A long shadow ir-8

by Charles Todd

  Distracting Rutledge, Hamish reminded him, "Ye ken, the crows flew up fra' the trees by the road at the sound of yon shot. No' at the sound of the motorcar."

  That's true, Rutledge agreed silently. They weren't disturbed until the revolver was fired. Whoever it was had lain quietly in wait for some time. Long enough for them to settle. He brought his mind back from Hertfordshire to Constable Hensley's attacker. What agitated them in this case? Not an arrow being loosed.

  The man in the bed was saying, "At a guess, I never got to Letherington. But you'll have to ask Inspector Cain about that. I remember setting out, I remember the crows." He shook his head, as if bewildered. "It wearies me, this business of not knowing."

  "If you can bring back any more details, ask Matron to call Chief Inspector Kelmore or one of his people here in Northampton, and he'll get word to me." Rutledge retrieved his hat. "Do you have a station in Dudlington?"

  Hensley's voice was weaker, and he closed his eyes against the dim lamplight. "We don't run to station houses. I use my parlor as my office. You'll find whatever you need there. Make yourself at home. I won't be back for a bit, if these bloody butchers have their say."

  Rutledge stood for moment beside the bed, looking down at the wounded man. He appeared to be in no hurry to find his attacker. And that in itself was odd. No anger, no fierce need to help speed the inquiry along.

  But then Hensley's eyelids opened, and he said, as if realizing his own mistake, "I'll worry about it when I'm better. I can't now. You can see that. Tell Inspector Kelmore I'm not fit enough for questions yet."

  Matron was coming with a little tray of medicines and a cup of water. Hensley saw her, and his face cleared. "Thank God!"

  Matron nodded to Rutledge as she reached the bed. "You promised me only five minutes."

  "Yes, I was just going. Tell me, do you know what became of the arrow that was taken from Hensley's back?"

  "You must ask the surgical sister about that."

  But the surgical sister, when Rutledge had run her to earth, said, "They'd removed the shaft before he was brought here. You must ask Dr. Middleton what became of it. As for the tip, it was an ordinary metal one. Chief Inspector Kelmore took it, but I doubt it did him much good. We had rather butchered it, extracting it from the rib. Constable Hensley was very lucky. His injury might have been far worse. If the arrow had got past the ribs, he'd be a dead man."

  ***

  Rutledge went in search of Chief Inspector Kelmore and found him in his office, a stuffy little room reeking of pipe smoke. Kelmore was a graying man in his late forties, with yellowed teeth and ears too large for his head.

  The Chief Inspector shook hands with Rutledge and said, "I was just leaving. The wife's ill, and I'm taking the rest of the day off. They've sent you here about Hensley, have they? Lucky he wasn't killed, according to the surgeon." He began to dig through the contents of his desk drawer, then reached instead for a box sitting on the floor. "Here's what's left of the arrow. I expect that's what you came for." He passed the broken shaft with its mangled metal tip to Rutledge. "Nothing unusual about it, except where it was found, in a constable's back."

  Rutledge studied the wooden shaft, then the tip. "I should think it would have depended on the distance the arrow flew as to how deep it might have gone."

  "Yes, that was my view as well. Hence the luck I spoke of. I daresay whoever loosed this arrow is afraid to come forward and admit to his carelessness." He held out his hand for the tip.

  "And that's what you put it down to? Carelessness?" Rutledge asked, returning it.

  "What else should I read into it? As you'll see for yourself, Dudlington is hardly a hotbed of murderers. I can't think why someone would have wished Hensley ill. Seems to be a decent enough chap, had no complaints against him. Nor has Inspector Cain, who oversees Dudlington, along with two other hamlets, Fairfield and Letherington. Letherington, to the north of Dudlington, is the largest of the three. Fairfield is a little more to the east." He pointed to a county map on the wall.

  "I'll call on Cain tomorrow. Was there any indication in that wood-what's it called? Frith's Wood-how Hensley had been carried or dragged there?"

