The Red Door (6 page)

He found an umbrella and went back out to his motorcar, driving through the wet streets to his sister’s house. For a mercy, she was at home, and he came through the door almost shouting for her.

“Ian. I’m neither deaf nor in the attics. What’s the matter?” she demanded, coming down the stairs.

He held up the telegram. “Trevor’s coming. Did you know? He’ll have to stay with you, I’m afraid, there’s no hope that the flat can be made habitable in time.” The thought of Trevor being there, in the same flat, hearing Rutledge scream in the night, was unbearable. Explaining
why
he screamed at night would be beyond him. And Trevor—Trevor would speak to Frances, and ask if she knew.

“Habitable? Don’t be silly. When has your flat been anything but scrupulously tidy? I sometimes wonder if you ever really live there. But yes, he’s staying here.” She laughed at the panic in his eyes. “Darling, this is your godfather. Not your Colonel in Chief. He’s bringing the little boy. He told me that Morag was turning out the cupboards and beating the mattresses, and it was no place for sane men to linger.” But the panic hadn’t subsided in her brother’s eyes, and she said, her laughter vanishing, “Ian. Surely you don’t mind giving up a day or two to spend with David? I’ll see to his comfort, of course I will. But he’ll want to talk to you, dine with you, that sort of thing. He’s been worried, if you must know. You haven’t written in ages, and he needs to be reassured that all’s well.” She paused, still considering him. “All is well, isn’t it, Ian? It’s just been the press of work, hasn’t it?”

He was well and truly caught.

The trouble was, David Trevor was an insightful man, and he would see too much. What if Hamish sent him into darkness in the middle of a dinner—a drink at Trevor’s club—during a walk in St. James’s Park? And there had been insufficient warning, not enough time to prepare himself. He’d be on parade, as surely as if he were in the Army again, and in the end he’d betray himself out of sheer witless nerves. Something would slip, a word, a hesitation, an instant’s lapse in concentration. Trevor would
know
.

Frances said gently, “It’s David, my dear, and he’s lost his son. He’s still grieving.”

“I can’t replace Ross. No one can.” Rutledge stood there helplessly, with nowhere to turn.

“He isn’t asking you to replace him. I think he merely wants to hear your voice and see your face and laugh with you at some bit of foolishness, the way you and he did before the war. A little space in time where there’s neither past nor future, where he can
pretend
. Do you understand what I’m trying to say?”

He did. All too well. The question was, could he provide the strength and the ease someone else required, and not find himself mourning too?

Rutledge took a deep breath. “He should have given me a little time to arrange matters at the Yard . . .” His voice trailed off. There was the inquiry into Teller’s disappearance. It was taking up all his time—

“And you’d have put him off. I suspect he knew that. Meanwhile, I’m the one with the preparations to see to. We’ve aired the spare bedroom and the nursery, and there’s food for meals and an invitation for his old partner in the architectural firm to lunch with David at his club, and there’s even a lady who wants him to come to tea.”

That got his attention. He looked up. “A lady?”

“Melinda Crawford, of course.” She smiled. “We’re going to Kent the day after tomorrow. It’s arranged.”

He could see how much had been planned without his knowledge. But if there was a luncheon and a visit to Kent, as well as the zoo, or whatever else a small restless boy might wish to see, he might—just—make it through.

“Ian?”

“All right. But you must go to the station, I can’t take—”

“But you can take a half an hour,” she said gently. “And bring them here to me.”

And so it was that he found himself at St. Pancreas the next morning, waiting for the train from Edinburgh, Hamish ringing in his ears and his mouth dry as bone.

F
or nearly eight months, Rutledge had refused every invitation from his godfather, David Trevor, to come back to Scotland. What had happened there in September of the previous year had left him physically near death and emotionally shattered. He needed no reminder of that time—events were still etched in his memory, and Hamish had seen to it that every detail remained crystal clear. For he had entered Hamish’s world without any warning to prepare either of them, and the price had nearly been too high.

