A Pale Horse

by Charles Todd

  Hamish chided Rutledge, “You wouldna’ heed me. They’re afraid of yon schoolmaster.”

  “I appreciate your concern for them, Mrs. Crowell. It’s admirable. All the more reason to interview the boys here. If you would bring them to me now…” He left the words hanging in the air between them, leaving her no way out.

  “I believe as a teacher I’m in a better position to judge.” She tried another tactic. “Inspector, these are children. It’s cruel to drag them into something as horrid as a suspicious death. I don’t understand how schoolboys here in Dilby could possibly know anything about your dead man at the abbey. I expect they’ve never set foot in the ruins.”

  He cut her short. “It will be done, Mrs. Crowell. Here. At their homes. Or in the police station at Elthorpe. The decision must be yours.”

  Mrs. Crowell capitulated with what grace she could muster. “Hugh is here. I’ll find him and bring him to you.”

  He could almost read what was running through her mind. Better to know what was happening than be in the dark.

  “Before you go. I’d rather you didn’t tell Hugh or your husband why he’s being taken out of class.”

  She couldn’t contain her fear any longer. “I know what it is you’re intent on asking. If they’ve seen my husband out walking late at night. After all, their house windows overlook the street. But he does walk sometimes. Albert suffers from headaches, he has since the war, and the cool air helps at the end of the day. Inspector Madsen will use that against him, and it isn’t fair.” A slow flush rose to her cheeks. “I thought,” she added accusingly, “that you had been sent here to put an end to this harassment of my husband.”

  “I shan’t know that until I’ve spoken to Hugh. If you please.”

  Ten minutes later she returned with a very flushed Hugh Tredworth. He edged into the room, staring at Rutledge as if the Devil himself were awaiting him.

  Rutledge smiled at Mrs. Crowell. “Thank you. I’ll let you know when we’re finished.”

  That alarmed Hugh, who was clearly not happy with being left alone with the tall man standing there by the window.

  “I think I should stay. In lieu of his parents—”

  But Rutledge cut her off again. “This is not a police interview, Mrs. Crowell. Merely a conversation.”

  She left reluctantly, casting a last glance at Hugh as she closed the door behind her. It could have been interpreted as a warning or as encouragement. Rutledge rather thought that Hugh took it as the former. He seemed to shrink, as if his last protector had betrayed him.

  He stood there, waiting for martyrdom, staring at his executioner with a complex mixture of bravura, fright, and a deep-seated worry.

  And it was the worry that intrigued Rutledge.

  “Hugh, my name is Rutledge. I’ve come from London to help the local police in a matter that perplexes them. You had nothing directly to do with this problem, but I have a feeling that you might know some small piece of the puzzle that will help us sort out what really happened at Fountains Abbey.”

  “I don’t know anything. I told you that yesterday, didn’t I?”

  “Is that true? Your friend Johnnie was very upset yesterday. Is he the one I ought to be speaking with this morning?”

  “No!” It was explosive. As if Hugh were afraid that Johnnie could be persuaded to tell more than he should.

  Rutledge gestured to the chairs in the center of the room. “Sit down, Hugh, I’m not here to persecute you or your friend. No, not on the bench. On the other chair. This is man to man.”

  Hugh sat gingerly on the chair, as if suspecting a trick. His face was set now, his mind racing. But his stomach was about to betray him, his nerve close to breaking.

  “Who are your friends, Hugh?” Rutledge asked, trying to put him at ease.

  But it was the wrong question.

  “Don’t have any,” he said gruffly. “Nobody likes me.”

  “That’s not true. You were very concerned about Johnnie yesterday.”

  “He’s not my mate,” Hugh said stubbornly. “He doesn’t like me.”

  “Are you protecting someone? Is that why you’re so afraid?”

  “I’m not afraid of anything!” It was almost a shout, but one that rang of pain rather than anger.

  “Who left the village on Monday night, the evening that someone was killed in the Fountains Abbey church?”

  “No one, I didn’t see anyone.”

  It was a plea now, and Rutledge heard more than Hugh intended.

