“It was a Winchester man. Constable Dutton. He was on his way back from giving evidence in a trial. On his bicycle, mind you, and he had a flat. By the time he’d walked to the next village and managed to get the tire mended, it was after dawn. The people celebrating the summer solstice had sent someone to walk to the nearest village—they happened to be one and the same. This man’s name was Taylor. Clerk in a bank. He’d been sick at least twice, and nearly fell flat on his face when he saw Dutton coming toward him. All he could manage to say was, ‘A body. At Stonehenge.’ So Dutton pedaled off, and there it was, hanging on that stone at the end of the avenue. And a group of would-be Druids were sitting on the grass, looking like they wished they were back at home in their beds. Dutton didn’t know whether to stay at the stones and send someone out on his bicycle, or go himself. In the end, he sent the schoolmaster for help. That’s when it was turned over to Salisbury. All the witnesses were interviewed two and three times, but they never saw anything of any use.”

Gregg shook his head, marveling. “There’s usually something, you know. You find the slimmest bit of evidence, a piece of paper, a pencil stub, a footprint. And it opens the inquiry right up. I kept up with the case, you see.”

“And someone looked into the background of each of the latter-day Druids?”

“Oh, indeed, sir. They were all what they appeared to be.”

They had reached the courts and were climbing the stairs to the room where Rutledge’s case was being tried.

As he stood there waiting to be called, Rutledge said, “Was there a Charles Henry among the Druids?”

“Charles Henry? Not precisely among the Druids,” Constable Gregg replied. “I believe that was the name of the solicitor the schoolmaster sent for. Yes, Charles Henry. He was—”

He turned as the door opened and the summons came. Rutledge was still looking toward Gregg, but he was moving away, nodding, as if to wish him well. He had no choice but to walk on, seeing the sea of faces turned his way in the crowded courtroom, the judge in crimson and the KC in black, their wigs properly appended to their heads, and the prisoner in the dock, his expression taut with concern. Rutledge moved to the witness box, fighting to clear his mind of Cummins’s obsession, which was fast becoming his own, and to dredge up the facts in this case. As he was taking the oath, he felt the calm of duty settle over him, and as he stated his name and rank as he’d done so many times in this box, he was ready for the first question.