He could not tell his godfather why the very thought of traveling north was still anathema. Because of Fiona, the woman Hamish should have lived to marry. Because too many young Scots like Hamish had died under his command. All the same, he sometimes felt that Trevor already understood much of the story, at least the part that had taken place in Scotland. Please God, no one would ever learn the whole truth about Hamish, and what had happened in France.

He was grateful now for the inquiry that was presently taking up so much of his time—it would give him the excuse to absent himself from his visitors when the strain of pretense was too much.

Rutledge met the travelers at the station, as promised, and as the train came into view, he felt tension invest his body, like steel rods.

Hamish said derisively, “It willna’ help.”

Rutledge said nothing in reply, swallowing the bitter taste that rose in his throat.

And then the carriages were passing him, slowing as the train came to a halt, and it was too late to run. His godfather was at the window waving to him before the carriage door opened, and then Trevor was stepping out, holding the small boy named for Rutledge by the hand. He said something to the child, and reached back into the carriage for the leather valise he’d left on the seat. Rutledge had a few seconds in which to realize that his godfather looked better than when he had last seen him. Some of the strain was gone from his face, and his step was lighter. The boy’s doing, at a guess.

The two crossed to where Rutledge was waiting, rooted to the spot.

“Hallo, Ian, it’s good to see you!” Trevor said heartily, taking his outstretched hand. “Everyone sends their love. And here is the young chatterbox, as we call him. My lad, do you remember your honorary uncle? He knew your father very well once upon a time.”

The boy shyly held out his hand and said, “How do you do, Uncle Ian?”

As Rutledge took the small hand in his, the boy added, “I rode the train. All the way from Scotland. And I was very good, wasn’t I?” He turned to look up at his grandfather. “And I shall have the pick of the litter of pups in the barn, if I mind my manners while I’m in London.”

His slight Scottish accent came as a surprise, though it shouldn’t have done. Rutledge searched for words of welcome and found none.

“And so you shall,” Trevor said, filling the awkward silence. As they turned to go, Trevor added, “Well, then. Are we to stay with you at the flat or with Frances at the house?”

The relief that this first encounter had gone off well enough was nearly intolerable. Yet after all his apprehension, the week’s visit had turned out to be an unexpectedly happy one. Nothing was said about the more recent past—nothing was said about anyone who had stayed at home, though Morag had sent him the Dundee cake she had made for him at Christmas in the hope that he might have come north after all. “It’s past its prime, she says,” Trevor warned him, “but the fault is no one’s but yours.”

Rutledge had taken it with apologies and promised to send Trevor’s housekeeper something in return.

He knew, none better, that Trevor refrained from saying that she would have preferred to see him, that she was getting no younger and still doted on him. The thought was there in Trevor’s eyes.

W
hen Rutledge arrived at the Yard after settling his godfather with Frances, a patient Sergeant Biggin was waiting for him in his office. He rose as Rutledge walked through the door and wished him a good morning.

“There’s news?” he asked the sergeant. “Good—or bad?”

“It appears to be bad news,” Biggin reported. “We’d like to have you come with us, sir, and have a look at what we’ve found. It appears Mr. Teller’s clothing has come to light—on the back of a costermonger near Covent Garden. An alert constable spotted the man and is keeping him in sight.”

Rutledge said only, “I’ll drive,” and he led the way to his motorcar. As they turned toward Covent Garden, Rutledge asked, “Do the clothes appear to be damaged in any way? Torn? Bloodstains washed out?”

“No, sir, according to the constable they only appeared to be a little soiled from pushing a barrow through wet streets. But that was at a distance.”

They found a place to leave the motorcar and walked the rest of the way. Covent Garden was quiet, the frenetic life of the dawn fruit and produce market in the Piazza had finished for the day, only the sweepers busy cleaning up the last of the debris and gossiping among themselves, their voices loud in the silence after the morning bustle. The opera house looked like a great ship stranded on a foreign shore.

