He spent the night watching over Rory. The boy only cried out once in sleep. The rest of it stayed buried in his dreams.
The following morning, the owner of the tavern provided the name of a man who rented out his horse and cart at the local livery.
Young Brimley, a man full-grown now, well-muscled from life on the sheep farm, was already far afield when they arrived. His wife greeted them at the door, two young boys racing about.
“I know who you are, Mr. Brodie,” she had gently smiled. “And who might this young man be?”
She nodded when he introduced Rory, then sent one of the young lads to the field to summon his father.
No questions were asked when young Brimley returned to the stone cottage with his oldest son.
“You seem to make a habit of rescuing young lads,” he commented. “We’ve room enough, and he’ll be good to have around for the young ones,” he assured Brodie.
“The son of arelativeas far as anyone needs to know,” he then added, the story that would eventually make its way around the nearby village.
“Yer leavin’?” Rory said, fighting back the tears when it came time to go.
“There are things I must do.” Brodie assured him that these were good people, and he must tell no one about what happened in London.
“I need you to be brave, as brave as yer mother would want. Do ye ken?”
Rory slowly nodded. “Ye’ll come back?”
“Aye,” he had promised, then turned the cart back toward the village.
Four
LONDON
I had learneda great deal from Brodie over the past two years in the various inquiry cases we’d had taken.
One: Assume that anyone might be the criminal in an investigation.
Two: It is quite often the innocent bystander who saw something important they weren’t even aware of.
Three: Always be aware of my surroundings.
Four: Trust no one—except for Brodie of course.
They were lessons that he’d learned on the streets as a boy and then in his time with the MET and during our private inquiry cases. Lessons to live by, as he put it somewhat grimly at the time.
And then there were the aspects of every case that must be determined:
Who had the motive for murder?
That might be anyone. A family member, someone wronged by the victim, greed for either wealth or power. Then there were the cases of foreign espionage, someone killed passing information or someone else determined to topple the government.
Who had the means?
Most usually it was someone in a position known to the victim beforehand, someone trusted, an acquaintance, or someone who moved in certain circles that brought them into contact with the victim and might never be suspected.
And who had the opportunity? Often someone who seemed unlikely, perhaps even innocent, however, they had the means and the motive, and then created the opportunity.
Motive, means, and opportunity. I found it all fascinating.
Brodie, of course, called it something different—morbid curiosity about the darker aspects of human nature that I had been studying for some time. He suggested that it was a dark aspect of my nature.
Women, ladies in particular, according to his experience, simply weren’t supposed to be interested in such things.
