by Charles Todd
“Who sailed the Belle, Strange? Was it you?”
“I—actually, it was someone who works for us. A Thomas Billingsley. I was in London.”
“You’re lying, Strange.”
He turned toward the nearest door. “We can’t talk here. If you’ll follow me?” Opening the door, he fumbled for matches and lit the nearest lamp. It was a small drawing room, lavender walls with white trim, the drapes white with lavender stripes, and the upholstery echoing that in narrower lavender and white silk. There was nothing Victorian to be seen, except for a round table, covered in a cloth embroidered around the edges with small dark purple fleur-de-lis. On the top were the obligatory silver-mounted frames holding photographs of family and friends.
Strange shut the door as soon as Rutledge had walked past him. “I’ve told you the truth—” he began.
“Just who is Alfred Morrow?”
“A friend. I defended him in a case after the war. And I kept in touch. My family has tried to make his life a little less—bleak. His parents seem determined to wrap him in cotton wool to keep him from all harm.” That much was true. As if on safer ground, now, Strange added, gesturing to the chairs by the cold hearth, “He comes to us when he can’t stand it any longer. Stays as long as he likes. It’s lonely, I’m sure, but at least he’s his own man.”
“Someone put him ashore in Dover without first looking to see that his father’s motorcar had arrived.”
“It was there, I was told it was there.”
“You took him to Dover yourself, Strange. If anything has happened to him, it’s at your door.”
He hadn’t taken the chair across from Rutledge, and was now struggling to keep himself from pacing. “The motorcar was there.”
“Then tell me where Morrow is now. His driver waited several hours, thinking there might have been trouble with the boat. Finally he went to the police, and then back to the house where Morrow’s parents live, to tell them what had happened.”
“It can’t be true. What do you know about this chauffeur? How dependable is he? Can he be trusted—”
“You were in Sandwich, Strange. You piloted the Belle. What have you done with Morrow? And why?”
“I tell you—”
“No. You’ve been watched, did you know that? We can account for your movements. Here, to Rochester where you met the train from the port. To the house in London where Alan Barrington once lived. Returning to your own flat afterward. Someone was with you from Rochester onward. We have been assured that it was not Alfred Morrow.”
Strange went to the nearest chair, rather than joining Rutledge by the hearth. He all but threw himself into it, leaning back to stare at the plastered ceiling above him. “Why in God’s name am I being watched?” he demanded. “Or is this part of what that damnable woman wrote about Barrington? I should have known that you were a party to that. Reopening the inquiry at the ten-year mark? Like hell you were. You’re actively searching for Alan Barrington, and that’s why I’m being watched.” His head snapped forward and he stared straight at Rutledge, angry and not bothering to conceal it. “That’s your game, is it?”
“Morrow is missing. What have you done with him?”
“I’ve told you. The motorcar was waiting. Alfred got off, walked toward it. Question the chauffeur, again.”
“His name is Rollins. He was delayed when a carter lost a load of cabbages on the road outside Dover.”
“So he says.”
“I saw the rotting cabbages myself.”
Strange took a deep breath in an attempt to steady himself. “Why should anyone harm Alfred Morrow? He’s no one, an ex-soldier who was blinded in the war. One of hundreds who lost their sight for King and Country. He never met Alan Barrington. Or anyone else of importance that I know of.” He got up and walked to the window. “I shall have to go to Dover. The man Windom sent insists on it. That’s your work as well, I’m sure. What is it you want, Rutledge?”
“The truth will do as a start.”
“Damn it, I’ve told you the truth. Morrow is a friend of the family. Nothing more.”
“Then why does his father have no idea where his son goes when he’s fed up with the coddling? Why, if the Strange family and the Morrow family are so close, was that a well-guarded secret?”
“My God. You’ve spoken to his parents?” Strange had wheeled from the window, crossing the room then stopping in the middle of it.
“As you should have done on your way here from London.”
“Look, have you said what you came to say? My family is upset about Morrow. I ought to be in Dover—I have duties in London.” Harried, he ran his hand through his hair. “And yes, of course. The Morrows. I must speak to them. But pray God Alfred is already found, and on his way to them.” He stood there, waiting for Rutledge to stand and take his leave. And then something else occurred to him. “Is the Yard taking over this disappearance? Is that why you’re here?”
“It’s only a matter of time.” Rutledge rose. “It doesn’t look very good for you, Strange. You should have stayed with him until he was in that motorcar.”
This time Strange didn’t deny that he had piloted the Belle to Dover. As soon as Rutledge started forward, he was behind him, all but hurrying the man from London to the outer door and into the street.
The last glimpse Rutledge had of Strange’s face as the door swung to and caught, was of a man carrying a heavier burden than he had ever hoped to bear.
His expression stayed with Rutledge as he went back to The Barbican.
Ten minutes later, leaving the hotel, valise in hand, he was on his way to Dover.
18
Inspector Windom wasn’t at the police station when Rutledge came to look for him.
The Sergeant on duty told him that Windom had left to have his dinner. “There’s a pub where he usually goes. Overlooking the harbor. The Crow’s Nest.” Then he turned to answer a question that one of his Constables had for him, and Rutledge left while he was occupied.
