In Pale Battalions (23 page)

She was as impervious to insults as to threats. “I can only con-jecture what’s in that note. Perhaps he did become infatuated with me. Some men do”—she smiled—“as you know. Perhaps he grew jealous of Ralph—for whatever reason—and killed him, then took his own life in remorse. Who knows?” “We can find out—by reading this letter.”

“Of course. But consider: it may say other things. If I really was intimately involved with Lieutenant Cheriton, he might know what I know . . . of your amorous inadequacies . . . and peep-hole discoveries. He might know—and speak of it . . . in the letter.” “That’s preposterous.”

“Is it? Well, you may be right. But the Lieutenant Cheriton I knew was a young man of delicate sensibilities. I remember you speaking once of what you saw as the depravity of this house. If

I N P A L E B A T T A L I O N S

153

that was a valid perception, what if he entertained it as well? What if he saw what you saw from the observatory on Friday?”

That was her ace, played with the ease and artistry of a mistress of her craft. “The observatory? How do you know . . . ?”

“Tut, tut, Lieutenant. Are we to be obtuse as well as absurd?

Leonora’s unconventional proclivities have long been known to me and have enjoyed free rein—if I may use the word—since her husband obligingly got himself killed. But I can only guess what effect a knowledge of her practices would have on a shy young man not without aspirations for the hand of an attractive young widow.” “Cheriton? How could he possibly . . . ?”

“He may have been shown.” She smiled. “I may have thought him entitled to know. The letter may tell me what he discovered. It may tell anyone who reads it.”

“Is this true? Did you really do that?”

“Once that letter is opened, it becomes public knowledge. The beautiful young widow of a fine gentleman who died for his country shames his memory in perverted couplings with an American fortune-hunter—and is pregnant into the bargain. It would be a feast for the newspapers. But what about you . . . and Leonora . . . and my husband? What would there be left for you?” In that moment I forgot how impossible it was to believe that Cheriton had killed Mompesson as a prelude to killing himself. In that moment, Olivia convinced me. She plucked the letter from my faltering grasp and tossed it into the grate, where the fire Sally had recently laid was crackling into life. Bright young flames began to lick around the sealed white envelope. I watched, transfixed, as the last words of a reticent man went up in smoke.

I walked downstairs in a daze, not sure where to go in the aftermath of what I had allowed Olivia to do. Fortunately, I wasn’t to be left to my own devices. Bannister was waiting for me in the hall.

“I’ve been looking for you, Mr. Franklin. The Inspector’s here.

Wants to see you right away.”

Without a word, I followed him into the morning room.

Shapland was slumped in one of the wing-backed armchairs, sending up clouds of acrid smoke from a fatbowled pipe.

154

R O B E R T G O D D A R D

“And so, Mr. Franklin,” he said, without getting up, “we meet again. This isn’t how I’d planned to spend my Sunday morning.”

“Nor any of us, I imagine.”

“They tell me you discovered the body.”

“That is so.”

“Then, show me how.” He lurched from the chair and led the way back into the hall. “Absent when Mompesson is murdered—first on the scene of Cheriton’s suicide. I’m not sure whether to compliment you on your timing or sympathize with your bad luck.” “Neither is necessary.”

“If you say so.” We came to the front door, where Bannister stood back to let us pass. “Did you come out this way?”

“Yes.” I blinked in the sudden brightness as we stepped out onto the drive. “I hadn’t slept too well and decided to take a stroll before breakfast.”

Out in the sunlight of the day, with the last of the mist burned away, Shapland looked more rumpled and seedy than ever, but still artful and dogged enough to see through most deceptions. “Why come out this way?”

“Since the . . . murder, all the doors have been locked at night. I knew I could lift the latch on the front door.”

He nodded and gazed down the drive. “And why did you head across the park rather than stick to the gravel?” He ground his heel in it. “Unless it was too noisy for your purpose?”

“It’s true I didn’t want to disturb anybody—but there’s nothing sinister in that.”

“Let me be the judge of what is and isn’t sinister, Mr. Franklin.”

I exerted myself to remain unruffled. “Very well. I’d probably have struck across the park anyway, but then I noticed footprints in the dew.”

“Where?”

