A Lonely Death (23 page)

Near the bottom of the page was a larger question mark, drawn in heavy strokes.

Doesn’t feel right,
Mickelson has scrawled just below it.
What if I’m wrong and the killing begins again after we’ve all gone away?

The final line was ambiguous.

Why Hastings?
Ask R.

Rutledge set the sheets back inside the drawer and closed it.

Did the second sheet represent uncertainty on Mickelson’s part before or after he’d arrested Carl Hopskins? They weren’t numbered.

Why Hastings?
Ask R.

Standing there, looking down at the street below, Rutledge considered that
R
.

He found it hard to believe that Mickelson would have contacted him about Hastings. Who, then, was the
R
? The rector?

Opening the door a crack, he listened, but the passage was quiet, and he stepped out of the room, shutting the door again. Glancing at his watch, he could see that he just had time to call on the rector before dinner.

But the rector wasn’t at home, and his housekeeper, an elderly woman with a plain face, informed Rutledge that he was with the elder Roper, the second victim’s father.

“He’s been feeling rather down, since Jimmy’s death. Rector takes a book and goes to sit with him from time to time. Poor soul!”

“Can you tell me if Inspector Mickelson called here at the rectory two nights ago? It may have been rather late.”

“He’s the one they just found in Hastings,” she said, and shook her head. “I don’t know what the world’s coming to. Has he died, then?”

“He’s still unconscious. Was he here, do you know?”

“I leave after setting out Rector’s dinner,” she said. “Unless he’s ill. I live with my sister, and we sew of an evening. So I wouldn’t know who comes to call later than seven.”

He thanked her and left, walking through the churchyard as the sun’s heat dissipated. Looking up at the church tower, and the weather vane swinging slightly west in the light breeze, it occurred to him that the rectory housekeeper often knew more about events in a village than anyone else—sometimes including the rector himself.

Retracing his steps, he knocked again. When the housekeeper answered a second time, Rutledge said, “I wonder if you could help me, since Mr. Ottley isn’t here. Have you lived in Eastfield most of your life?”

“All my life,” she told him complacently, “save when Mr. Newcomb and I went to Cornwall on our wedding trip.”

She invited him inside, leading him to the parlor and offering him a chair with the simplicity of someone accustomed to receiving the rector’s visitors and making them comfortable until he returned. But when it came to sitting with him, she was clearly ill at ease, perching on the edge of her own chair.

“How well did you know the murder victims? I wonder if you could tell me what they were like as schoolboys. Were they often in trouble, or were they generally good youngsters?”

“Not troublesome, precisely,” she answered, considering the matter. “Lively, I’d say. Thoughtless, sometimes, as when they set fire to the old mill. The fire could have spread, you see, but it didn’t. Except for Mr. Anthony, his brother Daniel, and Theo Hartle, they were farmers’ sons, and eager to be outside, not shut up learning history and Latin and the like. Not that some of them weren’t good students. The elder Miss Tate told me once that Jimmy Roper could have made something of himself if he hadn’t been the only son and expected to inherit the farm. Theo was very good at numbers, and if he hadn’t had such a gift for working with wood, I think Mr. Kenton would have made him bookkeeper.”

Here finally was the information that Mrs. Farrell-Smith could—should—have found for him in the school records.

“I’ve heard,” he said, choosing his words carefully, “that there was some problem with young Daniel Pierce.”

“He got his nose bloodied a time or two,” she said, nodding. “But he was a sweet boy, nevertheless. He just never wanted to be a brewer. That was Mr. Anthony’s life, he was always underfoot there. The foreman’s wife told me once that Mr. Anthony wanted to go hop picking, to learn more about them.” She smiled at the memory. “His mother put a stop to that. ‘When you’re older,’ she told him.”

“Were the brothers on good terms with each other?”

“They got on well enough together. They were just different. Mr. Daniel was always adventuresome, and Mr. Anthony more bookish. In 1910 when there was all this talk about going out to Africa to grow coffee, I told Mr. Newcomb it was a shame Mr. Daniel wasn’t old enough to give it a try, but he said if the boy didn’t care for the brewery, then he wouldn’t be one for growing the coffee beans.”

Rutledge brought her back to the subject at hand. “Who bloodied Mr. Daniel’s nose, if it wasn’t his brother?”

“It was the other boys, if you ask me. They’d band together sometimes and tease Mr. Anthony or Mr. Daniel about their clothes or their accent or their manners. Mr. Anthony would ignore them, but Mr. Daniel was not one to turn the other cheek. I remember Rector had a word with him about that.”

