The kitchen was empty. Pru considered going in search of Evelyn, but Christopher had suggested that they keep back this latest information about Will Donovan until it could be confirmed. And so Pru went through and upstairs, made herself a cup of tea in the bedroom, stretched out, and began reading a book about the rococo garden movement. When she woke up, the light in the sky had faded, and the room was almost dark.
After a good stretch and a splash of cold water on her face, she headed downstairs, catching a whiff of cloves—a spice Evelyn always added to her beef dishes. Christopher, Evelyn, and Peachey stood about in the kitchen. “Is there a fire yet?” Pru asked. “I could just do with a drink—won’t you two stay for a bit?” The question fell into a black hole.
The three stood in a tableau round the kitchen table, the air thick with a conversation broken off at her entry. The counter was strewn with containers and lids. Pru looked at each of them in turn—Evelyn’s wide eyes were locked on Peachey; Peachey, his face aflame, blinked at the floor; and Christopher’s gaze was guarded as he watched them both. “What’s wrong?” she whispered.
“I was just asking Peachey about his statement,” Christopher said.
“Albert, we have to tell him the truth about that evening.”
“What evening?” Pru asked, her stomach suddenly churning.
Evelyn faced Christopher with her chin up. “Albert said he was alone, but I was in the van with him when he stopped here—the evening Jack died.”
Christopher sighed. “Well, then, Peachey—” he began.
“It’s my fault he didn’t say so at first,” Evelyn said, kneading her hands. “Albert was trying to spare me police scrutiny. Everyone knows I’ve begrudged Jack all these years. Peachey counted on that railway job, and Jack Snuggs stole it from him. And then he up and quit not three months later to move to Canada.”
“Regardless,” Christopher said, “we’ll need to—”
“Ev stayed in the van,” Peachey said. “I swear to that. And so what does it matter if I didn’t mention it?”
“Is Evelyn in trouble?” Pru asked.
Christopher cut his eyes to her. “I never said—”
He got no further as Evelyn flung her arms out to him, her hands wide and fingers wiggling. “Take them,” she said. “Take my fingerprints, go on. Take whatever you need. I didn’t do anything to Jack.”
Pru saw the corner of Christopher’s mouth twitch. He held up a finger and said, “Hang on,” but an index finger could not stem the tide of protests that piled one on top of the other.
“I gave the false statement—”
“Albert only tried to protect me—”
“Go on, take me in, I’ll go quietly.”
“All right, all right!” Christopher’s voice rose above the clamor as his hands flew up in surrender. They fell silent, and he continued in a quieter tone. “It’s a very good thing, Peachey, that you never signed your statement.”
“Was I supposed to sign it?”
“Did Martin not tell you that?”
Peachey frowned at this. “No.”
Christopher shook his head. “Right, come in to see me in the morning, and we’ll sort it out. And you may keep your fingerprints to yourself, Evelyn.”
Peachey grinned. “There now, Evelyn my love, I knew it would be all right.”
The four of them made short work of boxing up the pensioners’ meals, and afterward, Pru walked out with Evelyn. “We’ve a roast chicken for Kitty,” Evelyn said. “I’ll shoo Orlando back here so he doesn’t eat their entire meal. You’ve a cottage pie for your tea—I remember it was one of his favorites.”
“Everything you cook is his favorite,” Pru said. “But tomorrow, now, we’re going into town for a meal—I don’t want you taking time away from baking for the competition. Tomorrow is Cake Day.”
Evelyn stood at the back of Peachey’s van holding one of the doors open for him to slide the stacks of containers in. She cocked her head but said nothing as Peachey shut the van doors and tied them together.
“Jack apologized, you know,” Peachey said with his arm around Evelyn’s shoulders. “That last day he came to see me while I was working. But I told him never mind, that I enjoy what I do, being in charge of my own self and traveling around the district—and so he really did me a favor, didn’t he?”
Evelyn leaned over and gave her husband a kiss on the cheek.
Pru opened the door of the cooker to check on their dinner. The cottage pie, mashed-potato top lightly browned to perfection, would hold in the warming oven until they were ready for it. She slipped off her shoes, took herself off to the library, and settled on the sofa with a whisky in hand, to watch Christopher build the fire.
“Did you know that Peachey’s statement was wrong?”
“I had a suspicion—neither of them would look at me when I asked about it. Martin suspected Peachey, but it was because he hadn’t asked enough questions.” As a tiny flame in the middle of the kindling began to spread, Christopher looked over his shoulder. “Kitty told me she saw Jack late that evening—after eleven—coming down the lane this way. She was up making cocoa and walked out onto her front step to speak to him.” He took his own glass of whisky and settled beside Pru.
“Hadn’t Kitty told Martin that?” she asked.
“She couldn’t remember if she had, and Martin hasn’t filed a statement for her.” Christopher turned the glass in his hand.
Even Pru knew that it was proper police procedure to interview everyone in the vicinity of a crime; how could Martin have missed that opportunity? “It’s taking far too long to get through all this,” she said, pointing out the obvious. “Martin’s made a great deal of trouble for you.”
Christopher gave a small nod of agreement. “He’s made a great deal of trouble for himself. And I believe he’s doing it on purpose.”
“He meant to make all those mistakes?” Pru tried to puzzle this out. “I thought he was just incompetent.”
“Incompetent for a reason,” Christopher said, rubbing a hand up and down his face as if to wipe away the exasperation. “I’ve seen it happen before. Martin’s decided he isn’t cut out for police work, but he can’t quit, because that would be admitting defeat. Better to get the sack for poor performance. That way, he could always blame his failure on someone else.”
“But he’s playing around with people’s guilt or innocence. Can you do something?”
Christopher smiled with chagrin. “I’ve taken the case over—officially—just as Harnett asked at the beginning.”
Pru felt a rush of relief that at last Christopher would be in charge—tempered by a pang of worry for him. “Well,” she said, putting her hand on his, “a promotion at last.”
He rubbed the back of her hand. “Martin’s got to quit, or he’s got to learn to be a proper detective,” Christopher said. “Either way, he must face up to it.”
“You’ll have a talk with him?”
Christopher nodded. “I’ve left him a message to say that first thing in the morning, we’ll need to go over every detail he’s collected about the case.”
“Has he always been this incompetent?”
“Harnett has had reservations for a while. He believes Martin joined the police only because of his father, because Jimmy was such a hero in his eyes. It’s understandable he’d want to follow in his footsteps.”
She saw Christopher’s ears go pink. Ah, she thought, there’s the hook. Christopher, who read natural history at Oxford, had become a policeman because his own father had died saving a child’s life. His dad had been his hero, and he had wanted to follow in his footsteps. No wonder Christopher cut Martin so much slack. But it could go only so far.
They heard Orlando thundering through the hall—really, he made the most noise of anyone Pru had ever known. She had missed hearing it.
“Oh, sorry,” he said, looking down when he burst into the room.
“How’s Kitty—all settled in?” Pru asked.
Orlando nodded. “Jemima’s looking after her and, well, I didn’t want to hang about. Families, you know, they need their time.”
“Too right,” Pru replied. “And so come in here to the fire and sit down.”