An Unmarked Grave (23 page)

“But he’s in hospital. And it isn’t much of a life for you.”

“Who has traveled across England to see him? Nobody. Which of my father’s neighbors will call me a liar?”

It was madness. The madness of desperation.

“Go back to your company, Private Morton. I’ll tell the Base Hospital how I found you wandering and confused. There won’t be charges to face.”

“Sister, I left my company to avenge my brother. It’s all I wanted—revenge for how Will was treated. But Will’s dead, the Major is dead. I’ve no more stomach for fighting. And I can do more good at home, helping my Da in the fields, than I ever could here.”

“I won’t be responsible if you’re caught. Do you understand that?”

“I do, Sister. I won’t even tell my father how I got home. What’s more, he won’t ask.”

“He may think you a coward for leaving France. None of your other brothers ran.”

“I doubt they would have stayed, given the choice. I doubt Will preferred to die in France, never seeing his son. Or Ross, drowning in the cold sea. Or David, when he looked down to find his leg gone.”

“All right. Go sit in the cathedral until dark. Meet me at the port gates. They’re taking wounded on board, and whatever I say to you at that time, you’ll do your part.”

“On my honor, Sister.”

But did a deserter have any honor to swear on?

I took him as far as the church, saw him safely ensconced by the organ loft stairs, and then walked away.

I wondered what my ancestress whose husband fought at Waterloo would have to say about what I was going to do.

I turned around and went back to the cathedral and found Hugh Morton where I’d left him.

“You will make me a promise,” I said.

“Anything, Sister.”

“If you survive this war, you will go to Cornwall and speak to your brother’s wife and see his son. Do you swear?”

“On my honor,” he said again. And this time I nodded.

I had left the cathedral and was making my way back to the Base Hospital when I happened to glance in a café window. Music was spilling out of the doorway, someone playing a plaintive tune on the piano, something about lost love and heartbreak.

And my own heart seemed to leap into my throat as the man sitting at a small table in the shadows of the doorway looked up at the very same moment.

He was wearing a British officer’s uniform, wearing it as if it were his, although it was a little tight across the shoulders, but his eyes were as cold as the winter sea. By comparison, Hugh Morton’s were as blue as a spring sky. And I’d last seen them shadowed by a muffler in the driver’s seat of a motorcar trying to kill me.

I couldn’t help my own response. This encounter had been too sudden, too unexpected, and we both knew, he and I, that I’d recognized him in the same instant he’d recognized me.

He had killed four people that I knew of. How many more I couldn’t say.

But those four were enough.

I walked on, half expecting him to stand up, walk out of the café, and follow me. But at the corner of the next street, when I looked back, there was no one behind me except for two elderly women in black, struggling to carry a tub of washed clothes between them.

Either I was no longer a danger to him or he was too close to whatever objective drove him to take the risk of killing me now. But why sail for England if the Prince of Wales was scheduled to come to France?

At the Base Hospital, I looked for Trelawney, but I was told he’d taken the motorcar down to the quay. The Chief Engineering Officer had sent word that it could be stowed aboard now.

I hurried after him, but he was nowhere to be seen. One of
Merlin
’s officers was coming through the gate, and I went to speak to him, asking if he’d seen my driver and my motorcar.

“The Chief is haggling with him now,” he told me, grinning. “He wants the tires for his own motor, at home in Chichester.”

I had to laugh. Good luck to him, getting the best of a Cornishman.

Thanking the officer, I moved off a little to wait for Trelawney to disembark, but he and the Chief Engineer must have moved past haggling and were swapping stories now.

Looking at the collection of people hanging about the port, I saw no sign of the Major from the café. It was possible he wasn’t on
Merlin,
but if he was here in Rouen, he would have to land in Portsmouth sometime. I had only to get there first and wait.

I was tired of standing, waiting, but I dared not leave until I’d found Trelawney. Finally, after I’d nearly given up twice, he came off the ship and saw me as he passed through the gates.

“She’s as snug as can be,” he told me, pleased with himself. “I saw her tied down myself. There was just room for her aft.”

