made up his own rules. But Rutledge had a feeling that the encounter had gone beyond curiosity. A fishing expedition, then?
He was just stepping into the motorcar when the inn’s clerk came to the door.
“Are you leaving, then?” he asked hopefully. “I’ll fetch your valise for you.”
Rutledge shook his head and drove off toward River’s Edge, leaving the clerk looking after him with frustration writ large on his face.
A s far as he could tell, after he’d left the motorcar and walked up to the gate, nothing had changed there. The chain was still looped between the pillars, and the high grass showed his passage but not, he thought, that of someone else.
Unless someone had walked in his tracks.
He made his way up the drive to the house, remembering last night and his care not to be seen until he was ready to show himself. And that had been wise, given the weapons he’d found in the study. Now he went boldly toward the house across the open ground, and around to the terrace. It was one thing to shoot an intruder in the dark, and quite another to fire on him in the light of day.
Instead of mounting the steps, he scanned the river for any sign of watchers. Where, for instance, had Cynthia Farraday met Ben Willet?
“Ye canna’ tell. You do na’ know the coves and inlets. Ye’d require field glasses to be sure.”
Rutledge turned to study the margins of the lawns, that line where the cultivated grass ended and the marsh began. How much draining had it taken to rip this estate out of the marsh’s grip? Or had this been a naturally higher stretch of land? He could see for himself that there were half a dozen places that might be the beginning of a track through the reeds, but striking out into one of them would be foolish at best, unless one knew what he was about. And how often did the tracks shift? Would Russell have been able to find his way after all this time? Rutledge was reminded, in fact, of a maze, with its artificial twists and turns intentionally leading the unwary down blind alleys.
There was the river, of course, to help keep one’s bearings, but as the ground rose in hummocky patches and dipped into small wet pockets, even that guide could disappear.
He was beginning to understand how Mrs. Russell could vanish so easily. But was she alive-or dead-when she did?
Turning to climb the steps to the terrace, he debated whether or not to go inside. If Russell was there, walking in uninvited could be considered trespass. And laying siege, in the hope to see him come out of his own accord, was wasting time.
What was the man’s state now? He’d left the house in Chelsea after slapping Cynthia. Not hard, but enough to shock both of them. His body was battered from the motorcycle accident, and he knew he was being hunted. Did he see himself as a man with a damaged mind who had burned his bridges?
There was a good chance that Russell had never intended to stay here, and every intention of dying here by his own hand.
Rutledge crossed to the door and tried it. It was still unlocked, just as he’d left it. But when he swung it wide, the morning sun fell across a muddy footprint on the floorboards just inside.
He hadn’t risked turning on his torch, and there was no way of knowing if it had been there last night before he’d seen the man out by the landing, or not. Squatting beside it, he touched the rim of mud. It was hard, dry. And the shape didn’t match his own boots; it was longer and wider. He cast about for any indication that the wearer of the shoe had gone out again.
Two or three crumbles of mud were caught in the threads of the carpet a stride away, but after that he could find nothing.
Straightening, he called, “Russell? Major Russell, are you here?”
The words seemed to echo through the house, loud enough to be heard by anyone inside, but even though he called again, no one answered.
Hamish was reminding him that he was here, where the Yard couldn’t reach him if new developments occurred in London. Or, for that matter, if something happened to him out here on the Hawking.
But he took his chances and walked into the garden room, taking care not to destroy the footprint or add his own.
He went directly to the study, to look at the gun case. If Russell was here and armed, he wanted to know it before encountering the man.
He opened the glass door. The shotguns were just what he’d expected, used for hunting. Below were the revolvers. And he would have sworn last night that there were only two in the case.
Now there were three.
Chapter 16
He stood there for a moment, thinking. Remembering how the cold metal had felt as he touched the handguns in the dark.
Yes, just the two last night, he was sure of it. He couldn’t be mistaken. Not with weapons.
The third was a service revolver, and it was the same caliber as the one that had been used to kill Ben Willet. It appeared to have been cleaned recently, no way of knowing when it had last been fired. The science that could tell him was in its infancy, and not always trustworthy.
Taking out his handkerchief, he examined the other revolver. Fired, but not cleaned since then.
He set it back where he’d found it.
More to the point, how had this third handgun magically appeared in less than twenty-four hours?
Did it mean Russell had finally come home?
What did this have to do with the man he’d seen last night? He’d been upstairs in the master bedroom, after searching the ground floor and then the first floor. Could the man have come in and set the revolver in the gun case? The house was large enough that neither man would necessarily have heard the other’s movements. What had taken him to the water’s edge before he left? Did he think he was safe enough that he could take his time about leaving? Or was he looking for signs of a boat along the riverbank? If the tide was out, there could have been a rowboat riding low in the water.
No answers to any of his questions.
Rutledge listened to the house. The maker of that footprint could still be here, and for all he knew, the revolver could have been used here.
He remembered that Timothy Jessup had mentioned seeing him at River’s Edge, and asked if he intended to buy the property. But Rutledge, as aware of his surroundings as any man of his experience could be, had not seen Jessup.
Frances was right. One could conceal a battalion out there in the grass.
There was nothing for it but to search the house again, and then the grounds.
But they yielded nothing. Save for the footprint and the revolver, he would have been prepared to swear that he’d been the only living soul inside River’s Edge last night.
Closing the terrace door behind him, he walked down to the water’s edge. No sign of a boat here, but at the second landing, while he couldn’t find any proof that anyone had come in here, he found the faint imprint of a man’s boot in the damp earth just above the high-water mark.
He squatted there, studying it. It appeared to belong to the same foot as the one in the house, but the soft earth hadn’t preserved it as well as the hard surface of the wooden floor.
Standing again, he looked back at the house, beyond the kitchen gardens and the few outbuildings, and felt a rising frustration with Major Russell. Where the hell was the man?
Halfway back to Furnham, just beyond the turning that led to the Rectory and the churchyard, Rutledge saw Constable Nelson pedaling toward him on his bicycle. Rutledge slowed.
“Looking for me?” he asked.
Nelson stopped. Rutledge could see that he was sober, although haggard, as if he had finished the last of his stock. “No, sir. But I will ask. Did you see a loose mare back the way you’ve just come?”
