Proof of Guilt (16 page)

“Pride can be hurt as quickly as one’s heart.”

She turned back to him. “Yes. Pride.”

He probed a little deeper, aware of some undercurrent that he couldn’t quite put a finger on. She had all but grown up with the French family, and yet she lived here in this modest cottage with only a daily and a cook. She had been engaged to both brothers, which meant she had the blessing of the family. And yet a doctor’s daughter was more socially prominent.

“Are you related to the family? A cousin, perhaps?”

She smiled. “Not at all.”

Against his will, he said, “Because of the handkerchief, the Yard is nearly convinced that you are in some way responsible for Lewis French’s disappearance and the death of a man whose body was found in Chelsea.”

Her head to one side, she studied him. “You’re a policeman. You must have dealt with the very worst sort of person. Do you really believe I’m capable of murder?”

Hamish’s voice was loud in his ears, drowning out the bells in the church tower marking the hour. “ ’Ware!”

And Rutledge heeded the warning.

“I’ve told you. There’s no mark of Cain to guide us in finding a killer.”

She turned, walking away. “Then come and take me into custody when you’re ready.”

He watched her go, and just as she reached for the latch to open her door, he asked in a quiet voice that would carry to her and not to the neighbors, “Afonso Diaz. Do you by any chance know the name?”

She had said all she intended to say to him. She shut the door firmly behind her, leaving him with no choice but to return to his motorcar and drive away.

There was another call he intended to make this morning.

Miss French was in her garden, he was told when he arrived at her house, and Nan, the maid, had answered his knock.

And he found her there, a pinafore over her dress to protect it as she worked among the roses in a garden shaped like a half-moon.

Looking up, she recognized him and said quickly, “Well? Have you found my brother?”

“Not yet. We’ve located his motorcar. It was in Surrey.”

“Surrey?” She frowned. “We don’t know anyone there.”

“As far as I can tell, it wasn’t your brother who abandoned his motorcar in a chalk quarry.”

“Aband— I think he cared more for that motorcar than for me. I don’t believe you.”

“Nevertheless, it’s true. And I’m afraid I must ask you a few questions as a result.”

She wiped her forehead with the back of her wrist, pushing away her hair, and said, “The summerhouse. Over there.”

He followed her to a round Greek temple set on a slight rise that enabled her to view the garden in comfort. Cushioned bench seats followed the rail, and she took one side, offering him the other. From this vantage point he could see that there was a ten-foot section only just added to one side of the garden. The earth was different there, indicating that it had been plowed recently.

“This must be a spectacular view when all the plants are in bloom,” he commented.

“Yes, I’ve worked on it since I was twelve or thirteen. But you aren’t here to admire my roses, are you? What is it you want to ask? And please hurry, I’d like to finish my work here before the day grows too warm.”

“Are you sure there’s no one in Surrey? Someone—perhaps a girl—your brother knew and you did not.”

“It’s quite possible. But I have no idea where he met her or who she may be. It won’t be as easy to jilt Mary Ellen Townsend. Her father has been very happy to tell everyone that his daughter is marrying a French. He won’t care to eat those words.”

“I was told Miss Whitman ran free in this house as a child. And that she was engaged to your elder brother before his death. There must have been a connection somewhere, or Laurence French would have looked for better prospects for his elder son and heir.”

“I wasn’t for that engagement, but then no one asked my opinion. I thought he could do far better.”

“In what way?”

Goaded, she said, “Whatever you heard about Valerie playing here as a child, she isn’t one of us. Her father was a Naval officer, that’s true. But her mother was the daughter of the firm’s chief clerk, Gooding. Because her mother died in childbirth, and her father was always off in the South China Sea or somewhere just as distant, my own mother felt sorry for her and brought her here to play with us.”

Rutledge turned away to look out over the garden so that she couldn’t read the expression on his face.

It was damning, that bit of news. Valerie Whitman had admitted that she didn’t love Lewis French. But if she had married him, she would have become one of the family. No longer
the daughter of the firm’s chief clerk
.

She might have been willing to let Lewis French go if she hadn’t cared for him. She herself, in Rutledge’s opinion, could have done far better than French, judging by what little he’d learned about the man.

But was she as willing to let go that leap into a different world? Wealth. Social standing. A house in London.

Miss French was saying, “I often wondered how she could attract both Michael and then Lewis. It was amazing to me. Yes, she was always underfoot, they were used to her. It’s not as if she’s actually pretty, like Mary Ellen Townsend.” It was said enviously. “I could have understood it if Michael had fallen in love with
her
.”

Rutledge was still considering the ramifications of the connection between Valerie Whitman and Gooding when he realized that Miss French had asked him something.

