The Murder Stone

by Charles Todd

  His anger and bitterness seemed to feed on itself. Before she could order him to leave, he went on in that harsh, hurried voice. “Did the old man tell you about his other son? No? If a man can’t hold his drink, he should stay away from the bottle. Tristan couldn’t; it was like a madness with him. He got himself into bad company, and in the end he brought the pox home to his wife. When the doctor told her why she’d miscarried, she shot her husband and then herself. Hardly a family tree to be proud of, would you say? The high-and-mighty Hattons fall as hard as ordinary men!”

  So that was why the newspaper cutting Mrs. Passmore had shown her had little to say about the deaths! Dead by an unknown hand . . . Why the police hadn’t vigorously pursued a killer. Why neither she nor her cousins had ever been told the truth. Syphilis—and a miscarriage.

  Was that what had brought “Mrs. Merrill” to the house called Willows in Essex? I heard him say once that what her husband had done was unforgivable. That he ought to be taken out and horsewhipped! Mrs. Perkins had told Francesca. Whatever was upsetting her, Mr. Hatton couldn’t find a way out of her dilemma, and in the end they left Willows. . . .

  No wonder he’d found no way out! Even her grandfather couldn’t have changed what Tristan had done. Yet at the end, he must have blamed himself for the murder and suicide of Tristan and Margaret Hatton. It was impossible to imagine what anguish Francis Hatton had suffered then.

  Francesca could feel her fury like a hot lump in her mind, and she hated this man standing so self-righteously in front of her.

  The words of the letter cursing the Hattons came back to her: May you and yours rot in hell then—it is no more than you deserve!

  It had come true beyond the writer’s wildest dreams. For it had been aided and abetted by human cruelty and viciousness at every turn.

  No wonder her grandfather had chosen this quiet backwater in which to protect his precious grandchildren from gossip and a shocking revelation.

  “I never want to see your face again,” she told Walsham, revulsion in her voice. “In this house or in this Valley. Do you understand me?”

  “You’re not your grandfather! You can’t stop me. And you won’t like hearing such stories as I might choose to spread abroad. I suggest you come to terms with me. Worse things than a broken limb can happen to a woman alone, with no family to protect her.” The venom in his voice matched that in his pale eyes.

  “My grandfather left a considerable sum of money to build a memorial to the men missing in the Somme offensive. I’d bear that in mind, Mr. Walsham. Touch me or mine—tarnish my grandfather’s name and reputation in any way—and I’ll turn Willows into a burial place for widows and orphans of this war. And put that land out of your reach forever.” It was quietly said, but with such a ring of passion that Walsham involuntarily stepped back.

  “You’d never do it. The property’s too valuable!”

  “I’m Francis Hatton’s granddaughter, remember? What do I care about the cost? Now I suggest you leave before my fiancé hears of this conversation. Unless you wish to be exposed for what you are!”

  Without a word he turned and walked out of the room.

  Francesca reached for her crutches and followed him to the hall door, left standing wide in his wake. She turned the heavy brass key in the lock, almost on his heels. Outside she could hear the hired carriage start off down the drive.

  She leaned against the wooden panels, cold comfort for her reeling thoughts.

  I don’t know if I’ve made matters worse—or frightened him off, she thought. Still—there’s an enemy for life!

  It was on her way back to the sitting room that Francesca had calmed down enough to recall exactly what she’d said. Her fiancé—

  She had made the claim in anger and self-defense. Not in love.

  The realization shook her.

  Over Mrs. Lane’s protests, Francesca changed her clothes and summoned Bill with the motorcar. She made it as far as the steps, and then with difficulty scrambled into the rear seat, although her splinted leg felt as if it weighed more than she did.

  The rector stood as she came hobbling through the study door, admitted by a hovering Mrs. Horner.

  “Well, well!” William Stevens said, surveying her skill. “I’m happy to see you’re managing. But—er—ought you to be here?”

  “That’s what everyone asks me.” She sat in the chair he pushed forward for her, and leaned against the back for a moment to catch her breath.

