Charles Todd - Proof of Guilt

“Scotland Yard? I can’t imagine why you should wish to speak to me.” She moved past him, opened the gate, and was walking up the path to her door before he could stop her.

“Miss Whitman?”

She turned quickly, her eyes wary. “How did you know my name?”

“I told you. I’m a policeman. It’s my business to know such things.”

“Then what is it that you want?”

“I’m trying to find Lewis French. It’s urgent that I speak to him as soon as possible. It could even be that he’s in some trouble. I might be able to help him, if he is.”

“If he’s in trouble, I’m the last person he’d turn to. I can’t think why, if you know my name, you would believe I could tell you anything. His sister lives between here and Dedham. You should speak to her.”

“She’s in London at present. I asked the curate, Mr. Williams, if there was anyone else who knew the family well. He gave me your name.”

“But he knows I’ve been—estranged from the French family.” She shook her head.

“You were close at one time. You’ve been engaged to both brothers.”

“Michael was going off to war. We’d known each other for ages, and it seemed natural to make promises. I can’t tell you now if it was love or just the need to cling to something sane in a mad world. In any event, when Michael was killed, I think Lewis proposed because he’d always wanted anything his brother had. Once he had it—in this case me—he tired of it quickly.”

“But you accepted his proposal, did you not?”

“Michael was dead, it came as a shock, and I was silly enough to think my life was over. My grandfather told me I’d be happy with Lewis, and certainly he was kind and caring and there . So many of my friends were killed. Men I’d known from childhood. Like Michael they’d marched off to war as if it were a great adventure. Then they began to fall, one by one. Mons, Ypres, the Somme, it was horrible, and no end in sight. Three of my friends were already widows—”

She broke off, staring at him. “Why am I telling you these things? They won’t help you find Lewis.”

“You said, once he had something of Michael’s, he tired of it quickly. Did that include the firm?” That could easily explain Lewis French’s disappearance.

Miss Whitman considered the question. “It was still a new toy at that time. Now? I couldn’t tell you. Ask Miss Townsend.”

“I’ve spoken to her. French appeared to be himself, the last time she saw him. Perhaps he’s tired of her as well.”

“I doubt it. She never belonged to Michael.” A smile flitted across her face, warming her eyes. “I doubt he could jilt her, anyway. You haven’t met her father.”

But he had. Another possible reason behind a sudden disappearance?

That would also mean giving up position and his wealth. It might be easier to wed Miss Townsend, relegate her to Dedham, and go on with his life in London as he pleased. Would it be as easy to relegate a wife as it was a sister? The answer to that would lie in the strength of mind of Miss Townsend. Or whether her father would be pleased to keep her close by.

Miss Whitman had turned to go inside. He wanted to keep her there talking, but his concentration had been broken by the question of the relationship between Lewis French and his fiancée.

Hamish said, “Yon dead man.”

Rutledge began, more bluntly than he’d intended, “I drove Miss French to London because we’d found a man dead on a street in Chelsea. We had every reason to believe it was French.”

Valerie Whitman turned back to face him.

“Was it Lewis?” Her expression was unreadable. Her hat shadowed her eyes now, and he couldn’t see their color, whether the green had changed to brown.

Was there a need to know—the fear of what he would answer? Or only curiosity?

“She very courageously went with me to the hospital morgue. Because you see, he had no identification, but he was carrying Lewis French’s watch in his pocket.” He took a deep breath. “It was not her brother.”

After a moment, Miss Whitman asked, “Then why was he carrying the watch? I don’t understand. Is this the trouble you think Lewis might have got himself into? Do you think he had something to do with this man’s death?”

“I don’t know. Yet. Miss French told me that her mother had always suspected her father of affairs with other women—”

“She did. I remember it,” Miss Whitman interrupted.

She stood there, the sunlight on her hair under that summer hat, her teeth catching the edge of her lower lip as she considered him.

Rutledge waited.

And then she said, “I won’t invite you in. But I will walk in the churchyard with you.”

Surprised, he opened her gate and held it for her to pass through. They crossed the road in silence and went through the gate in the wall, where trees offered a little respite from the sun.

“Let me see your identification,” she said, and he gave it to her.

Handing it back to him, she said, “I will talk to you for Agnes’s sake, but not for Lewis’s. I knew Agnes French very well once upon a time. She took care of her mother even when Mrs. French couldn’t recognize her own daughter. Strangely enough, she could always remember her sons. She was a woman of nervous disposition who gave her husband and her children a very difficult time. Mr. French was away a good deal, of course. And she imagined that he must be having an affair. In London, in Madeira, even in Lisbon, where he went sometimes on business. I never believed it could be true. Surprisingly, he was devoted to her.”

“That’s interesting in light of something I’d heard, suggesting it was her father-in-law, Howard French, who had had an affair when he was quite young. There was a child of the union, who was adopted elsewhere. Which has led me to wonder if the dead man could have been a descendant of that child. There was a slight resemblance to the portrait of Howard French that hangs in the offices of French, French and Traynor. In fact, it was that likeness coupled with a watch that does belong to French that sent us searching for him. But he’s missing. And so is his motorcar.”

“Well, of course, wherever he is, he must be driving. He hated trains. The fact that you can’t find the motorcar surely means he’s off on a personal errand of some sort.”

They had walked as far as the French mausoleum. She stood looking at it with sadness in her eyes, and he could feel her slip away from him, her mind elsewhere.

“It would be nice if things were that simple,” he said, answering her suggestion about the errand. “You mentioned a grandfather. Do you have any other family?”

“I didn’t agree to talk about myself,” she said sharply, turning toward him.

“You told me that you’d been close to Agnes French ‘once upon a time.’ What caused the breach between you?”

When she didn’t answer, he went on. “Was it the engagement to Michael—or the breaking off of your engagement to Lewis?”

Miss Whitman shook her head. “I don’t know. It was a sudden coldness. I wondered if Lewis had said something. I tried to put as good a face on it as I could, but I was jilted, you see. Yes, Lewis was a gentleman, he let me cry off. He walked into the cottage one afternoon, stood there in front of me, and said, ‘I’ve changed my mind. I don’t think we’ll suit after all. Besides, there’s someone else. I leave it to you to think of a reason why we should no longer wish to marry.’ He waited only long enough to hear me say, ‘Yes, all right, if that’s how you feel.’ He replied, ‘It is.’ I handed him his ring, he thanked me with a cool little bow, and that was that.”

Rutledge found himself thinking that Lewis French was a fool.