The Confession

Chapter 5

“Could this be Justin Fowler?” Rutledge asked.

“I’m afraid not.”

“Then you knew Fowler too?”

“He was a connection of Mrs. Russell’s, although I don’t believe she had known his family very well. She told me before he came that she’d lost touch with his mother after she married Mr. Fowler. I had the feeling that Mrs. Russell didn’t approve of him. That’s to say, of the husband. This was just after the solicitor had come to ask her to take the boy in. She said that God in his wisdom had seen fit to give her only one child. But to make up for it, God had sent her the daughter she’d never have and now a second son. I wondered later if she was as happy as she’d expected to be. They weren’t that easy to mother. They weren’t hers, after all. Then she was gone, and the boys-they were young men by that time-left to join the Army. I don’t know if Justin Fowler survived or not. I drove him in Mrs. Russell’s motorcar to meet the train to London, and that was the last time I saw him. A quiet boy, kept to himself. I didn’t know him well. But he was afraid of something. I never knew what it was.”

“Then who is the man in this photograph?”

Morrison frowned as he considered the face again. “I’m sorry. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen him before. But you said he’d come to call on you at the Yard? The man in this photograph? How did you come to believe he was Major Russell?”

“It was the name he gave me,” Rutledge said trenchantly.

“How very odd! And you tell me he was wearing the locket with Miss Farraday’s likeness in it when his body was pulled from the river?”

“According to those who found him.”

“Then I should think you ought to find her and ask her if she knows this man.”

“Before I do, what else can you tell me about the Russell household? Are there any of the staff still living in the vicinity? Perhaps in Furnham.”

“There was only a small staff. A housekeeper, of course, and several maids. A cook. An elderly groom. And I believe there was a man who acted as butler when there were guests, but generally drove Mrs. Russell when she went out. The household didn’t get on well with the local people and kept to themselves more often than not. The groom died soon after Mrs. Russell disappeared. And the cook went to live with a member of her family, when the house was closed. Mrs. Broadley. I remember how apt her name was. An excellent cook! I don’t know what became of the housekeeper, Mrs. Dunner. I was told she found employment in the Midlands. Harold-the chauffeur-stayed on as caretaker in the first few weeks of the war, then was called up. There was no one at River’s Edge after that.”

“The maids?”

“I’d nearly forgot. Nancy married a farmer’s son on the other side of Furnham. Samuel Brothers. The others went their ways.”

“Tell me how to find this farm?”

“You must drive through Furnham, and when the road curves to the left, just continue along it. The second farm you come to belongs to Brothers.”

Rutledge thanked him and took his leave. Morrison walked with him up the single aisle of the church and to the door, like a good host seeing a guest on his way.

He said as they reached the door, “I hope you can identify that poor man in the photograph. I shall pray for him.”

“Thank you, Rector.”

And then the door was closed behind him, and the rector’s footsteps seemed to echo in the emptiness of the sanctuary as he walked back down the aisle.

“He was in love with the lass. In yon locket,” Hamish said as Rutledge crossed the narrow strip of lawn to his motorcar.

“Morrison?”

“Aye, the priest.”

Rutledge remembered the sadness in the rector’s eyes as he said that Russell would have married Cynthia Farraday. Russell was more her equal than a country parson. It could explain why Morrison had found it difficult to discuss her.

He paused as he reached for the crank, and in the silence he could hear the whispers in the grass. It was easy to imagine people hidden among the reeds, some of them taller than a man. For that matter, it would be hard to find someone even twenty feet away from where one stood. It explained the difficulty in searching for Mrs. Russell.

He left the church, turning toward Furnham.

Who the hell was the man who had come into his office, claiming to be Wyatt Russell and swearing he’d murdered Justin Fowler? More to the point, who had killed that man not a fortnight later? And were the two events related? Or was there something else in the victim’s past that had led to his death?

Hamish said, “The lass in the locket will know.”

“Yes, very likely.” But finding her was going to be another matter.

Making a point to look for the turning Morrison had spoken of, he saw it to his left three-quarters of a mile from the church. He drove on, passing through Furnham and out the other side, turning away from the river’s mouth toward the farms and pasturage wrested from the marshes. The farms were not large, but they appeared to be prosperous enough. Dairy herds, mostly, he thought, judging from the cows grazing quietly. With only enough acreage for the corn and hay to feed them. He could just see the green tips of the corn in a field beyond, moving with the light sea breeze.