  "I don't think they looked. Does he claim he wasn't in the wood when he was shot? That's odd."

  "He says he remembers riding his bicycle on the main road, and the next thing he knew he was on his way to hospital. He doesn't know how he got to the wood. Or when he was shot."

  "They do say that sudden and severe injury can shock the mind, and events just before it happened are lost. His memory might return as he heals. I'm not sure why the Yard was brought into this business before we'd had a chance to look into it ourselves. But there you are. No offense intended."

  "None taken. I expect London was concerned because Hensley came from there. And it was possible that someone he'd helped convict had a long memory."

  "That's always possible, of course. Yes, I can see where it might have caused concern." Kelmore stored the arrow away again and rose to his feet. "I'll speak to Hensley myself tomorrow. I must go. The doctor is coming to my wife, again, and I must be there. If there's anything you need, let me know. If you can't find me, leave your message with Sergeant Thompson. He'll see that I get it."

  He was ushering Rutledge out of the tiny office and into the drab corridor. "How are you getting to Dudlington? It's isolated, you know. No bus service."

  "I have my own motorcar."

  "What luck! You can drive me home. It's on your way out of town."

  8

  It was nearly dusk when Rutledge came to the turning for Dudlington, and if he hadn't been on the lookout for it, he'd have missed it. An inn, standing alone on a rise, was all that could be seen in a wide landscape of fields running from his left down the slope of the land toward a little stream only visible because of the straggling line of trees that followed it. In the distance he could just see a low line of roofs that indicated barns. He passed the inn as he turned, and made a note of it. Then he was in the village some hundred yards beyond. Holly Street was narrow, with houses on either side set directly on the road. Farther on, Whitby Lane turned off to his left, and when he followed that, he saw that Church Street, coming in on his right, led to the churchyard, with the slender steeple of the church rising over the roofs surrounding it. No one was about, except a dog trotting down the lane toward his dinner. And there was no sign to indicate where Constable Hensley lived. Rutledge turned the motorcar near the churchyard and went back the way he'd come, toward the inn.

  The Oaks stood on higher ground than the village, a large inn for its location, with a pedimented front door that spoke of better days.

  He opened the door and found himself in a spacious lobby that had once been the entry to the house. A handsome stair climbed to a landing and turned out of sight.

  There was a bell on a table by the door, and he rang it.

  After a moment a woman came out of the back, tidying her hair, as if she had just taken off an apron.

  "Good afternoon, sir, are you stopping for dinner? We don't serve for another two hours."

  "I'm looking for a room."

  She was skeptical. "I don't know that we have one available. I'll just ask Mr. Keating."

  She left him there in the hall, and soon a balding man of about forty-five came out to speak to him.

  "You're looking for a room, is that it, sir? For the night?"

  The inn appeared to be empty, except for the man and the woman.

  "For several days. Inspector Rutledge, from London." He was curt, tired of delay.

  "Ah. You're looking for Constable Hensley's house, I take it. Second on the right, Whitby Lane. Not hard to find-follow the main road into the village and you can't miss it."

  "I've no intention of staying the night at Hensley's house. I'm looking for a room here."

  Keating was silent for a moment. Then he said, "We've got a room or two. I keep them for travelers. This is a rather isolated part of the world, as you must have
noticed, and we're accustomed to people late on the road, looking to stop the night. But I'm afraid we're booked up, just now."

  The words were firm, brooking no argument. But where were the motorcars or carriages by the door to support Keating's claim?

  Rutledge was about to point that out when he recalled what an elderly sergeant had told him years before: "I remember the day when a policeman under the roof frightened away custom. I'd be offered poor service and a cramped little room at the back, beneath the eaves, in the hope I'd go away sooner."

  He didn't think Keating was prepared to offer him even that. The innkeeper stood there, inflexibility in every line, although the pleasant expression on his face stayed securely in place. Short of calling the man a liar, there was nothing more to be said.

  Rutledge turned on his heel and left.

