“Yes, please.” He waited while she did, and then paid for them.
“It’s kind of you to help Mrs. Lowell. She’s a lovely lady, and I know how much these meant to her. Do tell her I hope she feels better very soon.”
He thanked her and left. Instead of going to the hotel, he walked on to the churchyard and carefully laid the flowers by Lieutenant Lowell’s memorial stone. The pansies, violets, and daffodils added a splash of color to the grass, just now reviving after the winter.
That done, he started to leave the churchyard, but on impulse, he turned toward Captain Nelson’s grave. And stopped short when he saw that the young woman from The Salt Cellar, the pub down by the harbor, was on her knees there. Liz was her name . . .
She looked like a wraith, for the fog was rolling in from the estuary. Still there was something in her posture, the slump of her shoulders, that led him to think she was crying. While it was his first instinct to be certain she was all right, this was very likely her only refuge, and he turned away instead. The tragedy was, her refuge was a dead man.
He left the churchyard, walking back to the hotel where Lady Benton was anxiously waiting.
He found her by the window, gazing out at the settling fog, and she turned at once to say, “There you are. I was beginning to hope there was news.”
“Nothing so far,” he said. “I found the florist. Apparently, Mrs. Lowell had ordered flowers as usual, but she hadn’t come in to collect them. I took them on to the churchyard.”
“That was kind of you. But now I’m rather frightened. Nothing short of serious illness would have kept her from going there early yesterday morning.” She shook her head. “I’ve been trying to think where she might have gone. Or where else we might look. If she’d been called away, she’d have left me a message, so that I could find someone else to mind the café.”
“Inspector Hamilton is starting a search. Let me drive you home, and then I’ll go out as well.”
“Thank you.” She collected her gloves and handbag, then went with him out to the motorcar.
“This is turning into a heavy fog,” she said as he got in after turning the crank. “I do hope Mrs. Hailey let the staff go early. There won’t be any visitors today.”
“Which reminds me. Are any of the other women close to Mrs. Lowell? Someone she might confide in?”
“I don’t believe there’s anyone in particular. We go on very well together, all of us. Surprisingly, since there’s such an age difference. Mrs. Stevens is the eldest, at sixty.”
He was threading his way out of Walmer, but once out on the main road, he found the going much harder. The fog came and went, drifting across the land and muffling sound. Rutledge was suddenly reminded of the waves of gas floating across the battlefield, oddly beautiful sometimes, and always lethal.
Behind him, he could feel Hamish stirring as well.
In spite of himself he coughed as it seemed to drift into the motorcar.
Lady Benton said, “Should we turn back?”
“We’ll just go very slowly,” he promised, and concentrated on the nearly invisible road ahead. The fog lamps of the big motorcar gave him no real assistance, forcing him to stay in the center of the road for safety.
She sat beside him, tense, her hands clasped tightly together, but she had nothing more to say until they were nearing the Abbey. “I can’t bear to think about Patricia, not knowing where she is, or why. I shan’t sleep tonight.” As the gates loomed out of the fog, seeming to have no top, she stopped Rutledge from turning in.
“If Mrs. Hailey let everyone go home—as I’m sure she must have done—the bar is across the main door. But I have keys to the door near the stables. If you wouldn’t mind—”
“Of course.”
He crept along, searching for the opening that would be the stable lane. And then he saw it, almost a difference in shadow and light rather than a space in which to turn.
“When we had one of these, the flights either went elsewhere if they were up, or stayed on the ground, if they hadn’t left. A little respite in the midst of war. Ah, just there, I think?”
He turned down the lane, and found the gate. Lady Benton said, “Shall I get down, and open it for you?”
“No, stay here.”
He opened it, driving through into the stable yard before walking back to close it again. His footsteps seemed muffled in the stillness. The fog stirred briefly, as if to welcome them, then came down thicker than before.
As Rutledge came around to the other side of the motorcar, she was collecting her handbag and gloves, preparing to get down, thanking him again for his help.
“I’ll walk with you to the door,” he said.
“No, of course not, there’s no need. I can find my way in the dark.”
“I’ll see you safely inside,” he told her firmly.
She gave him a wry smile, as if still reluctant to let him accompany her.
They started forward, had gone perhaps ten paces, when she said, “Ah. I only have one glove. I must have dropped it as I got down.” Rutledge turned, but she stopped him. “I lost it, I’m perfectly capable of retrieving it.”
And so he waited while she walked back to the motorcar. He could hear her opening the passenger’s door, but he couldn’t see her, only a moving darkness in the shrouding mist.
And then she screamed.
Racing back to her, he said quickly, “What is it?”
Her bare hand covering her mouth, she pointed a shaking finger.
He set her behind him and started toward whatever it was that had frightened her, although he could see nothing. But she caught his arm.
“No, you mustn’t—”
And in the same moment, Hamish shouted, “There!”
The mist swirled once more, and he could just see the gate, still closed. There was something beyond it, he couldn’t tell what it was. Ignoring her pleas to stay where he was, he ran to the gate—and then stopped short as the mist moved again.
Across the lane by the fence there stood a dark shape, monstrous in size, facing them but saying nothing. Like something out of a nightmare.
It hadn’t been there when he’d opened and closed the gate . . .
“Dear God,” Lady Benton asked softly, “What is it?”
“I don’t know,” he said over his shoulder. “Get back into the motorcar and lock the door. I’m going to find out.”
“No,” she exclaimed. “Let’s leave. While we can.”
“The gate is closed.”
“Break it down,” she urged him. “I don’t care—you aren’t armed—we have a better chance in the motorcar.”
Ignoring her, he stared at the figure. Whatever it was, it hadn’t moved. He was a tall man, but it was taller. And broader, with what appeared to be massive shoulders. Was that a cloak? And he couldn’t tell what it was wearing on its head. A helmet of some sort?
And then it moved slightly, as if bracing to face Rutledge.
It was alive, then. Not a straw man to frighten her.
He didn’t bother to open the gate, he vaulted it instead, and walked out into the lane, prepared for anything.
The unpredictable mist kept shifting, making it difficult to judge what was in front of him. He was almost all the way across the lane before he could see the figure clearly—