Sergeant Biggin found his constable on a street corner, his back to the doorway of a tobacco shop. He nodded to Biggin and then acknowledged Rutledge just behind the sergeant.

“Morning, sir. That tea shop down the street. The costermonger is in there. That’s his barrow—the one with the red handles—just outside.”

“Has he seen you?” Rutledge asked. The barrow wasn’t evidence. The man’s clothing was.

“I think not, sir. Wait—the shop door is opening—”

They watched as a heavyset man sauntered through the door, but instead of the light-colored suit of clothes that Jenny Teller had told the police her husband had worn to the clinic, and presumably out of it as well, he was wearing a pair of coveralls and Wellingtons, a flat cap on his head.

“Damn!” the constable said grimly. “Beg pardon, sir, but that’s him. The costermonger. But where’s his clothing?”

“He’s just sold it to someone else. Come on!” Rutledge strode swiftly down the street toward the tea shop. The costermonger looked up, and then his gaze sharpened as he recognized that one of the men bearing down on him was a uniformed constable, the other a sergeant, moving fast in the wake of a man in street clothes.

They could see the changing expressions on his face—alarm, the debate over whether to flee or stay where he was. Outnumbered, he chose to stay, bracing himself as Biggin said, “Good morning.”

Their quarry said nothing.

“I’ve been told that you were seen wearing different clothing earlier in the day,” Biggin went on. “We’d like to have a look at it.”

They could see the man weighing any profit he might have made against trouble with the police. He chose a middle course.

“What’s wrong with an honest man making a living out of old clothes that have come into his possession?” he demanded grudgingly.

“Nothing,” Biggin retorted. “Except they aren’t old, and it’s the gentleman who was once wearing those items that we’re interested in hearing about.”

“I know nothing about
him
. I found the suit of clothes in a neat pile by the river, just below Tower Bridge. I hung about, to see if anyone was to come along and claim them, and when no one did, I thought I ought not to look a gift horse in the mouth, as the saying goes.”

It was interesting, Rutledge observed, that the costermonger knew precisely which clothing the police were after. They would have been a windfall, worth as much as he might earn in a week’s time selling old clothes and boots and men’s hats. There had been no pretense of ignorance, no denials. It was possible he was telling the truth.

“And where would the items in question be now?” Biggin asked. The costermonger reluctantly answered, “I sold them to a gent in the tea shop. He fancied the cut of them, he said.”

The constable was already reaching for the door latch and disappeared inside the shop. He came out shortly thereafter with a known pickpocket, one Sammy Underwood, a well-spoken man of forty-five, who could pass for a gentleman in Teller’s suit of clothes. Rutledge had seen him at flat races, hobnobbing with rich punters and readily accepted in his pressed castoffs. A better sort of purse to pick there than the casual encounter at a street crossing.

Underwood demanded his own apparel back before he would consent to give up Teller’s clothing. The exchange made, he scuttled off before the police took an interest in his activities.

They spoke to the costermonger for another quarter of an hour, but he refused to change his story, although he claimed that he had not found shoes or hat with the trousers, shirt, and coat.

Sergeant Biggin turned to Rutledge. “A man doesn’t leap into the river wearing his hat and shoes.”

“For all we know, they were taken away before the costermonger found the rest of Teller’s belongings.”

Rutledge made a brief examination of the clothing. The labels had been removed.

The costermonger said quickly, “They were that way when I found them.”

“Yes,” Biggin retorted, “and the moon’s the sun’s daughter.”

“It’s true,” the man exclaimed. “I’ll swear to it, if you like.”

Rutledge tended to believe him, although the sergeant remained dubious. But if it wasn’t the costermonger—then who had taken the time to remove them? Someone intent on throwing dust in the eyes of the police? But if it hadn’t been for the vigilance of a constable, the clothing would have disappeared into the backstreets of East London, never to come to light.

“Ye canna’ find a man sae easily in different clothes,” Hamish pointed out.

To buy a little time, perhaps. Or travel.