When Rutledge walked into the busy pub, he couldn’t see Windom for the crowd of patrons trying to place their orders. But he pushed his way through the throng, refusing to give up and catching snatches of conversation here and there. He heard French amid the English, and realized as he looked at the speaker that a French Naval ship must be in port. And then someone moved away from the bar clutching three glasses of beer, calling to friends by the window, and for the first time Rutledge saw the small table tucked into the corner by the kitchen door. A man was sitting there alone, hunched over his plate, looking as if his mind was not on the food. Windom?
Rutledge stopped short as a woman came through the kitchen door with a laden tray, then as soon as she’d passed, he stepped into her wake and reached the table.
“Mind if I join you?”
Windom looked up, already framing No, when he frowned. “The Morrows. Any news?”
Rutledge sat down in the other chair. “I was hoping you had something.”
“Nothing.” He set down his knife and fork, then leaned back. “My men report to the Morrows when I can spare them, but what can they tell that family? Alfred Morrow might as well have disappeared in a puff of smoke, for all we’ve been able to find. We even sent someone to see if he’d started walking and lost his way. But no luck. And no body.”
“There’s hope then.”
“I doubt it. You can see all the traffic out there. A propeller does rather nasty things to a body about to surface. Releases the gases and sends the bits back to the bottom. End of story—he’s never found. We don’t have the men to keep searching. And we can’t justify foul play as an excuse.” He looked at his plate, still a quarter full. “There’s been another murder. Woman this time. A tart. Jealous lover, cut her up rather badly, and she’s just died. We’re looking for him now. Drowning his sorrows somewhere, most likely, but he’ll be back on the street soon enough. When the bottle is empty.” Shifting in his chair, he said, “I’d like to finish my dinner in peace. It’s going
to be a long night.”
Rutledge rose. “Thank you.” He turned and made his way through the crowd. It hadn’t thinned, and the level of noise had risen with every new arrival. He reached the door and stepped out of the smoke and the odors of food and spilled beer and sweaty men into the cold salty air. In the harbor he could see the riding lights of ships at anchor as the tide turned. They dipped and bobbed as the wind and the water moved them.
He tried two inns and a hotel, but they were full up. The hotel had a free table in its dining room, and Rutledge took that, sitting by the window, but the lights in the room made it impossible to see the water or anything else out there. After giving the waiter his order, he accidently caught his own reflection in the dark glass and turned hastily away, before he could judge whether Hamish was there in the shadows behind him.
Shaken, he asked a passing sommelier for a whisky, and turned his back to the glass.
His dinner came after what seemed an unconscionable time to prepare sole, but it was excellent, and he found himself enjoying it. He still had to find a room for the night, and as he finished his meal with a cup of coffee instead of tea, he wondered if Strange was having any better luck finding accommodations.
Something hit the glass in the window at his elbow, and he turned to see the face of a Constable, his helmet touching the frame, peering in at him, then scanning the room. It vanished almost at once, and minutes later there was a bustle at the door to the dining room as a waiter tried to stop a Constable from coming in. He brushed the waiter off and his boots thudded across the floor as he made a straight line toward Rutledge. Other diners stared.
Rutledge tensed, certain that the local police had finally put two and two together, identified him not as a friend of the Morrow family but a suicide on leave from the Yard. He rose before the policeman reached him.
It was the Constable who had spoken to the Sergeant at the station as Rutledge left.
He touched his helmet. “Inspector Windom asks to see you urgently, sir. If you’ll come with me.”
The other diners were still staring. Rutledge said, “I’ve not paid for my dinner.” He lifted a hand, and the nearest waiter summoned the man who had served him. He hurried forward, scribbling something in his pad, then gave Rutledge his bill.
Rutledge handed him the proper amount, thanked him, and followed the Constable from the room in a sea of whispers.
They left the lobby and stepped out into the night.
“Sorry to have interrupted your dinner, sir, but there have been developments.” He pointed toward the street, they went down the hotel steps and turned toward the station. It was a ten-minute walk, and the Constable said nothing more.
Rutledge remembered saying something to Hamish about in for a penny, in for a pound. He thought wryly that it was time for the pound.
The police station was busy when they got there, and the Constable asked Rutledge to wait while he made his way to the Sergeant on duty.
They stared at Rutledge, and then the Sergeant handed his Constable a sheet of paper.
The Constable hurried back to where Rutledge was standing, as if half-afraid his man would slip out the door and disappear if he weren’t careful.
“We’re to go to this address, sir. It’s in one of the poorer sections of the town. A twenty-minute walk, I daresay.”
“Windom is there?”
“If he isn’t, he’ll be there shortly, sir.”
Again they walked in silence, the hotels and nicer inns and shops and restaurants slowly becoming rooming houses and pubs and finally the back streets where older houses sat cheek by jowl, their paint peeling at windows and doors, here and there a broken window stuffed with rags or newspaper. On one street, there was a crowd of people standing by a door farther down the row.
A Constable with a lantern was trying to move the curious away, his deep voice telling them there was nothing to gawk at.
