Legacy of the Dead - Charles Todd [134]
“That still isn’t strong enough—”
“Yes. You don’t know him. He’s very clever, I tell you! It started when he began asking me where I was in 1916 when he called from London to say he was sent home to recover from wounds. I wasn’t here, you see—and I wasn’t here when he called to tell me he was being sent on to France. Over and over he’d ask where I was, what I was doing, who I was with—until my very silence answered him! It was after that that he must have learned somehow that I’d borne a child. He would bring me small gifts—a blue baby’s shawl. A small rattle for a teething child. A rocking horse he said he’d found in Edinburgh and knew I’d like. The servants thought it was a loving promise of children, when I was better. But I can’t have any more children! The nurse who bathed me— the doctor—someone must have told him there was a child!”
Rutledge shook his head. “He must have discovered something. Did you meet Fiona? Was there any communication between you?”
“We met at night sometimes, at the pele tower. But after Alex came home, we stopped. Drummond—I don’t know, he’s very loyal to me and my family. He wouldn’t have told anyone what he knew. Drummond brought me home, you see, from Lanark, when I was well enough to travel. But his sister was jealous of Fiona. Sometimes jealous people see more clearly. And Alex is a master at finding out secrets. He was trained to spy.”
“The persecution of Fiona was a test?”
“The anonymous letters? At first, yes. To make me tell him what he wanted to know. But I wouldn’t, and it escalated. He spread lies to Mr. Elliot and to Oliver—to the fiscal and other influential people, for all I know—until they came to believe that they’d thought of it themselves! When McKinstry didn’t search the stables, it was Alex who persuaded Inspector Oliver to go back. He reminded him of those old murders, before the war, that hadn’t been solved. That pricked Oliver’s pride. Alex knew the Jacobite bones must be hidden somewhere—he’d come across an old story about them in some of my father’s papers. That was to be the end of it, but by that time, Inspector Oliver was rabid to find a body. And throughout the whole ordeal, Alex would come home and tell me what he had been doing that day to make Fiona’s life unbearable. And watch me, until I could crawl off somewhere and hide my anguish!”
“Mrs. Holden. How did your husband come to know Eleanor Gray?”
“I’m not sure that he ever did. I’ve never heard him speak of her at all.”
“There’s some evidence that he could well be the man who drove her north, just after Captain Burns died. If he did, he may have been the last person to see her alive. I’d come to believe that he was after the boy because young Ian might inherit Eleanor’s fortune once it was established that he was her child.”
“He knows Ian is mine—it’s revenge that drives him, not money!” she cried. And then pressed her fingers against her eyes as if they ached. “I haven’t the strength to worry about this Gray woman too. I have enough sorrows already.” She looked out the window. “I should never have given my child life. I went to Glasgow once, did you know? Fiona took me. To a place where abortions were done. Never mind how I found out about it, another poor, desperate woman had gone there and later confided in me. But I couldn’t go through with it. I loved Ian’s father, you see. In spite of my fear of being found out, I loved his father. . . .” She lay back, her eyes shut. “I love him still. . . .”
Hamish said somberly, “Holden is driving her into her grave—she’s likely to die before Fiona’s trial! Does he no’ ken the risk he’s taking?”
I don’t think he does, Rutledge