Charles Todd: The Confession

And yet the airfield must have provided the decent if overgrown road that he had followed out here, keeping to the river most of the way and turning only when it opened into the sea beyond. There would have been officers to house, and the pilots. Had there also been an antiaircraft battery? The crews who kept the aircraft flying, the men who fed all of them, saw to their needs, maintained the fields they used for runways, and kept up the buildings they lived in must, at a guess, have doubled the population of Furnham. They must also have brought with them the breath of an outside world the local people were so intent on shutting out. Yet there was no sign as far as he could tell that the airfield had ever existed. As if on the day the war ended, those who had lived and worked there were as eager to make their escape from this isolation as their neighbors were to be rid of them, and like the Arabs, folded their tents and quietly melted away. He could almost envisage Furnham mustering to a man to tear down and obliterate this thorn in their side.

Their tea was brought on a tray painted with wildflowers tied in a bunch by a pretty ribbon. The woman set down a pot and two cups, spoons, a bowl of sugar and a small jug of milk without a word. As she went back to her counter, Rutledge saw a young couple start to enter the shop, notice the strangers by the window, and turn away.

Frances drank her tea with an air of enjoying it, and Rutledge was amused. He rather thought she was determined to make the shop owner, if that was who she was, suffer their presence for as long as possible. He caught the glint in her eyes as she leisurely accepted a second cup and made light conversation as she drank it. Finally, with no tea left in pot or cup, she smiled at him and thanked him.

“That was lovely, Ian. Not quite the luncheon I was promised, but a very nice interlude indeed,” she added sweetly, just loud enough for the woman behind the counter to hear.

He paid for the tea, then escorted his sister from the shop. Outside, she said in a low voice, “I swear there must be at least a dozen daggers in my back. Will you pull them out? If looks could kill, I ought to be dead by now. And you as well.”

Laughing, he said, “Thanks for being a good sport.”

They were walking back to their car when another man, dressed in corduroy trousers and an old shirt, stopped them and asked, “Looking to find property hereabouts, are you?”

Surprised, Rutledge said, “Why do you think we’re interested in property?”

“People like you who come here generally are. Possibilities, that’s what they said at the end of the war. Turn Furnham into a holiday town for the East End of London looking to enjoy the seaside. Well, you can see for yourself there’s not much in the way of seaside, is there? The river’s swift and the marshes run down to it, save for here in Furnham, where we’ve had boats as long as anyone can remember. We make our living from the river, it’s true, but there’s not much on offer for strangers wanting to amuse themselves.”

“A friend,” Rutledge said slowly, “was here during the war. He told me that Furnham was a very unfriendly village. That’s not likely to bring holidaymakers rushing to visit here, is it?”

“Yet you came, didn’t you?” the man retorted. “In spite of our being unfriendly.”

“Yes, well, I thought he might have been mistaken. I was-curious, you see.”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “Just why did you come, then?” He glanced at Frances, standing to one side, then turned back to Rutledge. “We’re at the end of a long road. It wasn’t happenstance brought you here.”

“I told you. Curiosity.”

“Was it the house with the gates? The ones with pineapples on the posts? It’s not for sale. Whatever you may have heard. Someone saw you walking there.”

“A fine view to the river,” Rutledge said, as if agreeing with him. “But I prefer neighbors whose rooftops I can see.”

“Then you’ll be on your way back to wherever it is you came from. I’ll bid you and your lady good day.”

And he walked on, leaving them standing there.

Frances said, “Ian, it’s not amusing any longer. I’d like to go.”

As he walked with her to the motorcar, she added, “What are they hiding? For surely it must be that.”

“A murder,” he said. “At a guess. But whose and when and why, I don’t know.”

“Then I was right, there in the shop. It was Yard business that brought you here.”

He shut her door and went to turn the crank. “I’m not quite sure what made me come here,” he said, joining her in the motorcar. “A man walked into my office recently and confessed to a murder. I’m not sure I believe him.”

“But why would he confess, if there was no truth to it?”

“A good question. To protect someone else? To cover up another crime? To settle a property dispute? Or just to see what we knew-or didn’t know-about someone’s death?”

“We’re back to curiosity, again. His-and yours.”

“Exactly. But the Yard can’t investigate a crime just because someone tells us it happened. There’s no body, for one thing. Nor proof that it ever existed.”

The rain arrived at last with steady lightning and heavy thunder, explosive drops striking the windscreen and blinding him as he concentrated on following the nearly invisible road. They ran out of the storm into a wind-driven downpour that pounded the motorcar, ending any conversation. Eventually that passed as well, leaving behind a steady drizzle that was more manageable. He was glad to be out of the marshes now, low lying and no bulwark against a rising river.

Frances said, replying to what Rutledge had been explaining just as the storm broke, “And yet you drove all the way out here. There must have been something about him that made you wonder.”

“He told me he was dying. From the look of him, that part may well be true.”

“You think, once he’s dead, the thread will be lost? Is that why you are looking into this on your own?”

“I expect I didn’t care to be made a fool of. With the truth-or with lies.”

“But what have you learned? How did this jaunt help you?”

“I now have a feeling for this part of Essex that I didn’t have before. And I was grateful for your company. A man on his own would have drawn far more attention, and the last thing I wanted to suggest was Scotland Yard’s interest.”

His reply satisfied her. But as he drove on, he wasn’t sure he’d satisfied himself.

Ten days later, Rutledge was in his office finishing reports when Sergeant Gibson knocked at the open door and came in.

Looking up, Rutledge said, “I’ll have these ready in another half an hour.”

Gibson answered, “It’s not the reports, sir. There’s a dead man found in the Thames and brought into Gravesend. He didn’t drown, and no one’s claimed the body. They’ve sent along a photograph, in the hope that the Yard can help out. It’s likely he went into the Thames in London. He’s not known in Gravesend, at any rate.”

He took a photograph from the folder he was carrying and set it down on Rutledge’s desk.

Rutledge’s first glance was cursory; he didn’t expect to recognize the thin face staring back at him from the photograph. His gaze sharpened. Looking at it a second time, he said, “Is this the man who came to the Yard a fortnight ago? Surely not.” He hadn’t expected Russell to end his suffering quite so soon.

“It was twelve days, sir. As I remember. Sergeant Hampton spotted the likeness-he was the one brought the man up to see you-and in my view he’s usually right about such things. A good memory for faces, has the sergeant. That’s why I brought the photograph up to show you. I thought you might want to know. There’s a strong resemblance, Sergeant Hampton says, although the water hasn’t been kind to him.”