In the end, the costermonger lost his sale, and Rutledge, after complimenting the constable for his good eye, left with a box under his arm containing what appeared to be Walter Teller’s clothing.

He went directly to Bond Street, and walked up and down, looking in shop windows. And then he saw what he was after. Grantwell & Sons specialized in dressing men who spent much of their time in the country, and displayed over a handsome chair in the window was a man’s suit of similar style and cut.

The shop was not busy at that hour, and Rutledge had the full attention of the owner. Bolts of fine cloth, trays of buttons and collars, and an array of hats indicated a clientele with the resources and taste to dress well. Sammy Underwood had found himself a bargain.

Mr. Grantwell recognized his workmanship at once, though he deplored the missing labels and the condition of the items he was scrutinizing. After consulting his client book with its diagrams and lists and measurements, he identified the owner of the clothing.

Looking up, he asked quietly, “May I inquire why you are bringing these to me? Does it mean that some harm has come to Mr. Walter Teller?”

“We haven’t spoken to Mr. Teller. These were found in the possession of a costermonger, and we are trying to discover who they belonged to and how they came into his hands,” Rutledge answered him. It was the truth, as far as it went, and Mr. Grantwell could make of it what he chose.

The tailor nodded. “Indeed. Which of course explains their state. I must say, I’ve always admired Mr. Teller,” he went on. “In his book, he described his years in the field. It was quite shocking. Accustomed as he was to the life of a gentleman, it was remarkable how well he coped with hardship and deprivation. It is a tribute to his upbringing that he had the resources of spirit to fall back on.”

Rutledge was struck by Grantwell’s remark. Jenny Teller had also mentioned the terrible conditions of her husband’s fieldwork, but from a police point of view, Rutledge had considered them as a possible explanation for Teller’s disappearance: events that could have preyed on his mind years afterward. But now he could see another point of view—that if Walter Teller had deliberately disappeared, for whatever reason, he was better prepared than most to deal with a completely different way of life. Sleeping rough, for one, and for another, disappearing into the London scene not as Walter Teller, Gentleman, but as an ordinary man of the streets, invisible to police eyes. And a first step would have been altering his appearance—including ridding himself of the clothing that would identify him.

Hamish, silent for some time, told him, “If ye’re right, he’s no’ coming back.”

Grantwell was saying, “My father had the pleasure of serving Mr. Teller’s father before him, and I’d like to think we’ll serve young Master Harry in the years to come.”

He was fishing, an experienced angler in search of information.

And it occurred to Rutledge that a man’s tailor knew nearly as much about him as his servants, tidbits garnered in fitting sessions or the type of cloth ordered. Military, funeral, wedding, baptism, riding, a weekend in the country or a shooting party in Scotland, receptions at the Palace or a day at Ascot. His own tailor, solicitous of the gaunt, haunted man who walked into his shop a year ago in need of new suits of clothing for his return to the Yard, had asked if his wounds were healing well and if there was to be a happy event in the near future.

Rutledge hadn’t been able to tell him the truth, the words refusing to form in his mind, and so he had murmured something about no date had been set, and then barely heard what followed as the man prattled on about his own son’s marriage in the winter.

He said now, “Mr. Teller’s brothers are among your clients as well?”

“Yes, indeed. Mr. Edwin Teller has never enjoyed good health, but during the war he was engaged in work for the Admiralty, serving with distinction, I’m told. He was for many years a designer of boats and often traveled to Scotland to oversee their construction. He was given a private railway carriage. Captain Teller was severely wounded a few months before the Armistice. I understand there was some concern that he might never walk again.”

The shop door opened and an elderly man stepped in. A clerk hurried from the back of the shop to greet him, and Mr. Grantwell said to Rutledge, “Is there any other way I can help you? My next appointment . . .” His voice trailed off, and Rutledge took the hint, thanking him and leaving.

Now came the unpleasant duty of showing the items of clothing to Mrs. Teller, to confirm what the tailor had said, that they did indeed belong to her husband.