Murder Most Fair

by Anna Lee Huber

  “What?!”

  I quailed at the fury in his voice, but the word finally popped from my mouth. “Rob.”

  He stared down at me for a moment as if he couldn’t believe what I’d said. “Rob’s been dead for over four years now.”

  I pressed my hands to my ears and closed my eyes, unable to face his words, his disdain. But I could still hear him.

  “For God’s sake, Ver, you haven’t fallen off your rocker. You know that.”

  There was too much sorrow inside me, too much pain—for a moment I thought I might burst. “Yes, I know that. But I don’t want to know that,” I screamed back at him, hating him for making me say it.

  He stared at me as if I had gone a bit rocky upstairs, and I flinched away, wishing I hadn’t spoken, furious that he’d forced me.

  “Pip, have you honestly been pretending all these years that Rob is still here?” He asked in a slightly calmer voice. “That if you didn’t come here to see with your own two eyes that he’s gone, that you could go on believing so?”

  When he phrased it like that, it sounded incredibly foolish, but the alternative . . . the alternative had been too much to bear. It still seemed like it might be.

  “What is going on in here?” my mother suddenly demanded to know, striding into the room.

  I sniffed, swiping at my tear-stained cheeks before I dared turn to face her.

  “All this shouting and carrying on like a couple of fishwives.” She turned to glare over her shoulder. “And half the household standing outside the door listening.”

  At this, the audience in the entry hall scattered. All except Sidney, who watched me with worried eyes.

  “I will not have my children behaving like this. We will be receiving callers soon, and I will not have them arrive to the sound of your caterwauling. Whatever your squabble, you will discuss it like civilized adults.” Mother’s stern gaze shifted from Freddy to me, scrutinizing my features. “Verity, go wash your face. Freddy, I need to speak with you about Fräulein Bauer’s funeral.”

  “Yes, Mother,” he replied dutifully as she turned to leave.

  I kept my gaze lowered, too ashamed to look at him as I passed by. But he surprised me by reaching out to touch my elbow, momentarily halting me. I glanced at him sideways, finding his expression far more forgiving than I’d expected. His brow was still lowered, holding on to his anger, but his hazel eyes were soft with a compassion I was certain I didn’t deserve.

  I allowed Sidney to pull my arm through his, but rather than turning my steps toward the stairs as he intended, I towed him in the direction of the servants’ quarters. I swiped my fingers under my eyes, dashing away any lingering wetness as I firmed my resolve. “We need to search Bauer’s affects.”

  Nothing was going to make me feel better about Rob. Nothing was going to ease this ache. But Bauer’s murder was different. That was a problem I could tackle, a wrong I could do something to right. And if I was lucky, it would distract me from the rest.

  CHAPTER 25

  Mrs. Grainger, the housekeeper, was able to direct us to the tiny room Bauer had been given to use. Barely larger than a closet, it contained a bed and a small bureau, and enjoyed only the dim light that could filter through one tiny window. Three hooks hung on one wall, and a cross on the other. Tucked up under the eaves as it was, she would have had to be careful not to hit her head on the ceiling when she sat up in bed. But she would have had privacy—a choice commodity among servants. Though, sadly, in this instance, I suspected it was also a reminder that none of the English staff had wished to share a room with her.

  I wasn’t certain why we hadn’t searched Bauer’s effects yet. It seemed obvious now, but truthfully it had never even occurred to me. I had seen how small her valise was, how little she owned. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t something among those things that couldn’t yield some sort of clue. Of course, thanks to her ramblings to Tim, I now also had a much better idea what to look for.

  Once Mrs. Grainger’s footsteps had receded down the hall, leaving us alone in the small room, I slid open the top bureau drawer to rummage through the contents. I was met with the clean scent of soap and crushed lavender, and I soon discovered she’d stored several stalks with her garments.

  “In the billiards room, you said you’d figured out who Fräulein Bauer was,” Sidney reminded me.

