A Pale Horse

by Charles Todd

  And—both deaths occurred after Rutledge had made himself known to Parkinson’s daughters. That ought to have been included in his time line.

  “Speak of the devil—” Hamish began.

  Below Rutledge a motorcar went speeding by, and he recognized it—it was one that Sarah Parkinson borrowed from her sister.

  It looked as if the things he’d said to her only this morning had sent her headlong to confer with Rebecca.

  Rutledge went down the hill fast, reached his own motorcar, and set out in pursuit.

  He wanted to be there when the sisters met.

  Halfway down the hill he stopped. The door to Allen’s cottage had swung open, and Allen himself stood there for an instant and then went sprawling head first into the front garden.

  Rutledge changed course, and shouting for Slater or Quincy, raced to Allen’s aid. No one came to help him. Not even the constables Hill had left on watch.

  When he reached Allen, he could see that there was no need for help. The man was dying. Rutledge turned him over and lifted the thin shoulders into his arms, holding him.

  Allen looked up, squinted at the sky, then slowly brought Rutledge’s face into focus. “It’s you,” he said. “You won’t get your statement after all. Sorry.”

  He lay back, trying to breathe. After a moment he said, “I don’t regret going this way. I’m just grateful that I’m not alone. I always worried about that, you know. Silly, when I chose to live here by myself.”

  Rutledge said, “Is there anything I can do? Anyone you want me to contact?”

  “It’s all there, in my desk. You’re a good man, Rutledge. Thank you for coming.”

  Allen began to recite the Twenty-third Psalm, breathless and yet not hurrying, as if he knew he had time. When he’d finished he said, “I didn’t live a blameless life. But I never did anyone any harm. I expect God will take that into account.”

  Rutledge had seen men die, most of them young, and had held more than one frightened boy until it was over. Allen, worn and frail, had reached the end of a normal life span, but it made no difference. Watching was difficult. But he spoke quietly, steadily, to the dying man, and Allen answered as long as he was able. And then he was quiet, but still breathing. After an interval he said, quoting King Charles II, “I seem to be an unconscionable time a-dying.” His chuckle caught on a small cough, and then he was gone, the light fading from his eyes.

  Rutledge said, “Rest in peace. I hope you have found it wherever you are.”

  He could feel his leg cramping but went on holding Allen for some time, until Slater, returning from the direction of Uffington, saw them there and came on the run.

  “What’s happened?” he called as he reached them.

  “Allen is dead. Time caught up with him, I think.”

  “Yes, he told me once that the doctor had given him six to eight months, but he was determined to live longer. And so he did.”

  He reached down and gathered the man’s body in his arms, lifting him gently and carrying him into the cottage where he laid Allen on his bed.

  Rutledge, working out the cramp in his leg, followed them.

  “I’ll go for Inspector Hill. Will you stay here?” Slater asked.

  Rutledge thought of the sisters meeting, the danger that Sarah might stand in. It was already too late to get there in time.

  He answered, “Go on. I’ll wait.”

  23

  For a time Rutledge stood by the hearth in Allen’s cottage, listening to the ticking of the carriage clock on the mantelpiece.

  The old man had been sitting in his chair when he realized that the end was near. A handful of papers had scattered across the floor as he struggled to his feet and dragged himself to the door to call for help. It must have taken enormous will to travel even that short distance. But he hadn’t died alone in an empty house. It was even possible that from his windows he’d seen Rutledge sitting by the horse, and held on until the man from London got to him.

  Rutledge gathered up the papers to set them neatly on the table beside the chair.

  They were mostly letters from Allen’s family, and he put them down without reading them. But among them he saw that Allen had begun his statement, writing out the first sentence in a trembling hand before realizing that his malaise that morning was the precursor to death.

  The sheet below that one caught Rutledge’s eye, for it was a list of the occupants of the Tomlin Cottages. Partridge’s name had been struck off, and then Willingham’s and Brady’s. There was a question mark by Miller’s, and the notation “The likeliest choice, I think. Mostly because he doesn’t belong here.”

