“. . . wasn’t given his job back after the War. No one else in Osterley will hire him. He’s nearly destitute and won’t accept help. Father James believed—but now that he’s dead, Mrs. Barnett and the Vicar try to see that Peter is fed. But he doesn’t want pity—” Her voice cracked, and she added, “It’s never the evil people, is it, who suffer? It’s always the lonely ones who are already afraid!”

She turned on her heel, going back into The Pelican to rejoin her party.

Not hungry any more, Rutledge stood there for a time in the darkness of the October night, and then walked back to the hotel. He would settle his bill in the morning.

When he came into the lobby, Rutledge was greeted by Mrs. Barnett. She gestured toward the small parlor. “You have a visitor, Inspector.”

“A visitor?” he repeated, his mind still on the darkness he’d just left. On Peter Henderson and Father James.

“Miss Connaught.”

He brought his attention back to the present. “Ah. Thank you, Mrs. Barnett.”

With a nod he walked past the stairs and to the small parlor. As he opened the door, Priscilla Connaught got to her feet and faced him, as if facing the hangman.

“I saw you with Lord Sedgwick the other morning. And then I was told you had gone back to London. Is it finished then, the reward paid and the case of Father James’s death finally closed?”

She looked as if she hadn’t slept, dark rings under her eyes and a nervous tic at the corner of her mouth. The handsome dark blue suit she wore seemed nearly black, emphasizing her pallor.

Rutledge recalled what she had told him—that with Father James dead, she herself had no reason to live. He wondered what she did each day, when not absorbed in her anger. Did she read? Write letters to friends? Or sit and stare out at the marshes, waiting for something that would never come? Peace, perhaps.

He answered with some care, “I went to London on other business. As far as I know, the probe into Matthew Walsh’s movements hasn’t been completed. There has been no mention of passing out a reward. Not in my hearing.”

“Oh.” She seemed shaken. As if she had been so very certain that she hadn’t thought beyond the need to find out if she was right.

Rutledge, studying her face, hought, She’s in worse straits than Peter Henderson. Father James was an obsession she couldn’t live without. Like a drug, only far more deadly.

Hamish said, “Aye, but there’s naught to be done. You canna’ stop the investigation.”

Rutledge gestured to the chair she had risen from, but she shook her head. And then, as if her legs wouldn’t support her any longer, she sank back into the seat.

“Do you know Lord Sedgwick well, Miss Connaught?”