  Hugh and at least one of his friends had been out that night, bent on some adventure of their own. One that their parents knew nothing about. And that was keeping them tongue-tied. The knowledge that any confession would get them into serious difficulty with their fathers, never mind the law. Rutledge wondered if Hugh had made a habit of late-night forays.

  I didn’t see anyone…

  No, I was in my bed that night…

  He said, while Hamish thundered in his head, “Hugh. You’ll be safer if you tell me what’s been happening. You know, don’t you? You and John Standing, his cousin William, Tad and his brother Robert.”

  Rutledge had no way of guessing that in Hugh’s mind, not even a London policeman was a match for the Devil. Probing, listening, he was trying to build a picture of what had so disturbed this distraught, tense child. But he was going about it from an adult’s perspective, knowing the truth and trying to work backward from it. That these boys had actually been in the abbey ruins was the last thing to cross his mind.

  Hugh was living in a different reality, one in his mind that was so unforgivable he could find no way back to the safety of his old life. What had begun as a daring escapade had turned into a nightmare. His knowledge of history, scant as it was, included burning witches at the stake for summoning the Devil. It hadn’t even occurred to him on his way to Fountains Abbey that he was going down that path, but it had struck him forcibly later. His concept of the Devil had been a simple one, more like the spirit in a magic lamp than the fiend they’d met. Something to brag about, not something that could destroy him.

  Hugh’s brows flicked together, and Rutledge could almost hear the thoughts rushing through his head. Who told? Who spoke out of turn?

  “If you won’t tell me, I must ask the other boys. Robert is younger, he might not be as stubborn as you are, or as determined to protect his friends.”

  “Robbie has nothing to do with us.” The words were angry, and full of fear as well. “Leave Robbie out of this.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t. There are suspicious circumstances surrounding a man’s death, you see, and I’ve come north to find out why he died. If he was killed.”

  It was all Hugh could do to stop himself from blurting out, None of us killed him—it was the Devil!

  Rutledge tried another direction. “Do you know the book on alchemy that belongs to Mr. Crowell?”

  “I’ve seen it,” Hugh said warily. He had nearly forgotten the book by the time the Elthorpe inspector brought it back to the school. That had shaken him. But with a child’s sense of what was important, he could now safely deny all knowledge of it. It was where it ought to be, wasn’t it, and no one knew he’d borrowed it. Now he dredged up his first acquaintance with it. “He shows it when he’s trying to explain how people get things wrong, but in the end, each bit of knowledge helps the next person looking for the truth.”

  Even to his own ears that sounded very much like a memorized lesson he was parroting.

  “Police work is much the same,” Rutledge told him, seizing his opportunity. “We try this bit of knowledge and that bit, and in the end, we learn the truth. We—the police—found that book in Fountains Abbey the night a man died. And so we came to speak to Mr. Crowell. His name was in it, you see. And the police believe he might have been in the ruins of the cloister talking with the man who was later killed.”

  “Mr. Crowell wouldn’t kill anybody. Not even in the war, he couldn’t.”

  “Then how did his book c
ome to be in the ruins beside a dead man? Who else could possibly have left it there? That’s our dilemma. That’s why we must know who might have met the man that night. Someone did. We found candle wax in the cloister as well. They must have stood there and talked at some point.”

  Hugh was silent, confused, his face working with his thoughts, his body tense as a cornered animal’s.

  “We have a body, we have a book with another man’s name in it, Mr. Crowell’s name, and no answers to the puzzle,” Rutledge persisted. “You can see, surely, that we must get to the truth if we’re to show whether Mr. Crowell is to blame for what happened. Otherwise, he’ll be held responsible.”

  Hugh said, as if he thought it was all a trick, “There’s no one dead I heard of. Who is it, then? And what was he doing in the abbey late at night?”

  Rutledge answered him with honesty. “We don’t know his name. He’s a stranger.” He reached for the file on Mrs. Crowell’s desk and opened it to show the sketched face to Hugh. The boy hesitated, then curiosity got the better of him.

