It appeared to Rutledge, looking down at the body, as if Brady had stabbed himself, his grip on the blade almost like iron. Sitting in his chair, forcing the blade into the soft flesh under his rib cage, he appeared to have sliced through an artery.
And on the table beside him there was a sheet of paper. Rutledge could see the writing on it from where he stood, but couldn't manage to read the words.
His guess was that Brady had died sometime in the night, and the letter would express his fear of hanging, or a full confession.
Rutledge looked at the man's narrow face, unshaven chin, thin graying hair. There was depression in the circles under his eyes, indicating sleepless nights and watchful days, and nothing to show for it but a shabby cottage and a reputation for the bottle.
At his back, the rain had begun in earnest, and Rutledge turned to look at the ground behind him. Whatever tracks were there, the rain would quickly obliterate. Yet all he could see from where he stood were his own, and the mixed prints of Hill's men, trampling about as they came to interview Brady.
If the murderer had come up the garden path, he knew he would be safe.
If, that is, murder had been done…
He looked about the room, staying where he was in the open door. A gust of wind came up and whisked the sheet of paper from the table, sending it into the ash-strewn hearth behind it.
What would Hill make of this death? An easy solution to Willing- ham's murder? Whatever path the inspector took, it would give Rut- ledge insight into the man.
He closed the door against the rising wind and walked away. He would have to send the smith again to summon the police.
Slater was reluctant to go.
"Why me? He'll think I've had something to do with it, as sure as the dawn follows the dark."
"Because I must stay here to keep an eye on the cottage-"
"But no one would go in there. And I could as easily keep watch."
"Slater. Go on. I don't have my motorcar here, it's at The Smith's Arms. You'll find it there. And hurry."
"There's no need to hurry. Brady will still be there when Inspector Hill comes." Slater collected rain gear from the cupboard where he kept his clothes and then paused at the door. "You're safe enough, getting yourself involved in this. You're a policeman. Who is willing to believe me?"
And he was gone, out into the storm.
Rutledge turned so that he could watch the Brady cottage. The smith's house reeked of wood smoke. He'd never noticed it before, but the dampness outside somehow brought it to the fore.
Slater used fire and hammer for his work. It was evident everywhere Rutledge looked. The hinges of doors and cabinets, the bolts that held them closed, the tongs on the hearth, the scoop of the shovel used to take out the ashes. So many details he'd never had time to notice.
Even the latches of the windows had been replaced by wrought iron, and the candlestick holders on the windowsill were attractively turned. There was a boot scraper by the door, made in the shape of a hedgehog, the bristles of broom on his back looking like the bristles on the hedgehog's back.
Overhead a wrought-iron lamp dropped down out of the ceiling on a finely made chain, the sconces shaped like tulips, the candle in the fold of the petals.
Alone here, he realized how the smith's presence, tall and vibrant, filled the room. Now it seemed larger, outsized, because he wasn't there.
Rutledge kept his eye on the Brady cottage, saw the rain running hard off the roof and cascading onto the path and spreading out into the garden, only trickles at first, and then tiny lakes that came together and separated as the wind pushed them back.
By the time Inspector Hill came dashing in from the motorcar, his hair shining with rain, the shoulders of his coat dark with it, the clouds were thinning, the worst of the cloudburst passed.
He shook himself like a dog as he crossed the threshold, and said, "All right, I'm here. I'll deal with Brady. The rest of my men are following." He looked up into Rutledge's face and said, "You seem to bring death in your wake."
"You have it the wrong way round," Rutledge answered mildly.
"Too bad the rain has washed away any sign of footprints along the walk. But there may not have been any if we've got a suicide. Still, better safe than sorry, keep an open mind and all that."
"I looked, before I left the cottage. It was hard to pick out any print in particular. Too much traffic."
Hill grunted. "I hope the rain is finished before we go inside there. As it is, we'll be tracking in half the garden."
"Where's Slater?"