I walked to the spot at the edge of the grass. “Here. Footprints leading away from the house. Quite distinct in the dew, which meant . . .”

“They were recently made, probably since dawn.” He joined me on the grass. “So you followed them?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

I N P A L E B A T T A L I O N S

155

“I didn’t know anybody else was up. I was curious—and worried; it might have been an intruder.”

“Unlikely, if the footprints only led away from the house.”

“So I thought.”

“Lord Powerstock’s servant is adamant he put the catch down on the front-door latch last night. Is that how you found it?”

“I don’t think so. I think it was up already. But I can’t be sure.”

He moved ahead of me across the grass and I followed. “If it had been an intruder—or even if it hadn’t—you might have found yourself alone with Mompesson’s murderer.” He stopped and looked back at me. “Did that worry you?”

I stopped alongside him. “Not unduly. I didn’t think of it in those terms.”

“No. I suppose not.” We went on again, aiming unerringly for the elm on the knoll where I’d found Cheriton. “So what did you expect?”

“Somebody else who couldn’t sleep. That’s all.”

“And was Lieutenant Cheriton a sound sleeper?”

“Invalid officers seldom are, Inspector. As it happens, since my room was next to Cheriton’s, I’m in a position to know that he suffered a good deal from nightmares.”

Shapland nodded. “No doubt.” We topped the knoll and rounded the bole of the tree; I was relieved to see that the body had been removed, though string between a couple of stakes had been used to mark off the spot. “And you found him here?” “Yes.”

“Describe how he was—if you will.”

“Surely you’ve seen . . .”

“I’d like to hear it from your own lips, Mr. Franklin. Please.”

So I told him, in as much detail as I could, omitting only the note I’d removed. As I went through it all, Shapland crouched on his haunches by the string, sucking on his pipe and glaring back occasionally at the house. When I’d finished, he remained silent for some time, then tapped his pipe out on one of the tree roots and rose to look at me.

“The condition of the body as it was shown to me—and as you’ve described it—leaves no room for doubt. He took his own life.

But why?”

“Who can say?”

156

R O B E R T G O D D A R D

“You could hazard a guess, Mr. Franklin. Yes, I think you could do that. Lord Powerstock hasn’t hesitated. He takes it to be an admission of Mompesson’s murder. He tells me that Cheriton was often taunted—or felt taunted—by Mompesson about his war record.

His Lordship tells me that it was touch and go whether Cheriton would be sent here to convalesce or be court-martialled for cowardice. He thinks Mompesson may have got wind of that and used it against Cheriton. What do you think?” “I think Lord Powerstock would know better than I. I’ve not been here as long as Cheriton. And I wasn’t privy to the reasons why he came. But what you’ve told me doesn’t seem out of character—for either Cheriton or Mompesson.” “How would Mompesson have come by such information?”

“I imagine somebody must have told him.”

“By implication, Lady Powerstock?”

“That’s your inference, Inspector. I’m implying nothing.”

He turned back to the marked-off space at the foot of the tree.

“Laying Mompesson’s murder at this poor young wretch’s door solves everybody’s problems, of course. The Powerstock family name is left intact and you and I can go our separate ways and forget all about it. It’s altogether too convenient for my liking.” “Surely you shouldn’t rule it out on those grounds.”

“I don’t. But nor do I come easily to the conclusion that a nerve-shattered young man unable to cope with the pressures of war could summon the resolution necessary to murder Mompesson.”

“Perhaps he just snapped.”

“Perhaps. But he’d have needed a cool nerve to sit tight in his room till the body was found. And I didn’t get a whiff of that when I questioned him yesterday. He seemed nervous, yes, but about going back to France, not my inquiries. Do you know when he was due to resume active service?” “He told me he had a medical board at the end of the month.”

“And how did he seem to be facing up to the prospect?”

“Badly. He didn’t want to go back. But none of us does, believe me.”

“I do, I do.” He began to wander down the far side of the knoll, as if finished with the place. As before, I followed. “I’ll tell you what troubles me, Mr. Franklin. Suicide for fear of going back to the Front fits everything I’ve seen. It’s just that the timing’s wrong. Why so

I N P A L E B A T T A L I O N S

157

soon after the murder? I don’t like coincidences—they make me restless. That’s what supports the idea that Cheriton was the murderer. Except that I don’t believe it was in his nature. Do you?”

