Watchers of Time - Charles Todd [159]
Rutledge went to the washstand and looked at his face in the mirror, shadowed by beard and the dreary light coming in the windows behind him. It was not a face he was particularly fond of. Lighting the lamp, he set about shaving and dressing.
A quarter of an hour later, he walked into the kitchen.
Sims said, “If anyone came to the door and looked at the two of us, they would be ready to believe we’d had an all-night carousal. My head feels like it.” In the lamplight he was haggard, lines bracketing his mouth and heavy circles under his eyes. He had found yesterday unbearably difficult.
“I sympathize.” Rutledge reached for the pot of tea, ready to pour the steaming liquid into his cup, and somewhere in the tangle of memories from the day before, one stood out clearly.
There had been three cups on the table yesterday morning—
He looked across at Sims, who was putting a rasher of bacon on a plate, while the toast browned.
“Who keeps this house for you?”
“I have a woman who comes in three times a week. Why?”
“She wasn’t here yesterday.”
“No. She’s coming around ten today. That’s why I woke you.”
“Then who was here—besides yourself and Miss Trent?”
The Vicar became very still. “You were here.” But his eyes swept down to the teacups and back to Rutledge. He didn’t lie well, as Hamish was busy noting.
Rutledge hazarded a guess. “It was Peter Henderson, wasn’t it?”
Sims said carefully, “Peter comes sometimes, yes. When he’s hungry. He often sleeps in the church if the weather’s foul. I don’t know where he sleeps the rest of the time, poor devil.”
“A cold roof over his head, the church. With stone walls and stone flooring, he’d not be very warm.”
“There’s a chest under the tower. I keep clean blankets there. He knows where to find them.” He paused. “The church has had a long history of offering sanctuary. I can do no less.”
“Miss Trent and Mrs. Barnett tell me that he roams the night more often than not. I’ve seen him a number of times myself.”
“Yes. I expect he does. Perhaps it’s easier for him, living in the dark. Fewer people to stare at him.”
“What did he see, the night that Walsh escaped?” Rutledge insisted.
Sims put down the plate and retrieved the burning toast from the stove.
“You must ask him.”
“I’m asking you.”
Sims sat down, reached for the pot, and poured tea for himself. “Look. The man’s little more than a vagrant now. Living hand to mouth. Most of the townspeople have no use for him; they think he’s beyond the pale. His own father disowned him. I do what I can, and so did Father James. But changing attitudes is much harder than preaching profound sermons on a Sunday.”
A silence followed; it was Sims who reluctantly broke it.
“Peter was in the church that night. He wasn’t feeling well, and crept in to sleep for awhile. He was still in the church when Walsh came in to hammer off his chains. Henderson heard him dragging them; he didn’t know who or what was there. His tally of kills from the War, for all I know. It must have been rather appalling. He slipped into the choir—it’s quite dark in there, and no one was likely to find him crouched among the misericords. And he moves like a wraith when he wants to.”
“Yes. That’s his training.”
“When Walsh left, he was on foot. Henderson—who isn’t a fool, by any means—had worked out who was in the church and what it must have meant. He followed, and kept an eye on him from a distance. They walked through the woods and past the barn where Trinity Lane ends. Henderson stayed with him for nearly five miles.”
“To Tom Randal’s farm.”
“Walsh didn’t go anywhere near the Randal farm. Not according to Henderson. He was moving as swiftly and quietly as he could. Walsh, I mean. Covering the ground faster than most. Peter kept up with him until he was well beyond Osterley. Then he turned back, not wanting to be spotted.”
Rutledge shook his head. “That can’t be true. The mare at the farm went missing in probably that same time frame. And it was her shoe that killed Walsh.”
Sims said, “That’s why we didn’t tell