A Fearsome Doubt - Charles Todd [128]
As Sergeant Burke, putting down the cat, moved heavily toward the other rooms calling Brereton’s name, Dr. Pugh saw the wine and went over to lift it, sniffing the contents.
“Laudanum?” Rutledge asked.
“I shouldn’t be surprised, but I’ll have to test it to be sure.” The doctor put out a finger as if considering tasting the wine in the glass, then prudently changed his mind.
Dowling was squatting by the pool of blood on the hearth. Weaver, following Burke, looked rather green.
Rutledge said, “Judging by the blood we’ve seen so far, how seriously wounded was Brereton?”
“It would depend on where the wound was located. Not an artery, of course, there’s no pattern to show that. Still—” Pugh turned to walk on into the kitchen and stopped short. “Look. It would appear someone dragged himself across the floor here!”
Burke was already examining the drying streaks. “But they stop just outside the kitchen door there,” he pointed out. “And Mr. Brereton’s body isn’t in the house.”
Rutledge stepped around the doctor and looked at the smears. Were they drag marks, where something heavy had been pulled toward the door? Or had someone crawled, half dragging himself, toward the only means of escape?
“The question is,” he said, “where’s Brereton? Trying to hide in the woods—or already half buried in the leaves somewhere out there? Would the killer have taken the time to hide a corpse? Or was he interrupted by Adams arriving on the scene, and Brereton got away?”
Inspector Dowling, scanning the trees beyond the garden, said, “We’ll need a score of men to search out there.”
Sergeant Burke reminded his inspector, “We can’t wait for a search party. He might be bleeding to death right now.”
Dr. Pugh said, “I’ll make a cursory search.” With the constable at his heels, he stepped beyond the smears and out the door, moving along the grassy path that bordered the small kitchen garden and the herb bed. Stopping at a garden shed, Pugh peered inside, pulling the door open only as far as needed. He looked up again at the men in the kitchen, shaking his head. Taking care to observe where he put his feet, he moved rapidly toward the boundary of the cottage and the beginning of the wood. “Nothing so far,” he called to the watching men. “I can’t see anything to indicate there’s been a body dragged along here. Still—even if Brereton had passed out, he might have come to his senses and managed to walk away under his own power.”
Burke stepped back into the house. “The odd thing is,” he said, “that this attack happened well before dark today. Not like the others. Sir, should someone be sent along to Mr. Masters’s house, to be sure there’s been no trouble there? It’s little more than a mile by the road.”
“With servants in the house, Sergeant, they shouldn’t be in immediate danger. Our priority right now is Brereton. Unless there’s a path that Brereton might have taken through the woods, trying to reach help?”
Burke shouted the question to Weaver, still searching, and got the reply “No, sir, no path that I can see.” Unsatisfied, Burke said, “I’ll just have a look on my own, sir, as it’s getting on toward dark.”
Rutledge crossed to the sink in the kitchen and saw that there were no dishes waiting to be washed up, possibly indicating that Brereton cleared away after his luncheon. And the stove was banked. But then Brereton often dined with the Masterses rather than make his own evening meal. The buffer between Raleigh’s temper and his wife’s anxiety . . . A high price for a good dinner.
He tried to picture the scene as it might have occurred. Had Brereton answered the door, expecting to find Adams arriving with the wood? And instead was greeted by someone else standing there, smiling and expecting to be invited in?
Hamish said, “You canna’ tell. The fire’s no’ lit, he may have been in the garden, clearing out a place for the wood.”
Rutledge called to Dowling, who was inspecting the rest of the house. “How trustworthy is this man Adams?