"He's still in your motorcar. I think he's half afraid I'm about to arrest him on the spot. Early days yet. I don't know whether to take it as a sign of guilt or just his way of looking at things." Suddenly he could hear himself speak. The rain had stopped. "All right, I'm off. You'll stay here?"
It was more a statement than a question.
He went out and splashed quickly up the lane to Brady's cottage, stopping on the threshold for a time and then disappearing inside, shutting the door behind him. He was in the cottage for several minutes, his men collecting at the bottom of the lane, awaiting instructions. Then he hurried back to Slater's cottage just as the sun broke hazily through the thinning clouds.
In his hand, protected by his coat, Hill held what appeared to be the sheet of paper that had fallen from Brady's table. He came inside and offered it to Rutledge. Rutledge scanned the words written there. Willingham called me worthless and a disgrace. I don't stand for that from any man. I killed Partridge as well, patronizing sod that he was. I don't regret either of them. Find Partridge if you can. If you can't, you'll find me in hell. I won't hang, I've no taste for it. A knife is faster and cleaner. Bury me where you will. I don't care. It's over, and I'm just as glad.
There was no signature.
Rutledge looked up. "Can you be sure this is Brady's handwriting?"
"There are papers and notes all over the floor, but whether they can tell us conclusively or not that this is his, I don't know." He took the letter back. "Looks as if Brady were keeping a diary. Dates and times scribbled down."
Would Deloran wash his hands of Brady as easily as he had of Partridge?
Hamish replied, "He willna' care to have it known that this was his man."
Hill might believe what was in the note, but Rutledge did not. What struck him was the reference to Partridge, but no admission that the body had been left in Yorkshire.
Half a confession…
Hamish said, "If Partridge's murder and Willingham's are solved sae easily, who will be best pleased wi' that?"
A very good question. Deloran for one.
And what about the two sisters?
Rutledge said aloud to Hill, "Do you think Brady killed Willing- ham? I'm not sure I can accept the admission that he killed Partridge." For one thing, Parkinson hadn't been killed with a knife.
Hill frowned. "That's the problem. Where's Partridge's body? Brady must have taken it away."
"Have you searched Partridge's cottage?"
"Not yet, but I'll see that it's done."
"I'd like to be there when you go in."
"I'm not certain-"
"It will be easy enough for me to obtain the necessary permission."
Hill grudgingly agreed, then asked, "What's this man Partridge to you? Did you have a suspicion that he's been murdered? Is that what brought you here in the first place?"
Rutledge chose his words carefully. "My instructions were to discover where he could be found, if he didn't return in a reasonable period of time."
"And he hasn't. Which may mean that what's on this sheet is the solution to your problems as well." He was probing.
"If I'm lucky," Rutledge agreed.
In the background, Hamish was reminding him that once more someone was using Partridge's disappearance for his own ends.
"I'll see to searching the Partridge cottage later in the day," Hill went on. "I'll set my men to asking the other cottagers when they last saw Brady. I doubt it'll be much use to me, but there you are. Has to be done." He rubbed his chin, as if something were on his mind, then thought better of speaking of whatever it was. "All right then. The doctor is on his way. The question will be whether or not Brady could have used that knife on himself. And after that I must ask myself why, if we had no inkling that he was involved with Willingham's murder, he felt compelled to confess."
Rutledge answered neutrally, "A very good question. Especially since you showed considerable interest in Slater, rather than the other residents. Brady was in the clear, still. But I'm told he was often drunk and not always thinking very clearly."
"True enough." Hill turned as a constable tapped lightly on Slater's door.
He nodded to the silent Rutledge. "The doctor is here," he informed Hill.
Slater finally brought himself to get out of the motorcar. He crossed to where the men were standing in his doorway and said, "Where will it end?"
"I'm not sure." Rutledge turned back to the room as Hill walked away. "I think we could use a cup of tea."
Slater came inside and began to prepare it. Rutledge quietly asked him, "Who lived in Brady's cottage before he moved here?"