He found the Brothers farm and took the rutted turning that led to the house. Beyond it stood a weathered barn and several outbuildings.

No one answered his knock, and after a moment he walked round to the kitchen door at the rear. There he found a woman in a black dress that had seen happier days, inside a wire pen scattering feed for the chickens bunched and clucking around her ankles. She looked up as Rutledge came toward her, her eyes wary.

It was an expression he was growing accustomed to, here on the River Hawking.

She said, politely enough, “Can I help you, sir?”

“Good morning. My name is Rutledge. I’m looking for Mrs. Brothers.”

“And what would you be wanting with her, when you’ve found her?”

“I’m trying to locate anyone who knew the family at River’s Edge. The rector at St. Edward’s, Mr. Morrison, has told me Mrs. Brothers was once a housemaid there.”

Nodding, she emptied the bowl she was holding in the crook of her arm and walked out of the pen, latching the gate behind her. “Come into the kitchen, then.”

He followed her down the path and over the stepping-stones that led between the beds of herbs, flowers, and vegetables flanking the kitchen entrance. Someone, he noted, took pride in the gardens, for they were weeded and the soil between the rows had recently been hoed.

Inside the kitchen, he saw the same care. The cloth over the table was not only clean but also ironed, and both the sink and the cabinets below it were spotless, as was the floor.

“I’m Nancy Brothers,” she said, offering him a chair and going to stand in front of the broad dresser. “Why are you looking for anyone from the house?”

“I’m not precisely sure,” Rutledge answered her. “This locket has been found, and I’m trying to trace the woman shown inside.” He took it from his pocket and held it out to her by the gold chain. “I was told she might have lived at River’s Edge.”

Instead of reaching for the locket, Mrs. Brothers asked, “Are you a lawyer, then? Or a policeman?”

He told her the truth. “I’m from Scotland Yard. We don’t ordinarily search for the owner of lost property. But in this case, it could help us in another matter of some importance.”

Mrs. Brothers took the locket, found the clasp, and opened it. “Oh.”

“You recognize her?” Rutledge prompted as she stood there staring at the tiny photograph.

“The locket. It brings back memories,” she replied slowly. “I thought I’d put all that behind me.”

“What had you put behind you?”

She sighed, and turned her head to look out the window. “In the end it was a troubled house,” she said finally. “I’d have left if there had been anywhere to go. It’s not as if this was London or even Tilbury, where I could have found another position.”

Was she making excuses for staying on, despite her feelings about the house? He wondered whether she was lying to herself or to him.

“How troubled?”

Nancy Brothers took a deep breath. “It’s not my place to gossip about my betters.”

“I understand. That’s commendable, in fact,” he told her gently. “But it’s not a matter of gossip, you see. In a police inquiry, it’s your duty to help the authorities in any way you can. If you know something, you must let us decide if it’s important or not.”

“Mrs. Russell was wearing this locket the day she disappeared. I know, I helped her put it on, and I saw it at noon that day, when she came in for lunch. She was still wearing it.”

“What happened to Mrs. Russell? Did the police find her? Or failing that, her body?”

“That was the odd thing. They never found any trace of her. Her son saw her walking toward the landing stage at two o’clock, but no one knew she was missing until I went up to help her dress for dinner.” She turned to set a bowl that had been draining in the sink up on a shelf. “They questioned all of us, the police did. Was she anxious about anything? Was she worried? Was she frightened? Did anyone harbor hard feelings toward her? She could be a trial, sometimes, to tell you the truth, but she was getting older, and crotchety. At least it seemed so to me at the time, young as I was. Sometimes she fussed over her hair until I was fit to be tied, wanting it to be thick and pretty as it was when she was eighteen. Or the ashes hadn’t been swept out proper, when I could see they had. But you don’t do someone a harm for that, do you?”

“Was this same photograph in the locket when Mrs. Russell wore it last?”

“No, it wasn’t. It was her and her late husband. On their wedding day.”

“Then how can you be sure this is the same locket?”

“I must have touched it a thousand times. Settling it around her throat, under her hair. Making sure it was hanging proper. She took it off each evening and put it on each morning. Even if she was wearing other jewelry, this was still around her throat.” She reached for the kettle and filled it with cold water. “Can you tell me how you came to have it? Does this mean you’ve found her body? And who put that other photograph in it?”

“We haven’t found Mrs. Russell. Someone else was wearing the locket.”

“How did she come by it?”

