Watchers of Time - Charles Todd [64]
Over his head the king-post roof was dark and lovely, and the sun spilled through a great stained-glass window leaving puddles of color on the stone floor. Looking up he saw that it depicted orders of angels—he could recognize the archangels and angels, seraphim and cherubim in rich shades of yellow and blue and blood red. The orders were a very popular theme in East Anglia. In the center was the symbol of the Holy Trinity, and at the bottom were four figures he couldn’t identify, although one looked suspiciously like early portraits of Richard II and another was self-proclaimed by the scroll spilling across his lap as the Venerable Bede.
Hamish, to whom stained glass was iconography close to idolatry, was more interested in the construction of the marvelously carved wooden roof. Rutledge walked down the nave past benches capped with ornate poppy-heads, like inhabited fleurs-de-lis, and armrests carved as small animals, from dogs to griffins to ponies.
His intention was to take a closer look at the window above the high altar, but as he entered the small choir he nearly stumbled over a box of charcoal and a knee.
The woman he’d spoken to so briefly the night before was sitting on a hassock making drawings of the odd figures on the misericords—those half-seats on which a monk might rest his posterior without actually sitting down in the choir chair assigned to him.
She looked up, as startled as he was, and said, “Sorry!”
Hamish, remembering Lord Sedgwick’s comment, said, “The religious woman.”
“Did I hurt you?” Rutledge asked in concern.
“Oh, no. And it’s my fault for sprawling across the floor with my kit.”
He looked down at the drawing she was making, of a nun with ragged teeth, dramatic and lifelike in bold strokes of charcoal. “That’s quite good.”
Her expression became defensive. “It’s a hobby,” she said curtly.
To shift the subject, he gestured around him. “This is a remarkably fine church.”
“Yes, it is. I knew someone who was writing a book about old parish churches. He brought it to my attention.”
“I shan’t distract you, I only intended to look at the glass here.” He walked on, examining the window with its fine colors and vividly detailed figures.
To his surprise, she said to his back, “You’re the policeman from London, I think?”
“Yes.” He didn’t turn.
“Perhaps you could tell me—is it true they’ve caught the man who killed Father James?”
Rutledge turned slowly. “You knew him? Father James?”
“A little. He was interested in work I was doing, and I found him quite knowledgeable about East Anglian church architecture. He was generous with his time and I valued that.”
Rutledge walked back to her. Her upturned face was attractive, with intelligent gray eyes and a determined mouth above a very pretty chin. The dress she was wearing, a mossy dark green, was very becoming, but without the drama that was part of Priscilla Connaught’s apparel. “We don’t know if we have the right man in custody. There’s a good deal of work to be done before we can be certain of his movements between the day of the bazaar and the murder. But Inspector Blevins expects to clear that up quickly.”
She nodded, as if satisfied.
Yet something in her voice—or the way in which she had waited until his back was to her—had touched that deep well of intuition that Rutledge had always relied on. There had been some deeper interest than mere curiosity in her question, he thought. Probing, his mind still on Priscilla Connaught, he asked, “Were you here in Osterley when the bazaar was held?”
“No, I was in Felbrigg, having dinner with friends.”
Rutledge shifted to another direction.
“Did you see Father James the day he was killed?”
“No—”
“Was there anything about his death that worried you?”
He waited, continuing to look down at her. It seemed to make her uneasy.
Reluctantly she tried to explain. “I haven’t had much experience with murder investigations. It was probably more my imagination than anything else.