"It was an elderly woman. Miss Chandler. A lawyer came to tell her a cousin had died and left her a goodly sum in his will. She didn't remember this cousin, but it wasn't surprising. She was a little daft, her mind going. Still, she thought she could recall her father telling her that someone in the family had gone to Australia to seek his fortune. I expect that was who died."
Quite a convenient windfall…
"Where did she go from here?"
"There's a nice home run by a Mrs. Deacon in the Cotswolds. She's well known for taking in elderly ladies without families. A bit pricey, but Miss Chandler could afford it now, couldn't she? She was very pleased. And she'd hardly got the good news when Mr. Brady came round asking about a cottage. They must have come to an agreement, because she left him most of her furniture."
"What did he offer as a reason for coming here to live?"
Slater brought in the tea tray. "How should I know? But she told me he was looking for a quiet life."
Deloran had been very clever. First the sizable bequest, and then someone there to take the cottage off Miss Chandler's hands at the right moment.
Rutledge took his cup from Slater, and said, "Did Partridge have any contact with Miss Chandler?"
"Fancy your asking that. I'd quite forgot. She was a typist, and the week before she left, he took her a handful of papers to type up for him. He had a machine and she told him she knew how to use it."
"Do you know the direction for Mrs. Deacon's house?"
"It's in the Cotswolds, a small manor house just outside Fairford. It's called Thornton Hall. I took Mrs. Chandler there in my cart, with her boxes and trunks. Why are you interested in what she typed for Mr. Partridge? Why is it important?"
Rutledge finished his tea. "There's no way of telling what's important and what isn't. Until all the information is in hand."
But Slater wasn't to be put off. "Why is it that people think I can't understand what's happening? Why do they think I'm easily distracted, like a child?"
Rutledge set his cup on the tray. "Mr. Partridge had another life before he came here."
"They all had other lives. Except for me." He shook his head. "No, that's not right. I'd lived in Uffington, hadn't I? I don't like remembering my life there. Still, I depended on the smithy for my livelihood, and I couldn't go very far."
Hamish was saying, the soft Scots voice just behind Rutledge's shoulder, "He's puzzled, and no one has the time to set him straight."
"Sometimes it isn't distance that matters. For Partridge I have a feeling it was the White Horse that brought him here, not the miles from where he'd lived before this."
"You don't believe that Brady killed Mr. Partridge, do you?"
"Let's say I'm keeping an open mind until all the facts have been collected."
"It's a waste of time going to Miss Chandler."
"Possibly. But I won't know until I speak to her."
He left, dashed through the puddles to where Slater had left his motorcar, and drove to the nearest road that would carry him up to Fairford.
Hamish kept him company along the way.
As it happened, the house he was looking for was three miles outside of the pretty little town, set just beyond a small grove of beech that had been planted sometime in the eighteen hundreds, judging from their size. Age had begun to take a toll, and three closest to the road looked to be near collapse.
Thornton Hall was a handsome stone house built in classical style, with a portico and dormers on the slate roof. A porch to one side had been closed in with long windows looking out over a large garden, and beyond that, fallow land rolled into the distance.
Mrs. Deacon wasn't what he'd expected.
A maid in crisply starched black that rustled as she walked led him through the hall to a small sitting room at the back of the house. A tall, spare woman with auburn hair rose to greet him and offer him a chair by the cold hearth. She took the other and nodded to the maid.
When they were alone, she asked Rutledge what his business was with Miss Chandler.
"I'm afraid it's private," he told her with a smile.
"Miss Chandler is a woman of means, but she's lonely and easily taken advantage of. I'd like to know that you won't upset her." Her gaze was sharp, her eyes detached.
"I have no designs on her wealth," he said. "The question might be, do you?"
A red flush flared across her cheeks. "I'm not in the habit of taking advantage of my guests, Mr. Rutledge. They are here because they have nowhere else to go. And I am here because this is my home, and the only way I can afford to keep it is to take in such guests. The property isn't productive now, and I have no other means of seeing that the roof 's repaired, much less the plumbing functioning. Now I think you'd better leave."
