The Red Door

by Charles Todd

  Hamish, silent in the face of what could only be called a cacophony, was as speechless as Rutledge himself.

  He’d heard the Irish speak of banshees, but until now he’d never given these harbingers of death much thought. He found himself remembering what old Michael Flaherty, once a jockey, had talked about in his cups. “A sound beyond any other. It tears at the soul, it wails like a lost spirit, and it can’t be seen except by someone in the family.”

  And then something moved, and for the first time Rutledge could see the source of the incredible noise. It was a small dove gray parrot with a flash of red on its tail, and it was clinging to a plate on the top of the dresser against the far wall, almost invisible in the last rays of sunset outlining the open kitchen door. Its bright eyes were fixed on the newcomers as if expecting them to attack.

  “There, you see,” Mrs. Blaine said, pointing excitedly. “All day, I tell you, and all night. I don’t see how she stood it. I’d shoot it if it weren’t for my best Staffordshire ware. He was always sending her gifts, Lieutenant Teller was, but what possessed him to send her that thing I don’t know. They can live a hundred years, she said.”

  Rutledge remembered the little pet graveyard, and the animals resting there. A hundred years—she would never have to weep over a lost love again. A lonely woman given something to talk to.

  The parrot shrieked again. Hardly talking, as Hamish was pointing out.

  “I couldn’t leave it, could I?” Mrs. Blaine went on, her sense of injustice still strong. “She’d been dead for days, I could see that much, the flies on her face, and it hadn’t been fed nor watered. So I took pity on it for her sake, little knowing quiet as it was, what was in store for me. I surely didn’t bargain for this!”

  Rutledge stepped into the room, moving quietly, and went to the overturned cage that was on the floor on the far side of the kitchen table. He picked it up and held it high. Tall as he was, he could bring the cage nearly to the level of the bird. And to his own astonishment, after a long moment, it stopped squawking and hopped into the open door, made for one of the swings, and sat there bobbing back and forth, plucking at the feathers of its breast.

  He shut the door carefully, then reached down for the cloth covering Mrs. Blaine’s kitchen table. She hurriedly caught the sugar bowl and the saltcellar before he pulled at the cloth, then lifted it over the cage, shutting the bird into darkness.

  Even the frantic creaking of the swing stopped, and a blessed quiet descended over the kitchen.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” the constable said into the silence.

  Mrs. Blaine stared from the covered cage to the man from London.

  And then the bird said in a very human voice, “Good night, Peter. Wherever you may be.”

  In a hushed whisper, Mrs. Blaine said, “That’s her voice. For all the world. As if she were still alive.”

  “You’d never heard it speak?” Rutledge asked.

  “Lord, no. Never in her house and not in mine, either. He was quiet as a lamb there, and here he’s done naught but to scream like a creature in pain.”

  “I didn’t know you’d taken anything from the house—this bird,” the constable was saying accusingly. “I asked if you’d touched anything.”

  “It’s a live bird, I thought it would be like a canary. I took it out of kindness,” she said, defending herself. “You’re not telling me it could name her murderer!”

  “No, it’s just that you said—was there anything else?”

  “Did she ever ask you to burn some letters for her, if something happened to her?” Rutledge asked. “Or take a photograph and post it to her late husband’s family? You were her nearest neighbor, she might have confided in you,” he added, though he couldn’t see a strong friendship springing up between two such different women. Still, needs must, and two widows alone on isolated farms could have turned to each other to carry out last wishes.

  Incensed, Mrs. Blaine said, “Look here, I never touched a thing in that house. I took pity on this creature, as I would on a stray cat. And look how it’s repaid me, I ask you.”

  “It could have been evidence,” Constable Satterthwaite pointed out, trying to keep his own temper.

  “A bird’s not evidence,” she retorted. “I’ll wring its neck and be done with it, and bury it up there in her little graveyard. See if I don’t.” She marched around the table toward the cage.

