Watchers of Time - Charles Todd [73]
CHAPTER 12
LORD SEDGWICK SHOWED HIMSELF TO BE a genial host. He possessed a wry sense of humor, which Rutledge enjoyed, and seldom put his views ahead of those of his guest even when he must have had far more insight into political matters, moving as he did in such vastly different circles.
Rutledge, under no illusions (policemen were not invited to dine with the gentry—indeed, they were seldom welcomed at the front door), took care not to overstep his role. All the same, the hour passed very pleasantly. The luncheon itself was excellent, finishing with a plate of cheeses.
The loneliness of the man under the polish of a titled and privileged life was apparent. Sedgwick’s wife had been dead some years, for he spoke of her with an old regret rather than a recent bereavement. Her portrait as a young American bride now hung in the library, he said at one juncture, replacing “a remarkably hideous work of dead rabbits and quail hanging from a nail” that Ralph, the first Lord Sedgwick, had fancied. Ralph had gone shooting
with the Prince of Wales in his day, and “bagged enough to show his aim was excellent, but was careful never to exceed his host’s count. Quickest way to see yourself off the royal invitation list!”
Arthur, Sedgwick’s elder son, had had a taste for racing cars before the War, and had even won a motorcycle race of some note, early on in his career. Sedgwick had traveled to France to watch him compete, and he spoke with wistful enthusiasm for the excitement. “It rained, often as not. I lived in terror that he’d spin out on a curve. Arthur had nerves of steel when he got behind the wheel, and a feeling for the road—and that made him one of the finest drivers I’d ever seen. His wife begged him to give it up, but of course he couldn’t. She didn’t understand that it was his life, speed and risk.”
“Racing is a dangerous sport,” Rutledge responded. “And few women are attracted to the prospect of being widowed young.”
Sedgwick grunted. “She was the one who died young, before they’d been married five years. Arthur took it hard, of course, but I must admit I was not particularly fond of her. A pretty simpleton.”
Edwin, the younger son, appeared to worry Sedgwick. “I see much of my father in him. Strange, isn’t it, how a man’s nature can jump a generation?” It seemed not to be a compliment. But then the grandfather had made a fortune in the City, and was not, perhaps, a rough diamond in his own son’s eyes.
Sedgwick dwelt on none of this, but a word here and there told Rutledge more than perhaps his host had meant to reveal. It was often a failing of lonely men.
“It doesna’ signify,” Hamish pointed out, “if there’s naught to hide.”
Certainly in Sedgwick’s case, that appeared to be true.
As the table was cleared, Sedgwick looked out beyond the terrace at the expanse of formal beds and cropped lawns, and sighed. “I’ve a mind to marry again, myself. If only to fill this garden with young voices and bring a spark of life to the house. Damned silly thing to do, but I’m not by nature a man who prefers his own company. Have a wife, do you?”
“No. The War altered any plans I might have made.”
“Never too late to start over.” He regarded Rutledge for a moment. “It’s odd, you know, but you remind me of Arthur. I don’t know quite how to put my finger on it. It’s there in the way you carry yourself and something in your voice.”
“A holdover from the Army,” Rutledge said.
“I suppose it must be. You’d like him. A good man. And a deeper thinker than the rest of us—he got that from his mother, not my side. I see it more and more often these days.” There was a sudden flash of grief in Sedgwick’s face, as if Arthur wasn’t the man he’d been before the War, losing that edge that had made him a fast driver and a dashing figure to watch in a race. Wounds changed a man in more ways than the physically apparent damage. Nerve, for one thing, was easily worn down by constant pain.
There had been a man named Seelingham on the boat to France at the start of the War, Rutledge remembered— he tried to dredge up an image of the man’s face,