  Allen had been playing at amateur detective.

  Beside Quincy’s name was another notation. “Armstrong? Or perhaps Remington? Can’t be sure, must write to Halloran and see…”

  Next to Slater’s name was an X as if Allen had crossed him off as a suspect. The notation beside it read, “He might manage one killing, but not a second. Not in his nature…”

  And after Singleton’s, he’d written, “Soldier, trained to kill. Still—”

  It appeared that he’d come to no particular conclusion.

  The door opened and Inspector Hill walked in. “You’re sure Allen died of natural causes?”

  Rutledge said, “Very likely. See for yourself.” And Hill went into the bedroom. Rutledge pocketed the list Allen had made, then looked in the desk. As Allen had told him, there was an envelope with the words “To be opened after my death” written in the same hand as the list. Rutledge took it out and set it against a lamp, where Hill would notice it.

  Slater was still outside, his face pale. Rutledge went out to him. “I know. It was what he wanted, all the same.”

  “What are we to do? I think these cottages are accursed. They shouldn’t have been put here in the first place. It was a desecration.”

  “Slater. If I were you, I’d sleep at your smithy tonight, not in your cottage.”

  “I’m not afraid, if that’s what you think.”

  “If you aren’t here, you can’t be accused.”

  The man’s eyes widened. “But what about Mr. Quincy, and Miller? And Singleton. You can’t leave them.”

  Inspector Hill came out of the cottage and cast a glance in the direction of Brady’s where his men had been stationed. “Why the hell didn’t they come? Slater said you were here alone.”

  “You’d better have a look.”

  Hill gave him an odd glance, then set out for Brady’s cottage at a trot. He went through the door without knocking, and even from this distance, Rutledge could hear him shouting angrily at his men.

  He came back, still furious, and said, “They thought it might be a trick. They were told to watch, and damn it, they watched, their eyes glued to the other cottages for any sign of trouble.”

  “There wasn’t anything they could do.”

  “No. All right then, I’ll take over here. Thanks.” And he turned to go back into the cottage.

  Rutledge walked down the lane with Slater. “Will you leave?”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “Good man.”

  Quincy was standing in his doorway. “Allen, was it?”

  “Yes,” Rutledge answered shortly. He was still angry with Quincy for not coming to the man’s aid.

  “I’m glad you were there,” Quincy said, and went back inside.

  Rutledge left then, knowing it was too late but driving anyway as fast as he dared toward Pockets, the house where Rebecca Parkinson lived.

  When he got there, Sarah’s motorcar was gone. He wasn’t surprised, but she hadn’t passed him on the road, and he thought he knew where else she might have gone.

  And he’d guessed right. She was at Partridge Fields, sitting in the motorcar just outside the gates, crying.

  He pulled up behind her and got out. She looked up, and said, “You’ve done enough damage. Go away.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “No, you’re not. I went to Re
becca to ask what we were to do, she and I. And she said there was nothing we could do. If you arrested us, so be it.”

  “A charge of murder is a very serious matter.”

  He looked up. Rebecca Parkinson was peddling toward them on her bicycle. She hesitated when she saw Rutledge’s car pulled in behind her sister’s. And then she came on, resolute.

  “Sarah? Are you all right? I was worried,” she said, ignoring Rutledge.

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “Come inside. It’s one of Martha’s days. She may still be here. She can make us some tea.”

  “I’m not sure I want to go in.”

  “Then why did you come?”

  “There was nowhere else to go.” It was said with great sadness.

  “I know. Come along in, and it will be all right, I promise you.”

  Sarah cast a glance in Rutledge’s direction. “What about him?” she asked her sister. “I don’t think I can bear any more.”

  “If he comes after us, I’ll have him up on charges of trespassing.” Rebecca turned to Rutledge, challenging him to argue with her.

  Leaving the motorcar where it stood in the middle of the road, Sarah opened her door and crossed to where her sister was still astride the bicycle.

  Rutledge waited.

