Pardonable Lie (8 page)

M
AISIE ARRIVED AT
the Strand Palace Hotel ten minutes late for her appointment with Priscilla. Though the country was in an economic slump, the modern hotel, with its silver revolving doors and ultramodern design, welcomed guests into a land of optimism, if only for a night, for dinner, or for a cocktail. Priscilla was standing in the lobby waiting. Wearing a slate-gray costume, clearly from an expensive Paris atelier, with matching shoes and bag, she seemed to be observing those who came and went, confident in their admiring glances yet somewhat amused by her surroundings. She saw Maisie and smiled. Maisie noticed immediately that Priscilla carried a large brown envelope.

“Darling!” Priscilla pressed her cheek to Maisie’s, then drew back. “Whatever is the matter with you, Maisie? First, I have never known you to be late in your life and, second, you look like hell.”

“Don’t spare me, Pris.” Maisie straightened. Why did she always feel so small next to Priscilla, even though she loved her friend?

“Are you ill?”

“No. Look, let’s have some lunch. I’m just a bit busy, that’s all.”

“Hmmph! I hope that doctor hasn’t turned out to be a cad.”

Maisie looked around for the dining room. “No, of course not. I’ve just taken on a lot of work recently.”

“Over here.” Priscilla linked her arm through Maisie’s and led the way. “You know what I think? I really do think you need a holiday. Come to Biarritz, Maisie. I’m sure your Billy and your doctor will be able to do without you for a couple of weeks.”

Maisie shook her head as they were seated. “Not a chance, I’m afraid.”

Priscilla raised an eyebrow as she reached into her bag and took out her cigarette holder and a packet of cigarettes. She pressed a cigarette into the holder and lit it with a silver monogrammed lighter that she placed on the table, drawing deeply through the holder. She looked closely at Maisie. Then she reached forward and extinguished the cigarette, leaving the holder in an ashtray.

“You know what I think, Maisie?”

Maisie sighed. “I’m
all right
, Priscilla.”

“Well, I’m going to tell you anyway, like it or not. Number one, you need a holiday. No two ways about it. If your idea of fun is a weekend with a country doctor while thinking about your work non-stop, it’s about time you had a few more options to choose from.”

Maisie opened her mouth to speak, but Priscilla raised her hand.

“I haven’t finished yet. The other thing I think you should do is get a place of your own—a flat or something.”

“But it’s not as if I haven’t done
that
before.”

“No, you haven’t, not really. Think about it. You came back from France, recuperated from your injuries—and remember, I know all about wounds—returned to Girton to complete your studies, and of course you spent some time in Scotland, didn’t you? At that gruesome place, what was it, where you worked with some of Maurice Blanche’s cronies? The Department of Legal Medicine. Ugh! Then you came back to London to work for Blanche. And where did you live then? You went straight to Lambeth, where you lived in a rented room for years.
Lambeth
. Back to the womb, so to speak. There was that little sojourn in a room next to your office in Warren Street; how you could ever have lived in such a place is beyond me. Then you went to live at Ebury Place at Lady Rowan’s insistence, to the home of ‘she who couldn’t come out and say that she really wanted to give you something’ but, instead, couched the invitation as if you were a sort of unpaid overseer while they were away in Kent. All very nice, I must say, but you’ve kept to the safe places, haven’t you? If you don’t watch it, you’ll end up living in a dusty old beamed cottage in Sussex.”

Maisie looked at Priscilla, who shrugged her shoulders, placed a fresh cigarette in the holder, and proceeded to smoke for a moment, saying nothing. Eventually, Maisie broke the silence.

“Not everyone gets the opportunity to have a flat in town on their own, you know. Most women go straight from their father’s home to their husband’s, and a good many live under their in-laws’ roof for a few years before being able to afford the rent on their own flat, if they’re lucky.”

