She was vehement, her face ablaze with purpose. “I told you once, if you want to hide the recent dead, do it in a fresh grave. Betty Cooper wanted to work in a gentleman’s house. Mr. Simon couldn’t hire her, he already had Edith. I can’t see that he’d have sent her away empty-handed! Not Mr. Simon. He’d have done what he could for the girl, for Mrs. Daulton’s sake. Have you even asked him? What they talked about, those two?”
Rutledge stared at her, and she grinned self-consciously. “No,” he said slowly. “I don’t think anyone has.”
“Well, I’d not let it linger on the tongue too long, or that Inspector Hildebrand will be back tomorrow with his warrants!”
He saluted her and backed up the car until he was in front of the Wyatt gate. He met Elizabeth at the front door, her face anguished. She caught his arm and dragged him into the parlor, shutting the door. “For God’s sake, what’s happening? No one will tell me. Aurore is in her room, I think she’s crying. Simon has shut himself up in the museum and won’t let me in. And my father was here in Charlbury, I saw him speaking to you, but he wouldn’t come to the house, he just sent Benson with a note telling me to leave straightaway. That madman Hildebrand’s to blame, isn’t he, it all went wrong when he came! For God’s sake, what’s it all about?”
“I don’t know. Hildebrand has finally convinced himself that Mowbray didn’t kill Margaret Tarlton—we were all fairly certain of that, it isn’t news. But if Mowbray didn’t kill her, then it has to be someone from Charlbury, you see. And it was Aurore Wyatt who was set to take Margaret Tarlton to meet the train.”
“Aurore.” She said the name unconsciously, as if tasting it on her tongue. “You’re saying that it was Aurore? But why?”
“I don’t know. There are several theories making the rounds. It seems she’s become the popular candidate, now that Mowbray’s out of the running.”
“But Simon will feel responsible! It was Simon who wanted Margaret to come here as his assistant!”
“No,” Rutledge answered bluntly. “It was your scheming that brought her here to interview for the position of assistant.”
“But what about that man Shaw?” she demanded frantically. “He was wild with Margaret for not seeing him. He taunts me every time I go into the Wyatt Arms. I can’t imagine Aurore battering anyone to death, but Shaw could do it! He’s been a soldier, he knows how to kill!”
“Knowing how to kill doesn’t make you a murderer,” he told her. But he had killed his share of men, in the war. Was that so very different? He could feel Hamish asking that same question in the depths of his mind. “Simon was also a serving officer. If Daniel Shaw is suspect because of his war record, we mustn’t forget Simon Wyatt.”
“Stop it, do you hear me? Simon hasn’t killed anyone! I’d believe Aurore did it before I’d believe Simon could have! I’ve never understood her, I can’t think why he ever married her! Can’t you do anything? Can’t you find out what it is Hildebrand wants?”
There was a pounding at the door that cut short his response. Elizabeth said something under her breath and went to answer it.
From where he was standing, he could see the heavy door swing open at the same instant a slurred, angry voice cried, “I want to know, damn you! I want to know who killed her!”
It was Shaw standing there, his face white, his body tense with pain.
“You’re drunk, disgusting! Go away!” Elizabeth said curtly, preparing to close the door in his face. Behind him the night was black, clouds having moved in with the sunset and now obscuring the stars. Somewhere in the garden a toad sang its mating call, and a moth swept through the bright square of light cast across the lawns. Shaw struck the door with his arm, forcing it open again, and stepped inside. Rutledge, moving swiftly from the parlor, was there to meet him, at Elizabeth’s back.
He said, “Go home, Shaw. I told you I’d give you a name, once it was certain. But it isn’t certain. Hildebrand has jumped the gun.”
“Truit’s in the Arms, bragging. They’re prepared to make an arrest, damn you!” He stared over Elizabeth’s head at Rutledge’s face, pain in his eyes that wasn’t all from the pain in his body. “I’m not drunk. I want the truth!”
“Wait by my car, and I’ll tell you what I know,” Rutledge said. “If you don’t go, I’ll have you arrested for disorderly conduct.”
Shaw bit his lip against the pain and said, “I’ll wait here on the step. I don’t think I could walk that far!” He stepped backward, nearly lost his balance, and sat heavily on the step, crouched protectively over his wound.
Elizabeth said, “You are drunk!”
Rutledge caught her arm and pulled her from the door as he shut it.
She turned on him, saying, “the wolves are gathering!”
“Listen to me! This can matter more than your wolves. Does the name Betty Cooper mean anything to you?”
Something stirred in her eyes. Curiosity? Calculation? He couldn’t be sure in the dim light that reached the hall from the parlor.
“She was a serving girl, if that’s the one you mean. Simon suggested we might consider finding her a place in London. We’d lost two of the younger maids to other positions, he must have known.”
“And so he sent her to you from here?”
“Well, we expected her to come to us on a trial basis, but she never arrived. I don’t see what this has to do with anything! There isn’t time!”
“When was that?”
“Nearly six months ago. Just after Simon came back from France and opened the house here in Charlbury. That’s not important, I tell you—”
“Yes, it is,” he answered her. “If Betty Cooper didn’t arrive at your door, where did she go?” And why hadn’t she taken up Simon’s proposal that she work for the Napiers? It was a position beyond the dreams of a country girl who wanted to make her way in London. Nor did it explain why the body was only three months dead. Mrs. Prescott was wrong; his questions led him nowhere.
“How should I know? Girls go to London every day, I can’t be responsible for the fate of any of them!”
But what if Betty had gone to London after all, avoided the Napiers for whatever reasons, spent three months there in the city, found it not to her liking, and come back to Dorset?
That was possible—but was it likely that in coming back, she’d meet her death here before anyone had seen her?
Unless her return threatened someone? But that wouldn’t take into account the fate of Margaret Tarlton.… The two women had nothing in common.
There was a connection somewhere. There had to be. Or else they were all wrong, Mowbray had killed Margaret and Betty Cooper was a separate crime altogether. There was only the doctor’s suggestion that the murders were similar.
He was aware of Elizabeth expostulating, telling him she wanted him to help Simon, to do something before Hildebrand made a grave mistake.
He put his hands on her shoulders to silence her and said, “Look, I’ve got to go. But I’ll be back before Hildebrand comes tomorrow. Is that fair enough?”
“Fair—” she began, but he was already out the door, speaking to Shaw, giving him the same promise.
Shaw, getting stiffly to his feet, stared balefully at Elizabeth and turned to move awkwardly down the walk to the gate. Over his shoulder he said to Rutledge, “I can’t fight you now, but if you don’t come to the inn by midnight, I’m taking matters into my own hands. Do you hear me?”
“I hear you,” Rutledge said, and then: “Can you make it on your own?”
“Damn you, I don’t want your pity! I want answers!”
Rutledge watched him go and waited until Elizabeth, unsatisfied, finally closed the front door. Upstairs at one of the windows overlooking the walk, he could sense Aurore’s eyes on him.