There was a placard set into the right post, bronze, he thought. It said PARTRIDGE FIELDS in elegant script.
Rutledge stopped the motorcar, and Hamish startled him as he spoke.
“You will no’ trespass.” It was the British outrage at a stranger’s encroachment. “The gate is closed.”
“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 wealthy, he must have held some position during the war years. In industry, perhaps, or in some capacity with the military. Men with certain skills worked at code-breaking, others at perfecting aircraft and weaponry or translating documents. There was always a need for clever minds. Stage designers had turned their talents to creating camouflage patterns for ships and gun emplacements and even trenches as spotter planes flew longer sorties over enemy lines. The list was endless.
Was that why the army was concerned about his whereabouts? Had he worked in something that was still under wraps, and therefore his erratic behavior had drawn attention to the need to keep an eye on him? It seemed far-fetched.
This was April 1920. The war had ended in November of 1918. According to Mrs. Cathcart, Parkinson/Partridge had moved into his cottage in the spring of 1918. What might have seemed important in the waning months of the war when the outcome was still in doubt wouldn’t explain Deloran’s secretiveness now.
Rutledge gave it up and lay there staring at the ceiling, listening to the night sounds, an occasional vehicle passing on the road, a dog barking in the distance, and then the sudden patter of rain on the roof.
The fine weather had broken.
It was still raining when Rutledge woke up in the morning. Sometime in the night he’d changed out of his clothes and gone to bed, only half awake as he fumbled with the sheets.
Mrs. Smith was serving breakfast when he came down, and he discovered just how hungry he was. The warm charger she set in front of him was demolished in short order, and he sat there drinking his tea and eating the last of the toast.
The door opened and the thin man—Will, wasn’t it?—with whom he’d played darts earlier in the week stepped into the inn and shook the last of the rain off his hat.
He nodded a greeting to Rutledge and went to find Mrs. Smith. Rutledge could hear their conversation over the banging of pots and pans.
When he came back, he had a Thermos of tea in one hand and a cup in the other. He sat down at Rutledge’s table with a polite, “D’you mind?”
“Not at all,” he answered. “Driving all night, are you?”
“More or less. The rain wasn’t so bad at first, but by dawn it was heavier. I’ve stared at the road for longer than I like. It was coming to look the same, every curve and straightaway. Played darts since that night?”
“No opportunity.”
“If my mother hadn’t taught me my manners, I’d wonder aloud what a man of your stripe is doing here at The Smith’s Arms.”
“It’s convenient.”
“To what?”
“To nowhere.”
The man smiled. “I know when to stop. She taught me that as well.”
“I came here to solve a riddle,” Rutledge said. “And it’s not likely to be solved as easily as I’d hoped.”
“About the White Horse? There’s a legend, you know. That on certain nights it comes down to the Smithy to be shod.”
“Indeed.”
“There’s more than a few say they’ve seen it. But I reckon they were not as sober as they claimed to be. Are you here to keep an eye on us? The lorry drivers?”
Rutledge laughed. “Hardly that. Should I be?”
“A man gets an itch between his shoulder blades sometimes and looks around to see who might be watching.”
“Watching for what? Surely you can’t be smuggling this far inland?”
“Smuggling? No. The war put an end to that, as a matter of fact. Ships couldn’t put in to a small cove and off-load goods there. Likely to find a submarine staring back at them as they up-anchored. Or a coastal warden coming to see what they were up to.”