Turning back to her, he said, “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

“I asked if you thought Valerie was pretty.”

What she read in his face brought a deep flush to her own. “You do, don’t you? You’re just like the rest of them, even my father.”

“I’m a policeman,” he said. “Involved with a murder inquiry. It doesn’t matter what I think.”

“But it does,” she said viciously. “If I’d killed Lewis and buried him there in my rose garden, you’d believe it quickly enough. But if Valerie has killed him for jilting her, you’ll not. You’ll make excuses and look for flaws in the evidence, and put off taking her into custody. Why is it,” she went on, the venom in her voice pinning him where he was, “that some women can be forgiven anything? There were times when I hated my father and my brothers. They never
saw
me. If I’d suddenly become invisible, they wouldn’t have wondered what had become of me until they needed me to look after Mama or keep the house open and ready for them whenever they took it into their heads to come to Dedham—”

She broke off, as if she suddenly realized where her outburst was leading. Breathing hard, she stared at Rutledge, and then turned her back on him, one hand on the railing, the other already groping for her handkerchief. “Go away. Just—go away.”

He glimpsed the edge of the pretty square of linen as she gripped it tightly, and saw in one corner the dark red embroidered rose, the petals just open and a drop of white-thread dew on one of them.

Hamish was urgently trying to tell him something, but he turned without a word and walked around the house to the drive, where he’d left his motorcar.

Shaken by the woman’s angry words, he wondered if he had indeed been looking for flaws in the evidence, twisting and turning it because he didn’t want to believe that Valerie Whitman could be a murderess.

If Afonso Diaz was simply an old man waiting to die and go back to his native country in the only way open to him—in a coffin—then he, Rutledge, had failed to do his duty in a proper and timely fashion.

His doubts and Hamish’s violent rumbling in his head carried him all the way back to Dedham and the inn.

And still he sat there in the tiny telephone closet for all of ten minutes before reaching out, taking up the receiver, and putting a call through to the Yard.

Chapter Twelve

F
ielding was finally tracked down and brought to the telephone. Rutledge, waiting impatiently, said at once, “Any news?”

“Early days,” the sergeant replied. “But there was a bicycle put on the train here in London on the night in question—that’s to say, the night after you found the body in Chelsea. We’re still looking into that, sir. Male or female, the man doesn’t remember, only that the bicycle’s rear wheel knocked over his Thermos of tea as he was loading it and sent the tea rolling away. He was afraid to drink it after that for fear the Thermos had broken inside, and he was still angry about that. He does recall that it was a woman’s bicycle.”

“He’s quite sure about that?”

“Oh, yes, sir. I’m looking into who might have bought a ticket to Dedham or the vicinity. But I daresay whoever it was used a false name.”

Rutledge suggested it before he could stop himself. “Or put the bicycle on board without any intention of claiming it in the end.”

“There’s an idea, sir. I’ll look into that as well.”

Rutledge thanked him and ended the call. Restless and unwilling to sit still, he drove back to St. Hilary and went to find the curate.

Williams had made progress on painting the Rectory. Rutledge followed the wet spills around the side of the house to the kitchen gardens and found the curate just beginning to paint the trim on the porch there.

Williams was whistling to himself as he worked and broke off to see who was coming. “Inspector. You’ve called often enough that I feel I should offer you a coverall and a brush.”

Rutledge laughed. “You’ve done nice work on your own.”

“Yes, well, that’s the new description of a clergyman. Jack-of-all-trades. I couldn’t ask the church warden to have the Rectory painted when there’s so much needing to be done in the church. Not when I’m young and fit.”

“Thinking of getting married, are you?”

Williams blushed. “Um—there isn’t gossip already, is there?”

“None that I’ve heard. Are you?”

The curate changed the subject. “What brings you here this morning?”

“I don’t really know,” Rutledge told him truthfully. “I’m in a quandary about the missing Mr. French. Ever hear of anyone called Afonso Diaz?”

“Who is he when he’s at home?”

“He’s from Madeira.”

“In that case, the French family ought to know. That’s where they do business.”

“Thank you. The other problem is, what has become of Lewis French? He’s been gone away too long, without a word to anyone. Someone must know the answer to that. He’s got a business in London that needs his attention. He’s expecting his cousin to arrive in England at any moment. He has a fiancée who must miss him.”

“It sounds to me rather as if he’s dead,” Williams said grimly as he carefully descended the ladder. “But that brings us back to the question of who would wish to kill him?”

“Perhaps his sister. She’s been left to cool her heels at home all these years while the sons of the family prepared to take their place in the firm.”

“Yes, I can see that. But if Lewis were dead, she’d be in London going through the books. Her time come at long last.”