  “What can I offer you?” he asked. “Tea? A little sherry?”

  “I’d like some of that hoarded whiskey of yours, if you don’t mind.”

  “The last time you drank whiskey, it was yours, and your grandfather had just died.”

  “I know.”

  He dismissed Mrs. Horner and added water to a small amount of whiskey in the bottom of the glass. “That’s all you’re allowed, with those crutches.”

  Francesca nodded ruefully. “I shan’t make you watch as I break the other leg.”

  “No.” He sat down across his desk from her, and after a time said, “Is this in the nature of a pastoral call?”

  “In a way,” she admitted. “Mr. Leighton has told me that he’d like to marry me.”

  “Good God! Is that what the whiskey is in honor of?”

  “I don’t think I gave him an answer. But soon afterward, I told someone—in anger—that we were engaged!”

  She spilled out the whole story of Walsham’s visit, adding, “Could it be true about my father? Was he careless at the wheel because he wanted to kill himself? Didn’t he care about my mother and me in the motorcar with him? And when did my aunt contract syphilis—after Harry was born? Were the cousins my cousins? Did my grandfather keep their names out of the obituary to protect them from curiosity and nastiness? Or didn’t they exist?”

  “Walsham, damn and blast him, was probably lying, hoping to frighten you into selling up. But there’s one way I can help. Shall I write to the rector at the church where your cousins should have been baptised, and ask for a copy of the birth records?”

  “Would you? I’d be so grateful!”

  “I don’t know the truth of your uncle’s death. Or your father’s. Mr. Hatton never confided in me—after all, it was something that happened years before my tenure here. Even if Walsham spreads such rubbish about, people are bound to consider the source—the man can’t have a very savory reputation. If I were you, I’d ask your solicitor to warn him off. I’ve told you before, Francesca, you oughtn’t stay in that empty rambling house all alone!” The words were clipped, angry.

  “I shan’t be alone—if I marry.”

  “You know nothing about Leighton! His situation, his prospects—”

  “He’s told me. They aren’t very good. I shall probably be a young widow. Oh, damn, look, it’s your whiskey making me cry! I’m so very tired—”

  “You’re crying because you’re confused about this whole damnable business. Tell me the truth, do you love this man? You are a considerable heiress, you know. You must take that into account.”

  “Bother the money!”

  “Do you want me to have a talk with Leighton?” he asked. “I’m willing, if that will help.”

  “You can’t see into his heart any better than I can. And it’s my heart I’m not sure of. How is it possible to love a man who called Grandfather a murderer? You’re a priest, talk to me about forgiveness!”

  “Francesca, your grandfather was a human being, not a saint. He’d done things he was ashamed of—and things he was proud of. You saw what he wanted you to see, and it was enough for you. If Leighton found no proof in all these years, is there any?”

  She remembered the lines around the Somerset Brass in the church:

  For the sins of my youth, I have paid. God accept my soul and grant it peace. . . .

  “Everything has been too muddled since he died. What am I to believe? He may not have been my grandfather, for all I know. What if, like you, I’m another of the orphans he
took pity on? And Harry as well, as Mrs. Passmore is trying to tell me. Did I have a brother? I don’t know. Perhaps he was one of the cousins—or you—or someone I’ve never met, taken away when I was too young to remember him. Was that why my grandfather brought you here? To look after me when he was gone? Who knows what was in his mind!”

  The scars across his face were white with a tension that she had never seen there before. “Francesca—” He stopped and turned away to search for something on his desk, as if to give himself a chance to recover.

  She realized that she had burdened him with more than he could bear. She had already seen how much he cared for her. She hadn’t stopped to think how hard it must be for him when she asked his advice on marrying another man.

  Guilt swept her.

  “I’m not your brother,” he was saying tightly. “And that isn’t why I came to the Valley!” Then, in a more normal voice, he drew on his priestly role once more. “What brought on all this soul-searching?”

