Search the Dark (13 page)

Authors: Charles Todd

Tags: #Fiction, #Mystery & Detective, #Historical

BOOK: Search the Dark

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For the most part the streets were empty, and the gardens too. Doors were shut. He wondered how many pairs of eyes
watched him from behind starched curtains. He could feel their stares, intent and waiting.

“They know,” Hamish warned him. “They’ve already been told.”

The second summons brought not the constable but his neighbor, Mrs. Prescott. He had seen the twitch of white lace curtains as she had looked him over before deciding what to do. Curiosity, he thought, had won over prudence.

“He’s not to home,” she said, standing in her door and leaning out to speak to him. “You won’t find him here.”

“Where is he?” Rutledge asked. By God, if the man had gone courting again—!

“His turn to lead a search party.” She moved down onto the front step, and said earnestly, “Is it true then? Is that Miss Tarlton missing and given up for dead? I’d not like to think of two deaths so close to home in so short a time!”

“Where did you hear about Miss Tarlton?” Rutledge asked, though he knew full well.

“Miss Napier. She came to find the constable herself. And she was that upset to learn he’d already gone out. ‘But it can’t wait—it’s been a week, that’s enough time wasted!’ she said. I could see her hands trembling, and her face was white, she looked about to cry. I brought her inside for a cup of tea, for she didn’t want Mr. Wyatt to see her that way. Took a quarter of an hour to settle her down, poor soul.”

Two masters at work, he thought. Mrs. Prescott intent on pulling the truth out of an apparently distraught woman, while Miss Napier was carefully sowing the seeds she wanted to bear fruit.

“Did she tell you what was wrong? Why she needed Constable Truit?”

“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Prescott said, casting a glance up and down the quiet street. “She said her secretary, that was visiting the Wyatts, had disappeared. She wanted to know if I could tell her anything that might help. But I couldn’t,” Mrs. Prescott said, with simple honesty. “I never saw Miss Tarlton leave. Miss Napier, she asked me to make inquiries
in Charlbury. Among my friends. To see if they had any word. And that’s what I did.” She paused, her eyes worried. “All Charlbury knew who she was—the Tarlton woman. She’d come to apply for that position at the Wyatt museum. They was in need of an assistant for Mr. Simon. A pretty young woman. Such lovely hair. I saw her when I carried a jar of my plum preserves along to Mrs. Wyatt. Why should anyone want to harm
her
?” It wasn’t a question he could answer. Yet. She added philosophically, “Well, it gives busy tongues something new to wag about. We’ve nearly talked to death Mr. Simon’s choice of wife and still nobody knows quite what to make of her.”

He was furiously angry with Elizabeth Napier for giving the story her own peculiar twist. No association with Mowbray or his wife—no link with the body found outside of Singleton Magna. It was as if the two crimes—if there had indeed been a second murder—had been unconnected. As if there were still Miss Tarlton’s dead body to find, well hidden in someone’s bushes or back garden.

Small wonder the village had withdrawn behind closed doors!

Another search, this time turning Charlbury upside down. Delving into secrets that no one wanted to see exposed. Because there were always secrets—whether they had had any impact on the crime in question or not.

And Hamish had been right. Elizabeth Napier had adroitly outmaneuvered him, by coming here and starting her own rumors. By worrying her father and sending him directly to Bowles to complain of the police.

Hamish interjected, “Helplessness is a weapon that’s hard to fight.”

And Rutledge had no taste for playing the bully.

All right then, he’d see if he could undo some of the damage!

He said to Mrs. Prescott, “We don’t know that anyone had a reason for wishing to harm Miss Tarlton. But Miss Napier is understandably concerned that her secretary can’t
be found, and she’s taken it upon herself to initiate a search.”

Mrs. Prescott sniffed. “What you’re telling me, then, is just what she said you would. It looks bad for the police when there’s two mysterious goings-on in one week! First that poor woman in Singleton Magna is killed, with her children. And now Miss Tarlton can’t be found. Miss Napier says that that Inspector Hildebrand has all but told her she’s making mountains out of molehills. But she won’t give up. Not her. And I know Miss Napier from before the war, when she came to Dorset regular. She’s not one to run about like a chicken with its head off! If she’s alarmed, there’s something to be alarmed about!”

Rutledge said, “There’s no sign of foul play. For all we know, Miss Tarlton may well be visiting her family in Gloucestershire!”

“She’s not,” Mrs. Prescott said with conviction. “Miss Napier, she called them last night, and they haven’t seen Miss Tarlton since she was down in July for her cousin’s birthday!”

“Retreat while there’s a way open,” Hamish warned him. “She’ll no’ believe you, whatever you have to say.”

Rutledge for once took his advice. After thanking Mrs. Prescott, he drove back to the inn, to leave the motorcar there.

