Remembering what Constable Dawlish had said, Rutledge asked, “You put the horse down, didn’t you? Was she there, watching?”

“Aye, it were left to me, and a hard job it were. Loved that horse, I did. Mr. Cormac were there, his head buried in the horse’s neck and crying. Miss Olivia came with Dawlish, who were only a boy then, and said, There’s no saving him? Not even if he never races again? Must we put him down?’ And I said, The smith looked at that foreleg, miss, and he said t’were shattered, there were no way to mend it so’s it’d take his weight.’ Fleet as he were, I couldn’t watch him live out his days a cripple, struggling over every step, though I didn’t say that to her face, her being a cripple herself!”

He looked into his cup and swished the ale thoughtfully. “She stayed till it were done. Not a bit squeamish, as you’d think in a young lady like her. Afterward, she told Mr. Cor-mac, if he cared so much for Lucifer, he could help dig the hole to bury him in. And we did it, out on the headland, Mr. Cormac and a few of the lads and me.”

Rutledge walked back to the inn as the church clock struck twelve. The rain had turned into a misty drizzle again, and the street was no longer a river under his feet. More people were about, now, men and women, a few of them nodding to him in recognition. Mrs. Trepol, hurrying past, wished him a good day, and in the distance he glimpsed Rachel moving head down towards the woods that separated the village from the Hall. Hamish, rumbling with suppressed irritation, kept Rutledge from concentrating his thoughts on the morning’s work. Or was it his own reluctance?

At the inn, Mr. Trask took his umbrella and greeted him with the news that he had a visitor waiting in the parlor. Rutledge went through into a long narrow room with a ceiling so low it seemed to brush his head. In the wave of claustrophobia that followed, he saw only the dark furnishings, the empty grate, and a tall man with white hair who rose from a chair and stood where he was, waiting for Rutledge to speak.

After a moment, he managed to say, “I’m Rutledge. I’m afraid I don’t know who you are.”

The man looked him over, then said, “Chambers. Thomas Chambers. I represent the Trevelyan family—”