A cold treachery - Charles Todd [119]
If she'd stayed at Keswick, he told himself, it would explain why she hadn't seen the police barricades in the road. . . . More to the point, why the police hadn't seen her.
“And when you heard what had happened, you believed it was Paul who had killed your sister and her family.”
“Oh, yes. If you hadn't found my revolver and taken it, I think I would have shot him myself. Don't you see? She—Grace—died not knowing I'd had a change of heart! And all that's left now is to be sure whoever killed her—them—hangs!”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Rutledge said into the sound of her weeping, “You are certain it was Paul Elcott you saw standing in front of the barn, talking to Gerald?”
“I'd take my oath on it!” She found a handkerchief and dried her tears angrily, fighting for control. “In a court of law!”
“Then why didn't you tell me this in the beginning? Why play games with coat buttons?”
“Because I was there. And because you're right: Paul would just as happily see me hang, instead. Otherwise he wouldn't inherit that bloody farm, which is why he killed them in the first place! I've seen Inspector Greeley looking at me, I've read what was in his mind. I'm the outsider, I have no place here, and it won't disturb his precious valley if I'm taken off to trial. I'm expendable!”
Rutledge let her go then. It was Hamish's voice he could hear as he walked out into the yard and looked up at the fell.
“You canna' believe both!”
“She's willing to swear he was there. As he'll no doubt swear she was. In the end, they may well cancel out the testimony on either side.”
“She had a revolver,” Hamish reminded him.
It was a sticking point in the evidence against Janet Ashton— and a stumbling block in the evidence against Paul Elcott.
And if Elcott was searching the heights, it could mean he hadn't found the boy the night of the murders. Indeed, had reason to suspect Josh hadn't died straightaway.
Hamish urged, “Time's short. You canna' leave the choice between them to Mickelson!”
Rutledge said aloud, “There's something about her account that doesn't feel—right.”
His intuition and his knowledge of people had always been his strengths as a policeman. What, when all else failed, he could rely on to take him through the tangle of half-truths and lies and misdirections to find the guilty party.
And now, when he needed them most, they seemed to elude him. “I shouldn't be questioning anyone. I've been relieved.”
Hamish repeated, “You canna' leave it to yon flunky from London.”
He had lived with these people for over a week and gotten nowhere. Was it possible Mickelson would see more clearly how the scant evidence stood? Or muddle it further in his driving need to please Chief Superintendent Bowles?
Mickelson was ambitious, he was quick, and if he made mistakes, he could live with them, where Rutledge couldn't.
If Rutledge didn't get there before him, it was possible that the wrong person would hang.
And time seemed to be melting away like the snow . . .
Walking back into the house, he made his way to Hugh Robinson's room and knocked lightly on the door.
“Come!”
Robinson was sitting by the window, an unopened book in his lap, staring out at Urskwater.
“I'd rather think Josh died of cold than that someone drowned him,” he said to Rutledge as he stepped into the room. “He wouldn't have suffered.”
“I don't think drowning is likely,” Rutledge told him. “If the killer found him, then the revolver was quickest. If he got away, the weather took him.”
With a sigh, Robinson turned. “I've heard you arrested Elcott.”
“Yes, and that's why I need to speak to you now. You knew Janet Ashton for a number of years. You said she did everything possible to help your family through the war.”
“Yes, it's true. I have a good deal of respect for her. It couldn't have been easy, two women struggling to keep a home going for two small children who had no idea what was happening around them.” He smoothed the crease in his trousers. “Grace told me she'd tried to explain to Josh that I'd gone missing and was very likely