“Before I answer your question, will you give me the name of this woman?”

She was measuring tea for the pot, but she lifted the spoon and pointed with it. “That’s Cynthia Farraday. She came to live with Mrs. Russell when her own parents died.”

“What became of her?”

“She went to live in London after Mrs. Russell disappeared. She said it wasn’t fitting to live in the house without a chaperone. Mr. Russell proposed marriage, but she didn’t want that. She wanted to be free, she said, to live her own life.”

“Who else was in the house-besides the staff?”

“Mr. Justin, of course. He was another cousin come to live at River’s Edge. After Miss Cynthia came. They weren’t related, those two. She was connected through the Russell side, while Mr. Justin’s grandmother and Mrs. Russell’s were cousins. I heard it said that Mr. Justin’s mother had died of the consumption. Her lungs was bad. I never heard anything about his father.”

“What became of Mr. Fowler?”

“He went off to war and as far as I know never come back.”

“I see.” As the kettle began to whistle, Mrs. Brothers turned to fill the teapot. Watching her, Rutledge said, “And Mr. Russell, himself?”

She stirred the leaves in the pot, peering at them as she spoke. “All I know is, he survived the war. But I don’t know that he ever came back to the house. A shame, that was. It was a lovely house. I wish you could have seen it when I was in service there. They had money, the Russells did. I often wondered how it was the family built that house out here, in the marshes. It could have been set down anywhere.”

While the tea steeped, Rutledge said, “I have a photograph to show you. It isn’t a pleasant photograph, but perhaps you will be able to identify the man in it.” He took out the envelope from Gravesend, opened the flap, and passed it to her.

She reached inside tentatively and pulled out the photograph. He saw her grimace as she looked down at it.

“He’s dead, isn’t he? This man.”

“Yes. He was found in the river.”

“The Hawking?” She glanced from the photograph to Rutledge’s face. “My husband never said anything to me about a body being found.”

“It was the Thames. Do you know him?”

“He’s changed so much I hardly recognized him at first. He was just a lad when last I saw him, all arms and legs, and polite enough,” she said slowly. “I didn’t go into Furnham that often, but he came to River’s Edge a time or two. From the village. As I remember, his father was a fisherman. I’m sorry I can’t put a name to him after all this time.” She turned away from the photograph, and Rutledge put it back in the envelope.

“Do you remember anything else about him?” When she hesitated, he added, “Was he a troublemaker? Was there gossip about him?”

“If there was, I don’t remember it now,” she answered. “But of course we didn’t mix all that much with the villagers. The staff at River’s Edge.” She smiled wryly. “We thought ourselves above them. And here I wound up marrying one of them. You never know, do you? But at the time, Mrs. Russell encouraged us not to go into Furnham. On our days off, every other week, she’d let us go into Tilbury for the day. Let us have the use of the cart, even, as long as Harold Finley drove it. And she cautioned us to stay well away from the docks.”

“You are sure this man isn’t Major Russell?”

“Oh, no, I’d know Mr. Russell anywhere. Even after all this time. I was a maid in that house for fifteen years, until Mr. Brothers come along. Yes, I’d recognize him even today, for certain.”

Throughout the questioning, Hamish had been silent. Now he interjected a comment, catching Rutledge off guard as he was setting the envelope down by the leg of his chair, out of sight. Mrs. Brothers was bringing the teapot to the table, and he glanced up quickly, certain she must have heard the voice as well. But she had turned away to pick up two cups and saucers.

“Ye ken, yon dead man knew the people at River’s Edge well enough to accuse the one of killing the ither.”

It was an excellent point.

“What was the relationship between Fowler and Russell? Did they get on?”

“They did, well enough, except where Miss Cynthia was concerned. Then it wasn’t so friendly, was it? And some of it was her doing, flirting with first one and then the other. It wasn’t serious, I’ll say that for her. Mind you, I know the difference. She didn’t fancy either of them, but she was the sort to like their attentions.”

“You didn’t care for her?”

“Not to say didn’t care for her,” Mrs. Brothers replied. “That’s too harsh a word, isn’t it? But I was not taken in by her ways. She even flirted with Harold Finley. Not in quite the same fashion, but enough to turn his head. That wasn’t fair, was it? To lead him on? But he was a fine figure of a man, tall and strong and clever as well. She couldn’t resist proving he was under her spell too.”

Harold Finley. The driver-cum-butler, when the need arose.

“How did she flirt with him?”

