He was halfway to The Unicorn when Inspector Padgett came out of a shop and stopped short.
“I thought you’d be in London today.”
“I was. There’s nothing unusual about Quarles’s will. Except for the bequests to staff, everything is left to his son, to be held in trust until he’s twenty-five. His wife will have a life interest in the house, after which it reverts to the boy. Which tells me that Quarles never really put down roots here. If he had, he’d have made certain Mrs.
Quarles was evicted.”
“Interesting idea. Did you speak to the partner? Penrith?”
“Former partner. He parted with Quarles more than a year ago and now has his own firm.”
“Any hard feelings when they parted company?”
“None that I could see. Penrith told me that Quarles wasn’t pleased, possibly because they’d made so much money as partners.
But he didn’t fight the dissolution of the partnership.”
“That’s disappointing to hear. What about trouble with former clients?”
“He couldn’t recall any.”
Padgett had been staring at the lump on Rutledge’s forehead.
“What happened to you?”
“A misstep,” Rutledge answered shortly.
“It must ache like the devil.”
It did, but Rutledge wasn’t giving him the satisfaction of admitting to it.
“All right, you’re back in Cambury. Have you been to question anyone? Or are you just taking the air?”
“I spoke to Mr. Jones, the baker. And his wife. They both swear Jones never left his house on Saturday night. Miss O’Hara was asleep with her cat. I was just about to call on Mrs. Newell, the former cook at Hallowfields. I went to the police station. Constable Horton told me you weren’t in.”
Padgett looked down, as if studying the road under his feet. “Yes.
Well, I went home. You didn’t tell me you were going to London. I found out quite by chance.”
“I left in the night. I wanted to be there before Penrith went to his office.” And before Mickelson returned from Dover.
“Fair enough.” He turned to walk with Rutledge. “I’m on my way to speak to Stephenson at Nemesis. The bookseller. A waste of time—I don’t think he could have managed the cage. But then you never know, if he were angry enough, what he might carry off. Are you certain you found nothing in London to turn the inquiry in that direction?”
“Not yet,” Rutledge said. “Early days.”
Padgett grunted. “Come with me, then. We’ll clear Stephenson off our list.”
Rutledge went on with him, but when they reached the bookshop, the sign on the door read CLOSED.
“He never closes,” Padgett said, putting up his hand to shade his eyes as he peered into the dark shop. “Celebrating Quarles’s demise, you think?” The sun hadn’t reached the windows, and the shelves for Stephenson’s stock prevented what light there was from traveling too far into the interior. “No sign of him. That’s odd. There’s a girl who comes in when he’s off searching for estate sales.”
Hamish said something in the back of Rutledge’s mind.
Padgett was on the point of turning away when a movement caught his eye. “Oh—there he is.” Tapping on the glass, he put his face up against it to attract the man’s attention. Then he said abruptly, “Good God— Rutledge—”
The tone of his voice was enough. Rutledge wheeled and pressed his face to the glass as well before shoving Padgett aside and kicking open the door. As it flew back, the flimsy lock shattering, Padgett was ahead of him, bursting into the shop.
Beyond the desk, in a small alcove where Stephenson kept a Thermos for his tea and a stock of wrapping paper, the man was hanging from a rope attached to a hook in the ceiling where he had once run a cord to bring the lamp nearer. The lamp was dangling beside him now, and it was the swaying of the glass shade that Padgett had glimpsed through the window glass as the bookseller jumped.
The odor of spilled lamp oil filled the small space.
For a mercy, Stephenson had not broken his neck in his fall, but his face was suffused with blood and his hands were flailing, as if to stop them from rescuing him. The chair he’d used had tipped over almost directly under him, just out of reach.
Rutledge turned it up, shoved a stack of books on it, and had it under Stephenson’s feet in a matter of seconds, catching first one and then the other and forcing them down to relieve the pressure on his neck. His hands went on thrashing about, in an effort to jerk away.
Padgett had clambered up the shelves in the alcove, pushing aside the rolls of wrapping paper and tipping over the Thermos in his haste to reach the dangling man. Rutledge spied a knife used to cut the wrapping paper just as it spun to the floor, and releasing one of Stephenson’s ankles, he reached up to hand it to Padgett. Stephenson tried to kick him in the face with his free foot, but Rutledge caught it again, just as a toe grazed the lump on his forehead. He clamped the foot down hard, his grip reflecting his anger.
The rope was heavy, heavy enough to do the work of killing a man, but Rutledge had Stephenson’s wriggling feet securely pinned while Padgett cursed and sawed at the rope from his precarious perch.
The strands of hemp parted so suddenly that all three men fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs, the books from the chair clattering around them. Rutledge fought his way out of the knot of hands and feet, stretching across to lift the rope from Stephenson’s neck.
A ring of red, scraped flesh showed above his collar as Stephenson clawed at it and gasped for breath, the air whistling in his throat before he could actually breathe again.
“Damn you!” he whispered when he could muster enough breath to speak. And after much effort, gulping in air, struggling to say something, he managed to demand, “Why didn’t you let me finish it—and save the cost of the hangman?”
“Because, you fool, we want some answers first,” Padgett shouted at him in furious relief. “You can’t go doing the hangman’s work and leave me to wonder if you were the killer or if someone else is still out there.”
Rutledge turned to the desk, looking to see if there was a note, but he found nothing. His head was thundering again, and Hamish was busy in his mind.
“Where does he live?” Rutledge asked Padgett as they got to their feet.
“Above the shop.”
Leaving Padgett to minister to the distraught man, Rutledge found the stairs and went up to the first floor. It was mostly used for stock, with a clutter of empty boxes, wrapping paper, a ladder, and other odds and ends that had no other home. After one swift glance Rutledge went on to the second floor. There he found modest living quarters, a bedroom and a sitting room, a kitchen to one side. On the walls were framed lithographs, the only touch of color except for a red tablecloth in the kitchen.
There was no sign of a note.
So Stephenson wasn’t intending to confess, but to leave doubts in all their minds, just as Padgett had accused him of doing.
Hamish said, “But it doesna’ prove he’s guilty.”
Rutledge hurried back down the stairs and found Padgett trying to get Stephenson to drink some tea from the mercifully undamaged Thermos. The man clenched his jaw, his eyes closed, his abrupt return to life leaving him shaken.
Rutledge squatted beside Padgett and, when he looked up, shook his head.
Padgett nodded.
They waited for five minutes before questioning Stephenson.
Padgett said, “What in God’s name did you think you were doing?”
As the heavy flush faded from Stephenson’s still-puffy face, Rutledge recognized him as the man he’d seen reading a book in the hotel dining room the morning he’d questioned Hunter about Quarles.
Stephenson said in a strained voice, “I knew you’d be coming.