  Sarah said, her back to him, “There’s something you’ve forgotten, Mr. Rutledge. In your concern for my father, and whatever justice it is you seem to want for him, you didn’t have to live in this house all your life. We did. Push too hard, and we could choose the way out that our mother chose, because right now there isn’t much left of our future. If you really want justice, what about a little for us? As for those men in the cottages, I’m sorry about them, but I didn’t know them, and neither did Rebecca. I won’t take their deaths on my soul.”

  Rutledge said, “Your father is dead. He doesn’t care now what you think of him, what you owe him, or what he made you suffer. For all you know, his own life was as wretched as yours.”

  Sarah started through the gate, still not looking at him. “Then we’re even, aren’t we, he and the two of us.”

  Rebecca followed her, propping her bicycle just inside.

  There was triumph now in the glance she cast over her shoulder toward Rutledge.

  Hamish said, “She’s got her sister under her spell.”

  And they were gone up the path, walking side by side in silence.

  Rutledge swore. It was as if they drew their strength from each other, secure in the knowledge that if neither of them confessed what they knew, there was nothing the law could do to them.

  Hamish reminded him that one of the lorry drivers had seen a woman alone and crying in a motorcar drawn to the side of the road, near Wayland’s Smith.

  “I’ll give you odds,” he answered aloud, “that it was Sarah, while her sister returned their father’s motorcar to the shed. Waiting to take her back to Pockets when it was finished.”

  The timing would be about right, although it would be hard to prove exactly which night that was. Or find the lorry driver who had seen her.

  It was late, but there was still one thing he could do. He drove back to the crossroads and began searching for a doctor’s surgery. If Butler had been called to attend Mrs. Parkinson during her pregnancy, he must be near enough to summon at need. And whoever took over his practice might still have Butler’s records.

  In a village not two miles distant to the west, he found the first of them, and then another just a little farther to the east. A third was due north. But none of them had treated the Parkinson family, or knew what had become of Dr. Butler’s records.

  He kept moving, first down this road and then that, and as the sun began to set, he turned on his headlamps, determined to find what he was after.

  Hamish said, “They had money, the Parkinsons. They would ha’ seen a London doctor.”

  “Not for measles or a fall or a sore tooth. There would have been someone closer who could be called.”

  “No’ for the lost child. For the despair that followed.”

  Rutledge considered that possibility. But he’d got the impression that for many years Mrs. Parkinson had withdrawn into herself, shutting out her husband, and would never have been persuaded to see a London doctor of his choosing. It would have been an admission that they shared a grief. Mrs. Parkinson had hugged it to herself instead, and in the end, used her death as the ultimate punishment.

  He gave up after another two hours. He was too far afield.

  He was halfway back to Partridge Fields when he saw a house well off the road, sheltered by a small copse. Its lights were burning in the dark and a drive wandered in their direction. It was just outside the first village he’d tried.

  What had caught his eye, in a flash of his headlamps, was not a doctor’s board but a small, elegant stone pillar at the end of the drive. He’d almost passed by it a second time when he realized that the scrolled name inset into the pillar was THE BUTLERS. He backed up and turned into the drive, pulling up by the door.

  The knocker was a worn brass caduceus, and he felt his hopes soar.

  A woman answered, her face framed in soft waves of reddish-brown hair, and behind her, peering around an inner door, was a girl of about twelve.

  “Betsy, dear—”

  She stopped when she saw a stranger standing on her threshold.

  “Oh, I do beg your pardon. I was expecting a friend, and she’s late. Are you lost?”

  “My name is Rutledge,” he said, offering her his identification. She peered shortsightedly at it.

  “Scotland Yard? Oh, dear. Perhaps I ought to call my husband.” She turned to the girl. “Will you fetch Papa, darling? There’s someone here to see him.” She sounded uncertain.

  The girl disappeared, and in a moment or two a man came to the entry. He was dressed in rough work clothes and there was paint on his hands and across his face.

