A Test of Wills

The first installment of the Inspector Ian Rutledge mystery series is set in England in June 1919. On a quiet morning in the Warwickshire village of Upper Streetham, Colonel Charles Harris, a decorated veteran of both the Boer War and the Great War, is shot in the head at close range with a shotgun while riding his horse across a meadow on his estate. His panicked horse bolts home to the stables covered in blood.

In London, Superintendent Bowles at Scotland Yard harbors a class-driven resentment toward Inspector Ian Rutledge, a talented detective recently returned to duty after serving in the trenches. Bowles views Rutledge as both suitable for the politically sensitive investigation and expendable if things go wrong. The local police requested outside help because the chief witness's testimony points toward Captain Mark Wilton, a celebrated war hero who holds the Victoria Cross and has ties to the Royal Family.

Rutledge drives to Warwickshire rather than take the train, unable to tolerate enclosed spaces after being buried alive in a collapsed trench. He has shell shock, a condition now recognized as post-traumatic stress disorder, and is haunted by the voice of Corporal Hamish MacLeod, a young Scottish soldier who refused an order during the Battle of the Somme. Hamish faced a firing squad but did not die immediately, forcing Rutledge to deliver the final pistol shot. That trauma, compounded by the shell blast that buried Rutledge moments later, left Hamish's voice permanently lodged in his mind. Rutledge also grieves over Jean, his former fiancée, who ended their engagement after visiting him in hospital, frightened by the man the war returned to her.

At the Shepherd's Crook Inn, Sergeant Davies briefs Rutledge. Harris's estate agent, Laurence Royston, discovered the riderless horse and organized the search. The evening before the murder, Captain Wilton quarreled violently with Harris at Mallows, Harris's estate, storming out and shouting threats. Davies reveals a detail Bowles withheld: The key witness is Daniel Hickam, a shell-shocked veteran who drinks heavily and claims he saw Wilton and Harris arguing in a lane the morning of the murder.

Rutledge begins his interviews at Mallows, where Harris's ward Lettice Wood receives him heavily sedated and grief-stricken yet strangely evasive, offering no defense of her fiancé Wilton. The butler Johnston describes the quarrel in detail but notes the Colonel seemed composed the next morning. Rutledge then visits Sally Davenant, Wilton's widowed second cousin, where the Captain flatly denies killing Harris and refuses to reveal what Sunday's argument was about. He describes his Monday walk along a path behind the church, where he saw a farmer's child who had lost her doll and a woman named Helena Sommers watching birds on the ridge.

Rutledge examines the meadow where the body was found and notes that Harris lay face-down, though a frontal shotgun blast should have thrown him backward. Helena Sommers, a birdwatcher renting a nearby cottage with her shy cousin Maggie Sommers, confirms she saw Wilton on the path that morning but heard no gunshot. The investigation expands to include Bert Mavers, a local agitator whose hatred of Harris stems from family grievances: Harris encouraged Mavers's brother to enlist, and the brother died in South Africa; Mavers's sister drowned herself after Harris lost interest in her. A recently fired shotgun is found in Mavers's unlocked cottage, though anyone could have borrowed and returned it.

Catherine Tarrant, an acclaimed painter and Wilton's former love interest, insists on Wilton's innocence. Rutledge learns that during the war, Catherine fell in love with Rolf Linden, a German prisoner of war working her farm. She asked Lettice to contact Harris for help obtaining permission to marry Linden, but he was removed without explanation and later died of influenza. Catherine blamed Harris and Lettice, giving her a strong motive.

One night, Rutledge encounters Hickam on the street and coaxes a partial account from him, but Hickam breaks down in terror and grief. Rutledge gives him money for drink, a decision he immediately regrets: Dr. Warren, the local physician, finds Hickam hours later nearly dead from alcohol poisoning. A child's wooden doll found in the hedgerow near the murder scene leads Rutledge to Lizzie Pinter, the farmer's daughter Wilton mentioned. Lizzie has been catatonic since the murder, screaming whenever her father approaches. When shown the doll, she clutches it and falls into genuine sleep. Hickam, partially recovered, provides the crucial revelation: Harris was calling off the wedding. Wilton, confronted with losing Lettice, had reason to silence Harris. A letter Rutledge obtains from Georgina Grayson, a Smithy Lane resident who received a message from Harris the morning of the murder, proves Harris was in the lane, corroborating Hickam's account.

After a church service, Mavers publicly denounces the congregation, accusing Royston of being "a murderer of children," Wilton of shooting Harris, and others of private sins. Rutledge builds his case and goes to arrest Wilton, but the Captain asks for a 24-hour delay to escort Lettice through the funeral. That night, Rutledge presses Lettice for the full truth. She confesses that she and Charles fell deeply in love; a week before his death, they spent a night together, and Charles resolved to cancel the wedding. Lettice concealed the truth to avoid being seen as the cause of Harris's death.

When Rutledge returns to the Pinter cottage, Lizzie's father Ted bursts into the room, and the child reaches for him joyfully. Rutledge realizes what terrified her: She saw Harris's bolting horse carrying his body and mistook the headless rider for her father. Harris was not necessarily killed in the meadow; the horse bolted from the actual murder site, and the body fell where it was found.

On the morning of the funeral, Rutledge realizes he overlooked Maggie, who lives directly across a stone wall from Mallows land. Racing to the cottage, he finds Royston staggering out with his face slashed by an ax. Inside, Maggie tells him she saw "Helena" shoot Harris by the wall with a shotgun hidden among climbing roses. The truth emerges: There never was a separate Helena. As a child, Maggie was adopted by a family whose biological daughter, the real Helena, was killed by a car driven by the young Royston, who had borrowed Harris's vehicle. The family blamed Maggie for surviving while their real daughter died, and the psychological torment caused her to create "Helena" within herself, a confident personality who believed Harris was the driver and killed him for revenge. When Mavers's tirade revealed that Royston had actually driven the car, "Helena" attacked Royston with the ax. Maggie, unable to bear her other self's actions, fatally stabs herself.

Rutledge saves Royston and reports to Bowles that the murderer is dead and Wilton is innocent. Bowles is relieved about the Palace but privately furious, having hoped the case would destroy Rutledge's career. Rutledge reflects on the parallels between Maggie's divided self and his own condition with Hamish, yet he recognizes that his detective instincts survived the war. When Hamish warns he will never let Rutledge escape, Rutledge responds with defiance, vowing to fight for his survival.