Wings of Fire - Charles Todd [63]
“In the war, were you?”
Rutledge nodded.
“Wounded?”
Rutledge hesitated, then said briefly, “Yes.”
“Thought as much! Stephen looked the same way when he came back. Shell of himself. Damned foot killed him in the end, too.”
Over Hamish’s rude comments about that, Rutledge recaptured the salient.
“What did you do in the war?”
“They wouldn’t take me,” Chambers said in disgust. “Too old, they told me. But I knew that part of France better than they did! My mother’s mother was from there. Stupid place to fight infantry battles, for God’s sake! No geographical advantage. No high ground. Prolonged deadlock, that’s what you’ll get, I told them. Enormous loss of life, I told them. No one will come out of it a winner. Americans tipped the balance, of course. And the tank. And still the best they could do was an Armistice!” Chambers realized suddenly that he’d mounted one of his hobby horses, and stopped, watching the advantage slip back to Rutledge. Then he grinned. ‘‘Over to you, I think.”
Rutledge found himself grinning back. He liked Chambers. He could also see what had attracted Rosamund FitzHugh to the man.
“Who sent for you?” Rutledge asked. “Susannah Hargrove?”
“Daniel Hargrove. He was worried, because his wife is in delicate health and this whole business was upsetting her. They tell me now she’s likely to bear twins, but that runs in the family, not surprising.”
They were still standing, Rutledge by the hearth, Chambers at the far end of the room, a position chosen to make Rutledge come to him, not the reverse. Rutledge said, impatiently, “Sit down, man!” He was aware of the smell of wool again, and with resignation ignored it. Hamish, perversely, did not.
After a moment, Chambers moved forward and took one of the chairs near the fireplace. The room was damp, chill, with an old coldness that seemed to come from the walls, seeping up from the earth that waited to consume the stone when it finally sank under its own weight.
Rutledge took the chair across from him, and said, “Actually, I’m glad you’ve come, I was considering traveling to Plymouth to find you.”
Surprised, Chambers said, “Not about the wills, I think?”
“In a way. I know that Olivia Marlowe made her half brother Stephen FitzHugh her literary executor. But then Stephen died soon after. And I haven’t been able to find her papers. Do you have them?”
“No, I understood that Stephen knew what was involved in that bequest and was prepared to deal with the responsibility himself. If Nicholas had survived, he’d have had that duty.”
“And if Stephen died?”
“Ah, now that’s a very good question. I think Susannah, Mrs. Hargrove. He didn’t specify her as literary executor, you understand. His will was made out while Olivia was still alive and it would have been presumptuous to consider that need. But he did leave everything else to her, and the courts will, I think, accept the inclusion of Olivia’s papers in his estate.”
“Not to Cormac FitzHugh, then?”
Chambers frowned. “No. There was some ... coolness between the two of them. Cormac and Olivia, I mean. She made it very clear to me at the time she drew up her will that she didn’t wish Cormac to be in any way responsible for her affairs. Stephen was still very young then, which is why I’d suggested an older and wiser man to handle the papers.”
“What was the cause of this coolness?”
“I never knew quite what it was, but Rosa—” his face flushed, and he quickly changed that to “—Mrs. FitzHugh told me once that even she didn’t know the reasons behind it.”
“You were well acquainted with Mrs. FitzHugh, I think?”
“Yes.” He looked down at his hands, turning a ring on his little finger. “I’d hoped to marry her,” he added reluctantly.
“Then she would have told you the reasons, if in fact she had known them? It wasn’t a polite lie to an outsider?”
“I think she would have been honest with me,” he said slowly. “Except at the end. She was very distressed. I begged