Search the Dark - Charles Todd [132]
“I shall have to take Henry in for questioning,” Rutledge said. “Will he understand what I’m doing and why?”
“Of course he will,” Joanna said sharply. “He’s not a fool. But it won’t be necessary. He didn’t kill those women. I did.”
He looked at her, infinite pity in his eyes. To protect her son …
“How many have there been?”
“It started in London. I’d taken rooms near the hospital while Henry was there recovering, and they’d let him out of hospital, in my care, with a nurse to come three days a week. He tried once to unpin her hair, and she screamed, and he choked her. She was very angry, she threatened to tell the doctors, to have Henry put away. I gave her a great deal of money and bought her passage on a ship leaving for New Zealand. And that was that. Afterward, I watched him very carefully. But when Betty came to the house, to tell me that Simon was giving her an introduction to the Napiers, Henry was alone with her in the parlor. I was finishing the washing up. I didn’t know, I thought he was out. I didn’t know until I heard her scream. I offered her what money I had and told her she’d be better off going to London with a small fortune in her pocket than settling for being a maid to the Napiers. And she went. But the money didn’t last. She came back, demanding more.”
Joanna Daulton shuddered. “I couldn’t give her any more. I didn’t have any more to give. But she was a greedy little bitch, she threatened to have Henry put away, and in the end I had no choice but to kill her. It was horrible. I hated myself, I hated her, I hated having to connive and lie and live with such a thing on my conscience. I told myself, in future I shall never let him out of my sight again, I’ll watch even more closely. It won’t happen again, I could see he was showing great improvement—”
“But he wasn’t, was he?” Rutledge asked gently. “He has never fully recovered. He never will.”
“No.” The word seemed stark and anguished, matching her eyes. “And I shan’t be there to care for him. He will have to go back to hospital now whether I want him to or not.”
“The next woman he was alone with was Margaret Tarlton, looking for someone to drive her to the train.”
She sighed. “I hate to say this about the dead, but Margaret Tarlton was worse than Betty. I knew, from something Richard Wyatt told me once, when he and Margaret had a stormy affair in 1913, that she had a way of getting whatever she wanted. I think she’d have married Richard, if he’d had enough money to satisfy her. And now she had the power of the Napiers behind her. She was hard, and very angry, very unforgiving. I didn’t have any money to offer her. She said she didn’t care what happened to Henry. She said it was what he deserved.” Joanna Daulton turned to Aurore. “I told her, You aren’t a mother, or you’d understand. But she said it doesn’t matter, he belongs behind bars, he isn’t stable. We argued again outside Singleton Magna. I was driving your car, Aurore, there wasn’t enough petrol in mine. I’d walked over to the farm and borrowed it, and all the way to the train Margaret Tarlton was insisting on going to the authorities in Singleton Magna. I couldn’t persuade, I couldn’t bribe—she made me stop the car and put her out. That’s when, God help me, I took that stone you keep in the back of your car and I killed her! And that poor man Mowbray took the blame, because to save him, I’d have had to destroy my own son!” Her voice twisted in anguish.
Aurore said, “Don’t—for God’s sake, don’t!”
Mrs. Daulton said, “I’m glad it’s over. I thought when I heard Elizabeth scream tonight, it will go on and on and on, until one day I can’t bear it anymore. But I love him, you see. I really wanted him to be whole again. I told myself that Simon was recovering—Henry could recover too. I told myself a hundred lies. I told myself that I could make Henry well myself, if I had time enough and peace enough. It was all so terrible. But I couldn’t harm Elizabeth. I’ve known her almost