A Pale Horse - Charles Todd [61]
“But apparently not locked. I’ll walk up to the house and knock at the door, as any guest would. All very civilized.”
Hamish was silent. Rutledge opened the gate and started up the drive. As in the other houses on this lane, tall shrubs lined the way, cutting off a view of the house. But when he reached the end of the plantings, he found himself in a circular drive before a Georgian brick house. There was a semicircular portico held up by slender fluted columns and a black paneled door reached by three shallow steps. He went up them, lifted the brass knocker, and let it fall.
It seemed, as he stood there, that it echoed through an empty house beyond, and no one answered the summons, though he stood there for a good five minutes, waiting.
He went down the steps and looked up at the shining windows, wondering if someone was there, looking down at him. Then he turned to his right and started around the house. There was a terrace on this side, French doors leading down to a French-style garden of roses and perennials. Beyond the garden was a square shrubbery of boxwoods, and he could see wrought-iron benches and a stone fountain inside the small sheltered garden they created. Inside the bowl of the fountain was a horse, head to one side, tail and mane flying. It was a lovely thing, but no water splashed over it. The fountain was dry.
He went on to the back of the house, and saw that the kitchen door was shut. No signs of servants going about their duties, the kitchen garden more than a little overgrown compared to the formal plantings, and the outbuilding doors were barred.
The house, for all intents and purposes, was closed up.
Rutledge came back to the French doors and stood with his hand shielding his forehead, trying to look inside. Dust sheets covered the furnishings, and even the small chandelier was swathed in what looked to be a pillowcase.
Why had Partridge—Parkinson—left behind this jewel of a house to live in a tiny cottage in the middle of nowhere?
Hamish had had enough of trespassing. Rutledge turned to go, with one last look over the gardens. Someone kept them up, though not the kitchen garden, and came here often enough to see that no weeds marred the symmetry of the beds or weather damaged the plants. There wasn’t so much as a twig underfoot on the small well-mown lawns at the far side of the house, ringed by flowering trees. A croquet lawn? It was smooth enough for that. And a long pair of windows from what appeared to be a study looked out over the green carpet. There the draperies had been drawn and he could see nothing.
He took one last look at the house. It seemed to be standing there waiting for its owner, and if he was right, that the dead man in Yorkshire was Parkinson, then its owner could never come again.
Hamish said, “He lost his wife.”
And that might have explained the man’s exile—too many memories here to let him heal.
But it didn’t explain his death.
Rutledge drove back to The Smith’s Arms, too late again for his dinner. Mrs. Smith was waiting up for him, as if half afraid that he wasn’t coming back, his account unsettled.
She said, “There, you’re in. I was just tidying up a little. I’ll be off to bed, then.”
Saying good night, she mounted the stairs, and he looked into the bar before following her. It was already shut and dark.
He went up to his bed and stretched out fully clothed, too weary for more than that.
Why had Partridge—Parkinson—changed his name? To fit into his surroundings without attracting attention? But then that was the name that Deloran had given him too. Either Deloran was content to go along with Partridge’s need for anonymity or it suited the War Office very well.
Who was he? What sort of man had he been before the spring of 1918? And what was it that had triggered this abrupt change in his life? Losing his wife, yes, that would account for much.
How had he made his living, to be able to afford a house of that size with well-kept gardens? Even if he was independently