The Formula for Murder (32 page)

“You won’t be getting a refund on your room. Stay a minute, stay the whole night, it’s same to me.”

“Thank you,” I respond inanely and then realize I’m not supposed to say anything because of my accent.

The stable is half a block away and it is everything I can do to keep from breaking into a run, but even running would not have gotten us there any quicker than the swift stride Wells sets out for us.

We get lucky—the stableman is working late to make repairs on a carriage wheel. Our buggy is still loaded and the ponies are quickly harnessed.

As we come out of the stable yard a man bursts out of the hotel and runs down the street away from us. It’s the innkeeper.

“Going for the constable,” Wells says. “Change of course.”

He quickly steers the ponies in the opposite direction.

“Please tell me you have an idea of where we are going.”

“No, but I’m sure that somewhere ahead will be a road that can take us north.”

I know we will get lost, I just feel it, but there are no other options than to head out blindly.

We wander for a while, trying to find the road without finding the constable first. It’s an hour before we reach a simple wood sign at a crossroad that says
POUNDSGATE
and has an arrow pointing left. We haven’t passed an inn.

Wells and I exchange looks. No words are needed. The only certainty about turning left is that we will leave a small town for a long, poorly maintained road with few accommodations on it. But if we continue straight, we’re certain we’d end up at the train station.

Taking a train back to London is tempting. We could leave all this chaos behind, Wells would return to teaching, and I could catch a ship back to New York.

“I don’t think we will be able to make out what is ahead on the road.” I stated the obvious.

My rational mind knows that probably little will change in terms of the scenery of the moors after we leave Ashburton, but the part of my brain that sometimes imagines the unimaginable tells me that the night has grown darker, the fog thicker, the road more deserted.

“Maybe we should pull over and wait ’til morning?” I’m still trying to put off the inevitable.

“And let the constable find us … I don’t think so.”

“When you and Dr. Doyle were perusing routes for us to take, did he tell you anything about Poundsgate?”

“A small but comfortable inn, good ale. And the devil.”

“Why does that not surprise me? Is the Dark One the innkeeper?”

“Giving equal credit to each sex for evil, I’m not certain Satan is a ‘he’ as opposed to a ‘she,’ but we can refer to him as a ‘he’ to keep things simple.”

“Just tell me about the devil. It’s cold, it’s dark, it’s creepy and I’m sure there are things out here that would give pause to Satan himself.”

“It’s said that the devil stopped at the Poundsgate inn on his way to collect a soul in Widecombe, which is farther north.”

“How did the innkeeper know it was the devil?”

“His cloven heels were a tip-off. He was dressed in black and rode a black horse. As he downed a mug of ale all in one long chug, the barmaid heard a hissing sound. He left money on the bar that appeared to be coins but turned out to be dried leaves when she picked them up. The mug he set on the bar left a scorch mark. After he left the bar, he found the man whose soul he’d come for at church services in Widecombe. He collected the man after causing damage and a death or two in the church.”

“Other than the cloven hooves and his bad bar manners, is there anything to corroborate the visit of the Dark One or can we just attribute it as another old wives’ tale?”

“There is the matter of the ball lightning.”

“Which is?”

“Our image of lightning is of long, narrow flashes. There is a rare variety which appears as a fiery ball. The earliest know verification of ball lightning happened that day when a ball of fire went through a church window and wreaked havoc at Widecombe.”

Cloven hooves, ball of fire, it was good enough for me.

“No rest for the wicked,” Wells states flatly.

“I wish you hadn’t put it that way.”

We turn left, heading for the wild moors.

It occurs to me that left-handedness has always been associated with the devil.

54

The moors … the dark side of the moon as far as I’m concerned.

On this chilly, foggy, gloomy night with just the ghost of a full moon sailing through a sea of ashen clouds, our Dartmoor ponies somehow manage to maneuver down a dark, dirt road without breaking a leg, an axle.

Mr. Poe, genius of the horror and the macabre, could hardly have imagined a night with more unseen but felt terrors. The most frightening element of all is that we can see so little. We have no idea of what lies before us and I mean
right
before us. Everything is shrouded, distorted by dense fog. The effect is otherworldly, nothing which I have experienced before.