“Was there much teasing or taunting, do you think? If they turned on the Pierce brothers, who did the other boys harass? People tell me boys will be boys, but sometimes it’s cruelty, well beyond the bounds of teasing.”

“Yes, sometimes it did get out of hand. I remember that poor Summers lad. He was overweight to begin with, and afraid of his shadow. Not good at sports, his face all blotched, clothes never together properly. Mr. Newcomb worked on the wormwood at the school one September, and he told me the boy was the butt of all manner of jokes and pranks and never stood up for himself. Mr. Newcomb wanted to say something to the elder Miss Tate, but it wasn’t his place. Mr. Newcomb did speak to Constable Walker, when Mr. Daniel got into trouble about fighting, defending him, like, but nothing came of it.”

Rutledge had heard some part of this story before. From Mrs. Winslow? Yes, as she talked about her brother Theo tormenting her about her freckles. He asked, “What became of the Summers boy? Does he still live in Eastfield?”

“Oh, heavens no. His father was a clerk at Kenton Chairs, and he was made a better offer by a firm elsewhere. Lincolnshire? Staffordshire? I can’t remember just where, but he packed up and left. There was just the two of them, a boy and a girl. Their mother died when they was very young. She’s buried in the churchyard here.”

Walker—speaking about the near-drowning of a boy—had said the family moved away.

“Do you remember the child’s first name?”

“I believe it was Tommy. Tommy Summers. I haven’t thought about him in years. I hope things worked out better for him, wherever he went.”

Yet sometimes a child was marked, and other children sensed it, like wolves turning on the weakest member of the pack. It was a poor analogy, perhaps, but it served.

“I wonder if Inspector Mickelson came here to ask Mr. Ottley about the Summers boy?”

“Where would he hear about him?” Mrs. Newcomb countered. “I daresay half the people in Eastfield have forgot about him by this time. I had, myself.”

But Tommy Summers may not have forgot Eastfield or the wretched years he’d spent here.

They talked for ten minutes or so longer, but Mrs. Newcomb had very little to add to what she’d already told him or he’d learned elsewhere. And so he took his leave.

Walking back down the rectory drive, Rutledge asked himself if Tommy Summers, a grown man now, could be slowly wreaking revenge on his erstwhile playmates. But then what about Carl Hopkins?

16

R
utledge encountered Constable Petty on the High Street as he was walking back to the hotel.

Petty stopped, saying, “I was about to report to Inspector Norman.”

“Did you take anything from Inspector Mickelson’s room when you searched it earlier today?”

“No, sir, I did not. I made an inventory of his personal belongings. Inspector Norman was waiting for instructions from Scotland Yard regarding their disposition.”

“Is Mickelson in hospital in Hastings?”

“I was told he had been transferred to Chichester. There’s a man there who knows a good deal about head injuries. It wasn’t considered wise to try to move him to London.”

“No, I understand. I want a daily report on his condition. If you’re here to keep an eye on things for Inspector Norman, then you might as well serve me too.”

“Sir, I—”

“Yes, yes, I understand. You’re Hastings police. But I’ll have that report each day. I think you’ll find that Inspector Norman will raise no objections.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did Chief Inspector Hubbard leave?”

“He found someone from the hotel willing to take him to the station. Or so I was told.”

“How did you get here, Petty?”

“Bicycle, sir.”

“There’s something else you can do. Keep an eye out for motorcars similar to mine, but the color scheme may not be the same. I’d like to know where they’re going and who is driving them. If there’s one in Hastings Old Town that doesn’t belong there, I want to hear about that as well.”

“I’ll do my best, sir.”

Rutledge nodded and walked on.

Petty had only one loyalty. But Rutledge needed his eyes.

He brought back to mind the man he’d seen at The White Swans. Most likely Daniel Pierce, not Tommy Summers. The descriptions differed.

Hamish said, “Aye, but ye canna’ judge how the Summers lad looks now.”

And that was an important point.

As agreed, Constable Walker had collected his nephew, Billy Tuttle, Hector Marshall, and Alex Bullock, and they were waiting for Rutledge in the Eastfield police station.

They sat on the bench, stony faced, as if expecting Rutledge to lock them up again, already resisting what he was about to say.

But there was new information since he had summoned them, and so he asked, “Do you recall a village child called Summers? He and his sister attended school with you.”

They stared at him.

“His father moved north when the boy was about ten, I should think—not all that many years ago. Tommy Summers.”

Tuttle turned to Bullock. “I don’t think there was a Summers lad, do you?” Looking back to Rutledge, he added, “He must have been younger. Or older, even.”

Marshall said, “Summers. There was a girl by that name. My sister’s age. Long blond plaits down her back.”

“Was she the Summers girl? I thought she was dark.”