The chauffeur of the other car looked up quickly as Rutledge came to a halt, as if expecting to see someone else. Thomas Napier, perhaps? He nodded politely once he realized that Rutledge was no one he knew and went back to his task of brushing out the interior. It looked spotless.

“Is that Miss Napier’s motorcar?” Rutledge asked, getting out. It was a simple way to open a conversation. And the car was, he’d noticed, very like the Wyatts’.

“Her father’s, yes, sir,” the man replied warily. He was sturdy, in his midtwenties, and there were burns across his face and the backs of his hands. Rutledge had seen such wounds before, on airmen sent down in flames.

“Where will I find her?”

“My instructions were to wait for Miss Napier here. That’s all I know.”

Rutledge turned to look up the road toward the Wyatt house.

“I don’t know what there is about this town,” the driver said unexpectedly, coming to stand behind him. “It’s—un—friendly. I wouldn’t want to live here!”

“What’s your name?” Rutledge asked over his shoulder.

“Benson, sir.”

“I understand Miss Napier came here often in the past. Did you drive her?”

“No, that must have been Taylor. He’s retired now. I was hired some six months back to replace him.”

“Knew Margaret Tarlton, did you?” He caught himself using the past tense but let it go. He turned. If Benson noticed the slip, he gave no sign.

Instead he studied the man before him. “Who’s asking?”

Rutledge told him. Benson nodded. “You must have been the policeman who came for Miss Napier last night! Yes, I know Miss Tarlton—I’ve driven her around most of London, on occasional business for Mr. Napier or his daughter. Always tries to be punctual and says she’s sorry if she keeps me waiting.”

“She was expected in Sherborne?”

“On the evening train. Miss Napier wanted the car most of that day and said she’d go along to the station herself to fetch Miss Tarlton. But she wasn’t on the train.”

“What did Miss Napier have to say to that?”

“She said something must have detained Miss Tarlton, and she’d want me to go back on the next day. But Miss Tarlton wasn’t on that train either.”

“Which day was it that Miss Napier met the train? And where did she go beforehand? Do you know?”

“Over a week ago, sir. Thirteen August it was, sir. I don’t know where she went beforehand. It’s often to Sherborne, when I’m not asked to drive her. But that’s not to say it was Sherborne. Miss Napier just told me I’d have the day and the evening free.”

Hamish stirred with sharpened interest.

It was on 13 August, in the late afternoon, that the murdered woman’s body had been found outside Singleton Magna.

Rutledge said, “Does Thomas Napier ask you to—er—keep an eye on his daughter? He’s a prominent man, and she seems to do some sort of charity work in the London slums. He must feel some concern about that.”

“No, sir. He’s never seemed to have a particular concern in that direction. It’s Miss Tarlton he’s always wanting to know about.”

R
utledge walked up the road to the Wyatt house. Hamish, still mulling over Benson’s last remark, demanded, “Why did you no’ ask him what he meant?”

“Because Elizabeth Napier might question him, if she saw us there talking together. I’d rather bring up her father to her, not the chauffeur. Bowles might have been on to more than he realized, when he asked about a London connection—”

He saw Mrs. Daulton and her son, Henry, coming toward him. Mrs. Daulton paused to speak to him as he touched his hat, and said in her usual no-nonsense way, “You find the cat firmly ensconced among the pigeons, Inspector.”

Was she using the term metaphorically? Or was she being careful not to say in plain terms what Henry might hear and repeat?

He nodded to Henry, who responded in kind.

“You’re a policeman,” he said, as if glad to have this straight. “I thought you liked old churches.”

“As a matter of fact, I do,” Rutledge answered truthfully. He’d always had an interest in architecture, thanks to his godfather. David Trevor probably knew more about any given British building than the men who had originally put
it up. Stone and brick and wood were profession, passion, and pastime to him.

Mrs. Daulton was saying, “Miss Napier seems to believe something’s happened to Miss Tarlton. She’s quite worried, in fact. She came to see me before she went to speak to Simon. To collect herself before they met, I expect. I thought there might have been more to your questions than you told us earlier!”

“I don’t know myself what my interest is in Miss Tarlton,” he replied. “At first it was as a witness. That was true enough. Now she could be involved, in one way or another.”

“You’re right, young women of her class don’t vanish into thin air. But I refuse to believe that there’s a murderer loose who might slaughter all of us in our beds—three parishioners have already come to see me this morning with such a story. Apparently
they
had it from Mrs. Prescott.”

“I don’t think Charlbury is in grave danger,” he agreed.

“Then you feel that that poor man in Singleton Magna’s jail may have killed Margaret Tarlton—that he may have mistaken her for his wife.”

“It’s possible,” he replied. She was an intelligent woman, one who was plain and uncompromising in her view of life.

