Anne Perry - A Christmas Beginning

Runcorn felt a pang of compunction about disturbing him with questions that had to be painful, but such awareness had never hindered him before, and he could not allow it to do so now. There was a kind of comfort in duty.

“I don’t know what further I can tell you,” Costain said wearily. “Olivia could be exasperating, heaven knows, but I cannot imagine anyone being driven to such a rage as to do that to her. It was somebody quite mad. I just cannot think that anyone we know is so depraved.”

“Such things are always hard to understand,” Runcorn agreed. “But it is inescapable that someone did this.” He had no time to spare on re-treading old ground, and there were no words that would change or heal anything. “I believe there was a young poet and explorer she was fond of,” he said.

Costain frowned. “Percival? Interesting man, and knowledgeable, but hardly a suitor for Olivia. He spoke well. But that was two years ago at least. And he went to Africa, or maybe it was South America. I don’t recall.”

“Mountains of the Moon,” Runcorn supplied.

“I beg your pardon?” Costain’s voice was sharp, as if he suspected Runcorn of a highly insensitive flippancy.

“In Africa.” Runcorn blushed. It was just the kind of clumsiness Monk accused him of. “At least that is what I heard. Could such adventure have caught Miss Costain’s imagination, and perhaps made her compare more realistic suitors with something unattainable?”

“Probably!” Costain ran his hands over his brow, pushing his hair back. “Perhaps. But what does that have to do with her death? They grew impatient with her. Faraday is now going to marry Mrs. Ewart, so I understand. Newbridge was annoyed because Olivia turned him down, but that is hardly a reason to lose his sanity altogether. He is a perfectly decent man. I’ve known him most of his life. His family has lived here for generations. He could find any number of other suitable young women. If you’ll forgive me saying so, Mr. Runcorn, you are looking for violent passion where there is only irritation and inconvenience or, at the very worst, disappointment. I cannot help but think you are looking in the wrong places.”

Runcorn had a deep fear that Costain was right. He was drawn to the emotions around Olivia and her betrothal, or lack of it, because he felt that was where the seat of much violence lay. Perhaps he only saw so much in it because he had fallen in love for the first time in his life.

But of course nothing would make him kill anyone over it, least of all Melisande. He wanted her happiness, he wished her to be loved and to marry a man worthy of her, which he did not consider Faraday was. But then, maybe he would never think any man worthy of Melisande.

He thanked Costain and asked to see his wife. With deep reluctance, permission was granted. Runcorn found himself in the sitting room opposite Naomi.

“Are you any closer to the truth, Mr. Runcorn?” she asked almost as soon as the door was closed. She spoke very quietly, as if she did not wish her husband to overhear her questions, or possibly Runcorn’s answers.

“I am not sure,” he replied honestly. “Miss Costain was not afraid of whoever killed her, until the very last moment, when it was too late. That suggests it was someone she knew, possibly even cared for. And it was a crime of great violence, so profound emotion was involved.” He watched her face and saw the pain in it, so deep that guilt twisted inside him.

“You are saying it was someone who knew her well, and hated her.” She stared out at the bare, winter garden and the tangled branches of the trees outlined against the sky. “She did awaken strange feelings in other people, sometimes unease, and a sense of loss for the unreachable. She was not content to be ordinary, but is that a sin?” She turned now to look at him, searching his eyes for a response. “She reminded us of the possibilities we have not the courage to strive for. We are too afraid of failure. Does one kill for that?”

“One can kill for safety,” he answered, surprised at his own words. “Did she threaten someone’s comfort, Mrs. Costain?”

She walked to the farther side of the window. “Not at all. It was a foolish thing to have said. I’m sorry. I don’t even know what she was doing outside at that hour on a winter night. She must have quarreled with someone.”

“Over what?” he asked. “Who would she meet in the churchyard? He came with a knife, as if he intended harm.”

She winced and shivered, holding her arms around herself. “I have no idea.”

He had a sharp sense that she was lying. It was nothing obvious, only a subtle tightness in her shoulders, an altered tone in her voice. Was she protecting her husband? Or even herself? Was the threat that Olivia posed far closer to home than anyone had previously thought? Had Olivia, in desperation, tried to force her brother into keeping her for the rest of his life, and had he found the endless, draining expense too much to endure? Had his tortured self-control broken, and had he seized a terrible escape? This situation answered every fact they knew.

But what secret? What did this quiet, sad, seemingly conventional house hide?

“I think you have an idea, Mrs. Costain,” he told her. “You knew your sister-in-law as well as anyone did. You cared for her, and you understood her. You also must know the expense of her remaining unmarried, and refusing offer after offer for no reason she was prepared to give, unless it was to you?”

She turned around to stare at him, anger flaring in her eyes, her mouth hard. “If I knew who murdered Olivia, I would tell you. I do not. Nor do I know anything that would be of use to you. I have admitted that she was a disturbing person, and hard for many to understand. I can tell you nothing new. Please do not waste any more of your time, or mine, in asking me such things. Good day, Mr. Runcorn. The maid will show you out.”

“How dare you behave with such crass insensitivity?” Faraday accused him that evening when he answered his summons to the big house. They were standing in the library. The gas lamps were lit and a good fire roared and hissed in the grate.

“You will not approach Mrs. Costain on the subject again,” Faraday went on. “If anything should be necessary to ask, I will do it. Have you no sense at all of how the poor woman must be feeling?” His face was red and his features pinched with anxiety and perhaps a sense of panic as failure crept closer around him. They knew nothing more than they had the morning after Olivia was found. Every thread they pulled came loose in their hands. But this was not Runcorn’s jurisdiction, no one was going to blame him if Olivia’s murder went unsolved. Faraday was the only one with something to lose.

“She is lying,” he said aloud. “She knows something that could have provoked the kind of rage we saw in that murder.”

“Dear God!” Faraday exploded. “Tell me you didn’t say so to her!” He closed his eyes. “You did! Don’t bother to deny it, it’s in your face. You oaf!” Suddenly he was shouting, his voice raw. “This may be the way it is done in the alleys and brothels you usually police, but these are decent people, gentry, people of class and Christian values. Runcorn, the man’s a vicar! Have you really no …” He drew in his breath and let out a heavy sigh. “No. I suppose you haven’t. It was my failure that I even let you in at the door.”

Runcorn felt as if the fire had burned out of the grate to scorch him. Perhaps Faraday was right. He was clumsy, and had always lacked the grace of someone gifted like Monk. He had achieved his rank by plodding patience, determination, the will to succeed, and perhaps now and then a flash of understanding of how the poor and the frightened had found ways of retaliating. He kept his word, so people trusted him, but he was not a gentleman; he had never known how to be.