  “It was pressing on my memory almost from the moment Tim started telling us what she’d told him about her family. But it wasn’t until he mentioned that her father called her mother ‘his snow fairy’ that I made the connection.” I turned to look at him. “That’s what Becker called his wife.”

  He frowned. “Becker? Wait. You mean the deserter you helped over the border into Germany?”

  “Yes. Heinrich Becker was from Berlin.” I began ticking the items off on my fingers. “He had two daughters and a son. And his term of endearment for his wife was ‘his snow fairy.’ I cannot believe it’s a coincidence that Bauer’s family was the same. Not when she supposedly had to travel four hundred miles away from home to find a position, and it just happened to be with Tante Ilse.”

  “She was looking for her father,” Sidney deduced.

  “That’s what I think, too. After all, Captain Landau told me Becker had succeeded at his first mission. Landau didn’t know whether he’d visited his family while he was in Germany, but I’m willing to wager he did. If you were in his situation, wouldn’t you?”

  I didn’t wait for Sidney’s reply, instead turning back to my search of the top drawer, which seemed to be filled with nothing but a few undergarments. I closed it and opened the second drawer.

  “We have no way of knowing what exactly Becker told his family, but it’s not inconceivable that he revealed some of what he was doing. Perhaps he even told them about my great-aunt in Monschau.” My hands stilled for a moment as I contemplated the precariousness of his having done so, and how little I liked the idea that he had put Tante Ilse at such risk when she’d helped him. “Whatever the case, he then returned to Holland to report to Landau. But when he was sent back into Germany on a second mission, he disappeared. I privately hoped that meant he’d simply returned to his family with the money given to him. At least, that was better than the alternative—that he was captured and killed. But if Bauer is, in fact, his daughter, and he didn’t return to them, then that must mean something unfortunate happened.”

  I glanced over my shoulder. “Search the garments on those hooks,” I ordered as my hands stumbled upon something more solid in the drawer filled with serviceable skirts. Pulling it from beneath the fabric, I discovered it was a worn leather journal of some kind, penned in German. The first page proclaimed it belonged to someone with the initials ALB, but that was of no help since Bauer had been clever enough to choose a surname that began with the same initial.

  Skimming through the pages, I found the usual ramblings of an adolescent girl’s private thoughts interspersed with lists, some of which were self-explanatory, while others were not. The first entries were dated before the war, and then as the war progressed, the span between writings seemed to increase. Thirty or so pages into the journal, for whatever reason a large hunk of pages had been ripped out, leaving nothing but their worn edges where they’d clung to the binding.

  After that, the content changed. Here were various notes, likely gleaned from her father. Words like Frau Vischering/ Vissering(?) in house at edge of woods to northwest of Monschau—German or British person pretending? Helene—British, spy, young, auburn hair. As well as my code name and description, she’d listed Landau’s and the passeur who had helped me and Becker over the border between Holland and Belgium. And then her questions began. Last seen? Who betrayed? Why?

  I was frankly surprised by the depth of information she possessed. Her father must have shared nearly every identifying feature he’d collected, though I was uncertain to what avail. Plainly he hadn’t trusted us. Not completely. In his shoes, I wouldn’t have either. But what had he expecte
d his daughter to be able to do about it?

  Whatever his reasons, this seemed to be confirmation of my suspicions. Fräulein Bauer was, indeed, Becker’s daughter. And Sidney turned to pass me another piece of evidence that corroborated it.

  He had fallen silent as I scrutinized the journal, but now his deep voice broke into my thoughts. “Look at this.”

  A label had been sewn inside the sleeve of the maid’s dark woolen coat that read “Becker.” It was likely the best coat she or her mother had owned, and she had been loath to part with it.

  “Then it is her,” I stated with finality, handing the garment back to him.

  “It certainly appears so,” Sidney agreed, hanging the coat beside the other clothing. “But then, why didn’t she simply tell your great-aunt who she was? If she was searching for her father, wouldn’t that be the easiest way to gain information. Why this charade?”

  “I think I can answer that.” I passed him the journal, opened to the page with my great-aunt’s name.

