“And possibly Mr. Comfrey,” El added, examining the painting Arnaud had set against the wall. “You see it too?” she asked of the artist.
“Too high for the attic, definitely from the roof. It’s cleverly done,” Arnaud acknowledged.
Andrew carried in a handsome mahogany, marble-topped table.
Grey promptly used it as easel so all could see. “Excellent perspective, but how does one paint from a roof?”
El hid a smile. The art puzzle had distracted his magnificent brain from his foolish fury. “Did I not read in one of your papers about an artist who despaired of learning perspective because his one eye was crossed?”
“Knock, knock,” a musical voice called from the entry. “If we carry in our own seats, may we enter?” Without waiting for a response, the curate and his wife arrived carrying two more of the elegant dining chairs.
El bit back a snicker as Grey hastened to help the diminutive librarian settle her chair next to El.
“There’s a much nicer sofa buried beneath the rest of these chairs,” the petite Mrs. Upton announced, reaching for a teapot. “And a far better tea table.”
El demurely sipped from her cup and watched Grey go from rage to resignation. He couldn’t yell at his neighbors as if they were unruly students.
“As I was saying—” El waited politely while furniture was settled and more tea poured. “One does not normally paint from a roof, especially one as slanted as ours. Lord Greybourne, if you will recall the story of the artist with crossed eyes?”
Calling him by his despised title returned his glower, but he was more intent on Mort’s painting. “The artist in question had a more visually acute student sketch in geometric shapes for the objects he could see but couldn’t align.”
“Geometric shapes?” Clare asked. “He drew squares and triangles and circles?”
Arnaud stood beside the painting and used his finger to sketch the underlying shapes behind trees and river and all in between. “Mort only needed the relative proportions of each object, as seen from above. He could then do the actual painting in his studio.”
“A bird’s-eye view, as it were,” Grey said in admiration. “Clever. But a man his size sitting on that roof, even for a sketch?—”
“Tiny must have been the one Mr. Bradford reported working on the roof,” El corrected. “He’s the handy brother, the one who uses tools. I assume he’s helped Mort with dimensions before.’’
Captain Huntley growled at this conclusion. “We have proof of that? And where does this take us?”
Grey, however, understood instantly. “Tiny can’t paint, but he may be as good at—let us call it geometry—as he is with mechanics. We don’t know the inspiration for the painting, but while he worked on the roof—because Comfrey paid him to do so?” he inquired as he began to see the light.
“The bank might verify who was paid,” Clare said, catching on. “The person working on the roof may have been watching for boats to steal from and simply put his sketching talent to use. Piracy is a profession Mort admits his father and uncle practiced and most likely explains the stolen goods in the cellar, although he won’t admit his brother stole them.”
“Mort and Tiny, and all the local Bradfords, most likely know sailing rigs,” Eleanor observed, thinking it through. “But Comfrey and Percival grew up in town. They most likely did not.”
“Which means what?” Hunt demanded querulously.
More interested in the cart’s contents than this discussion, Andrew and Silas entered the hallway, carrying a handsome dining table. The carpenter-curate leaped up to help, admiring the polished wood and fine design as they carried it into the dining parlor, discussing the disposal of the ancient table already there.
Grey didn’t even notice. He was following the path of her thoughts, if El was any judge of his expression. And she’d been studying him for a year.
“Tiny, working on the roof, watches Comfrey enter the yard. With someone? Or does he climb down to confront his banker cousin over something?”
“That little whelp isn’t large enough to knock down a man Comfrey’s size,” Hunt protested.
“You’re a brilliant engineer, my love, but you lack imagination.” Clare leaned over to pat him on his propped-up knee, before turning to Grey. “If Tiny was on the roof, he had a hammer, didn’t he?”
Eleanor shook her head. “He couldn’t swing it hard and high enough to hurt me. He couldn’t have hurt anyone larger, like Comfrey. And Meera said it appeared Comfrey was punched in the jaw, hard enough to bruise. She said something about Comfrey not dying instantly when his head struck the rock, so there was time for bruising.”
“So, from the roof, Tiny saw his brother hit Comfrey and was protecting him when he came down and helped haul him to the well?” Minerva Upton didn’t appear happy with that answer.
“Mort is big enough to carry Comfrey to the river without aid, I should imagine.” Arnaud caught the dilemma. “I could have easily carried him that distance. Why dump him in a well?”
“Because that’s where the winch is.” Eleanor pointed out the obvious, although not all the company knew about the grappling hook.
“A winch, right!” Hunt, the engineer, started to see the picture. “The grappling hook had blood on it. So Tiny may not have killed Comfrey but he was a witness? The larger man fled, leaving Tiny to clean it up?”
