An Incomplete Revenge

  Corporal Willem van Maarten’s file was somewhat fuller, given that notes had followed him from the reformatory. Maisie had known that many boys and men incarcerated at His Majesty’s Pleasure were enlisted with the promise that their service would render sentencing void, unless they committed criminal acts while in the army. Youth did not spare one the opportunity to serve, though van Maarten’s record contained two letters of complaint from the boy’s father, who was concerned at his son’s age upon enlistment. An official note had been attached to the letter, to the effect that the boy wished to remain in the army and to serve in France. She shuddered to see a letter from the reformatory with the words RELEASED TO THE ARMY stamped across it.

  There were also notes pertaining to the issue of whether Corporal van Maarten had been taken prisoner and then confirmation, in September 1916, that he was presumed dead. The telegram to his parents had been sent just one day after the Zeppelin raid. The final comment by his commanding officer had described his service record as exemplary

  Maisie did not need to make notes on an index card, for she had already garnered the information required, and those details she wished to retain were lodged firmly in her mind. She replaced all notes in the manner in which they had been given to her, collected the folders and her belongings, and walked back to the counter.

  “Got everything you want?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “Well, if you need anything else, you just come back and we’ll help you out.”

  Maisie looked around the room, at the solitary woman holding her hands to her forehead, leaning forward as she read, shaking her head. She would prefer never to have the need to come to the war records repository again, but she knew that, given her work, it was a faint hope.

  It was half-past four when she left London. If she had a good run down to Chelstone, she would arrive by six o’clock. Time to see her father and walk across to the Dower House to visit Maurice. She planned to be in Heronsdene again by nine o’clock. Then she would lay down her head and rest, for morning would herald a formidable day.

  SIXTEEN

  Following supper with her father, Maisie walked across to the Dower House to see Maurice Blanche. She guessed he had seen her motor car pull in through the gates of Chelstone Manor, and she knew in her heart that he hoped she would come to see him again. She made her way though the gate that divided the properties, up the path past the conservatory, and around to the front entrance. The housekeeper, a short woman who always wore a black skirt and a white blouse with a cameo at her throat, was waiting with the door open to greet her.

  “You’ll find the doctor in his study. He asked for port to be brought for you, and there’s some nice Stilton with biscuits on the trolley—I always think port’s too harsh on its own.”

  “That’s lovely. I’ll go straight through.”

  Maurice was sitting at his desk as Maisie entered the room, and he looked up, smiling, as she closed the door behind her. She tried not to notice how he had aged of late. There seemed to be a strain in his standing and locomotion, and he reached for his cane more than he might once have done. Had sadness wrought such changes? One year ago they traveled to France together, and though there was no doubt about his age—he was in his seventies—there had been more of a spring to his step. Had his work begun to take its toll? The events of last September, when she was brought in secret to the house in Paris to be told that her investigations had crossed the path of the intelligence services, proved his knowledge was still in demand and that he played a role of some significance in matters of international importance.

  “Maurice, are you feeling unwell?”

  He shook his head. “Do not concern yourself with my health, I am simply demonstrating the effects of age. Those falls and scrapes one has in earlier years come home to roost. Take that as a caution, Maisie.”

  Maurice kissed Maisie on the cheek and then held out his hand toward her usual seat by the fire, opposite his well-used armchair. A trolley was positioned between the two chairs, and Maurice poured a glass of port for Maisie and a single malt for himself before easing himself into his customary place. He reached to the side of the fireplace, selected a pipe and his tobacco pouch, and began to speak as he went through the motions of filling and lighting the pipe.

  “You wish to talk about the case in Heronsdene?”

  “Yes, I do. But first—”

  Maurice looked at Maisie, inclining his head as he drew upon his pipe.

  She continued. “Simon was cremated and—oh, dear.” She rested her head in her hands. “I can’t believe it was just this morning. So much has happened.”

