“They were up on the next roof,” she replied thoughtfully, remembering it as she spoke. “They can see all of this one from there. It’s not so big. Anyway, I really don’t think anybody could have been up there. We would have heard. How can you hide a gun on a rooftop? It would be obvious.”
“Not if it were poked barrel first into one of the funnels at the top of a downpipe,” he said.
Her eyes widened. “You could reach those from the dormer windows. It could be anyone who was in this house!”
“Yes,” he agreed.
“Aidan? Harry?”
“No.” He shook his head. “Neither of them had the opportunity. Harry could not have killed Sebastian—you told me that yourself. Weren’t you telling the truth?”
“Yes! Yes, I was!” she assured him. “You don’t think Aidan? But why? Not over . . .” Again the blood flushed up her cheeks. “He doesn’t know,” she said huskily.
“What about Elwyn?” he asked her. “Could he have found the gun there and taken it to kill Beecher, believing Beecher had killed Sebastian?”
She stared at him, misery and grief swimming in her eyes.
“Could he?” he repeated.
“Yes.” She nodded. “But how would he know it was there? Who killed Sebastian? I can’t believe Aidan would have, and I know I didn’t. And it wasn’t Harry, so who was it?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’m right back to the beginning with that. Who else could have put the gun up there? He would have to have come through the house.”
“No one,” she said after a moment. “It must have been somewhere else. Unless . . .” She blinked several times. “Unless Aidan was hiding it for someone. Do you think he would have done that, and Elwyn knew?”
“Perhaps, but why?” And the moment the words were spoken he knew the answer. It was back to the document again, but he dared not tell her that. “Of course, it depends upon other things,” he added.
She opened her mouth to ask, then changed her mind. “The police, the whole college, think that Harry killed Sebastian,” she said instead. “And that when he thought they were about to arrest him, he killed himself.” Her voice was shaking. “I wish I could prove that wasn’t true. I loved him very much, but even if I hadn’t, I don’t think I could allow anyone to be blamed for something terrible if I could prove they were innocent.”
“Then I think we had better go and tell Inspector Perth. I imagine we can find him at the police station in the town.”
She hesitated only a moment. She might never have to do anything that would cost her more than this. Once the words were said, she could not ever return to this privacy, this safety of unknowing. Then she took a step forward, and he followed her out of the room and to the front door.
They walked to the police station. It was less than a mile, and at this hour in the morning it was still cool and fresh. The streets were busy with tradesmen, early deliveries, shoppers seeking a bargain. The footpath was bustling with people and the roadway loud with hooves of horses pulling wagons and drays, delivery carts, and a doctor’s gig. There were several cars and a motor van with advertisements printed on the side, and, as always, dozens of bicycles. Only if one listened carefully did one hear a different tone in the voices or realize that conversations were not about the weather and there was no gossip. It was all news, carefully disguised anxiety, forced jokes.
Perth was busy upstairs, and they were obliged to wait over a quarter of an hour in tense, unhappy impatience. When he finally arrived, he was less than enthusiastic to see them, and only when Joseph insisted did he take them to a small, cluttered office where they could speak without being overheard.
“Oi don’t know what you want, Reverend,” Perth said with barely veiled impatience. He looked tired and anxious. “Oi can’t help you. Oi’m very sorry about Mr. Beecher, but there’s an end to it. Oi don’t know if you’ve seen the papers this mornin’, but the king o’ the Belgians has gone against his own government and mobilized all his armies. There’s a whole lot more at stake than any one man’s reputation, sir, an’ that’s something we can’t tossle about no more.”
“Truth is always worth arguing about, Inspector Perth,” Connie said gravely. “That’s why we fight wars: to keep the right to rule ourselves and make our own laws, to be who we want to be and answer to no one but God. Dr. Beecher did not kill himself, and we believe we can prove it.”
“Mrs. Thyer—” Perth began with exaggerated patience.
“You never found the gun, did you!” Joseph exclaimed. “Until it was by Dr. Beecher’s body.”
“No, we didn’t,” Perth admitted reluctantly, anger sharpening his voice. It was a failure he did not like having pointed out to him. “But he must have known where it was, because he got it back again!”
“Did you search his rooms?”
“O’ course we did! We searched the whole college! You know that, sir. You saw us.”
“There must be somewhere you missed,” Joseph said reasonably. “The gun did not dematerialize and then reappear.”
“Are you bein’ sarcastic, sir?” Perth’s eyes hardened.
“I am stating the obvious. It was somewhere that you did not look. I have spent some time considering where that could be. You looked on the roof, didn’t you? I can remember seeing your men up there.”
“Yes, we did, sir. Very thorough, we were. Not that there’s a lot o’ places on a roof as you could hide a gun. Quite a big thing, a revolver, an’ not the same shape as anything else. Not to mention that metal shines in the sun.”
“What about the bucket at the top of a drain pipe?” Joseph asked. “With the barrel pointing down and the top covered with, for example, an old handkerchief, suitably dusty, and a few leaves?”
“Very good, sir,” Perth conceded. “That could be. Except we looked.”
“How about the downpipes on the master’s lodgings?” Joseph asked. “Did you look there, too?”
Perth stood absolutely still, his face frozen.
Joseph waited, aware of Connie holding her breath beside him.
“No,” Perth said at last. “We reckoned . . . nobody’d be able to hoide anything there unless they went through the master’s lodgings to do it. Are you saying as they did?” The last was addressed to Connie.
“Elwyn Allard was in and out of the house a great deal while his mother and father stayed with us,” she replied, her voice very nearly steady. “He was there within an hour of Dr. Beecher being shot.”
Perth stared at her. “If you’re saying that he shot his brother, Mrs. Thyer, you got it wrong. We thought o’ that. Lots of families don’t get on all that well.” He shook his head dismally. “Brother killing brother is as old as the Bible, if you’ll excuse me saying so. But we know where he was, an’ he couldn’t’ve. You’d not understand the medical evidence, mebbe, but you’ll have to trust us in that.”
“And Dr. Beecher didn’t do it, either,” she said, her voice tight as if her throat would barely open. “He was with me.” She ignored Perth’s expression of incredulity. “I am perfectly aware of what time it was, and of the impropriety of it. I would not admit to it lightly, and I can barely imagine what my husband will feel if it has to be public—or what he will do. But I will not allow Dr. Beecher, or anyone else, to be branded for a crime they did not commit.”
“Where were you . . . and Dr. Beecher, madam?” Perth asked, his face sour with disbelief, and perhaps disapproval.
Connie blushed, understanding his contempt. “On the Backs along the river, Inspector Perth. At this time of the year, as you say, the daylight hours are long, and it is a pleasant place if you wish to talk unobserved.”
His expression was unreadable. “Very interesting, Oi’m sure. Why didn’t you mention this before? Or has Dr. Beecher’s reputation suddenly got so much more important to you?”
Her face tightened. She was white about the lips. Joseph could see how intensely she would like to have lashed back at Perth and withered him, but she had already given away her weapons. “Like others, I’m afraid I thought Sebastian Allard had been blackmailing him over his regard for me and the indiscretion of it for both of us,” she replied. “I thought he had killed himself rather than have it exposed, which he believed was going to happen because of the investigation into Sebastian’s murder.”
“Then who did kill Sebastian, Mrs. Thyer?” Perth asked, leaning forward a little across the desk. “An’ who put the gun down the drainpipe on your roof? You? If you’ll excuse me saying so, we only got your word that Dr. Beecher was with you. Same as we only got his word that you was with him . . . an’ he ain’t here to back you up.”
