Death at Gallows Green (28 page)

“Pocket didn't say when Sir Charles might return?” Kate asked.

“No, mum,” Mudd replied, serving Bea's soup. He placed the tureen on the table so that they could serve themselves if they wished, and stepped back. “But Ben learned that the constable is still away with Sir Charles. They have gone to Colchester, to the police headquarters.”

“I see,” Kate murmured, and at the thought of Sir Charles turned slightly pink. He had touched her arm when he spoke to her in Agnes's kitchen. And he had spoken with a deeply intimate tone, as if in his mind this anguish had somehow drawn the two of them closer.

She looked up to find Bea's eyes on her, and felt herself blushing even pinker. “I suppose that they have gone to instigate a search for Tod and Brock,” she said briskly. “Thank you, Mudd. We will ring when you are wanted.”

“Well, we've done all we could,” Bea said, when the servants had left the room. “If Constable Laken and Sir Charles are searching for Tod and Brock, I wish them good fortune!” Her voice became low and fierce. “If I were a man, I'd like to be the first to lay hands on them! I'd have them dead!”

 

As the evening wore on, however, Charles began to suspect that fortune was not to smile on Edward and him that night. While they were still at Agnes's, after the news of Betsy's drowning had arrived, a message had come from P.C. Bradley. Edward was to meet him in Inspector Wainwright's office at Colchester, to receive certain intelligences regarding the whereabouts of Tod and Brock.

They arrived at nearly five to find the inspector there but the P.C. delayed. While they waited, they dispatched Sergeant Battle to the pub for several two-penny pigeon pies, a half-dozen boiled eggs, cake, and bottles of East India ale. Edward could scarcely eat for impatience, but Charles fell to his meal with a good appetite, not sure when he would have another. lt was nearly six when P.C. Bradley arrived, breathless and damp. He explained that Chief Constable Pell, when notified by wire that Napthen was in custody and had named Tod as the leader of the grain-theft ring, had wired back that a police informer believed Tod to be in Wivenhoe, a port village at the mouth of the Colne, a few miles to the east and south of Colchester. Bradley and Edward were directed to go to The Flag, a pub on the wharf there, and apprehend Tod when he appeared, expeditiously.

“Expeditiously?” Edward growled. “Does Pell take us for asses?”

“Perhaps Sergeant Battle can be spared for duty,” P.C. Bradley said. He cast a hungry look at the half-pie that remained on Edward's plate, the crust crumbling, juices oozing. “You've been eating, I see,” he added unnecessarily.

“Battle?” Wainwright snorted, contemptuous. He stood up. “Battle is not your man. I'll go myself.”

“Right, then,” Bradley said, as Charles too got up. “We're off.” But he remained staring at the food.

“For God's sake, man,” Edward said, already at the door. “Wrap the damned pie and eat it on the way. Let's be gone, or we'll miss the bloody devil!”

 

It was still drizzling and very dark as they made their way to Wivenhoe, Charles and Edward in a fly, P.C. Bradley and Inspector Wainwright in a gig. The road was mire and the wind chill, and Charles sincerely hoped that their journey might not be in vain.

The Flag, whose sign-board bore the storm-beaten semblance of the Union Jack, was located on the wharf at Wivenhoe, not twenty paces from the moorings of the dozen or so wooden-hulled ships that were crowded into the narrow harbour. The pub consisted of three cramped rooms, one behind the other. The ceilings were barely higher than Charles's head and the roaring fireplaces rivaled the blazes of perdition. The rooms were crowded with all the crews of all the ships in the harbour (or so it seemed), every man suffering from a quenchless thirst.

After the chill freshness of the damp night, the place was stifling and rank with the odour of men, cigars, and stout. The din of voices in the first two rooms was loud. From the third room (which appeared to be a separate establishment, with a doorway connecting it to the pub) came the noisy thumping of boots on a board floor, to the accompaniment of a seaman's ditty, brayed out by a concertina and fiddle. A half-dozen Jacks turned and churned around the floor, clutched by and clutching robust women, young and old. As Charles peered over the heads of seated imbibers, the dancers lined up for heel and toe, heel and toe, and in a minute were back to the churning and turning again. The concertina gave one last wheeze, the fiddle one final wail, and the shout of
rum! boys
,
rum!
was heard.