I look at Wells whose eyes are trying to focus on the dirt road ahead. “I feel like we have entered into the Dartmoor mist you were telling me about.”

“Quit.” Is all he says. His back is ridged and his hands grip the reins tightly as he leans forward trying to focus on what lies ahead.

What my eyes don’t see, my mind imagines—which is nothing good. Nor does my imagination stop flaring up with the landscape—images of the black beast of a hound are conjured in my head every time I hear the howl of a farmer’s dog, the ice pick killer on his horse whenever something appears to move in the dark. On occasion, there is the eerie howl of a hound that sends quivers up my spine and causes me to edge closer to Wells.

“We should have bought a gun,” Wells says.

Should have, would have, could have. “But we bought a compass,” I try to say in a cheerful voice.

“Wonderful, we can ward off demons and murderers by leading them in the wrong direction.”

Wells’s attempt at humor does nothing for either of us.

Instead, just the mention of demons and murderers brings horrible images to my mind. I keep seeing the ice pick in Weekes’s back and the one in Archer’s head. The ice picks are left as a boast and a trademark, Wells concluded earlier.

Which brings up a question—what direction has the ice pick killer taken?

If Lacroix is in Okehampton and the murderer is returning to his nest, he could be taking the direct route across the moors just as we have. Could he be on horseback? I regret not asking the stableman if another man had picked up his horse shortly before we arrived. He could have headed out in any direction—especially ours, since he has now twice appeared at the same location as we have.

“Is he following us?” I ask Wells. “Or are we on his heels?”

It takes him a moment to realize who I’m talking about.

“He … or … they?” he asks. “Why must we assume there is only one? If it is the Whitechapel gang, there may be more of them out there.”

“Out there” of course included where we are.

“The ice pick and cowboy boots serve a number of purposes for the London gang,” he continues. “It’s a trademark and a boast, making it easier to intimidate people. But what if in our case it’s also a red herring?”

“Something to throw us off?”

“Throw suspicion on the Whitechapel bunch and direct the police, and us, to look for the wrong person?”

“Thank you, Wells. A moment ago I was watching out for a killer with an ice pick and cowboy boots. Now I have to worry about everyone on the planet.”

There’s an edge of humor to my remark, but there is nothing funny about the situation. While I had not found Archer to be the most admirable or finest specimen of humanity, he didn’t deserve to die, nor did the artist Weekes, who seemed like a pleasant fellow who just wanted to enjoy life and paint.

“Why not us, too?” I ask Wells. “He—they—wanted to keep the artist from revealing the location and wanted the diary from Archer. Is it just a coincidence that they were killed after talking to us or did we lead the killer to them?”

“Perhaps both.” Wells readjusts his body on the wooden buggy seat. “If it is the Whitechapel gang, there’s probably more than one involved. They could have been following both us and Archer.”

“Wait, I just remembered, when we talked to the shopkeeper in Linleigh-on-the-moor, he said something about strangers in town. I was sure he was referring to us and only one other person because he talked about the stranger with the full-sized horse. I didn’t think anything of it because I assumed that anyone we had to fear would be following us and no one had passed us on the way.”

“You think the killer got there before us because Lady Chilcott spilled the beans.”

“Yes, I’m sure of it now. But that still doesn’t answer why they haven’t tried to kill us yet.”

“There’s an answer as to why they haven’t attacked you.” Wells’s voice seems to be relaxing a bit. Maybe it’s because we’re talking instead of sitting in silence, letting the ghostly thoughts and images feed our imaginations.

“A couple deaths in small Dartmoor towns are a tragedy,” he continues, “but they will not be a national issue. The police could even consider them random killings by some sick bastard who kills whenever he gets the opportunity. But the murder of a famous American reporter would cause a sensation and an intense investigation, especially since you’ve made it obvious to the police in both London and Bath that you suspect Lacroix and the spa in the death of your friend.”

