Littleton's face changed from the smile he used to welcome custom to a wariness that went deep.
'Who's asking?' He smoothed the leather with his fingertips, as if judging its quality without looking at it.
'Rutledge, Inspector, Scotland Yard.'
The shop was redolent with the scents of leather, wood, and polish. A cobbler's bench sat by the window and there were lasts on the shelves against the back wall. Patterns lay on a table below. And two chairs, high enough to allow the shoemaker to work on the footwear of a client without squatting, were set into the near wall, facing the counter.
'He never went to trial for what he did.' It was defensive, as if Rutledge had come to take Shoreham back to Whitby. 'So it never ended, you might say. No one let him forget what had happened. There was the young woman of course, she suffered and was scarred, mind you, but Henry also paid dearly for his drunkenness. And he never set out to hurt anybody. He wasn't that sort.'
'I'm not here to charge him. The problem is we can't seem to locate him at present. Is he still living with you?'
'If you've come this far, you know he's not here. Inspector Madsen will have told you.'
'Quite. Why did Shoreham choose to come to Addleford? Because you were here?'
'Because he didn't have two pennies to rub together. They didn't want him back at the bank. Bad for business, they said. Everyone recognized him. There was nothing else he knew how to do but clerking. When no one would take him on and his savings ran out, he left Whitby and came to me to get back on his feet. But he couldn't get the hang of shoemaking, and then a neighbor of his from Whitby moved here as well, and the story was spread about again. He decided to go to another cousin in Wales. Sheep aren't easy to manage, but they don't have to fit someone's foot just right.'
Hamish said, 'Ye canna' judge how he felt about his cousin.'
It was true, there was a distance in what Littleton was saying, as if he were discussing a stranger.
Rutledge asked, 'When did he leave?'
'I could tell he'd made up his mind, and I let him go. And the house was crowded with seven people under our roof, I'll admit it. My wife was just as glad to see him move on. But then he's not her kin, he's mine.'
'When did he leave?' Rutledge repeated his question.
'It must be getting on to a week, now.' Littleton shrugged. 'A fortnight even. One of the little ones has been ill. I've had more to worry about than keeping in mind when Henry set out. I had no way of knowing, see, that it would matter to have the exact day.'
'Did Constable Pickerel or Inspector Madsen tell you there was a dead man at Elthorpe who might be your cousin? Surely that should have worried you.'
'Constable Pickerel said nothing of that when he first came here. He was all for leaving for Wales straightaway. My cousin Llewellyn knew Henry was coming, but there wasn't a fixed date. You could have blown me over with a feather when the constable reported Henry never got there. Then Inspector Madsen came, going on about a dead man. I was afraid that it might be Henry. That he'd finally done himself some harm, out of remorse. That he never intended going to Wales.'
'Yet you felt no need to travel to Elthorpe, to be sure?'
Littleton looked him in the eye. 'It was the inspector telling me Henry was dead. Add to that, he'd never arrived in Wales, had he? So I believed what I was told. My going to Elthorpe wouldn't bring Henry back, would it? I have a wife and family to feed. A child that's ill, and the doctor is costing us more than we can pay. I have a shop that brings no money in when I'm not here to open it. Besides, we never had a suicide in our family. I'd not want that getting about.'
'Who told you it might have been suicide?' Rutledge asked sharply.
'What else could it be? I know, the inspector was hinting that it was murder. As I explained to the constable, Henry was persecuted. It might have ended differently if he'd gone to prison instead, but the woman and her husband forgave him. That turned everyone in Whitby against Henry. When the law wouldn't punish him, everyone else did. There was a great outcry.'
'You never considered the fact that Albert Crowell might have killed your cousin, that they ran into each other by accident, and Crowell took the chance offered to avenge his wife?'
'Then why did this man Crowell forgive him in the first place, if that's what he wanted to do?'
'To keep Henry Shoreham out of prison? To make sure he could be found and killed? Only he came here to Addleford and Crowell couldn't find him.'
In spite of himself, Rutledge found that it made a certain sense- perhaps explained why Crowell had chosen to teach at Dilby. Looking for Shoreham. Madsen could easily make that case.
'That was before the war-a long time to wait to get even.'
'Then you'll leave your cousin to a pauper's grave, and let the police sort out how he died?'
'I'll pay what I can for a decent burial. Inspector Madsen knows that. But I won't do more. Truth is, the scandal affected all our lives. Harboring Henry was what I had to do, because he was my blood. I'll not bring him back here and put him in the churchyard for everyone to stare at and remember.'
Rutledge could hear Martin Deloran's callous dismissal of the dead man. Did no one care what became of him?
'An interesting point of view, Mr. Littleton. Still, I'll have to speak to your wife and your neighbors. I need to know precisely when Henry Shoreham left Addleford. How he was traveling, and in what direction.'
'You're not understanding me. Henry kept to himself. Most particularly after the Jordan family moved to Addleford. I doubt my neighbors have clapped eyes on him since. He never came to town, went to church services, called in at the pub. He just sat in his room and stared out the window.'
There was evasion here, almost a washing of the hands. Why?
Rutledge had brought the folder in with him and opened it now to pull out the sketch. 'Perhaps you know this man?' he asked.
Littleton looked intently at the face. 'He's the dead man?'
'Yes.'
Littleton shook his head, then glanced up at Rutledge. 'The description Inspector Madsen gave of the body was too close for comfort. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. But this is like seeing Henry younger and happier.'
'There's no cleft in this man's chin.'
Littleton was rattled. 'Should there be? I don't see it here, and Inspector Madsen never said anything about one.'
'Shoreham didn't have one?'
'No.'
Then either Mrs. Crowell had been mistaken, or she'd lied. It had been six years. And she had been in shock and pain at the time.
'Who else besides Crowell might have wished your cousin ill?'
'If you found Henry, he's dead by his own hand,' Littleton answered stubbornly.
Rutledge considered the possibility that Littleton himself had killed his cousin. But judging the character of the shoemaker, he thought not. If the man went to prison or was hanged, who would support his family?
'Did Inspector Madsen tell you that this man, the one you see in this drawing, died somewhere else, not in the place where he was found?'
It was clear that Littleton didn't know what to make of this information. Inspector Madsen, for reasons of his own, had kept some facts of the case to himself.
'Here! I can't tell you what happened to him. He left my house, he told me he was going to Cousin Llewellyn in Aberysthwyth. Then along comes Inspector Madsen, saying he never got to Wales, that he was dead and lying in a doctor's surgery in Elthorpe. I've told the police all I can. You must ask him-Inspector Madsen-what this is all about.'
Rutledge was again reminded of Martin Deloran, willing to give any name to a dead man for his own ends. But what end could Peter Littleton have, unless he'd killed Shoreham long ago and hidden the body?
Hamish said, 'Ask yon cousin in Wales.'
Blood was thicker than water… How far would Henry Shore- ham's relatives go to protect him? Or be rid of him?
