'I was there. Before they moved it. Half the town came to look. I couldn't believe he was dead. Not after going through the war unscathed.'
'Oddly enough, that's what Royston said.'
Wilton nodded. 'You sometimes meet people who appear to have charmed lives. There was a pilot in my outfit who was at best a mediocre flier, shouldn't have lasted a month, but he was the damnedest, luckiest devil I've ever known. Invisible in the air, the Germans never could see him for some reason, and he'd find the field in any weather, instinct almost. Crashed five times, and walked away with no more than a few bruises. I'd thought of Charles as having a charmed life too. I knew my own chances for surviving were slim, but we'd plan to meet, Charles and I, in Paris on our next leave, and I always knew he'd be there, waiting. Whatever happened to me.' Wilton shrugged. 'That was comforting, in a strange way-certainty in the midst of chaos, I suppose.'
Rutledge knew what he meant. There had been a Sergeant in one company who always came back, and brought his men back with him, and men wanted to serve with him because of that. The Sergeant's reputation spread across the Front, and someone would say, 'It was a bad night. But Morgan made it. Pass the word along.' A talisman-bad as the assault was, it hadn't been bad enough to stop Morgan.
He'd asked the sergeant once how he'd managed it, when he ran into him on a mud-swallowed road out in the middle of nowhere, moving up for the next offensive. And Morgan had smiled. 'Now, then, sir, if you believe anything hard enough,' he said, 'you can make it happen.'
But by that time, Rutledge had lost his own will to believe in anything, and Morgan's secret wasn't any help to him. He often wondered what had become of the man after the war…
Wilton looked at the light through his glass, almost as if it held answers as well as liquid amber, then said quietly, 'I was as surprised as anybody when I made it through to the end of the war.'
Rutledge nodded in understanding. He himself had gone from being terrified he'd die to not caring either way, and then to the final stage, wishing it would happen, bringing him to a peace that was more desirable than life itself.
Returning to Charles Harris, as if he found murder an easier subject than war memories, Wilton cleared his throat and went on. 'As I said, I had to see for myself. My first thought was, My God, Lettice, and my second was, I still don't believe it's true-'
He stopped. 'Sorry, you can ignore that,' he went on, when Rutledge made no comment. 'I wasn't trying to sway your judgment.'
'No.'
Wilton took a deep breath. 'I hear that Hickam is dead drunk at Dr. Warren's. Or ill. The story varies, depending on which gossip you listen to.'
'What else does gossip say?'
'That you haven't found much to go on. That you're floundering in the dark. But that's not true. I know what's in the back of your mind.' He smiled wryly.
'If you didn't kill Harris, who did?'
'The comfortable answer would be, 'Mavers,' wouldn't it?'
'Why not Hickam, who claims he saw you speaking to Harris-arguing heatedly with him, in his words-in the lane? Why isn't it possible that he knew where to find a shotgun, and decided, in that confused mind of his, that he was off to shoot the Boche? Or to kill an officer he hated? He wouldn't be the first enlisted man to do that. In fact, he might just as easily have chosen you as his target as Charles Harris. A toss-up, given his drunken state.'
The look of stark surprise on Wilton's face was quickly covered, but it told Rutledge one thing-that Hickam's story might very well be true, that he'd seen the Captain and the Colonel quarreling. For Wilton had taken the bait without even questioning it. He'd immediately recognized the twist that could be put on Hickam's evidence, and his mind had been busily considering that possibility just as alarm bells had gone off reminding him that-in his own statement- Hickam hadn't witnessed any meeting at all, angry or not.
'I suppose I'd never thought he was capable of such a thing,' Mark answered lamely. 'Shell-shocked-mad, perhaps-but not particularly dangerous.' Feeling his way carefully, he added, 'And it probably wouldn't matter whether he actually saw Charles that morning or just thought he did. Well, it does make a certain sense out of this business. I can't imagine anyone in his right mind shooting Charles. It would have to be a Mavers. Or a Hickam.'
Which was all very interesting. Taking another shot in the dark, Rutledge said, 'Tell me about Catherine Tarrant.'
Wilton shook his head. 'No.' It was quiet, firm, irreversible. He emptied his glass and set it down.
'You knew her well when you were in Upper Streetham before the war. You were, in fact, in love with her.'
'No, I thought I was in love with her. But her father was wise enough to see that it wouldn't do, and he asked us to wait a year or two before we came to any formal understanding.' He turned in his chair, easing his stiff knee. 'And he was right; a few months apart, a dozen letters on each side, and we soon discovered that they were getting harder and harder to write. I think we both realized what was happening, but there was never any formal ending. The letters got shorter, then further apart. I'm still quite fond of Catherine Tarrant, I admire her, and I like her work.'
'Was she painting then?' There was a clatter in the kitchens, someone dropping a tray, and then Redfern's voice, sharply taking whoever it was to task.
'Oddly enough, nobody seemed to recognize how talented she was. Yes, she'd mention something about a painting. But you know how it was before the war, most well-bred girls tried their hand at watercolors or music-it was rather expected of them.'
Rutledge recalled his sister's lessons, and smiled. Frances could sing beautifully, but her watercolors had generally been a welter of slapdash color sent running over the paper with an enthusiastic and generous hand. Not one, to his certain knowledge, had ever seen a frame. She had studied assiduously, searching for subjects and giving grandiose names to her work, but her teacher had finally written, 'Miss Rut- ledge makes up in spirit what she lacks in talent,' and to everyone's relief, the lessons had ended there.
Wilton was saying, 'And no one thought anything about it when Catherine said, 'I'm doing a portrait of that old woman who used to milk cows for us, remember her? She's got a wonderful face.' ' He glanced wryly at Rutledge. 'Least of all me! I wasn't interested in anything that didn't have wings to it! But that one later won a prize in London. When I went to her first exhibit, I was stunned. I wondered where in God's name Catherine had found such power of expression, such depth of feeling. How she'd come to change so much in such a short time. But she hadn't changed-it was there all along, and apparently I'd been blind to it. I suppose that's the difference between infatuation and love, if you come down to it.'
'And Linden? Had he brought any of these changes about? Found the woman somewhere inside the sweet, untouched girl you'd met before the war?'
Wilton's mouth was grim. 'I've told you. Ask Miss Tarrant about her personal life.'
'Then you disapproved of the affair?'
'I was in France, trying to stay alive. I couldn't have approved or disapproved, I didn't know. Until much later. In fact, it was Charles who told me, the first time he brought me down to Mallows. He thought I should be aware of it, before I ran into her. But Catherine has never spoken of Linden to me.'
'Did she blame Colonel Harris for not handling their case properly with the Army? Or blame Lettice for not making it clear to her guardian that Catherine was serious about this man?'
'I don't know, I tell you. Except that Charles would have done what he could. If he'd known. For Catherine's sake if nothing else. He'd been fond of her.'
'But he didn't know?'
'I can't answer that. I can tell you his headquarters was swamped with people's letters, wanting news about their sons, their husbands, their lovers. He said once it was the hardest part of his job, reading such letters. Sometimes they were sent to the wrong place, or lost.'
'Surely not a letter from his ward? That wouldn't have been shoved in a sack with dozens of others and forgotten?'
This time Wilton stood up. 'You're putting words into my mouth, Rutledge. I don't know what went wrong over Linden. I don't suppose anyone does. I'm sure that Charles would have done his best for the pair of them, he would try to help Catherine. My God, he did what he could for anyone in Upper Streetham in one way or another, so
