, is it?”
“No, Sir William. Madden’s the name. Detective Inspector. This is Detective Constable Styles. Chief Inspector Sinclair is on his way. He’ll be here shortly.” Madden’s glance roamed the forecourt.
“Well, for God’s sake!” Raikes fumed. “What’s keeping the man?”
“He’s getting a team together. Pathologist, fingerprint squad, photographer . . .” The inspector made no attempt to disguise his impatience. “It takes time, particularly on a bank holiday.”
“Indeed!” Raikes glared at him, but Madden was already turning away to greet the older man, who had joined them.
“Lord Stratton? Thank you for sending the car, sir.”
“It was nothing. How else can I help you, Inspector?” He held out his hand to Madden, who shook it. His face showed signs of recent shock, the eyes wide and blinking. “Do you need any transport? I’ve a runabout at the Hall. You’re welcome to use it.”
“Would you mention that to Mr. Sinclair? I’m sure he’ll be happy to accept.”
“Now see here, Madden!” Raikes tried to force himself back into the conversation, but the inspector ignored him and went on speaking to Lord Stratton.
“There’s something I need to know. The woods behind the house, do they belong to you?”
“Upton Hanger? Yes, the ridge extends for several miles.” He seemed eager to help. “I keep a pheasant shoot over by the Hall”—he pointed in the direction of the village—“but this side the woods run wild.”
“What’s your policy on trespassing?”
“Well, technically it’s private property. But the villagers have always had the run of the woods. Over on this side, at least.”
“Would you change that, sir? Make it clear no trespassing will be allowed and ask the police to enforce it.”
“I understand.” Stratton frowned. “Better to keep people away.”
“I was thinking of the London press. They’ll be here soon enough.”
“Boyce!” Chief Inspector Norris spoke.
“I’ll see to it, sir.”
“One other thing.” Madden drew Lord Stratton aside. “There’s a crowd of villagers outside the gates. Could you speak to them? Tell them what’s happened here. There’s no point in keeping it a secret. Then ask them to go home. We’ll be questioning them later. But they’re no help to us standing out there blocking the road.”
“Of course. I’ll see to that now.” He set off up the drive.
Watching, Billy could only marvel. How did Madden do it? He wasn’t a nob himself, that much was certain. There was a rough unpolished air about the inspector that set him apart from the likes of his lordship. But when he talked, they listened! Even Sir William Whatsit, who could only stand there glowering.
“Chief Inspector,” still ignoring Raikes, Madden turned to Norris, “could we have a word?”
He moved away, and after a moment’s hesitation Norris joined him. The Guildford chief was red in the face and sweating heavily in his thick suit.
“I’ll need some details, sir.”
“Speak to Boyce.” Norris blinked rapidly. “Good God, man! You can’t treat a lord lieutenant that way.”
Madden regarded him without expression. Norris opened his mouth to speak again, then changed his mind. He spun on his heel and rejoined Raikes, who stood with his back ostentatiously turned to them, glaring up the drive at the retreating figure of Lord Stratton.
Madden nodded to Boyce and led the way out of the forecourt around to the side of the house. When they came into a pool of shade he paused and took out a packet of cigarettes. Billy, encouraged by the sight, lit up himself.
“I was told four in the house.” The inspector was speaking to Boyce.
“That’s right.” The Surrey inspector took out a handkerchief. “Colonel and Mrs. Fletcher. One of the maids, Sally Pepper, and the children’s nanny, Alice Crookes.”
“Who found the bodies?”
“The other maid, Ellen Brown. We haven’t talked to her yet. She’s in hospital in Guildford. Under sedation.” He wiped his face. “Brown returned this morning. Mrs. Fletcher had given her the weekend off—Saturday and Sunday—but she was due back last night, and the other maid, Pepper, was to have had today off. Brown missed her train—she’s got a young man in Birmingham—and only arrived this morning. She was seen passing through the village, running from the station, looking to be in trouble with her mistress, I dare say. Half an hour later she was back again, not making much sense by all accounts.”
“Half an hour?” Madden drew on his cigarette.
Boyce shrugged. “I don’t know what she did when she found them. Fainted, I would guess. But she had enough sense to get herself to the local bobby. He lives at this end of the village. Constable Stackpole. He didn’t know what to think—whether to believe her, even. He said she was raving. So he got on his bicycle
and pedalled like blazes. He rang Guildford from the Lodge. I was the duty officer and I informed Chief Inspector Norris and he rang the chief constable who decided to call in the Yard right away.”
“When did you get here?”
“Just before midday. Mr. Norris and I.”
“You went through the house?”
Boyce nodded. “We didn’t touch anything. Then Sir William arrived with Lord Stratton.”
“Did they go inside?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Both of them?”
Boyce looked shamefaced. “Mr. Norris tried to stop them, but . . . Anyway, they didn’t stay long. It was getting to be ripe inside. The heat, you know . . .”
“Anyone else?’
“Only the doctor.”
“The police surgeon?”
“No, Stackpole couldn’t raise him—he lives in Godalming—so he rang the village doctor.”
“What time did he get here?”
“She.” Boyce glanced up from his notebook. “Dr. Blackwell’s a woman.”
Madden was frowning.
“Yes, I know.” Boyce shrugged. “But it couldn’t be helped. There was no one else.”
“Was she able to cope?”
“As far as I can tell. Stackpole said she did what was necessary, confirmed they were all dead. It was she who found the little girl.” He consulted his notebook. “Sophy Fletcher, aged five. Apparently she’s a patient of the doctor’s.”
“The child was in the house?”
“Hiding under her bed, Stackpole said. She must have been there all night . . .” Boyce looked away, biting his lip.
Madden waited for a moment. “You said ‘children.’ ”
“There’s a son, James, aged ten. He’s been spending a few weeks with his uncle in Scotland. Lucky, I suppose, if you can call it that.”
“Do we know if the girl witnessed the murders?”
Boyce shook his head. “She hasn’t said a word since Dr. Blackwell found her. The shock, I imagine.”