A Long Shadow (31 page)

Sarah Lawrence smiled, delighted. "On my good days, I can tell you what it was like to see the old Queen married. A pretty slip of a girl she was, then. Hardly came up to the Prince's shoulder, but running to plumpness, if you ask me. I never saw that wicked Scotsman she was so fond of, but even as a small girl, I was quite taken with her Prince. Pity he had to die, but there you are."

"Yes." He glanced up at Patricia Lawrence, indicating that he'd like to speak to her husband's grandmother alone.

She nodded and said, "I'll just fetch some tea. You'd like that, I think?"

Sarah Lawrence squinted her eyes to see the mantel clock. "Is it teatime already?"

"No, Grandmama, but we have a guest."

"Yes, indeed. Very well, young man, tell me why you've come. It isn't about the Queen, I'm sure. She's dead."

She was swathed in shawls, but her hair, pure white, was beautifully brushed, and her black dress was of good quality. Her grandson and his wife, Hamish noted, were taking good care of her.

"I remember my own granny," he added, "and how she ruled the house."

Rutledge said to Mrs. Lawrence as the sitting room door closed, "I'm looking for a man who went missing many years ago. Perhaps as early as 1881. Do you remember gossip about that?"

"What was his name?"

"Sadly we don't know it."

She stared at her lap, thinking. "In 1881, you say? That was the year we put in the pear tree, my husband and I. The one blown down in the storm of 1894. A pretty thing it was too, white clouds of blossoms covering every limb. I was that fond of the pear tree."

"What was happening in Dudlington that year?" he prodded gently.

"When the storm came?"

"When you put in the pear tree."

"Ah. I told you, that was 1881."

He tried another tack. "Who was the doctor in 1881, Mrs. Lawrence? Do you remember his name?"

"It was Blair. Dr. Blair. I never liked him. Thought he knew more about children than their mothers did."

"And who was the rector?"

"That would be Mr. Anderson, I think. Or, no, Mr. Anderson came in the next year. It was Mr. Fellowes."

He walked her through the village, asking about the postmaster, the greengrocer, and every other person he could think of, to jar her memories.

"Do you remember Mrs. Ellison's marriage? It must have been quite a social affair."

"Pooh! She wasn't married in St. Luke's, too small by her lights. Connected with the Harkness family, you know. Her aunt in Northampton arranged the wedding. There weren't that many invited from Dudlington, though her husband had family here at the time. They're gone, of course. That's why he sold the farm. Mr. Shepherd owns it now. He wanted cattle, not sheep. Said his name would become a byword, if he ran sheep. They lost their only son in the war. Sad."

"And who owned the baker's shop?"

"Simpson's father. He would let us have treats on our birthday."

"What do you remember about the Christmas of 1881?" he asked, guiding her slowly.

But she frowned. "Was that a special Christmas, do you think? I don't remember much good coming of it."

"Why?"

"There was a typhoid outbreak that autumn. And my best friend died of it. I wasn't intending to celebrate because of it. But Mr. Lawrence, my husband, told me we must think of the children. And the rector told me I mustn't forsake God." He sat there for another ten minutes, priming the pump of her memory, to no avail. After all, it was many years ago, for a woman who must be well into her eighties.

But his questions had jarred some of the tangled threads in her mind, and as Patricia Lawrence brought in tea on a pretty painted tray, Sarah said, "Oh, do look, I'd forgot! The teapot! I broke the spout on mine, and Mr. Ellison found me a match for it in London. He was there a number of times in '82, and he said it might take my mind off Sally's death. My friend, you see."

"That was kind of him," Rutledge replied, taking his cup as the younger woman passed them around.

"Yes, he was a kind man. I never knew what he'd seen in Mary Clayton. Except that she was cousin to a Harkness and pretty as a picture."

She was off again on another line of thought, recalling that her own father had known old Mr. Harkness, "who died of a broken heart when the manor burned to the ground. He collected butterflies, you know. His niece kept some of the trays at her house. That's The Oaks, of course. It's seen a sad comedown since her day, let me tell you." He finished his tea and rose to take his leave. Sarah Lawrence seemed disappointed, as if she had expected him to entertain her for another hour or so.

Rousing herself, she made an effort to hold his attention. "You were asking me about '81. Except for the typhoid, it wasn't an unusual year, you know. But '82, now, that was a year of tragedy. The rector's wife died, Gerald Baylor was nearly trampled to death by one of his bulls, and Mr. Ellison died in an accident in London. A runaway horse, that was. And him leaving behind that dear little girl. Beatrice was such a suitable name, you know. I can remember her christening as if it were yesterday."

Rutledge left soon afterward and found himself walking toward St. Luke's Church. It was a place of tranquility, with no echoes of Constable Hensley, Emma Mason, or Mrs. Channing.

Inside it was chilly, the stone walls already letting go of what had briefly passed for the winter sun's warmth. He pulled up his coat collar as he chose a chair set near the pulpit, his mind working.

Hamish said, "It's nae use, it willna' all fit together."

"Somehow it does. In the end I'll see my way clear." His voice startled him, ringing hollowly through the empty church.

"You were sent here wi' only the ain duty."

"Murder is my duty."

"Aye, but no' a corpse long dead before you were born." Rutledge didn't answer him.

Hamish persisted. "It willna' serve. There's nae proof. You canna' find it after a' this time."

"I must speak with the rector."

"He's no' the man to burden with such a tale."

It was true. The rector, for all his experience of the world, was also a little unworldly. He wouldn't believe what Rutledge had to tell him, and the gossip mill would soon have part of the story if not all of it.

