A False Mirror - Charles Todd [151]
Rutledge bent to unlace his shoes and set them to one side, out of the way. Then, moving on stocking feet, he walked softly through the door into the kitchen passage.
He listened, his eyes blind, his senses alert.
And far away down the passage, a door creaked on old hinges, then opened with only a whisper of sound.
Five minutes more and he’d have been too late.
A breath of air stirred, bringing a hint of smoke with it. Footsteps, moving quietly and without haste.
Rutledge stood there, nestling into the shadows of the wall. He could follow on the plan of the house he carried in his mind just where the trespasser must be. Through the servants’ outer door. Now down the passage that led to the hall. Slowing, apparently searching in the dark for the back stairs to the floors above.
But who was it?
He thought for an instant that he’d caught the flash of a torch, as if the intruder needed the reassurance of seeing a door was open before blundering into it.
After a few minutes, a chance footfall informed him that someone had made a decision not to go up the back stairs. Rutledge took a silent breath of relief. Better a confrontation here than near Hamilton or his wife. It was what he’d hoped for.
In another twenty feet, whoever it was would be close to the room where Nan Weekes had been murdered.
He counted steps he couldn’t hear.
Half a dozen more, and it would be time to show himself.
Whoever was there paused by the door to Nan’s prison.
At that instant, the darkness erupted with light, brilliant, shocking, and blinding.
Rutledge swore with passion and swiftly moved forward.
Through the glass in the room where Nan Weekes had died, he saw Mr. Putnam, armed in righteousness and sincerity, standing in the full glow of a pair of lamps.
And outside, pinned like a startled insect in the brightness, was Dr. Granville.
What the bloody hell was the rector up to?
He didn’t think either man could pick him out beyond the circle of light. He stopped short, keeping absolutely still, standing there like the wolf in Russian fairy tales, waiting to see what the carnage would be.
And Hamish was roaring in his mind like all the imps of hell.
Mr. Putnam said, “Doctor.”
“Miss Trining told me you’d gone back to comfort Joyner’s daughter, once you’d learned you weren’t needed at her house.” Granville tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice.
“Yes, I should have done. What did you give him, that let him die?”
“I didn’t. It was coming, just sooner than he or I expected.”
“But you killed your wife. In my workbox there’s a ball-peen hammer I don’t recognize. I expect Mr. Rutledge has already found it. Mine was my father’s, with a worn blue handle. It’s there as well.”
Rutledge felt his anger rising. Putnam had been ordered to let Rutledge confront Granville, while he stood by as a witness concealed in shadows. Instead he was putting Rutledge’s questions himself. Had the man run mad? Or had he been afraid that Rutledge wouldn’t arrive in time to ask them?
“Matthew Hamilton killed her,” Granville was saying. “Rutledge has a confession.”
“Hamilton confessed to choking her. I told you earlier, he was muddled last night. But that’s clearing up with rest and food. As you knew it must, once he was no longer sedated so heavily. Why don’t we go and find the inspector?”
“The last I saw of him, he was still at the fire.”
“There’s the hammer.” Putnam was firm. “I can swear to seeing it. The name of the hospital where you trained is on the handle.”
“The hammer doesn’t exist. Not anymore. It’s burned up in the fire with the wood stacked outside Miss Trining’s kitchen door.”
“Do you feel Nan’s spirit here with us? She worked for your wife. Conscientiously, as she did for everyone. She even sent you a message about the sheets left at her house.”
“She’d heard us quarreling. It wouldn’t have done if she’d remembered and told the world what those arguments were about.”
“Money? You’d already set your sights higher. I expect when the Granville family cut you off, Margaret must have appeared to be a lifeline. She told me