“I’m glad. Trelawney, I found the man we’ve been looking for. He was in a café halfway between the cathedral and the Base Hospital. I doubt he’s there now. He saw me as clearly as I saw him, but he didn’t follow me. And that reminds me, Hugh Morton is in the cathedral. I’m going to try to get him aboard.”

“A deserter?” he demanded, aghast. “Sister—you can’t mean it!”

I said, “I won’t be the one to hand him over to be shot.”

“I have no such qualms,” he told me.

“But you will do as I tell you. It’s more important to find this Major than it is to see Morton in irons.”

“Bloody coward,” he muttered, then realizing that I’d heard, he begged pardon.

“Nevertheless,” I said. “This you will do for me. My reasons are sound.”

He said nothing for a moment, then changed the subject. “What do we do, if he’s on this ship? This man you’re after?”

“The Captain is a friend. I’ll ask that he be held until my father can come to meet the ship.”

“He’ll do that?”

“Yes,” I said with far more assurance than I felt.

Trelawney nodded. “And if he’s not on board?”

“I think he’ll come to Portsmouth within a day or two. He has the orders he needed. It’s only a matter of time. What’s more, we’ll have a chance to prepare. He won’t get away in England. He mustn’t.”

“I was told he might be looking to kill the Prince of Wales.”

“I don’t know,” I said, uncertainty loud in my voice. “There’s something he intends to do. Or else he would stay in France.”

“Makes sense, doesn’t it?” Trelawney agreed. “He doesn’t know me. Why don’t you go aboard alone, and I’ll watch until the last minute?”

“Yes, all right. But be very careful. He’s killed four people that I know of. He won’t be taken by surprise. If he even suspects you’ve recognized him, he has a choice. Kill again or wait for another ship. And waiting would be far more dangerous.”

He said, “I’ll leave you then. What about Morton?”

“If he reaches the ship, I’ll put him with the wounded on board. Ah—here comes the first of the ambulances.”

And indeed it was making its slow approach to the port.

Trelawney disappeared, there one minute and invisible the next. I scanned the dozen or so onlookers, and I saw no one I recognized.

I had to collect my valise, and I hurried back to the Base Hospital for it. I was just leaving with it, thanking the duty nurse for the hospitality shown me, when I saw ahead of me a man in the uniform of a British officer, his back to me, but there was something familiar about his shoulders and the way he walked.

And then I realized where I’d seen him before.

He wasn’t the man with the bandaged shoulder who’d gone into the makeshift canteen just a few yards from the shed where the dead were taken. He had been the orderly carrying a mop and pail. The orderly Sister Burrows must have stopped and asked to bring fresh sheets to the ward. I’d been trained to observe—and so had she. I didn’t think I was mistaken.

I followed at a distance, making certain that I wasn’t where he might glimpse me in a shop window. Soldiers saluted him as they passed, and I tried to judge whether he was actually an officer—or a private soldier masquerading as one. I came to the conclusion he was a sergeant, for his back was ramrod straight, and his officer’s cap didn’t have that jaunty angle I saw so often. Rather, it sat squarely.

As if he felt my scrutiny, he turned and looked back the way he’d come, but a party of sappers had just cut across my path, and I was shielded by them. When they had passed, he was walking on again.

I tried to judge if he was British or German, but it was impossible to be sure. And someone sent to spy or act as an assassin would have been carefully chosen for his ability to fit in. Even his voice would be suitable, his English more than acceptable.

He’d reached the ship. I stopped to gaze at a window of cheeses, my back to him, and let him board. Apparently his papers passed inspection, and when I looked again, he was nowhere in sight.

Someone took my arm, and I nearly leapt out of my skin.

I turned quickly, prepared to scream if need be.

It was Hugh Morton.

“Would you have waited for me?” he asked. “Or left me in the organ loft?”

“I had other worries. But yes, I would have come. Trelawney is aboard with the motorcar, and there’s someone I didn’t want to encounter just ahead of me. He’ll be on the same vessel.”

“The officer you were following?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll keep an eye out for him. He won’t know me.”

“That would be helpful,” I said. “But he’s not a fool. You must be very careful.”