  “I take it you fell to your work soon after the ritual of that final farewell? No doubt you busied yourself with appointments germane to your investigation.”

  Maisie nodded. “I allowed only a day in London; I have to return to Heronsdene tonight. I’ll drive back to the inn when I leave here.”

  “Was that necessary, the rush?”

  “It was best. There is a momentum, and I am under some pressure to secure an end to my work there within the next day or so.”

  “I see.” Maurice shook the match and threw it into the fireplace. “Tell me about the cremation.”

  “At first I was taken aback, but I realized that Margaret—Simon’s mother—had made the best decision. Simon had remained alive for so long, yet it was not Simon, not like we all remembered him. But I had never been to a cremation before. I was”—Maisie pressed her lips together as she searched for the word to describe her feelings—“unsettled. Yes, I was unsettled, knowing his body was being consigned to an inferno.”

  There was a silence as Maurice looked into the fire, considering her words before speaking again. “He was wounded in the fire of shelling, and he has been laid to rest in fire. There is a rhythm to the decision, as well as a practicality for an aging woman alone.”

  Maisie remained silent, holding the glass of port in both hands, turning it around in her fingers and watching the alcohol’s film run along the rim of the glass.

  Maurice began to speak again. “The concept of such an end brings to mind the phoenix, the sacred firebird, who at the end of life builds a nest of cinnamon twigs, which he ignites, and goes to his death amid flames that will bear new life.” He took one sip of the rich amber malt whisky. “Of course, a new young Simon will not walk through that door to greet us, but I sense that seeing him go in this way, knowing there will only be ashes to sprinkle on the breeze, is a gift that has been given you, if you choose to take it.” He smiled. “This is one of those times, Maisie, when you must not think, must not dwell and search for meaning. You have done those things, you have held Simon in your heart, and you have taken steps into a future that you might never have imagined in 1917. He is gone now. Think of the newborn phoenix and embrace it.”

  She said nothing. In her mind’s eye a bird with gold and red plumage struggled amid flames of its own combustion.

  “It is also worth knowing that tears from the phoenix were said to heal all wounds.”

  Maisie looked up at her mentor, placing her port on the trolley. “Thank you, Maurice. I’m glad I came to see you.”

  “You are no longer my pupil or my assistant, Maisie. You are accomplished in your own right. You have little need of me now, I understand that—”

  “But—”

  “Allow me to finish. Our relationship has changed, as it should. I hope, however, a new friendship will develop between us, and that you might allow an old campaigner to share in the excitement of your investigations, if only afterward, in a story by the fire.”

  Maisie came from her chair and kissed him on the cheek. “You have been so kind to me, Maurice.”

  As she stood back, Maurice reached for his cane once more. “I will walk you to the door.”

  “But the case—”

  He held up his hand. “You don’t need my counsel, Maisie. You know what must be done.”

  SHE ARRIVED IN Heronsdene later that ev
ening, parked the MG outside the inn, and walked down toward the waste ground that was once the site of the van Maartens’ house. She thought of the fear, the terror, the sheer unimaginable suffering they must have endured, their lungs festering with smoke and fumes, skin searing back from the bone, as unconsciousness and death claimed them. She wondered about the house, a bakery with a dwelling above, and imagined this home, a place of security, the lair to which a family cleaves, as instead a flame-filled inferno that consumed three human beings who had lived, breathed, worked, made music, and loved. Then there was nothing. Nothing. Nothing but an eerie cold, a bitter aura that kept a village at bay—except one soul who seeded the land with a profusion of Michaelmas daisies and who had come back, on the night of the fire at the inn, with a humble bouquet. It was as if a message had been left: There, it is done, you are remembered.