“She’d invent little errands where he was to drive her here and everywhere. To Tilbury to return a book to the lending library in the bookshop. To Furnham, to find a ribbon that matched her hat. Once to London to see a friend. But Mrs. Russell put a stop to London visits. A young girl like that. It wasn’t wise, was it?”

London, the den of iniquity? “No, it must not have been,” he answered.

“I don’t suppose you know how that man came by Mrs. Russell’s locket or had Miss Cynthia’s photograph in it?”

“No. But when I find Miss Farraday, perhaps she can tell me.”

“Yes, and she’ll lead you up the garden path, if I know her, unless she’s changed.” As if she’d said more than she intended, Mrs. Brothers added, “But to be fair, she wasn’t wicked, just lively and sometimes trying.”

“Did you by any chance keep in touch with her after she left River’s Edge?”

“There I can’t help you, and I’m that sorry. I never knew just where it was she went to in London. But she could have told me ten times over, and it wouldn’t have made any difference. I was never in London, you see. I did hear that the house had belonged to her parents, which isn’t much help, as she’s likely married by now and living somewhere else.”

He finished his tea, retrieved the locket from the table along with the envelope, and prepared to take his leave, thanking her.

“You never told me how you came to have Mrs. Russell’s locket.”

He owed her the truth.

“The dead man was wearing it when he was pulled from the river.”

“If this man,” she said after digesting what Rutledge had told her, “had the locket-where did he get it? Did he know what became of Mrs. Russell?”

“I wish I could answer that,” Rutledge said. “But he told the police at one time that Russell had killed Fowler.”

She shook her head vehemently. “I don’t believe a word of that. Now I could see maybe Mr. Russell taking his fists to Mr. Fowler. He had a black temper on him, Mr. Wyatt did. But murder? No.”

“But you said that they were jealous of Cynthia Farraday’s attentions.”

“If every jealous man took to killing his rival, you’d be busier than a beaver in a rainstorm!” she retorted. “What’s more, in your shoes, I wouldn’t believe someone wearing a dead woman’s locket.”

F rom the Brothers farm, Rutledge drove back to Furnham and left his motorcar by The Dragonfly Inn. It was small and for Furnham, rather picturesque, with a cottage garden in front where hollyhocks bloomed among other summer flowers.

The streets were busier now, women going about their marketing, fishermen coming up from the water, workmen standing in front of the ironmonger’s, passing the time of day. Beyond the High Street, the river was dappled with sunlight, and the boats riding at anchor were turning with the tide.

Rutledge stopped the first man he encountered. From his rough clothing, he appeared to be a laborer, and there was cement crusted in the cuticles of his fingers.

“My name is Rutledge,” he began, already drawing the photograph out of its envelope. “I’m trying to locate the family of this man.” He held it out.

The man barely glanced at it. From his flat expression it was impossible to tell what he was thinking. “Don’t know him,” he said, and brushing the extended photograph aside, he walked on.

Rutledge continued down the street, found another man just coming out of the ironmonger’s, a bolt in his hand, staring down at it as if he weren’t satisfied with the choice he’d made. He looked up when a shadow fell over his hand.

“Who are you?” he demanded, as if Rutledge had dropped from the moon.

Rutledge recognized him, the man in corduroy trousers and a workman’s shirt who had challenged him earlier as he drove along the street with Frances. He wasn’t sure, however, that the man remembered him. He repeated his earlier approach.

The man pushed his extended arm aside. “Never saw him before,” he said brusquely as he walked on.

Rutledge tried three more times, and met with the same unfriendly refusal to admit to recognizing the dead man. And there was no way to tell whether they were speaking the truth or whether the man was their long-lost brother or son.

Hamish said, “Speak to a woman.”

But Rutledge was reluctant to show the photograph to a woman. He’d done so with Mrs. Brothers because she knew the household at River’s Edge and could tell him if she recognized the face.

He had reached the end of the High Street, where the bend in the road turned slightly north toward the farms. Looking back the way he had come, he decided to try the pub. It was on the river side of the street, just before the small harbor cut into the reedy land.

He hadn’t chosen to go there first, unwilling to spread word about his search. He knew very well that the men he’d already spoken to might gossip, but he had a feeling they wouldn’t. In a pub, where men gossiped as freely as members of the Women’s Institute, rumor would fly after he’d gone, and he preferred to watch reactions for himself. Still, he needed to find a name, and Chief Superintendent Bowles would be expecting him to produce it when he’d returned to London. And Bowles didn’t care for excuses, however valid. The pub was named-not surprisingly-The Rowing Boat. And the sign above the door, swinging in the light breeze, showed three men pulling for the open sea in their small vessel, backs bent to the oars.