  He found Hensley's small house squeezed between a bakery and a greengrocer's. The door was unlocked, and he let himself in, feeling the chill from no fire over the last several days. The cold seemed to hang in the air, and the darkness in the tiny entry compounded it.

  Retrieving his torch from the motorcar, he walked back inside searching for a lamp. The bloom of light dispelled the sense of emptiness, but it wasn't until he'd got a fire going well in the parlor that served as an office that he took off his hat and coat and set them aside.

  The parlor was a square room, windows only on the front, and it was occupied by a desk sitting across from the hearth, papers scattered over its surface. Rutledge paused to look at them and found nothing of interest. Notices from Northampton, a letter inquiring for a Mr. Sandridge in the town, and a logbook that had been kept meticulously until the day Hensley was shot.

  In the back was a sitting room, a kitchen with an empty larder, and upstairs a bedroom with sheets on the bed that were damp and wrinkled.

  "It willna' do," Hamish told Rutledge. "It's no' a place to be comfortable."

  Rutledge took out his pocket watch and looked at it. The Oaks would be serving dinner in another forty-five minutes, and the thought of a warm meal and a bed pulled at him. Keating be damned.

  There was a voice from the hall at the foot of the stairs. "Halloooo!"

  He went to the top of the steps and called down, "Inspector Rutledge here. What do you need?"

  "Well, I told myself it couldn't be Bart Hensley." She moved into the light of his torch as he pointed it down the stairs in her direction. "What are you doing here? He hasn't died, has he?"

  "No." He could see her now, a tall, slender woman wearing a knitted hat and a gray coat with a black collar. "I've come to investigate what happened to him."

  "Well, then, dinner is at eight. I usually prepare it for him. An arrangement we've had since he came here in 1915. You might as well take your meals at my house too. There's not much choice in Dudlington. I'm your neighbor next but one, on the other side of the bakery. Oh, and you can leave your motorcar just by the side of the house. It's out of the way there." And she was gone, shutting the door firmly behind her. Rutledge presented himself at the house on the far side of the bakery, exactly at eight. The door was opened, and the woman invited him in. "My name is Barbara Melford. I'm a widow, I live alone, and I am paid for each meal. The dining room is this way."

  Her house was larger than the constable's, with good furnishings and a fire in the dining room where the table was set for one.

  "You don't take your meals with Hensley?" Rutledge asked.

  "I am paid to feed him, not to keep him company. As I've already said, I'm a widow. And I'm not looking to marry again, least of all, not to Constable Hensley."

  He could see her clearly now in the lamplight: a woman in her thirties, smartly dressed-for his benefit and not Constable Hensley's-trying to cover her apprehensive- ness with a chilly demeanor.

  Hamish, taking a dislike to her, said, "Why did she invite you to dine?"

  For information?

  Rutledge took the chair at the head of the table and pulled his serviette out of a china ring with blue violets painted in a garish pattern.

  "We've had no news about Constable Hensley's condition. Was his surgery successful?" Barbara Melford asked as she brought in the soup, creamed carrots with leeks.

  "Apparently, although he was in a good deal of pain when I spoke to him," Rutledge answered, choosing his words with care. "Nothing was said about when he might be released."

  "I can't imagine being driven that far with an arrow in my back!" she commented, returning to the kitchen while he sat in the dining room in lonely splendor. It was a pretty room with drapes of a floral brocade and an English carpet under a table that could seat eight. Rutledge found himself wondering if Mrs. Melford had ever entertained here, when her husband was alive.

  He was tired, and it was a very tense meal, as his hostess brought each course in silence and disappeared again, but he could feel her eyes on him through the crack in the door leading to the kitchen.

  Once he tried to question her about what had happened, but she answered brusquely, "I can't see the wood from my windows, thank God! You must ask someone who can."

  There was a flan for dessert, better than many he'd had, but he didn't linger over his tea. As soon as the first cup was empty, he folded his serviette, and calling to Barbara Melford to thank her, he started for the door to the hall.

