HE WENT TO see the procurator-fiscal late in the afternoon. Jedburgh was busy. The heart of the town was crowded, the shops doing a bustling trade along with the pubs and the hotel, people spilling out into the street in the path of carts and wagons jammed with goods. There had been a cattle market in the morning, and farmers in for the day seemed to be making the most of it. To Rutledge’s eye, the population of Jedburgh had nearly doubled, and no one seemed to be in any haste to go home again. Finding a place to leave his vehicle took nearly twenty minutes, and even then he had to pay a grinning, gap-toothed man for the privilege.

The procurator-fiscal’s office, overlooking the center of the town, was dark-paneled and furnished with mahogany and leather. The books lining the shelves above the handsome old desk were a blend of law and science and literature.

Burns was tall, stooped, and thin. A handsome head of white hair was brushed back from his forehead, and gold pince-nez concealed sharp blue eyes. A man used to command and discipline.

“Inspector Rutledge. It’s good of you to come. May I offer you tea? A sherry?”

Rutledge, judging him rightly, accepted the sherry, and lifting the golden liquid in its slim glass, he saw that the pattern etched around the base of the cup was of thistles.

“Have you made any progress in the matter of Eleanor Gray?”

“I know more about her now. She was a wealthy young woman with a taste for rebellion and an intense desire to study medicine. She worked with the wounded during the war, providing entertainment for them where possible and taking an interest in their care. She was invited to a house party near Winchester early in 1916 and accepted. But the officer she was bringing with her discovered he had more leave than he’d expected. She came north with him instead, apparently intending to spend a few days at his house. Whether she got there or not no one seems to know. Where she may have gone after that week no one seems to know. But the information I have is reliable, and puts Miss Gray in Scotland in the spring before the child was born. If she had just learned that she was pregnant, she could have arranged to wait for the birth of the child here, where she wasn’t as well known.”

“Yes, yes, that makes sense to me. Who was the officer, do you know?”

There was nothing in the procurator’s face to show that he was in any way prepared for the shock that was to come. Interest and a natural curiosity were there. Nothing more.

“We have reason to believe that the officer she had been friends with for some time was a Scot,” Rutledge said carefully. “I’ve been told by a reliable witness that his name was Robert Burns.”