Watchers of Time (9 page)

Where there had once been the blue wash of water, banks of silt met his eye instead. These grassy hummocks rolled like earthen waves out to the North Sea’s edge, and the muddy earth below the stone quay gleamed wetly under the gray sky, a small ghost of its medieval magnificence. A handsome port, suitable for coastal trading, where fishing boats had brought in heavy nets filled with plaice and cod and mackerel, had become a narrow ribbon of water that wandered halfheartedly into view, touched the quay at high tide, and then wandered away again. Two or three small boats had been drawn up behind a line of sheds at the far end of the quay and left to rot. Another pair sat in the black mud, waiting to be pushed into the main stream of the ribbon.

He lifted his gaze to the great arm of sand dunes, covered with shore plants and grasses, which was flung out beyond the marshes on his right, ridged with color—rust and waning green and dull gold. It had once sheltered Osterley from storms, making it a safe haven. But it must also have allowed the sand to find a haven as well, until the water had been lost amid the pits and shallows rising faster than it did. A haunt of waterfowl now, but through the breaks in the ridges one could still glimpse the sea, tantalizing and perhaps close enough to hear when the wind fell off. There must be a fine strand still, out where the headland rose to his left, the kind of place that would have attracted fishermen and bathers had there been easier access.

Small houses, shops, and a single hotel had taken over the waterfront now. Cheek by jowl, they presented a blank face to the sea: few windows and most of the doorways shielded by narrow, rectangular entries that kept out the wind and provided some protection in storms. These were a signature of many seaside towns accustomed to rough weather.

Neither rich nor poor, and mostly unchanged over the past century or more, Osterley offered a middle-class solidity that was the backbone of England, attitudes still firmly fixed in Victorian morality and the responsibility of Empire. Clinging to the edge of the land, the town was no longer a part of the sea.

His was the only motorcar on the street today, although he saw three more standing at angles in the walled yard beside the only hotel.

A fat gray goose, wild, not domestic, picked at the black mud beyond the quay, and its mate stood watch, neck straight and eyes bright. Early winter arrivals. Beyond the town to the right of the harbor the marshes spread east for miles. Rutledge found a small space in which to shift into neutral and look out across them. They held a fascination for him, always had, but he had forgotten their odd beauty.

Just below him in the water, a boat was coming in, the man at the oars handling them well, keeping the bow midstream as if he knew his way, his fair hair dark with sweat as he pulled toward the quay. He wore a good tweed coat, and an English setter sat between the thwarts, tongue lolling as it watched the quay come closer. Rutledge turned off the motor and got out, standing there until the boat had reached the stairs, and then walked forward to catch the rope the man threw up toward him.

“Thanks!”

“My pleasure.”

The rower stood up and stepped out onto the lower stair. A man of middle height with a strong face and eyes the color of a winter sea, he was fit and trim. Clicking his tongue, he waited as the dog leaped up the stairs ahead of him, excitement in its movement, waiting for a sign to run.

“Heel, you ragbag!” he said, and looking up at Rutledge added, “He’s got more energy than I have! But then he hasn’t been working the oars for the past hour or more. I’ll have the devil of a time walking home; he’ll be there and back twice over before I cover half the distance.” It was said with a mixture of impatience and affection. The voice was cultured, without the local accent.

“Can you go out as far as the sea?” Rutledge asked, nodding toward the distant headland.

“Oh, yes. It’s quite nice out there. Silent as the grave, except for the waves breaking as they come in, and the birds putting up their usual fuss. I rather like it.”

He spoke to the dog and the pair set out up Water Street, the dog matching the man’s strides for the first twenty paces and then bouncing ahead like a thrown ball, urging his master on. Then an older woman, coming out of a shop to her horse-drawn carriage, called out, “Edwin? Care for a lift?”

The man waved to her, and whistled the dog to heel. Rutledge watched him swing himself into the carriage and heard his laughter as the woman agreed to allow the wet, wriggling animal to leap up with them.