"I'm sorry," he apologized, and meant it. "The business I have with Miss Chandler has to do with some typing she did for a man in the cottages where she used to live."
Her eyes didn't waver. "Then you'll have no objection if I stay while you speak to her."
"None at all."
Hamish said, his voice soft, "The dragon at the gate."
She rose again and led him down the passage to the enclosed porch where several women, most of them between their early sixties and late seventies, sat dozing or gossiping. They looked up with interest as Mrs. Deacon came into the room, smiling up at her as if pleased to see her. Then their eyes went directly to Rutledge, curiosity rampant.
"Is this the new doctor, then?" one asked.
"I'm sorry, no. A guest. Miss Chandler?" She spoke to a small woman swathed in shawls and seated in a large winged chair near the French doors. Needlepoint pillows at her back and on either side made it more comfortable for her, and Rutledge could see that she was well dressed, her clothes and hair and skin well cared for. Her eyes were a bright blue and still very clear. He hoped that her memory was as well.
She leaned forward a little, as if hard of hearing, and Mrs. Deacon said, "This young man is here to see you, Miss Chandler. Would you like to speak to him?"
"Is it my cousin from Australia?"
"No, this is Mr. Rutledge, Miss Chandler. He's here to ask you about a little typing you did for someone he knows."
She was crestfallen to discover it wasn't her cousin, and Rutledge spared a moment to think of Deloran's deception. But she brightened again as she said, "My fingers are getting a little stiff for the typing, young man. What is it you need?"
He took the chair across from hers so that she wouldn't have to look up at him. Mrs. Deacon remained standing. "I wonder if you recall Mr. Partridge? He lived in the Tomlin Cottages near the White Horse for a few weeks before you moved here."
She searched through the cobwebs of her mind and finally nodded. "Mr. Partridge. Polite, as I recall, and very pleased to learn I could type. Yes, I do remember him, now that you speak of him."
"Do you perhaps recall what it was you were asked to type for him? It appears to have been lost."
"Oh, that's a shame, truly. But I'm afraid my brain is a little addled these days. I'm sure I couldn't remember what I did well enough to type it again from memory. That must have been all of two years ago."
Hamish was saying, "It wilna' help." But Rutledge persevered.
"Was it a letter? Memoirs?" He tried to think of anything else that Partridge might have worked on. "Reports? Papers for a professional society?"
"Oh, yes, that's precisely what it was! How clever of you, Mr. Rutledge. Yes, indeed, it was a paper for a professional journal, I recall it now. He promised to send me a copy of the journal, when the paper appeared. I suppose he forgot. I never received it." There was disappointment in her face as she considered the matter. "I daresay it wouldn't have mentioned my name, I only typed it, but still…"
"Was the paper difficult to work on?"
"Quite so. A good many symbols had to be carefully inserted by hand. I didn't know what all of them represented, but I do remember how he insisted that they must be absolutely precise. He told me that others duplicating his work must know exactly what he knew, or it would be useless to try. It appears he'd made an interesting discovery in his laboratory just before he left his firm, and he wanted to report it to some society or other. As a last claim to fame and glory." She frowned. "Although truly, I thought he might be joking about that. He said it in such a wry way."
"Was he a man given to joking?"
"Far from it. He seemed withdrawn, as if he had a habit of living alone and had to remind himself sometimes to be jolly in company. Don't misunderstand me. He was quite professional, very clear in his instructions, and he went through the typed pages with great care to be sure everything was exactly as he'd set it out. I asked him if this discovery of his, however small, might be something mankind would be grateful to know about. 'In some quarters, perhaps,' he replied, 'it will be highly regarded.' I thought perhaps he meant in the medical field. He'd mentioned once working in a laboratory, you see. I was a great admirer of Madame Curie, and told him so. He answered that he could never aspire to her greatness, and I found I believed him."
Mrs. Deacon, standing to one side of the chair, put in, "Did you make a carbon copy for Mr. Partridge, my dear? If the original went to the society."
"No, he told me that wasn't necessary. There was only the original."