Rutledge thought that might well be true, but, devil’s advocate, he said, “If she’s clever enough to kill him and get away with it, I should think she’d be clever enough to not to show her hand too soon.”

The curate grimaced. “I really don’t like to think of anyone in my flock being a murderer.” Wiping his fingers on rags that were even more flecked with paint than his hands were, smearing the droplets in every direction, he said, “Tea?”

“Yes, thank you.”

“I was about to stop anyway. Now’s as good a time as any.”

“Someone said to me not long ago that Dedham was too pretty a town to harbor murder. Does St. Hilary seem as charmed as Dedham?”

“I don’t know that either of them is charmed in that way. Even beauty can cover a multitude of sins. Yet for all you know, the murderer is waiting to be discovered in London.”

“Would it were that easy.” But Rutledge reminded himself of the clerk, Gooding. Could he have tried to murder Lewis French? Because of his granddaughter? If true, it might go a long way toward explaining why French was afraid to show himself, if he was still alive. The flaw was, Gooding wasn’t a young man. Was he still capable physically of putting a deadweight into the motorcar, driving all night to London, leaving a body in Chelsea, then walking away from the Surrey chalk pit and bicycling back to London? Surely he’d need an accomplice.

Rutledge could hear again Miss French’s angry accusation:
You’ll make excuses and look for flaws in the evidence, and put off taking her into custody.

Realizing that Williams had already gone inside and was holding the door for him, he shook himself mentally and followed the curate into the tidy kitchen.

There had been a woman’s touch here once. The faded but still pretty curtains patterned with bunches of cabbage roses on a cream background that matched the cream walls gave an unexpected warmth to the plain room. He took the chair the curate offered and watched the man’s deft preparation of their tea. Rutledge decided that the curate had been a bachelor for some time and liked his comforts.

“Did Lewis French ever come to you with a troubled mind? Especially over his decision not to marry Valerie Whitman?”

The curate, his attention on counting spoonsful of loose tea into the china pot, shook his head. Finishing, he said, “He might have spoken to my predecessor, if he were still here. He was older, you see. Someone with whom French might have felt comfortable discussing his feelings.”

“And Miss Whitman? Did she confide in you when she was jilted?”

Color ran up into the curate’s face again. “No. But this I can tell you about her. She has enormous strength of character. I’ve seen it. She came to Sunday services the day after she had agreed to end her engagement to French. And she sat there, knowing the gossip going on behind people’s hands, the speculation, the questions. Then when French announced his engagement to Miss Townsend, she endured their pity. I asked her why, when I saw her that same afternoon, why she hadn’t stayed at home. She told me, ‘It will be over sooner if they can see me. If I hide in the shadows, it will only encourage them to wonder how I felt.’ ”

It was clear that Williams was half—probably wholly—in love with Valerie Whitman.

“And Miss French? What did she have to say?”

“You’ve met her. You know how forthright she can be.” Pouring water from the kettle into the pot, the curate kept his face turned away from Rutledge. “I heard her tell someone that her brothers never asked her opinion on any subject, least of all their love affairs.”

It was callous and very much in Miss French’s style.

As he set a cup in front of Rutledge, and put the sugar bowl and milk jug to hand, Williams said, “I’m afraid we got off the subject. What did you come to see me about?”

“Actually I already have asked you about that. The man Diaz.”

“Oh. Well, then I’m sorry I couldn’t help.”

“You said you believed French was dead. What makes you think so? Aside from the fact that he hasn’t made any attempt to contact anyone.”

“I was thinking about it the other day after speaking to Miss French. She was buying a small stone. It looked extraordinarily like a rough-hewn tombstone. I asked her what it was for, and she said she felt she should add a little something to her rose garden. That it lacked perspective. I thought that rather odd, and afterward wondered if perhaps she has indirectly faced the fact that her brother is not coming home.”

“Why a tombstone for a garden, then, if there will eventually be one in the churchyard?”

“You must ask Miss French. It might have been nothing more than my own fancy.”

Rutledge hadn’t noticed a stone when he was there. Had Miss French changed her mind about it after her conversation with the curate? Or was it still waiting to be placed?

When they had finished their tea, Rutledge asked one final question.

“What did you feel when the engagement between French and Miss Whitman was called off?”

“I was glad, to tell you the truth. I didn’t think they suited at all.”

“Is it possible he had a change of heart and decided he wished to marry her after all?” Someone had left—or put—her handkerchief in that motorcar, and if Valerie Whitman believed French was having second thoughts, she might have gone for a drive with him. “Would she, you think, have wanted to marry him still?”

