Charles Todd - Wings of Fire

Fey, the old woman in the woods would have said…

Ian Rutledge, returning to London in late June, found a mixed welcome at Scotland Yard. Warwickshire had not been a complete triumph-there were those who believed the outcome was more politically sound than judicially defensible, and others saw in his success a taste for notoriety. Chief Superintendent Bowles himself had set that rumor flying. “Not a well-defined closure, would you say? Field day for the press, of course, name in all the papers. I’d not care for that sort of thing, myself… but some do.”

Rutledge himself, still mentally and physically drained by events in Upper Streetham, was glad enough to be relegated once more to the mundane while he tried to heal.

It didn’t last as long as he’d anticipated. There had been a series of brutal knifings in the City and the newspapers were attempting to resurrect the old Ripper killings, making farfetched comparisions in order to expand circulation. People had tired of the Peace, which had brought more misery to the country than any sense of enormous Victory. They were tired of grimness and stoicism, of poor food, no jobs, strikes, and unrest, and there was even a boredom with the struggle to revive the England they remembered before the Kaiser played for power in Europe. Any news that didn’t have to do with the strife of ordinary life, that could be parlayed into sensationalism, was followed with the frisson of fear that comes from knowing that you’re safe even while the tigers noisily devour your neighbor.

Superintendent Bowles, on whose turf the knifings began, was already scenting a powerful public upsurge in attention, and never one to shirk the glow of reflected glory, he took over the cases himself.

And that soon meant allowing Rutledge into the investigation as well, because of the need for manpower.

It was not something Bowles relished, and he put off any briefings for three whole days.

Then fate stepped in-he had extraordinary good fortune, he told himself, it was a sign of his righteous nature-and offered a partial solution. He grabbed it with both fists, and had soon twisted it around to his own satisfaction. Then, with energy and a sense of mission, he went to find Inspector Rutledge.

It was a warm day in early July, the sun flooding the dusty windows and collecting in pools on the dusty floor of the small office Rutledge had been allotted.

‘‘Beautiful day! Damned shame to be shut up inside. And I’m off to the City and conferences for the rest of the afternoon.”

Rutledge, looking up from his paperwork, said, “The Ripper?” He’d been expecting Bowles to send for him.

“Yes, they’ve all but called him that, haven’t they? Certainly drawn every parallel they can think of, although this fellow doesn’t gut his victims, just all but flays them, there’s so many cuts on the body. Still, it’s bloody enough to make the innuendos successful. But that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about. It’s this.”

He tossed a heavy sheet of paper on Rutledge’s desk, and it settled upside down on the dark green blotter. Rutledge turned it over and saw the crest at the top. “Home Office.”

“Yes, well, that’s where it came from, but if you want my own interpretation, it originated in the War Office. Or the Foreign Ministry. Read it.”

Rutledge scanned the typed lines.

It said, in the flowery phrases of a man asking a favor he didn’t care to ask, that Scotland Yard was kindly requested to look into a trio of deaths in Cornwall that had been ruled a double suicide and an accidental death. The local people had not seen fit to pursue the cases further, but now information had come to hand that these were possibly not, in fact, what they appeared. If an officer could be spared from the Yard to travel to Cornwall and quietly go over the evidence, to be sure that ail was as it should be, the undersigned would be very grateful.

Rutledge considered the letter again, then regarded Bowles. “What cases? And what new information?”

“It seems,” Bowles said, availing himself of a chair, “that a certain Lady Ashford, who is somehow related to all three deceased parties, felt that there had been a hasty judgment, and insufficient consideration had been given to the likelihood of murder. Sounds like the old bitch got left out of the wills, and is now raising holy hell with some lord or other of her acquaintance, and he’s palmed her off on another lord in the Home Office, who’s now palming her off on us, worse luck!”

Suddenly realizing what he’d just been saying, Bowles’ amber goat’s eyes flickered. In his irritation, he’d lost sight of his goal. Rapidly mending fences, he added, “It means, of course, that whoever we send out has got to mind his manners with the local people and still satisfy this Lady Ashford that her fears are groundless. Or, if they aren ‘t, reopen the cases as soon as possible and deal with them before we all get a black name for sheer incompetence.” He gestured to the letter. “He’s important, this Secretary. If we don’t please him, we’ll never hear the end of it from upstairs.”

Rutledge read the letter again. “There’s a Henry Ashford in the Foreign Office,” he said thoughtfully. “Very highly placed.” He had gone to school with Ashford’s brother.

Trust Rutledge to know! Bowles scowled. “Yes, well, that’s as may be.”

“And you want me to go to Cornwall?”

“It’s the kind of thing you can handle. Bennett, now, he’s available, but he’s as clumsy as hell when it comes to soothing ruffled feathers in little old ladies, however good he is in Whitechapel. And there’s Harrison. I could spare him, but he’s not got the patience to pussyfoot around anyone else’s investigation. He’ll go in with the notion they’re in the wrong and before you know it, the Chief Constable will be demanding his recall! And the Home Office will be wanting to know what we thought we were about, choosing the likes of him.” He sighed. “You’re the best I’ve got. Simple as that.”

“And what about those murders in the City?” Rutledge asked. He was beginning to know his man. Bowles wanted Rutledge out of the way…

“Well, I don’t think we’ll solve them overnight! And if you don’t stay beyond a week, then I’ll have you to fall back on when I need you.”

A week. You didn’t spend a week exploring the closed cases of the County constabularies. Did that mean that Bowles felt there would be a reopening of the investigation? Something to keep Rutledge out of London-more to the point, out of the City-until Bowles had caught his own man?

Suddenly Rutledge realized that he didn’t care either way.

Going to Cornwall would be better than being cooped up at the Yard with time on his hands and Hamish growling from boredom at the back of his mind… He turned and looked out at the sunshine. “The report you asked me to do is finished. I can leave this afternoon, if it suits you.”

Bowles stared at the other man. Was he too willing? Was he intending to be down in Cornwall and finished with this matter before the weekend? Or did Rutledge know something that he didn’t about the London killings? And was all too pleased to be excluded from them? That would be a fine kettle of fish, sending Rutledge out of harm’s way just as the roof started to fall in here! Suspicious, he said, “Well, I’d not rush the investigation if I were you. It’ll all be to do over again if we don’t satisfy this sod in the Home Office!”

“I won’t rush it.” Rutledge was still looking out the window, his mind already on the road west. Stirring to life, Hamish, a voice from the past, said, “It’s a bonny day. I’m not the man for four walls and a door.”

Which made them seem to shrink in upon him. Shivering, Rutledge turned back to Bowles. “What do you have on these cases?”