The Red Door Part 28

"All the same, it was interfering with the scene of a murder." He paused. "Peter Teller is dead."

"What? How? By his own hand?"

"We don't know yet. Early days."

"My G.o.d." Cobb shook his head in disbelief. "She'd have been a widow after all. As for the cane, I wouldn't have kept it, gold or not. There's blood on it. Constable Satterthwaite made certain to point it out."

"We'd like to ask you one last thing. What became of the rosewood box with Mrs. Teller's letters in it?"

"I wouldn't have taken them. What good were they to me? But they meant a lot to her. It would be like taking Timmy's photograph. A cruelty."

"What else was in that box? The deed to the house?"

"How do I know? I never saw the contents. Only her reading a letter to Jake." He frowned. "Even my mother-in-law saw her reading them. She thought it was a love letter from me. And didn't I get a flea in my ear! But I could look her in the face and tell her it wasn't true. The only time I'd ever written Florence Teller was when Timmy died, to tell her how sorry I was over his loss. I doubt she kept it."

Into the brief silence, he said to Rutledge, "You haven't asked me if I killed her. Only what I had to say for myself."

"Did you kill Florence Teller?"

Beside him he could feel Satterthwaite stir and then be still again.

"I did not. If I hang, I will tell the hangman I never touched her."

"Then who did? Teller?"

"He must have done."

Rutledge turned away.

The constable holding the lamp said, "Will that be all, then?" He s.h.i.+fted it to his other hand, preparing to close and lock the cell's door.

"No. Not yet." Rutledge walked away, through the gloom of the station and out into the cool morning air.

Satterthwaite's silent accusation, as if Rutledge had betrayed him, kept him from thinking, and the beaten spirit of Lawrence Cobb, feeling his own sense of betrayal, clouded the issues.

And what were they? A dead woman. A broken cane with blood on the k.n.o.b. A missing box of letters. Those were the facts, irrefutable, and the evidence must encompa.s.s them or it was faulty.

It was also a fact that Teller-or someone-had driven away around the same time Florence Teller was murdered. And Larkin, a walker, was a witness to that. The cane was a witness as well to Peter Teller's presence. If he'd been chary with information about his regiment while living here in Hobson, he'd never have left that at Sunrise Cottage in his absences. It hadn't been there for the killer to find ready to hand, until Teller himself brought it.

Teller-or Cobb? Where did the truth lie?

He walked on up the street, shops still closed, the milk van making its rounds, the sound of clinking bottles off in the distance, a crow calling from the church tower down another street, and wheels somewhere clattering over cobbles. A dog trotted up behind him, sniffed in his direction, and trotted on, looking for company. A cat in a house window silently meowed at him as he pa.s.sed.

Go back to the evidence.

Hamish said, "It hasna' changed."

And that was true. It hadn't altered. Going back over it was fruitless.

Rutledge swore.

He needed a night's sleep, to clear his mind. But there wasn't one in the offing.

Hamish was right. The evidence was the same. What was new?

The cane's head had been found. Peter Teller's regimental crest on it showed that Peter had been in Hobson, at Sunrise Cottage, on the day of the murder.

But that was all it showed. It couldn't speak and identify who had used it.

Cobb's words came back to him: She found the body. If she'd seen the cane and realized that the head was gold, she'd have taken it. She's like a magpie . . . She found the body. If she'd seen the cane and realized that the head was gold, she'd have taken it. She's like a magpie . . .

And Satterthwaite's voice: Mrs. Blaine reached for the paperweight, and I had to push Cobb back to the only cell. Mrs. Blaine reached for the paperweight, and I had to push Cobb back to the only cell.

After that, his own: What else was in that box? The deed to the house? What else was in that box? The deed to the house?

Cobb again: She'll offer to buy Florence's land. See if she doesn't. She'll offer to buy Florence's land. See if she doesn't.

He could hear Mrs. Blaine threatening to wring Jake's neck, because he didn't talk, he only made a terrible racket.

Hamish said, "Aye, it wasna' the letters."

Rutledge turned on his heel and walked briskly back to the police station. He found that Satterthwaite had brought chairs to the cell door, and he and Cobb were staring at each other like mastiffs circling each other looking for a weakness.

Rutledge said to the Thielwald constable, "Handcuff him. I want to take him with us."

"Back to Hobson?" the constable said.

"Where?" Satterthwaite demanded.

"Just do it," Rutledge told them. "I'll be in the motorcar."

And he walked away.

His mind was on Hamish. Cobb in front, Satterthwaite in the back. And then both of them could watch Cobb.

The two constables emerged from the station with Cobb between them.

"This is most irregular. Sir?" the constable was saying.

"It's all right. He'll be back within the hour. Front, Cobb. Sit just behind him, Satterthwaite."

They did as they were told. One look at Rutledge's face, and none of them was willing to risk argument.

They drove in silence out of Thielwald to the road for Hobson, and then took the turning for Sunrise Cottage.

"We're going back to the house?" Satterthwaite asked.

Rutledge didn't answer, his mind on what was to come.

When he drove past the cottage and turned into the rutted lane to the Blaine farm, Satterthwaite said, "Here, you can't call on her at this hour!"

"She keeps a dairy farm. She was up milking at four." Drawing up at the front of the house, he said, "Cobb, stay here. And keep watch." He strode up to the door and knocked. "Let me do the talking," he told Satterthwaite.

