When he could relax his concentration on the road, Rutledge considered what Bowles had told him. The chief superintendent took a perverse pleasure in giving out as little information as possible to any subordinate he didn’t like. But everyone at the Yard knew that it was one of the methods Bowles used to weed out men he didn’t wish to see climb the ladder of promotion.
The victim, Quarles, had a place of business in Leadenhall Street and thus lived in London. Who then was taking over that part of the inquiry while Rutledge was busy in Somerset? It would be revealing to have the answer to that.
Rutledge drove on through the mist with only Hamish for company, the voice from the rear seat, just behind his ear, keeping up a running commentary. Hamish had been—for him—unusually silent during the weekend, his comments brief enough to be ignored. It was never clear why Hamish sometimes had nothing to say. Like an army that had lost contact with the main body of the enemy, Rutledge was always on his guard at such times, distrustful of the silence, prepared for an attack from any quarter when he least expected it.
Dr. Fleming, who had saved Rutledge’s sanity and his life in the clinic barely twelve months ago, forcing him against his will to acknowledge what was in his head, had promised that his patient would learn to manage his heavy burden of guilt. Instead, Rutledge had become a master at hiding it.
All the same, he answered that voice aloud more often than he liked, both out of habit and because of the compelling presence he could feel and not see. He stood in constant danger of disgracing himself in front of friends or colleagues, drawing comment or questions about the thin edge of self-control that kept him whole. Shell shock was a humiliation, proof of cowardice and a lack of moral fiber, never mind the medals pinned on his breast. And so the tension within himself built sometimes to intolerable levels.
It was the only scar he could show from his four years in the trenches.
Unlike Edgar Maitland. His men had commented on his luck, watched him with misgivings at first, and then with something more like fear.
Many an inexperienced officer gained a reputation for reckless daring and wild courage, believing himself invulnerable. More often than not, he died with most of his men, not so much as an inch of ground gained.
But the young Scots under Rutledge soon realized that their officer put the care of his men above all else, and so they had followed him into whatever hell was out there, across the barbed wire. Knowing he would spare them where he could, and bring them back when he couldn’t.
And that had finally broken him. Aware of the faith put in him, trying to live up to it, and watching men die when it was impossible to save them—even while he himself lived—had taken an incalculable toll of mind and spirit. Hamish’s unnecessary death had been the last straw. Finding a way back had somehow seemed to be a final betrayal of the dead.
In that last dark hour before the spring dawn, the road Rutledge had been following rounded a bend and swept down a low hill into a knot of thatched cottages. Then, like a magician’s trick, the road became Cambury’s High Street, leading him into the sleeping village.
The mist that had kept pace with him most of the way was in tatters now, a patch here and there still lying in wait, and sometimes rising to embrace the trees on the far side of the duck pond. The Perpendicular church tower, to his left, loomed above the clouds like a beacon.
The village’s modest prosperity was visible in the shop fronts and in the houses that lined the street. Typical of Somerset, there was an air of contentment here, as if the inhabitants neither needed nor expected anything from the outside world.
He noted several lanes that crossed the High Street, vanishing into the darkness on either side. Like Dunster, whatever Cambury had been at the height of the wool trade, when it had had the money to build such a church, it was now a quiet byway.
What, he wondered, had brought Quarles here? It wasn’t the sort of village that had much to offer a wealthy Londoner. Unless there were family ties to Somerset . . .
Hamish said, “Ye ken, it’s a long way to London.”
In miles and in pace and outlook.
An interesting point. What reputation did Quarles have here, and was it different from that of the man of business in the City? And could that have led to murder?
He saw the police station just ahead and pulled over.
Inside a constable was waiting for him, yawning in spite of himself as he got up from his chair to greet Rutledge.
“You made good time, sir,” he said. “I’m to take you along to the house straightaway. My name is Daniels, sir. Constable Daniels.”
For the second time that night, Rutledge helped a constable lash his bicycle to the boot, and then the man cranked the motor for him, before getting in and shutting the door.
“Where are we going?” Rutledge asked as Daniels directed him out of the village.
“The house is called Hallowfields. This was mainly monastery land once, and there’s a tithe barn built to hold whatever goods the local tenants owed the monks as rent.”
The High Street had turned back into the main road again, and as they crested a slight rise, walled parkland on their right marked the beginning of an estate.
“The tithe barn is on his property, and so Mr. Quarles set himself up as squire, taking over from the monks, you might say.”
“Was this popular in the village? Surely not?”
“He wasn’t the first owner to claim squire’s rights, but as he was mostly in London, it wasn’t hard to ignore him. Though some of the farmers came to him for help when their crops were bad or their plows broke or their roofs leaked.” Daniels grinned at Rutledge, his face bright in the reflected glow of the headlamps. “A costly business, being squire. There, you can just see the gates coming up ahead. We’ll pass them and turn instead at the entrance to the Home Farm.”
Hamish said, “He doesna’ grieve o’er much for the dead man.”
A pair of handsome iron gates, disembodied in the mist, closed off what could be seen of the drive before it vanished into the night, a gray ribbon that appeared to go nowhere.
They came to a break in the wall, where a small, whitewashed gatehouse marked the way into the working part of the estate. The cottage was very pretty, with roses climbing up the front, framing the windows and the single door.
“Here we are, sir.”
“Does anyone live there?” Rutledge asked, nodding at the gatehouse.
“No, sir. It’s been empty for some time.”
Rutledge turned into the lane that led to the farm, and almost immediately his headlamps picked out a track bearing to the left.
“That way, sir, if you please. We don’t go as far as the farm.”
Rutledge bumped into the rutted track that curled through a copse of trees. Ahead, his lights picked out the rising bulk of a gray stone building that appeared to block his way. The mist lingered here in the trees, as if caught among the branches, and then without warning he drove into a thicker patch, like cotton wool. It swallowed the motorcar, and he felt the sudden shock of claustrophobia as the track seemed to vanish as if by magic, leaving him in an opaque world. Just as suddenly he came out into a small clearing, where a bicycle and two other vehicles were clustered together, as if for comfort.
At the edge of the clearing stood the tithe barn, vast, dark, and hunched, as if it had lurked there for hundreds of years, waiting patiently for the return of its builders.
Judging from the size of it—a good 200 feet long and possibly closer to 250—this part of Somerset had been prosperous under the monks’ rule. The roof soared high above their heads as they got out of the motorcar, and something about the way it loomed in the darkness and shreds of mist was almost evil.