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING, Maisie left the inn early, having asked only for tea and toast, though her taste buds were tempted by the rich aroma of eggs, bacon, tomato and mushrooms being fried ready for the guests. Fred had offered to pack a hot egg and bacon sandwich, but Maisie declined. She had to be at the Sandermere estate at a time when the groom might be out exercising the horses—it was widely known in the village that Alfred Sandermere had still not emerged from his rooms on the first of the mansion’s upper floors. According to local talk, trays left outside his door were being dragged inside when servants left the corridor, only to be pushed outside again in the middle of the night. An empty brandy or wine bottle indicated that a fresh supply must be brought to the room, but it was said that Sandermere had not left either clothing or bed linens to be laundered, nor had he allowed servants into the rooms to clean.

  She parked the MG some distance from the estate, in a lay-by from which she could hike through the woods and climb over a fence on the way to her destination. She had deliberately worn her brown corduroy trousers, brown leather walking shoes, and a dark brown cardigan over her blouse. She wore a brown felt hat, pulled down as low as she could, and hoped she had enough camouflage to avoid being detected. Along with her knapsack and Victorinox knife, she brought the hazel divining rod she had fashioned herself.

  Soon she was on the perimeter of the Sandermere property, making her way toward the stables. She looked about her, ran from the security of overhanging trees to the rear entrance, and listened for movement. The only sounds audible were those of horses, pacing a stall, munching on hay, or nickering at the sound of someone close by. She did not hear a groom talking to the horses or walking back and forth with pails of water, nor did she hear the scratching sweep of a brush being drawn back against a horse’s coat. She looked around the arched entranceway to the stables and stepped inside. She counted the horses—one was missing, so the groom was out. Stepping with care along the brick walkway that divided the stalls, she reached out to each horse as she went by, perhaps to offer a sugar lump—she was Frankie Dobbs’s daughter and never went anywhere near a horse without a treat—or to rub a soft equine nose or the side of a horse’s neck. She reached the far end of the stable block, where tarpaulins still flapped against the side of the building, and took out her divining rod. She slipped her Victorinox knife into her pocket and hid her knapsack on the ground behind the door of the tack room, which was drawn back and tied to prevent it from slamming shut. Unencumbered, she walked out beyond the stables, holding the divining rod in the manner taught by Beulah. She closed her eyes. Think silver.

  She felt the heft of the rod in her hands, not light as the branch had been when she cut it from the tree. Now it had substance as she clasped it, and she recognized the weight of its power as it drew her on. She had thought it might lead her to the tarpaulin, to the foundation recently disturbed and pulled apart. The ground was gravelly and uneven where workers had been reconstructing the stables before Sandermere had called a halt—it was this unfinished work that had brought her back, suspecting it might be evidence of more than a job awaiting completion. But as she walked toward the site of the rebuilding work, the fork seemed to become small and delicate in her hands. Holding the image of silver in her mind’s eye, Maisie turned, trying to find that vein of energy again, that line of influence where the hazel would come alive, like a fish on the line.

  The rod became strong as she turned and stepped onto the cobblestone floor of the stables. Now she felt the draw, now she and her divining rod were engaged as she placed one foot in front of the other. It was as if the rod itself were formed of that sacred ore, magnetized toward shared mystical properties, as she was pulled back toward the archway through which she’d entered the stables. Then, just as she was about to step out of the building, she felt a drag on her hands, a wilting, so she turned first to the left, and almost cried out in frustration as the rod became loose, unharnessed as it rested on her fingers. Maisie turned to the right, and sighed with relief as the leaden sensation returned. Now she was looking straight into the eyes of Sandermere’s hunter. The horse responded to her hand, blowing soft sweet air onto her palm, and then reached out to investigate the rod with his nose.

  “Oh, no, you don’t, laddie.” She unlatched the half door of the stall, pushed back on the horse’s chest with her left hand, and waited as he moved away at her touch. She latched the door again and paced around the stall.