"If you'll just tell me, sir-"

But the door was swinging open, and Mrs. Blaine was standing there, a basket of eggs under her arm.

She stared at them suspiciously. "Inspector. Constable. I was just about to candle the eggs." Then she saw Cobb in the motorcar, and said angrily, "What's he doing here? He's a dangerous man."

"If he's smart, he's doing precisely what I told him to do," Rutledge said. "May we come in?"

She was still blocking the door, but she said now, "I'll tell you flat out I found it hard to believe he was a killer. Just shows you, doesn't it, that you can't be sure about people, however well you think you know them. And so I shall say at the inquest."

"This isn't about Cobb. I've come to tell you that the parrot does talk."

Her eyes widened, but she said only, "We heard it. It said good night to Lieutenant Teller." She stepped aside. "You'd better come in, then."

"Thank you."

They followed her through to the kitchen where she set the basket of eggs to one side of the sink, then turned to face them.

"There's a witness who heard the bird exclaim 'No. No. No.' in some distress. We've come to believe that this was the moment when Mrs. Teller turned from her a.s.sailant and tried to escape.

"A witness?" Mrs. Blaine asked warily.

"The person who is presently caring for the bird."

"Did it mention a name?" She waited, her eyes on Rutledge's face. "It would know Cobb. He was always there. Couldn't stay away."

"You found the body. Is that correct?"

"I told you-I was off to market and I often asked if there's anything Mrs. Teller needed. That's why I saw her in the doorway."

"After she'd been dead for what? Two days?"

"It's you and the constable there who said two days. I couldn't tell."

"You brought Jake here, to keep him safe, is that correct?"

She was more comfortable now. "Yes. Poor thing, someone had to have mercy on him."

"But you were prepared to wring his neck when you discovered he couldn't name her killer."

"I-who said he could name him? It was you, wanting to take him to London with you."

"You found the body. You'd taken Jake without telling the police. What else was there? Did you see that the cane had a heavy gold head? And did you think the rosewood box might hold more than letters? That the deed to the house might be in there as well? After all, there were no heirs."

"Here!" she exclaimed. "You can't prove any of that. Except that I took the parrot out of pity for it."

"There's no one else who would have taken the box. She was alive when Peter Teller saw her, and she would never have given the letters up-"

"Peter-but I was told he was dead."

"But he was there that day. It was his cane you picked up. And he owns the house with the red door, now that his wife is dead."

Her face flushed. "If it was Teller who came back, why didn't he stay? Why did he leave? I don't believe you."

"I don't know the answer to that. Still, he must have spoken to Florence. She must have turned him out. Perhaps she decided that she preferred Lawrence Cobb after all."

"She did. Betsy-"

She stopped.

"Betsy asked her?"

"I was about to say-"

"Mrs. Blaine. Was it you or your daughter who murdered Florence Teller?"

Satterthwaite's breath came out in a hiss, but he said nothing.

"Murdered her? It was that husband of hers, I tell you. You've seen the proof."

"I don't think it was Cobb. Teller came to see his wife, and she sent him away. Or he said what he'd come to say and left. We'll never know. And someone came along just after that. Was Mrs. Teller sitting on her step crying? Or standing at the door looking as if she'd seen a ghost? Someone stopped. A woman. And misunderstanding what was said when Florence was asked what was wrong, one of you suggested she go back inside, and as she turned, one of you picked up the cane her husband had dropped in his own shock and grief, and struck Mrs. Teller with it, then panicked and left her there."

"There's not a word of truth-"

"And then," he went on inexorably, "when no one found her, you had to be the one to call the police. You couldn't wait any longer."

"It's Cobb-"

"Cobb didn't have the box of letters. Teller didn't have them. That left you. Which means you went inside that house, stepping over the body, to see if Cobb was in the back weeding. And because he wasn't, you helped yourself to the bird, to the box where you knew Mrs. Teller had kept her personal papers, and then the head of the cane, which was gold. Putting it all together, I can see now that it was Betsy who killed her. And you went there as soon as she told you, to make sure there was no evidence against her."

Mrs. Blaine, fighting for control, said, "I'll tell them in the courtroom that you're a filthy liar, that you came here from London and couldn't see your nose in front of your face. I'll tell them that because I did a good deed, you want to blame me, to cover up your incompetence. They won't like you when I've finished with them, and they won't believe a word you say."

"Betsy thought it was Cobb, didn't she, who had brought Florence Teller to tears? She didn't wait to hear all of it. She acted in a fury."

Mrs. Blaine moved away from the sink. "You'll not hang my daughter. She's the victim here. Betrayed by her own husband, watching that woman suck him dry of any feeling for her, and not satisfied with that, he turned my daughter out of her own house. The constable will tell you, he saw Cobb coming into Hobson with the mark on his face where my daughter had to defend herself from his brutality. He said straight out that he'd kill her if she touched Florence Teller. Do you think she'd dare?"

"Cobb walked out, he didn't turn her out."

"He's a murderer. He'd have come back in the night and stabbed her in her sleep. That bit of cane was found in his things. Not hers."

"The parrot. The head of the cane. The box of letters," Rutledge said again. "You took them all. Shall I bring the parrot back to Hobson?"

"I thought I was protecting her. It turned out I was protecting her worthless husband. And who will listen to a bird?"

"If you'd believed it was Cobb, you wouldn't have needed the parrot or the box. And you'd have left the cane where it was. Didn't it bother you that she lay there two days while you hoped someone else would find her? Two days Two days-I call that inhuman."