Williams shook his head. “That’s unlikely. No, I can’t imagine that. She’s quite proud, you know. She wouldn’t have him back.”

If French had had a seizure and hit someone on the road, would Miss Whitman have helped him conceal it? Rutledge wanted to ask the curate that as well, but in the end decided that the man wasn’t able to look at Miss Whitman objectively.

Rutledge said, “Thank you for the tea. And the conversation.”

“Anytime. Although it might speed up my work if you took up a brush after all.”

The words were lighthearted, but Rutledge could see the worry in the curate’s eyes. “Look in London, Inspector. St. Hilary isn’t hiding a murderer.”

L
ondon had left a message for him. The clerk at the Sun’s desk called to him as he walked in and said, “Mr. Rutledge. Could you ring Scotland Yard as soon as possible?”

He thanked the man and went into the telephone closet.

It was Gibson who answered this time. “Fielding is speaking to someone at the railway station. He’s asking for a photograph of Miss Whitman. Do you know where one can be had on short notice? It appears to be urgent.”

There was Gooding, of course. But Rutledge would have preferred to speak to him first. And Miss French might well have a photograph, but it would be here in Essex, not London. He thought for several seconds.

“The housekeeper at French’s London house. A photograph of the happy couple on their engagement? She might know of something like that.”

“Thank you, sir. I’ll send a man round straightaway,” Gibson said and rang off.

A photograph. And needed urgently. That did not bode well for Miss Whitman.

Rutledge went out into the street, walking without any direction in mind, just . . . walking. He paused at the square to watch the construction going on there, realized that this was to be Dedham’s war memorial, and quickly moved on.

He had only a matter of hours. How best to spend them? Where could he find new information that would offset what the luggage van man would most surely say? Or the ticket agent in his kiosk.

Where would Afonso Diaz go to find a killer for hire?

Bob Rawlings? The undergardener with the belligerent attitude? Or one of the other staff, hiding the fact that he knew someone who had killed before and would for the right price kill again? For that matter, where had Diaz found the money to pay such a person?

It was a dead end. There was nowhere left to go with the inquiry into Afonso Diaz, no matter how promising it had seemed in the beginning.

Then why, Rutledge asked himself, had he felt so sure that it was worth pursuing?

Wishful thinking? Or sheer instinct?

Someone spoke to him, and he came out of his reverie to see French’s fiancée standing in front of him, smiling.

“Miss Townsend,” he said, removing his hat.

“Mr. Rutledge? Have you found Lewis? Is that why you’re still in Dedham?”

“Sadly no, I haven’t caught up with him,” he told her. “I’d hoped he would come to London, if not return to Essex. But there’s been no word.”

Her expression had been hopeful. Now it fell into worried lines. “But what’s become of him? Men don’t just disappear. His friends—surely he would be staying with someone. I can’t imagine—”

But the trouble was, she could. When he said nothing, she went on. “Is he— Do you think he might be having second thoughts about our engagement? Is he worried because of my father? I know he’s strict, I know he is overly protective of me.”

With an assurance he didn’t feel, Rutledge said, “I don’t believe his disappearance is connected with you, Miss Townsend. Rather, I think it has a great deal to do with his firm.”

“Do you really? Thank you, that’s so comforting to hear. Thank you, Mr. Rutledge. And if you do find him, will you ask him to write to me as soon as possible? Until I hear, I’ll worry.”

“I promise,” he said, and she hurried away, her step lighter, as if she believed him.

He watched her go, then turned briskly back to the inn, his mind made up.

After giving up his room, he drove directly to the French house.

His knock was answered by the maid, Nan.

“Miss French isn’t receiving this afternoon,” she told him firmly.

“I needn’t speak to her. I’d like to borrow a photograph of Miss Whitman. A recent one if you have it. Will you please ask Miss French if this is possible?”

From down the passage came Agnes French’s voice.

“The one in the right-hand drawer of Mr. Lewis’s desk, Nan.”

The maid turned in her direction, but over her shoulder Rutledge saw the door behind which Miss French had been listening shut.

“Just a moment, if you please,” Nan said and closed the outer door quietly.

In three minutes she was back, and in her hands was a silver frame. She passed it to him. “Miss French would appreciate it if you returned this when you have no further need of it.”

He told her he would and left. It was not until he was outside the gates that he looked at it.

Black-and-white imagery didn’t do her justice. Without the fascinating color of her hair and the ever-changing color of her eyes, Valerie Whitman was just a rather ordinary girl, pretty because she was young, but of no particular attraction.

He turned the photograph facedown on the seat next to him.

Hamish said, “Did ye expect it would be sae different?”

Rutledge replied, “I don’t think I considered it at all.”

“Aye, and pigs fly.”