  Rutledge said, “Constable—”

  “I’ve got a cat,” he said, as if that absolved him of all responsibility. Rutledge stepped forward. He could hear Hamish. It was clear that the voice in his head was trying to tell him something, but he reached for the cage and said, “I’ll take possession of it. The bird may not have seen who killed her, or watched if the killer searched the house. But until we know differently, it’s a ward of the court.”

  Constable Satterthwaite turned to him as if he’d taken leave of his mind.

  Mrs. Blaine said, “Ward or not, I’ll thank you to remove it from my house.”

  “Did she have any enemies? Anyone who had had a falling-out with her, anyone who might have held a grudge against her?” he asked, gingerly lifting the bird—cage, cloth, and all.

  “I’ll have my tablecloth back,” she told him. “As for enemies, you might as well ask if I have any. She wasn’t the sort to make people angry. She never asked for much, and it was just as well, she was never given much in this life but great sorrows to bear. She had nothing to steal, though she never lacked for what she needed. It was people who’d failed her. And I can’t think why anyone would have wished to see her dead.”

  Rutledge looked around the kitchen and saw nothing he could use to cover the bird. He set the cage down again and took off his coat, wrapping it around the cage in place of the tablecloth. The bird had his head tucked under his wing, and hardly stirred.

  “You’re a right fool,” Mrs. Blaine said to Rutledge as he handed her the tablecloth, “but I’ll thank you all the same for ridding my house of this nuisance.”

  “What can you tell us about Mrs. Teller’s husband?” he asked.

  “Only that he never came back from the war. They said there was a collection being taken up in London for a monument to the men gone missing. I’ve no doubt Lieutenant Teller’s name will be on it. I asked her if she was going to make a contribution, but she said that would be like walking over his grave. As long as she held him to be alive, he was. Though in the last months, I think even she had begun to give up all hope. She painted that door red to welcome him, and she’d set a dress aside for the day. Well, if he’s in heaven, she’s found him now and is at peace.”

  She walked with them to the door. “She told me once that she’d read a story about a man who had gone on the crusades, and he lost his memory, and it was years before he came home again. She asked if I thought it was a true story. And I told her I did, because I couldn’t say, could I, that some writer had made it up out of whole cloth to make women readers cry. I was never one for that sort of thing myself.”

  “If you can think of anything that would be helpful,” Constable Satterthwaite told her, “you’ll let me know, first thing?”

  “I will. And I’m locking my door at night, and bringing in the dog. I don’t want to be found dead like she was. How long do you think she lay there? It was a cruel thing to do, kill her and leave her to the flies.”

  They thanked her and left. For a second, Rutledge didn’t know what to do with the bird, standing there looking at the motorcar and unwilling to put it on the floor by what would be Hamish’s feet. But the constable took it from him and set it there, saying, “Here’s a travel rug. Shall I put it around the cage instead of your coat?”

  “Oh—yes, thank you.” Rutledge took his coat back and pulled it on as he opened the door of the driver’s side.

  As the constable cranked the motorcar, he said to Rutledge, “What will you do with that thing? You can’t be serious about taking it to London.”

  “Why not?” Rutledge ask
ed. “For the time being at least. Who knows what else it might say.”

  “Aye, and I’d give much to see the judge’s face when you offer a parrot in evidence.”

  Rutledge laughed. “What matters is whether or not someone else thinks the bird can talk. That could be interesting.”

  The motor caught, and the constable got in. All color had gone from the sky now, and the first stars were growing brighter. “Shall we go and see the body, sir? I think the doctor would like it released as soon as possible for burial.”

  “Released to whom?” Rutledge asked. “There’s no family. You said as much yourself.”

  “What else are we to do? I’ll be there. And some of the village women, no doubt. She won’t be put in the ground without someone by her.”

  They drove through the dark streets of Thielwald, light from house windows making bright patches on the road. Satterthwaite pointed out the doctor’s surgery, and they knocked at the door. Dr. Blake answered the summons himself, nodding to Rutledge and saying to the constable, “Another five minutes and I’d have gone up to my bed. But I’m glad you’ve come. Any word on her killer?” He was a short man, graying at the temples, perhaps fifty-five, with pale, heavy-lidded eyes.

