“That’s an extraordinary story, Mrs. Pendle. Who would believe such a thing?” Maisie leaned forward too, allowing the impression of being drawn into the tale. “And you never reported the blaze? Not even to your landlord?”
The woman waved her hand. “No, no point. We sorted it all out ourselves and made repairs. Good as new in next to no time. We all help each other in Heronsdene, you can depend on that. People came. It’s not as if the fire got out of hand and hurt anyone.”
“Well, I’m glad the whole house didn’t go up.” Maisie paused. “Can you tell me about the night of the Zeppelin raid, Mrs. Pendle?”
The woman sat back. “Whatever do you want to know about that for?”
“Oh, not for the sale of the estate. No, I heard about it from the smithy and became interested. I understand it took a whole family—the Martins. Dutch, weren’t they? You must have all been terrified when it happened.”
Mrs. Pendle had rested her hands in her lap and now she wrung them together, her fingernails grazing paper-thin flesh and swollen veins. “Terrible thing, it was. Not that I ever knew they were Dutch beforehand, though I knew they came from somewhere over there.” She faltered, leaning forward again. “The airship came over just a day after we found out about the boys, you see.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, half the men and boys in the village had joined up together and were with the West Kents, and we lost them in 1916. The Somme, it was. Then, just one day—or it might’ve been two; it all runs together now, when I think back—before the raid, six or seven more families had word that their sons were gone, killed in action. Brought it all back, you know, to those still mourning. It was like they went all at once, us all being so close.” She looked up at Maisie. “We’re not a big town, just a small village, and look at how many we lost, boys and men born here, who worked here and would have died here, at home. Men who had families or sweethearts, boys you’d’ve seen grow into men, who would’ve had families of their own. Instead they were dead, in France, killed by them Germans.”
Maisie began to speak again, but the woman went on.
“I mean, it must have been the same, over there in Germany—I know that now, don’t I? But then, all I could think about—all anyone could think about—was how our village had lost so many. And then, to add insult to injury, along comes that Zeppelin.”
“It must have been dreadful for you all. Especially to see the Martin family killed.”
The woman picked at a loose thread in the arm of the chair. “Yes, well, it was very sad, yes.”
“And their boy gone too.”
She nodded, her face flushed.
“Did you lose a son, Mrs. Pendle?”
She nodded again. “That’s why I can’t tell you much about the Zeppelin raid. We still couldn’t believe our Sam had gone. His brother was at home, wounded, when we heard, and our daughter was working at the hospital in Maidstone. I can’t say as I remember as much as some might be able to.”
Maisie nodded. “Thank you, Mrs. Pendle, you’ve been very kind to answer my questions.”
“Yes, well . . .“ She glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece and stood up. “I’d better get on. No peace for the wicked, eh?”
Maisie stood up and moved toward the door. “The people here must have been very angry when the Zeppelin went over.”
“Oh, yes, we were angry alright. But it’s sometimes like that, isn’t it? Instead of feeling heartache, all you are is filled with temper.”
MAISIE MOVED ON to the next house on her list, on the opposite side of the street to the smithy. A man recently widowed lived at the cottage, which was another example of medieval architecture, with low beams and a thatched roof. Once again, the door was opened following the first knock, and Maisie explained why she was calling. This time she was led into a small kitchen not unlike her father’s. A black cast-iron stove was set into an inglenook fireplace, beside which a threadbare armchair with several worn cushions—to make up for a sagging seat—provided a convenient resting place for an ample cat with a neck as wide as its girth. The cat looked up at Maisie, yawned to reveal every needle-like tooth in its head, and went back to sleep.
“Better not disturb Mildred there. You wouldn’t want to sit on that chair, on account of the hair, and she’d only want up on your lap anyway.”
Instead, the man, George Chambers, pulled out two wooden chairs from a pine block of a table that was bowed in the middle from decades of use, dusted off the seat of one chair with the palm of his hand, and beckoned Maisie to sit down.
“Now then, what do you want to know from me? I can’t see as an old fella like myself can be of any use to one of those concerns in the city bent on buying from his nibs over at the estate.”
Maisie smiled. She liked Mr. Chambers, though she suspected he knew—probably the whole village knew by now—that she would come to see him. But though she understood that no one person would ever tell her the whole truth, if at each house she came away with one small nugget of information, it would help her color the story that had already been outlined, in her mind and on her case map.
“Mr. Chambers, would you be so kind as to tell me about the fire you had here, about five years ago?”
“Fire?”
“Yes, I understand a fire broke out in your living room under suspicious circumstances, yet you did not inform the police.”
“Suspicious circumstances? Where did you hear that?” His laugh was phlegm-filled, as if something were caught in his chest. Maisie thought he would be well advised to spend fewer hours sitting beside a stove fueled by anthracite. “We got it so quick, it wasn’t worth even calling out the fire brigade—I daresay you know by now that the nearest is in Paddock Wood.”
“So what started the fire?”
“Boys. Always the same. The little blighters start collecting or making fireworks about now, in time for Guy Fawkes night.”
“But that’s not until November fifth.”
“That it might be, but those nippers think ahead when it comes to Bonfire Night.”
“And you think they—what? Threw a banger or a Catherine wheel through the window?”
“That’s about the sum of it, miss.”
“I have to say, Mr. Chambers, that you seem rather sanguine about it. Why, where I grew up you would have had your hide tanned for such antics and been called upon by the constabulary.”
He shook his head. “Oh, no, not for a bit of high jinks. And the neighbors came quickly, and everyone helped put it right.”
“And you never caught the children responsible?”
The man shook his head. “Per’aps we were a bit soft on them, but that’s how we’ve come to be here, us who lost our sons in the war. My wife passed on last year and was glad to go, to be with her boys—neither of them came back, you know.”
“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Chambers.” Maisie paused. “I was a nurse in France.”
“Then you know, don’t you. You know.”
“Yes. I know.”
The man’s eyes grew moist, and he pulled a soiled handkerchief from the pocket of his corduroy trousers.
“I’ve heard from some of your neighbors about the Zeppelin raid. Can you tell me about it?”
He blew his nose, sniffed, and inspected the contents of his handkerchief before crumpling it again and returning it to his pocket. “I reckon it was either going toward London, and for some reason had to turn back and so dumped its bomb here, or it was on its way out of London, hadn’t found the target it wanted, saw a light—even though we had the blackout—and then dropped it.”
“And it happened just after some of you had received word that your boys had been killed in France?”