"The doctor, then."

"Aye. The doctor."

After a time, Rutledge left the church and went to find Dr. Middleton.

Middleton would have none of it. "You're reaching for the moon, you know."

"I think what I just described to you is likely. Certainly it's possible."

"And how do you expect to prove it? Be reasonable, man, there's nothing to be gained by looking into it, and it could cause a great deal of pain if you're wrong."

There was that as well.

"You'll give me your word not to speak of any of this?" Rutledge asked.

Middleton smiled grimly. "I live here, you know. I'm not about to cut my throat to spite my face!"

Rutledge went back to Hensley's house and began to write his report.

An hour later, he finished it and set it aside under a stack of papers on Hensley's desk.

Mrs. Channing tapped lightly at the door shortly afterward and said, "I've come to say good-bye. My bags are packed, and the car has been brought around."

"It isn't over yet," he told her.

"There's been nothing since the lorry ran you down. I think he's warned off after such a public display. Or tired of the game. I expect he wanted someone he could frighten badly. And if that's true, he chose the wrong man."

"You don't lie very well."

"I don't want to see you die," she said bluntly. "I've seen enough of death and destruction. I want to hold my séances and bring back dead kings and silly jesters and the ghost of Hamlet's father. There's no harm in that, and it makes people laugh. And it keeps my mind from dwelling on what it shouldn't be remembering. You were the soldier, Inspector, but I put soldiers back together. Or tried to help others do that. I don't know which is worse."

"I'm about to make an arrest. As soon as I do, I can leave Dudlington."

"I think you only want me here to keep an eye on me."

"It's partly true."

She was suddenly angry. "I'm going back to London. It's too late to change my mind."

"Then go."

Mrs. Channing said, in exasperation, "That's so like a man. All right, I'll call your bluff, Inspector. Good-bye." She walked to the door and was on her way out when she stopped and turned.

"I think Frank Keating has been in prison. Don't ask me why. Perhaps the way he avoids people. If he's paid his price for whatever he did, it doesn't matter. But if you had sent him there—it might be worth looking into. Consider that bit of information my parting gift."

It was the middle of the night when Rutledge woke with a start. There was someone in the bedroom. Standing somewhere between the door and the window.

Half-asleep, his first thought was that it must be Hamish, coming out of the shadows of his mind, the voice at last assuming shape and depth and reality.

He lay where he was, fighting to hold his body quiet, keeping his breathing even.

A silhouette paused briefly against the pale light from the window, and then was gone. Rutledge had the distinct feeling that it had moved nearer to the bed.

He counted the seconds, waiting.
If it was Hamish
—

He didn't finish the thought.

He could hear the faint sound of breathing, but he couldn't see who was there, a shadow in among darker shadows. His heart began to pound.

Please, God, not Hamish—!

And then he was awake enough to realize his danger.

"I know you're there," he said softly into the blackness of the room. "Is that what you want? Or have you come to leave another shell casing by my pillow?"

There was silence.

"What do you want? What is it that makes you want to kill me?"

It was a challenge, thrown down deliberately.

But it brought him no response.

The lamp was on the table by his bed. It would take too long to light it. And he cursed himself for not bringing his torch upstairs with him. It was a blunder he wouldn't repeat.

"Did I send you to prison? Or does it have to do with the war?"

He'd lost track of where the breathing was coming from. And then the silhouette was passing the window again, on its way back to the door.

Rutledge had a split second to make his decision. Then he was out of the bed in one smooth motion, muscles tight as a spring as he launched himself at the figure.

But it eluded him, and he crashed into the tall dresser instead. Swearing as he hit his shoulder hard against the corner, he wheeled toward the door and felt cloth rip though his fingers, his hands coming up empty.

He went down the stairs as fast as was safe, plunging out the open door and into the empty street.

Whoever it was had gone, or had slipped into the shadow of a doorway, invisible in the night.

He went back inside, his bare feet cold from the cobblestones and the threshold.

"Was it you?" he asked Hamish.
"Tell me if it was you!"

Hamish said, "He's still in the house. You were tricked."

Firmly shutting the door, Rutledge found his torch where he'd left it on Hensley's desk and began a search of the ground floor.

But as he walked into the kitchen he knew it was too late.

Behind him the outer door opened and closed so quietly he wasn't sure at first that he'd heard it. The intruder had doubled back and gone.

His presence had been a message. "I could easily have killed you as you slept."

So much for Meredith Channing's prediction that it was over.

Rutledge stood in the parlor that served as Hensley's police station and realized that without a key, he was at the mercy of someone intent on terrorizing him. It would be only a matter of time before the sport palled, and the decision was made to take this game to its logical conclusion.

And he had a feeling that he wouldn't see the blow coming.

Rutledge went to call on Grace Letteridge that morning, finding her brooding over her roses.

"I don't think this one will live," she told him as he came up the front walk. "The roots aren't stable." She rocked the offending canes back and forth. "I won't know for certain until spring, but the signs aren't good."

"Yes, well, that one left a thorn in my back, I'd swear to that."

She stood up and dusted her hands. "You're a liar."

"Probably. Come inside and let me ask you a few questions."

"Why should I do that? I'm not guilty of anything. And what's more, I don't know anyone who is."

"Still—"

She reluctantly preceded him into the parlor and sat down, prepared to block him at every turn. He could feel her resistance across the room.

"Tell me about Robbie Baylor—no, don't fly off at me. This is more important than your pride."