Charles Todd - An Impartial Witness

"Then why did he let her drive him to London?"

"Because he was desperate to go there," Mr. Hart replied, "and I'm really not comfortable driving such distances now." He put his hand to his heart as if in explanation. "I asked him to wait a few days, that I'd find someone to take him. But he was impatient, he said there was something he had thought about, that he must ask Helen Calder, although he wasn't about to tell Victoria his real reason for speaking to her. Michael had been rereading Marjorie's letters to him, but he didn't have all of them. He believed Mrs. Calder might remember what he was searching for."

I leaned forward. "What was it he was hoping to ask her? I expect to see Mrs. Calder tomorrow. Perhaps I can ask her instead."

"I wish I knew," he replied. "I didn't understand the urgency, you see, or I'd have risked the journey myself. I've regretted that bitterly. I would have been with him instead." Michael's alibi, which Victoria couldn't-or wouldn't-give him.

"Could Victoria have been suspicious enough to follow him?" I asked. "If she was jealous of Marjorie, she could have been jealous of Helen Calder as well. She might have jumped to the conclusion that he had used her to see Mrs. Calder." But even as I said the words, I thought about Mrs. Calder's long, thin face. And she was a few years older. What was there to be jealous of?

But jealousy didn't always heed reason.

Small wonder Victoria was eager to testify at the trial. She would have enjoyed twisting the truth if it put Michael Hart in the worst possible light.

"Just how much did Victoria know about Marjorie's life in London?" I asked after a moment. "Did she go up to London often, after her father's death?"

"If you want to know what I think," Mrs. Hart said, "she went to spy on her sister."

"My dear," her husband cautioned, "we couldn't be sure where she was going when she left here."

"Well, you saw her often enough at the station in Great Sefton. Where else could she have been going at that hour but to London? It isn't as if trains pass through Great Sefton as often as they do in Waterloo Station or Charing Cross! There are only two a day, the morning train to London and the evening train to Portsmouth."

"She was fond of the theater and the symphony," her husband reminded her. "And Mrs. Toller mentioned that Victoria volunteered there, arranging programs for the wounded. I've told you before."

"Yes, that's all well and good. It doesn't convince me she wasn't spying on Marjorie."

I said, "Perhaps there was a man, someone she cared about."

But they would have none of that. Not Victoria, they said. They weren't even certain she'd cared for Michael, except for the fact that he belonged to Marjorie.

"She wanted him because she couldn't have him," Mrs. Hart declared. "And what she can't have, she despises."

I tried to pin Mr. and Mrs. Hart down to precise dates when they'd seen Victoria in Great Sefton, but too much time had passed.

When I left the Harts, I wondered if Michael had weighed the grief his decision had inflicted on them. Protecting the dead was admirable, but the living counted too.

From there, I went to call on Alicia.

Her face was cool when she answered the door.

I said quickly, before she could shut it again, "Please. I'm so sorry that I made you angry on my last visit. It was wrong of me to exclude you when I spoke to the rector's cook. I thought I was being wise, and I was only being selfish." I stopped, seeing no softening in her expression. "I've only just come back from France. I couldn't get leave for Michael's trial. And he's to be hanged next week." I wanted her to know that I hadn't been in England since the day of our quarrel.

"I was shocked by your behavior when he was taken into custody. To argue with the constable and that man from Scotland Yard on a public street was unseemly. It embarrassed me. After all, I'd introduced you to everyone here."

I didn't think that had bothered her as much as my interviewing the rector's cook on my own. But I said, "It was the only chance I had to speak up. I had to stand up for what I believed to be true at the time."

"And he confessed, didn't he? To murdering one woman and attempting to murder another. I couldn't believe it, but I expect he did it to save his aunt and uncle the ordeal of a trial. At least in that he showed some courage."

I didn't argue. What good would it have done?

After a moment she said, "What brings you back to Little Sefton?"

"I came to offer my support to Mr. and Mrs. Hart. They are guilty of nothing, except perhaps for loving Michael and still believing in him."

"He wasn't their child. As Victoria has been busy pointing out."

"I don't think they consider whose child he was, only that they are losing him before very long." I hesitated, and then said, "Speaking of Victoria, I hear she was often in London. Did you ever go with her to a play?"

Grudgingly she answered me. "I did once, yes. I didn't enjoy it very much. I didn't know anyone there, and I felt guilty enjoying myself while Gareth was in France."

"I understand that."

"No, you can't. You aren't married. The man you love isn't likely to be killed in the next push, or at risk of dying in an aid station before you even hear that he's been wounded."

I realized then that she hadn't heard from him for a while. And looking more closely, I could see that she had passed sleepless nights as well.

"I'm sometimes the last caring face they see," I told her gently. "I often write letters for the dying. I know that their last thoughts are for those they love."

She burst into tears then, unable to hold them back, burying her face in her hands. "You don't know. No one can know."

I took her arm and led her into the house, then sat with her as she cried. After a while I went to the kitchen and found the kettle, put it on, and made a pot of tea. She was quieter when I came back to the sitting room, and drank her tea obediently, sniffling at first, and finally dully sitting there, worn and worried.

"I'm so sorry," she said in a muffled voice. "I've been out of sorts, worrying. There's been no news for weeks and weeks."

"If there is bad news, you will know. It won't take weeks and weeks."

Taking a deep breath, she set her teacup aside. "Thank you, Bess," she said simply. "And I'm so sorry about Michael. I feel responsible, I introduced you to him. I didn't dream-"

"No, that's all right." I rose to take my leave. "Will you be all right now?"

"Yes, sometimes it just overwhelms me, the worry about Gareth."

Following me to the door, she added, "I am sorry about Michael. I know you were beginning to care for him. But you'll forget in time. There will be someone else."

I didn't contradict her. I thanked her for the tea and asked her to write to me if she felt like it.

I had reached the walk, heading for my motorcar, when she stopped me.

"Bess?"

I turned.

"I think Victoria was seeing someone in London in the winter. But it must not have come to anything. It was over by the spring."

"Did you know who it was?"

She shook her head. "I only heard the gossip. Someone told me he was an officer. And Mrs. Leighton swore that he was married. She saw them coming out of a mean little restaurant near Hampstead Heath. Those were her words, 'a mean little restaurant,' and she interpreted this as proof he was married, because he hadn't taken Victoria somewhere nice in London."

I thanked her, glad we were parting as friends, and walked back to the church, where I'd left my motorcar. I'd just turned the crank and stepped back when someone came up behind me.

I turned, expecting it to be Alicia again, but it was Victoria Garrison.

"I thought that was your vehicle, hidden in the shrubbery where no one would notice it."