Returning to his motorcar, Rutledge noticed The Pelican Inn, standing at the far end of the quay, where the road turned up. A barmaid had just finished sweeping the entry and was now shaking out the bit of carpet where customers wiped their feet. She was buxom, fair, and middle-aged, with a good-natured face.

Children rolling hoops ran up the street, shouting to each other, drawing a frown from two well-dressed men conversing under the wrought-iron sign for the baker’s shop. A black cat sat in a sheltered corner, licking its fur and ignoring the small terrier that was trotting at the heels of an elderly man with a cane. The man spoke to the barmaid and she laughed.

A pub, Rutledge thought, was one of the best places to test the temperament of a village. He left the car at the end of the quay and walked across to The Pelican.

The barmaid had gone inside and was wiping down the last two tables, her face pink with exertion as she gave them a good scrub. She looked up and smiled at him, saying, “What can I do for you, love?”

“Is it too early for a lunch?”

“The ham’s not near done, nor the stew neither, but I can give you a Ploughman’s.”

“That will be fine,” he answered. Bread and good English cheese and a pint.

“Here, sit by the windows where you can enjoy the view.” She shrugged plump shoulders and added, “
If
you like the marshes. I find them dreary, myself. Too much wildlife for my taste. Of the crawly kind, if you take my meaning! More of them than there are of us, and that’s no lie!”

He sat down by the window that looked out across the marsh and counted a flight of some dozen ducks coming in to what must be a pool hidden somewhere among the tall grasses. The barmaid had disappeared into the kitchen, and he heard the rattle of cutlery and dishes.

As his eyes adjusted to the dimness created by smoke-blackened beams and tables, he realized that he wasn’t alone. Another man sat in a corner nook by the bar, his head bent over a newspaper. Rutledge wasn’t certain whether he was reading it or using it as a barrier against conversation.

Decoratively, The Pelican contained the flotsam and jetsam of a seafaring port: an iron anchor in one corner, several ships’ models suspended from the beams, a handful of blue-and-white Chinese plates resting on shelves nailed to the walls with haphazard artistry, carved seabirds of every shape and size perched on the wide windowsills as if trying to find a way through the glass.

A stuffed greylag goose, enormous and showing signs of moth, occupied one end of the bar, with a sign around his neck advertising a Norfolk ale.

There were even odd bits and pieces from around the world, hung wherever they might fit. A great hammered-copper dish from Morocco or Turkey, set above the hearth, was large enough to serve an entire family without crowding. A small elephant sat in one corner, carved from teak and caparisoned in fraying velvet, with tiny silver bells in the fringe. What appeared to be a water buffalo’s horned skull was mounted above the door. And on another wall, curved knives in ornate sheaths shared honors with a hideous mask from somewhere in Africa, leering through shell-rimmed eyes and mouth.

It gave the public house a decidedly eccentric air, as if more than one seaman had settled his account with whatever souvenirs he had in his kit.

Hamish commented, “I canna’ say the goose is an encouragement to a man’s drinking.”

The barmaid came toward the table with Rutledge’s lunch—chunks of freshly baked bread and sharp cheddar cheese, a pickle, and a pot of mustard. As she set them before him, she tilted her head to the room at large and said, “We’re generally busier than this, but it’s market day at East Sherham, and most people won’t be back before two o’clock.”

She went to draw his pint, and added, friendly gossip that she was, “Here on business, are you?”

He answered that he was, and she continued to chatter for a few minutes longer, telling him that she had been born in Hunstanton and had come to Osterley with her husband, who had since died fighting a house fire, and that she and her two daughters had found a good home here. She seemed to ignore the man in the corner, as if he was another fixture along with the elephant and the mask.

Rutledge said, “I was shocked to hear that a priest was murdered in Osterley a week ago. It doesn’t strike me as the sort of town where such a thing could happen.”

She shook her head. “I never thought it, either. None of us has got over it, I can tell you. I keep my girls close, and lock the doors at night. If he’d kill a priest, he won’t stop at
children,
will he? I shudder to think what sort of devil could do such a thing! I haven’t slept deep since it happened.”

