Lancashire, which isn’t as demanding as the Lake Country or Derbyshire. Or perhaps he took the sea air in Morecambe?”

“I don’t believe anyone in this family has ever been to Morecambe? I’m beginning to think you must have the wrong Burrows, Inspector.”

“We’re trying to find anyone who might have been in that vicinity in 1902 and into 1903.”

“It couldn’t have been our Thomas. He was very ill for weeks, and then there were weeks of recovery after that. Walking tours would have been impossible.” She frowned. “I’ve always had the feeling that Thomas knew he was living on borrowed time. He grasped life with such eagerness after that. I was surprised his regiment allowed him to sail with them for India. But of course the long sea journey was good for him.”

Rutledge hadn’t intended to name names, but he could see no other choice.

“Do you perhaps know Peter Teller, who was in your son’s regiment?”

“Yes, we met him at a regimental affair. Quite a handsome young man in his dress uniform, and his wife was charming. Susannah? Was that her name? Imagine remembering it after all these years. But I couldn’t help but think watching her that I hoped Thomas would find someone just as loving. I heard from friends that Captain Teller was severely wounded and is still recovering. Is there better news now?”

“He’s walking again,” Rutledge told her, “though still with great difficulty.”

“I’m glad. Thomas admired him so. I must say that if my son had to emulate anyone, Peter Teller was as fine a choice as I could wish for.”

Susannah Teller had been right about the imitation, then. But either she’d forgotten or didn’t know about Thomas Burrows’s illness.

Hamish said, “Ye ken, he’d ha’ put it behind him. It was no’ something to bring up.”

And that was true. Stiff upper lip and all that for a young subaltern just learning to fit in.

Rutledge took his leave, thanking her for her help.

“But I’ve given you very little,” she said. “I hope your inquiry prospers.”

In the motorcar once more, Rutledge said as he let out the clutch, “I don’t think Susannah Teller expected her story to collapse so quickly.”

“Aye. That’s verra’ likely. But she’s afraid her husband is a murderer.”

“And she may be right.” He took a deep breath. “It’s time to go to Hobson. Constable Satterthwaite and his superiors have the right to know where we’re looking, and what the evidence is.”

“He will be verra’ angry,” Hamish warned. “It was a cruel thing to do to such a lass.”

He stayed the night in Cheshire and drove the rest of the way to Hobson just after first light.

The village was awake and the shops busy when he got there. Constable Satterthwaite was pleased to see him, standing in the police station doorway with a packet of tea biscuits in his hand and smiling.

“Did you learn anything more about Larkin?”

“I went to his college in Cambridge. The porter there vouched for him. Meanwhile, I’ve been searching for the real Peter Teller. Not the man you thought you knew. That man never existed.”

“I met him—we saw him time and again here in Hobson,” the constable argued. “He wasn’t a figment of her imagination. Or ours. Besides, there’s the boy.”

“He was someone else. There’s much to tell you,” Rutledge said, taking the chair across the desk, as they reached the office.

“The man in London, then,” Satterthwaite said with resignation.

Rutledge proceeded to outline what he had learned so far, and how he believed it all fit together. Satterthwaite listened in silence, but his face reddened as the evidence against Peter Teller mounted.

“Why did he have to kill her, then?” he asked finally. “She thought he was dead. It was finished.”

“I don’t know. Yet,” Rutledge admitted.

“Damn the man!” he said heavily, and then to Rutledge, “I’m sorry, sir, but you weren’t here, I was. I’d like very much to watch him hang for what he’s done. Not just the murder, you understand, although that was bad enough. But for her empty life, for not being there when Timmy died and she was half out of her mind with grief, wanting to bury him at the farm, and not in the churchyard. We had all we could do to convince her to let us take him away. She wanted him there, where she could see him every day.”

Rutledge was reminded of Mr. Cobb, who spoke to the memorial to his sons, every morning and every evening. He could understand her need.

Satterthwaite got up and paced