Rutledge stepped inside. In the dim interior, he could see two men playing cribbage at one table. Another man sat hunched over a corner table, eating a thick sandwich and drinking what appeared to be cider. The windows at the far end of the room looked out over the river, and stairs to one side must lead, he thought, down to a cellar and possibly the water as well.

Behind the bar, with its gleaming brass, the wood polished from age and generations of elbows, stood a very tall, thin man with receding gray hair. He straightened when he saw that the newcomer wasn’t a regular, and he watched Rutledge stride toward him without a word of welcome. His eyes gave away nothing, but there was a tightening in the muscles around his mouth.

His first words were, “Police, are you?” The men at the two tables turned to stare.

“My name is Rutledge,” he began without further identification, and as he passed the photograph across the bar, he repeated what he’d said before, that he was searching for the man’s family.

“Coming into money, are they?” the man asked.

“I won’t know until I succeed in finding them.”

“How did he die, then?”

“He was found in the river.”

The barkeep’s eyebrows rose, his first sign of interest. “In the Hawking?”

“Nearby,” Rutledge replied. After all, the Thames passed Tilbury. That, in terms of distances in this part of Essex, could be called nearby.

“Never seen him before,” the man said finally.

“How long have you been barkeep here?”

The question was met with silence.

“My guess is a good ten years,” Rutledge continued. “I’m told the dead man once lived here in Furnham. I should think you’d know your custom by face if not by name.”

“I have a very poor memory,” the barkeep answered him, and lifting his voice, he asked, “You there, at the corner table.”

The man had gone back to his sandwich and now looked up, his craggy brows lifted in surprise at being addressed.

“Have I ever called you by name?”

The man at the table hesitated.

“Well, have I?”

“No. Never,” the man responded at last, taking his cue from the barkeep’s tone of voice.

“There, you see?” he said to Rutledge. “And do I remember,” he went on, to the cribbage players, “do I remember your favorite beverage when you come in?”

They shook their heads, eyes wary as they stared from Rutledge to the publican and back again.

“Sorry I can’t be of help, Mr. Rutledge or whoever you are. But there it is.”

Rutledge said, “Then how could you tell that I was a stranger?”

That caught the man off guard just as he was beginning to grin at his own cleverness.

“You’d have asked what I’d have. Instead you identified me as a policeman.”

The barkeep pushed the photograph back across the bar.

“No one here can help you,” he retorted. “You’d be better off looking elsewhere, if you take my meaning.”

“Scotland Yard doesn’t take kindly to threats. I’ll have you closed down within the day.”

“On what charges?” the man demanded.

“The bar is greasy with spilled beer. The plates you’ve used to serve those men have leftover food clinging to them. And this floor is so filthy I should think a meal here would send a healthy man to his grave. The Chief Constable will be glad to know of these conditions. And as he isn’t likely to trouble himself to travel all the way to Furnham, he’ll take my word for what I’ve seen.”

“It’s all a lie. You wouldn’t dare-”

“Try me,” Rutledge said, his voice cold. And he turned toward the door, ignoring the barkeep, who was shouting abuse after him.

Rutledge had almost reached the door, his back to the bar, when Hamish said, “ ’Ware!”

He turned in time to see the man coming toward him, the heavy wooden club usually kept behind the bar raised in one hand. Rutledge had expected no less.

“Put that down, you fool. Killing me won’t stop the Yard, and you know it.”

The barkeep hesitated, a flash of uncertainty in his eyes. And then it was gone, and his intent was clear-he would finish what he’d begun.

In the next instant he was bent back over the bar, the club across his throat, and Rutledge was saying through clenched teeth as he put pressure on the length of wood, “If anyone else in this room moves, I’ll break his damned neck.”

There was a scraping of chair legs against the floor as the other patrons hastily sat down.

“Now,” Rutledge said to the red-faced barkeep struggling to breathe, “I will step back, and you will sit down in the nearest chair and conduct yourself with decorum. Do you understand me?”

The man could barely move, but he signaled with his eyes that he understood.

Still holding the club, Rutledge released him, and the man nearly sank to his knees. Catching himself with one arm across the bar, he stood there for a moment, fighting for breath, and then he moved to the nearest chair, sinking into it.