“There you go again, sackcloth and ashes! But you are
different
, Maisie. A
professional
woman. You’ve worked pretty damn hard, so for goodness’ sake, enjoy a bit more freedom before Sir Lancelot comes racing up on his charger and drags you off. And, not to digress, but I must say I’d like to know why he’s still a bachelor. After all, it’s not as if there aren’t enough available spinsters. But back to my point—frankly, I’m glad I had a few years on my own, even though it wasn’t exactly my best time.”

Maisie wanted desperately to change the subject. “What’s in the envelope?”

“I’ll get to that in a moment. I haven’t finished yet.” Priscilla waved the waiter away for the second time, then called him back to ask for two gin and tonics. Maisie opened her mouth to protest, but the waiter left the table. “Look,” Priscilla continued. “I’ve decided to invest in some property. It appears I have to, according to my advisers. My inheritance was pulled out of stocks in the nick of time, I really must do something constructive with it, and there’s nothing more constructive than bricks and mortar, is there? I want to buy a couple of flats, perhaps a mews cottage in Chelsea—now
there’s
an ideal location for a professional woman.”

“But if I rent from you, it’ll be like living at Ebury Place, Priscilla!”

“Not at all. It’s…it’s younger, for a start. None of this crusty old nonsense. Victoria, God bless her cotton socks, is dead. Move on, Maisie.”

“Let’s talk about the envelope. I know it’s for me.”

“All right.” Priscilla rested the cigarette holder on the ashtray, her hands shaking, and leaned toward Maisie. “I’ll come back to my point later.” She picked up the envelope. “It’s to do with Peter.”

Maisie noticed Priscilla’s knuckles become white as she clutched the envelope, and as she began to speak it was not with her usual strong authoritative voice but with a stutter, as if she did not know quite where to begin.

“I—well, I have…no, let me start again.” Priscilla opened the envelope and closed it again. “I have been pondering, you know, since our supper together. I’ve been thinking about asking a favor of you.”

“Me?”

“Yes. You see, I think—no, I
hope
you might be able to help me.” Priscilla reached for her drink. “Look, Maisie, I know you are terribly busy, and I wouldn’t ask if it were not fiercely important to me—to my family—and it’s really only if you are coming to France after all, as you suggested….”

Maisie frowned, observing the tears in her friend’s eyes. “What on earth is it, Pris?”

“It was when you first mentioned this case you are working on and having to go to France. A light went on, and—”

“But how can
I
help you, Pris?”

“I think…no, I
know
I must find out where Peter was lost. I’ve wanted to know for ages, wanted to put his memory to rest, lay a few flowers by the nearest village memorial, that sort of thing. I’ve paid my visit to Pat and Phil’s graves, ages ago, but Peter still lingers. For a long time I’ve felt I must do this, if not for me then for my boys, so they know it’s important that I don’t let these things go.”

Maisie nodded. “Yes, I understand.”

Priscilla waved to the waiter and ordered another drink; then she turned back to Maisie. “I know this isn’t really up your street—I mean, there’s no criminal here to track down—but when you mentioned this case of yours it struck me—I mean, I thought that if you were taking on this sort of thing, you might be able to find where Peter was lost.”

Maisie breathed in deeply. In truth, she did not want to accept such an assignment, even an informal one for a dear friend, any more than she really wanted to prove Lawton’s son dead. She thought that if her mentor, Dr. Maurice Blanche, were to counsel her, he would draw attention to the fact that both calls for help pointed in the direction of France and that there might be something there for her, something for her to learn about herself. She was about to decline, but looked at Priscilla and saw the appeal so clearly etched in her eyes and mirrored in her tension. It was an appeal that touched her heart.

Maisie bit the inside of her lip and thought for a moment longer, picked up her drink and swirled the liquid around without raising the glass to her lips, and looked at Priscilla again.

“Look, Pris, I’ll do what I can for you, but don’t expect any results by a certain time. This must be an informal assignment. It’s the best I can do, the most I can promise.”

Priscilla beamed and reached across the table, taking Maisie’s hands in her own. “Oh, Maisie, that’s good enough for me. I cannot thank you enough. I know it’s a terrible imposition, and I wouldn’t do it if it weren’t—”

Maisie released her hand from Priscilla’s grasp and pointed to the envelope. “So, what have you got for me to look at?”

