Watchers of Time - Charles Todd [120]
Rutledge found his shoes and stockings, pulling them on hastily, then ran his fingers through his tousled hair. “All right, let’s be on our way.”
Hamish was saying, “I canna’ believe he’d run. It’s sure proof against him!”
May Trent, in a dressing gown, her hair in a dark plait over one shoulder, was at her door as he strode into the passage. The words found their way into the jumble of thoughts in his mind: She’s damned attractive—
“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Is there something amiss?”
The constable started to answer her, but Rutledge said, “No, it’s a problem at the station. I’ve been sent for. Go back to sleep, there’s nothing to worry about.”
There was doubt in her face, but she nodded and went back into her room, shutting the door. As he turned toward the stairs, he heard the click! of the lock behind him. Just as well, he told himself. But Walsh had no reason to come here. . . .
They let themselves out quietly, and Mrs. Barnett, in dressing gown and slippers, shut and locked the door behind them.
As the two men walked fast up Water Street to the station, Rutledge said, “You were on duty, then?”
“Yes. Walsh was asleep when I checked at midnight, snoring like the wrath of God. He always does—you can hardly hear yourself think!”
“And?”
“Close on to two o’clock, I heard him making an odd sound. As if he was choking. I went back to the cell, wary because Inspector Blevins had warned me he might try something. But there he was, hanging from the top bars, choking his life out, kicking like a mad horse. I opened the door, to get him down from there, but he was tangled in a shirt, and I had to struggle to make any headway. Then his fist came down on my face as I managed to lower him, and I hit the back of my head on the door. That’s all I can tell you.”
“And he made a run for it. All right, what else?”
“For the life of me I don’t understand why he didn’t kill me! He could have done, easily enough, and there’d be nobody to raise the alarm. As it was, it took me all of a minute to shake off the blow, I was that dazed, and half sick. But I got to my feet and went after him, running out of the station and looking in both directions. I couldn’t think he would go to the quay; there’s nowhere to escape there. I went up Water Street and looked up and down the main road. I couldn’t see anything, or hear anything. I went on to Inspector Blevins’s house. It took him nearly five minutes to come down and open the door, and then he was accusing me of rousing the children with my clamor!”
Excitement had loosened the young constable’s tongue, and he was finding it hard to conceal his reaction to Blevins’s rebuke when he’d been trying to carry out his duty. Stumbling on the cobbles, he caught Rutledge’s arm to steady himself.
“You should see the doctor,” Rutledge told him as they walked through the open door of the station. All the lights were lit, and another constable was waiting for the two men.
“You’re to stay here, Harry, and wait,” he said to Franklin. “If you’ll come with me, sir, I’m to take you to the vicarage.”
“Give me two minutes,” Rutledge said, and he walked back to the cell. Looking in, he could see that by standing on his toes, Walsh could have reached high above his own head to an exposed pipe coming out of one wall and crossing to the other side, wrapping his twisted shirt around it like a rope, and giving every appearance of a man hanging there.
After all, as Hamish was pointing out, the man was used to entertaining crowds. He would have put on a good show.
Long enough, at least, to lure the gullible young constable into the room.
Hamish said, “Blevins will have his hide!”
Rutledge silently agreed. He turned on his heel and followed the second constable—Taylor, was that his name?— out to the street.
By the time they had reached the vicarage, they could already see that all the lights had been turned on, giving it a strangely festive