Anne Perry - A Christmas Visitor

Where the stream had carved little bays and hollows out of the bank the current had carried ice down and left it, glittering in the broadening light. The far bank rose more steeply. Henry looked from left to right, but there was nothing except faint indentations where sheep had made tracks for themselves. What on earth would bring Judah here, at night? To be alone with thoughts that troubled him so intensely he could not address them in the house, with Antonia present? Or to meet someone?

Had he been afraid of Ashton Gower and the damage he could cause? Had Gower threatened Antonia, or even Joshua? Would Judah have considered paying him in some way, to protect them?

That was nothing like the man Henry had known. But do people change when those they love are threatened?

He stared up and down the swollen stream. In the daylight he could see the fall clearly, the water splashing white over the jagged rocks. They were certainly sharp enough to have caused the injuries Leighton had described. Everything fitted with the facts. Ice on the stones, one false step, poor balance, even simple tiredness, and a fall could cause a blow that would render one senseless. Face down and one could drown in minutes—the water did not need to be deep. The current could carry a body down to the fall and cause the lacerations Leighton spoke of.

But knowing Gower, why on earth would Judah meet him here, alone at night? The answer was simple. He would not. And to suppose chance, made no sense either. Gower would not wait here on a bitter, winter night in case Judah came! That was absurd.

Ashton Gower might well have wished him dead, and rejoiced when he was, but there was nothing whatever to suggest that he had killed him, except the madness of the man and his hunger for revenge, and they proved nothing at all.

Reluctantly he turned and made his way back, shivering in spite of his coat, scarf, hat, and thick, fur-lined gloves. Everything in him wanted to believe Gower was responsible. It was factually absurd, and emotionally the only thing that made sense.

With the daylight the snow was thawing and by the time he reached the house his feet were thoroughly soaked, as were the bottoms of his trousers. He went up the back stairs to his room and changed before coming down again to the dining room.

Mrs. Hardcastle brought him a late breakfast, and he was joined by Benjamin, curious to know where he had been.

“To the stepping stones,” Henry replied when asked. “Tea?”

Benjamin sat down. He looked tired, his eyes hollowed round with shadows. He accepted the offer. Henry poured for them. “Why?”

“Just to see if what Leighton told us makes sense. It does, Ben. I can’t imagine Judah going there to meet Gower at night, and it’s ridiculous to think Gower waited there for him by chance.”

Benjamin looked at him steadily. “You think it was simply an accident?”

Henry did not know how to answer. His intelligence and his instinct fought against each other. He was a man used to logical thought, brought up in the discipline and the beauty of reason. And yet his knowledge of Judah Dreghorn made the deductions sit ill with him. He answered the only way honesty could dictate. “There must be something we don’t know, perhaps several things.”

Benjamin gave a rueful smile. “Same old Henry, careful thinker.” He drew in a deep breath and let it out in a sigh. “We need that now more than ever. What do we tell Antonia?”

Henry did not have to weigh his answer. There was only one they could afford, and he had a firmer trust of Antonia’s courage and judgment than Benjamin had, sharp memories of her frankness, her curiosity, and the courage with which she met the answers, so many of which she had had to face alone. It hurt him deeply that her happiness had been so short. “The truth,” he replied.

The opportunity did not come until the evening. Either one of them had been otherwise occupied, or Joshua had been with them, but after dinner they were all gathered around the fire, and Joshua had gone to bed. It was Benjamin who began, looking at Antonia with grave apology.

“I’m sorry to raise it again, but I believe we need to understand better what happened the night Judah died.”

“I don’t know anything I haven’t told you,” she answered, her hands knotted in her lap, unornamented but for her gold wedding ring.

He was gentle. “What did you talk about on the way home from the recital?”

“The music, of course.”

“How was Judah? Of course he would be proud of Joshua, but was he otherwise just as usual?”

She considered for a few moments. “Looking back on it, he was more than usually absorbed in thought. I believed at the time it was the emotion of the music, and that perhaps he was tired. He had had a difficult case in Penrith. I didn’t know then just how awful Gower had been. Judah had not told me, I only learned after his death of the details. He’s an evil man, Benjamin. To hate so much is a kind of insanity, I think, and that is frightening.”

“Did Judah mention him at all? Can you remember?”

Ephraim sat motionless, his face deep in thought. Henry felt a chill of anxiety. There was a power in Ephraim, a courage that stopped at nothing. If he once were convinced that Ashton Gower had killed his brother, nothing would deter him from pursuing justice. Such strength was disturbing.

“When I think of it,” Antonia replied, “he actually spoke very little. He only answered me.”

“He didn’t say where he was going, or why he wanted to walk at that hour?” Benjamin persisted.

“Not really, just for the air,” she answered. She looked uncertain. “I thought he wanted to think.”

“Outside, on a winter night?”

She said nothing, now deeply unhappy.

Henry was gentler. “Did he suggest you should not wait up for him?”

She had to think for a moment. “Yes. Yes, he did say something like that. I don’t remember exactly what.”

“So he expected to be gone an hour or more,” Henry deduced.

“An hour?” Benjamin questioned.

“By the time Joshua had got over his excitement and gone to bed, and then Antonia herself had,” Henry replied. “It sounds as if he intended to go as far as the stream. What lies beyond it? Where is this Viking site, exactly?”

“Farther down the stream,” she said. “Just above the lower crossing before you get to the church. He wasn’t going to the site. There’s nothing really beyond the higher crossing, except a copse of trees, and a shepherd’s hut. Do you suppose he was going there? What for?”

There was only one answer, and it hung in the air like an additional darkness.

“If it was someone he didn’t trust, he’d have taken the dogs. They’d have attacked anyone who threatened him.”

“Or he was going to see someone he trusted,” Henry said.

Antonia stared at the fire. “Or there was no one else. He slipped, that’s all, just as Dr. Leighton said.”

Benjamin’s face was bleak. “Which could not have been Gower. We are no further forward.”

Another thought occurred to Henry. “Unless he went with the purpose of helping Gower, perhaps to offer him some kind of assistance in getting himself work, or some establishment in the community again.”

Ephraim’s eyes opened wide. “After what Gower had been saying about him? But if he was, why there, of all places? And in the middle of the night!”

“Judah might have helped him anyway,” Antonia said quietly. “He helped all kinds of people. But I can’t think why meet there!”

“Neither can I,” Benjamin agreed coldly. “What happened? Gower killed him for his trouble? Or else when Judah slipped, just left him there to drown? I know the man was a swine, but that’s inhuman.”