  His gaze flitted over it, taking it all in.

  “If she’d believed her father was betrayed, then she would be wary of trusting Tante Ilse,” I said.

  He flipped through several more pages of the journal, filled with additional notes. Notes that made clear her suspicions about me. She’d evidently deduced that Helene was a member of Tante Ilse’s family long before they’d come to England. And her growing suspicions about me were evident in the flowing script.

  “Clearly, she was an amateur,” he stated, brandishing the journal.

  “Yes,” I agreed. Sidney well knew my aversion to putting any intelligence in writing. No experienced agent would have dared keep such an incriminating piece of evidence. It was far safer to store such facts in your brain unless or until it became absolutely necessary to transpose them to paper.

  “She even went so far as to blab it all to Tim.”

  A move that many of my male colleagues would have classified as typical of female spies, and evidence of why we couldn’t be trusted as intelligence agents. However, the women in the service I knew were far from fools, and I was quite certain they were no guiltier than men of falling prey to the illusion of safety that intimacy inspired. Perhaps less so, as we were often confronted with such prejudice, and so were on our guard against it.

  But even though Bauer had not been in the service, as a woman I felt the urge to defend her.

  “She hardly gave herself up,” I countered. “After all, she didn’t offer any real identifying figures. She almost certainly didn’t know her father had shared the story with me about how he came to call his wife his snow fairy.” I took the journal back from him, gazing down at her fluid handwriting. “Besides, she could safely assume Tim didn’t know her father, had never even heard of him. And I imagine it got rather lonely never being able to speak of her family, to actively remember them.” I stifled a pang of empathy for her. “Even the best of agents are caught out by such miscalculations and assumptions, believing a small piece of information is untraceable or the man you’re speaking to isn’t really listening but purely pretending to as he dozes off.” I couldn’t resist turning a pointed glare on Sidney as I uttered this last statement.

  He arched his eyebrows. “Is that supposed to be an indictment of all men or just me?”

  “Merely an observation,” I replied crisply as I closed the journal with a snap. “But now that we know Fräulein Bauer was Fräulein Becker, the question is, What was she intending to do? Was she planning to confront me? Blackmail me even? Is that why she asked me to meet her at that field barn?”

  “If that’s the case, then do we still think the straw-haired German fellow she’s been seen speaking to is someone seeking help?”

  “Honestly, I don’t know what to think,” I admitted in exasperation. Was he the second deserter? Was he the man from Monschau that Bauer had told Tante Ilse was following her? Or was he simply a German searching for work? Perhaps even a prisoner of war who had been released, but never made his way back to Germany.

  I shook my head, still not understanding how all the pieces of the puzzle fit together. “Whoever he is, we still need to find him. That’s our best bet for getting answers.”

  “Then let’s hope he hasn’t gone far.”

  But that wasn’t to be the end of our concern for the mystery man that day. The family had all gathered in the drawing room following dinner, when there was a knock at the front door.

  It had been a long day and a tedious afternoon. Mother had elected not to make her usual round of Monday afternoon calls, correctly deducing that instead people would come to her. Or at least, the women of Hawes and the neighboring villages. As a female member of the family, I had been obliged to sit through these calls with Mother and Grace, as well as Rachel and Tante Ilse, who were present for at least part of the afternoon.

  I’d expected to glean some sort of useful information from these visits, but people had come to gossip and ask questions, not to answer them. So I spent most of the time discussing my life in London and my dashing husband, while hopelessly trying to turn the discussion back to Bauer and dodging Rachel’s icy glares.

  Exhausted from the effort, I’d considered retiring early, but Tante Ilse had expressed an eagerness to play bridge, and I had agreed to be their fourth. Tim was just dealing out the cards when the knock on the door came. I turned from my seat at the table, curious if anyone had been expecting a late caller, but everyone seemed to sport varying looks of perplexity. All but Freddy and Rachel, that is, who seemed resigned to the fact it must be for him. I supposed life as a country doctor meant he was called from home at all hours of the day.