"And he paid you for this work?" Rutledge went on.
"Of course, with a nice little bit extra for finishing it quickly as well as accurately. I was planning to leave the cottage, you see. And he didn't want me to take the information with me. I suspect he felt someone else might see it and steal his idea. I told him it was safe with me. I knew nothing about science, and it was difficult enough, making certain I was exact, word for word."
Hamish noted that as she traveled back into the past, the strength of her memory grew. But could it be totally trusted? Rutledge ignored him.
Miss Chandler leaned back in her chair. "I thought he might find me and ask me to do other typing for him. I've missed it, and it kept my fingers nimble. He had a very nice machine, but it was borrowed, he said, and must be returned on time."
From the laboratory, very likely. But what had become of the paper? Knowing that Brady was watching him-and might even from time to time search the cottage-it would have been foolish for Parkinson to keep anything valuable there. And not at the house, where his daughters came and went. What would have felt like a safe place to him, where his work wouldn't be found?
It was possible that he'd long since taken the paper with him on one of his forays and put it in a bank vault or left it with someone he'd trusted. He hadn't had it with him in Yorkshire. And Rutledge hadn't found it in the cottage.
Hamish said, "Why did he write whatever it is doon? Much less gie it to someone to type."
A good question. A red herring? Or something Parkinson had been working on and hadn't quite finished, but knew that in time his earlier research might hold the key? A better way of killing armies was always a marketable commodity.
Miss Chandler was tiring. She made a little gesture with her hand, as if to apologize for failing him. "That's all, really. I wish I could do something to help. Mr. Partridge must be beside himself."
"It has been worrisome," Rutledge answered, sidestepping the issue of Partridge. "Thank you for seeing me, Miss Chandler. I wish you a pleasant evening."
"You won't stay and have tea with us?" She looked around the sun- room at the other women seated there, avidly listening. "We seldom have the pleasure of a young man's company."
"I'm afraid I've a long drive ahead of me."
"I have hoped against hope that someone from my cousin's family might come to England so that I can tell them how grateful I am to their father. But they haven't. I expect it's a long journey to make, just for an hour or so with an old woman."
He damned Deloran in his mind, yet could see that this woman was pleased with her good fortune and would be bereft if told the truth, that it was the need for her cottage and not an interest in her well-being that lay behind the sums she'd been given. He wouldn't put it past her to refuse the money.
"I'm sure they wish you well, even if they can't visit."
"How are my former neighbors?" she asked him then, searching for a reason to hold him there a little longer. "Will you give my regards to Mr. Allen and Mrs. Cathcart in particular? I've missed them, please tell them that. Mr. Miller was always kind to me as well."
"Yes, most certainly." He had reached the door when he turned and asked a last question. "Has anyone else come to ask you about the work you did for Mr. Partridge?"
"No one," she answered him, "knew about it. I've told you, he feared someone might steal his discovery."
He thanked her again, and Mrs. Deacon followed him to the foyer. "You can see that my guests haven't been cheated. Nor have I. I have my house still. And I would do it again, if I had to." She looked around her at the high coffered ceiling of the foyer, the pineapples in each square flecked with gold, at the paneling on the walls and the parquet flooring. "This is where I lived as a child. My brother inherited the house, you know. But he's dead, in the first fighting at Mons. I've been a widow for many years, and I longed to come back here. But his wife and I didn't see eye to eye." A brief triumphant smile touched her face. "It took every penny I possessed to buy her out. But I managed it. I don't know why I should feel required to defend myself to you. I expect it's because you doubted my motives. That was unkind of you."
He was reminded of the sunroom, a comfortable place for old bones on an April day when the rain had brought damp with it.
He smiled in return. "I misjudged the circumstances. I had reason to believe that perhaps Miss Chandler's good fortune was suspect. But I see it isn't. Do you remember the name of the solicitor who handled the inheritance for her? I should have asked."
"There was no solicitor. I was told she received the money directly from the solicitors in Australia and put it in her account in the bank." She held out her hand. "Good day, Mr. Rutledge. You would have made a good policeman. If you aren't one already."