The landlord was a man of sly face and a girth unusual even for a publican, with a ring of coarse black hair encircling a bald head. He resembled nothing so much as a stout, happy friar, Charles thought. When P.C. Bradley identified himself and desired information, the landlord wiped his hands on his white apron and professed himself eager to be of service.

“Any
service, sirs,” he added, with a crafty grin, his look taking in all four of them. “I'd ruther be on th' gud side o' th' law than th' bad.” He gestured with his head to a painted and feather-decked lady, pretty, but not as pretty as she once had been, smoking a brown cigarette and being courted by two drunken sailors. “Jenny's fond o' a kiss an' fonder o' a crown,” he confided. “Her sisters live ‘round th' corner an up th' stair. Jes' tell 'em George sent ye, an' they'll treat ye right.”

P.C. Bradley, heaven help him, blushed to the tips of his ears, and Charles wondered whether he should alter his estimation of the young man who had seemed so worldly and self-assured.

“That isn't the kind of information we're looking for,” the P.C. said rather stiffly.

“Ooh, ah, ye're ‘ere fer
that
business, are ye?” The publican delivered himself of a heavy sigh, together with his hope of a tip for special services rendered. “Why they'd send four o' ye fer such a mite of a job, an' late too? 'Ee warn't a fighter, as it turned out, an' Smokey over there already give 'im th' boot. ‘Ee jes' wanted a row, was all. 'Ee didn't mind 'oo it wur with, er wot it wur fer. But Smokey moved 'im on.”

Edward pushed forward, clearly impatient. “We weren't sent here to keep the peace,” he said. “We're looking for a man named Russell Tod.”

“Tod, eh? Russell Tod?” The publican screwed up his face, considering. After a moment's reflection, he shook his head. “Tod, Tod. Niver ‘eard of 'im.”

“But we were told he would be here,” Bradley said angrily. “We've come all the way from—”

“Decker!” The publican beckoned with a beefy hand to a wizened, wily-looking man enveloped in a brass-buttoned greatcoat several sizes too large for him. “Decker! These gennulmen o' th' law want ter know ‘bout somebody named Tod.” To Bradley he said, “If Tod's t' be known, Ol' Decker'll know ‘im. 'Ee knows ever‘body, 'ee do.”

The wizened man dragged himself to the bar. “Wery dry,” he whispered in a voice like the Sahara.

Edward snapped his fingers. “Give the man a pint,” he ordered.

The pint was delivered, and Old Decker refreshed himself, but when he was questioned as to the whereabouts of Tod, it fell out that he, like the publican, had niver ‘eard of 'im, and he shuffled off to cradle his pint by the fire, where he could bask in the warmth of Jenny's perfumed laughter.

“But I don't understand,” Bradley said desperately. “We had certain intelligence that Tod would be here.”

“Ooh, intelligence, is it?” the publican remarked. “Well. then, sirs, p'r'aps it's only a matter o' time a-fore yer man shows 'is face. Whyn't yer ‘ave a pint an' wait?” He peered at them. “Wot's ‘ee wanted fr, that brings out four o' ye?”

“Theft,” Bradley said.

“Murder,” Edward growled. “The killing of a constable and the drowning of a child.”

The publican's eyes opened. “Ooh, aye,” he muttered. “Well, then, best ye look sharp. 'Ee sounds a very untoward gen‘leman, 'ee do.”

They took their pints to a table in the corner from whence they could oversee the comings and goings of pugnacious sailors and pliant Jennies, but the untoward Mr. Tod failed to materialize, nor did any of the men whom they questioned acknowledge ever having heard of him. Two hours later, despairing of doing what they had come for, Edward pushed back his chair and stood up.

“You and Wainwright can stay if you like,” he told Bradley, “but Charles and I are going back to Gallows Green. We'll do as well watching Tod's house as sitting here. Maybe better.”

The P.C. scrutinized his third pint. “Well,” he said thickly, “p'r'aps that's best. Inspector Wainwright an' I can stay here an' see what we see.”

Wainwright, as cheerful as Charles had ever seen him, agreed. “We might walk down the wharf,” he remarked, “and inquire of another pub.”

“You do that,” Charles said, “and if you come upon Tod, apprehend the man.” He grinned dryly. “Expeditiously.”