  “No, sir. But this is Inspector Rutledge from Scotland Yard. He’ll be looking into her death.”

  Dr. Blake took them back to the room where Florence Teller was being kept, and lighted the lamps. He carried one to the sheet-draped figure and held it high so that Rutledge could see her clearly.

  In the flickering light, Rutledge studied the body. A slim, trim woman of perhaps forty, he thought, older than the Teller wives he’d just dealt with. The doctor was pointing out the location of the wound, but Rutledge only half heard him, seeing the look of peace that Constable Satterthwaite had spoken of. With the lines that sorrow had put in her face smoothed away, she looked young again.

  “Is there anything more you can tell me?” Rutledge asked.

  “I’m afraid not. That one blow on the back of the head, near the base of the skull, was enough. I should think the killer was right-handed, considering the direction of the blow, and possibly on a level with her, rather than shorter or taller. And he was either very strong or very angry. No one interfered with her, no one moved the body from where it fell. There were no other wounds.” He shook his head. “A tragedy. I knew her,” he added to Rutledge. “She was seldom ill, but her son was my patient. He had measles when he was very young and never fully recovered. He died of typhoid fever, and I thought she would go mad with grief. There was nothing I could do. There are times when I curse my profession for its ignorance.”

  After a few more questions and a promise to release the body for burial, they thanked him and left.

  Rutledge drove the constable back to Hobson and asked where he might spend the night. There was no hotel in the little town, and after the long day of driving, the thought of going another ten miles or more to find lodging was daunting.

  The constable sent him to the house of a Mrs. Greeley, who sometimes took in summer walkers. The room was at the back of the house, and as she led him there, she said, “I was just putting the kettle on for my tea. There’s bread and butter, creamed eggs, and some slices of ham, if you’d care for it.”

  He thanked her and offered to pay for the meal as well as the room. She accepted his offer, and he could tell that she was pleased to have the money.

  She insisted on serving him at the small table in her sitting room, though he was perfectly willing to sit in her kitchen. But Mrs. Greeley was agreeable to talking as she laid out his cutlery and brought in a soup that she had made with beans from a tin and bits of bacon.

  “Did you know Mrs. Teller very well?” he asked, after complimenting her on the soup.

  “None of us knew her really well,” she said. “She was a quiet sort, kept to herself. I remember she met the lieutenant in Morecambe, where she had gone for a few days by the sea after a chest cough lingered beyond the winter. He was on a walking tour, but he came back later in the summer and called on her. Then back again he came before the end of October. I could tell she liked him. And he was very taken with her. They were married two years later. He liked the Army, he said. It gave him the opportunity to travel. But he couldn’t take her with him. Not then, and later, with the boy being sickly, he never wanted to take her to his postings. I always thought she must be very lonely, out there on the West Road, as they called it then. But she seemed to be happy there.”

  Over the flan, he asked if she could think of anyone who held a grudge against Mrs. Teller.

  “Her? Never. She wasn’t one to attract trouble, if you know what I mean. I don’t know what’s got into folks these days. The war changed everything, didn’t it People could live anywhere and be safe, no one would think of any harm coming to them. I’ve taken in strangers, young men on holiday, and never feared for my life.”

  “I understand she painted her door red to welcome her husband back from the war.”

  “It was a seven days’ wonder, that red door. Everyone found an excuse to walk out that way, just to see it. Afterward, when he didn’t come home, I thought it must be a daily reminder of her loss. But she wouldn’t hear of having it painted something else. I even offered one of the lads who stayed with me. He’d caught himself a chill, and was at his wits’ end for something to do until he could move on. He would have painted it any color she liked.”

  He waited until she had gone to bed before bringing the bird in and settling it in a corner of his room. He gave it some sunflower seeds he’d seen in Mrs. Greeley’s kitchen and filled up its water bowl. And then as he covered it again, it said softly, “Good night, Peter. Wherever you may be.”

  Chapter 19

  The next morning Rutledge could hear the parrot mumbling to itself, and so could Mrs. Greeley. “I see you’ve got Jake. Lord, I’d forgotten all about that poor bird, or I’d have gone up myself to see to him.”

