dead, you see, and she's ill, rather a dreadful illness I'm afraid, and he takes her to the doctor in Lincoln for treatments. I expect he doesn't know how long she may have to live, and if she does, how long she will need to convalesce.'
'Why tell me this? Why not speak to Frances directly?'
'If I tell her, I'm betraying a confidence from a friend. But Frances came to me for answers, and I know how wretched she is. I'm hoping you'll find a way to assure her that it isn't personal.'
'I'll do my best.' He hesitated. 'Is she in love with Simon, do you think? Or is this a passing fancy? I've been busy, and there hasn't been time to find out.'
'I think she's lonely, and sometimes that palls. Simon is single, attractive, and of her own social set. If she isn't in love with him, she may believe she ought to be. And that could go a long way toward explaining her unhappiness.'
He hadn't considered that possibility. It put matters in a different light.
They had reached the Smithy and stood beside it, gazing at it but not really seeing it. He thought that Frances was not the only problem that Mrs. Channing had brought with her.
After a moment she said, 'I shouldn't have come. This could have waited.'
'I'm glad you did.'
In the darkness her face was a pale blur framed by her hair. 'Ian. I only just heard about Jean Montroy's death.'
He took a deep breath. 'It was a surprise.' Inadequate, but that was all he could manage.
'Yes, it must have been. I'm sorry.'
Rutledge turned away, listening to the roar of Hamish's voice in his ears, and not understanding any of what he was saying.
'What did the poet say? That the saddest words of tongue or pen were what might have been? It's true. If we'd been married in the summer of last year, the child might have been mine. But it wasn't, and if she was happy, I'm glad. Her happiness was brief enough.' He walked a short distance, then came back. 'Who told you?'
'It was in the Canadian newspapers, of course, and a friend sent me the cutting. I wondered if you would like to have it.'
He considered that, and in the end, said, 'Thank you. No. At least not at present.'
'Of course.' She put her hand on one of the stones that formed the Smithy and said, apropos of nothing, 'Whoever was buried here must have been famous in his day. I wonder what his life was like, and his death.'
'I don't suppose there's any way to know. Although the local smith will tell you that there's still treasure to be found inside.'
'Perhaps he's right. Well, it's late, and I must be on my way. I'm staying with friends a few miles from here, and they'll be wondering what's become of me.'
They walked back to the inn in a comfortable silence, and he found it soothing. 'Where is your motorcar? I didn't see it when I came in.'
'I left it in the kitchen yard. Mrs. Smith thought it best.' He could hear the amusement in her voice. 'I don't think she quite agrees with women driving.'
He turned the crank for her and said, as she pulled on her driving gloves, 'Thank you for coming.'
'I wasn't sure it was the right thing to do. Good night, Ian.' And with that she drove out of the inn yard and went on her way.
He watched the rear light disappearing down the road before turning back to the main door and going inside.
Rutledge didn't sleep well. He was awakened by the sound of guns firing in the distance-artillery, German, he could tell-and realized after the first startled instant that they were in his head. He'd been dreaming about the Front, and it had stayed with him even though he had awakened from it. The inn was quiet around him, and he lay there listening to the night.
In the darkness he heard Hamish saying, 'Why did a friend send yon widow a cutting aboot your Jean?'
It hadn't occurred to him to question that at the time, but it struck him as odd now. Why had she really come? To see how he was mourning Jean? Or to be certain that the news hadn't eroded his narrow margin of safety, his tenuous grip on sanity? He wasn't sure how much Meredith Channing knew about his war. Sometimes it seemed that she guessed more than he was prepared for anyone to know. But then she'd been at the Front, a nurse in the forward aid station closest to his section. She had seen men in every state between living and dying and somehow managed to keep her own sanity intact. There was a well of something there, understanding perhaps or sympathy, even knowledge. But no pity. He couldn't have borne that from anyone.
A rooster crowed in the distance, and Rutledge reached for his watch, lighting his lamp long enough to glance at it. Dawn would be breaking soon.
And with it, what? Another murder? Another day of chasing a truth that didn't want to be discovered?
Sometimes he thought that Gerald Parkinson would be happier in an anonymous grave rather than one where he wasn't wanted.
After a time he drifted again into sleep, his last thought one that had grown out of his conversation with Meredith Channing.
A murderer would have put Parkinson's body in Wayland's Smithy and called his death a suicide.
When he came down the next morning, Mrs. Cathcart was eating her breakfast at the table that was usually his, but he made no move to join her. She seemed to be in better spirits, and Mrs. Smith had been carrying on a running conversation with her as each dish was brought in. The subject under discussion was affairs at the cottages, and they had reached the point of debating whether Partridge was one of the victims or not.
'He's not been seen for some time. But the police were there, in his cottage, and nothing was said about finding him,' Mrs. Cathcart was saying.
'He would come here sometimes to talk with the lorry drivers. The distance to this place or that, what accommodations might be had, what kind of weather he might expect. I didn't know for the longest time that he was from the cottages-I thought he'd come in from Uffington. Horrible to imagine him murdered. Are they quite sure of that?' Mrs. Smith asked over a rack of toast.
Rutledge asked, 'Did he ever talk about his visit to Liverpool?'
It was Deloran and his men who had tracked Parkinson there. And Rutledge had never been satisfied that Parkinson hadn't lured them there, to keep his watchers from guessing what he'd really done during his brief absences.
But neither Mrs. Cathcart nor Mrs. Smith could answer that question.
Mrs. Smith was called away by two drivers just in, and Mrs. Cathcart was still sitting over the last of her tea when he left the inn.
Hamish said, 'She believes her husband willna' think to look for her here.'
It was true-The Smith's Arms was hardly a place where the Mrs. Cathcarts of this world spent their days. But she seemed less anxious this morning, as if she had slept well enough.
Rutledge drove as far as the foot of the lane and pulled the motorcar to the verge. The sun was watery as he walked up to the cottage occupied by Mr. Allen. The smith had fashioned a wrought-iron SIX in a Gothic script for Allen's door, giving it a distinction the other cottages lacked.
The curtains twitched in the front window before the door was opened to Rutledge's knock.
'Taking precautions,' Allen said in explanation as he moved aside to let Rutledge inside the small entry. 'I'm dying but have no interest in hurrying the process.'
'Miss Chandler, who once lived in Brady's cottage, sends you her regards. She was pleased to hear that you're still alive.'
He smiled. 'She didn't belong here. But beggars can't be choosers. I'd wondered if her good fortune was truly that.'
'It appears to have been.'
'I wish I were well out of here myself. This business of murder practically on one's doorstep is not good for any of us, I expect. I've found it hard to sleep. I spoke to Miller this morning, and he agrees, if we had anywhere else to go, we'd be off. I'm not up to travel, sadly. I'll have to take my chances.'
'What does Miller think about events?'
'He's a rather timid man, and he overcomes it with bluster. Once you get past that, he's all right. Though I