  “That’s him, then?” Hugh stared at the face. “He doesn’t look dead.”

  “I assure you he is. We don’t know where to find his family.”

  After a moment Hugh looked away. “What killed him?”

  “He was—er—overcome by gas.” Rutledge had debated what to say, knowing that the question would surely come up. It was important to be honest with the boy, now.

  That took Hugh aback. “Like in the war?”

  “No. Not like in the war.”

  “I never saw him before.” There was a wealth of relief behind the words. “Never.”

  “He hasn’t come to call on someone in Dilby? Perhaps met him by the church or at the edge of the village? On the road, or even out in a field?”

  Hugh shook his head vigorously.

  “Perhaps you didn’t see his face, only his back or a silhouette. The problem is, who did he come here to see?”

  “He never came to Dilby that I know of. It’s God’s truth.”

  “And so we’re back to the book of alchemy. And why it was left at this man’s feet. In an ancient abbey cloister, of all places.”

  Another thought had struck Hugh. He frowned fiercely, as if concentrating on something. What was running through his head was the fear that the Devil they’d raised had found another victim after they had fled the ruins. If this were true, he was as good as a murderer. He felt sick again, his stomach clenching and twisting.

  Rutledge was saying, “He was lying on his back, this man. He wore a respirator on his face and was wrapped in a dark cloak.”

  Drawn out of himself, Hugh was staring, his face so pale Rutledge realized he’d touched on something that was shocking to the boy.

  “Say again?” It was a croak, coming out of a tight, dry throat.

  “I didn’t mean to frighten you, Hugh.”

  “No, sir, tell me that bit again.” There was urgency in the boy’s posture and his voice.

  “The dead man was wearing a respirator. You’ve seen them, during the war. We don’t know why this was on his face, and it was broken, but there you are. And the cloak was heavy, black. What is it, Hugh, what’s wrong?”

  Rutledge was on his feet as the boy slumped in his chair, starting to shake as if he were running a fever.

  His eyes stared at Rutledge accusingly, begging.

  “For God’s sake, young man, what’s wrong?”

  “You’re lying to me.” It was a whisper.

  “I don’t lie, Hugh. I can take you to Elthorpe and show you these things.”

  Hugh nodded. “I want to see them.”

  But he sat there, as if he couldn’t manage to stand on his own two feet.

  Rutledge was watching him. “What is it, Hugh? Tell me what you’re afraid of.”

  Hugh struggled with himself, then got up and said, “Can I go now?”

  Rutledge thought he meant, was he free to leave. Then realized he was actually asking to be taken to Elthorpe.

  “Yes, now.”

  Hugh nodded, followed Rutledge from the room, and in the passage outside he ran into another boy Rutledge hadn’t seen before. The boy was staring at Hugh, and he said shortly, “There’s nothing wrong, Tad. There’s nothing wrong!”

  Rutledge said, “Do you want Tad to come with you?”

  Hugh shook his head forcefully, and Tad seemed to melt back into the wall, making room for the policeman and Hugh to pass.

  It was a silent ride to Elthorpe, though Hamish was still vocal just behind Rutledge’s right ear. At one point, Rutledge retorted sharply, “It was the right thing to do.”

  Hugh looked across at him, startled. Rutledge tempered his voice and repeated, “It was the right thing to do, Hugh. You’re a brave lad.”

  When they reached the doctor’s surgery, Rutledge explained that he’d come to show Hugh Tredworth the clothing that the dead man had been wearing. The doctor’s nurse took them back to a door at the end of the passage, and Hugh began to drag his heels.

  “I don’t have to see him, do I? You didn’t say I had to see him. Just his things.”

  “That’s right. I’ll bring them out to you.”

  The nurse opened the door into a room lined with shelving, storage for blankets, medical instruments, an array of bottles, and other paraphernalia. On a lower one, tidily boxed, was the folded cloak and on top of it was the respirator.

  On a bench outside the closet, Rutledge spread the cloak out for Hugh to see, and set the mask in at the head, the way it had covered the dead man’s face.