They argued amongst themselves, but the upshot was, they had no recollection of Tommy Summers at all.

Rutledge said, “You tried once to drown him as a witch.”

Something stirred in Marshall’s eyes, but he shook his head.

Tuttle shrugged. Bullock looked at the far wall, as if expecting more to follow, and this was somehow a trick to lull them. They were more interested in the present than the past.

Rutledge said, “Someone fought with Daniel Pierce for defending the boy.”

Walker said, “I remember that. Was Summers his name?” He pulled out his watch and added, “It’s growing late.”

“Yes, all right. Take them home, Constable.” There was no use pushing the issue. He watched them go, grumbling amongst themselves at the waste of time. As Hamish was pointing out, it was high summer and their busiest months.

And as if he’d overheard the remark, Marshall said in a voice intended to carry to Rutledge’s ears, “He hasn’t volunteered to milk the bloody cows, now has he? Londoner.” But there was bravado in the words.

Walker admonished him and followed the men into the street.

They had gone no more than twenty yards when Tuttle turned and glanced at Rutledge, as if of half a mind to call to him or go back, but Walker said, “Come along, then, it’s getting dark,” as if he were all too aware of Inspector Mickelson’s fate. The sanctity and authority of a policeman had been shattered. He was taking no chances being out in the night alone.

Rutledge waited until he’d returned, reluctant to leave the police station until he was sure Walker was all right.

The constable came in after Rutledge had lit the lamps, and shut the door with undue haste, as if he were shutting out the shadows waiting in the street.

“You’re still here, then.”

“I waited to ask you the same question I’d asked the others. You told me once, I think, about a boy being bullied. Do you remember any other details?”

“Not bullied, exactly. He was just one who never quite fit in. I’d have intervened if they’d done any real harm,” he said dismissively. “They were young lads. It happens.”

But words could hurt as much as blows.

“Where did the father go, to take up his new position?”

“Did I tell you that?” Walker was surprised. “North, I think. Staffordshire?”

“Has Constable Petty left for Hastings?”

“Half an hour ago.” He hesitated, and after a moment asked, “Is the killing over, do you think? We assumed, after Hopkins was taken into custody, that it was. Then Inspector Mickelson—it doesn’t make sense, does it?”

Which was precisely why the police had come for Rutledge, but he said nothing.

Walker added, “I did tell the others to take the same precautions as before. To be on the safe side.” He grinned. “Marshall called me an old woman. But his wife told me once it’s dark, he’s under her feet.”

“We’ll patrol the streets until Inspector Mickelson regains consciousness and can tell the police what happened. Did he call on the rector that night, before he was attacked? Or was it a coincidence that he encountered someone near the rectory?”

Walker shook his head. “Rector never mentioned it. I think he would have, under the circumstances.”

‘I’ll take the first four hours, as soon as it’s full dark.” It was the most dangerous time, based on the earlier killings. “I’ll come for you, shall I, when it’s your turn?”

Walker opened his mouth and then shut it again. “I’ll be awake. Good evening, sir,” he called finally as Rutledge was about to close the police station door behind him.

Hamish said as Rutledge was on his way to the hotel, “It would ha’ been best to give yon constable first watch. Or to share it. Ye’re no’ a trustworthy witness, ye ken that. The ithers will believe what he tells them, but no’ you.”

He’s older.
Rutledge almost said the words aloud, stopping himself just in time.
And not as fit.

“And what if there’s no trouble atall?”

I’ve wasted four hours of sleep.

He recalled his impression of Carl Hopkins. Whatever anger the man harbored, Rutledge couldn’t quite imagine him using a garrote. Physically, he could probably have managed it, but was there the strength of mind needed to kill four men with it?

“But ye havna’ seen him in a frenzy. Only despondent in yon cell.”

Which was a very good point. There had been three days between each of the murders, three days in which a man could whip himself into another killing temper.

“It willna’ be easy returning to the Yard,” Hamish warned, “if Mickelson doesna’ recover, and Hopkins is convicted.”

As he put out his hand to open the hotel door, Rutledge heard someone call his name. Turning, he saw that Tyrell Pierce was coming toward him. He paused and waited for the older man to catch him up.

“I’d expected you to call today,” Pierce said without greeting him. “Sad business about Inspector Mickelson. But I would be lying if I said that I wasn’t glad to have you back in charge. What happened, anyway? You were here, and then you weren’t. Walker wouldn’t tell me anything, so I had to assume he knew nothing to tell.”

Rutledge didn’t answer him directly. “Who do you think attacked the inspector?”