  “Sorry, we’re doing up my mother’s room. How can I help you, Mr.—er—Rutledge, is it?”

  “Yes, from London. I’m looking for a Dr. Butler, who once practiced in these parts. Are you by chance related to him?”

  “Good God, how did you ever find us? Yes, he was my father. Dead now, I’m afraid. I don’t think he practiced after 1910.”

  “One of his patients was a woman named Parkinson. I’m trying to learn more about her, and the illness he treated. You don’t, by any chance, have his records?”

  Butler brushed a hand across his forehead, pushing his light brown hair out of his eyes and leaving another streak of paint there. “I doubt they’d do you much good. But yes, we do. Somewhere. In the attic, at a guess. Well, not his records, actually, those went to the man who took over his practice. And he’s dead, as well, killed in the war, worst luck. I don’t know who might have taken over from him. But my father kept a series of diaries, and they’re boxed up just as he left them. Would that be of help?”

  “If I’m lucky,” Rutledge said.

  “Do you need them now?” It was clear Mr. Butler would have preferred another time. “We’ll be up all night with our painting. My mother arrives in the morning. This morning.”

  “It would be best.”

  “Let me clean up a bit first, then. Come in, man!”

  Rutledge followed Butler into a sitting room and waited there for nearly three-quarters of an hour before Butler came back with a wooden box in his hand. Inside were rows of small leather-bound diaries, each with a year printed in gold on its spine.

  Rutledge had been trying to calculate which year he was after, based on what Sarah Parkinson had told him about her holidays as a child. He pulled out a likely diary, but there was no mention of the Parkinsons at all save for a reference to a cough that had kept Sarah in bed for three weeks and a burn that the housekeeper, Martha Ingram, had sustained while cooking a Christmas goose.

  Butler was sitting across from him, clearly anxious to get back to his painting, and Mrs. Butler, held by curiosity, sat quietly knitting and watching fr
om across the room. The girl was nowhere in sight.

  Rutledge had to go back two years before he found the diary entry he was after. There was a date, April 27, and then the notation “Mrs. Parkinson went into labor at two o’clock in the afternoon. All proceeding normally. Three weeks short of full term.”

  Was that the reference he’d been after? The housekeeper had distinctly told him there was a miscarriage. This child was nearly full term.

  “Yon housekeeper wasna’ there. She left to wed a scoundrel.”

  On the twenty-eighth there was a second entry. “Eleven in the morning. Boy survived only an hour. Gave Mrs. Parkinson a strong sedative and told the housekeeper, Mrs. Fortner, to sit by her through the night, until I can arrange for a nurse. Four o’clock same day, set Robert Dunning’s leg after he was kicked by a horse. Five o’clock, Peggy Henderson brought in with a splinter in hand. Six-thirty, looked in on Mrs. Parkinson again. Sleeping. Nurse Meadows with her now, replacing Mrs. Fortner. Just as well, not impressed with housekeeper’s skills. Had long talk with Parkinson, explaining situation. Question about who should see to burial. He left arrangements with me. I did what I could. Sad day for that family.”

  There was nothing else about treating Mrs. Parkinson, except for the daily visit to be sure she was recovering from the birth.

  Rutledge scanned ahead.

  Two months later there was a final entry. “Mrs. Parkinson refuses to leave her room. Have advised husband to let her mourn in her own fashion. Would have been easier if she hadn’t heard the child cry and knew it lived. Better to have told her it was stillborn. But it was out of my hands.”

  The only other mention of the Parkinsons that year was a notation that Parkinson had come to Dr. Butler in July with cuts on his hands after an accident in his laboratory. “Self-inflicted” had been added to the terse notation. But Dr. Butler hadn’t seen fit to elaborate.

  The heartbreaking loss of a son recorded in a few dozen words written in a cramped but clear hand.

  Rutledge went through the next year to be sure, but there was no other mention of the child or how the family had learned to cope. Whatever role Dr. Butler had played in Mrs. Parkinson’s recovery was not given. These were reminders to himself, not a medical record.