Maisie Dobbs (27 page)

“Oh, they might do, Miss,” Billy replied thoughtfully. Then with a wink added,“But not when I’m due to defend my snooker title in ’alf an hour.”

Maisie smiled as Billy climbed through on to the other side of the fence, and secured the wire. But instead of going back to the car, she remained in the same place to watch Billy Beale once again walk across the fields, back to his temporary life at The Retreat.

“O
h, please don’t worry about the car, my dear. Heavens above, I can’t even drive the thing, not with my hip at the moment. Besides, I think your need is greater than mine, and you are working in my interests.”

Maisie had been holding the telephone receiver away from her ear while Lady Rowan spoke, but brought the receiver closer to reply.

“Thank you. I was worried. But I should have it back to you by the middle of next week.”

“Right you are. Now, tell me. What’s happening? James is due to leave for The Retreat in ten days. And heaven knows he won’t be spoken to about anything. Not even to his father. I swear he hasn’t been the same since that girl—”

“Yes, Lady Rowan. I know.”

“And if it weren’t for you, I would be absolutely frantic.”

“Lady Rowan, may I speak to Lord Julian please?”

“Yes, yes . . . I know, I am just about to become tedious. He’s in his study. I’ll just nip next door to get him. Won’t wait for Carter, it would take all day.”

Maisie smiled. It would probably take a while for Lady Rowan to walk next door to the study to get Lord Julian. She hadn’t been able to “nip” anywhere for some time.

Eventually, she heard Lord Julian Compton’s voice. “Maisie, what can I do for you?”

“Lord Julian. In confidence.”

“Of course.”

“I wonder if you could help me with some information that I believe you may be able to obtain for me from your former contacts at the War Office.”

“I’ll do what I can—what do you need, Maisie?”

“Jenkins. Major Adam Jenkins. I need to see his service record, if at all possible.”

“I’ve already obtained it, m’dear. Didn’t like the sound of this Retreat business when I heard about it from James. Got the service record in my office now. Didn’t know he called himself Major, though. I only heard him called Jenkins by James.”

“The men at The Retreat call him Major.”

“That’s interesting. Jenkins was just a lieutenant.”

“Is there anything else there, Lord Julian? Any other anomalies?”

“Of course a service record is limited. He was discharged though, medical discharge.”

“Where to?”

“Craiglockhart.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. Right up your alley I’d say, Maisie. Mind you, he was a mild case, apparently. Of course I don’t have a record of his treatment. Just the notes of his commanding officer. Says that he went gaga after a couple of chaps in his command deserted. Seems to have been an innocuous fellow, quite frankly. Got a commission based on need rather than any military talent, I would say, from the record. Officers were dropping like flies, if you remember. Well, of course you remember. Mind you, the chap’s obviously got a business head on him, setting up this Retreat.”

“The men seem to adore him for what he’s done there. Providing a place for them to go,” said Maisie.

“Yes, I’ve got to hand it to him. Now he’s opened the doors to those who sustained other injuries. Like James. Bit like a monastery though, if you ask me, wanting people to sign over their assets. Mind you, if the idea is a place of refuge forever . . . .”

“Yes.”

“Shame, isn’t it? That we only like our heroes out in the street when they are looking their best and their uniforms are ‘spit and polished,’ and not when they’re showing us the wounds they suffered on our behalf. Well, anything else, m’dear?”

“No. I think that’s all. Is there any chance that I might see—?”

“I’ll have it sent down to Chelstone in the morning.”

“Thank you, Lord Julian. You’ve been most helpful.”

Maisie had spent most of that day at the dower house with Maurice, taking only a short break to visit Frankie Dobbs. She declined to sleep in the small bedroom that had always been hers at the groom’s cottage, instead electing to remain by Maurice’s telephone, just in case Billy needed her.Time and again she ran through the details of events and research information she had accumulated.

Adam Jenkins had lied about his status. But was it a lie, or had a man simply called him “major” and it stuck? She remembered her grandfather, working on the Thames boats. People called him The Commander, but he had never been in the navy, never commanded anything. It was just a nickname, the source of which had been lost over the years. But how did Jenkins,“an innocuous little man,” assume such power? Billy had become a believer, and the men seemed to adore him. Was fear a factor? Was there a deeper connection between Vincent and Jenkins? And what about Armstrong Jenkins? Family member, or coincidence?

She had missed something. Something very significant. And as she reexamined, in her mind’s eye, each piece of collected evidence that had led her to this place, she considered Maurice’s words, and felt as if each day, all day, she was living in the moment before dawn broke. Maisie thought back, to that earlier dawn, more than ten years earlier. The beginning of the end, that was what it had been.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

T
he time is drawing closer, is it not my dear?” Maurice asked her now. He looked at the grandfather clock, patiently tick-tocking the seconds away.