“Of course,” Bradley said with great seriousness. “And you do the same.”

“Ah,” Wainwright said, “expeditiously.” And raised his glass in signal for another.

But even though Charles and Edward drove hard back to Gallows Green, it was close to midnight when they arrived. If Tod had been at the cottage at all that evening, he was not there now. The place was dark, and only the querulous hooting of an owl broke the silence, and on a wall across the green, the shrill cacophony of courting cats.

Without speaking, they set up a concealed watch where they could observe the door of the cottage and waited there in the damp night chill until a pale dawn silvered the morning mist. But they waited in vain, for their quarry failed to return home that night. And of all the reasons that Charles imagined as he waited, the only one he did not consider was that Russell Tod, he of the sharp chin and coppery whiskers, was dead.

“W
i' respects, mum—”

“With respect, Amelia,” Kate broke in crossly, “I shall wear what I please. Now tell Pocket we shall want the gig. Immediately.” As the maid left the room, Kate shook her head. Of course, Amelia hadn't actually
said
anything about the costume she had chosen, and she likely wouldn't have dared. But her agonized look had spoken volumes.

Bea gave her a slight smile. “If you don't mind my saying so, your dress does invite comment.”

Kate looked down at herself. She was wearing a version of the garment that Mrs. Bloomer of Seneca Falls, New York, had devised almost fifty years before as part of her program of rational dress, designed to free women from the confines of their costumes. The trousers were fashioned like knickerbockers, buckling neatly at the calf. The jacket was snug but comfortable, with reasonable sleeves. Both were cut of sturdy green tweed.

“The Society cyclists are wearing this in Hyde Park,” she said, a bit defensively. She had seen a drawing of the costume in
The Queen
, with a caption that reported that titled debutantes had taken to riding between the Achilles statue and the powder magazine in Hyde Park every morning in bloomers. On a bicycle, a full skirt was an invitation to a tumble.

Bea raised both eyebrows. “There's a great difference between Hyde Park and an Essex village,” she remarked in a practical tone. “People in London are used to emancipated women, but in the countryside, ladies who wear such costumes are thought to be—well, headstrong, at best.”

“And at worst, beyond the pale.” Kate couldn't help smiling. “I'm sure you're right,” she added. “I am always surprised by how easily the villagers work themselves into a lather about things. But still—”

She sobered, remembering why she had decided to wear her tweed bloomers. “I do want to join the search for Betsy, and a full skirt is inappropriate for probing a muddy river bank. I would be weighed down by pounds of muck.” She looked down at the black stockings that showed above the high tops of her boots. “If people want to be offended by two inches of leg, for pity's sake, let them. There are more important things to worry about in this world.”

Betsy's awful fate, for one. The capture of the man or men responsible for her death, for another. She thought of Sir Charles and Edward and wondered whether they had been successful in their search for Tod and Brock.

Bea sneezed. “I would join you at the river if I dared, Kate. But it's mizzly this morning, and I have been overtaken by a cold. I think I should not walk about in the wet.” She pulled on her gloves. “I'll stay with Agnes, while you do whatever you must.”

“Agnes needs you.” Kate pinned her tweed cap to the curls she had massed on the top of her head. “Losing Betsy is such a horrible thing, almost incomprehensible.” She took up her aunt's heavy walking stick, which she had decided might be useful in her search.

“How dreadful it must have been for her last night,” Bea said sadly. “What will she do with her life now? How can she live, having lost both husband and child?”

Kate didn't say so, but if there was any good thing about this miserable business, it was that Agnes did not yet suspect that both of her loved ones had been taken from her, and by the same evil hands. She must know, of course, sooner or later. Kate found her gloves in a pocket and pulled them on. But let her first become accustomed to the magnitude of her loss, before she was burdened with an even greater pain.

They went outside and climbed into the gig Pocket had brought around. Kate picked up the reins and they headed toward Gallows Green, where she left Bea with a pale, silent Agnes. With a heavy heart, she drove on to the River Stour below Highfields barn. There, a subdued group of men and boys were working from barges, dragging the river bottom with heavy iron hooks. The banks had been searched yesterday, but as Mrs. Wilkins had so graphically remarked, the river clung to its dead and often yielded them up tardily. The banks would be searched daily until Betsy's body was found, and Kate wanted to do what she could.