  Resting her hand first on the horse’s flank and then his withers, she moved him back and forth, pushing fresh straw aside so she could check every inch underfoot. She stepped to the right, to the left, and to the back of the stall, kicking away straw and pressing down on the square paving stones with her feet. She used her divining rod again, and as her fingers took the weight, so she was drawn toward the raised water trough in the corner. It was a plain brick and enamel trough, akin to a square scullery sink but deeper and longer. Underneath, a support had been built of the same slate slabs as were used on the floor. Maisie knelt, aware but not afraid of the hunter behind her. The horse seemed as curious as she, his warm breath close to her neck as if he too wanted a closer look.

  She took out the knife, selected a blade, and began to run the tip along the pointing between each slab. One slab came away with ease. Soon she could grasp it, her fingers working carefully to pull it free. She checked the security of the water trough. It held firm, likely supported by bolts or bricks underneath.

  Hearing horses’ hooves and a voice coming closer, she held her breath.

  “Right, then, Humphrey, that’s you done!”

  Maisie listened as the groom dismounted, his boots clattering against the cobblestones.

  “Nice and easy does it, eh, old fellow? None of that racing all over the place, just a nice little trot, that’s good enough for us.” The groom spoke kindly to the horse. “We’ll get all this lot off you, a bit of a rubdown, and then we’ll take you down to the bottom field. How about that, my friend?”

  Maisie heard the groom pat the horse’s neck and the sounds that accompanied the removing of saddle and bridle, of the horse’s hooves being picked out and cleaned, one by one.

  “Fontein, you’re next, so don’t you stand there getting in a state, alright, guv’nor?”

  Maisie listened, still as stone against the water trough, as the groom made much of the horse just exercised. At last she heard the horse turned around and sounds indicating the groom had left the stables once more, to put the horse out to pasture.

  She continued with her endeavor, finally easing away the slab and using all her strength to pull it aside and lean it against the wall that separated the hunter from his stablemate. She had no torch with her, so was dependent upon the shaft of light that came in through the archway and was now being blocked by the horse.

  “Move over, lad. Come on.” Maisie stood and pushed the horse back once again, reaching into her pocket for more sugar lumps, which she hid in the hay remaining in his manger. “There, that’ll keep you busy.”

  Kneeling down next to the water trough, Maisie peered into the space revealed by the slab she’d removed, feeling with her hands
for something loose, unexpected. Soon her fingers alighted on fabric of rough texture; using one hand to brace against the side of the trough, she pulled it out. The sack was dirty and damp, tied with string at the top. She lost no time in untying the closure to inspect the contents. Silver. The sack was filled with so much silverware that Maisie thought it looked like a priest’s ransom. There were goblets, decanters, cutlery, all manner of goods marked with the etched insignia of the Sandermere family: a large “S” set in a shield with a heart in the center and a single sword across.

  She reached in again and found another sack, this time containing items indicating theft from places other than the estate. There was an empty wallet, a watch, a roll of money, jewelry. Maisie stood up, took off her hat, and wiped her hand across her forehead. Instead of taking the sacks with her, she secured them as she had found them and heaved the slab back into place. The groom was no thief, of that she was sure. She replaced her hat, while the hunter, who had eaten all the sugar, nuzzled her for more.

  She pushed him aside. “If you’re not careful, I’ll have a soft spot for you, you big lug.”

  Maisie checked the stall and, listening for the groom’s return, let herself out and latched the half door once again. The hunter’s blanket had been hung over a bar on the outside of the door, obscuring his nameplate.

  “Well, well, well. Merlin. I should have known.” She patted him once more. “Only you and I know that your master is a thief.”

  MAISIE GATHERED UP her knapsack, relieved that the groom had not even noticed it in the shadows, and made haste back toward the woods, once more climbing the iron fence and claiming her MG. She drove away from Heronsdene, into the next village to find the telephone kiosk, and lost no time in placing the call.

  “James?”

  “Maisie—gosh, you sound out of breath.”

  “Just a bit. I have some information for you that I believe you must act upon without delay.”