  She came to speak to him then, following him as far as the front door to point out a silver tray on the small table at the foot of the stairs. "You'll find your account waiting here every morning. I serve breakfast at eight sharp."

  "I'll be here."

  He stepped out into the cold night air, feeling it strongly after the heat of the dining room. Hensley's house was still chilly, the fire struggling to do more than heat the parlor. He searched for the linen cupboard and at length discovered clean sheets and pillow slips as well as two or three fairly new blankets.

  Making up the bed, he considered his conversation with Hensley, wrapped in pain still, but alert enough to answer questions guardedly. Why, since he'd been found in that wood, would the constable refuse to admit he'd gone there? For one thing, moving a large man with an arrow in his back would have been difficult, and dragging him would leave marks. That would have to be looked into, tomorrow.

  "And where is the bicycle he was riding?" Hamish asked.

  "I'll find out tomorrow. There should be someone who can tell me. The doctor, for one."

  "At a guess, yon widow doesna' care o'ermuch for the constable. She must be desperate for money, to put up wi' him."

  "Or she finds him willing to talk more than he should about village business. A man can be flattered into boasting."

  It was late when Rutledge finally got to bed. The house seemed unfamiliar and unwelcoming. And he hadn't found a key for the door. Yet Hensley had used the parlor for his office.

  "Which means," Hamish answered the thought, "that there are no secrets to be found here."

  ***

  Rutledge was up well before eight, dressed, and already searching through the meager files in a box in the parlor. It appeared that Dudlington had no experience with crime as such. The constable had registered every complaint with meticulous care. A lost dog found and returned to its owner. A quarrel over a ram's stud rights. Pilferage at the greengrocer's, traced to a small boy with a taste for fruit. A domestic matter, where a wife had accused her husband of spending more time than was necessary-in her view- repairing a chimney flue at Mrs. Melford's house.

  He set the files back into their box and stood, looking around the room. There were no photographs here-or in the bedroom for that matter. And little else of a personal nature. But he'd discovered a letter in a desk drawer, a commendation from the then Chief Inspector Bowles for Hensley's services in apprehending a murderer in the City.

  Then why was Hensley in this outpost of empire, serving his time chasing after lost dogs and calming irate wives?

  It was apparent that Hensley had kept the commendation letter with some pride…

  R
utledge glanced at the wall clock and saw that he had three minutes to get himself to the Melford house for breakfast.

  The meal was as well cooked as last night's dinner, the eggs done exactly to his taste, but he asked as the toast was brought in, "I tried to find a room at The Oaks. They all but turned me away. Do you know why?"

  "Mr. Keating has always been a private sort. He doesn't seem to care for guests staying there, not beyond one night. Mostly he serves meals to travelers, and of course the pub is popular with the men here in Dudlington."

  "Who was the woman? An employee? Or his wife?"

  She laughed, breaking the stern set of her face. "She may wish she was his wife, but Frank Keating is a misogynist. The woman is Hillary Timmons. She lives near the church. There aren't many opportunities for employment here."

  "Which is why you feed Constable Hensley for a price."

  "Indeed. I'll just fetch the warm milk for your tea." Dr. Middleton was an elderly man, his face lined but cheerful. He welcomed Rutledge with a nod and took him back to his surgery, which was no more than a room at the rear of his house.

  "Did you see Hensley? How is he faring?"

  "Well enough. In pain."

  "I should think he was. That arrow was in deep."

  "How long have you been the doctor here?"

  "Seven years last month. I retired from practice and came here to die. But I haven't had time to get around to that." He sat behind the table in a corner that served as his desk and gestured to a chair on the other side. "My wife died, and I lost interest in living. She was born in Dudling- ton and is buried in the churchyard. I feel closer to her here."

  "Where had you lived before?"

  "Naseby. It's not a very challenging practice, but I'm the only doctor within twenty miles. Babies and burns and bumps, that's mostly the extent of my duties."

  "Dudlington is a quiet village. There was hardly a soul on the streets when I came in last night."