Proof of Guilt

Chapter Sixteen

His forty-eight hours at an end, Rutledge presented himself at the door of Markham’s office and, after the briefest hesitation, resolutely knocked.

“Come,” the Acting Chief Superintendent said, his tone of voice indicating that he was busy.

Rutledge stepped inside the door. “Inspector Rutledge reporting, sir,” he said when Markham didn’t immediately look up.

When he did, he pushed back his chair and gestured to the one opposite. “That business in Staffordshire? The police there found the murderer this morning, just before dawn. He was asleep, mind you. Soundly asleep after what he’d done. I can’t fathom it, can you?”

As he knew next to nothing about events in Staffordshire, Rutledge could offer only “No, sir.”

“Well,” Markham said, setting aside the papers in front of him. “What are we to do about Essex?”

“I’ve told you my feeling on that score, sir. We should investigate Diaz.”

“Yes, yes, you’ve made that clear. But I think we must act on what we know, rather than speculate about an old man’s dreams of vengeance. I looked over your interview of the doctor at the clinic. He saw no reason to keep the man locked up. And he’s the professional viewpoint. I don’t hold with all this mumbo jumbo from Austria, delving into a man’s mind. But the good doctor has dealt with Diaz for what? Years? And I should think that by now he’d know Diaz better than his own mother and possibly more objectively. We must accept his opinion and go forward from there.”

He reached for a file, opened it, and went on. “Did Gibson tell you? The trunk in Portsmouth is empty of bodies. It contained the clothing of a gentleman traveling home. But that was good thinking on your part. A clever way to take a body off the ship without being noticed. But I’d like to know. If Traynor had been in that trunk, who killed him? Gooding was on shore, mind you. He couldn’t have done it. Would you lay the killing at Diaz’s door?”

“He hasn’t left Surrey. But I should think he could have had murder done.”

“If that had been the case, I’d be forced to agree with you. But Traynor was not in that trunk, and he isn’t aboard the ship. And Gooding was intending to meet him when he arrived in England.”

“Put that way, I must agree with you.”

“Yes. So here we are. Mr.Traynor missing. Gooding very likely the last person to see him alive. And once Traynor is quietly out of the picture, Gooding can turn his attention to ridding himself of French, if he hasn’t already. What we don’t know is how involved the granddaughter is. Certainly it appears that she had driven French’s motorcar at some point. To the quarry, most likely. And then she went home with her bicycle, only she was clever enough not to claim it at the other end of the line. She could walk home if need be. Less likely to be noticed, I should think.”

Rutledge could find no fault with Markham’s reconstruction of events. And presented in such a way, almost in the same way a K.C. would open his remarks to the jury, it sounded imminently logical.

Rutledge found himself thinking that Markham should have read law. He would cut an impressive figure, summing up for the prosecution.

He said, “It is most certainly possible. But what if we’re wrong? What if this isn’t the way it happened? The killer could have met Traynor as he disembarked, told him that Gooding had sent him, and Traynor would have gone with him without suspicion. There are a dozen dark stretches of road or a small wood where the driver could have killed Traynor and disposed of the body. Everyone would assume that Traynor was still in Lisbon awaiting a ship sailing for London. As they did.”

“Are you suggesting that we should search Hampshire for his body?”

It was useless to argue about what Markham had already decided was the train of events.

“It would be prudent to discover if there were any unsolved homicides on the road north from Portsmouth.”

“As we have no body, I’m agreeable to that request.”

That was the only concession Rutledge could wring from the Acting Chief Superintendent.

Rutledge left Markham’s office with instructions to take Gooding into custody forthwith, on suspicion of the murder of the partners of his firm. And Miss Whitman was to be taken into custody as an accomplice.

Relieved—for if she was convicted on that charge, she would be spared hanging—he left the Yard and drove directly to French, French & Traynor.

When he was ushered by a junior clerk into Gooding’s office, the man rose from his chair and said, “I can tell by your expression. You’ve come to take me into custody.”

“I have no choice, Gooding. We are searching for Traynor’s body in Hampshire, and I have asked Hayes and Hayes to look into the Last Will and Testament of Afonso Diaz’s father, to see whether he was disinherited or not.”

“And Valerie? What’s to become of her?”

“She is to be taken into custody as an accomplice.”

Gooding sat down heavily. “No. She cannot go to prison. I won’t allow it.”

“There’s nothing you can do.”

“There is.” He reached into his desk drawer and drew out several sheets of paper. Taking up a pen, he began to write without hesitation, as if he’d already planned what to say. When he had finished and signed at the bottom of what he’d written, he passed it to Rutledge. “A full confession,” he said. “See for yourself.”