He leans against me and gives me a kiss on the cheek. “But killing a teacher wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow in London. Stay close to me. I’m safer when you’re around.”

An unpleasant thought strikes me. “You might not be completely right about being safe with me. We are on an isolated road where no one can hear our screams. And he can easily get rid of our bodies in a bog … never to be found again.”

The unnerving thought that we have put ourselves at the mercy of the killer makes my heart jump up to my throat.

“I wonder what it would be like to slip down—way down—in peat.” I look at Wells. “They say it’s not cold beneath the surface, that it generates its own heat, sometimes smoldering for years and even starting forest fires. So, on the brighter side, if our bodies were thrown into a bog, we’d be down there for thousands of years until someone dug us out and put us in a museum. We’d be preserved forever.”

“I think the mist-fog is affecting your brain.” Wells pats my leg. “If you keep this up, I’m turning this buggy around and heading back for Ashburton.”

I glance to our rear. “Don’t. He may be following us. Or…”

“Nellie—”

“I have to say it. Or ahead of us. We could be trapped.”

On that charming thought, we grow silent, drawing into our own thoughts.

The bumpy road makes for very slow going and unfortunately plenty of time to think, which right now I don’t want to do. All my thoughts are negative.

“Are we lost?” I finally ask Wells.

“No.”

“How can you be so sure in all this fog?”

He takes a deep breath. “The compass has us going in a generally north direction.”

“But the way the road twists and turns I would think it would make the compass hard to set even for a generally northern course. One moment we’re going north and the next east or west. It’s too dark to see anything on the horizon to help steady out the course or decide which fork in the road to take.”

“Good point.”

“So…”

“I agree.” Wells looks at me, tired. “We have no idea where we are.”

“Terrific—wait, is that a farmhouse?”

A home materializes in front of us and we hear the howls of dogs and the telltale ratchet of a double-barrel shotgun being loaded.

“Wells … did you hear that?”

“Yes…”

“Who’s out there?” comes the nervous voice of a man.

“Don’t shoot!” I shout. “We’re lost in the fog.”

A moment of silence, then, “Your voice don’t sound right to me.”

“I’m an American!”

“And I’m British—Herbert George Wells, from London. We were making our way to Widecombe, but our compass has led us to a dead end.”

We hear the crunch of footsteps and a man comes into view. He’s carrying a shotgun and wearing a woolen cap and a full-length nightshirt.

55

Farmer Hayes raises sheep on the rugged land and maintains a garden that provides enough for himself and a little left over to sell at market day.

The small farmhouse he has invited us to stay the night is a stone cottage with a thick gray thatch roof. It is much smaller and more roughly hewed than the Old Bridge House, both inside and out. Just two rooms, a bedroom, and living room–kitchen.

The sink has a hand pump that brings in water from a tank outside. The few pieces of furniture—a small table, sideboard, two chairs, and a large rocking chair heavily padded with wool—are all of wood, only finished by time and smoke from the fireplace when a gust of wind reverses the draft.

He does, in fact, have two delightful companions—two big, friendly Old English sheepdogs, Hansel and Gretel. They have thick shaggy coats and long, straight hair that drops down over their faces and covers their blue eyes.

Farmer Hayes told us that not only do their shaggy fur coats keep the dogs warm, but their undercoats shed water. “Can get four or five pounds of hair from them every year. Women weave socks and sweaters from it.”

The sleeping accommodations are basic—a padded woolen mat in front of the fireplace and a warm quilt with dog hair on it—but after being lost in the moors and chased by creatures of my imagination, I wouldn’t have felt more snug at the Langham Hotel.

“I’m a bachelor,” Hayes tells us as he puts a log on the fire. “Had a wife once, but she couldn’t take the solitude. Said it’s too lonely for her out here. Not too lonely for me. Any itch I get for people gets satisfied with a couple pints and a game of darts once a week. And that’s more than enough.”

Satisfied with the fire, he offered us a cup of home brew “to keep you warm” but we both politely declined.

“If my wife had been here when you two came along, she would have been properly frightened. She was superstitious and scared of things that went bump in the night.”