Charles Todd - A long shadow

Unless Hensley had found something in that bloody wood. But if he had, he'd held his tongue even in hospital. Why? Had it been self-incriminating? That was possible.

But even if the rector had fallen through his own carelessness, Hensley hadn't shot that arrow into his own back. Which still brought in a third party into the picture. If Keating had come to the house in his absence, Rutledge found no sign of it. He debated going back to the inn, but it would be a wild-goose chase. Keating was no Josh Morgan, of The Three Horses, glad to stand and gossip with his custom. Short of searching the building, there would be no way of flushing him out if he didn't want to be found.

Had Keating played any role in what was happening in Dudlington? He appeared to hold himself aloof from the other inhabitants, except for Hillary Timmons's services as a barmaid and cleaning woman. And there he'd chosen well-Miss Timmons was a mouse terrified of lions, and he could probably count on her to keep her mouth shut.

What were the man's secrets? Most people had one or two.

Hamish said, "Aye, and you've kept yours. But would ye keep it here, where there's no' sae much else to do but gossip?"

There had been a few times dealing with perceptive people when he'd feared his would slip out. They had stood on the brink of discovery, and yet he'd managed somehow to forestall them. Set apart from the village as he was, the owner of The Oaks just might succeed as well.

Hamish warned, "You mustna' have anything to do with yon woman in London. She worked wi' casualties in France. She'd ha' seen and heard more than most."

And Mrs. Channing had remembered him very clearly.

He couldn't picture her hiding in hedgerows to shoot at him.

"It needna' be her, but someone she put up to it," Hamish reminded him.

Circle upon circles.

As for Keating, it would probably prove to be more useful to confront him while he was working in the pub, with his patrons looking on. He wouldn't find it as easy to walk away then.

For the present-for the present, it might be useful to speak to Hensley again. He ought to be out of the woods, and therefore awake for longer periods.

Traffic was heavier than he'd expected on the road south to Northampton, and Rutledge found himself walking into the hospital just as dinner was being served. He thought of his own on the sideboard at Mrs. Melford's.

He was once more cornered by the plump sister, who disapproved of interrupting a patient's meal, and he said, "Shall I have Chief Inspector Kelmore to speak to Matron?"

It was a threat that worked. He went down the line of beds, some of them empty now, others filled with what appeared to be new cases. Hensley was sitting awkwardly propped against half a dozen pillows, and he was trying to feed himself with his left hand. From the state of the towel under his chin, it wasn't going well.

He looked up at Rutledge, a sour expression passing across his face. It had more color now, but there were still lines of pain around his mouth.

"What is it now? Sir?" he asked.

Rutledge took the man's knife and fork and cut up his meat into manageable bits, then drew up a chair.

"There are more questions than answers in Dudlington. Inspector Cain can't help me, and the man you replaced, Constable Markham, has retired to Sussex. It's your turn."

"What questions?" Hensley asked warily, trying to appear unconcerned and failing.

Rutledge found himself thinking that a man in bed, with his dinner down his front, has no dignity. He said, "Mr. Towson, the rector, fell down his attic stairs today. Someone had come to the door and called to him to come at once-and then went away. He couldn't have missed the sound of Towson tumbling down the steps or crying out in pain. Yet he went away."

"Towson's dead?" Hensley demanded, appalled. His fork had stopped halfway to his lips. "Good God!"

Rutledge left it. Instead he said, "I think it's time you told me what took you to Frith's Wood, the day you were shot."

"As God's my witness, I didn't go there. I was on the road on my way to Letherington, and that's the last I remember." The words had become rote now.

"That you were on the road is true enough-I've found your bicycle where you left it, behind the pasture wall."

"I didn't leave it anywhere. Whoever shot me and dragged me to the wood, he put it there."

"Hensley. You were lucky to live. Towson was lucky to survive his fall. How many more people are going to be hurt, so that you can deny being in Frith's Wood? I looked for myself. From the attic windows at the rectory, there's the best view of the wood, short of climbing the church steeple." "Towson survived?" Hensley was quick, his mind already leaping ahead. "Why are you here, then? Why not ask him who it was called to him on the steps?" "If you weren't tied to this bed," Rutledge retorted shortly, "I'd have suspected you." "Me?" "Only someone in that attic could have seen you walk of your own accord into that blasted wood." Hensley stared at him, a stubborn set to his chin. "Well, they'd be lying. I never went there." Changing direction, Rutledge asked, "Tell me about the fire at Barstow's offices in the City." Hensley nearly choked on his tea. "What's that in aid of? You can ask Old Bowels, I had nothing to do with Barstow." "There's someone who tells a different story. That you looked the other way the night of the fire." "Then they'd be a liar!" He swore, nearly upsetting his tray. "Sister!" he shouted. But she was busy at the other end of the ward and didn't turn. "Tell me what became of Emma Mason. And why you watched her with your field glasses while she was in her bedroom." His fingers kneaded the piece of bread in his hand. "You can't prove it," Hensley told him belligerently. "She was what, seventeen, at the time." "She was no innocent lily, I can tell you that," Hensley snapped, glaring at Rutledge now. "Half the village thinks her a saint. The others won't open their mouths because Mrs. Ellison rules the roost. But just ask Constable Markham, he'll tell you he saw our pure Miss Emma rolling in the grass behind the church with Miss Let- teridge's fiance. And she wasn't seventeen then." It was Rutledge's turn to stare at Hensley. Hamish said, "He's telling the truth." It was all too apparent that Hamish was right. Hensley's eyes were blazing with fury, and there was no uneasy prevarication in the words he'd spat at the man from London. "It does you no good to blacken her character." "Blacken it? Hardly that. Reveal it, more like." "Was she promiscuous?" "She wasn't having any of me or anyone else. But there was no doubt that Constable Markham was right. It explained why Miss Letteridge left for London, just afterward." "And the man? Who is he?" "That's not your business. Besides, he's buried in the churchyard. That's why Miss Letteridge came back." On their way out of Northampton on the road north, Hamish said, "I willna' believe she murdered the girl." Rutledge, avoiding a milk wagon and gearing up to pass a lorry, said, "Grace Letteridge? At least it gives her a motive." "Then why did she no' rid herself of the girl before leaving for London?" Hamish was right, he thought. Jealousy was a hot- blooded crime, impetuous and filled with anger. "Her hands may have been tied then. She might have been afraid to touch Emma, for fear the man would guess she'd been responsible, and reject her a second time. But when he was killed, she was free to come home and balance the scales. Anger and blame are a part of grieving." Hamish wasn't convinced. "Ye ken, she could ha' traveled to London to make it right wi' him before he went to France."

And she'd gone as soon as her father died. Her father might not have approved of her following any man on such a slim hope.

But then there would have been no need to kill Emma.

Unless of course Grace Letteridge had waited in London until the man got leave, only to discover he was marking time until Emma was of age and free to marry where she pleased. It would have been an appalling blow, especially if he'd died soon after their meeting, leaving her with an empty future.