Priscilla reached into the envelope and began to pass various documents to Maisie one by one. “These are letters after Peter enlisted. He was in Surrey somewhere. They are mainly to my parents, but there’s a couple to me, before I joined the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry.” Priscilla reached into the envelope for more letters. “And these are from France. You can always tell the ones from France; the ink gets noticeably thinner. I think the shops must have had such a run on it they watered it down to make it go farther.” She shrugged, then continued. “Now, these are from England again. From a barracks in Southampton, from which it would seem he made trips to London for courses.”

“Promotion?” asked Maisie.

“I really don’t know. I do know that his communiqués were extremely brief, and he commented that he really didn’t have much time to write.”

“Not surprising, really.”

“Then here are a few more from France.” Priscilla passed the letters to Maisie, becoming quiet as she clutched a final piece of paper. “Oh, blast! It does this to me every time, every single time, no matter how many times I look at the bloody thing!” She took a handkerchief from her handbag and dabbed at the corners of her eyes. “This was the last letter my parents received from him. Just a half page of nothing much at all.”

Maisie took the letter and looked back and forth through the envelopes. “Priscilla, it seems he was in France for some time before the final telegram was received, yet there are only three or four letters postmarked quite close together after he went over again. Of course, we’re assuming this is his last letter.”

Priscilla shrugged. “Yes, I’d noticed the same thing. I expect Mother and Father burned them. I understand they burned all subsequent letters from the Army.”

“But why only the ones for that second posting? Why not all of them?”

Priscilla looked at Maisie directly. “Frankly, I haven’t a clue. Why do people do what they do, especially in a time like that? Perhaps he didn’t actually write any more, though I have to say that would surprise me, knowing Peter; he was always talking, always had a story to tell. But then I thought I’d be writing to my brothers all the time, ‘The Dastardly Wartime Exploits of Priscilla the Younger,’ but apart from a letter here and there I frankly fell exhausted into my bed, such as it was, every single night.”

“Well, I certainly assumed Peter was the sort to write often. From everything you’ve told me, I would have thought he’d have a lot to say.” Maisie inclined her head and frowned, her curiosity piqued.

“Well, yes. But…oh, I don’t know, Maisie. I just want to know where he might have died, and seeing as I don’t have a ‘regret-to-inform’ letter, I am completely in the dark.”

Maisie collected the papers and placed them in the envelope once again. “Well, this may surprise you, but considering the terror and chaos, fairly good records were kept. It’s interesting that you haven’t been able to locate the information.” She smiled at Priscilla, knowingly yet kindly, for she knew her friend had probably not tried particularly hard to procure details pertaining to Peter Evernden’s death.

Priscilla was thoughtful. “The only thing I can say that might help is that I heard from my parents—this was just before I went over to France—that Peter was being transferred to another job and he was very excited about it. Then the next thing you know, he’d clammed up and they were dying to know what he was doing. My father had a map pinned to one wall of his study so he could follow, as best he could, all four of us. After Southampton he had nowhere to put Peter, because he didn’t know where he was sent next, and I was certainly never told anything about where he went missing. Then, of course, the pins came off one by one until I was the only one left.” Priscilla had relighted her cigarette while speaking; now she drew deeply, blowing a smoke ring as she exhaled. “I came home, Father rolled up the map, and that was that.”

Maisie allowed a silence to seep into the space between Priscilla and herself. She could not help but be drawn by parallels in the two requests, one from a stranger and one from her dearest friend. One inspired by the other. Two men dead in France, two grieving relatives unable to rest, one of whom she loved dearly. She reached over and placed her hand on Priscilla’s arm. “I’ll do everything I can to find out where he was lost, Pris. Now then, come on, let’s get something to eat. I’m starving.” Maisie stared at Priscilla until she turned to her. “And I want to talk to you a bit more about finding a flat. But I don’t want to live in someone else’s property. I’ve been saving my money and I’ve paid off my motor car. I think I want a home of my own.”