He glared at Rutledge, but the fight had gone out of him.

Rutledge said, “What was worth an attack on me? This photograph? What’s your name? And don’t tell me you can’t remember.”

“Barber. Sandy Barber.”

“Who is this man in the photograph?”

He waited, and after a moment the barkeep said hoarsely, “It’s Willet’s son. The old man’s youngest boy.”

“Who is Willet?”

“Ned Willet. He’s a fisherman. It will kill him, seeing his boy dead.”

“And who is his boy, when he’s at home?”

“That’s it, he hasn’t been home since before the end of the war. He’s in service in Thetford-Ben never wanted to be a fisherman, you see. Abigail sent for him as soon as Ned took a bad turn. But Ben never answered. Well-now we know why, don’t we? Look, he’s not got long to live, Ned hasn’t. Let him think his boy can’t leave his post.”

“Why doesn’t Willet have long to live?” Rutledge asked, thinking about Ben Willet’s stomach cancer.

“He got hurt bringing his boat back in a storm. Gear shifted and pinned his foot. It turned septic. They wanted to take his foot off and he wouldn’t hear of it. Stubborn old fool. Now there’s gangrene, and it’s only a matter of time before it takes him. You should see his leg-nearly black it’s that purple, and so swollen it doesn’t look like part of his body.” Gesturing with his chin toward the envelope Rutledge had dropped on the bar, he added, “What happened to Ben, then? You said he came out of the river.”

“Someone shot him in the back of the head. Before putting him in the river.”

There was consternation in the room. The other men, listening, stirred restlessly.

The barkeep shook his head. “Well. They’ll meet on the other side, won’t they?” he said after a moment.

“What’s Willet to you, that you would have stopped me any way you could?”

“My wife Abigail is his only daughter. Who’d want to kill Ben? We never heard of him making enemies. He could put on airs with the best of them, but no one minded.”

“Fishing is a hard way to make a living. Furnham didn’t hold it against Ben Willet that he’d escaped to a different life? Possibly a better one?”

“Ned wasn’t happy.” Barber frowned. “If anyone else felt strongly, I never heard of it.”

The older man who had been sitting alone, eating, spoke from the far end of the room. “When he came back on his last leave before sailing to France, showing off his uniform, everyone was glad to see him. I remember. My daughter fancied him. But nothing came of it.”

“You said he could put on airs. What did you mean by that?”

“He’d hobnobbed with his betters, hadn’t he? He could pass himself off as a duke, he said, if he’d half a mind to do it. He had Abigail in tears one night, she laughed so hard, describing the family he worked for, taking all the parts. It was better than a stage play.” As if realizing he was speaking of the dead, Barber added, “Aye, that was Ben.”

Rutledge recalled the man who had come to his office, passing himself off as another person, a gentleman. He had done it so well that he’d even fooled an inspector at Scotland Yard. But then he, Rutledge, had had no reason to doubt him. It was unlikely that such a man would come forward to confess to a murder he hadn’t committed.

Or had he?

Pulling out the photograph again, Rutledge said, “And you are absolutely certain that this man is Ben Willet?”

“Ask them,” the barkeep said, gesturing to the other men in the bar.

And so he did, showing the photograph to each of the three men in turn. He met hard eyes staring up at him, but in them Rutledge read recognition and certainty.

Walking back to the center of the room, Rutledge said, “And what about Wyatt Russell? How many of you know him?”

There was a silence. One of the players finally answered, “Not to say know him. He lived at River’s Edge before the war.”

“How well did Ben Willet know him?”

“I doubt they ever spoke to each other more than a time or two,” Barber said. “The Russells wanted no part of us here in Furnham. The family never has.” He appeared to be on the point of adding more, then thought better of it.

“I was told the men of Furnham helped the family search for Mrs. Russell when she went missing.”

“That was the police set us to scouring the marsh,” one of the older men answered. “It wasn’t the Russells.”

“Justin Fowler, then.”

One of the older men stirred in his chair, but when Rutledge turned his way, he said only, “I’ve heard the name. I doubt I could put a face to it.”

“He never had much to do with Furnham either,” Barber told Rutledge. “From River’s Edge it was easier to go west than turn east. There was nothing here the family needed or wanted.”

“Someone sold them fish from time to time,” Rutledge said, remembering what Nancy Brothers had told him.

