Page 66 of Murder on Cold Street
She was capable of great faith, this woman.
As was Lord Ingram.
Charlotte hadn’t realized this before, because she was not accustomed to thinking in such terms, but he had placed his faith in her, who did not always understand the full spectrum of human emotions.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” she said. “Was that the last you saw of Mr. Sullivan?”
“Yes.”
The relief was evident in Mrs. Treadles’s voice, even though Mr. Sullivan would never be able to prey on her again.
“And Mr. Longstead—when did you last see him?”
“After I returned to his house I came across him speaking to Mrs. Coltrane, his housekeeper—they were near the cloakroom where I hid for some time.”
“Before or after you went into the cloakroom?”
“Before. I remember thinking that I didn’t want them to see me, and they didn’t. Or at least Mr. Longstead didn’t.”
Silence fell. The heels of their boots clicked on wet pavement. A gust blew, shaking bare branches all along the street. As they walked past a house with a blazing Christmas tree by the window, someone inside began to play “Silent Night” on a piano, the notes faint yet crystalline.
Mrs. Treadles worried her upper lip, her apprehension warringwith her need to know. “May I ask what your questions are about, Miss Holmes?”
“I wonder whether it was possible that the loud noise had been produced by none other than Mr. Longstead. If that were the case, I could see he and Mr. Sullivan getting into a heated argument after your departure.”
“What?” The volume of Mrs. Treadles’s voice shot up.
Hastily she glanced around before asking, in a vehement whisper, “Surely you aren’t implying that Mr. Sullivan then killed Mr. Longstead with my husband’s service revolver?”
“If Inspector Treadles didn’t kill them, and as there is no trace of anyone else who did, then we must consider that possibility,” Charlotte pointed out.
There was, of course, the scrap of fabric that had been found on the fence outside 33 Cold Street, which could have been left by the escaped murderer. But they would have a difficult time persuading Scotland Yard of that.
“But then how did Mr. Sullivan die?” Mrs. Treadles demanded, her eyes full of doubt and incomprehension.
“He could have shot himself.”
“No, not him,” said Mrs. Treadles decisively. “If he had shot Mr. Longstead, he would have tried his best to wriggle out of it, not kill himself. There was too much spite and vanity in him to let a moment’s panic bring him to suicide.”
Despite Charlotte’s assertion, the facts were on Mrs. Treadles’s side. The shot that had killed Mr. Sullivan hadn’t been a contact shot. That meant the tip of the revolver hadnotbeen pressed against his forehead, which argued much more strongly in favor of homicide.
They were now behind Mrs. Treadles’s house. She opened the back door and asked, in a low, anxious voice, “Have you other theories, Miss Holmes?”
Charlotte shook her head. “None worth mentioning, I’m afraid.”
Mrs. Treadles smiled gamely. “Well, there’s still time. We are still three days away from Christmas.”
She led Charlotte to Inspector Treadles’s dressing room, a neat and well-organized space, so Charlotte could see where his service revolver was usually kept.
Holmes looked down into the drawer. The only item it contained was an unopened box of cartridges, the edges of its wrapping paper still glued together.
“Mrs. Graycott said she told you about Inspector Treadles asking about items missing from the house,” said Mrs. Treadles. “I believe, as she does, that the revolver was missing from before he left on this last trip. As you can see, he didn’t take any rounds. A man intending on using a revolver would have taken rounds.”
There was a note of pleading in her voice, even though she must know that Scotland Yard would simply say he had acquired cartridges elsewhere.
Charlotte closed the drawer. “May I have the letters that he sent you when he was away recently?”
When Mrs. Treadles realized that Charlotte was not going to comment on the cartridges, her eyes dimmed, but she kept her voice even. “Inspector Brighton took the letters. I can give you the envelopes though—I’d already removed the envelopes because I didn’t want the police to see that the locations on the postmarks didn’t agree with what he’d written on the letters themselves.”
