Murder Most Fair

by Anna Lee Huber

  A lump formed in my throat, grateful he, at least, had recognized that.

  “But your mother is hurting, Verity. She thinks you don’t care about her, about Rob, about any of us. And nothing anyone else says will convince her otherwise.” He adjusted the flat cap on his head, narrowing his eyes to see into the distance. “I know she’s always been particularly hard on you, but it’s simply her way.” He chuffed. “To hear tell, she thinks she’s been too soft on you, considering how strict her own mother was. But all the same, it’s only because she wants to see you safe and settled. Unfortunately, it’s her lot in life to have a daughter who thrives in the chaos she most hates.”

  I could tell the last was said mostly in teasing, but it was also the harsh truth. Mother had always craved order and constancy, while I had sought—not so much chaos, but adventure and excitement, and the thrill of trying new things. Even at a young age. When exasperated with me, Mother liked to tell the story of how at the age of two I’d toddled off from the churchyard while she was helping to decorate for Easter Sunday. Our nanny had been ill, and so she’d taken me with her. Once she’d realized I was gone, she’d spent half an hour frantically searching for me, only to find me happily climbing up and down the barstools in the Crown.

  “Talk to her, aye?” he urged.

  I nodded.

  “And, Ver, I know it’s painful. I know you don’t want to do it. But I also know one of the reasons you came here was to finally face what you’ve been afraid to.” He tipped his head, fixing me with a gently reproving look. “So get on with it. Stop dragging your feet, lass. Waiting any longer will not make it better. But it will certainly make you crosser, and everyone else in the family as well.”

  I choked down the lump that had settled at the back of my throat, unable to argue with that even though I wanted to.

  His gaze flicked toward the house and back. “Tante Ilse told you about her cancer.”

  “Yes,” I whispered in a broken voice.

  His stalwart frame seemed to sag with weariness. “Then you have that to confront as well.” He nodded toward the woods. “So go on.” His eyes dipped to the dog, sitting at my side. “Take Tabitha with you, if you wish.” He reached up to press the back of his hand against my cheek. “But go make what peace you can.”

  With that order, I turned my steps toward the woods, trudging forward on feet of lead. I didn’t turn to look back, but I knew Father was standing there watching me, perhaps knowing I would turn chickenhearted if he did not.

  As my footsteps broke through the unblemished snow, trailing off into the trees, they became lighter. As if the momentum alone was enough to carry me onward. Rather than gamboling ahead like normal, Tabitha remained faithfully by my side, as if she sensed my turmoil. We wound our way through the oaks, rowan, and downy birch to the treehouse deep in the copse.

  At its base, I paused to look up, trying to remember the last time I’d been inside, but I’d not marked the occasion. It must have been during that final summer before the war, but I hadn’t spent as much time up there as usual that year, being too wrapped up in Sidney and his courtship.

  What had Rob thought of all that? After all, he hadn’t only been my brother, but my oldest and dearest friend? It was true that Tim and I were closer in age by a few months, but Rob had been the brother I’d most related to and relied on. He’d been the peacemaker between me and Freddy, between all of us, really. Had he felt abandoned by my absorption in Sidney? He hadn’t seemed upset, but then I’d been too blinded by my own giddiness to notice.

  The wood appeared warped and faded, overgrown with moss and riddled with gouges, but it still looked stable. I reached up to tug on the boards hammered into the trunk of the tree, and finding them sturdy enough, hitched up my skirts, and began to climb. It wasn’t high off the ground. Even if I fell, I would only twist an ankle or bruise my backside. But still I tested each rung before pulling myself upward.

  Tabitha sat obediently at the base of the tree. When I reached the top and gave a mighty shove to open the door fashioned into the floor, she barked at the thwack of it hitting the boards on the other side. The hinges had creaked with age and disuse, but they’d held.

  Cautiously peering inside, I noted that a corner of the roof had been damaged by a falling branch, letting even more light filter inside than the two small windows allowed. Spiderwebs draped the darkened corners, but I trusted the cold had either killed or driven the leggy weavers to warmer locales. Rotting piles of leaves had drifted to the edges of the space, giving the treehouse a damp, moldy odor.