“I can’t say.”

“A suicide note would have convinced me. A confession in his own hand. I’m surprised he didn’t leave one. These young, sensitive types usually do. But you found nothing?”

I steeled myself to sound expressionless. “Nothing.”

“That’s odd.” We went on in silence for a while, taking a vague route between the spaced elms towards the orchard. Then he resumed. “It’s especially odd in view of the position of his left hand.

Did you notice it?” He looked at me with a smile.

“I don’t think so.”

“It was placed neatly by his side. And the fingers and thumb were held just so”—he held up his own hand to depict the gesture—

“as if he’d been holding something in that hand—holding it there when he died. Yet you saw nothing.”

“There was nothing there.”

“Unless somebody else had removed it.”

“There were no other footprints in the dew. Nobody else had been there.”

He smiled at me. “No. I don’t suppose they had. Shall we go back to the house?” He wheeled in that direction without waiting for an answer. “You haven’t asked, by the way.”

“Asked what?”

“About Thorley.”

“I felt sure you’d tell me—if you wanted me to know.”

He laughed, so warmly I could believe he was genuinely amused. “Very good, very good. Well, we caught up with him at Alton and he corroborated your account of Friday night—as far as he could. Then we released him.”

“Just like that?”

“I have his address in London. And we’re keeping an eye on him.

But I don’t regard him as a serious suspect. He had some kind of motive and he definitely had the means and opportunity. But he doesn’t have what it takes to kill a man in cold blood. Nor did Cheriton.”

“What does it take?”

We paused at the edge of the drive. “It takes what you’ve got, Mr. Franklin: not the hot-blooded fury of the warrior or the 158

R O B E R T G O D D A R D

half-crazed frenzy of the coward, but the finely controlled turmoil of a man at odds with himself.”

I tried to outface him. “You’ve mistaken your man, Inspector.”

“You may be right. I’ve made plenty of mistakes in my time.

It’s an occupational hazard. If you want my candid opinion, I think my superiors will settle for the Cheriton version. It’s much neater and it’ll keep Lord Powerstock happy. But I shan’t make it easy for them. I shan’t let them forget the inconsistencies.” “Such as?”

“Such as the calibre of Cheriton’s revolver: standard army issue.

Whereas the post-mortem reveals Mompesson was shot with a smaller, quieter weapon. Almost, you might say, a lady’s weapon.”

“What do you conclude from that?”

“I conclude you know more than you’re telling, Mr. Franklin, and that, perhaps, you’re protecting somebody—or yourself. I don’t blame you for letting suspicion fall on Cheriton. It can’t hurt him now, after all. But you needn’t think I’m taken in by it—not for a moment.” “There’s nothing to be taken in by.”

“Perhaps not.” He made as if to walk away, then turned back to face me. “There is one more thing that’s puzzling me, though. You said the footprints in the dew looked fresh.”

“Yes.”

“But you heard no gunshot?”

“Not consciously, though I suppose it might have been what woke me. Still, my window was shut and he was some way from the house.”

“His bed hadn’t been slept in, you know.”

“Are you suggesting he was out there all night?”

“The post-mortem will tell us that. But it seems unlikely. Rigor mortis hadn’t set in when I saw the body.”

“My impression was that he’d been dead not much more than half an hour or so. That would fit with first light. I can’t imagine him going out there in the dark.”

“No. Nor can I. Which suggests nobody—apart from you—could have removed a note, if there was one.”

“But there wasn’t.”

He nodded slowly, though the expression on his face drained all the assent from the gesture. “Well, we’ll talk again later . . . I have no

I N P A L E B A T T A L I O N S

159

doubt.” Then he slouched away across the drive and disappeared into the house. I watched him go, cursing myself silently for all the lies I’d been forced to tell by that one concession to Olivia’s threats, that one act which went so far to confirm Shapland’s suspicions that I could almost believe them myself. He’d warned me of his tracker’s instinct for complicity in a crime and still I’d gone ahead and done enough to prove him right for all the wrong reasons. Now he was on my trail.