“And there are many women wanting for jobs too, Billy, a good number of them widows from the war with children to feed.”
“I tell you, Miss. What kind of a country are we livin’ in, eh? Where there’s people feelin’ pain in their bellies where food should be, and widows left wantin’—and little children dyin’ for need of the hospital.”
Maisie saw Billy’s anger and pain from his daughter’s death rising again, along with his dissatisfaction with his lot. The grass is always greener, Billy. She was about to speak when he began again.
“And as for them down there, where did they all come from, anyway? They certainly ain’t from this country, and there they are, picking fruit and ’ops what we—we who come from ’ere—want to be picking.”
“I’m sure the people of Kent feel the same about Londoners, Billy.”
“Hmmph!” He looked down at his work again, without commenting.
“Well, I have to return to London tomorrow morning. I’m following some leads, Billy, so don’t lose heart.” She made to leave, then reached out to her assistant, placing her hand on his shoulder. “And don’t harden your heart, either, Billy. That heart is the finest part of you.”
IT WAS AS she left the hop-garden that Maisie reached for her old nurse’s watch. She usually pinned it to her jacket, and when she did not feel the cool silver at her touch, she realized it wasn’t there. She gasped. How could she not have noticed it missing? The watch had been a parting gift from her patroness, Lady Rowan Compton, before she left for nursing service on the battlefields of France in 1916. It had needed repair only once. She thought of it as her talisman, for it had remained with her even when she was wounded, when the casualty clearing station in which she was working was shelled. Simon was caught by the same shell, though his wounds had taken his mind, whereas hers had seared a welt into her scalp and a deeper scar into her soul.
She began to retrace her steps, walking an exact path back through the farm, searching around the area where she had parked the MG, and then, with a certain reticence, she picked her way across the waste ground again. Nothing.
Returning to the inn, Maisie entered via the residents’ door in time to hear raised voices in the public bar.
“Are you refusing to serve me?”
Maisie recognized the voice straightaway. It was Sandermere.
“I was just saying that you might have had a bit too much, that’s all. Now, if you’d like to take a seat, we’ll bring you a nice cup of tea.”
“I do not want a nice cup of tea, I want a double whisky. Either pour me my drink or I will come over there and get it.”
“Now, Mr. Sandermere—”
“Don’t ’now Mr. Sandermere’ me, you worm.” The man’s voice was thick, his language slurred. “I own this whole damn place, and I shall do as I please.” At the last word, there was the sound of breaking glass as a whisky tot hit the wall. “Now, get me my drink—and Whyte here will pay for it!”
She heard the drink being poured, then a few seconds elapsed, during which, she guessed, he had drunk the alcohol straight back. He cracked the glass down on the bar and left, saying, “That’s better. We’ve all got to stick together here in Heronsdene, in our loving little community, haven’t we? I’ll see myself out the back way—I’ll have a look at the remains of your sheds on the way.”
Maisie allowed a moment to pass, then went to the door, which she opened and shut again, before calling, “Hello! Anyone there?”
Fred came to the bar in the residents’ sitting room and greeted Maisie with cheer, though he seemed quite shaken, with ashen skin and trembling hands. His jaw was set, and his eyes were reddened.
“Ah, Miss Dobbs, I know exactly why you’re here.” He reached under the bar and brought out her watch.
“Oh, wonderful! I don’t know where I would be without that. I am so glad you found it.”
“It was where you left it, miss, on the side table in your room. Mary came down as soon as she found it, saying it looked important, not your ordinary watch.” His eyes met hers. “Been through a lot, has that, judging by the date on the back.”
Maisie nodded and reached for the watch, which she began to pin to her lapel. “Yes. It’s been with me since I was a nurse in France. I was at a casualty clearing station.”
“You saw enough, then.”
“Yes, I saw more than I want to see ever again.” She paused. “Bit like living through your Zeppelin raid for twenty-four hours each day.”
He sighed and shook his head.
“Are you alright, Fred?”
“Just thinking.” Another sigh, then he looked up at her. “How do you feel now? You know, about them—the Germans.”
Maisie paused. “We treated many of them in the clearing station. In fact, we had two German doctors working alongside us—prisoners of war. Doctors who were captured always went to work straightaway, just as our Allied doctors who were POWs went to work for the Germans.” She shrugged. “If your calling is to save life, it takes precedence over killing.” Another pause. “But here’s what I saw, Fred. I saw wounded soldiers who cried for their loved ones, wherever they were from. I held the hands of dying young men, whether they were British, Allies, or German. It’s war itself that I have an opinion about, not the origin of those who fight.”
“Even now, even with some of the business we’re hearing about, you know, going on over there? There’s them as says we’ll be at war again before this decade’s out.”
“Perhaps not if it were down to the ordinary people, Fred.” Maisie smiled. “Now then, I must be on my way. I have to go into Maidstone again today.”
“Right you are, miss. I daresay we’ll see you again next week, like you said.”
MAISIE LEFT THE village with two more pieces to add to her puzzle. That Mr. and Mrs. Whyte had not left for the coast today but were very much ensconced in Heronsdene. Secondly, she now understood that Sandermere wielded some leverage, some coin of influence, in his relations with the villagers. Of course, in a feudal system—and many small villages still resonated with the echoes of times past—he would be very much the country squire. “He who must be obeyed” seemed an apt description, and Maisie had already deliberated upon his aura of entitlement, of ownership, when it came to the town. But she sensed something deeper, a mutual connection that went beyond an imagined master-servant relationship. She sensed that whisper of fear once again, a dependence, perhaps, on a shared truth.
AS SHE CAME to the outskirts of the village, she passed a woodland that had been newly coppiced, the trees thinned and pruned, with the younger branches and twigs bound together and leaning in stooks, waiting to be gathered by the farmer. It was there she saw Beulah, walking with the lurcher, the dog stepping with care in her wake, for the woman was making her way deliberately, step by step, where only days ago men had worked with saws and axes. In her hands she held a forked branch, each hand holding an end, with the fork in the middle. Maisie slowed the MG, knowing Beulah could not see her, though the lurcher looked up in her direction, then back at the heels of her mistress. As she watched, the fork dipped, and Beulah stopped, bent over to squint at the ground, and then reached down to brush fallen leaves aside. She picked up something, perhaps a threepenny-bit, possibly a lost trinket, which she rubbed on her skirt and scrutinized, holding it sideways to better catch the light. Then she put it in her pocket and began again, dowsing for coins lost when a handkerchief was taken out, or a small treasure dropped as a forester bent over to gather up twigs.
Maisie watched for a moment more, then pressed the motor car into gear again and drove on her way. So Beulah was a practitioner of the ancient art of dowsing. She should have guessed. It was a skill worth knowing about.