A Cold Treachery

CHAPTER SIX

The stars were just visible as Rutledge drove into the small community hugging the roadside. Shops and houses mingled against the backdrop of the lake on the right and in the shadow of high peaks to his left. The main thoroughfare was churned into muddy ruts, freezing over in the predawn cold and cracking under his wheels. Another quarter of an hour or so, and it would be morning. But now the windows were dark, the streets empty. The door to the police station was shut, and no one answered his call as he stepped inside. He went back to the idling motorcar and began to search for his lodgings.

A long ridge loomed above the village, its irregular outline smooth in the darkness, the rocky slopes shapeless under their white blanket. As if concealing their true nature. Below, Urskdale was oddly quiet, almost withdrawn. Rutledge soon found the rambling stone house that served as the local hotel-hardly more than a private home with rooms to let in the summer for walkers.

Someone had shoveled out the drive after the earlier storm, and the new fall was not as deep. Rutledge made the turning with ease and continued past the side of the house into the yard behind it. Here there was a motley collection of vehicles between the stable and the sheds-carts, wagons, and one carriage-left helter-skelter as if the arriving searchers had been in great haste. Muddy tracks led from the yard towards the sloping land beyond, soon lost in the darkness.

As Rutledge got out of his motorcar, a light came on in a ground floor window and someone peered out through the curtains. He walked around to the front of the house. After some time the door opened, and a woman asked, “You're the man from London?” Wind swirled up in their faces as she looked up at him.

She was seated in a wheeled invalid's chair, her lower limbs covered by a soft blue blanket, and he found himself thinking that she had been brave to open the door to a stranger when there was a killer at large.

“Inspector Rutledge. Sorry to arrive so late-or so early. The roads-”

She nodded. “Do come in.” With accustomed ease she turned her chair and made room for him. “I'm Elizabeth Fraser. All the able-bodied men are out searching for the child. Mrs. Cummins, whose house this is, asked me to keep a fire in the kitchen and the kettle on. She's not well, and I've been staying with her. Inspector Greeley arranged for her to put you up while you're here.”

He stepped past her into the hall and watched as she latched the door behind him before expertly guiding the chair ahead of him through another door that led to the rear of the house. He could feel the warmth as he followed her down a passage, as if a stove was beckoning him.

Or was his mind dazed with exhaustion?

Holding another door for her, he found himself in the kitchen.

It was bright with color, the walls a soft cream and the curtains at the windows a faded dark green that complemented the floral-patterned cushions on the chairs around the table. A door led to an entry from the yard.

“Would you care for a cup of tea?” She gestured to the kettle on the stove.

“Yes. Please,” he answered, already awash with it but suddenly unwilling to be alone. The kitchen was ordinary, quiet, cozy-it had nothing to do with a murdered family or the faces of a jury or the voice of Hamish MacLeod in the rear seat. Nothing to do with the overwhelming mountains outside or the duty he had come to carry out. He wanted only to sit down in one of the chairs and think about the crackle of the fire and the warmth that was spreading through him and the drowsiness that would follow. Without dreams, because the light kept them at bay and the woman in the chair somehow reminded him of Olivia Marlowe…

But Olivia Marlowe-the war poet O. A. Manning-was dead, buried in Cornwall. Beyond his reach.

Shaking himself awake, he began to take off his gloves, scarf, and coat, setting them with his hat on one of the chairs. Miss Fraser was busy with the tea, and without getting in her way he stood to one side of the great iron stove, absorbing the heat. In the cupboard she found a plate of cakes left from tea and said, “I can make sandwiches, if you are hungry.”

“Thank you, no.” He roused himself to ask, regretfully shattering the illusion of peace, “Any news? Have they found the boy?”

“Not that I've heard. One of the men fell and twisted his knee. When he was brought down, he said his party had failed to find any signs. And there haven't been signals from the other search parties. Each carried a flare…” Elizabeth Fraser glanced at the window, though the curtain was drawn. “I can't see how Josh-the boy-could possibly survive in this weather. It's been brutal-and he's so young, barely ten…” Her voice trailed off.

“Early storms are often the nastiest,” Rutledge agreed. “I wonder if the killer counted on that to cover his tracks-or if it was a matter of luck.” His limbs were on fire as circulation returned to them. The room felt stifling now, and he sat down on the far side of the table from the stove. Forcing his tired mind to concentrate, he said, “London wasn't able to give me the usual briefing. I was in Preston when they reached me. Did you know this family-the Elcotts?” He ought to be in his bed-but he wasn't sure he could stand up again.

“Not all that well.” She smiled, her face lighting with it. “Up here, there isn't what you'd describe in London as an active social calendar. We see each other at market or at baptisms and weddings, often enough at funerals. But I've met them. A very nice family. Gerald has”-she stopped and bit her lip-“ had a sizeable sheep farm he'd inherited from his father.”

