A Test of Wills - Charles Todd [86]
From the market cross, Rutledge made his way to the lane where Hickam had seen the Captain and the Colonel together. Where Sergeant Davies had found Hickam drunk and rambling about the two men.
He looked about the lane for several minutes, then walked to the first house and knocked on the door, asking questions.
Did you see Daniel Hickam in this lane on the Monday morning that Colonel Harris was shot? Did you see Captain Wilton in this lane, walking? Did you see the Colonel, on his horse, riding through here, stopping to talk to anyone? Did you see Bert Mavers anywhere in the lane, coming or going toward the main street?
The answer was the same at every house. No. No. No. And no.
But at one of the doors, the woman who answered raised her eyebrows at finding him on her doorstep. “You’re the man from London, then. What can I do for you?” She looked him up and down with cool eyes.
He didn’t need to be told what she was, although she was respectably dressed in a dark blue gown that was very becoming to her dark hair and her sea-colored eyes. A tall woman of middle age and wide experience, who saw the world as it was, but more important, seemed to take it as it was.
Rutledge asked his questions, and she listened carefully to each before shaking her head. No, she hadn’t seen Hickam. No, she’d not seen the Captain that morning, nor Mavers. But the Colonel had been here.
“Colonel Harris?” Rutledge asked, keeping his voice level as Hamish clamored excitedly. “What brought him this way, do you know?”
“He came to leave a message by the door, knowing it was an early hour for Betsy and me, but he wanted to put our minds at rest about the quarrel we’d had with the Vicar.” Her mouth twisted, half in exasperation, half in humor. “Mr. Carfield is often of a mind to meddle; he likes to be seen as a thunderbolt, you might say, flinging the moneylenders out of the temple, the whores out of the camp. Not that there’s that much to go on about in Upper Streetham. It’s not what you’d call a regular Sodom and Gomorrah.”
She caught the responsive gleam in Rutledge’s eyes. “The Colonel, now, he was a very decent man. We pay our rent, regular as the day, but Vicar had been onto that Mr. Jameson about us, and he called around, talking eviction. I could have told him who put him up to it! But there was no changing his mind. So the next time I saw the Colonel on the street, I stopped him and asked him please to have a word with Mr. Jameson about it.”
“Jameson?”
“Aye, he’s the agent for old Mrs. Crichton, who lives in London, and he manages her holdings in Upper Streetham. Well, the short of it was, Mr. Jameson agreed he’d been a little hasty over the evicting.”
“Do you still have the message?”
She turned and called over her shoulder to someone else in the house. “Betsy? Could you find that letter of the Colonel’s for me, love?”
In a moment a thinner, smaller woman came to the door, apprehension in her eyes and a cream-colored envelope in her hand. She handed it silently to the older woman. “Is everything all right, Georgie?”
“Yes, yes, the Inspector is asking about the Colonel, that’s all.” She gave the envelope to Rutledge, adding, “He never came here—as a caller. He was a proper gentleman, the Colonel, but fair. Always fair. If you’d asked me, I’d have said I knew most of the men in Upper Streetham better than their own wives, and I can’t think of one who’d want to shoot Colonel Harris!”
There were two words on the front: Mrs. Grayson.
“That’s me, Georgina Grayson.”
Rutledge took the letter out of its envelope, saw the Colonel’s name engraved at the top, and the date, written in a bold black hand. Monday. He scanned it. It said, simply, “I’ve spoken to Jameson. You needn’t worry, he’s agreed to take care of the matter with Carfield. If there should be any other trouble, let me know of it.” It was signed “Harris.”
“Could I keep this?” he asked, speaking to Mrs. Grayson.
“I’d like it back,” she said. “But yes, if it’ll help.”
Turning to Betsy, Rutledge went over the