He moved on to the barn, stepping inside the great open door. Dust motes floated in heavy air smelling of manure and hay and moldering leather. An old side saddle was propped over a wooden bench. In the far dimness, a pair of horses turned their heads to stare with interest at him. A cat, stretched out along the top of a shelf, yawned and stared at him as well, through narrow, yellow eyes. Doves cooed desultorily from the rafters of the loft.

And where was the caretaker? Out in the fields? Or in one of the scattered outbuildings?

He went back to his motorcar and blew the horn. Once, then twice. In the silence that followed he thought he heard the lowing of cows, softened by distance. He blew the horn again. After a time a man in ragged coveralls peered out of one of the smaller sheds. He was tall, wiry, his white hair cut short, his face weather-lined. It was hard to judge his age. Fifty? Older, Rutledge thought.

As he came warily toward Rutledge his stiff gait said closer to seventy.

“Lost, are ye? Well, that’s the difference between one of them newfangled motorcars and a horse. A horse has sense when you don’t!”

He smelled strongly of ale and a mixture of manure and dried earth.

Rutledge said easily, “My name is Rutledge, I’m helping the local police look into the disappearance of a young woman who was found murdered a few miles from here—”

“You’re not a local man,” the farmer said, shading his eyes from the sun to stare at Rutledge’s face. His fingernails were crusted with dirt from working in the vegetable gardens, and his chin was poorly shaved, as if he couldn’t see to use his razor.

“No. I’m from Scotland Yard.”

“Ha! London, is it?” He spat. “That Truit needs all the help you can give. Whoring son of a bitch, can’t keep his eyes or his hands to himself. Or hold his liquor!” There was disdain and disgust in the loud voice. “Constable, my left hind foot!” He considered Rutledge for a moment. “I thought they’d caught the man who’d done the killing.”

“We don’t know if we have or not, Mr.—” He left the sentence unfinished.

After a moment the caretaker said, “Jimson. Ted Jimson.” He was still watching Rutledge closely.

“How long have you worked here?”

“Worked here? Nigh all my life! What’s that to do with a murder?”

Rutledge said idly, as if it was more a matter of curiosity than anything else, “I understand that Mrs. Wyatt was here on fifteen August, from around eleven o’clock until well into the afternoon, working with a sick animal.”