  Hugh stood there, absorbing the image Rutledge had created. His eyes squinted, as if he were comparing a memory with what lay before him. Then he looked up at the man from London. There was a mixture of emotions in his expression. Understanding, alarm, confusion, distress. Rutledge could have sworn that among them was disappointment.

  “It wasn’t the Devil, then.” The boy’s voice was flat, without feeling.

  “The Devil?”

  Hugh turned and marched out of the surgery, Rutledge hastily thanking the nurse and following him out to the motorcar.

  Hugh was leaning against the wing, his face hidden.

  Rutledge gave him time to recover and then said quietly, so that passersby couldn’t hear, “Will you tell me what you know, Hugh?”

  “I want to go home now.” Hugh turned and scrambled into the passenger’s side, waited for Rutledge to crank the motorcar, then join him.

  They were nearly out of Elthorpe before Hugh spoke.

  “We thought it was the Devil lying there,” he said, beginning at the end of the tale, tears suddenly welling in his eyes. He looked away. “That’s when I dropped the book, we were all so afraid.”

  “You were there?” Rutledge tried to absorb that. “What took you there, Hugh? Why should you think it was the Devil?”

  “Because we’d been trying to raise him, weren’t we? With that book of Mr. Crowell’s.”

  “That’s a book of alchemy.”

  “There’s spells in it. That’s why I took—borrowed—it.”

  The story came tumbling out, relief so great that there was no stopping the pent-up words. Backward, leaping ahead, sometimes garbled, but clear enough. The boy ended, “It wasn’t Mr. Crowell who carried the book there. It was me. I went to his office when I was running an errand for Mrs. Crowell, and I took it. Must you tell him? Must you tell my father? There’ll be the strap for the lot of us—even Robbie.”

  Rutledge said, “Have you told the whole truth, Hugh? Nothing left out, nothing made up?” But he was sure nothing had been held back. The boy had needed the release of telling the whole story to someone. Even a policeman.

  “It’s the truth,” Hugh said fervently, “I swear it!”

  “Is this why you and your friends were so afraid? Because you believed you’d raised the Devil?”

  “We swore an oath not to tell. But Robbie wanted to tell, he was so afraid. I warned him his tongue would turn black.” He b
rushed his lips with his own tongue. “And look who it was broke first.” There was disgust in his voice.

  “You swore not to tell about raising the Devil. But you didn’t raise him. What you saw was a human being, lying there in the shadows.”

  “It doesn’t matter, does it? An oath is an oath.”

  “It matters a great deal. What you’ve done today is help with a police inquiry. You can rightly be proud of that. Should I speak to your friends, tell them you’ve done your proper duty? They may remember details that you haven’t.”

  “I’d rather you didn’t. I’ve told you the lot. What about Mr. Crowell, then?”

  “Leave this to me. Once the book has been explained away, there’s nothing to link him to this other man, is there?”

  Hugh still seemed uncertain.

  Rutledge asked, “Was there anyone else in the ruins that night? Did you see anyone on the road? Or hear anything, men arguing, someone walking fast to make sure he wasn’t seen?”

  “There was no one on the road or in the woods but us. And no one in the ruins. I’d swear to it.”

  “If you remember anything, however small the detail might be, will you ask Mrs. Crowell to find me? This is true of your friends as well. Any small detail, Hugh.”

  He said again, “No, there was no one. We’d have run for home if there’d been any such thing.”

  Which Rutledge thought was more true than any spoken denials.

  He returned the boy to the school, spoke briefly to Mrs. Crowell, and then went looking for her husband.

  “You’re in the clear, Crowell. As far as I can see. I’ll tell Inspector Madsen that you weren’t in the abbey ruins that night.”

  “Why are you so certain? And why did you take Hugh Tredworth away from the school without my permission?”

  “He was out that night, and you’d best leave it at that.”

  “What do you mean, out that night?”

  “It’s police business, Crowell, and if I were you, I’d let sleeping dogs lie. It’s in your best interest, after all.”

  Crowell’s face had taken on a stubborn tightness.