Charles Todd - An Impartial Witness

But Helen hadn't known who the man was. At least she told me she didn't.

"Someone shot at Michael. Perhaps it was the same person who killed Marjorie and tried to kill Mrs. Calder."

"You are pathetic," she said. "Don't you know what that was about? I knew, the minute I heard about it. Michael was trying to kill himself. And he failed. He couldn't quite bring himself to do it. So he invented someone shooting from the bushes, to spare his aunt and uncle the truth. Someone was bound to have heard the shots."

I felt ill, unable to think of anything to say. I hadn't considered suicide.

Victoria interpreted the silence and laughed. "It's rather shocking, isn't it, to realize he's in love with a dead woman. He hasn't let her go. But you're like all the rest, that's why you came to his defense when the police wanted to take him away. Even dead, Marjorie still has him in thrall."

There was a sudden break in her voice, and I realized that she was talking about her own sense of loss, not mine.

And then before I could answer, she added harshly, her voice hardly recognizable, "They won't hang him, you know, until that shoulder is fully healed. But hang him they will. Mark my words. And it will be my testimony that will put the noose around his neck."

There was a click at the other end of the line. Victoria had hung up before she gave herself away.

I stood there for a moment, the receiver still in my hand, then put it up.

Victoria was angry, vindictive. But Michael had sealed his own fate when he lifted the knocker on Helen Calder's door. If the maid knew him by sight or could identify him, the police had all the evidence they wanted.

For a fleeting moment I wondered if Victoria had tricked Michael, and while he was walking off the pain in his shoulder, she had taken advantage of his absence to kill Mrs. Calder herself. From the start I'd been surprised to hear that Michael and Victoria had gone anywhere together, much less London. Why had he asked? Why had she agreed?

Could Victoria stab two women?

I could have asked Michael-but he was beyond reach.

Feeling closed in, I went out into the gardens, thinking to refresh the vases we'd arranged for the dinner party.

Now that he had Michael in custody, would Inspector Herbert still summon Raymond Melton to England to make a statement? Or would that be left to the KC who was preparing the prosecution? I wanted to hear just what had been said at that meeting in the railway station. If Captain Melton had made promises, he had given them grudgingly, and they had provided no comfort. Marjorie deserved better.

I was ready to go back to France, but I wanted very badly to be here when Helen Calder regained her senses. And time was running out.

My father met me as I came through the garden doors into the passage.

"Hallo." He took one look at me. "I've seen Pathan warriors with happier faces. Care to talk about it?"

I smiled. "I just had a conversation with Victoria Garrison. She could probably hold the Khyber Pass single-handedly with a fork." As he laughed, I went on, "I've been trying to decide if Lieutenant Hart is the sort of man to want to kill himself."

"Do you mean before his trial?"

"No, earlier. According to Victoria, no one fired at him as he walked in the garden. The only reason I can think of for a suicide attempt is guilt. And why two shots?"

"It's hard to miss with a revolver if you're serious about using it." He led me to his sanctuary, the study full of trophies from his years in the Army, and offered me the chair across from his. "Especially twice. Unless one intends to miss. In which case, it's a cry for help."

"If it was a cry for help, he covered it up very well indeed." I stared into the golden glass eyes of a Bengal man hunter, a tiger that had killed fourteen villagers before my father brought it down. "More important, I'd like to know if he lied to me. And if he did, what else had he lied about? Conversely, if it was Victoria's lie, it could have other implications. There's a big difference between being shot at and shooting one's self." I turned to look at my father. "I also have to wonder why Victoria agreed to drive him into London-and I'd give much to know what they talked about on the way. I do know he didn't tell her who he expected to see while there."

"It would be wiser, don't you think, to leave the entire matter in the capable hands of Inspector Herbert?"

"I have done. It doesn't stop me from wondering, or from weighing up what I know or suspect."

"And you'd be content to see Victoria Garrison as a murderess."

"It's entirely possible that she could have killed her sister, and tried to make it appear that it was a random act of violence on the part of someone nameless and faceless in London."

"That's a damning comment."

"Yes, but Victoria is so filled with something-hate, envy, jealousy-a wanting-that she might have seen her chance and taken it before she'd even considered what she was doing."

"Women don't usually carry a large knife in their purses."

Which was an excellent point. I smiled. "You've just shot down my best argument for Victoria as a murderess."

"I'm not saying it couldn't be done, only that she would have had to plan carefully." He considered me. "I'll be just as happy to see you back in France, if you want to know the truth. Out of reach. You ask too many questions-if the police are wrong about Michael, then you will need to be cautious."

"Being shot at by Germans is preferable to being stabbed by Englishmen?"

"Absolutely. Just don't tell your mother I said that." He paused. "If you must go back to London before you leave, do take Simon with you."

I promised, and felt the eyes of the Bengal tiger follow me from the room.

My distant grandmother, who had followed her officer husband to Brussels in June 1815, and helped nurse the wounded brought in from Waterloo, was not certain until well into the next evening whether her husband was among the living or the dead. Reports had come in placing him in the heat of the battle, and various accounts had listed him as dead, severely wounded, or missing. But she had held to her faith in his ability to survive, and her words to him as he finally walked into the house they had taken in Brussels had been, "My dear, I'm so sorry, there seems to be nothing for your dinner."

My mother, dealing with the ravages of this war's shortages, still managed to put a decent meal on the table, and I was reminded of Mary's remark that a country house fared better in trying times.

It was Simon's night to join us, and we were finishing our soup when he said, "You'll never guess who I ran into as I was coming out of my meeting today."

I thought he was talking to my father, then looked up to realize that he was speaking to me.

I named several retired officers we'd known in other campaigns, and he shook his head each time.

"I give up. Tell me."

"Jack Melton."

I stared at him. "You didn't mention his brother, did you?" I wouldn't have put it past Simon to have engineered the meeting for the sole purpose of finding out what I would like to know about Raymond Melton.

"I did ask how his brother was. It was the decent thing to do," he said, smug as a cat with a mouthful of canary feathers.

"Well, then?"

"He's presently near Ypres. You might keep that in mind when you go back to France next week."

"Little good that will do me. I've no idea where I'll be sent next. What else did you learn?" I asked.

"That Melton wasn't particularly at ease talking about his brother. His answers were short, as if it wasn't a subject he was comfortable with." Simon Brandon had dealt with men all his adult life-soldiers, prisoners, angry villagers. Men in trouble, afraid, lying, angry, vindictive. He could read them without effort because it had become second nature. I knew he could read me as well, and oddly enough, it was one of the things that made me trust him.