A cold treachery - Charles Todd [15]
Turning her head as the two men came in, she stirred and began to pluck at the edges of the quilt, as if in modesty.
Mrs. Follet handed Rutledge a cup of tea, and he realized with the first swallow that she'd added a little something to it. Grateful, he smiled at her. Then he nodded to his passenger and asked gently, “Feeling better?”
She said, “Yes.” But her voice was a polite thread in the quiet room.
“What's your name?”
As if surprised that he didn't know it, she answered with more strength, “Janet Ashton.”
“Can you tell us what happened, Miss Ashton?”
That seemed to alarm her, and Mrs. Follet put her hand on the quilted shoulder, comforting her.
“The horse lost the road,” Mrs. Follet answered for her. “And dragged the carriage a bit before it went over and pulled him down. He injured himself thrashing about in the shafts and finally was still. She couldn't reach him or coax him to his feet.”
Miss Ashton blinked, as if awakening from a dream. “Yes . . . I—it was frightening, I thought he'd crush the carriage—but I couldn't get out, not at first—” She shuddered, and took a deep breath, trying to shut the experience out of her mind. Then she looked up at Rutledge. “You said—you did tell me the horse is dead?”
“He is.” Rutledge pulled a chair away from the table and sat down close to hers. “Is there someone I can contact? Your family must be worried about you.”
“No—there's no one. No—”
“What brought you out in this weather?” Follet asked on the heels of her faltering answer. “It was foolishness, a lass like you!”
But she buried her face in the quilt, refusing to answer.
Mrs. Follet scolded, “Don't fret her, now! She's that tired. I'll take her up to bed. Jim, there's a warm bottle for her feet. If you'll bring it up in five minutes.” With a soothing croon that would have comforted a child, she coaxed Miss Ashton across the kitchen and down the passage, her arm around the thick wrapping of quilt.
Follet and Rutledge watched them go. “There's my son's bedroom, at the head of the stairs, if you're agreeable to staying what's left of the night. He's over to Keswick, where he's been courting a lass.”
“Thank you, but I must be on my way,” Rutledge replied with sincere regret. “They're expecting me in Urskdale.” He set his cup on the table and went out to the motorcar to bring in the empty Thermos.
As Follet refilled it, Rutledge reconfirmed his directions before stepping out into the cold, windy night. As the farmhouse door swung to, Bieder, the dog, followed the interloper all the way to the motorcar, head lowered and a deep growl in his throat to emphasize a personal dislike for strangers. “I'd not like to come across you unexpectedly,” Rutledge commented as he put up the crank and went around to the driver's side. “Murderer or no.”
Hamish said, It's a pity the slaughtered family didna' have a dog like yon.
“I doubt that it would have mattered, if he was armed. Or the killer might have been known to the animal.” Rutledge turned the motorcar with some difficulty and went back down the farm lane in his own tracks. Miss Ashton was safe. He hadn't far to go to his destination. He'd had a chance to warm himself and the whisky had given him second wind. He should have felt revived, eager to go on. But as the darkness encompassed him, isolating him in the bright beams of his headlamps, he could feel the mountains again, out there like Russian wolves beyond the campfire's light. It was a trick of the mind, nothing more, but he was thrown back into the war, when in the darkness an experienced man could sense movement in the German trenches, even when there was no sound, nothing to betray the congregation of enemy forces before a surprise attack.
As it