“Ned would take part of his catch to the cook. Mrs. Broadley. And she was the one who paid for it. I doubt he saw Mrs. Russell five times over the years.”

“She did come once to thank him,” the lone diner put in. “I’ll say that for her.”

“Do any of you know what became of Wyatt Russell or Justin Fowler?”

After a moment Barber said, “They went off to fight in the war, didn’t they? No one opened the house again afterward. Which says they didn’t come home.”

But Rutledge wasn’t sure he was telling the truth. When he turned to look at the other men in the pub, they refused to meet his eyes, staring out at the river at their backs.

He said, “I’d like to speak to Mrs. Barber. She should know more about her brother’s years here in Furnham, before he went into service. Where will I find her?”

“Here! You aren’t showing that dead man’s face to my wife, and him her own brother!” Barber was on his feet. “And how is she to keep the news from her father? I ask you!”

“I’ll strike a bargain with you. Find a way for me to speak to Mrs. Barber and I will keep her brother’s death out of it. For now.”

The barkeep considered him. “I have your word?”

“You do.”

Barber turned on his patrons. “I’m leaving. If one word of what happened just now goes beyond this room, you’ll have me to answer to. Am I understood?”

There were hasty nods of agreement, and then Barber said to Rutledge, “Come with me.”

From The Rowing Boat they went left, and Rutledge soon found himself in a muddy lane that led north from the High Street past a row of elderly cottages. The one at the far end was barely larger than its neighbors, and here Barber turned up the walk.

“You’ll remember your word,” Barber demanded before reaching out to lift the latch and swing the door wide. Rutledge nodded.

The front room was surprisingly comfortable. The furnishings were old but well polished and upholstered in a faded dark red. A thin carpet with arabesques in deep shades of blue, red, and cream covered the floor. It seemed out of place here, somehow, but gave the room an air of worn elegance, and Rutledge wondered if it had come from River’s Edge. Sunlight spilled across it to touch the iron foot of a plant stand where the fronds of a luxuriant fern overhung a dark blue fired clay pot. To Rutledge’s eyes, it appeared to be French.

Barber left Rutledge standing there and went to fetch his wife.

After several minutes he returned accompanied by a small, plump woman with a pretty face, although she was pale and there were dark pockets beneath her green eyes, as if she hadn’t slept well in a very long time.

“Mr. Rutledge, I’ve told Abigail that you’re trying to find anyone connected with the family that lived at River’s Edge.”

“I hardly knew them,” she said apologetically. “I don’t know why you should wish to see me.”

“I’m casting at straws,” he told her, smiling, and she appeared to relax a little. “Did you know the family? Mr. Russell or his mother?”

“I knew them if I saw them in the shops, ’course I did. But not to speak to. They didn’t come into Furnham all that often.”

“How would you describe them?” he asked. And when she hesitated, he added, “There’s no photograph, as far as I know, of the family members.”

“Oh. Not even in River’s Edge?” Shyly offering him a seat, she asked, “What is this about, then?”

From behind her shoulder, Sandy Barber sent him a fierce frown.

“Alas, the house is closed.” He fell back on his recollection of his father’s methods of dealing with clients. John Rutledge had been a very fine solicitor, and his easy manner had belied his sharp mind. “A legal matter,” he told her. “To do with a certain piece of personal property that has been recovered. We don’t seem to know where to return the item.”

Reassured, she said, “Well, then. Mr. Russell was tall and fair. A friendly enough man. He’d touch his hat to us if he encountered my mother and me on the street or in a shop, and say ‘Ladies’ as he passed by. My mother always said he had good manners. But he wasn’t one to stop and ask after the children if one had been ill, or inquire how my father’s boat had fared after a high wind. Mrs. Russell, now, she would speak to my mother if she met her in a shop. She knew my father; he sometimes would take a choice bit of fish out to Mrs. Broadley, the cook at River’s Edge. ‘That was a fine bit of sole,’ Mrs. Russell would say. ‘Thank Ned for thinking of us.’ Sad that she disappeared the way she did.”

Rutledge caught Barber’s eye. The barkeep had left the impression that the Willet family had had very little to do with the Russell family. “What did local gossip have to say about her disappearance?”

“We thought she’d drowned herself. Well, it was what you’d naturally wonder about, isn’t it? Last seen walking down to the water’s edge?”

“People don’t drown themselves without a reason,” he responded quietly. “Was Mrs. Russell-unhappy?”