“I daresay it was the killer. I’m not particularly happy to be out at this time of evening myself.” As he reached Rutledge, light spilling from the windows was reflected in his face. There was tension around his eyes, a grimness to the set of his mouth.

“Then why didn’t he use the garrote?” Rutledge asked him.

“Yes, I wondered about that myself. I decided he must not have had it with him. Well, I shouldn’t care to be walking around with the damned thing in my pocket, in the event I was stopped because I was a stranger in town. Walker stopped someone just yesterday. Did he tell you? A man on his way to Hastings, as it happened. That’s what my foreman told me—he’d witnessed the incident. According to him, the man might have been able to handle a garrote, but he’d have been hard-pressed to use it on Theo Hartle.” He gestured toward the door. “Have you had your dinner? I was just going to the hotel hoping to find you.”

They walked in together, and as they paused on the threshold of the dining room, they saw Mr. Kenton sitting by one of the windows. He looked up at the same time, and beckoned to them. They joined him, and as Rutledge sat down, Kenton said, “I didn’t expect Carl to be taken into custody. I merely told you about him out of a sense of duty.”

He had ordered his dinner but it hadn’t arrived. The woman serving meals that evening brought over a menu, and Rutledge, after scanning it, made his selection.

While Pierce was considering his choice, Rutledge turned to Kenton. “I never passed on that information to Inspector Mickelson. Nor to Walker. Someone else saw you with me.”

He could tell that Kenton didn’t believe him.

“I should have thought that what happened to Mickelson proved beyond a doubt that Carl isn’t guilty.”

“We don’t know if that attack and these murders are connected—”

“Any fool will tell you that there aren’t two murderers running loose in a village the size of Eastfield! Carl is one of my best workers. I’m going to have to find a replacement soon. And I don’t want to do that. I wish I’d never come to you. I expected you to ask him a few questions, clear the air.” But that wasn’t the impression Rutledge had got when Kenton first approached him.

Hamish said, “Second thoughts.”

Pierce turned to them and said, “What’s this about Carl?”

“I was just saying he was one of my best workers. I’ve known him all his life, I can’t see him committing murder.”

Rutledge thought that when Kenton was speaking to him about Hopkins earlier, he had been driven by his own uncertainty, perhaps even the fear that if the killer was shown to be an employee as well as a personal connection of the owner of Kenton Chairs, it might seem that Kenton had protected him.

Pierce said, “I’m of two minds there. Anthony would have trusted him, if he’d come into the brewery looking for him.”

It was to Pierce’s advantage, Rutledge knew, to distract the police from any interest in his son Daniel. But would the man go as far as letting another person take the blame? He reminded himself that Pierce might have attacked Mickelson if he had been on the verge of finding new evidence that pointed in Daniel Pierce’s direction.

Kenton scowled. “And why, pray, would Carl need to find your son, in the brewery or out of it?”

“I’m only saying—” He broke off as their soup arrived, and then added, “How is Inspector Mickelson? Any news in that direction?”

“Just that he’s alive and holding his own,” Rutledge told them. He hoped that it was still true.

Pierce said, “Nasty business. I suppose he hasn’t spoken yet?” The question wasn’t as casual as it seemed. Rutledge understood now why Pierce had sought him out when he’d failed to come to the brewery.

“He was found in Hastings, I’m told. Just as young Hartle was,” Kenton put in. “I don’t see why that shouldn’t clear Carl.”

They argued through the first course and well into the second. Rutledge was heartily sick of it. And then Kenton asked, “When is Daniel coming back to take his brother’s place? He’ll require some training, I should think. He was never as interested in the business as his brother was, although I wondered if that was only a facade. He said to me once, before the war, that there was no room for him at the brewery and it was all he knew. What has he been doing since the Armistice? New interests of some sort?”

Pierce said shortly, “When he’s ready, he’ll take his place at Pierce’s.”

“You’re not growing any younger,” Kenton pointed out. “I’d considered leaving Kenton Chairs to Carl, before all this happened. Now I’m not so sure if it’s the right thing to do. Last thing I heard about Daniel, he was going into business with someone. Mrs. Farrell-Smith’s husband, as I remember. But then the man died rather suddenly, and nothing came of it. Race horses, was it?”

He was goading Pierce, using Rutledge’s presence to keep the moment civil.

Rutledge thought, Kenton has heard rumors about Daniel Pierce, and the father’s smugness has irritated him.

Pierce was outraged. “Race horses? Good God, where did you hear that nonsense? I grant you they were at school together—Anthony was there as well. As for any business venture, they were hardly of an age before the war to be thinking about such matters. In fact, as Mrs. Farrell-Smith can attest, she and her husband were only just married, and Daniel was considering the law as a profession.”