Charles Todd - A test of wills

With a laugh Royston said, "His father was an architect, his mother's family's in banking in the City. Even if he never flies again, he'll hardly be reduced to growing lettuces."

But when he came back to Warwickshire, he'd stay at Mallows, not with his cousin…

"Right, thank you, Royston." Rutledge stepped out of the way of a woman pushing a pram. She acknowledged Royston with a pleasant smile and walked on, glancing at Rutledge out of the corner of her eyes at the last minute.

Royston waited until she was out of hearing. "You've made no progress, then?" He shook his head. "I keep thinking about it-how someone could shoot the Colonel down and then disappear so completely. Unless he's left the County. But if he's still here, there's been no change in his manner, nothing to point to him. It was a bloody, vindictive sort of crime, Inspector. And yet it doesn't seem to have changed the killer at all. Either to make him happier or make him angrier. Somehow I find that particularly horrifying. Don't you? That someone could kill and not be marked by it?"

Rutledge watched Laurence Royston walk away down the busy street, then brought his mind back to the task he'd set himself. He stepped out into the afternoon traffic, following a woman with a pram. Standing by the market cross, he looked up and down the main street. Two boys on bicycles passed him, grinning, trying to attract his attention, but he ignored them.

Mavers, that Monday morning when Harris was shot, had been busily haranguing the market goers. Both Mavers and any number of witnesses had sworn to it.

But Sally Davenant, for one, had suggested that it was possible for him to disappear for a short time without anyone noticing his absence.

Rutledge considered first of all Mavers's cunning, and the distance from here to the meadow where Harris died.

The gun was a problem. If Mavers went to his house first, retrieved the shotgun, then went to the meadow, waited for Harris, shot him, put the gun back, and returned to Upper Streetham, he would need at the very least some ninety minutes, possibly even two hours.

Too long. He'd have been missed.

All right then, what if he'd taken the shotgun and left it somewhere along the hedge before coming down to the village? Harangued the crowds, disappeared, and after the killing, concealed the shotgun again in the high grass before returning to his post? A long hour? Could he have done it that quickly? It was a risk, a calculated risk, and Rutledge wasn't sure that Mavers was willing to run it. On the other hand, Mavers liked nothing better than thumbing his nose at his betters…

Rutledge nodded to the woman he'd seen earlier with Sally Davenant, his attention on Mavers's movements. And then he brought himself up sharply and caught up with her as she crossed the street in the direction of the greengrocer's. Touching her arm to attract her attention, he introduced himself and said, "Were you in Upper Streetham last Monday morning? Did you by any chance hear the man Mavers speaking out here in the street?"

She was a pleasant-faced woman, dressed well and carrying a small basket nearly full of parcels. But she grimaced as Rutledge asked his question. "You can't miss him during one of his tirades," she said. "More's the pity!"

"Could you tell me if he was there, by the market cross?"

"Yes, he was, as a matter of fact."

"All the time? Part of the time?"

She frowned, considering, and then called to another woman just coming out of the ironmonger's shop. "Eleanor, dear-"

Eleanor was in her fifties, with short iron gray hair and a look of competence about her. She came across to them, head to one side, her stride as brisk as her manner.

"Inspector Rutledge from London, Eleanor," the first woman said. "This is Eleanor Mobley, Inspector. She might be able to help you more than I can-I was here only very early that morning."

Rutledge remembered the name Mobley from Forrest's list of witnesses. He repeated his questions, and Mrs. Mobley watched his face as she listened. "Oh, yes, he was here by the market cross very early on. At least part of the time. He went down along the street there, closer to the shops and the Inn, for a while. Later I saw him near the turning to the church. But he came back to the cross, he usually does." She gave him a wry smile. "I was trying to line up tables for the Vicar's summer fete. A fund-raiser for the church. You know how it is, everyone promises to contribute something for the sale. All the same, you can't let it go at that, can you-you have to pin them down. Not my favorite task, but this year I'm on the committee, and market day brings most everyone into town, I just catch them as I can. I must have been up and down this street a dozen times or more."

"He moved from place to place, but as far as you know, he didn't leave? To go to the pub, for instance, or step into the Inn?"

"Not as far as I know. But since I wasn't paying him much heed, I can't be certain that I'm right about that. He just seemed to be underfoot wherever I turned, putting people's backs up, spoiling a perfectly lovely morning."

Someone passing by spoke to the other woman, calling her Mrs. Thornton. She acknowledged his greeting, adding, "I'll be along directly, tell Judith for me, will you, Tom?"

Mrs. Mobley was saying to Rutledge, "Is that any help at all?"

"Yes, very much so. What was on his mind that morning? Do you recall anything he might have been saying?"

Mrs. Mobley shook her head. "He was running on about the Russians, you can usually depend on that. Something about the Czar and his family. I remember something about unemployment too, because I was thinking to myself that he was a lovely one to talk! The strikes in London."

"You don't really listen, do you? He's not a very pleasant man at the best of times!" Mrs. Thornton put in. "And riding his hobbyhorse, he's-repellent. As Helena Sommers put it, any good he might do is lost with every word that comes out of his mouth!"

"Was Miss Sommers here on Monday?"

"Yes, just around noon, I think it was, buying some lace for her cousin," Mrs. Mobley said. "I put her down for two cakes; I was glad to have them."

Mrs. Thornton bit her lip, then said, "You'll think it silly of me, but I don't feel it's safe for two women in a cottage in the middle of nowhere. Since the Colonel's death, I mean. Since we don't know- And Helena might as well be alone, her cousin is such a ninny! I went out there to call one afternoon, and Margaret was working in the garden. Well, that goose gave my horse such a fright, and she was absolutely too terrified even to drive the silly thing away with a broom!"

"I think they're probably safe enough," Rutledge said, refusing to be drawn.

"If you say so." Mrs. Thornton seemed unconvinced. "Now, if there's nothing else, Inspector?"

He thanked them both and went back to the market cross, threading his way between a buggy and a wagon piled with lumber.

If Mavers had moved from place to place that Monday morning, and given some forethought to the shotgun, he might-just might-have killed Harris and gotten away with it… From the market cross, Rutledge made his way to the lane where Hickam had seen the Captain and the Colonel together. Where Sergeant Davies had found Hickam drunk and rambling about the two men.

He looked about the lane for several minutes, then walked to the first house and knocked on the door, asking questions.

Did you see Daniel Hickam in this lane on the Monday morning that Colonel Harris was shot? Did you see Captain Wilton in this lane, walking? Did you see the Colonel, on his horse, riding through here, stopping to talk to anyone? Did you see Bert Mavers anywhere in the lane, coming or going toward the main street?

The answer was the same at every house. No. No. No. And no.