  She took the letters she’d received out of her pocket. “There were two others. I burned them, thinking that that would be the end of it.”

  He read them through quickly and said, “I shouldn’t let these weigh with you. They’re unkind, and meant to be. Walsham is very likely behind them.”

  Yet she’d had the strongest feeling they’d been written by Alasdair MacPherson. She finished the whiskey. “I’m troubled, all the same.”

  “Would it make any difference to you if you—or Harry—were adopted?”

  Tears filled her eyes unbidden. “You don’t understand how much I loved my grandfather. My cousins. What if I don’t belong at River’s End after all? What if—” She stopped, hearing the whiskey speaking, knowing she’d said enough. “Oh, bother, I’m not good company for anyone! You’ve been kind to listen to me ramble. I’ll be all right. But I shall have to find myself another dog. The hound of the Baskervilles might do.” She gave him a rueful smile.

  He suggested gently, “I think you ought to stay here tonight, Francesca. Miss Trotter is hardly a suitable companion—she’s more frail than you are.”

  “You haven’t told me what to say to Mr. Leighton.”

  “I’m the last person to tell you that,” he said quietly. “Follow your heart.”

  “That’s the problem. I’m not sure I know where it is.”

  As the rector was seeing Francesca to the door, she turned to him and asked, “Where is Mr. Chatham? The rector who was here before you? Is he still living in that little house on the water, beyond Exmouth?”

  “Yes, I believe so. He hasn’t been well. He was glad enough to lay down his responsibility and rest.”

  “I’d like to go and see him—”

  She broke off as the sound of lorries came down the narrow, rutted road, sending the ravens swooping up in raucous objection. And around the bend swept a pair of Army vehicles filled with men.

  CHAPTER 27

  “What on earth—?” Francesca began, watching the lorries.

  They didn’t speed on down the road as she’d expected, heading north to Minehead or Dunster. She could see they were slowing, braking for the village of Hurley.

  She turned anxiously to the rector.

  “Are they here to find the shooter, do you think? Oh, gentle God! You’d think he was a division of German infantry!”

  “The Tallons were adamant that something had to be done before he killed someone. I expect they’re behind this.”

  “Well, you must stop the soldiers. I don’t want them to take this man, whoever he is—whatever he is! Not just yet.” The sergeant would have listened to her grandfather. But not to her. “Not until we find out if he’s a Valley man.”

  The lorries had drawn up by the small green, and a sergeant got down, looking around him with interest. Middle-aged, a rough face. If there was compassion in it, she failed to find it. The men behind him stared out from under the lorry’s tarpaulin, rifles upright between their knees, for all the world like a firing squad.

  “Francesca, it’s not in your hands. This is Army business.”

  “They believe he’s a deserter—they wouldn’t go after a man who was ill, armed like this. It’s inhuman!”

  How would she feel if it was Harry they were after? What if they hanged him, and he was in no fit state to defend himself? He deserved a chance—

  “Go and ask them—” she commanded, her hand gripping his arm. “Go and find out what they intend to do—”

  But before he could reach the lorries, Mrs. Passmore was flying out of the inn, to stop the sergeant as he was about to order his men to dismount.

  Francesca could hear the woman from where she was standing at the Rectory door, Mrs. Horner looking over her shoulder.

  “Sergeant! Please—someone just told me at the inn—he’s my son—I’ve come to find him and help him— Please—don’t do anything rash! Let me speak to him and ask him to come back quietly to hospital—”

  The intensity of grief in the woman’s voice reached Francesca where she stood. The rector had caught them up and was speaking quietly to the sergeant, while Mrs. Passmore was standing almost on tiptoe, waiting to hear the response.

  Mrs. Horner was saying, “Her son—the shooter? Bless me! What’s he been doing here in the Valley, then?”

  Now Mrs. Passmore was in tears, her hands over her face, and Stevens was offering her comfort. The sergeant had his men out of the lorries and was giving them instructions, gesturing up the hill toward River’s End and the long, wooded ridge.