Priscilla beamed a mischievous smile, as Maisie knew she would.

“Excellent!”

NINE

Maisie did not return to Ebury Place directly after seeing Priscilla but, instead, decided to consider where she might live, if she moved. There were other things to think about too.

Dusk was descending as she made her way to the Embankment. She loved to walk by the water, though when the tide was out the Thames mud was less than fragrant. Pondering the luncheon with her friend, Maisie wondered why she always found herself giving in to Priscilla whenever they met: One minute she was full of resolve, the next she could hear herself agreeing that a flat of her own was the best thing in the world for her, while at the same time
knowing
that she would have given the idea short shrift if she were alone or if anyone else had made the suggestion—Maurice notwithstanding. Not only that, but she had found herself agreeing to visit Priscilla in Biarritz when she went to France. But Maisie loved Priscilla and, after all was said and done, she valued her honest opinion, which she was never slow to offer. Without doubt, they were chalk and cheese, but there was a bond that no one could deny. And she had missed her.

Priscilla had said Maisie should draw up a list of attributes her new home should have. Maisie pulled her jacket collar up as a chill breeze nipped at her neck. It was the sort of thing she would have suggested herself, yet apart from being near the water, she really didn’t know what she liked in terms of a place to live. Her accommodations had always been something of a fait accompli, established already rather than chosen to reflect her own tastes.
What do I want?
Priscilla had decreed that her flat must be close to places where she could go to meet people, a social set.

Turning back, Maisie was now walking in the murky darkness with only the streetlamps for guidance. It would not take long to provide answers to Priscilla’s questions, once she consulted Peter’s records at the War Office Repository, a task she would get out of the way as soon as possible. Maisie considered what sort of training Peter might have been undergoing, especially as he was brought back from France to complete his promotion, if that’s what it was.

Billy would be back on Monday with news of his investigation into the Jarvis girl’s background, and she would also be driving up to Cambridgeshire, to the childhood home of Ralph Lawton. This weekend she would see Maurice on her return from visiting Andrew Dene. She would tell him of her plans to go to France, probably within the next few weeks. Of course she would tell Andrew first, after he had shared the surprise he had mentioned. She wondered about that surprise and hoped very much that it would not be one to force her hand in a way that upset them both.

“O
H, M’UM, THERE’S
been a telephone call for you, from Dr. Dene.” Sandra reached for Maisie’s coat as she entered through the front door of the Compton mansion at Ebury Place.

“Really? What did he say?”

“Very sorry he was, m’um. Said to tell you he’d been called out in an emergency. Apparently there was an accident on a building site this afternoon, lots of back and leg work, so he said, and he’s been summoned to Hastings General to assist in the circumstances. He’ll be busy all weekend.”

“Oh, dear.” Maisie hoped the relief was not as visible on her face as she felt inside.

“I bet you were looking forward to the weekend away, m’um. You’ve been working hard lately.” Sandra curtsied and began to walk away as Maisie moved toward the stairs.

Thinking quickly, Maisie turned and stepped back into the entrance hall. “You know, Sandra, I think I might not stay in London in any case, so no need to count on my being here this weekend. My bag is ready, so I’ll leave first thing tomorrow morning for Cambridgeshire; it’s just the opportunity I need to see a client at home.”

“Right you are, m’um.”

H
AVING TELEPHONED HER
father to explain why she would have to postpone the fortnightly visit that had become her routine since his accident in the summer, Maisie made sure that she packed the collection of letters from Ralph Lawton to his parents, most of which were sent specifically to his mother, though there were one or two addressed to his father. She also flicked through Peter Evernden’s correspondence again, replaced the items in the brown envelope, and packed them alongside the other notes and files in her bag. The Lawton country home was in the village of Farthing, about five miles outside Cambridge. She hadn’t been back to the area since her Girton years.

