Racing the Devil

by Todd,Charles

  “I doubt it,” Rutledge answered, smiling. “I should think the Vestry would have something to say in the matter.”

  He left the rectory and turned toward Eastbourne.

  He would have to call on Wilding and have a look at the man’s motorcar. The more affluent doctors had seen early on the advantages of a motorcar when called out in foul weather, no horse to care for and tend at the end of a long day.

  But would he have been stupid enough to follow Wright back to Burling Gap and run him off the road? Or daring enough to slip unseen into Trotter’s garage to buff out the green paint on Standish’s motorcar?

  Hamish said, “If he’s an arrogant sort, he willna’ expect to be found out.”

  And there was some truth to that.

  What would Miss Wilding have to say about Rutledge’s appearance in her father’s surgery?

  He left his motorcar around the corner from the Wilding house and walked back. Then he changed his mind and continued to the Promenade, going as far as the bandstand. But there was no sign of Miss Wilding walking the dog, Ginger. Retracing his steps, he went back to the house and up the path to the surgery door.

  The woman who let him in looked at his face and said, “There are two patients before you. But the doctor will see you as soon as possible.”

  He’d opened his mouth to tell her his business, then said, “Thank you,” instead.

  After giving his name, he followed her down the passage to the room where patients waited, he took a seat and looked around. The walls were cream, the furnishings comfortable enough, and the carpet a dark green. Seascapes were hung on the wall, in keeping with the holiday air of Eastbourne, and the other patients, a man and a woman, appeared to be fairly prosperous.

  When he was at last called into the doctor’s inner office, Rutledge was not surprised to see that Wilding was a man of middle height, dressed soberly in well-cut dark gray clothing, a heavy gold watch chain across his vest. His younger daughter hadn’t inherited his attractive features, or his dark hair, silver-streaked now. But she had a grace that her father lacked.

  Wilding would have been perfectly at home on Harley Street in London, where the best-known doctors and surgeons had their surgeries.

  “Were you in a fight?” he asked, coming around the desk to take a closer look at Rutledge’s face. “No stitches, that cut will heal cleanly, I daresay, if you take care of it. Any trouble with that eye? No? Good. I don’t think the cheekbone is broken, although it might well feel as if it is.”

  Rutledge let him finish his examination and return to his chair behind the desk.

  “I’ll give you something for the pain, as needed. Enough for three or four days. If it troubles you, come back again. Or see your own doctor if you live elsewhere. Which hotel are you staying in?”

  “I’ve come from East Dedham,” Rutledge said, “but only in an official capacity. I’d like to have a look at your motorcar.” He took out his identification and handed it across the desk. “Inspector Rutledge, Scotland Yard.”

  Wilding looked bewildered for a moment and then, rising, glared at him angrily.

  “You, sir, are here under false pretenses. You will leave here at once.”

  “Hardly false pretenses.” Rutledge didn’t move. “There has been a fatal motorcar accident. The Yard is looking for the other vehicle involved, which left the scene rather than stay and offer assistance.” There was no need to mention Wright or Standish. If Wilding was guilty of running down the Rector, then he already knew their names. And it was just as well not to bring the Rector into the conversation, for Miss Wilding’s sake.

  “Are you suggesting that I was a party to this? I’ve taken an oath, Rutledge. I would have been honor bound to render assistance.” He was livid.

  “Nevertheless, I shall need to see your motorcar.”

  The fact that Rutledge hadn’t risen, that he had quietly insisted on doing his duty, seemed to reach Wilding, and he got a grip on his fury, the effort showing in his flushed face. “Very well. Come with me.”

  He walked rapidly out of the office, through the empty waiting room, collecting his coat from a stand, and out of the house into the street without waiting to see if Rutledge had followed him. The motorcar was kept around the corner in a former livery stable that had been converted into spaces numbered for each house that had reserved one. There were lamps burning overhead, and they walked down the row until Wilding stopped at a dark green Rolls, very similar to Rutledge’s but newer. He went around to the bonnet and turned the crank before moving the motorcar out into the space next to where Rutledge was standing.

