A Fearsome Doubt - Charles Todd [71]
Taking acceptance of the invitation for granted, Grimes got heavily to his feet, and Dowling said diffidently, “Ought I to wait here? Too much officialdom—”
“No, you might as well hear what’s said.”
The three men walked briskly in the direction of the brick cottages that stood in a cluster where the High Street ran into the Marling Road. For the most part the homes were well kept, sedate with white curtains at the windows and pots of flowers set in the sunny doorways.
“Mrs. Parker lives here,” Grimes was saying, indicating one of them. “You can see how that pair of windows in the front room overlooks the street.” He tapped lightly on the door, and stood back.
An elderly woman opened it a crack and peered out at them. “Now, then, Mrs. Parker,” Grimes said with gruff affability, “I’ve brought Mr. Dowling and Mr. Rutledge here to listen to what you told me you saw the other night. If you’d not mind repeating it for us.”
She was swathed in shawls, stooped and breathing with noticeable difficulty. She didn’t offer to invite her visitors in; she stood her ground in the doorway, clutching the frame and the edge of the door as if to support herself. A brief gust of wind stirred her thin gray hair and she stepped back into the shelter of the entry. She spoke to them from there, like a frail ghost of the woman she must once have been, her large frame shrunken with illness and age.
“I don’t rest of a night, as you know very well, Bill Grimes! I sit by my windows”—a gnarled finger pointed out the one he’d indicated earlier—“and sleep in my chair when I sleep at all. It was last Tuesday night, I think it was. There was someone walking by, and I leaned forward to tap on the glass.”
“Did you know who it was?”
“Well, I thought I did. I thought it was Tommy Jacobs, and one of the twins had taken ill.”
“And was it?”
She glared at him. “You know very well it wasn’t. You went straight to his door after you left here, and asked him yourself!”
“I know, Mrs. Parker,” Grimes answered patiently. “But these gentlemen don’t.”
“If it’ud been Tommy, he’d have stopped and told me what he was doing out at that hour. Instead he crossed the road there, head down, and hurried off, as if he hadn’t heard me.”
“And how would you describe him?”
She pressed her lips together, trying for breath. “He looked like Tommy Jacobs,” she said after a moment. “Tall. Good shoulders. He had on a heavy coat and his hat. It was cold that night. That’s all I saw.”
“I’ll let you step in out of the wind, then, Mrs. Parker. Kind of you to talk to us, I appreciate it.” Grimes tipped his hat again.
She looked from him to Dowling, then to Rutledge. “I’ve seen him before,” she said, indicating the inspector from Marling. “But not him.”
“Mr. Rutledge has come down from London,” Grimes informed her.
She gave Rutledge a toothless grin, her bright blue eyes suddenly dancing. “From London, is it? Mr. Parker was from London. I always fancied London men!”
With that she shut her door firmly, and left them standing on the street.
“Do you believe her?” Rutledge asked Grimes.
“I think I do. She’s not well, but her eyesight is keen enough, and so is her mind.”
Dowling said, “Her windows are near enough to the street for a clear look at the man.”
They considered the story for a moment longer before walking on.
“If her testimony was the only one we had, I’d be more chary of taking it seriously,” Grimes said. “The next woman in a way corroborates what Mrs. Parker saw. But before we walk on, notice the direction of the church from here.”
Rutledge and Dowling turned to observe that the church was closer into town.
“Now, look down there, the house set back from the road in the trees.”
It was on the outskirts of Seelyham, a good fifty yards away, and rather finer than the cottages. Rutledge thought it might have been at one time a Dower House, judging by the low brick wall in front and a handsome portico.
Grimes set off with determination, explaining as he went.
“Miss Judson and her father live in that