And it was. Gooding admitted to killing Lewis French, transporting him in his own motorcar to the quarry in Surrey, and, having struck a man walking along the road because it was late and he was very tired, deciding to use the man as a decoy. He also admitted to having killed Matthew Traynor, meeting his ship, taking him to a place where no one could hear his cries, and throttling him, as he had French. He ended the statement, I have acted alone throughout. I did these things because I had worked very hard for this firm most of my adult life, and I felt when the partners got together here in England, they were planning to replace me and give the position to a younger man.

Rutledge said, “Is any of this true?”

Gooding smiled, but Rutledge couldn’t read it.

He thought, Two old men, Diaz and Gooding. It would be easy enough to walk away, accept the statement at face value—

Hamish cried, “ ’Ware!” just as Gooding reached into the drawer a second time.

Rutledge was already across the desk, his left hand clamping down hard on Gooding’s right wrist and his other hand holding the drawer only half open.

Gooding cried out from the pain but fought hard. The door behind Rutledge burst open, the junior clerk who had admitted him rushing into the room.

“The revolver—in the drawer. Get it,” Rutledge ordered.

The clerk stopped short, staring at the two men, Rutledge awkwardly across the desk, Gooding struggling to free his hand and pull the drawer wider.

“Get it,” Rutledge ordered again, this time in the voice that had commanded frightened men going into battle.

The clerk ran forward, came between them as Rutledge let go of the drawer, and reached inside. His face was white, his hand shaking, but his eyes went to Rutledge’s face as his fingers touched whatever lay inside.

Gooding gave up the struggle then, leaning back in his chair, his eyes closed.

The clerk pulled out a revolver, an older one but just as lethal as if it had come from the Front. He was handling it so gingerly that Rutledge could see Gooding gathering himself to reach for it, his eyes flying open and almost black with his determination. Rutledge took the revolver out of the clerk’s trembling hand and flung himself back across the desk, nearly tripping over his own chair before he got his feet under him again.

Gooding said, rubbing his wrist where Rutledge could see the white marks of his fingers turn slowly to red, “It’s easier than hanging.”

Angry, Rutledge replied, “It is. You should have done it before I walked into the room.”

Smiling wryly, Gooding said, “I had hoped . . .”

He didn’t handcuff the man. He said, “You must come with me.”

Gooding took his statement, folded it properly, and asked the junior clerk to find him an envelope. He exchanged it for his ring of keys and slid the statement inside. Handing it to Rutledge, he said, “For God’s sake, let us go.”

He started for the door. The junior clerk, still standing by the desk, said to Gooding, “But, sir—please, sir!”

Rutledge said, “Put in a telephone call to Miss French. Tell her what’s happened.”

He followed Gooding down the passage and outside to the motorcar.

Without a word, the man got in and waited for Rutledge to turn the crank.

As they were driving through the City, Rutledge said, “You know that if you’ve lied, it will be found out—because the bodies are not where you tell us they are.”

“If I were dead, the police would assume that I’d taken their resting place with me. It was the way I’d planned it.”

Naïve, yes, but with the case closed, would the Yard continue to put men and time into the search for the dead? Miss French could of course keep up the pressure to find the bodies of her brother and her cousin, but in the end, it would be one of the unanswered questions of the Yard’s history.

Gooding alive could be questioned over and over again. Tripped and confused, he might inadvertently cast doubt on his granddaughter’s innocence, on what she could have known, and leave her increasingly vulnerable. He would have to keep a clear head, he would have to keep his wits sharp, and it would mean walking a very thin, dangerous line to convict himself and not Valerie.

Hamish said, “If he had shot himsel’, ye would blame yoursel’.”

And Rutledge would have done, because he didn’t have the evidence to clear Gooding.

“But are ye thinking o’ the lass, or the grandfather?”

Gooding said, “Will you speak to Valerie? The police will tell her terrible things and frighten her with threats. I don’t suppose they will let me see her. Tell her—tell her that I love her very much, and that I did what I did for the sake of the firm.”

“I don’t expect they will let me go back to Essex. If I do, I’ll tell her.”

“Yes. Well. It can’t be helped.” Scotland Yard was just ahead. “What will you do now?”

“Go where I am sent.” Rutledge debated, then said, “If you know where the bodies of French and Traynor are buried, tell them. Or they will use Miss Whitman as a lever. Is her father still alive?”

“Sadly, no. He died somewhere off the coast of Ireland a month before the war ended. And his brother died in France. He was a doctor. His heart gave out.”

There was no one, then, to help her.

“I’ll do my best,” Rutledge promised.

“She isn’t guilty. Whatever value you may give to the handkerchief as a clue, she did nothing.” Gooding was speaking rapidly now, trying to say what had to be said before the motorcar stopped. “She had no reason to kill Traynor.”

They were at their destination.

Rutledge got out and helped his prisoner out of the motorcar. He seemed to have aged in the time it had taken to drive to the Yard, his feet stumbling over the verge as he tried to put a good front on what was being done to him.

Rutledge made a note to ask for a suicide watch.

And then he opened the door, nodded to the Duty Sergeant, and began the process of charging Gooding with murder.