Rutledge, seeing what lay ahead, knew what he was going to find. A body.
And he knew who it must be, if the police had looked for him and brought him here.
Alfred Morrow was dead.
The policeman with the lantern asked them to wait for Inspector Windom, just as another man stepped out of the open door to the house and said urgently to Rutledge, “You the doctor?”
“No,” Rutledge replied. “But I’ve had some medical training.” In the war he’d done his share of patching up his wounded until proper help could get to them. And he wanted to see the body before Windom got there and decided he shouldn’t.
The two policemen conferred, and then the one with the lantern nodded to Rutledge.
He walked down the short path to the door. As he stepped inside he could smell despair in the odors of bad food and unwashed bodies. The man who had come to the door said, “Upstairs.” And pointed to the narrow flight of steps going up into the darkness of the first floor.
“A lamp?”
The man turned and stared around the room they stood in. The furnishings were worn and dirty in the light of the unshaded oil lamp. But there was a candlestick with a nub of candle in it on the mantelpiece, and he went to fetch it.
Rutledge had a chance to look at him. Forties, thin, with graying hair in need of shears, wearing corduroys and a heavy coat against the chill in the house. He fumbled with a match but succeeded in lighting the candle before handing it to Rutledge.
“First room on your left.”
Rutledge thanked him, cast a quick glance out the door before starting up into the darkness, bringing light with him as he went. The passage at the head of the stairs was pitch-black. He turned left, found the room, and stepped inside.
There was a bedstead against the far wall, a washstand, a single chair, and a small chest in the room. Clothes hung on pegs on the nearest wall. And as he came closer to the bed, he noticed the lumpy shape lying there under a coverlet that had seen better days. The room was chill, and for an instant he thought he heard rats in the walls, a scraping sound.
He realized almost in the same instant that it was the raspy breathing of someone in trouble.
Shielding the wavering candle flame with one hand, he stepped nearer the bed and shone the light on what was there.
The stench of old blood, sweat, and sickness rose from the body like a miasma as he tried to pull back the coverlet.
A man. Dark hair, several days’ growth of beard, bandages all across one shoulder. The figure in the bed began to shiver violently as the cold in the room touched him, and then he whimpered.
Rutledge could hear heavy boots on the stair treads as someone came pounding up them.
Windom, his Constable at his heels, came charging through the door, blinding Rutledge with the torch beam in his hand.
“What the hell—”
“The man downstairs asked for a doctor. I came to see what was wrong.”
Windom shoved him aside and bent over the bed, gasping as the smells hit him in the face.
“They said a body—” Windom straightened. “He’s alive?”
“He won’t be for long unless we get him out of here.”
“Is it Morrow?” His voice was hard with tension.
But Rutledge had never seen Morrow’s face.
“Is it?” Windom demanded again, urgency in his voice, in his eyes and the set of his jaw, caught in light and shadow by the torch.
There was only one response Rutledge could make. If this was Morrow, help now might well make the difference between living and dying. If it was not, would that help be as certain and as fast?
“Yes,” he said. “Is an ambulance on the way?”
“We were told a body,” Windom said, glancing up at the Constable, who hurried from the room and could be heard clattering down the stairs, shouting as soon as he reached the ground floor.
“How did you find this house?”
“I told you. The tart who just died. This is her house. A Constable had been keeping an eye on it, in case her killer came back here. Then a neighbo
r—that man downstairs—came out to say that he’d gone into the house earlier to take what he could find from the larder, and instead he’d seen a dead man in one of the bedrooms. Must have given him quite a start, rummaging for what he could steal and finding a witness. I doubt he looked too closely. He thought it was the tart’s killer, the man we were searching for. Constable sent word to us, only we’d just found our man and were taking him into custody. He was still drunk as a lord, claiming she’d got what she deserved for taking up with a toff—his words—she’d found lying on the seawall and kicking him out.”
Windom peered again at the man on the bed. “His breathing seems worse. Did you notice?” He reached out with two fingers, about to lift the bandages.
“Better not to touch them. He’s been here since she was found stabbed?”
“Your guess is as good as mine. I’d say yes. From the look of him.”
“My motorcar is in the town. Your Constable didn’t tell me where we were going, or I’d have driven here.”
“Yes, well, you’re the only one among us who knows Morrow. I told them to keep you outside until I got here.” He walked to the window and pulled aside the dusty curtains. “What’s keeping yon ambulance?”
And even as he said it, they heard the distant clanging of the bell, and listened as it grew louder, coming up the slight rise from the harbor and finally pulling up out front.
Two men appeared, a stretcher over the shoulder of the taller of the two. Windom kept his torch turned on the man in the bed, but backed away when the attendants appeared in the doorway, to let them work. Rutledge blew out his candle and set it on the low chest. Working swiftly but efficiently, the attendants wrapped their patient in the blankets from the bed, trundled him onto the stretcher, and bound him there with the two dangling belts. The taller man headed out of the room, helping his partner maneuver the stretcher through the door into the passage with practiced ease, and then took the lead down the stairs. Rutledge, closer to them than Windom, was on their heels.
