Todd, Charles (20 page)

Remembering what Heller had hinted, Rutledge said, "Did any of his advice go wrong? I mean very wrong, not just an investment that didn't work as it had been promised to do."

"He was damned astute. That was his trademark. Nothing went wrong that he hadn't balanced in one's portfolio to take up the risk, should the worst happen. People were very pleased. That was, until Cumberline."

"Cumberline?" He'd seen the box with a label bearing that name in Quarles's study.

"Yes, it was an adventure stock. A South Seas Bubble sort of thing, as it turned out. Do you remember Cecil Rhodes's great concept of a Cairo to Cape Town Railway driven through the heart of Africa? The same sort of thing, but here the railroad would run from Dar Es Salaam to the Congo River, with goods coming by ship from the southern Indian Ocean to the East African coast, carried by train overland to the Congo, and then put on ships again for the passage north. It was expected to save the journey through the Red Sea and the Mediterranean and was to bring out ivory and other goods from East Africa as well. Zanzibar spices, Kenyan coffee, wild animals for the zoos of the world, and anything that expanded scientific knowledge. Labor would be cheap, and using the river cut the costs of such a railway nearly in half. On paper, it was exotic, and many men who had made money in the war were in search of new enterprises. Especially with Tanganyika in our hands now."

"I must have been in France while this was talked about. It sounds feasible, but then I don't know much about the Congo, other than that the Belgians fought the Germans from there. As did Britain in Kenya. How deep is the Congo where a train could transfer goods?"

"I've no idea. Neither did the promoters or the investors. It turned out to be a case of the sly fox being tricked by sharper wolves. Quarles had mentioned it to a few of his clients but for the most part didn't promote it. And it was just as well there were only a few clients involved, because the project collapsed. Gossip was soon claiming that he'd chosen men he was happy to see fall. That it was a matter of revenge, and he knew all along that the project was doomed."

"Certainly an excellent way to make enemies," Rutledge agreed. "Quarles went to ground here in Cambury until the worst was over. The odd thing is, it was a nine days' wonder. His reputation for honesty prevailed, and the general opinion was, the men who complained were making him the scapegoat for their own poor judgment."

"Did any of those clients live here in Cambury?"

"I have no way of knowing that. But I should think that if one of the investors was out for revenge, he wouldn't have waited all this time. Nearly two years."

"I wonder. Did Quarles manipulate this scheme? Did he for instance collect investment funds but never transfer them to Cumberline, knowing it was likely to fail?" Rutledge had read parts of the treatise on Africa in Quarles's bedchamber. Surely a man as astute as he was said to be could see through the promises made in it?

Archer turned to look at him. "What a devious mind you have."

"It won't be the first time that such a thing was done."

"Quarles has a partner. One Davis Penrith. I hardly think he could have perpetrated such a scheme without the knowledge of his partner. And Penrith is not the sort of man who could carry off such trickery, even if Harold could. He came into the firm to lend respectability. He has that kind of face and that kind of mind." Archer hesitated. "Although it was soon after the Cumberline fiasco that Penrith went his own way."

"Interesting."

"Yes, isn't it? But for Penrith, I'd almost be willing to believe in your suggestion. I don't particularly like the man, for reasons of my own. Still, Quarles has been scrupulously careful—a man of his background has to be. That's the way the class system works."

The chauffeur had made his circuit of the pond and now stood some distance away, awaiting instructions. The High Street was busy, people taking advantage of a fine afternoon. From time to time they gathered in clusters, heads together. The likely topic of gossip today was Harold Quarles and his untimely death. Or possibly the news of Stephenson driving off with Padgett was already making the rounds. A number of people cast quick glances at Charles Archer seated in his motorcar, deep in conversation with the man from London. Speculation would feed on that as well, as Rutledge knew.

He made to open his door, but Archer said, "Er—you will have noted the arrangements at Hallowfields. I wasn't cuckolding Harold, you know. I'm no longer able to do such a thing. But I would have, if I could. I've found that being with someone you love, whatever the arrangement, is better than being alone. I sank my pride long ago, in exchange for her company."

"You needn't have told me this."

"I read your expression when you saw us together. I want you to understand that what lies between Mrs. Quarles and myself didn't lead to murder. Harold's death won't change our arrangement in any way. She won't marry me. I'm honest enough to accept that."

"Why not?"

"Because she knows that pity is the last thing I could tolerate. As it is, we are friends, and it is easier to accept pity from a friend. Not from a lover."

"Thank you for being honest. I will not ask where you were late Saturday night. But I must ask if you can tell me with certainty that your invalid chair was in your sight for the entire evening and into the night."

Archer considered Rutledge. "You're saying someone moved the body. He wouldn't have been a light burden."

Rutledge said, "Yes." The full account of the nightmarish hanging in the tithe barn would be out soon enough.

"For what it's worth, I give you my word that to my knowledge the chair never left my bedside."

Rutledge got down, and as he closed the door, Archer signaled to his driver.

As the motorcar moved on toward Hallowfields, Rutledge stood on the street, looking after him.

Hamish said, "Do ye believe him?"

"Time will tell. But he made his point that neither Mrs. Quarles nor her lover had any need to murder her husband. Now the question is, why? To help us—or to hinder the investigation?"

A boy came running up, pink with exertion and hope. "A message for you, sir."

Surprised, Rutledge put out his hand for it.

The boy snatched the sheet of paper out of reach. "Mr. Padgett says you'd give me ten pence for it."

Rutledge found ten pence and dropped it into the boy's hand. The crumpled sheet was given to him and then the boy was off, racing down the High Street.

The message read:

I'm about to speak to Mrs. Newell. Care to join me?

Rutledge swore, turned on his heel, and went back to the police station, where Padgett was on the point of setting out.

