tight, inward look about his eyes. The limp was more pronounced as he came to take Rutledge's order, and he leaned against the table.
'Been on it too much,' he said, aware of Rutledge's perception. Then he shrugged. 'It's the stairs that are the worst. The doctors say it will pass in time.'
But he sounded dejected, as if he had stopped believing in them.
Rutledge spent what was left of the afternoon talking to Inspector Forrest in his office about the names in his notebook. It was better than being alone, better than letting Hamish reach him again too soon, and it was a way of thinking aloud that might lead to something that the local man knew and he didn't. An idle hope, he realized, when he'd finished and Forrest sat there in silence, reflectively scratching his chin and staring at the ceiling as if half expecting to find an answer written there.
'What do you think?' Rutledge repeated, trying to keep his impatience out of his voice.
'None of them is likely to be your murderer,' Forrest said, unwittingly emphasizing your as if setting himself apart from the whole business. 'Take Miss Wood, for a start. I've never seen a cross word pass between her and the Colonel, no, nor ever heard of one. And he'd have given her whatever she wanted; there'd be no need for trouble over it.'
'What if she wanted what he couldn't give her?'
Forrest laughed. 'And what would that be? I can't think of a thing she didn't already have! She's a lovely girl, nothing mean or selfish or strong-headed about her.'
'Well, then, Wilton?'
'He was marrying the girl. The surest way to lose her would be doing a harm to the Colonel, much less killing him. Here, just before the wedding? It would be insanity! And what if they did argue the night before the murder? What if it is true? You can't make much out of that-not enough for murder, if you ask me! Not without more evidence than we've got.'
'Then why won't Wilton come straight out with the truth and tell me what caused the quarrel?'
Forrest shrugged. 'It could be something that happened in France, something only the two of them know about. Maybe something that Captain Wilton thinks the Colonel wouldn't want known, even after his death. A personal matter.'
'Yes, that's what he said,' Rutledge replied, and got up to pace, unable to sit still while he talked. 'But we don't know, do we, and as long as we don't, I intend to keep the quarrel in mind. Mrs. Davenant?'
'A very well respected lady. She wouldn't be very likely to have a hand in murder. And what reason could she have for it anyway?'
'I don't know. Was she ever in love with the Colonel? Or with Wilton?'
'There's never been a hint of gossip. If she was in love with anyone but her husband, she kept it to herself. And somehow I can't picture her stalking the Colonel with a loaded shotgun in her hand. If she was jealous of Lettice Wood, killing the Colonel wouldn't help her any.'
'Unless the Captain-or Lettice Wood-was blamed for it.'
'If the Captain's blamed for it, she's going to lose him to the hangman, isn't she? And I can't see how she'd put the blame onto Miss Wood. Besides, if there was any real threat to Miss Wood, I can see Wilton stepping in and saying it was his doing, the Colonel's death-to protect the girl. And Mrs. Davenant ought to know that as well as I do. It would be a risk, wouldn't it? One she'd have to consider.'
'And Catherine Tarrant?'
Forrest was suddenly wary. 'What's she got to do with this, then?'
'I know about the German. Linden. She wanted to marry him, and she wanted Harris to clear the way for them. Instead, Linden was taken away and he died. Women have killed for less, and what she felt for Linden wasn't a girl's infatuation, it was passionate and real.'
'You're on the wrong track! Miss Tarrant might have wanted somebody else to suffer too, once she found out what had happened to the German-she was that upset. Yes, I'll grant you that much. But you don't bide your time, you don't wait for a year or two, not when you feel the way she did then! You come in a rage for revenge, hot and furious.'
'Then you think she's capable of seeking revenge?'
Forrest flushed. 'Don't put words into my mouth where Catherine Tarrant is concerned! I said she was that hurt, she might have done something foolish straightaway, out of sheer mad grief and shock. But not murder.'
Rutledge studied him. 'You like her, don't you? You don't want to think of her as a killer.'
Forrest answered stiffly, 'I've always been fond of the girl, there's nothing wrong in that. And you don't know how people in Upper Streetham shunned her when they found out about her and the German. Treated her like dirt, the lot of them. My wife among them. As if she'd done something unforgivable.'
'How did they find out? About Linden?'
'I never did learn how. But I had my suspicions. She tried to move heaven and earth to find out where they'd sent the German, and people started to talk. Gossip, speculation, but nothing anybody could pin the truth on. So I think Carfield was to blame-he was in Warwick when she came back from London on the train, and he offered to drive her home. She was half sick with grief-she may have blurted out the whole story without thinking. And he's one to pry, he could have gotten around her. At any rate he made some pious remarks on the next Sunday about loving our enemies and healing the wounds of war, just when the reality of the war was coming home to all of us, the cripples and the wounded- and the dead. And the next thing I knew, the story was racing all over Upper Streetham that Catherine had been expecting to marry the prisoner, only he'd died. That there had been something between them. That she'd even slept with him. And the damage was done.'
'I've heard Carfield was courting Lettice Wood.'
'Oh, yes, indeed. He'd have liked to marry the Colonel's ward-but how much he cared for Miss Wood is anybody's guess. There are those would say it was little enough, that he isn't capable of loving anybody but himself. And it's true, I've never seen a man so set on his own comfort.' His mouth turned down in distaste. 'All right, he's a man of God, but I don't like him, I never have.'
'Royston? What do you know about him?'
'A good man. Hardworking, reliable. There was a time when he sowed his share of wild oats, his place at Mallows going to his head a bit, and he was one for the girls too. But he settled down and got on with his life soon enough.' Forrest smiled. 'Well, we're none of us free of that charge.'
'Nothing between him and the Colonel that you know about, which might have led to murder?'
'I can't think of any reason for Mr. Royston to shoot anybody.'
'He hasn't married?'
'He's married to Mallows, you might say. There was a girl years back. When he was about twenty-six or - seven. Alice Netherby, a Lower Streetham lass, pretty as they come and sweet with it, but frail. She died of consumption and that was that. He's always gotten on very well with Catherine Tarrant, but he's not her sort, if you know what I mean. A countryman. And she's a lady. A famous artist. I've a cousin, living in London. He says her work's all the rage.'
'Which brings us back to Mavers, doesn't it?'
'Aye,' Forrest answered with regret. 'And it doesn't seem very likely that we'll prove anything against him, worst luck!'
The interview with Forrest left Rutledge feeling dissatisfied, a mood reinforced by an encounter with Mavers on his way back to the Inn.
'You don't look like a successful man,' Mavers said, his goat's eyes gleaming with maliciousness. 'You've got my shotgun, but you haven't got me. And you won't, mark my words. I've got witnesses, as many as you like.'
'So you keep reminding me,' Rutledge said, taking his own malicious pleasure in the sight of Mavers's swollen nose. 'I wonder why?'
'Because I enjoy seeing the oppressors of the masses oppressed in their turn. And you might say that I have