  “Look, if that’s why you’re here, then I shall have words with your superiors in London.”

  Rutledge was already walking around the vehicle, stooping here and there to search for any indications of a collision. By the time he reached the bonnet again, he had already come to the conclusion that this was not the motorcar he was seeking. There was no sign of a recent buffing, no dents or scrapes that might have occurred in an accident involving another vehicle.

  It was possible, as Hamish was suggesting in the back of his mind, that Wilding had had repairs done professionally. But Rutledge was of the opinion that Wilding wouldn’t risk going to a garage, where a stranger might see an advantage to removing red paint from a green motorcar.

  “There’s no indication that your motorcar was involved,” Rutledge said, coming to join the fuming doctor. “As for contacting my superiors, Acting Chief Superintendent Markham will be happy to hear from you. I hope you’ll explain as well that you were obstructing the course of my inquiry by refusing to bring me here.”

  Wilding got back into his motorcar, returned it to its allotted space, and then without a word waited for Rutledge to leave before stalking back to his house.

  Rutledge watched him turn the corner and then walked to where he’d left his own motorcar. He took his torch out of the boot and went back to the mews. With torch in hand, he searched every dark green vehicle there. If Wilding had chosen to go after Wright, he might have been cunning enough to borrow another man’s motorcar. Just as Wright had borrowed the Captain’s.

  He came up empty-handed.

  Walking back to his own vehicle, he was relieved that he hadn’t run into Miss Wilding.

  And then he saw her, standing at the end of the path just outside her front door, staring this way and that as if searching for someone. She hadn’t even brought a coat, and her hair was caught by the wind, blowing across her face. Her skirts were moving with it, flicking around her ankles.

  He was about to turn away before she could see him, but it was too late. She cast a worried glance toward the door behind her, then ran down the street toward him.

  “I heard my father—he was angry about a policeman coming to his surgery. How could you betray me like that?” she demanded as soon as she was near enough to talk to him. Close to tears, angry herself, she stopped in front of him, barring his path.

  “I didn’t mention you or the Rector. I came to look at your father’s motorcar. Someone ran Wright’s vehicle off the road, causing him to turn over and crash.”

  “You never told me you suspected my father! You lied to me about that as well.”

  He shook his head. “I had no choice in the matter, I had to clear your father.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Why would I lie? I can’t abandon my inquiry, Miss Wilding, because you object to the manner in which it has to be carried out.”

  “Did you tell him? Does he know?”

  “I’ve already answered that.”

  She was shivering violently in the cold wind.

  “Is there someplace we could go?” He took off his coat and held it out to her, well aware that she wouldn’t want him to put it around her shoulders.

  For a long moment he thought she would refuse, but her teeth were chattering now, and she took the coat, slipped into it, and hugged its warmth around her. “It smells of smoke.”

  “The
re was a fire last night. Deliberately set, as far as we can tell.”

  “Is that how you hurt your face? Fighting the fire?”

  “Yes,” he said deliberately, not wanting to tell her the whole truth.

  She considered him. “You aren’t at all like Constable Plant. He’s our local policeman.”

  Rutledge smiled. “I expect I’m not.”

  “He would tell me to listen to my father, that he knew best. But Papa doesn’t always know best. My sister was quite headstrong, and I think he’s trying to be more careful about me.”

  “She didn’t get her way about Nathaniel Wright.”

  “No,” she said pensively. “I think that was because in the end she could see the disadvantages of marrying a country parson. Penniless and dull, my mother says. Nathaniel wasn’t like that, but they couldn’t look beyond his living. If he’d been given a very fine church in a large city, it might have made a difference. More to the point, I probably wouldn’t have fallen in love with him if he had.”

