Charles Todd - A matter of Justice

"We don't know how long. We're hoping the doctor can answer that. I came past here on my way home. It's a little out of my way, but I'd told Constable Horton here that I'd do his last patrol for him before he went off duty at eleven. We'd had a busy night of it with a pair of quarrelsome drunks, and we were tired. Just by the turning for the Home Farm, I heard a dog barking in an alarmed sort of way, and I stopped to investigate. The noise was coming from the trees here, and I walked in toward the barn. I saw that the door was ajar, and I thought perhaps the dog had cornered a badger inside. I went back to my motorcar for my torch, and by that time the dog had given up and gone away. I was on the point of leaving myself but decided to step inside, since I was already here. And at first I saw nothing. Then something creaked, and I looked up. I can tell you, I got the fright of my life!"

It was a well-rehearsed account, and Rutledge nodded, still staring at the figure over his head.

Into his mind's eye came the image of the swan on Edgar Mait- land's wedding cake, its wings spread, a ribbon in its mouth. The contrast was appalling.

"Where's the dog now? What did it look like?"

"I heard him, I didn't see him. There are several dogs at the Home Farm, and I'm told Mrs. Quarles has two King Charles spaniels."

Rutledge took out his own torch and shone it on the spectral winged body in the darkness above.

Quarles was dressed in street clothes, a dark suit, waistcoat, and white shirt. His arms were rigidly outstretched in an openwork cage that enclosed his entire body. An angel in a nativity pageant could easily conceal the white cage with a full-length robe and long flowing sleeves worn over it, giving the impression of floating in the shadows overhead. The thickly feathered wings attached somewhere at the back of the shoulders and partially outstretched, as if in flight, were a bizarre counterpoint to the dead man's ordinary clothing.

"He's a reasonably heavy man. Could one person pull him up to that height?"

"It's block and tackle. I've seen one man do it, for the pageant."

"Is there anyone who hated Quarles enough to do this to him? Because this is not just murder, there's viciousness at work here. Otherwise he'd have been lying on the floor."

Padgett sighed. "I shouldn't wish to speak ill of the dead, but he was a hard man to like. Cold-natured and unbending when he wanted his way. I'd bring my children here for the pageant, like the rest of the village and the surrounding farms, but only because they wanted to come and see the angel and the camel. I'd have stayed away, myself. I'll tell you straight out, I didn't have much use for Harold Quarles."

Padgett turned away, as if ashamed of his honesty. But something in his face told Rutledge that the man's feelings were too strong to conceal.

Hamish said, "He intended for you to hear it from him first."

"You've described the public man. Why did you dislike him so much?" Rutledge was blunt.

Padgett shrugged. "He could be callous. Almost to the point of cruelty. I don't like that in anyone."

Rutledge walked in a circle, trying to judge the body from every viewpoint. But only the man's front was visible. What else might be there, on the dark side, would have to wait until he was brought down.

"There's no blood on his shirt," Padgett offered. "We don't know if he was shot or stabbed."

"And no blood here on the floor."

"I had to leave him long enough to fetch Horton, and the lanterns. There was nothing else I could do," Padgett confessed.

"You were certain, before you left, that there was no one else here in the barn? Hiding behind one of the trestle tables?"

"I made sure of that. And besides, he was already dead. What harm could the killer do to him now?"

"He had time to clear away any evidence he'd left behind."

At that moment the door opened, and they turned as one man to see who was coming in.

Constable Daniels had returned, this time with a thin man wearing gold-rimmed spectacles. He appeared to have thrown his clothes on in some haste, and his hair hadn't been properly combed. Rutledge put his age at early forties.

"The doctor," one of the constables said under his breath.

"What's this about, Padgett? Daniels wouldn't tell me." O'Neil came briskly toward them, his gaze on the men staring back at him.

Padgett, almost reflexively, glanced upward, and O'Neil's eyes followed his.

"Good God!" he said in horror. "You aren't-that's Quarles!" He stood there for a long moment, as if unable to take in what he was seeing. "What the hell is he doing up there?" His gaze swung toward Padgett. "Is he dead? He must be dead!"

"To the best of our knowledge, he is. I didn't care to move him until you got here." Padgett crossed the flagstone floor to shake the man's hand, then presented Rutledge.

"Dr. O'Neil. Inspector Rutledge from London."

O'Neil looked Rutledge up and down. "Has he been up there that long? For you to be sent for? I should have been called sooner."

"I was in Dunster, attending a wedding, and word reached me quickly. We think he must have been killed earlier tonight. Last night. But that's your province."

"Indeed." His attention turned back to the dead man. "Who in God's name strung him up like that? He couldn't have done that to himself, could he? And how are we to get him down?"

Padgett nodded to Daniels, who was standing behind the doctor, his jaw fallen in shock. It was the first time he'd been allowed inside the barn. "Constable, you've used this apparatus. Let him down."

Daniels, startled, said, "Me? Sir?"

"Yes, yes, man, get on with it. You've done it often enough for the pageant."

Daniels reluctantly went toward the shadowed west end of the barn and fumbled at something on the wall. As he did, the man above their heads swayed, his hands moving, as if he still lived, and the lamplight picked out the whites of his open eyes as he seemed to stare balefully at his tormentors.

Inspector Padgett sucked in his breath and took a long step back. Dr. O'Neil swore sharply, adding, "Have a care, man!" The apparatus creaked as Daniels put his weight into it, and a feather, dislodged from one of the wings, drifted down from above, turning and spinning, holding all their eyes as it wafted slowly among them, as if choosing, and then coming to rest finally at Rutledge's feet. The other men turned toward him, as if somehow he had been marked by it. A shock swept through Rutledge, and he couldn't look away from the white feather. He prayed his face showed nothing of what he felt. During the war, the women of Britain had handed out white feathers to anyone they felt should have joined the armed forces, challenging the man to do his duty or be branded a coward. It had got out of hand, this white feather business, to the point that the government had issued special uniforms for the discharged wounded, to spare them the mortification of explaining publicly why they were not now fit for active duty.

Every man there knew that story. And Rutledge could feel a slow flush rise in his cheeks, as if the feather had been earned, though in another time or place, by the charge of shell shock. That they recognized him, even without evidence, for what the world believed he was.

Padgett broke the spell, cursing Daniels under his breath. He started forward to help his constable and then thought better of it. "Horton."

Constable Horton hurried forward, his face tight, and in short order the two men got the apparatus under control. Bracing themselves against the dead man's weight, they began gently to lower Quarles into the circle of lamplight.

Rutledge saw, watching them now, that a single man could have manipulated the rope under less stressful circumstances. But Daniels, fearful of dropping Quarles, had found it impossible to work the rope smoothly.