She set the pot of tea beside Rutledge and then brought him a fresh cup. He had noticed that everything was to hand, rather than on high shelves. It appeared the kitchen had been designed for her. “Go on,” he urged.

“Gerald ran the sheep himself-except during the war years, when his brother, Paul, managed the farm for him. Then Gerald received a medical discharge and came home to take it up again. But while he was in hospital near London, he met Grace Robinson, a widow with two small children-the missing boy and a little girl. They fell in love and were married. Only, as it turned out, she wasn't a widow. Her husband had survived in a German camp, and came home to find his family gone.”

“And no way to trace them,” Rutledge observed, “since she had remarried.”

“Exactly so. It was the Army's fault, not his or Grace's. His name had been confused with another man's. Robinson is common enough. I expect it wasn't really easy, at the Front, to keep up with who was captured or wounded, and who had died.”

Rutledge remembered the thousands of dead, Hamish among them. Stacked like logs, rank with the stench of blood and rotting flesh. And others blown to bits, listed simply as “missing.” “I expect it wasn't,” he answered simply.

She sighed. “At any rate, they were married, Gerald and Grace, with twins on the way by the war's end. And then Robinson reappeared out of the blue. It was a shock for Grace. She hadn't seen her husband since Christmas of 1914, and even the boy, Josh, hardly remembered him. And yet-there he was.”

“A dilemma of major proportions,” Rutledge agreed. “How was it resolved?” He took one of the cakes and bit into it. Rich with egg and sugar and butter, it reminded him of boyhood treats, not the austere cooking of wartime and postwar, when many commodities were hard to come by.

“Amicably, surprisingly enough. I expect a divorce was quietly arranged, because Gerald and Grace were as quietly remarried before the birth of the twins. Robinson gave his blessing, or so I was told. The war had changed him, he said, and he didn't know how to begin again. It was rather sad.”

This wasn't the first marriage that had come apart with the long separation of the war. Some couples made do with what they had, especially when there were children, and others lived in silent wretchedness, enduring what they couldn't afford to change, socially or financially.

Hamish said, “It's as well ye didna' marry your Jean. But I'd ha' given much to ha' wed Fiona.”

It was a frequent source of contention between the two men-how shallow Jean's love had been, while Fiona had remained faithful to Hamish, even after his death. Rutledge still envied Hamish that depth of love.

Hurrying past that hurdle, too tired to argue with the voice in his head, Rutledge said, “Where does this Robinson live now?”

“Near London. Poor man, someone will have to break the news to him. I'm glad it isn't my lot.”

“And Urskdale? Did the village take these events in stride?”

Miss Fraser replied thoughtfully. “It was a nine days' wonder, of course. The whole affair. Gossip flew like smoke. And afterward everyone settled down again into the old way of thinking. Grace iswas -a lovely person, and we liked her well enough as herself.”

Her words ran together and then faded. Rutledge set his cup down with great care, aware that he was losing his battle with sleep.

“I think,” he said slowly, “that if I don't see my bed very soon, you'll have to step over me to prepare breakfast.”

He had meant it lightly, but was all at once reminded that Miss Fraser sat in a wheeled chair and was not likely to step over anyone.

Silently swearing at himself, he said abruptly, “I'm sorry-”

She smiled again. “Don't be. I'd rather everyone forgot that I don't walk. Pity is far worse than simple acceptance.”

He believed her. He wanted no pity for his shell shock. Nor reminders that he had failed himself and his men. Dr. Fleming had been right-it was better to fight through it on his own, whatever the toll.

Standing, he reached clumsily for his coat and gloves, and watched his hat roll across the floor like an oddly shaped football. Retrieving it, he said, “If you'll tell me where I shall be sleeping-I wouldn't want to walk in on Mrs. Cummins.”

“Go down the passage again, and through the second door on your right. It leads to rooms that are kept ready for guests. Yours is at the end. A hot water bottle is over there by the hearth, wrapped in a towel,” she added, pointing. “I'd recommend it. The house can be quite cold in the early morning. I'll see that you have warm water for shaving-”

“I can fetch it myself, if you leave the kettle on the stove. You must be as tired as I am, watching for my arrival.”

“Fair enough. Well, then, good night, Inspector. I hope tomorrow brings news that Josh is safe. If anyone comes, I'll wake you at once.”

“Good night. And thank you.”

His luggage was in the car and he retrieved that before making his way to his room. It was, thankfully, commodious, and his windows looked out on the distant lake. But Miss Fraser was right, it felt like ice, and the sheets were cold enough for Greenlanders, he thought when he finally got into bed. The hot water bottle, a welcome bit of warmth, made it possible to slip into quiet sleep, lulled by the wind off the fells brushing the corners of the house.

Dreams came after first light, the candle guttered and the room still dark with the long winter nights. Rutledge awoke with a start, the image of a frozen child lying deep in the snow still with him when he opened his eyes.