  “Do you think,” he asked, “that Wright had come in to see your father that night? To have it out with him? He couldn’t have been happy about meeting you without your family’s permission to call on you.”

  “He wasn’t very happy about that. But I knew, you see, that my father wouldn’t have allowed it. And I wanted to decide for myself if what I’d felt toward him at sixteen had been anything more than a schoolgirl’s infatuation with her elder sister’s fiancé. It didn’t take me very long to realize that he was the man I’d thought he was.”

  He believed her. Her face was earnest, her eyes holding his. But she hadn’t answered his question.

  “Did he come to see your father that Saturday night?”

  She looked away, but he saw the worry she wanted to hide. “My father went to attend a patient at seven that evening. My sister was here. She waited up for him. Mother and I had gone to Rye to spend the day with her cousin. Nathaniel knew I’d gone there. That’s why it isn’t likely that he would come to Eastbourne.”

  But sitting there alone in the rectory, fighting his conscience about the secretiveness of his relationship with Miss Wilding—possibly even worried about his encounter with Grant—he might have decided to have it out with Wilding. And so, with a storm brewing, he’d chosen to borrow Standish’s motorcar rather than arrive in Eastbourne wet to the skin from riding his bicycle.

  A bicycle that was still missing.

  And it was entirely possible that it wasn’t Dr. Wilding whom Wright had found at home that night, but his former fiancée, Wilding’s elder daughter.

  Rutledge said, “Does your sister drive down often?”

  “More and more frequently. I’ve told you Margaret isn’t very happy. She learned to drive just to be able to come home whenever she likes. She doesn’t care for traveling by train. And Lawrence, her husband, indulges her frightfully. I think she would respect him more if he told her that her place was in London with him.”

  “What sort of work does Lawrence do that made him more acceptable than a country parson?” he asked, leading her toward the answer he was after.

  “He’s a barrister. He has chambers near Leadenhall Street, and a fine house in Hancock Square. My mother is quite pleased about that. Two of Margaret’s neighbors have titles. Minor ones, but titles nevertheless.”

  He had what he needed. “You’re still shivering, with no hat or gloves. I’ll walk you to your door.”

  “No, it’s best if you don’t.” She took off his coat and passed it to him. “I want to attend Nathaniel’s services. Will you take me to East Dedham? Will you send me word? There’s no one else.”

  Her voice nearly broke on the last words, and he found himself promising.

  “Thank you.” She turned away and hurried up the street to the Wilding house. She disappeared inside without looking back.

  He slowly put his coat on as he watched her go, then went to find his motorcar.

  He couldn’t help but notice that the scent Elizabeth Wilding wore lingered in the warmth of the wool.

  He made a decision, as he turned the crank and got into his motorcar, to go on to London from Eastbourne. And there was one other stop he intended to make on the way.

  Melinda Crawford had been close to his parents before their deaths, and her affection for them had included their son and daughter. Melinda herself had led a very interesting life. Her father had been stationed in India during the Great Mutiny, and while he was away with his battalion, the rebels had attacked Lucknow, besieging the residency where English women and children and other noncombatants had retired for safety with the small garrison. Before the first siege was lifted eighty-seven days later, young Melinda had been hailed as a heroine, bringing water and cartridges to the defenders. She had grown up to marry a cousin who was also a British officer, and after his death she had made her way back to England by the most roundabout way she could devise, traveling with only her Indian servants. It had been an outstanding feat in itself. Making her home in Kent, she maintained her contacts with the Army and with many men in the government—if rumor was true, refusing the proposals of half of them—and Rutledge had no doubt that she knew more about the conduct of the Great War than any other civilian alive.

  As a resource, she was priceless. More than that, he was particularly fond of her.

  And so he arrived in time for dinner, to the delight of his hostess and her staff.

  Shanta, Melinda’s Indian housekeeper, came smiling to take his coat, and he was ushered into the small drawing room.

