“Yes. This must be the ring. I had the dead man’s family sketch it for me. The sketch was quite good because they had seen it over the years. The father had worn it until his son was of an age that he could be given it. Where did you find this? Start at the beginning.”
And Rutledge began with the ghost in the garden.
When he’d finished, Haldane nodded.
“We had no idea where he’d gone. The man whose identity he took after killing him in Derbyshire has been a blank. No one came forward to report him missing or to tell us where he had been expected to arrive. Of course they couldn’t—he appeared to have been accounted for, all through the war. He could have been in France—Egypt—or even killed in action, for all we knew, because we had no name.”
His emphasis on the last word was a trenchant indication of the frustration Haldane and the authorities must have felt with a corpse wearing a murderer’s stolen clothing, but nothing to indicate who he was or where he’d come from, much less where he was going. No way to trace the man’s killer, much less the victim. Franklin had chosen his victim very carefully.
After a moment Haldane added, almost to himself, “He stayed on our watch list as a question mark, because he might have been up to no good. A spy. A saboteur. Why else kill a soldier and take his place? If a killer wanted to escape having to serve, he’d have chosen a civilian.”
“Did he kill in France, do you know?”
“Vermuelen was attempting to backtrack him when the wound turned septic. And so we have no answer to that. But from what I was able to understand, there was something in Picardy.” He didn’t elaborate.
“I have a feeling he’d killed before. Before the victims in Dorset.”
Haldane regarded him sharply. “We had kept that out of the papers. Only five of us knew that.”
“Who were the victims?”
“They lived in Hereford. A young woman and her father. Mrs. Lambert’s daughter had gone to school with her. She must have thought she recognized Franklin. The deaths are still unsolved, because without Franklin we have no way of learning the truth. After he was tried in the Dorset case, he was to be taken to Hereford. But he used a different name, and the photograph that was sent to Hereford raised some doubt. I expect he’d changed his appearance.”
“I should have been told this in the beginning.”
“Neither the Chief Constable nor Markham had any idea this was related to Essex. But anything that had to do with a military installation had been flagged during the war, and so it came across someone’s desk when the Yard was sent to Walmer. It would have been no use to you, if the ghost had been no more than a prank. But when you queried the airfield, we paid attention.”
“Still—”
“It was more helpful to us for you to make the connection on your own. Rather than jump to conclusions.”
Rutledge said nothing.
Haldane added, “I must say, it was well done, all the same. And that’s why you were sent to France.”
But Rutledge was not mollified by praise. He found himself thinking that Haldane and he had a very difficult relationship at best. And trust was not necessarily a part of that relationship.
“What happens now?” he asked.
“I think it best if you finish what you’ve begun. You know the people, you know the ground. And most importantly, you’ve kept what you’ve learned to yourself. He still believes he’s safe, there has been no talk about an arrest coming soon. A new face might make him decide to cut his losses and disappear.”
“And what if I don’t find him?”
Haldane shrugged. “That would be unfortunate. Given the number of people he’s killed.”
“What does he want in the Abbey?”
“I don’t know. It’s possible that Mrs. Lowell had unwittingly left something in the house that could lead to him. From his days there with the squadron.”
“Why there? Why not in her own home?”
“Whatever it is, he must know by now that it isn’t in her house. I daresay he looked long before she was killed, and then turned his attention to the Abbey.”
It made sense, in a way. But Patricia Lowell hadn’t struck Rutledge as a keeper of secrets. The little that Rutledge had seen of her had given him the impression of an open, rather naive person. Easily taken advantage of? She had tried to help the lonely and the outsiders.
He said only, “That’s possible.”
Preparing to leave, Haldane asked, “Is there anything you need?”
“Markham will be demanding a report on progress. And the Chief Constable here in Essex is related to Lady Benton. He’ll be asking as well. What do I tell him?”
Haldane gave the question some thought. “If need be, tell both of them that you believe that this began as a blackmail plot to force Lady Benton to sell her estate. Give them no details.”
Rutledge wondered if Haldane knew something about the man Wilbur, who had pressed to buy the meadow once the land was returned to Lady Benton.
“Is there anything you’re holding back about Franklin? Like the ring?”
Haldane regarded Rutledge. “There is one other thing. Be very careful. He’s quick with a knife.”
Rutledge left before Haldane.
He was not so far from Melinda’s house. As the crow flew. Across the Thames into Kent. An hour, possibly . . .
It might as well be across the sea.
Turning away, he drove out of the inn’s yard and turned back the way he’d come.
“Ye heard the man. Best to keep your mind on what’s to be done. The sooner ye finish wi’ Franklin, the sooner ye’ll be free.”
It was some miles before he could force himself to think about Walmer again.
“Where do you disappear to?” Inspector Hamilton asked him crossly when he walked into the police station sometime later. “I came by the hotel just after breakfast, and they told me you hadn’t come down. I pounded on the door, and there was no answer. When I went out back to look for your motorcar, it wasn’t there.”
“Sorry. I went for a drive to clear my head.”
“What sort of drive? You’d be in the Irish Sea by this time.”
“Just—driving. I’m here. What’s happened?”
“There’s a body.”
“Whose? Where?” he demanded.
“Ah, you’re interested now, are you? Head all clear and ready for bones?”
Bones . . .
Long dead.
“Tell me.”
“The salt works. You know how they collect the salt?”
“Yes. They work in the marshes along the coast. As the tide recedes, it leaves salt behind in the shallow pools created for the purpose. When a pool has enough salt to be salvaged, they pump it into large sinks, where the salt finally comes to the surface.”
“Yes. That’s right. Only this time, when they set the pump in a pool it ran slow. When someone got around to taking a look at the pump, there was a bone stopping the end. They’re out there now, trying to find the rest. Dr. Wister says there are bound to be more.”
“Take me there. Now.”
“Got anything for wading?”
“In the boot of the motorcar.”