9
SUDDENLY THERE WAS URGENCY. SMEDLEY RECALLED THAT THE NEXT bus was almost due, so the three of them ran. Jumpy and chattery, he waited at the bus stop with them until the bus arrived, a creaky old double-decker. Alice and Jones both found seats, but not together, so they had no chance to talk.
Alice was beside a verbose middle-aged lady with pronounced—loudly pronounced—opinions on the Germans, the war, prices, food shortages, the need for rationing, and many, many other topics. Letting this blizzard of complaint drift around her, Alice sat back and marveled at the sudden emergency that had disrupted her life.
She had met Julian Smedley four times previously, with a lapse of years between each encounter. He had always been one of Edward's closest friends at Fallow, and always more of a follower than a friend. It might be more accurate to say that Edward had always been Smedley's friend, for Edward was one of those people who had friendships thrust upon them. Her memories of Smedley were like photographs in an album. Weedy little boy on page one, then pimply adolescent, and now wounded hero on page five. Each memory was strangely different. He had been shy and owlish, yet mischievous and quietly witty. Moreover, as Ginger had pointed out on the train down, Julian Smedley had always possessed a gift for falling on his feet. When the cake was passed out, the largest piece would usually land on his plate, yet nobody ever disliked him.
Perhaps even a missing hand counted as a largish piece of cake in 1917. He had been buried alive by a shell burst and dug out in time. Now he was out of the war, which was what mattered. Ginger said he had medals galore, although she would never have marked Julian as a potential hero. Why had she made that stupid, stupid remark about them? Buried alive!
Shell-shocked or not, Julian Smedley had talked Jones and herself into this madness very slickly. She might lose her job over it, although jobs were no problem now. She might even go to jail, although that prospect was sufficiently improbable not to trouble her unduly. She was not the one in danger. If things went wrong, the police would want to know by what right she had taken a motorcar belonging to Sir D'Arcy Devers. The danger was scandal.
The bus groaned into Canterbury at five minutes to three, and there was a branch of the Midland Bank directly across the street. With a wave to Jones, she ran over to it and managed to cash a check just before it closed. Ready money might be useful.
After that she had a chance to talk with her fellow conspirator. They walked side by side to the station. He looked haggard and worried. Jones she had met only once before, and now suddenly they were plotting an illegal undertaking together. He seemed so much a typical, dull schoolmaster, a stolid rock, pitted and barnacled by wave after wave of untiring youth. He was obviously close to retirement, possibly due to having been put out to pasture before now had the war not intervened, a tweedy badger of a man. By no means cuddly, but unthinkable as a criminal.
"Have we both gone insane,” she asked him, “or are we merely bewitched?"
"You've been wondering that too, have you? I decided that it's something to do with the war. It's stripping away all our pretences, layer after layer."
"Pretences?"
"Our veneer of culture. Illusions. Everything we hid behind for so long. We see those young men who have gone out into hell to fight for a cause, and we realize that they now know something we don't. Life and youth seem infinitely more precious than they did three years ago. Many other things have become trivial and meaningless."
She considered that thought and decided it was more profound than it had sounded at first. He had an aching conscience, this Mr. Jones.
"I am extremely grateful to you, and—I confess—more than a little surprised that you would let yourself become involved in this for the sake of my cousin."
The schoolmaster cleared his throat. “Ahem! Your cousin is an admirable young man. I feel very sorry for his many misfortunes. But I should be less than honest were I not to admit that my primary interest is Julian Smedley."
"He has severe emotional problems,” she said warily.
"He has been horribly damaged, both physically and mentally. We old men who have stayed home and sent the young to fight for us—we do have certain obligations. At least I feel that way. And you cannot conceive the difference between the Smedley you met today and the one I saw last Sunday."
She remembered the tears. “Better?"
"Infinitely better. His efforts to aid his old friend are working a miracle cure on our young hero."
So that was why he had let Smedley talk him into this! What would Smedley think if he knew that? That reasoning would not sound convincing in the witness box at the Old Bailey. How would Smedley react if they failed?
"I wish he were not coming!” she said. “If he would just set off the alarm and then stay with the other inmates, then no harm could come to him.” But they had both argued that case, and Smedley had insisted.
"I am sure he has his reasons. We must show him that we trust him. It is the best treatment he could get."
"Your sentiments do you honor,” she murmured. “Have you ever had children of your own, Mr. Jones?"
He laughed feebly. “A highly improper question to put to a lifelong bachelor! I suppose I could be platitudinous and say I have had hundreds of sons, but that would not be true. Perhaps twenty-five, a little less than one a year. I always hoped that a year would bring forth at least one. Sometimes it did, sometimes it didn't. Rarely two. Two of them are involved in this."
She squeezed his arm. “I hope they appreciate you."
"Perhaps they will one day. Not now."
They turned into the station. It was ominously crowded.
"They are sending all the engines to France, you know,” Jones complained. “And some of the rails, too! Let us go look at the board."
According to the board, there was a train in fifteen minutes. The waiting room was packed to the doors. By mutual consent, they wandered along the platform together, taking the chance to talk.
"May I inquire about this automobile, Miss Prescott?"
It was a very fair question.
"I told you I have the key. Its owner would certainly not object to my using it. He has let me drive it before."
"And why do you think it has petrol available? Why do you believe it to be in operating condition?"
Alice sighed and decided that there had better be honor among thieves. “His wife is a woman with a great deal of influence."
She glanced sideways at her companion, expecting to see a bristling of shock. But Jones had a trick of using his pince-nez to mask his eyes, and his face gave away nothing.
"Does she know you have the key?"
"She does not know I exist. I am certain of that. You know it's illegal now to employ men between the ages of eighteen and sixty-one in nonessential industries, and yet she still has a chauffeur. What strings she pulls I cannot imagine, but she does. Admittedly she is not in good health, but I feel that morally Captain Smedley has a greater claim on the vehicle tonight than she does."
Jones uttered his quiet chuckle again. “Learned counsel would hesitate to present such an argument in court. And what happens if we are caught and the lady finds out?"
Alice winced. “She will not lay charges, I am sure. It would cause tongues to wag."
That was not true at all. Lady Devers would trumpet it to the four corners of the earth. She was a vindictive, malicious bitch. Alice would not tell Mr. Jones that. He was more shocked by bad language than he was by confessions of adultery.
A porter began shouting, “London train!” and they had no further chance for private conversation.