“You were a happy family,” said Maisie, encouraging him to continue.
He nodded. “We were. It was my fault that everything changed. Children can be harsh, Miss Dobbs. They can be hurtful. One of the boys at school had heard us speaking Dutch at home, and for some reason—I never understood why it began, it could have been because my reading was better than his—he started to tease me, and the teasing went on, and it got worse, until I didn’t have any friends at all. I was the whipping boy, the one who was always left out. The one who was bullied.”
“And your sister?”
“Ah, Anna was beautiful, so for her it was not too bad. And she tried to protect me, but as soon as she was twelve and matriculated, she left the school to help in the bakery. Then later on, I met him: Alfred Sandermere.”
“And he offered you friendship, but at a cost?”
“Yes. I was to be his cohort, the younger sergeant-at-arms who would get into mischief with him.”
“And the mischief grew more serious.”
He nodded, leaned forward, and rested his head in his hands.
“My father was so diminished by my behavior. He tried everything to help me but was lost, trying to deliver me from the path I’d chosen. I was not the man I am today. I was a boy who made a poor decision, a boy who wanted to be of some account, and Alfred gave me what I needed. He gave me friendship.”
“Then you were caught.”
“Yes.” Webb leaned back, his cheeks wet. He removed his hat and ran his fingers straight back through his hair. “We had committed a crime, a robbery—Alfred was a seasoned thief, but there were dogs, and we were discovered.”
“And you took the blame.”
“His father, the name, connections—you know, the magistrate who goes shooting on the estate—Alfred’s time in custody was over like that.” He snapped his fingers.
“But you were sent to the reformatory.”
“Yes.” He wiped the back of his hand across his eyes. “My father came whenever he could to visit. He brought me books, he brought me my old violin, which he had to take away again because they would not allow me to have it. He was ashamed of me, his son, but he never failed to visit. He blamed himself for what I had done.”
“When did you enlist?”
He sniffed, composing himself. “They came to me when I turned thirteen. They looked at all of us of a certain age. I was solid for my years. Working in the gardens and in building jobs at the reformatory had given me muscle. I could have been taken for nineteen, and that’s all they wanted, boys who would pass the medical and could be listed as fit for service.” He took another deep breath and blew it out through pursed lips. “I was told that enlisting would absolve me of my crime, that my record would be destroyed. I signed the necessary papers, and off I went. By the time I was fourteen, I was in France, in the trenches. I was a soldier, a fighting soldier. And there were others, other boys who passed as older. Some of them had enlisted with their fathers, some wanted to get away from home, and there were the boys like me who had been released from the reformatories or borstals.”
“Yes, I know.”
“I saw terrible things there.”
Maisie nodded.
“I saw things I never want to see again.”
She allowed a pause before speaking. “And you were listed as dead.”
“I didn’t know what I was listed as until I was sent home. I was in a shell hole, my mates shot or blown to pieces and gone, the rats crawling all over me. I was scared to put my head up, scared to do anything but cry—cry because I could, because it was the only thing left for me to do. Then, the next thing I knew, there was sky no more, so I looked up, and there were five big Germans leaning into the hole with bayonets fixed. Then one of them said, ’He’s a boy, a big boy They have sent boys to do the work of men.’” Webb turned to Maisie. “I also speak some German and some French, so I knew what was being said. I was taken prisoner. And because I thought they would kill me, I pulled off my tags and threw them in the hole, so that my father and mother might have word of me. I thought that even though there was no body—and that wasn’t unusual, the way men were blown up in the shelling—when my pals were found, they would know that I, too, was dead.”
“Yes. I understand.”
“I was released after the war and repatriated. Then came demobilization, and all I wanted to do was come straight home.” He gasped, a cry issuing from his lips, as if he might break down. “I walked from the station and came into the village before dawn, when people were still in their beds. I’d returned a man, not a boy, and though the war was written in the lines on my face, in years I was still a youth. I was proud of myself. I had a clean record. I could take on anyone who went for me, and I could turn away from Sandermere. I wanted to be my father’s son again, I wanted to see my family.”
They were silent for some moments, until the man, his voice breaking, began speaking again.
“I walked down this street—there was no memorial then, no division in the road to accommodate the list of fallen from the village. Most of the older boys who had made my life a misery were gone. Dead. I have seen others, though, seen them with their arms missing, in their wheelchairs, or with their faces scarred.” He shrugged. “Then I came to this place, expecting to walk through the front door to wake my family, expecting to be received with their love, but there was nothing. Nothing but the burned shell of a building that was gone, incinerated. I could not speak, could not think. My breath left my lungs. The only thing I could think to do was to go to my sister’s friend, to see Phyllis. I waited in the woods close to her house. I could not go in, could not trust myself to speak to anyone, could not even have mustered polite conversation with her father. I waited until they departed the house one by one, until I saw Phyllis, in her maid’s uniform, leave the house to walk up to the estate. And I stopped her.” He gave a half laugh. “She thought I was a ghost.”
“And she told you everything.”
“Yes, everything. And she told me who was involved. I knew I would never forget them.”
“How did you meet Beulah?”
“I told Phyllis not to say a word about seeing me. Then I ran. I ran, my kit bag across my shoulder, until I couldn’t run anymore. I half walked, half fell into the woods and collapsed. I have no memory of the days and nights that followed. I do not know what happened. When I awoke it was to the smell of broth and wood smoke. I was laid out in that clearing up on the hill. It was summertime, 1919, and they had come for the fruit-picking and the hop-picking.”
“And Beulah claimed you for her son.”
“Her real son had died as an infant and would have been about my age, so, yes, she took me for her son. And I was willing to be adopted, for I had no one, nothing except a need to make them pay.” He turned to Maisie. “You see, I understood revenge. And I understood that if that was what they had wanted—revenge—then the job was left half done, because I was still alive. Pim van Maarten was alive, and I wanted my pound of flesh, from them”—he pointed back toward the center of the village—“and from Alfred Sandermere, because my father, mother and sister would still be alive if it hadn’t been for him.”
“Yes, I know.” Maisie paused. “So you hounded the villagers with fires, each year, on the anniversary of your family’s death.”
“I surprised myself, you know. I thought I would be able to take the life of every one of them, make them feel what my family felt. But I must have seen too much killing in France. All I could do was scare them. I only caused damage to bricks and mortar.”
There was silence, broken when Maisie spoke again.
“Your father would have been proud of your mastery of the violin. You are a worthy successor—and you favor him, though not with the hair.”