“Right you are, Miss Dobbs.” He looked around, then up at the inn. “I would’ve lost the lot if it weren’t for you. I owe you everything.”
“You would have smelled the fire soon enough.”
“A fire can do a day’s work in a minute.” He pursed his lips. “No, you’ve got a calm head on your shoulders, and we owe you. The men will help now, you go on back indoors. Mary will get a bath out for you.” He gave a half laugh. “She’s banking up the stove for more hot water now. Better tell her to go easy with the logs, eh?”
Maisie was silent for a moment longer. Still no one moved. “Why wasn’t the fire brigade called?”
“Takes too long. No station here—they would have had to come over from Paddock Wood.”
“But that’s not far. Who has a telephone in the village? The damage should be inspected, to ensure all traces of fire are gone, and the police must be called so that the person who did this is caught.”
“You go in to Mary, miss. We’ll look after it all now. These things happen. I’ve been building up the path here at night, with ashes from the fireplaces inside the inn. Like as not, it’s my fault for not making sure the embers were dead. Only takes a spark to get a fire going, especially near a coal bunker.” He stood straighter and squared his shoulders. “No, I blame myself. I should have known better.”
“But I saw someone, running down to the end of your garden, then off across the field.”
The innkeeper shook his head. “No, miss, I doubt you did. There’s a vixen that comes a-hunting for food at night, around our dustbins at the back. She’s a right one, that fox-bitch, and what with this moon”—he pointed to the sky with the forefinger of his blackened right hand—“the shadows would’ve made her look like a person.”
“No, I don’t think—”
“You go on in now, miss. There’s Mary at the door, she’s got a nice hot bath waiting. We’re grateful to you, all of us. But we can do what needs to be done now.”
Maisie looked at the villagers standing by, men and women listening to the conversation. She nodded, acquiescing, and walked to the back entrance to the inn. Just as she dipped her head to avoid the low-beamed back door, she turned. The women were moving away but the men were clustered, looking at the waterlogged and smoking ruins, their heads drawn together as they spoke of the fire.
IN A ROOM next to the kitchen, decorated with floral wallpaper and white wainscoting, Mary had filled a tin bath with piping hot water and, on a chair next to the bath, set two white towels still infused with the memory of the warm breeze that had dried them on the washing line outside. The innkeeper’s wife had also left a freshly ironed flannel nightgown on a chest of drawers in the corner, along with a dressing gown. As she was about to remove her clothes, Maisie caught sight of herself in the oval mirror hanging from an olive-green picture rail. Her face was almost black, her hair was slicked against her cheek, and her eyes were red and stinging from soot and heat. She looked down at her pajamas and dressing gown and saw that they were fire-soiled beyond repair. Sighing, she undressed and eased herself into the bath, reaching for a brick of green Fairy household soap that Mary had placed upon the towels.
The fire had been ignited deliberately, of that she had no doubt. But why was her observation of the person running away across the field denied by the landlord? Why did he decline to summon the fire brigade? The church bells ringing in the middle of the night should at least have alerted people in the next village that there was something amiss. Why did no one come? There had been fires before, one a year for some years, according to James Compton’s report. Were the people of nearby villages immune to the call for help? Or did they offer help once, only to have it turned away?
Questions filled Maisie’s head as she soaped away the soot and sweat of the night. Her nails were broken and her knuckles grazed from filling the buckets with water, then running back and forth before the chain was formed. All those silent, ashen-faced people. Maisie closed her eyes and imagined their collective demeanor again, saw the message written in their eyes. There had been no surprise registered, no shock at a tragedy averted by a hair’s breadth of time. Instead, she had once again seen the emotion she was becoming familiar with in the course of her work in Heronsdene: fear. And something else: resignation, acceptance. As if the events of the evening were expected.
EIGHT
Breakfast was a quiet affair. The other guests had left as early as possible, their curiosity regarding the fire far outweighed by their desire to depart from the site of a troubled night. Maisie understood that, though they were not consciously aware of such a sensation, the mood of the village and the nature of the “accident” had driven them away. But she was hungry for the plate of eggs and bacon served by Mary, and relaxed as she tucked into toast and marmalade and poured another cup of tea. She was also waiting. Waiting to speak to Fred Yeoman again, to gauge, if it were possible, the depth of his silence on the matter of the fires. She heard him in the cellar, changing the barrels of beer and grumbling to himself as he made his way back to the bar, where he began preparing the inn for opening time.
“Hello, Fred,” Maisie called out, turning toward the bar.
Fred’s hobnail boots clattered on the stone floor as he came along to the bar in the residents’ sitting room.
“Morning, Miss Dobbs. You don’t look any the worse for wear. I hope we didn’t keep you awake with our clearing up out there.”
Maisie dabbed the corners of her mouth with a table napkin and shook her head. “That hot bath worked wonders. I slept like a log as soon as my head hit the pillow.” She paused. “How bad is the damage?”
“Not as bad as it would have been if you hadn’t raised the alarm. I won’t be charging you for your stay here, on account of that.”
She was about to shake her head and protest, then reconsidered. The innkeeper wished to thank her in a tangible way, and this was likely his only means of doing so. It would be foolish to decline the offer. “Thank you, Fred, that’s very kind of you.”
“Not at all.” He remained at the bar, wiping a cloth from left to right across varnished oak that centuries of beeswax polish had brought to a rich hazelnut-hued shine.
“Don’t mind me saying so,” said Maisie, as she reached for the teapot, “but even if they are accidents, you seem pretty unfortunate in Heronsdene when it comes to fires. Didn’t you say that Mr. and Mrs. Smith’s conservatory was destroyed last year?”
The innkeeper shrugged. “Whyte. It was the Whytes,” he replied, as if looking into the flames once more. “And it was their summer house.” He looked up again, shaking the memory from his mind. “I wasn’t aware that we had more accidents here than anywhere else, and I didn’t know it was anything to talk about.”
Maisie shrugged. “I know there’s been at least one fire for each of the last ten years or so.” She lifted her teacup to her lips and let it remain there without sipping from the rim as she continued. “And always at this time of year.”
Fred rested his hands on the bar and shook his head. “I wouldn’t mind betting them Londoners—or the gypsies—have been up to some mischief over the years. I don’t allow the gyppos to come in here, shady buggers if you ask me. We let the Londoners in, but I don’t know—they’re just as bad, looking for trouble.” He paused, then continued running the cloth across the bar. “The truth is, no matter how much I don’t like them, this fire was down to me, and like I’ve said before the other fires have been on account of carelessness. It’s not as if there have been that many, not when you look at it, and certainly not every year, like you said.”
Maisie pushed back her chair and stood up. “I’d better get going now, or I’ll be late.” She walked to the bar. “Are you sure I can’t pay for last night?”