Rutledge let a silence fall. It expressed nothing, but Stevenson seemed to read into it a refusal to accept his offhand remarks. After a moment, the doctor added, “But you’re right. The last time or two it wasn’t an illness that brought him here—his or a parishioner’s. He wanted to ask me about a patient of mine. Man named Baker. Father James had been to see him just before he died. Afterward he began to wonder about Baker’s state of mind at the end. Far as I know, it was clear and coherent. I saw no reason to believe otherwise, and I was in attendance.”

“One of Father James’s flock?”

“Actually, no. I suppose that’s what lay behind his questions, although Father James didn’t go into the matter. Baker was staunch Church of England, but he wanted to be shriven by a Catholic priest as well as his own Vicar, and his family humored him. Father James, to his credit, attended even though it was one of the nastiest nights I’d seen in a year or more. A few hours later Herbert Baker died of natural causes—I can vouch for that—and his Will was quite straightforward. As a matter of fact, I’d been asked to witness it some years back. None of Baker’s children has complained about it, as far as I know. There was no reason to feel any concern, and I told Father James that.”

“And yet you tell me he spoke to you again about Baker.”

The doctor picked up his pen, indicating that he wanted to get back to his own work. “I just explained what happened. There was some confusion the night this patient was dying. Baker insisted he wanted a priest. The one from St. Anne’s. But it was the Vicar who sat beside the old man when he breathed his last, close on to three in the morning. Father James had already gone back to the rectory, having spent no more than half an hour with the patient. I grant you that it wasn’t the usual sort of thing, but then I’ve sat by enough deathbeds myself to know that there’s no accounting sometimes. Martin Baker sent for a priest to give his father ease. Rightly so!”

“What do you think was resting so heavily on Herbert Baker’s conscience?” Rutledge asked the question conversationally, as if out of simple curiosity.

“I expect it was no more than some youthful indiscretion. Baker had been sexton at Holy Trinity for many years, and he may not have relished spoiling the Vicar’s good opinion of him, just at the end. I’ve known more than one case where a man’s wild oats came back to haunt him on his deathbed.”

“I shouldn’t think that Father James—an experienced priest from all I’ve heard—would be overly concerned about a young man’s wild oats.”