Lord Compton had left Ebury Place for Kent, and once again Maisie was alone. It was unusual for her to have a Friday evening with nothing to do. Not that she was ever idle; no, finding something to do was never an issue to contend with. Yet as she undressed, ran a bath, and lounged in her dressing gown for a while, Maisie sat in the armchair close by the window and sighed.
A holiday in Biarritz
. She had never had a proper holiday, not a real going-away holiday for which special clothes were packed and salt sea air or long walks in the country anticipated. Before her mother was taken ill, a holiday was two weeks spent picking hops in Kent in September or a few days with her grandparents on her mother’s side. Later in life, her grandfather had taken a job on the waterways as a lockmaster, so the Dobbs family would travel by train to Marlow and then by bus to the hamlet where her grandparents lived in a small cottage alongside the canal.

Now Maisie smiled at the memory, for her grandparents and her mother were long gone. It seemed that with them had gone any inclination to go away on holiday.

She knew she had been driven, at first to forget the war, then to complete her education. She had been determined to excel in her work with Maurice Blanche, and now her energy was directed into making her business a success. Maisie strove to bring each case to a close in a way that ensured that those whose lives she had touched were at peace with the outcome of her endeavors, as far as such a thing might be possible. But there had been no break in that work, except for a day or two here and there and, for several months now, alternate weekends when she spent a day either in Kent with her father or with Andrew Dene in Sussex. They were weekends when she always took work along in her bag, and her thoughts were never far from her office.

She thought of the posters adorning the railway platforms, the temptation to travel overseas that greeted her as she reached the turn-stile at Warren Street station. Hadn’t it been the same since the war, with those who could afford such forays traveling via ship, train, motor car and aeroplane—to the Riviera, to Africa, to the Mediterranean, or even to Devon and Cornwall? Not that travel was expensive, for the ships of war had been converted for civilian use and prices had tumbled. But one had to have some independent wealth to have the time to travel, so Maisie had ignored those compelling illustrations of a grand ship’s prow or a deep azure sea seen through the branches of an orange tree: the lure of travel to take away memories of trenches, of cold, mud, and blood.
For those who are free to leave
.

And here she was on a Friday evening with nothing to do unless she worked. Or read, which was of course her other distraction; the quest to learn, to expand her knowledge of the world without taking another step overseas. Perhaps that was why her meditation practice had suffered, for Maisie did not always like the message she heard when she was alone at the end of the day. It was a voice that spoke of her isolation and of her choosing not to move beyond the boundaries of those worlds in which she felt a modicum of safety. What was it that Maurice said, one of his favorite challenges?
Seek the opportunity to swim beyond your own little pond
. She knew every reed, mud-bank, and fish in her pond. Perhaps it was time to look for that flat after all, sooner rather than later.

After bathing, Maisie telephoned the Lawton residence, expecting Sir Cecil to be there. He was known to enjoy various country pursuits and also the company of a circle of academics with whom he dined at weekends. Lawton agreed to her proposed visit to the house in order to look through Ralph’s belongings, personal items that had been saved by his wife, who had believed that her son would return one day. Maisie was extended an invitation to be a guest at the house, but knowing that the offer was one of protocol, and in the spirit of her musings on travel, she declined in favor of staying at a good hotel—after all, she had been given a generous expense allowance in advance. Yes, she would splash out, she would spoil herself.

O
N
S
ATURDAY MORNING
, Billy telephoned, just as Maisie was pulling on her coat, ready to leave Ebury Place.

“Billy, how are you?” Maisie took the call in the library.

“Awright, doin’ well, Miss. Yourself?”

“I’m well. Now then, what news?”

“Turns out Avril Jarvis is from that family. This is what I’ve found out so far: There’s four kids, Avril’s the oldest, but the others ain’t fully related.”

“What do you mean?”

“Her real dad was killed in the war. She never knew ’im, because she weren’t born when ’e went back over there after bein’ ’ome on leave. Mrs. Jarvis was married again after the war to a fella who was in the town lookin’ for work. Little Avril was about four at the time.”

“Go on.”

“The family have gone through difficult times—mind you, so ’ave a lot of people, ’aven’t they?”

“Billy….”