  “My dear,” Melinda said, holding up her face for his kiss on her cheek. “This is a lovely surprise. There’s just time for a drink before we go in. And the fire is blazing away.” After living in the tropics, she kept fires going most of the year, and in this season, what appeared to be a log was burning away on the oversized hearth.

  Rutledge winced, remembering the fire in the stable last night, but allowed himself to be led to the best chair and handed a whisky.

  “And what have you done to your face?” she asked as he took his first sip. It was very good, a single malt that was as smoky as the Highlands she got it from. He could feel himself relaxing.

  “There was a fire last night, a stable being used to house a motorcar. I was on the scene.”

  “Oh, yes? And who struck you while you were fighting this fire?”

  It was no use. Melinda Crawford had seen war firsthand. She wouldn’t be palmed off with a tale of ladders collapsing.

  He lifted a hand, accepting defeat as gracefully as he could. “I wish I knew,” he told her. “He got away. Whether he’s a murderer or not, I don’t know, but there’s every chance that he is.”

  “Constables on the beat have their clubs. Why don’t you have some means of defense?” It was an old argument, and he had no hope of winning it.

  “I ducked. It could have been worse if I hadn’t.”

  “Yes, I see that. It’s a good thing you don’t have a wife, Ian. She would worry herself into an early decline over the chances you take.”

  He smiled. “I don’t need a wife. I have you to fuss over my wounds.” He’d always been afraid that she might discover the one wound, invisible and haunting, that he’d hidden from her and from his sister. Hamish MacLeod had no place in their lives. But sometimes he suspected that Melinda understood more than she let him see.

  Satisfied, she returned his smile. “Now, tell me your news. How is Frances faring with her wedding plans? I’m told she’s found the gown she wished for. I’ve asked her to send me a photograph of it.”

  He gave her what news he had, and asked after the staff.

  It wasn’t until the port was passed—Melinda made no secret of the fact she enjoyed a small glass—that she asked what had brought him to her, and if he could stay the night.

  “I’m in the middle of an inquiry along the East Sussex coast,” he said. “And there appears to be a mystery within a mystery. I thought perhaps you could help me find out what I need
to know.”

  “Of course. Tell me the whole story.”

  And so he did, about the seven men who had pledged to meet after the war and drive from Paris to Nice, an affirmation of survival.

  “That’s not unusual, you know,” she said when he’d finished. “Richard Crawford—Bess’s father—told me a story once about three officers in India who vowed they would meet on a certain date to travel to Nepal to hunt tigers. They must have been quite drunk at the time because they drew up an agreement and each signed it in his own blood, cutting his finger with the pear knife and writing his name. Later, one died of dysentery, another of cholera, and the third of gangrene from the prick of a thorn. But their faithful bearers went to Nepal on their behalf, because the arrangements had already been made. When they got there, they were told that villagers claimed that someone had just shot a tiger, and yet there was no one at the lodge, the guides hadn’t taken out anyone, and there was no explanation for the tiger’s death. This spooked the bearers, as you can well imagine, and they fled back to India as fast as they could go, spreading the account everywhere they stopped.” She smiled. “This intrigued Richard. He was a Major at the time, and he happened to have official business in the north. And so he and Simon—you recall Simon? He became Richard’s Regimental Sergeant Major? Yes—somehow got themselves a bit of leave and made their way to the lodge near the Nepalese border with India, to look into this tale. It’s the lodge where the three men had intended to stay. Everyone swore the incident was true. The odd thing was, when the lodge people had gone out to bring in the tiger’s body, it was no longer there, even though the villagers had seen it there, quite dead. The story got around that both the tiger and the hunter who killed it were ghosts.”

  After a moment, Rutledge said, “You’re suggesting that whoever killed the Rector and drove the Standish car off the headland road above Nice is a ghost?”

  “Stranger things have happened, but I’ve never heard of ghosts driving a motorcar. Coaches and carriages, yes, but not motorcars. What is it you need from me?”