The Gate Keeper Read online

  He said, “Can you drive?”

  “I—yes.” She stared at him, uncertain what he was asking.

  “How far is Wolfpit from here?”

  “Tw-two miles, I think. Three at most.”

  “Does it have a policeman?”

  “Yes. Constable P-Penny.”

  He considered her. She was wearing a rather pretty dinner gown, shimmering gold under a matching wrap, and gold slippers, muddy now. There were feathers in a spray, held by a pin in her fair hair. Hardly proper attire for driving a large motorcar.

  “Will you take my motorcar, drive to the village, and bring back the local Constable? Tell him there has been a death, and we’ll need the doctor. He’ll know what to do.”

  “I don’t think I can manage it,” she said, anxiously gazing up at him. “Is there any other way?”

  “I’m afraid not.” He let that take root in her mind, then asked, “Are you sure you didn’t recognize the man in the road?”

  “I don’t know that Stephen did, either. He was just—there. In the middle of the road. Waiting.”

  “What was he wearing?”

  “I don’t think I noticed. You don’t understand—it happened so quickly. There was no time really to look at him.”

  He let it go for the moment.

  “And you didn’t hear what he said to Wentworth?”

  She shook her head.

  “Did Wentworth reply?”

  “I don’t think so. No, he must have done. Just a word or two. But I didn’t hear that either.”

  “We must have the police, and the doctor. I’m reluctant to leave him lying there, but I don’t want to move the motorcar. Not yet. You’ll have to go in my place. Or else stay here alone.”

  That was all the persuasion she needed. “No.” She shook her head again, the feathers dancing. “Anything but that.”

  He led her to his motorcar, turned the crank, and collected his torch from the boot before helping Miss MacRae into the driver’s seat. She looked around for a moment, as if she had never seen gauges before. He waited, giving her time to collect herself. Finally, setting her mouth resolutely, she pulled her skirts aside so that she could reach the pedals, then put her hands on the wheel.

  With some trepidation he watched her drive slowly around Wentworth’s motorcar and carry on toward the village.

  In a matter of seconds, he was alone on the road.

  He stood there, staring at the scene, dark now without his own headlamps to light it. Wentworth’s beams probed the shadows ahead, catching movement as a predawn breeze stirred the dry grasses. A fox’s muzzle poked out of the undergrowth, sniffed the air, then vanished as quietly as it had appeared.

  What had he heard or seen as he was coming up to Wentworth’s motorcar?

  He tried to remember. Had he heard a shot? Or a woman’s scream? He couldn’t quite believe he’d missed the sound of a shot. Not even in the throes of nightmare.

  The problem was, he couldn’t be sure.

  Had it been the approach of his own motor that had sent the killer away? If whoever it was had stayed, would he have killed the only witness too?

  Why hadn’t he killed her, come to that?

  Rutledge went back to the body lying in the road, switching on his torch. A single shot, almost point-blank range. Meant to kill, not to frighten or wound.

  The dead man was fair, of medium height and build, a gentleman from the quality of his clothing, and reasonably attractive. There were laugh lines around his eyes and mouth, smoothing out now in death, but just visible.

  Who had wanted to see him dead? Did someone know that he would be coming down this road at this hour of the night, and wait for him? This wasn’t a main thoroughfare, just a narrow road through fields joining two small villages. It wouldn’t have been heavily traveled, not at this hour.

  The killer couldn’t have been at the party that Elizabeth MacRae had attended—she would have recognized him. And the same was true of the village. If he lived in Wolfpit, she would very likely have known who he was. Not by name, perhaps, but certainly able to identify him.

  Still, in Rutledge’s experience, it was odd that in a random murder like this, Wentworth was dead—and Miss MacRae still alive. Surely there had been time to fire at her before disappearing?

  There was another explanation. Either the killer was looking for Wentworth, or he thought Wentworth was the man he sought. Had he been mistaken? And if he had been, would he stand in the road another night, and kill again, until he found the victim he wanted?

  Hamish spoke suddenly, loud in the quiet of the night.