He gave me that one-sided grin, his eyes all but crossed, his mouth drooping. “I told you. People don’t see the afflicted,” he said. “They’re too uncomfortable to look at.” It was a perceptive remark.

Just then more ambulances turned in toward the port, and I took Hugh Morton with me to add to the queue, explaining to the sister in charge, God forgive me, that he had been left off the list.

He was ordered on board with the others, and at the end of the long line, I myself handed over my own papers. I didn’t see the man I’d been following, but I thought perhaps he was taking care not to be in plain sight, just in case someone could identify him—or inform the port authorities that he wasn’t who he claimed to be. The only other possibility was that he wasn’t on
Merlin
at all, that he was scheduled to depart on the ship just tying up behind her, and he’d come early to keep out of sight.

In due course,
Merlin
was given leave to sail, the lines were hauled in, dripping wet, and coiled neatly on the fore and aft decks. I stayed by the rail, looking out over the city, watching the flashes of the guns in the distance. My father remembered France from well before the war, and I wondered if it would ever look again as it had then.

The ship eased into the current, then turned to steam slowly down toward the sea. The night was dark, the running lights masked, and as I looked up to the bridge, I could see Captain Grayson’s profile, tense and focused on what lay ahead.

He had given me his cabin for the voyage, as he wouldn’t be using it as long as
Merlin
went in harm’s way.

Indeed, as soon as we reached the sea, word was passed that we were being shadowed by a submarine, and the watch was doubled. The rating who came to my door was young but steady, assuring me that we were safe. But of course I knew otherwise, having sailed on
Britannic
. It was a long journey, seemingly longer than the usual, nerves stretched almost to the breaking point as we waited for the shout of “Torpedo!” My life vest was too warm but I kept it on, in case.

We reached the shelter of the Isle of Wight without being attacked, and Portsmouth Harbor lay ahead. I slipped out on deck to watch us come in, standing in the shadows, where I wouldn’t be in the way or noticed.

But someone had seen me.

Out of nowhere, someone put hands on me, thrust a canvas bag over my head before I could scream or struggle, and then I was being dragged toward the railing.

It had happened so fast—a matter of seconds—and then I was being lifted over the railing, my muffled cries covered by the racket of the heavy anchor cable paying out as we came into the roads to await a berth.

I could feel myself dangling now, no foothold or handhold, and unable to see, I couldn’t tell where to reach out and save myself.

And just as suddenly I was being pulled up so roughly that I struck my head on the teak railing, seeing stars in the blackness of the bag. I landed on deck with such force I was winded, and then as I reached shakily for the bag, someone stepped on my skirts. I realized that just above me, two men were locked in a fierce struggle. Only their feet were visible, and I quickly rolled out of the way.

As the heavy bag fell away, I could see their shapes. One in an officer’s uniform, the other in the distinctive blue worn by Base Hospital patients. They were surprisingly well matched in size and reach. But Morton’s hip wound put him at a disadvantage, unable to keep his balance on the moving deck. He was quickly losing the battle, pushed until his own back was hard against the rail, and as I watched, the other man rammed his knee into Morton’s groin and hip.

The crew, busy with docking, had no time for us, but two orderlies had just come on deck from below. If they saw him fighting with an officer, he would be taken up for the offense. I could do nothing then.

He had saved me.

I still had my little pistol in my pocket. Scrambling to my feet, dizzy at first, and then quite determined, I brought it out, aimed, and fired.

The shot seemed so loud in our ears that we froze where we were. Morton turned his head to look at me, stunned, and in his grip I could see his attacker’s eyes incandescent. I wondered how anyone could have described them as cold.

A trickle of blood began to run down the side of the man’s face where my bullet had grazed his skull. With an oath he let go of Morton, turned, and stumbled away, disappearing down the nearest companionway as three ratings converged on Morton and me, alerted by the shot.

They caught his arms, pinning him, and I realized that they thought he’d been attacking me. I shoved the pistol into my pocket, and pointed over the railing.

“There!” I shouted. “Someone just tried to climb aboard. Look!”

They held on to Morton but ran for the railing, staring down into the dark, swirling waters. I joined them, pointing down the side of the ship now. “Over there. Stop him!”