“Yes it is. Maurice, I want to take Billy out of The Retreat.”

“Indeed. Yes. Away from Jenkins. It is interesting, Maisie, how a time of war can give a human being purpose. Especially when that purpose, that power, so to speak, is derived from something so essentially evil.”

Maurice reached forward from his chair towards the wooden pipe stand that hung on the chimney breast. He selected a pipe, took tobacco and matches from the same place, and leaned back, glancing again at the clock. He watched Maisie as he took a finger-and-thumb’s worth of tobacco from the pouch, and pressed it into the bowl of the pipe.

“Your thoughts, Maisie?”

Maurice struck a match on the raw brick of the fireplace, and drawing on the pipe, held the flame to the tobacco. Maisie found the sweet aroma pungent, yet this ritual of lighting and smoking a pipe soothed her. She knew Maurice to indulge in a pipe only when the crux of a matter was at hand. And having the truth revealed, no matter how harsh, was always a relief.

“I was thinking of evil. Of war. Of the loss of innocence, really. And innocents.”

“Yes. Indeed. Yes. The loss of that which is innocent. One could argue, that if it were not for war, then Jenkins—”

The clock struck the half hour. It was time for Maisie to leave to meet Billy Beale. Maurice stood, reaching out to the mantelpiece to steady himself with his right hand.

“You will be back at what time?”

“By half past eight.”

“I will see you then.”

Maisie left the cottage quickly, and Maurice moved to the window to watch her leave. They needed to say little to each other. He had been her mentor since she was a young girl, and she had learned well. Yes, he had been right to retire. And right to be ready to support her as she took on the practice in her own name.

“B
illy. Good timing. How are you?”

“Doin’ awright, Miss. Yourself?”

Without responding to his question, Maisie continued with her own.

“Any news?”

“Well, I’ve been thinking a bit and keeping my eyes open.”

“Yes.”

“And I’ve noticed that the fella who wanted to leave ain’t around.”

“Perhaps he’s left, gone home.”

“No, no. Not in the book.”

“What book?”

“I found out there’s a book. By the gatehouse. Records the ins and outs, if you know what I mean. Took a walk over to ’ave a word with old Archie the other day, and it looks like the bread delivery is all that’s gone on in a week.”

“And Jenkins?”

“Chummy as ever.”

“Billy, I think it’s time for you to leave.”

“No—no, Miss. I’m safe as ’houses. Sort of like it ’ere, really. And no one’s looking twice at me.”

“You don’t know that, Billy.”

“One more night, then, anyway. I want to find out where this fella’s gone. I tell you, I keep my eyes peeled, like I said, and one minute ’e’s there and the next ’e’s not. Mind you, there is someone in the sick bay.”

“And who tends the sick bay?”

“Well, there’s a fella who was a medic in the war, ’e does all your basic stuff, like. Then this other fella came up today. In a car, doctor’s bag and all. I was working in the front garden at the time. Dead ringer for Jenkins actually. Bit bigger, mind. But you could see it round ’ere.” Billy rubbed his chin and jaw. “’round the chops.”

“Yes. I know who that is,”Maisie whispered as she wrote notes on an index card.

“What, Miss?”

“No. Nothing. Billy, listen, I know you think that Jenkins is essentially a good man, but I fear that you may now be in some danger. You are an innocent person brought into my work because I needed information. That must change. It’s time for you to leave.”

Billy Beale turned to Maisie and looked deeply into her eyes.“You know, Miss, when we first met, when I said I’d seen you before, after that shell got me leg. Did you recognize me?”

Maisie closed her eyes briefly, looked at the ground to compose herself and then directly at Billy. “Yes. I recognized you, Billy. Some people you never forget.”

“I know. I told you, I would never forget you and that doctor. Could’ve ’ad my leg off, ’e could. Anyone else would’ve just chopped the leg and got me out of there. But ’im, that doctor, even in those conditions, like, ’e tried to do more.”

Billy gazed out across the land to The Retreat.

“And I know what ’appened. I know what ’appened after I left. ’eard about it. Amazing you weren’t killed.”

Maisie did not speak but instead slowly began to remove the pins that held her long black hair in a neat chignon. She turned her head to one side and lifted her hair. And as she drew back the tresses, she revealed a purple scar weaving a path from just above her hairline at the nape of her neck, through her hair and into her scalp.

“Long hair, Billy, hides a multitude of sins.”

His eyes beginning to smart, Billy looked toward The Retreat again, as if checking to see that everything was still in its place. He said nothing about the scar, but pressed his lips together and shook his head.