  “Or it was the lass herself. Miss MacRae?”

  Rutledge had to keep that in mind as well. It was, in fact, far more likely that she had shot Wentworth than that someone had appeared out of the darkness and killed him. A quarrel, Miss MacRae threatening to get down, the motorcar stopping abruptly in the middle of the road. Wentworth getting down as well, as the quarrel escalated into a shouting match . . .

  The problem was the revolver. Where had it come from? There was no indication that they’d fought over possession of it. Those elegant feathers in Miss MacRae’s hair would surely have been the first victim of any struggle.

  Rutledge began a thorough search of the vehicle. But there was nothing useful to be found. Wentworth’s hat, lying on the rear seat with his gloves. Miss MacRae’s purse, lying on the floor of the passenger’s seat, a beaded affair on a silver chain that was far too small to conceal a revolver. But there was a coat in her seat as well, with deep enough pockets.

  You didn’t carry a revolver with you in your coat pocket to a fashionable dinner party. Not unless you expected to need it. For protection. Or in anticipation of a quarrel ending badly. But then she might have left it out of sight in the motorcar before going in.

  Hamish said, “Jealousy?”

  If Miss MacRae had carried it with her—where was it now?

  Finishing his search, Rutledge scanned the road on either side. It was relatively flat here and open, no hedgerow or straggle of trees to make a killer’s disappearance easier. To his left, he could just see hay stacked in the field beyond the fallow one closest to the road, eerie humps in the darkness. On the far side, a shed of some sort, shapeless and swaybacked, as if it had been there a very long time and was near to collapsing.

  Which direction had the killer taken? Surely he would have gone the shortest distance, toward the hayricks? Still, he might have doubled back once he had got clear, to throw searchers off.

  The field of hay would take longer to search. Torch in hand, Rutledge set out toward the shed. The ground was rough, muddy in some places. He thought, as he nearly lost his footing for a second time, that this had been a pasture plowed up during the war to grow a crop, then abandoned at war’s end. Every bit of arable land had been put to the production of food, once submarines in the North Atlantic made it nearly impossible to bring in sufficient supplies from overseas. He cursed the field now. When he finally reached the shed, he saw that the door was half off its hinges, hanging crookedly inside the frame. He swept the interior with the torch, but it was empty save for scraggly weeds that had survived for a time and then died, leaving behind skeletons of their past.

  Although Rutledge looked closely, he couldn’t find footprints in the dry soil of the interior. He looked on the outside as well, circling the shed in the hope of spotting where someone might stand out of sight and watch for passersby. In the end, reluctantly, he ruled out the shed.

  He had just reached the road again when he saw his motorcar approaching. A Constable was driving, the shield on his helmet gleaming in the reflection of the headlamps. Beside him, looking exhausted, was Miss MacRae.

  They pulled up well ahead of the dead man’s motorcar, and the Constable got down, striding forward to meet Rutledge.

  “Constable Penny, sir,” he said. “What’s this about a body?”

  Rutledge took him to see where Wentworth was lying, and heard the low whistle as Penn
y recognized the dead man.

  “Know him, do you?” Rutledge asked.

  “He lives in Wolfpit. Owns a bookshop there. But who shot him? I couldn’t quite make out the story the young lady was telling me. Did you see what happened? I understand you came along only moments later.” There was a detectable hint of suspicion in the policeman’s voice.

  “Unfortunately I arrived just after the shot was fired. By that time the killer had vanished in the darkness, according to Miss MacRae.”

  “Do you know her, then?”

  “No, I don’t,” Rutledge answered. He indicated the interior of the motorcar. “No weapon that I’ve been able to find. You might have better luck in daylight.”

  “That was wrong of you, sir. Meddling with the crime scene.”

  “Yes, well, we don’t know where the shooter went, and I’d rather be in possession of his firearm than find it pointed at me when my back was turned.”

  “That’s very brave of you, sir.” There was a hint of sarcasm in the Constable’s voice.