He went through the door and she shut it behind him with a firm click.
Rutledge stood there for a moment. His work at the Yard, he thought, had made him overly suspicious of goodness. He had seen so much that was evil.
Hamish said as he walked back to the motorcar, "Yon Mrs. Deacon is no' afraid of anyone. It's her strength."
Rutledge was late arriving at The Smith's Arms. Mrs. Smith had set his dinner on the back of the stove to keep warm. He hung his wet coat over the other chair to dry and sat by the fire in the bar, only half listening to the gossip of the lorry drivers and the locals who came regularly to sit and drink.
Most of it was of no importance.
Then Hamish said, "Hark!"
And Rutledge brought his attention back to the room in time to hear a farmer comment, "They took the smith to the police station today. I always said he was a danger. I wouldn't let him play with my son, would I, when they were in school together. Too big by half, and didn't know his own strength."
"It was a knife he used, not his hands," his companion reminded him.
"Yes, well, he killed them, didn't he?"
What had happened to Brady's confession? Had Hill already discounted it? Rutledge finished his meal and went out into the night, directly back to the cottages.
There was still a light in Quincy's cottage, and Rutledge knocked at the door.
"Who's there?" There was an undercurrent of alarm in the query.
"Rutledge. I need to talk to you."
"It's late." But there was the sound of the latch being lifted, and Quincy stood in the opening. The light behind him struck him from the left, throwing that side of his face in stark relief while the other half was deeply shadowed. It gave him an oddly malevolent look. "What's brought you here? Not another killing?"
"It's Slater. I heard at the inn that he'd been taken into Uffington by Inspector Hill."
"Shows how wrong gossip can be. No, Hill took him there to the doctor. He was using a hammer while they talked, working on one of those kettles he makes sometimes. They sell well at the summer fair. And he smashed his knuckles. Slater nearly passed out from the pain, and Hill called one of his men to get Slater into a car."
"Then all's well."
"Why do you think he's not guilty?" Quincy asked with some curiosity. "People like that often have a bad temper." He turned his head to look at the cat asleep on her favorite chair. "She's mine now, I expect. She didn't mourn long for Partridge. If I thought it would work, I'd make a gift of her to Mrs. Cathcart. God knows she needs something to calm her nerves."
"She's afraid."
"Aren't we all? But you're right, Mrs. Cathcart's fear is exacerbated by what happened in her life before she came here. She peers out the window at every newcomer. I've seen the curtains twitch. A pity, really. She'll die a tormented soul."
Which is probably what her husband had in mind, Rutledge thought.
"Did you ever see Brady go in or come out of Partridge's cottage?"
"No. He stayed away from Partridge as far as possible, considering he lived here as well. Look, do you want some coffee? I developed a taste for it in Guatemala. If you aren't going away, then you might as well come in."
"I'll take you up on the offer."
Rutledge stepped inside and shut the door behind him. The room where the birds were kept was in darkness, but the flickering light of the fire on the hearth glanced off iridescent feathers and glass eyes. He took the chair next to Dublin's and sat down. The night was just chilly enough to make the fire comforting, and he felt a drowsiness steal over him. Quincy was busy in the kitchen, and the cat had begun to purr.
Hamish urged him to keep awake, prodding at him with words. Reminding him that the night watches in the trenches had meant life or death.
Rutledge asked him silently if he thought Quincy would poison the coffee, and Hamish gave him no answer.
"I'd give much to know what's going on here," Quincy was saying as he worked.
The rich scent of coffee beans in a grinder filled the room.
"So would Inspector Hill. Brady wrote a note before he died. At least it would appear he had. In it he claimed he'd killed both Willing- ham and Partridge."
"Willingham I can understand. There was no loss of love there. But Partridge was, if you forgive me, the goose with the golden egg. Brady was out of a job if he harmed the man."
"Quite." Rutledge reached out a hand to smooth the head of the cat as she stretched, her purr loud in the room. "You'll have to give Hill your full name on any statement, you know. It's a matter of form."