  However, when the door to the drawing room opened and Violet Capshaw came bustling inside, still bundled from the cold, it became clear this was not the case. For if either of the Capshaws had required a doctor, they would have telephoned or sent a servant to fetch Freddy.

  “Violet,” I exclaimed, rising to my feet.

  “So sorry to barge in on you like this,” she gasped, seeming slightly out of breath.

  “My dear, please sit down,” Mother coaxed, guiding her toward the sofa nearest the door. “Whatever is the matter? Is it your father?”

  “No, it’s not that.” Violet perched on the edge of the cushion. “Though I did scold him soundly for tramping about in the cold with his rheumatism. And he’s likely to be a perfect beast because of it tomorrow.”

  “Then, what has you so flustered?” Mother pressed, offering her the sherry cordial Father had poured.

  “No, thank you.” She pressed a hand to her chest, as if to still her heart. “I’m terribly sorry. I’m not explaining myself well.” Her gaze lifted to seek mine out. “I understand you were at the inquest earlier today, but I take it you left early?”

  “Yes,” I replied, glancing at Sidney, Father, and Freddy in turn. “We all did.”

  Her mouth twisted grimly. “Well, it might have been better had you stayed. Apparently, the men got themselves worked up over the possibility there’s a murdering German prowling our streets. The things Father was spouting when he returned home . . .” Her cheeks flushed and she shook her head. “They’re not worth repeating. But at any rate, they weren’t just muttering threats. They actually set out to comb the countryside, looking for the fellow, determined to find him and . . . do who knows what to him.”

  I looked toward Tante Ilse, whose face had turned ghastly pale. I was not the only one to notice. Freddy sat forward in his seat, almost as if he meant to go to her, and I found myself wondering if it was merely the shock or something else he knew about her health that concerned him.

  Violet gave a little gasp, seeming to have forgotten she would be present. “Oh, Mrs. Vischering, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean . . .”

  But Mother cut her off kindly, patting her knee. “It’s all right, dear. This isn’t your doing.” Then she pushed to her feet. “But I don’t think we all need to be present for this. Grace, come with me and Tante Ilse to the parl
or,” she urged as she coaxed Tante Ilse to her feet. “You can play that minuet for her I heard you practicing earlier.”

  Grace appeared as if she wanted to object, but she rose to her feet to dutifully follow.

  Mother’s gaze cut to mine, her lips tightening, but she didn’t attempt to remove me. And then she was too preoccupied with supporting Tante Ilse’s shuffling steps. I darted another look at Freddy before focusing on Violet’s next words.

  “I’m sorry,” Violet tried again to apologize as soon as the door shut behind them. “I should have thought.”

  I sat in the space vacated by my mother, clasping Violet’s hands between my own. “No more of that. Mother is right. This isn’t your doing. Now, go on.”

  She swallowed and nodded, trying to regather her thoughts.

  “I take it your father joined them in their search,” I prompted. “That’s why you’re so cross with him.”

  “Yes, he was gone all day, making me fret something awful. I was on the verge of telephoning the police when he returned home exhausted about an hour ago. After hearing all his talk, I settled him as quickly as I could and came to tell you.” Her eyes passed over the faces in the room as the notes of Grace’s minuet penetrated dimly through the wall from the next room. “I doubted any of the Townsend men or Mr. Kent would have taken part in such a farce.”

  “Do you know if they called the search off for the night or are they still at it?” Father asked.

  “I . . . I believe they halted for the night, but plan to resume tomorrow.” Her eyes darted to my face. “But you should know, from what I could gather, Isaac Hardcastle was one of the ringleaders.”

  “Isaac?” I queried in shock.

  She nodded. “He’s been rather vocal in his feelings about Germans in the past few years. He put forth a few measures with the parish council, statutes that would make it illegal for villagers to hire Germans or recent immigrants of German origin and whatnot, but the rest of the council felt such measures weren’t necessary. After all, it’s not as if Hawes was expected to receive an influx of foreigners.”