Wings of Fire - Charles Todd [113]
Rachel opened her mouth to say something, then decided against it. “Come on, then,” she said instead. “It shouldn’t be sitting out there in the sun.”
They walked in silence to the house, and Rutledge was grateful for it, for the lack of questions in spite of the doubts that he knew were seething just below the surface in the woman at his side.
She was spirited. She’d have made someone a very good wife. But not for Peter, who had valued his peace. In the long run, Rachel would have needed more than a book-filled house in the country and quiet evenings by the fire discussing Roman ruins. And not for Nicholas. Because the Nicholas she’d seen and loved was a figment, a falsehood built on lies that he couldn’t do anything about. The man who cared for Rachel, the man who’d done his best to send her away, was there inside, but for reasons Rachel herself would never willingly grasp.
Rachel’s tragedy, he thought, as they came out of the woods and turned up the drive towards the house, was that love had seemed so real and so possible because she had wanted it too much.
Just as he had wanted to believe Jean loved him as deeply as he believed he’d loved her. Jean, who hadn’t had very much courage, who turned from him because she couldn’t accept any other dream but the shiny, perfect one that had been shattered in 1914. Four years of war hadn’t changed her. And it had changed him—their lives—beyond recognition. Had he wanted her so much because he’d thought she could restore what was gone? Or had it really been love? He didn’t know any more.
“Which may be an answer of sorts,” Hamish reminded him.
In the back of the car, now sitting below the steps at the front door of the Hall, was a large object wrapped in heavy brown paper.
It took him fifteen minutes, with Rachel offering unsolicited advice, to gently dislodge it from its cocoon of surrounding blankets and cushions, then lift it out onto the drive. Between them they got the package up the steps and then, unlocking the door, into the hall and across it to the drawing room.
Another fifteen to find a small ladder and carry it there too. But in the end, stepping back to see the results, he was satisfied.
Rosamund Trevelyan smiled benignly down from her proper place above the hearth, her face turned slightly, her cheek smooth and creamy against the background of light, her eyes full of life and love and hope.
An extraordinary woman, mother of another extraordinary woman. As full of goodness and joy and beauty as the Gabriel hound had been full of darkness and destruction.
23
Rutledge was just returning from the kitchen, where he’d left the ladder, when the bell rang loudly in the emptiness of the house and brought Rachel, frowning, out of the drawing room.
“Who is that?” she demanded.
“Dawlish,” he said, and opened the door to the constable, who had Mrs. Trepol at his heels. The elderly housekeeper was staring over his shoulder, her eyes moving nervously from Rachel to the London policeman.
Before Rachel could say anything more, Rutledge closed the fingers of his right hand around her arm to silence her, and nodded to Dawlish. “The drawing room. You’ll see the chairs and a table. Use them where they are.”
Uneasy and uncertain, Dawlish glanced at Rachel, but Rut-ledge cut short any query. “See to it, man!” And he led Rachel towards the stairs, his eyes commanding her to wait. Not here. Not now. Her mouth was tight with suspicion and anger, and she moved ahead of him with the stride of a woman biding her time with a vengeance. Behind them, Mrs. Trepol followed Dawlish into the hall, their steps sounding loud and uncertain as they moved towards the drawing room.
Once in the back sitting room overlooking the sea, Rachel rounded on him in a fury. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? I won’t have it! This is wrong, this is trickery! Tell me what’s going on, or by God, I’ll find the nearest telephone and call London!”
“Look,” he said earnestly, “I’m trying to get at the truth. Do you want me to walk away and leave this unfinished?