Rutledge was on the point of asking her another question when a group of men strode in, hailing her with accounts of their success bidding on a pair of rams at the sale in East Sherham and eager to relive it blow by blow. She went off to serve them, and listened with good grace to their rambling story of the day’s best bargain. Underlying their enthusiasm was a more somber thread of strain, and they seemed to be intent on ignoring it. Their laughter was a little loud, a little forced. The barmaid—Betsy, they’d called her—soon had them settled with pints to celebrate their success.

Rutledge decided, from the strong noses that marked each weather-beaten face, that they were father and sons. He finished his meal amid the general hilarity and a rash of newcomers bringing their own news of the market. It was, as far as he could tell, the only topic of conversation of interest just now: who was there, what they’d bought or failed to buy, how the prices ran, and any gossip gleaned. For an hour or so, the shadow of the priest’s death was being resolutely lifted.

The man at the corner table had not moved, as far as Rutledge could tell, nor had he turned a page in the newspaper. No one encouraged him to join in the good-humored banter or asked him to drink with them.

Settling his account, Rutledge left the pub and went out to start his motorcar.

“It doesna’ appear to be a town with dark secrets,” Hamish said. “And they didna’ stare at you—a stranger— with suspicion.”

“Interesting, wasn’t it? But then market day generates its own excitement. When the euphoria of a bargain wears off and night begins to fall, people will begin to look over their shoulders again.” He’d been to towns where the silence hung heavy as mist, faces shut and unfriendly, where there was no distraction from fear and uncertainty. Here there seemed to be a determined refusal to acknowledge that Osterley had been touched by evil. He wondered why.

Where Water Street turned at harbor’s edge to run back up to the main road, there were two horse-drawn carriages outside the green-grocer’s shop, and a lad from the butcher’s next door was carrying a bulky package out to deposit in a pony cart, accompanying a woman dressed in black with a small touch of cream at her wrists and collar. An elderly woman stepped out of the greengrocer’s with a large basket filled with her purchases, and turned to walk up toward the main road. Rutledge thought she might be Mrs. Wainer. But there was no one to ask.

“You can feel the water,” Hamish said. “It must be verra’ bitter here in winter. Raw with an east wind.”

“Sometimes,” Rutledge agreed. “When the storms roll in.”

Back on the main road, Rutledge braked as he came to the police station, but the sign hadn’t been removed from the door. He drove on to St. Anne’s and got out of the car, staring up at the rectory. Cupolas and mock turrets and gingerbread gave it a frivolous air that the simpler lines of the Victorian frame seemed half ashamed of. There were carvings at the peak of the gables, and he told himself that if the builder had found a place to add gargoyles, he’d have done it. And yet the whole seemed far more pleasing than any one part.

Next to the rectory was a fair-sized flint house with a small glass conservatory now flecked with moisture from an array of tall plants inside. Most certainly the home of the neighbor who had been away on the night of the priest’s murder. The windows on that side of the rectory looked across a narrow stretch of grassy lawn almost into the windows of the larger house.

But the rectory windows also looked down the lawn to the road. Had Father James seen someone there, someone he believed would hear his shout? A laborer walking home from the fields? A constable on patrol?

Hamish said, “Was it luck that the family was no’ at home? Or did the killer choose his time because of that?”

“Yes, it’s possible,” Rutledge answered. “If he’d been watching the house for several days.”

The next three houses were more modest in design, curving toward a house closest to the point that must have been part of the port buildings in its heyday. A small hotel? Or a customs house. A placard nailed to a board and neatly lettered in white identified it as a rooming house in its present incarnation. Across the street from where he stood, there were five flint houses, built for comfort more than style.

Rutledge walked up the short path to the rectory door. The knocker, he discovered, was a bit of whimsy as well: a coffin. He let it drop, and the echoing ring of sound startled him, deep as a bell tolling. Hamish, responding to his unspoken thought, said, “It must ha’ been the last owner’s, an undertaker’s.”