A cold treachery - Charles Todd [46]
He didn't answer that. “What about Robinson? He came home to find his wife and family gone, part of another man's life now.”
“Hardly a good reason to kill them!” she retorted in distress. “To win them back—that's understandable. From what Grace said, there was very little left of the marriage anyway. Otherwise she couldn't have fallen in love with Gerald.”
Which was, he thought, an innocent view of love and marriage. “How did they meet, Grace and Gerald?”
“He was convalescing in the village outside London where she was living. And he seemed to get on with the children long before he met her, making little things for them to play with. Invalids are encouraged to find ways of passing the time, and it helps, I expect, to keep one's hands busy.” She frowned, as if remembering her own recovery after her accident. “At any rate, as I heard the story, he was one of a group of soldiers sitting under the trees on the clinic's lawn, and he'd carved a lovely little boat to float in a pail of water, which Josh adored. Grace came to see if it was proper for Josh to accept such a gift, and soon found herself reading to the men every afternoon. I gather it wasn't a hasty, thoughtless courtship. They appeared to be so happy together, as if their feelings ran rather deep and would last . . .” She lifted her hand as if to make light of her words.
“Did she tell you she was happy?”
“Grace? It was something you read in her face, whenever Gerald stepped into the room. The way she turned to greet him—the smile she always had for him. I must say, I was more than a little envious.” She gave him a wry smile. “Every young girl dreams of that kind of love. Grace seemed to have found it.”
“All right then. Let's consider Janet Ashton. Was she happy with her sister's decision to remarry and move north?”
“Grace never discussed her sister with me, Inspector. And you must remember—when Miss Ashton came to visit she went directly to the farm and stayed there. We don't have dinner parties and afternoon fêtes here in Urskdale. If she was in a shop with Grace, of course I'd make a point of speaking to both of them. But these were chance encounters, hardly an opportunity for anything more than idle conversation.”
“I understand Miss Ashton wasn't here for her sister's second marriage.”
She slid her serviette back into its ring. “It isn't pleasant, what you do, is it? Asking questions, prying into people's lives.”
“Better than letting a murderer go free.”
She looked at him. “I suppose that's true . . .”
But something in her face made him wonder if she believed it.
Late in the night, Rutledge awoke with a headache, and reaching for his dressing gown, went to the kitchen for cold water to bathe his face.
Silent on stockinged feet, he moved along the passages wondering if his fellow guests were awake or had finally found sleep, however fitful. The house was quiet around him, and he felt at ease in the darkness.
“You canna' see through the doors,” Hamish reminded him. “Grief can make a long night!”
The front part of the house was drafty, cold air sweeping around his feet. Rutledge glanced at the front door as he passed, but it was firmly latched. As he stepped into the passage that led to the kitchen, the cold was like a sudden surge.
“'Ware!” Hamish warned.
The door into the kitchen was standing ajar, and Rutledge stopped, uncertain whether someone else was there. The room was dark, but the cold was more intense. Who had come in, without disturbing the household? A man making a report would have pounded on the door.
Behind him the short passage seemed alive with an electric tension. Was there a murderer even now making his way through the house, searching for a victim? Or had he come—and gone?
Rutledge moved forward quietly, until he could peer through the narrow crack. There was no light at all—the curtains pulled, the stove banked—and yet the chair backs were curved silhouettes.
He shifted his position, trying for a better view of the room.
He could just see the strip of harsh light where the door to the