“Well, I’ve found out that the father—the second one, that is—was in some trouble with the law. Done time: theft, burglary. Seems to me as if Avril’s mum married a lot of trouble there, because ’e drinks as well. There are the kids wantin’ for a good meal, and the man’s knockin’ back pints in the local.”

“How did Avril get to London, did you find out?”

“From what I can make out—and I got quite a lot of this from a neighbor—”

“You didn’t say anything?”

“No, said I was from the school board because they ain’t been at school—which was a pretty good guess, because they ain’t. The littl’uns ’ave been put out to work in the fields, doin’ their bit for the family.”

“Poor kids.”

“Poor kids is right. And you should see the mum, all drained and lookin’ double ’er years, she is.”

“Anyway?”

“Well, anyway, apparently the stepdad said that Avril could earn good money in service in London, so—this is what was told to the mum, accordin’ to the neighbor—’e puts ’er on a train to London where a bloke ’e knew arranged for ’er to work at a job in service, with ’er wages bein’ sent to the family, leavin’ the girl with a bit of pocket money to get by. The mum told the neighbor that the ’usband’s mate’d said that accommodations and keep were all found.”

“I’m sure.” Maisie shook her head. “And what about this business with the medicines?”

“That’s on ’er dead father’s side. Turns out they didn’t much like Avril’s new stepdad but couldn’t do anything about it. The family were in a tricky position, what with the business about the woman who’d killed a man with the ’erbs and what ’ave you. From what I know, it was the father’s sister, the girl’s aunt—apparently they was tight, the two of ’em.”

“Can you find out more about that, Billy, and the aunt’s activities?”

“Workin’ on it already.”

“Good. And if you can, find out the name of whom she was sent to in London. By the way, any sign of the newspapers, or even of Stratton’s men?”

“Not a dickey bird. Bit strange, that, ain’t it, Miss?”

“Yes, it is. Anyway, you’ll be traveling back tomorrow afternoon. We’ll talk first thing Monday morning.”

“Very good, Miss. I’m glad I caught you, only telephoned on the off chance. I was a bit surprised when they said you was still up there in the Smoke.”

“Change of plan. I’d best be off now, Billy. See you Monday. Take Doreen out for a nice dinner tonight.”

“Right you are, Miss. Ta-ta.”

Maisie replaced the telephone receiver.
So Avril Jarvis was sent to London by a violent stepfather. To whom did he send her?
It was common for a family friend to be called
uncle
—so was this a relative of the stepfather or did
uncle
have another connotation? Billy would find the answer.

T
HE
M
OOR’S
H
EAD
Hotel had been built in the early 1800s. Following a period that could only be described as “genteel decline,” it had been refurbished by new owners in 1925 and was now a rather sumptuous place that regularly drew visiting academics, families of students, and an influx of American travelers keen to enjoy a much-admired city. Maisie arrived just after noon on Saturday and, following lunch in the hotel dining room, claimed her MG from the garage that had once been stabling for carriage horses and made her way to the Lawton country home.

As she drove across the Cambridgeshire fens to the village of Farthing, she remembered how captivated she had been by the flat farmlands, so very different from the soft hills of Kent and Sussex. Farthing was a small yet busy village, with a number of people out and about their business, whether visiting the grocery shop, the post office, or the butcher. It was still too early to see a steady stream making their way to the King’s Arms, though at evening opening time she was sure the local hostelry drew quite a few customers. Saplings, the Lawton home on the edge of the village, had originally been built as a vicarage but was subsequently deemed too grand for a country parson. The Lawtons had bought the house before Ralph was born, when it was customary for a man in Cecil Lawton’s position to own not only a house in London but a country home to which he would travel when his work in the City was done at the end of the week. For some years now, Lawton’s work was frequently “done” on a Thursday and did not continue again until Monday afternoon.

A manservant answered the door and showed Maisie into the drawing room, where Lawton was waiting for her. Instead of the more formal clothes worn in chambers, Lawton was wearing plain gray gabardine trousers, a brushed cotton shirt with small checks, a cravat at his neck, and a tweed jacket with leather patches at the elbows. He immediately stretched out a hand to greet Maisie.