“I’ll stay ’ere until tomorrow, Miss. I know you need me to be at this place at least another day. I’ll meet you ’ere at half past seven tomorrow, and I’ll ’ave me kit bag with me. No one will see me, don’t you worry.”

Billy did not wait for Maisie to respond, but clambered back through the fence. And as she had each evening for more than a week now, Maisie watched Billy limp across the field to The Retreat.

“I’ll be here,” whispered Maisie. “I’ll be here.”

Maisie did not go to bed, and was not encouraged to do so by Maurice. She knew that the time of reckoning could come soon. Yes, if Jenkins was to make his move, it would be now. If not, then the investigation would lie dormant; the file would remain open.

She sat on the floor, legs crossed, watching first the night grow darker, then the early hours of the morning edge slowly toward dawn. The clock struck the half hour. Half past four. She breathed in deeply and closed her eyes. Suddenly the telephone rang, its shrill bell piercing the quiet of the night. Maisie opened her eyes and came to her feet quickly. Before it could ring a second time, she answered the call.

“Billy.”

“Yes. Miss, something’s goin’ on down ’ere.”

“First, Billy—are you safe?”

“No one’s seen me leave. I crept out, kept close to the wall, came straight across the field and through the fence to the old dog ’n’ bone ‘ere.”

“Good. Now—what’s happening?”

Billy caught his breath. “I couldn’t sleep last night, Miss. Kept thinking about, y’know, what we’d talked about.”

“Yes, Billy.”

Maisie turned to the door as she spoke and nodded her head to Maurice, who had entered the room dressed as he had been when he had bidden her goodnight. He had not slept either.

“Anyway. ’bout—well, blimey, must ’ve been over ’alf an hour ago now—I ’eard a bit of a racket outside, sounded like a sack bein’ dragged around. So, I goes to the window to see what’s what.”

“Go on, Billy. And keep looking around you.”

“Don’t you worry, Miss, I’m keepin’ me eyes peeled. Anyway, it was ’im, bein’ dragged away down the dirt road.”

“Who?”

“The fella that wanted to leave. Could see ’im plain as day, in the light coming from the door.”

“Where does the dirt road lead to—the quarry?”

“Yes, Miss. That’s right.”

Maisie took a deep breath.

“Billy, here’s what you are to do. Go into the hamlet. Keep very close to the side of the road. Do not be seen. There may be someone else coming from that direction heading for The Retreat. Do not let him see you. Meet me by the oak tree on the green. Go now.”

Maisie replaced the receiver. There was no time to allow Billy Beale another question before ending the call.

Maurice handed Maisie her jacket and hat and took up his own. She opened her mouth to protest, but was silenced by Maurice’s raised hand.

“Maisie, I never, ever said that you were too young for the many risks you have taken. Do not now tell me to stay at home because I am too old!”

B
illy clambered out of the ditch and stretched his wounded leg. Kneeling had made him sore, and he rubbed at his cramped muscles. The sound of a breaking twig in the silence of the early morning hours, as leaves rustled in a cool breeze, made him snap to attention. He remained perfectly still.

“Now I’m bleedin’ ’earin’ things,” whispered Billy into the dawn chill that caught his chest and forced his heart to beat faster, so fast he could hear it echo in his ears.

“Like waitin’ for that bleedin’ whistle to go off for the charge, it is.”

Billy took his bag by the handle and slung it over his shoulder. Looking both ways, he began to cross the road to take advantage of the overhanging branches that would shield him as he made his way along the lane into the hamlet. But as he moved, his leg cramped again.

“Blimey, come on, come on, leg! Don’t bleedin’ let me down now.”

Billy tried to straighten his body, but as he moved, his war wounds came to life, shooting pain through him as he tried to take a step.

“I’m afraid you’ve let yourself down, William,” a man’s voice intoned.

“Who’s that? Who’s there?” Billy fell backward, his arms flailing as he tried to regain balance.

Adam Jenkins stepped out of the half-light in front of Billy. Archie stood with him, together with two other longtime residents of The Retreat.

“Desertion is what we call it. When you leave before your time.”

“I just, well, I just wanted to ’ave a bit of a walk, Sir,” said Billy, nervously running his fingers through his hair.

“Well, a fine time to be walking, William. Or perhaps you prefer ‘Billy?’ A fine time for a stroll.”

Jenkins signaled to Archie and the other men, who pinioned Billy’s hands behind his back and tightly secured a black cloth across his eyes.

“Desertion, Billy. Terrible thing. Nothing worse in a soldier. Nothing worse.”

M
aisie drew up alongside the oak tree in the hamlet of Hart’s Lea. There was no sign of Billy.