  “I understand Mrs. Teller’s husband brought him to her on one of his leaves.”

  “He did, and I could have laughed myself silly when I heard Florence say Jake could speak. I didn’t believe a word of it; he was silent as the grave whenever I called. They say it’s possible to teach a magpie to speak, but I don’t believe that either. All the same, Jake was company for her, and that’s what mattered. She’d just lost Callie Sue, her cat, when Jake arrived, and I was glad she had something to take her mind off her loss. Callie Sue had been Timmy’s cat, you see.”

  Rutledge left the parrot to Mrs. Greeley’s tender care—she appeared to know what the bird ate—and spent the morning walking around the village, asking residents about Mrs. Teller. But most of the answers to his questions were a variation on what he’d already learned from Mrs. Blaine, the constable, and Mrs. Greeley. And no one could offer any explanation for her murder. When they spoke of Peter Teller, it was with warmth, but it was also clear that they had never quite felt he was one of them. For one thing, he’d never been in Hobson long enough to put down deep roots.

  The ironmonger, Mr. Taylor, told Rutledge, “When he came in for this or that bit of hardware for the house or outbuildings, he talked about Dorset more often than not. That’s where he lived before he went into the Army.”

  “Did he say anything to you about his family—brothers—sisters?”

  “Not directly, no, though when Timmy was born, he told me he hoped the boy wouldn’t be an only child, as he was.”

  “What did his father do? Was he in the Army as well?”

  “His father was a rector, and Teller mentioned that he’d regretted it all his life. That he’d have been an Army man if the choice had been his. Like his son.”

  Sam Jordan, the man who owned what was the closest thing to a pub that Hobson possessed, could add very little more to what Rutledge already knew. But he made one remark in passing that was helpful.

  “I’d ask him sometimes about his regiment and where he was stationed. I never got a clear answer to that. I
expect on leave he didn’t want to think about going back. Then Jack Blaine said he thought Teller was in the Buffs. Florence told my wife he was in a Hampshire regiment.”

  “Did he come home on leave during the war?”

  “As I remember, he didn’t. Well, it’s a long way from London, and the trains were carrying troops and the wounded. My own boy came to London twice, and there was no way to travel down to see him. Upset my wife no end.”

  Mrs. Greeley’s neighbor commented that Teller had brought her a box of cherries from the tree that grew out beyond the Teller barn, and she had made preserves with the last of her sugar. “I wasn’t to know the war was coming and we’d see no more. I sent a bottle up to Mrs. Teller—I sometimes did the heavy washing for her when Mr. Teller was at home—and she said they were the best cherry preserves she’d ever tasted. I remember it as if it were yesterday, her standing there in her doorway, praising my preserves, and then the Jordan boy come up on his bicycle to say we were at war. Mr. Teller came to the door and said, ‘It will be over by Christmas.’ But it wasn’t, was it? Nor for four more Christmases to come. I asked Mr. Teller if he must join his regiment straightaway. And Mrs. Teller, poor thing, looked as if I’d struck her. Her face went all white, then flushed, as if she was about to cry. It was the last time I saw him. Two days later and he was gone at first light, to make the train.”

  Mr. Kerr, the curate of the small church, told Rutledge, “He never came to services, which I thought was sad. Not even after Timmy died. But Florence was here every Sunday until near the end of the war. I think she must have had a feeling, you know—a premonition—that he wasn’t coming back.” The curate rubbed his bald head thoughtfully. “Of course, I talked to Mr. Teller whenever I saw him in Hobson. And I wondered if he’d lost his faith. Soldiers do, sometimes, you know.”

  Rutledge understood that all too well.

  The curate added with a smile, “Of course, attending services here at St. Bart’s was never compulsory.”

  Rutledge found he was learning as much about Peter Teller as he was about the man’s widow. She was well liked, people had known her as a child and accepted her as one of their own. But her husband apparently had kept to himself when he was in Hobson, making very little effort to fit into his wife’s social life. Which of course had made the local people more curious about him than they would have been if he’d attended church services and spent an evening in the pub. It was in a way very selfish.