No Shred of Evidence: An Inspector Ian Rutledge Mystery by Charles Todd Page B

wanting to dry a bit by the looks of you. Come into the study and stand by the fire.”
    Rutledge followed him down the passage and into another dark Victorian room. The wallpaper was a medium blue with sailing ships plowing their way through the sea.
    Toup saw him looking at it, and said ruefully, “The former vicar was from a seafaring family. I find myself seasick at the sight of them. I was about to eat my lunch. There’s plenty, won’t you join me?”
    “Yes, thank you.”
    “Then we’ll adjourn to the kitchen if you please, unless it’s a matter of my services that brings you here.”
    “Just your memory,” Rutledge answered, and followed him to the rear of the house to the large kitchen. Here the walls were painted a soft green, with a plain deal table and chairs set under the windows.
    “I often take my meals here. There’s fresh bread and eggs and cheese and so on. I can make a dish I learned to cook in France.”
    “By all means.”
    Toup busied himself at the counter, then checked the ancient cookstove before putting the kettle on for tea. “My housekeeper’s day off, and I’m sure she’s elated to be warm at home instead of trudging back down the lane to her house. Talk to me if you will, I can do two things at once.”
    Rutledge had considered his approach. “I’ve learned quite a bit about the Grenvilles and the St. Iveses. Even the Gordons and the Langleys. I know next to nothing about Trevose. Is his an old family?”
    “Yes, they’ve been here for centuries. On the same land. They’ve produced some fine soldiers over the years. And even finer farmers.”
    “There’s an older woman who came to the door.”
    “That’s Bronwyn, the housekeeper. She was Trevose’s mother’s housekeeper as well. I have no idea how old she is, but my guess would be seventy. I may be wrong.”
    He was busy chopping onions, their sharp tang filling the room.
    “Did Trevose have any brothers or sisters?”
    Finishing the onions, Toup cracked a brown egg into a bowl. The yolk was a rich yellow. “There were three children, I believe. A sister who died of some childhood ailment, and a brother who was killed in an accident when he was sixteen, seventeen.”
    “What sort of accident?”
    “It was before my time. And I’ve never asked. You don’t, sometimes. In my first church I asked a woman about her dead son, only to learn he’d been hanged for murder. What I’ve told you I’ve discovered in the course of many conversations. Or seeing a name on a tombstone or in the church records.”
    “Then Trevose is not married?”
    “No. I can’t say ‘never’ because I don’t know. But he’s been alone save for the housekeeper ever since I took over the church.”
    He had finished beating the eggs, added bits of cheese and onion and a handful of breakfast bacon he took from the pantry. The teakettle boiled, and he set it to one side and put a large iron skillet in its place.
    “And when did you come here?”
    “Twenty-seven years ago. Straight out of seminary.”
    “And the Saunders family. Any children other than Harry?” He knew the answer but was interested in how the vicar would reply.
    “The apple of their eyes, Harry. Someone told me that Mrs. Saunders had suffered several miscarriages before he was born.”
    “You told me that his family had come down from London in the past. Where is she from?”
    “London. While the elder Saunders was there in training, he met her and brought her home with him.”
    “Love at first sight.”
    “Or so many people claim.”
    “And the Grenvilles?”
    “I would say it was a love match. They are certainly well suited and seem to go on well together. And if you’re about to ask where she’s from, it’s Plymouth. She’s a distant cousin or something.”
    He remembered that Mrs. Grenville had told him the events in St. Michael’s Mount had occurred before she met her husband.
    “So they’ve known each other most of their lives.”
    Toup had scrambled the