seemed like all night.
Joseph was getting considerably stronger. It still hurt him to walk, but far less now and he wore only a light sling on his arm. The bone was knitting well, and as long as he did not jar it he could ignore the occasional twinge.
He had been to see Gwen Neave. He was returning now across the fields, his footsteps soundless on the grass. He had meant to find out how she was, to offer any help, however slight, in the practical duties she would have to perform, although he thought she was probably extremely capable. And so it had proved. It was company she needed, and someone with whom she could speak in confidence about mounting tension in the village. Suspicion was cutting like acid into old friendships, leaving scars it might take years to heal. The Nunns and the Tevershams were whispering about each other. Someone had seen Mrs. Bateman with a foreign letter. One of Doughy Ward’s sisters had been accused of loose talk, or worse. There were fights at school. Children had broken old Billy Hoxton’s windows. It was all stupid and ugly, and growing worse.
Joseph had also felt compelled to pursue the investigation into Blaine’s death because it threatened Shanley Corcoran, and that was something he could not leave, however cruel or inappropriate it might seem to others. He had asked her about the person she had seen on a bicycle coming out of the path through the trees. He had questioned her persistently, but she could add nothing helpful.
Now he walked across the field and turned over in his mind all he knew. It was little enough. Theo Blaine had been on the edge of solving the last problem with the prototype of the invention, perhaps only a day or two from completing it. He had been having an affair with Penny Lucas, and no one was likely to tell the truth as to how serious that had been, or whether it was over, or in what circumstances.
Blaine had quarreled with his wife and gone down toward the potting shed on the evening of his death. She had said she had remained in the house, but there was nothing to corroborate that, or disprove it.
Dacy Lucas was accounted for, according to Perth. No one else was, unless you considered Shanley himself, and Archie, at the Cutlers’ Arms.
Someone had cycled along the path in the woods; the tire marks were there. Perth had estimated someone of moderate weight according to the depth of the tracks in the earth. A person of heavier build than most women, or else a lighter person carrying something. Gwen Neave had seen a man, she was adamant about that.
The fork had a raised screw that had scratched Perth’s hand when he swung it experimentally. If Blaine’s murderer hadn’t protected his hands, he would have a similar scratch. Except that it would probably be healed by now. Still, it might have been noticed by someone.
Or perhaps the killer had worn gloves. In any event, there were no fingerprints. Was it a crime of passion and opportunity? Or a carefully planned killing, and the fork simply a chance taken at the last minute?
Joseph had talked to Kerr as well, resurrecting everything he knew and had observed for himself. That had amounted to nothing of use. Perhaps he was stupid to have imagined otherwise. It had all ended in Kerr begging Joseph to deliver the sermon on Sunday.
He had stood in the pulpit and looked at the familiar faces turned toward him. He could see the squire, Mrs. Nunn, Tucky still swathed in bandages, Mrs. Gee, Plugger Arnold’s father, Hannah and the children, all the families he knew. They were waiting for him, full of confidence that he could give them some comfort and guidance.
For a moment he had felt panic seize him. No wonder Hallam Kerr was overwhelmed. Did any of the old stories in the old words answer the confusion of today? Would anyone hear the truth wrapped up in the phrases they were so used to?
He thought not. The Bible was all to do with other people, two thousand years ago and somewhere else. They would nod and say Joseph was a good man, and go out exactly the same as they had come in, still angry, frightened, and lost.
What use was religion if it was about somebody else? It was about you, or it was about no one. He had abandoned the story of Christ walking the road to Emmaus, unrecognized by the apostles, although it was one of his favorites. He told them instead of the reality of war in Ypres, where their own families were dying. He reminded them of the corpse-filled craters of no-man’s-land, and the agony endured in terrible wounds. He did not make it anything like as harsh as the reality, only enough to tear them out of their own present.
“These are our sons and brothers!” he had told them. “They’re doing this because they love us. They believe in home, the laughter and the tolerance we stand for, the things of labor and decency. If we don’t keep it a good home, if we soil it with bigotry and intolerance, if we learn how to hate and destroy, if we forget who we are, what are they dying to save? What is there left for those who survive to come home to?”
Now he stood in the grass and the sweet-smelling air, and was afraid he had said too much. No one had spoken to him afterward, and Kerr had looked gray-faced enough to be buried in his own churchyard. Only Mrs. Nunn had smiled at him, tears in her eyes, and nodded before she went on her way home.
The elms were heavy out over the fields, clouds towering high and bright into the blue of the sky, and there was hardly a sound in the wide peace of it, except for the wind and the larks.
He reached the edge of the field and the orchard gate. He unlatched it and went in. There was someone coming toward him, floundering awkwardly. For an instant it took him back to men floundering like that in the mud, the crash and thud of shells around them. But there was no sound amid the apple trees foaming with blossom, except Inspector Perth up to his knees in the uncut grass.
“We should get a scythe to it,” Joseph apologized. “Nobody’s had time.”
Perth dismissed the suggestion with a wave. He was a town man, and he did not expect to find things here comfortable. He looked grim, lips drawn tight and brow wrinkled. “I’ve bad news, Captain Reavley,” he said, perhaps unnecessarily. “Can we stay out here, sir? This mustn’t go any further. In fact I would probably be in trouble if anyone knew I’d told you, but could be as I’ll need your help before we’re through.”
“What is it?” Joseph felt a flutter of fear making him a little sick.
“The Scientific Establishment’s been broken into again and . . .”
Shanley Corcoran! He had been murdered as Joseph had dreaded. He should have done something when he had the chance. Shanley knew who killed Blaine, and he had let himself be—
“I’m sorry, Captain Reavley,” Perth apologized again, cutting through his thoughts. “Mr. Corcoran’s very upset, and knowing you’re a friend of his for a long time, I . . .”
Joseph felt his heart beating in his throat. “He’s upset? Then he’s all right?”
“Well, I wouldn’t go so far as to say ‘all right,’ ” Perth qualified, biting his lip. “He looks like a man at the end of his strength, to me.”
“You said the Establishment was broken into? What happened? Was anyone hurt? Do you know who did it?” Joseph could hear his own voice out of control, and he could not stop it. Corcoran was all right! That was all that mattered. He was dizzy with relief.
“No, we don’t know,” Perth replied. “That’s the thing, sir. Whoever it was smashed the piece of equipment the scientists were working on. Prototype, they called it. Broke it to bits. Mr. Corcoran says they’ll have to start again from the beginning.”
“But he wasn’t hurt?” Joseph insisted.
“No, sir. He was in a different part of the building. Nowhere near it, thank heaven. But he looks proper wore out, like he was coming down with the flu, or something.” He shook his head, his plain, pleasant face twisted in concern. “He’s a very brave man, Captain Reavley, but I don’t know how long he can go on like this. It looks as if there’s no question we’ve got a spy in the village, or hereabouts, and that’s a bitter thing.” His mouth was pinched as he said it and there was a downward tone in his voice, as if he had struggled a long time to avoid facing that conclusion.
Joseph looked at him with a sudden clarity, seeing not just a methodical policeman who was tackling a difficult case, but a man of deep loyalties to his country.
The blossom was drifting off the pear tree, the white petals lost in the high grasses, and a thrush was singing in the hedge.
“War changes us,” he said to Perth.
Perth swung his head around, his eyes miserable and challenging. “Does it, sir?”
“Strips us down to the best and the worst in us.” Joseph smiled at him very slightly, just a warmth in his eyes. “I think so. I’ve found heroes where I didn’t expect, as well as villains.”
“Yes, I suppose,” Perth conceded. “I’d like to put men in the Establishment to keep Mr. Corcoran safe, but I