  “Aren’t they a rough-looking lot!” Mrs. Horner was exclaiming. “I’d not like to be in that poor soul’s shoes.”

  The soldiers had fallen in and were preparing to march toward the bridge.

  Francesca had all she could do to stop herself from shouting to the rector, asking him what was happening.

  And then, with his arm around Mrs. Passmore’s shoulders, he led her back to the Rectory and handed her over to his housekeeper.

  “I didn’t know he was her son!” Stevens was saying, shocked. “She’s been in Hurley since yesterday, but she’d said nothing about a son—nothing about this man on the hill! Not in my hearing.”

  “She’s searching for a child. Her son would be of an age to fight, you see. She’d convinced herself he was brought up in the Valley. Now she’s heard about our man up on the hill, and I expect she’s afraid he might be her son.”

  “No wonder she’s beside herself!”

  “She feels terribly guilty for abandoning him. She wants to make amends. I think she needs him as much as she hopes he needs her. Look, when they bring this man in—if they do!—I want to see him!”

  From the sitting room behind them, Mrs. Passmore called, “They aren’t going to harm him, are they? Miss Hatton—do you trust them to keep their word?”

  Lowering his voice, Stevens said to Francesca, “I was told they were going to try to flush him out of wherever he’s hiding and take him back to hospital. There will be no trouble. The sergeant’s done this before, I’m sure! He must know what he’s about. Francesca, come back inside—”

  “You must see to Mrs. Passmore. If there’s any news, you’ll send word straightaway?”

  “Yes, but—”

  Bill was coming back, hurrying.

  “Help me into the motorcar, if you will.” And as Stevens did so, she remembered something else. “Ask Mr. Leighton not to talk to the Army. If he cares for me at all, he won’t speak to them!”

  “I don’t know where Leighton is—”

  “He should be at The Spotted Calf. Will you do that for me?”

  “Gladly, as soon as I’ve seen to Mrs. Passmore. Francesca—”

  “No, there’s no time. Just remember to speak to Mr. Leighton.”

  And she tapped Bill on the shoulder as soon as he had turned the crank and stepped behind the wheel, urging him to hurry.

  Stevens looked after her, then turned back to the house.

  He failed to see Leighton standing in the doo
rway of The Spotted Calf, also staring after Francesca’s motorcar.

  The Army was up in the hills until nearly dark, searching. Francesca, sitting by the window in the boudoir chair, her field glasses and the pistol that had belonged to Simon on the sill in front of her, listened for any sound of gunfire, and waited. Her leg ached abominably, and she ignored it.

  Leighton came in the afternoon. He said nothing more about marriage. She asked if he’d told the Army where to look for the shooter.

  He shook his head. “It’s their job to find him, not mine. If he’s as clever as I think he is, he heard them coming up the Valley in those blasted lorries, and is off to another safe haven. Good riddance, I say. I don’t fancy being shot.”

  “I shouted at him once—told him to go fight the Hun. It’s not something I’m proud of.” Absently she put a hand across the healing wound on her arm, easing it gently.

  “You saw him?” he asked, surprised.

  “No. But I heard him. And I thought perhaps he was near enough to hear me.”

  “Is it true that he’s Mrs. Passmore’s son? Everyone at The Spotted Calf was speculating.”

  “I’m sure she’d like to believe he is. Maybe it’s true; who knows? But I think not. I’m afraid it might even be Harry.” She gave him a rueful smile. “Her fear is contagious . . .”

  But the night came on without news from the rector, and the Army withdrew to The Spotted Calf and liquid consolation.

  Miss Trotter arrived with that report a little after dark, and settled in with the knitting that she was doing for the soldiers in the trenches. “They need so much. Gloves and scarves and sweaters.” She lifted the needles to show her work. “This khaki is so ugly! I wish I could use gay colors, to lift their spirits, but I’m told it would make them an easier target for the snipers.”

  “Are you certain there’s no word of the shooter?”

  “None. I hope he’s gone away from here. I have a bad feeling about him, poor lad.”