CHAPTER ELEVEN
Over the course of several weeks, Constable Gallagher had managed not only sobriety, but had additionally secured an investment of funds on behalf of the Fraser estate which would allow him to temporarily shutter his cobbler shop and, in lieu of mending soles, pursue the course of inquest which he believed—and had been efficacious in persuading the inheritors of Grantley Manor to believe—would lead to the capture of its late owner’s killer.
The chance meeting of the Constable and the driver, Rawden Acton, had spurred a frenzied conversation and an even greater frenzy of cerebral activity within the unpaid officer of the peace. He could not accept, after seeing the slain corpse of the departed and having the associated carnage impressed firmly in his mind’s eye, that such a barbaric act could go unanswered by the law. Then, hearing in explicit detail of the murder of Sir Eoin Walters from Mr. Acton, he could not escape the conclusion that the slayings, as eerily and inexplicably similar in manner as they were, must have been committed by the same fiend.
He spoke at length a second time with Dingham, Mr. Fraser’s footman, who had recovered Sully, the horse, in the wood near the road. Dingham related the events of the evening, from his perspective, with much candour and excessive, and largely superfluous, detail. The footman was quite affected at being summoned for a second interview and evidently thought himself honoured that he should have been to be so singled out amongst the house staff. Through a series of burrowing inquiries, Constable Gallagher was able to determine that the surprisingly astute footman had, in addition to discovering Sully tied to a tree, bucket of water left for him, also noticed a set of footprints in the mud, diverging from that spot in the direction of the road. He had initially failed to report this finding due to the euphoria of recovering his late master’s prized stallion.
The day following the aforementioned second interview, Constable Gallagher accompanied the footman to the place where the horse was found. The woods were, even in the midday hours at that point in the autumn, fairly dark, which was a boon to the law-man’s hopes, as the two were able to readily retrace the horse’s steps in the now dry mud. When they reached the place Dingham had described, they located the perpetrator’s boot prints still intact. The coppice floor had been particularly wet that evening, as rain had been falling steadily for some time prior—so wet, in fact, that the prints were deeply fixed. Gallagher sent Dingham back to the estate while he followed the tracks in a south-westerly direction toward the main highway where, naturally, he lost sight of them at the road. He took particular care, however, to sketch the footprints, which, to his trained cobbler’s eye, happened to be particularly unique.
On nothing but a hunch, Gallagher set out the next morning by horse on the road toward the west. He was not able to sleep most of the night, and rather than employing his restlessness in some prudent endeavour—such as shining his muddied boots, as he should have—he simply tossed and turned. Once he departed, he came through the towns of Buckstone, Holly Springs, and Hillingshire, stopping at local inns and petitioning their proprietors for information. None had seen a suspicious rider during the evening in question. He was nearly about to give up his hope in this direction, when some small voice inside him pried him to continue on toward just one more village, a mere eight miles to the west. It was already nearly dark, and he would most likely have had to take up lodging anyway, so he resolved to persist.
To his chagrin, at the inn at the small market town of Lambton he also garnered no such hope from the innkeeper. Frustrated, cold, and by this time very hungry, he ordered a room for the night and a meal. Once he had paid with funds allotted to him for expenses by the Fraser estate, he went out to make sure his horse was seen to properly. In the yard, he introduced himself to Robert Toomey, a local who worked in the stable. Toomey was something near fifty years of age, but at least seventy in appearance. His posture was fixedly hunched forward, and he approached with a limp as he took the reins.
“My, you must have come a great distance,” Toomey pronounced.
“Why do you say so?” Gallagher replied.
“We have not had rain in a full week.”
“I am afraid I do not discern your meaning.”
“Your boots,” the stableman pointed with a crooked finger. “Caked in mud. You must have been somewhere along the coast where it rained.”
“I comprehend you now,” answered the Constable. “Nay, I am from not but thirty miles toward Sheffield.”
“And have you had rain in that direction?”
“Not recently, no. I had a walk through a rather damp wood yesterday.”
“I see,” Toomey answered. “It must have been some walk.”
“Yes, indeed, and not for the pleasure of it, I can assure you.”
Toomey laughed heartily and then coughed into his sleeve. “I have not seen boots that muddy in nearly a month!”
“Have you not?”
“No, sir. And I would remember such a time.”
“Why is that?”
“The last time I laid eyes on boots in such a state was under very peculiar circumstances.”
Gallagher took him gently by the elbow. “Peculiar—how so?”
“I rose at three-thirty in the morning, as is my custom, and began checking the stables and polishing saddles, when lo, with a great uproar, a carriage came thundering up the lane.”
“A carriage?”
“Yes, sir. And a costly one at that.”
“Please, go on.”
“As I neared the front gate, the horses reared to a halt. The coachman dismounted, rounded the back, and opened a trunk. He approached me with two of the soggiest, muddiest boots I had ever laid mine eyes upon. Then, he offered them to me!”
“Do you have them?” Gallagher asked excitedly.
“Nay.” The Constable let out a sigh. “Astonishing quality as they were—I most certainly have never seen a pair their equal in my lifetime—they were a bit too large for my frame, so I declined them.” Gallagher groaned in displeasure.
“And what of the carriage—in which direction did it depart?”
“Off toward Pemberley,” came the flat reply, crooked finger pointing the way.
“ Pemberley? ” Gallagher asked in astonishment.
“Aye, sir.”
“The Darcy estate?”
“The very same.”
“It was not Mr. Darcy’s coachman, was it?”
“No, sir. In fact, it was not even one of the Darcy’s coaches.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive, sir.”
“How can you be positive?”
“There are not so many carriages in this part of the country, aside from Mr. Darcy’s. Additionally, I have never met with that coachman before. Mr. Darcy’s driver is Edward Dalton. He lives just up the lane.”
“I see,” Gallagher contemplated. “Is it possible that the driver went on to Pemberley directly?”
“I suppose it is possible, sir, but not likely,” came the courteous reply.
“And why not?”
“The Darcys were all in London at the time. I doubt very highly a guest of such means would be staying at Pemberley in their absence.”
“So, if not to Pemberley, where might they have gone?”
“To the seven seas and beyond, sir.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Headed in that direction,” Toomey said, jabbing the air with his gnarled appendage, “a man could take a road to Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, Bristol, or anywhere in between.” The lawman hung his head in disappointment at the impasse he had seemingly reached. “What’s your horse’s name?” asked the servant.
“Abacus,” replied the Constable. “But he is not my property.”
“What a shame—beautiful creature.”
“That he is.”
After a moment’s silence, Toomey suddenly asked, “Would you like to see the boots?”
“Excuse me?”
“The boots—would you like to see them?”
“You have them? I thought you declined them?”
“The coachmen told me to give them away or dispose of them on his behalf. He said they belonged to his gentleman, but he had no further use of them, and wished not to weigh the carriage down—silly thought indeed!”
“What did you do with them?”
“Cleaned them up nicely and gave them to my son.”
“And he has them?”
“Certainly. Wears them every day.”
“And he lives here —in Lambton?”
“Aye, sir. He can bring them to you in the morning.”
The Constable had a few pints inside before proceeding to his room for the night. He slept heavily in a serene medley of exhaustion and delighted inebriation.