“Not precisely unhappy,” Abigail Barber answered, trying to remember. “I do recall my mother saying that she hadn’t seemed like herself in a while, as if something was on her mind. But then the war was coming, wasn’t it, and there was her son and Mr. Fowler, of an age to go.”

“I understand you had brothers about the age of Mr. Russell. Did they ever spend time together-go off on the river together?”

She laughed, her face flushing a becoming pink. “God love you, Mr. Rutledge, I don’t think I’d live long enough to see that day. But Ben had an eye for whatever Mr. Russell was wearing. He longed to be a footman, and someday a gentleman’s gentleman. Once or twice he went up to the house with my father, and he’d come back and say, ‘I wonder how he gets that polish on his shoes,’ or ‘He must have dressed in a bit of a hurry today. The back of his coat wasn’t properly pressed.’ He could mimic their voices too. It came natural to him.”

“Did he indeed? Was he hoping to be taken on as a footman in the Russell household?”

“Oh, no, sir, it wasn’t at all likely. Ben said he’d be best off where he wasn’t known. But what he learned would help him fit in, he said.” She glanced over her shoulder at her husband. “He was a fisherman’s son here. He said he could be anybody somewhere else.”

Ben Willet, so it seemed, was ambitious.

“How did your father take this desire to go into service?”

“He had other sons to go out in the boat with him. That was before the war, of course. Tommy and Joseph never came back from France. But Ben was always his favorite, and I think he was sorry not to have him want to go to sea.”

“Did you know Justin Fowler?”

She shook her head. “He was a cousin or some such, wasn’t he? But I never saw him, that I know of. He didn’t come to Furnham. We put it down to him being more of a snob.”

“Was there bad blood between Russell and Fowler?”

“I wouldn’t know, sir.”

He could hear a weak voice calling from another part of the house.

“My father,” she said, rising quickly. “He’s not well.”

Rutledge rose as well. “One more question. Did Miss Farraday come to the village on occasion?”

Her face hardened. “Oh, yes, I knew who she was. If you want to know, she had an eye for the lads, and no time for the rest of us.”

“Any particular lad?” he asked.

“I saw her once or twice speaking to Ben. But he told me later she hadn’t.”

And then with a hasty excuse, she hurried back to her bedside watch.

Rutledge said, “Thank you. Mrs. Barber was very helpful.”

“Was she?” Barber was urging him toward the door. He lowered his voice. “To my way of thinking you’re no closer to knowing about Ben than you were before. I told you it was no use speaking to my wife.”

“No closer to finding his killer, perhaps.”

Barber said, an edge to his voice, “Then what was that all about?”

“Catching you in several lies.”

“What lies?”

But Rutledge gave him no answer. And they walked in uneasy silence back to where he’d left his motorcar.

R utledge had stayed longer than he’d intended in Essex. He set out for London, and driving out of Furnham, he felt a sense of relief as the village disappeared in his mirror, reduced to a tiny rectangle of glass.

In the war, he’d been blessed with a strong sixth sense, which had kept him alive far more times than he’d deserved. And unexpectedly that had stayed with him as he’d resumed his career.

There was something wrong in Furnham. Not just Ben Willet’s killing, but something else that seemed to reside in the very bricks and mortar of the village. Frances had felt it and had been made uneasy by what she’d called the whispering of the grasses. If there was such a thing as a communal conscience, he thought, it was laden with guilt.

Barber had been defending his wife and her family, and that was understandable. But the easy shift from surly to murderous was not common. The club Rutledge had taken from the man could have been lethal, and the back windows of the pub looked out over the river, offering a swift passage to the sea for an unwanted body. The narrow estuary, with few shallows to trap a corpse, was at a guess not a quarter of a mile away, the current running strong.

What was appalling was Barber’s certainty that his patrons would hold their tongues if he’d killed the interloper in the pub.

Hamish said, “If someone there killed yon victim, ye willna’ ever ferret him oot.”

And Rutledge believed him.

Whatever had knit that village together so tightly, Ben Willet had escaped it. And Rutledge found it hard to believe that he’d been punished for it so many years later. What then had he done in the past few months that had put him beyond the pale?

But what to make of the fact that the body in Gravesend was not Russell’s?

What to make of Ben Willet’s passing himself off as another man while confessing to murder?

Was that what had put Willet beyond the pale? Had his conscience driven him to bring a murder to the attention of Scotland Yard in the only way he’d dared?

The next step, then, was to find Major Wyatt Russell and see what he had to say.