"I'm damned if I will. As long as I'm not a suspect, I'm giving him nothing."
"After so many years, do you really think your family cares where you're living? It's more to the point that you stay away from them."
"I signed an agreement, in front of witnesses. My brother might take it into his head to see that the letter and not the spirit of the law is carried out."
"And your parents?"
"Dead for all I know. It hasn't seemed worth my while to find out."
The coffeepot was on the stove, and the aroma was building.
"What did you do that was so unforgivable?"
"I was born. Do you have any sisters or brothers, Rutledge?"
"A sister."
"Close, are you?"
"Very."
"Well, it wasn't that way in my family. My brother hated me from the start. No, I swear it. He was a nasty piece of work in my eyes as well. We never got along, and just when he was rising in his firm, I was being sent down from Cambridge in disgrace. Too much drinking, too many women, my schoolwork suffering into the bargain. There was talk that I was the black sheep of a fine old name, and I wouldn't amount to much. And then I did the unspeakable-I met the woman my brother was planning to marry, and she liked me well enough. Perhaps a little too well, for she broke off their engagement. I like to think the contrast with him pointed up just how great a bastard he was. My father offered me a sizable sum paid to my account anywhere in the world except England, and I was young enough not to fancy taking a position in my father's firm. Going off to build the Panama Canal for the French seemed to be a fitting revenge, and off I went. Only the French died like flies, and the engineers died with them. So much for that."
He went for the coffee and brought a cup of it back with him, handing it to Rutledge. "I take mine black. There's not much choice, actually. I don't have sugar or milk." He fetched his own cup and sat down. "I don't know why I talk to you. I don't care for people as a rule. But before I know it, I'm telling my life story and thinking nothing of it. You're a bad influence."
Rutledge laughed. "So I've been told."
"Did Brady kill Willingham, do you think?" Quincy asked abruptly, changing the subject.
"He confessed to it."
"All right, for the sake of argument, what about Partridge?"
"I'm not as sure of that."
"Nor am I. Which makes me wonder if Brady isn't a scapegoat. And accordingly, I keep my door bolted at night now. I can protect myself. What's loose amongst us here?"
It was an echo of the question Slater had asked.
"There's no way of knowing."
"Well, if it's Slater, he won't be using that hand to kill anybody for a while. Then we have Allen, who doesn't have the strength left to overpower anyone, and Mrs. Cathcart, who is afraid of her own shadow. Which leaves in the suspect category Miller, Singleton, and me. Unless it's Partridge coming back from the grave. We haven't been shown his body, and that's something to be taken into account."
Rutledge couldn't tell if this was a fishing expedition or not. But Hamish was warning him to take care.
"I think Hill is planning to dig up the floor of Partridge's cottage tomorrow. To be certain he's not under it." It was a light answer, to avoid the truth.
It was Quincy's turn to laugh, but it rang hollowly. "Yes, well, I wish him luck." He drained his cup and held out his hand for Rut- ledge's. "I'll say good night. Thanks for coming by. I was in the mood for company."
It was said with an edge to it, as if he weren't particularly pleased to have been disturbed.
He let Rutledge out the door and bolted it behind him.
Rutledge went back to the inn and to bed. It was too late to see what Inspector Hill had to say about the murders.
In the night someone tried to burn Quincy alive in his cottage.
But he'd been telling the truth when he said he was armed. The shotgun blasted a hole through the door and peppered the front garden. Then he was outside, taking a broom to the rags someone had jammed under his door, pulling them apart in smoky masses. Those shoved through the broken windowpane in the bird room took longer to extinguish.
Damage was not as extensive as it might have been. Someone had counted on the door being unlocked, to make fire-starting easier. And when he found it wasn't, he had tried to improvise, determined to set the house ablaze.
For the rest of the night Quincy sat in his dark sitting room, the shotgun across his knees and the coffeepot at his elbow.
When Rutledge came back the next morning, Quincy said with an edge to his voice, "I want to make a statement."