  He went to stand in the open door of the motorcar, peering inside, poking around. Rutledge wondered if he’d come to the same conclusions. “What brought you along this road tonight, sir?” he asked, withdrawing from the vehicle and taking out his notebook.

  What had brought him along this road? He couldn’t have said. Nor could he explain himself to this man. Rutledge looked back the way he’d come, and finally answered, after examining the map in his head, “I was on my way to Ipswich.”

  “And your name, sir?

  “Rutledge.” He reached in his pocket, and found that he’d left his identification in the London flat. “Inspector. Scotland Yard.”

  “Can you prove that, sir?”

  “I was on personal business this evening. Morning,” he added as he looked toward the eastern sky. But the first faint rays of false dawn hadn’t appeared. “I don’t have my identification with me.” He realized he’d driven much farther and much faster than he’d expected. London seemed a very long way behind him. And the wedding had receded in his mind, driven out by the return of the war. What had made that stop so abruptly? Had it been the sound of a real shot close by? Was that why he couldn’t actually recall hearing it?

  “I see, sir,” Constable Penny was saying.

  Rutledge knew that the man couldn’t possibly begin to understand. “Is the doctor coming?”

  “Yes, sir, Dr. Brent is on his way. Although he’ll not be able to help this one.”

  Miss MacRae had remained in Rutledge’s motorcar. He could see the pale oval of her face, the color drained even more by the brightness of his headlamps.

  Turning back to Penny, Rutledge said, “I’ve walked out to the shed you can see over there. No sign of anyone hanging about, waiting for Wentworth to come along. But I haven’t gone in the other direction. Now you’re here, I’ll have a look.”

  “I’d rather you waited, sir. For the doctor.”

  “That’s my motorcar, Constable. I’m not likely to walk away and leave it.”

  As if he hadn’t recognized the dryness in Rutledge’s voice, Penny nodded and then began to examine the scene for himself, studying the ground, the position of the body relative to the vehicle, and finally walking along the verge.

  Rutledge stood to one side, watching him. Penny was making much the same survey that he himself had done. A competent man, he thought, and unwilling to take anyone’s word for what had happened here. He himself had already contaminated the ground, but it couldn’t be helped. Still, there had been damned little to find.

  As a place to commit murder, this was ideal. No habitation in sight, the road relatively straight in either direction, making it possible to see vehicles approaching long before the killer could be spotted.

  And that brought up another point. Had the killer known that it was Wentworth’s motorcar? Had he recognized it? Or just stopped it at random, the first to come along after he’d chosen his spot?

  How had he come to this place? By bicycle? Motorcar? If so, where had he left them? Or on foot? But that would slow his escape, walking across fields without a torch.

  Any chance of finding Wentworth’s killer was rapidly fading. Rutledge still had his torch in his hand, and ignoring Penny, he started toward the hayricks. But just then lights came around the slight bend in the direction of Wolfpit, and the Constable squinted to see who it was.

  “That’ll be the doctor, sir. Dr. Brent.”

  Rutledge stopped and turned around.

  The doctor pulled in behind Rutledge’s motorcar and got down. He paused for a moment to speak to Miss MacRae, then nodded and came on toward the two men waiting by the body.

  “All right, Penny, what do we have here?” he asked as he approached. He was a man of medium height, graying, and sporting the trim mustache affected by many officers during the war. “And who is this man?” He nodded toward Rutledge.

  “Mr. Rutledge, sir. He came along from the other direction, just after the shooting.”

  Satisfied, Brent moved around them and inspected the body. “You don’t need me to tell you he’s dead.” Kneeling, he began to examine Wentworth. “Probably by the time he hit the ground. Dead center shot, close range. I’ll be damned if it didn’t go straight through the heart. But we’ll see about that, won’t we? And still relatively warm, despite the cold air. Killed in the last hour, I should think.” He shook his head. “A damned pity. Wentworth was a fine young man. Who closed his eyes?”

  “I did,” Rutledge said. “I was first on the scene. It appeared that Miss MacRae had tried to revive him. There was blood on her hands. No sign of the weapon.”