"I'm surprised you got my note. I saw you hobnobbing with Archer when you'd been heading for Mrs. Newell's cottage. Anything interesting come of it? The conversation with Archer, I mean?"

The suggestion was that Rutledge had lied to the local inspector.

"He'd gone to the surgery to offer to identify the body. O'Neil put him off."

"Now, Dr. O'Neil didn't tell me that. Did Archer ask you to arrange for him to see Quarles?"

They were walking down the High Street. At the next corner, Padgett turned left onto Button Row. It was a narrow street, with houses abutting directly onto it.

"Not at all. I don't think he was eager to do his duty, but he wished to spare Mrs. Quarles. He also wanted me to understand his relationship with Mrs. Quarles."

"And did you?"

"It's unusual, but clearly acceptable to all parties. That's the point, isn't it?"

"He went to the surgery to protect Mrs. Quarles, if you want my view of it. She could have struck her husband from behind, then finished the job when he was out of his senses. It would be like her not to leave the body there, a simple murder, but to make a fool of him in death."

"Could she have dealt with that apparatus on her own?"

"Given time to get the job done? Yes. If you let the pulleys work for you, you can lift anyone's weight. That's the whole point of it, to make the angel fly without dropping her on top of the crèche scene." He smiled. "Though I'd have given much to see that a time or two. Depending on who flew as the angel that year. The question is, would she have had the stomach to touch her husband's corpse as she put him into the harness? If she hated him enough, she might have." Hamish said, "He doesna' like yon dead man and he doesna' like yon widow. Ye must ask him why."

Until Quarles and his wife came to Cambury, there was no one to make him feel inferior, Rutledge answered silently. They weren't born here, he didn't like looking up to them, and at a guess, both of them expected it.

Hamish grunted, as if unsatisfied.

Rutledge changed the subject. "How is Stephenson?"

"O'Neil says he'll be in pain for several days. The muscles in his neck got an almighty yank when he kicked the chair away. By the time we reached the surgery, he was complaining something fierce. Dr. O'Neil is keeping him for observation, but I don't think Stephenson will be eager to try his luck a second time. At least not with a rope." They were coming up to a small whitewashed cottage in a row of similar cottages. This one was distinguished by the thatch that beetled over the entrance, as if trying to overwhelm it. In the sunny doorway sat a plump woman of late middle age, her fair hair streaked with white. She was making a basket from pollarded river willows, weaving the strands with quick, knowing fingers.

She looked up, squinting against the sun. "Inspector," she said in greeting when she recognized Padgett.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Newell. I see you've nearly finished that one."

"Aye, it's for Rector. For his marketing."

"You do fine work," Rutledge said, looking at the rounds of tightly woven willow.

Behind her in the entry he could see another basket ready for work, this one square, the top edge defined and the tall strands of willow that would be the sides almost sweeping the room's low ceiling. The sleeves of Mrs. Newell's dress, rolled up past the elbows, exposed strong arms, and her large hands, handling the whippy willow as if it were fine embroidery thread, never faltered even when she looked away from them.

"Where do you get your materials?"

"I pay old Neville to bring me bundles when he and his son go to fetch the reeds for their thatching over by Sedgemoor. These he brought me a fortnight ago are some of the best I've seen. My mother made baskets. Lovely ones that the ladies liked for bringing cut flowers in from the gardens. It's how I earn my bread these days. And who might you be, sir? The man from London come to find out who killed poor Mr. Quarles?"

Bertie and his milk run had been busy.

"Yes, my name is Rutledge. I'm an inspector at Scotland Yard."

She studied him, still squinting, and then nodded. "I've never seen anyone from Scotland Yard before. But then Mr. Quarles was an important man in London. And he let the staff know it, every chance he got."

A ginger cat came to the door, rubbing against the frame, eyeing them suspiciously. After a moment, he turned back inside and disappeared.

"Can you think of anyone who might have wished to see Mr. Quarles dead?" Rutledge went on.

She laughed, a grim laugh with no humor in it. "He could charm the birds out of the trees," she said, "if he was of a mind to. But he had a mean streak in him, and he rubbed a good many people the wrong way when he didn't care about them. Sometimes of a purpose. If you wasn't important enough, or rich enough, or powerful enough, you felt the rough side of his tongue."

"Rubbed them the wrong way enough to make them want to kill him?"

"You'll have to ask them, won't you?"

Padgett took up the questioning. "You worked at Hallowfields for a good many years. Was there anyone among the staff or at the Home Farm who had a grievance against Mr. Quarles?"

She glanced up from her work, staring at him shrewdly. "What you want to know is, could I have killed him? Back then when he let me go, yes, I could have taken my cleaver to him for the things he said about me and about my cooking. The tongue on that man would turn a bishop gray. I'm a good cook, Mr. Rutledge, and didn't deserve to be sacked without a reference. Where was I to find new employment? It was a cruel thing to do, for no reason more than his temper. And I've paid for it. For weeks I thought about what I'd like to do to him, from hanging him from the meat hook to drowning him in the washing-up tub. But I never touched him. I didn't relish hanging for the likes of Harold Quarles."

"Perhaps someone else in the household believed it was worth the risk. How did they get on with the man?"

"I can't see Mrs. Downing touching him neither, however provoked she is. She's all bluster when it comes to trouble. Besides, she's Mrs. Quarles's creature."

"Would she kill for her mistress?"

Mrs. Newell shook her head. "She could hardly bear to see me kill a chicken."

"What about Mr. Masters at the Home Farm?"

"They had words from time to time, no doubt of it, and I've heard Mr. Masters curse Mr. Quarles something fierce, when he thought no one was in hearing. There's many a house like Hallowfields that would like to hire him away from Mr. Quarles. But he stays, in spite of the wrangling."