A False Mirror - Charles Todd [95]
“Thank you, Miss Joyner. I won’t keep you any longer.”
She said, “You’ll tell Doctor how sorry we are. I’d hate to think of him being here when his wife was so ill and needed him. Makes me want to cry.”
“There was nothing he could have done,” he assured her, and left, before the next question was asked: how Mrs. Granville had died.
Hamish said, “It wasna’ necessary to come here.”
But Bowles would ask for such minute attention to detail. It would balance what London would see as his unnecessary venture out to the landslip. Even if it had produced that tantalizing bit of bandage.
It also established that Granville had come east, not west, when he went out on the Joyner call. He wouldn’t have been a witness to whatever had been done on the road to Devon.
Worst luck. It would have helped to corroborate the story that young Jeremy Cornelius had told.
Mr. Putnam, leaving a note for Dr. Granville on the hall table, collected his coat and was standing in the rectory drive when the greengrocer pulled up with his cart.
The horse, an old hand at the game, stopped as soon as Putnam approached, waited for him to clamber up to the high seat beside Mr. Tavers, and then walked on.
Circling the drive to the gates in the low wall, Tavers said, “I’m not setting foot in that house. I’m not finding myself shut up there with a revolver at my head. Not good for business.”
Putnam said, his voice pacific, “You won’t be in any danger. Mr. Mallory isn’t a madman, he’s just frightened that what happened to Mr. Hamilton is going to be laid at his door, simply because he had had a quarrel with Mr. Hamilton. Well, not precisely a quarrel. A difference.”
“But Hamilton’s gone missing. And Mrs. Granville is dead. What did he have to do with that nasty business?”
“I don’t think Mr. Rutledge or Mr. Bennett has come to a conclusion about that. Not yet.”
“Mrs. Bennett has an opinion, and it isn’t in Mallory’s favor, I can tell you that.”
“Yes, well, I’m sure she’s worried for her husband. He blames Mr. Mallory for the injury to his foot.”
“My point exactly. A volatile temper, that’s what Mr. Mallory has, and it got the better of him this time.”
“Have you ever seen him lose his temper?”
“When he first came to Hampton Regis, Mrs. Tavers noticed how edgy he was, and uncertain in his moods. She said to me he was not one she’d like to meet along a dark road in the middle of the night.”
“I understand Mallory had a very rough time in the war.”
“And so did my son Howard, the youngest. But he’s not going about bashing in heads and keeping another man’s wife against her will, is he?”
With a sigh, Putnam said, “Don’t worry, man, I shall take everything inside the house. You need only set the parcels by the door.” Changing the subject, he asked, “Have you been considering one of these new lorries for your business?”
“Not as long as Fred here is still pulling his weight,” Tavers retorted.
It was a tense greengrocer who drew up in front of Casa Miranda and halted his horse to let Putnam step down.
Putnam tapped at the door and waited, wondering what his reception would be.
But Mallory, casting a swift glance outside, said, “Good afternoon, Mr. Putnam. Is there any news about Mr. Hamilton?”
“Sadly, I haven’t any. I wish I had.”
Mallory swallowed his disappointment. “Thank you for rescuing us from starvation. If you’ll just bring the parcels to me, I’ll carry them the rest of the way.”
“Of course.”
Tavers stepped down, turned his back on Mallory, and began to pull out a box of goods. Putnam hurried to help him and lifted the first box with a grunt. He ferried it to the man waiting in the doorway and went back for the second. When he had transferred the fifth box, and Tavers went back to his seat on the cart, Putnam approached Mallory diffidently.
“I shan’t presume on a mission of mercy,” he said quietly. “But I can offer my ser vices for what they are worth.