  Dr. Brent looked up sharply. “You aren’t saying that Miss MacRae shot him?”

  “She told me that there was a man standing in the middle of the road. Wentworth got out to speak to him after he refused to move out of the way. They appeared to exchange a few words, and the other man shot him without warning, then disappeared while Miss MacRae rushed to Wentworth’s assistance.”

  “Description?” The Constable and the doctor asked the question almost simultaneously.

  “She didn’t recognize him. She didn’t think Wentworth did either. Or he gave no indication that he had. She was so shocked she couldn’t give me much more than that.”

  “Small wonder. I’m amazed she’s held up as well as she has,” the doctor said.

  “And the weapon belonged to the man in the road?” the Constable asked.

  “Apparently he brought it with him. If what Miss MacRae told me is true. He simply pulled it out and fired. There was no anger, no shouting, no warning.”

  “What was said between the two men?” the Constable wanted to know.

  “She didn’t hear.”

  Constable Penny looked toward Rutledge’s motorcar again, then turned back. “I have to ask, sir. Do you believe the witness is telling the truth? Or did she kill the victim?”

  “I don’t know,” Rutledge said truthfully. “She was in such a state when I arrived that my first impression was that she had not. And we haven’t got a weapon. But of course if she had, she might have been shocked by what she’d done and refused to believe what had happened. Or—she’s a very fine actress.”

  “Nonsense,” the doctor said, in his turn glancing toward Miss MacRae. She was still sitting in Rutledge’s motorcar. “Besides, where had she come by a revolver?”

  “It could have been Wentworth’s,” Rutledge said. “Was he in the war?”

  “Yes, he was,” the doctor responded shortly. “Captain in the Royal Navy.”

  “He would still have had a sidearm,” Rutledge answered.

  “Where had they been, where were they coming from? At this hour?” the doctor asked, looking into the darkness in the direction Wentworth and Miss MacRae had come from, as if somewhere there he might find an answer. “Dressed for a dinner party, from the looks of it.”

  “I don’t know precisely where that was. It’s best to ask Miss MacRae.”

 
“Well, that can wait. We’ve been lucky no one else has come along. Penny, can you drive this motorcar back to Wolfpit? I wasn’t able to bring a stretcher, but I think between us we can get him into the rear seat.”

  “Do you know Wentworth well?” Rutledge asked as he bent down to lift the dead man’s feet.

  “Fairly well. I know his parents, of course. They live just outside Norwich now, to be closer to their daughter and her children. Her husband was killed in the war. Stephen went to Cambridge, read the classics, and wanted to travel. He was in Peru when war broke out. Came home and joined the Navy. Ship went down under him three times, and he survived.” He shrugged. “Only to die within sight of home. Or nearly so. Sad.”

  They lifted the body, heavier in death than in life, and got him into the rear of his own motorcar.

  The doctor closed the door, then said to Rutledge, “You’ll bring Miss MacRae back to the village?”

  “I’d also prefer it if you did,” Constable Penny added. “To help with this inquiry, sir?”

  “He doesna’ believe ye’re an Inspector,” Hamish put in, startling Rutledge.

  Recovering quickly, he said, “Unless she would be more comfortable traveling with you, Dr. Brent?”

  “No, no. She doesn’t need to be bounced from motorcar to motorcar,” he answered briskly.

  Rutledge walked back to his own vehicle to turn the crank, then waited while the doctor reversed his, before getting behind the wheel to do the same. The Constable was already starting Wentworth’s, preparing to bring up the rear.

  Miss MacRae was huddled in the corner of her seat, still clutching the rug he’d given her. Rutledge asked, “Are you warm enough? Your coat and evening purse are still in Wentworth’s vehicle. Shall I fetch them for you?”

  “No, please. I-I just want to go home. To my aunt’s house,” she amended.

  As the three-car convoy started toward the village, she turned to look at him.

  “They think I killed him, don’t they?” she asked after a moment. “They kept looking this way. I saw them. And it wasn’t very sympathetic.”