A cold treachery - Charles Todd [105]
“I expect he felt Hugh had deserted him. By not coming here and taking him back to London. Perhaps Hugh is right, Josh was unhappy and vengeful. But that doesn't make the child a killer.”
Rutledge's loud knock at the door woke up Paul Elcott well before eight o'clock.
He came to the door of the licensed house with his hair tossled and his pajamas shoved into his trousers. Rutledge looked down. His feet were bare.
“What is it? What's wrong?”
“I want to have a look at your boots.”
“Boots? Good God, man, are you mad? It's barely morning!”
“Nevertheless.”
Elcott led the way up to his quarters and opened the door to the wardrobe. “There they are. The other pair is by the bed.”
In the close quarters of the room, Rutledge could smell the gin. It permeated the bedclothes and Elcott himself.
He lifted each shoe and examined it.
Dry, clean except for paint smears on one pair, and not newly polished.
“Are these all that you have?”
“I'm not a rich man!” Elcott said defensively. “That's the lot.”
“I'd like to look at the coat you were wearing at the funeral.”
“Search the wardrobe and be damned!”
Rutledge found the dark cloth coat and ran his hands down the side where the buttons belonged.
One was missing.
How had the coat fit at the church? He tried to bring back the image of Elcott standing there beside Belfors and his wife. Could the button have been missing then? In the rain, streaking coats and hats with long dark shafts of wet, such things would have been difficult to note.
But he made no issue of it, putting the coat back where he'd found it.
“When did you start drinking?” he asked instead.
“If it's any of your business, it was after I had my dinner. Such as it was. I don't have the heart to cook these days. And precious little appetite after working in that cursed kitchen. I'd sell High Fell, if I thought my father wouldn't come back from his grave and devour me. Instead I'll have to learn to live there. Call it Dutch courage, the gin. It's left over from last summer's stock.”
Rutledge stood in the middle of the room, noticing that it was warmer than usual. “Have you had your breakfast?”
Elcott swore. “I got up about six and made myself a cup of tea. There's no law against that, the last time I looked.”
But a stove would dry boots very efficiently. Was that when Elcott had begun drinking, to cover his night's activities?
Elcott went on, “I thought you'd be at the farm, by this time, spade and torch in hand. Looking for whatever it is you expect to find there.”
“How did you get on with Josh?”
“Well enough. I told you, I thought Gerry was a fool to take on a ready-made family. And I didn't like the boy. But that's not to say I'd harm him.”
“But the Robinson children were no threat to you, were they? They couldn't inherit from their stepfather.”
“I asked Gerry about that. How things stood. I mean, it's one thing if the children are Elcotts by blood, quite another if they have no ties to the land or to Urskdale. He told me the farm wouldn't be left away from our line.”
“Did you believe him?”
“There wasn't much choice, was there? But yes, I think he was telling the truth. He was bred to that land, more than I ever was. Josh was ten. He had no ties here, except his mother and sister. It might have been different if the boy was a babe in arms—”
He stopped, realizing what he'd all but said. “Have you finished what you came for, Inspector?”
“I'd like to see the kitchen, if you don't mind.”
“I do mind, but that's beside the point. You know the way.”
Rutledge examined the small kitchen. Any rags that might have been used to clean shoes would have gone into the fire.
Hamish was complaining, “For all your fine lies, you've got nowhere!”
There was a bit of mud under the table, where Elcott might have sat in the chair drawn up to it.
But there was no way of telling whether it had come from walking in from the stable or from climbing the fell.
Rutledge thanked Elcott and left.
His next call was on Hugh Robinson. The man was already dressed and having breakfast in the kitchen. Rutledge