A cold treachery - Charles Todd [59]
The room hadn't been used, according to Elizabeth Fraser, in weeks: “Not since the middle of September—we haven't had any guests.”
It would have taken hours of a roaring fire to defeat the winter chill in the walls.
“Tomorrow night, perhaps, when your husband is here,” Rutledge replied, to distract Mrs. Cummins.
“I wish Harry had sent news,” she answered fretfully. “Why do you suppose he hasn't? Do you think something could have happened to him? I always worry that something has happened. That there are more dead we don't know about—”
And then it was as if the pent-up emotions in the room couldn't be held back any longer.
Janet Ashton exclaimed impatiently, “Surely in all this time someone has seen something. A footprint, a depression in the snow where he could have taken shelter, even a lost glove. I mean, these men live here, they're supposed to know every inch of these fells in the dead of night in blinding rain! I've heard the sheepmen brag. How they found a lost ewe that everyone else had given up hope of finding. How they located an injured walker in heavy mist that filled Urskdale for days on end. How they can tell where they are by the feel of the stone under their feet or the smell of the wind.”
Mrs. Cummins, alarmed, answered, “Are you saying that my husband and the others haven't done their duty? But surely that's not true. Mr. Robinson, do you feel that way?”
Before he could answer, Janet glanced across the table at Hugh Robinson's strained face. “I'm sorry, Hugh. I don't mean to dash your hopes, but it's the waiting—spirits rising every time someone comes to the door—plunging when there's no news—I can't fall asleep without jerking awake at the slightest sound. You must feel it, too. It's making all of us edgy.”
Elizabeth Fraser, in an effort to distract her, put in, “Yes, and you must be in some pain, as well. Would you like me to send for Dr. Jarvis—”
But Janet had already turned to Rutledge. “I wish I knew what you'd said to Paul Elcott. I wish I'd been there. You don't know him, Inspector! How sly and devious he can be. Gerald never listened, either. He felt sorry for Paul, and he cosseted him, just as his mother had done. And just look how that ended!”
“Miss Ashton.” Elizabeth Fraser's voice was firm. “This doesn't do any of us any good!”
Janet stared at her for a moment and then dropped her eyes to her plate. “I'm sorry. I've lost my sister. I know how afraid she was, and how Gerald thought she was just suffering from the melancholy sometimes associated with a difficult pregnancy. I just want Josh to be found! I want something of hers to hold and love. And I want justice for her, too. Inspector Rutledge hasn't lost someone to murder, has he? He doesn't understand what I—we—feel.”
Rutledge, unwilling to be drawn into her arguments, said only, “We've all lost people we've loved, Miss Ashton. And it's natural to rail against what we can't prevent or change.”
“I will tell you this.” Hugh Robinson set down his fork as if he couldn't go on pretending to eat. “He's alive. Josh. I can feel it! Whatever the search parties may tell me.”
“If he is, it would be a miracle,” Rutledge warned. “You have to prepare yourself—in the event—”
“No, he's still alive!” His eyes met Rutledge's, despair in them.
“I don't see what Paul Elcott has to say to anything,” Mrs. Cummins interjected. “Josh was Gerald's son, after all! Dear Gerald, he was such a nice man—I miss him so terribly!” Her face crumpled.
Elizabeth Fraser said hastily, “Josh is Hugh Robinson's son—”
Confused, Mrs. Cummins looked around the table. “I never heard of it if he was! The boy lived with Gerald, didn't he? Well, then—”
Rutledge caught Miss Fraser's eye and shook his head. In an attempt to shift the subject, he said to Janet Ashton, “I've been meaning to ask you. Didn't you believe the policemen stopping traffic in Keswick, when they told you that the roads were impassable going towards Urskdale?”
He thought for an instant he'd read surprise in her eyes, but if it was there,