“Then it’s time I set matters straight. As my late husband would say, the sooner you scotch a snake, the better.” She suddenly smiled, transforming her face, giving it an attractiveness and youthfulness that surprised him. “I do not, of course, refer to Miss Napier as the snake.” The smile faded as she looked down the empty street behind him. “Still, you can see for yourself what suspicion and fear can do in a small place like this. Everyone is staying indoors.”

Henry said, “The last time it was the influenza. Like a plague. Frightened everybody. I’d read about the plague at school.” He frowned, then said, “I think I remember Miss Napier. From before the war.”

“Of course you do,” Mrs. Daulton said calmly. “You and Simon, Miss Napier and Marian were friends.” To Rutledge
she added, “Marian was my daughter. She died in childhood.”

“She died of lockjaw,” Henry put in. “It wasn’t very pleasant.”

In the brief silence that followed, Rutledge seized his opportunity. He said to Henry, keeping his voice on a conversational level, “Do you remember Miss Tarlton coming to the rectory last week? I expect she was looking for someone to take her to Singleton Magna.”

Henry nodded. “She wanted to know if I could drive her. Or failing that, my mother. She said she didn’t want to go in Denton’s car.”

With Shaw? Interesting! “How was she dressed? Do you recall?”

He smiled. “I don’t know much about women’s clothes, Inspector. It was summery, like flowers. I do remember her straw hat, though. I didn’t much like it. Her hair was pretty enough without it.” His eyes were clear, untroubled.

“And after that?”

“She went away. I think she was quite angry.”

“Do you know why?”

“She said something about a train. She was afraid she might miss it.”

Mrs. Daulton was gazing at her son with rapt attention, hanging on his words as if he were delivering the profoundest of answers, making her enormously proud of him. Rutledge found himself thinking, This man’s tragedy isn’t his, he doesn’t know what he’s lost. It’s his mother’s. His wounds are the death knell to any ambitions for him, and she can’t accept it. She’ll push her son as long as she can. She’s another civilian casualty, like Marcus Johnston … .

She turned back to him. “Inspector, if you should want to speak with me at any time, leave a message at the rectory. I always check the little basket by the door.” With a nod, she walked on. Henry followed.

Hamish said, “She’s a strong woman. I think it did na’ come naturally to her. It’s there in her eyes. Long years of pain. Did you take note of it?”

“Yes, I saw it.” But Rutledge’s eyes were on the Wyatt house. He could just pick out the shape of someone in an upstairs room, looking out. He would have sworn it was Aurore.

When Rutledge stepped through the garden gate, he could hear voices from the museum, Simon’s deeper tones, and then, as counterpoint, Elizabeth Napier’s lighter responses.

He turned that way but glanced up at the window on the first floor. Yes. Aurore was standing there looking out, her face still, her body like a statue in its unyielding stance. And yet behind the stillness was not rigidity, nor was it tranquility. There was only an air of waiting … .

He knocked at the door of the museum, although it was open to the muggy air. Surely not, Rutledge told himself, very good for the hide puppets or the small, fragile wings of butterflies.

“Come in!” Simon called impatiently.

Rutledge stepped inside and found Wyatt with his guest in the second room. Elizabeth was holding a lovely sandalwood carving in her hand, this one of a god with an elephant’s head, human foot lifted as in a dance, one arm raised.

“—Ganesh,” she was saying. “I remember Margaret mentioned him as one of her favorite Hindu figures. And much nicer, I must say, than that ugly one with all the arms! Shiva, I think? The destroyer. Yes, that matches, doesn’t it? You find yourself picturing death when you look into his face!”

“Rutledge,” Simon acknowledged, over her head. “Have you any news?”

“No,” Rutledge answered. “I’ve come to see what news Miss Napier has to tell me.” He turned to her, waiting with polite interest.

She blushed, the rich color rising into her cheeks and giving her eyes a brightness. “You’re absolutely right! I should have waited for you to come back to the Swan. But after I’d called Gloucestershire, I thought—I felt I had to
tell Simon before that awful man Hildebrand took it into his head to come here, with no regard for anyone’s feelings!” There was honest contrition in her face as she swung around to him. “I’m not accustomed to the way the police work. If I’ve done anything wrong, I sincerely beg your pardon, Inspector!”

Simon said, “You’ve not done anything wrong, Elizabeth. Don’t let them harass you with their nonsense!” He added to Rutledge, “I can’t understand why you didn’t tell me your suspicions earlier! All that rubbish about what Margaret was wearing! Look, you don’t think that maniac Mowbray got to her somehow?”

“How could he? She wasn’t walking—she was, as far as I can determine, driven from Charlbury directly to the station at Singleton Magna. If she had come across Mowbray on the road and he’d attempted to stop the motorcar, she should have been safe enough. Whoever was driving the car would most certainly have gone straight to Hildebrand afterward, even if Miss Tarlton left on the train. And no such person has come forward.”

