reading from the Psalms for Florence Teller’s service. He had seemed to speak from the heart.

“If those men were comforted, then it didn’t matter what you felt.”

“I wish I could believe that.”

“There must have been rewarding moments in your mission work?”

“That too was a sham,” he answered tersely.

“But you spoke eloquently about fieldwork in your book. So I’m told.”

“That was worse than a sham, it was a fraud. But it bought me time. And that’s all that mattered.”

“Time for what?” Rutledge asked, but Teller ignored him.

“You have no conception of what Africa is like. There was a tribe on the far side of the river. Which was hardly more than a stream that fed into the Niger. Still, it kept them from our throats. We only had to guard the crossing. But then their crops failed in the rain. My God, I’d never seen so much rain! And then it was gone, the soil baked nearly to brick in days. I’d been frugal—thrifty. So they came for our crops, pitiful as they were. And I abandoned my flock. I stood in the pulpit and exhorted them to put their faith in a merciful and compassionate God, knowing all the while they’d be slaughtered. And I’d be dead with them if I stayed—the foreign priest who had lured them away from the old worship. I can still see their eyes, you know—looking up at me, believing me, putting their trust, their lives in my promise, and the next morning I was packed and walking out before first light. I dream of their eyes sometimes. Not the poor slaughtered bodies.”

Rutledge said nothing.

As if driven, Walter went on.

“And then there was Zanzibar. We’d had a disagreement with the bishop, and we thought we knew better how to deal with the Arabs. Better than he, surely? And instead we found ourselves charged with insubordination. Zanzibar is an island—have you ever been to a spice island? My God, pepper and mace and allspice, cloves and vanilla and nutmeg—you ride down a hot sunny stretch of road where they’re drying the cloves on bright cloths spread almost to your feet. Small brown spikes, thousands of them, like a carpet that moves with the wind. And vanilla pods—or tiny green seeds of pepper. Mace. That thin coating of a nutmeg is worth its weight in gold. Amazing place, and the sea so blue it hurts your eyes to look out across it. But the smell of slaves is there in the town as well. Misery and grief and pain and helpless anger. That’s Zanzibar as well.”

Hamish said, “You mustna’ let him finish.”

But Rutledge refused to halt the flow of this man’s confession. He could see how the soul of the man had been scoured to the bone.

“In China we used the opium traders. They carried messages where no one else would, and sometimes were the only protection a traveling man of God had from bandits we found on the road. So we lived with the devil—quietly, mind you—while we preached that opium was evil and led to madness and death. Double standards, Rutledge. We preached and didn’t live a word that came out of our mouths. Sanctimonious, self-righteous prigs, that’s what we were, and I was ashamed of all of us in the end.”

“Do you think you were the only missionary who felt that way?”

“I hoped I was.” He laughed harshly. “I wasn’t like the rest of them. I had no calling, you see. I became what my father told me to become. And Peter hated the Army as much as I hated my own work. I’d have liked being a soldier, I think. But who knows? I might have hated that too.”

Which, Hamish was remarking to Rutledge, explained why he had told Florence Marshall that he was a soldier. Living a lie because it made him feel better about his lack of choice in the matter, made him appear to be dashing and romantic in the eyes of a young woman who had never seen the world beyond where she lived. And yet, cowardly enough that he used his brother’s name, for fear his father would somehow learn of his rebellion.

They could hear Mr. Stedley, the vicar, coming down the stairs.

Teller shook himself, as if awakening from a reverie, as if he’d been talking more to himself than Rutledge.

“She’s very peaceful,” Mr. Stedley said, coming into the room.

“Yes.”

“Is there any comfort I could offer you, Walter?”

“Thank you, Rector, for coming. You might wish to speak to