Simon said, “It was Aurore who drove her. I don’t know why she won’t come out and admit to it! I asked her myself, as soon as Elizabeth told me what she thought might have happened.”

Rutledge felt a wave of disgust. He knew how Simon, with his oddly abrupt, unfeeling manner toward his wife, must have confronted her, making her feel she had been directly accused … .
“Why have you been lying about this? I’d think it would be better to come straight out with the truth—everyone knows it was you who drove Margaret
… .”

“Perhaps she didn’t take Miss Tarlton to the station after all,” Rutledge replied in her defense, before he could stop himself. His task was to determine guilt, not innocence. But he refused to watch possible innocence trampled.

There was a brief silence.

“I suppose someone else might have driven her,” Simon agreed reluctantly. “There are other motorcars in Charlbury.
But Aurore promised me she’d see to it. And it isn’t like Aurore to lie. I don’t understand this, any of it!”

Yet he had told Rutledge earlier that Aurore never lied … .

“I think it’s too early to go on witch hunts,” Elizabeth put in, her voice appealing for reassurance. “Margaret’s missing. It—it doesn’t actually mean she’s—dead. I don’t know where she might have gone. Do you?”

“Perhaps your father might know her whereabouts,” Rutledge countered, not allowing himself to fall into the neat trap she’d set—expecting him to bring up the dress she’d identified the night before.

There was darker color in Elizabeth Napier’s face this time, then it drained away as quickly as it had come. “I asked him myself this morning. He thought she was with me. He was understandably upset that she’d been missing a week and no one had realized it. He likes Margaret, I think everyone does. She’s one of the most dependable people I know. That’s why her position was so important.”

“Then why did she choose to apply for the position here?” Rutledge asked. “Just because some of the things in this room remind her of India? I’d say at a guess that many of them come from other places in the East. Java. Burma. Perhaps Ceylon or even Siam.”

“It’s much the same culture,” Simon impatiently pointed out. “Buddhism. Hinduism. The same
roots.
Margaret told me that herself. What are you doing to find her? Do you have men out looking? Has anyone spoken to the stationmaster in Singleton Magna?”

“I went to see him this morning,” Rutledge answered. “And men are searching the same ground two and three times, looking for the Mowbray children. If she’s out there, one of the teams will find her. Somehow I don’t think they will.” His glance moved on to Elizabeth. Let her tell the rest of that story, if she felt so inclined—that the body had already been properly buried. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to find Mrs. Wyatt. Is she at home this morning?”

“Yes, yes, just go around to the house,” Simon told him.
“And I want a report, Rutledge. What’s being done, how you’re handling this situation. I still have connections in London. I’ll use them if I have to.”

“There won’t be any need for that,” Rutledge said. “The police are quite good at what they do. It’s a question of time. That’s all. Miss Napier.”

He turned and left, irritated by the implied threat.

Aurore must have seen him coming back toward the house from the museum because she was there at the main door as he came up to knock.

“It isn’t a very fine morning, Inspector. And so I will not wish you one. Is there any news?”

“I’m afraid not. I’d like very much to talk to you,” he said. “But not in the house or the garden. Will you walk with me? As far as the church, perhaps?”

She smiled wryly. “While all those faces are pressed against their windows, wondering if you will arrest me on the way back? Yes, I know what is being said! I can feel it. Charlbury is both titillated and scandalized by this affair. What is that novel one of your famous authors has written about the French Revolution? Where the old women sit by the guillotine and knit as the heads of aristocrats fall into baskets? Except here it is not knitting, I think. It is the face that is just behind the lace of the curtain, each breath stirring it with anticipation!”

“I saw you standing behind a curtain. As I came up the walk,” he said.

She smiled. “So I was! Allow me to find my sweater, Inspector!”

She was back in only a moment, as if she’d had it close to hand. They walked out of the house and turned through the gate toward the churchyard.

“I apologize for such stupid bitterness!” she told him, as if there had been no interruption to their conversation. “It is not like me. But Elizabeth Napier is a woman one cannot defend herself against. She uses innuendo like a sword. But then I must remember that I have robbed her of the man
she wanted to marry. It is the most unforgivable thing one woman can do to another.”

“I think she’s worried about Margaret Tarlton.”

“Is she?” Aurore turned her head and looked at his profile. “I am glad to hear it. I thought she was worried for Simon.”

He smiled down at her. “Touché. A little of both. With Elizabeth Napier, as I am fast learning, there are no absolutes.”

She laughed, a deep, brief chuckle.

“You are an extraordinary man,” she said. “Are you married?”

“No.” It was uncompromising. She read more into it than he intended.