  Climbing the two remaining rungs, I sat on the edge of the floor with my legs dangling through the door, tentatively testing the wood. It seemed solid, but I decided it would be best not to press my luck, sliding backward a few feet along where the sturdy junction of the two tree limbs rested, bracing the floor beneath me. Pulling my knees up to my chest, I cradled my chin in the well formed between them. Then I closed my eyes and exhaled a long breath, releasing the shaky grip I held on my emotions.

  When nothing happened, I sat dumbfounded. I’m not sure precisely what I’d expected to happen, but it was more akin to a dam breaking and torrents of water coming rushing out than this numbing sense of disbelief. It was like believing an angry mob was battering at your door, fighting to get in, only to open it and find there was no one there except a squirrel.

  I lifted my chin to look around me, worried that this was all there was. This hollow emptiness forever and ever. Then my gaze caught on something poking out of the leaves to my right, and I leaned over to pull it toward me.

  I wasn’t certain what it was at first. It was definitely wood, and it had been carved and smoothed by human hands, most likely Rob’s. But it seemed unfamiliar, until I recognized the distinctive long, thin shape and the wave-like design with the hole at the center for what it was. An aeroplane propeller. Likely from a model Rob had built.

  My hand tightened around the wood, feeling a surge of emotion at the knowledge that my brother had touched this, had sanded it, had taken such care with it. It felt almost as if it was an invisible tether somehow connecting him to me. And I knew, I suddenly knew to the core of me that Rob was never coming back. He was never striding through my parents’ door, or climbing the rungs to this treehouse, or wrapping me in the arms that it seemed had always been there to hold me. He was gone.

  The pain inside me first escaped with a whimper and then with a sob, and then I could only clutch my knees as I wept. I cried so hard that I felt my ribs would crack and my heart would break. They were the tears I would not let fall when I’d learned Rob had died. And Henry, and Daphne’s brother Gil, and cousin Thomas, and every friend and family member since. Including Sidney.

  Oh, Sidney. That he’d miraculously come back to me mattered, but it didn’t vanquish all the pain I’d suppressed at learning of his supposed death. It didn’t erase it like the flip of a switch. The fear and darkness was still mixed up in all the other grief I’d repressed.

  Then, as if conjured by my thoughts, he was there beside me, pulling me into his arms, holding me as I completely came apart. He didn’t speak. He seemed to know better than to try. He simply held me close.

  There was no going back. There was no returning to the way things were, the life and innocence that we’d had before. There was no returning to the people we were before. The only choice left to us was to shrivel up and die or to move bravely forward. To abandon hope or continue to clutch it to our hearts with all the might we possessed.

  It was a long time before my sobs began to subside. By then the woolen front of Sidney’s coat was soaked through, as well as his handkerchief. My face felt puffy, my eyes stung, my head pounded, and my ribs felt as if they’d been cracked. It was worse than the morning I’d lain battered and bruised, trying to rest in a Belgian farmer’s attic after taking a tumble into an unseen rocky ditch in the middle of the night and then having had to hike three more miles to reach the next safe house. Then I’d ached in body
, but now I also ached in spirit.

  Barely able to lift my arm, I fished around in the pocket of my coat to locate my own handkerchief, blowing and wiping my already-raw nose. Truth be told, all of me felt raw, like the outermost layer of my skin had been scraped off. Or perhaps it had been sloughed off, like a snake shedding its skin. Maybe I’d emerged a new person.

  Either way, I felt too weak to sit upright, let alone stand, so I sat slumped against Sidney, staring down at the toy propeller I still clutched.

  “Was that Rob’s?” Sidney asked, the first words he’d spoken other than crooning comforts since his arrival.

  I passed it to him. “I found it.”

  He turned it over in his fingers, clearly recognizing its purpose. “I wonder where the rest of it is?”

  “Maybe buried in that pile of four years’ worth of decaying leaves, but I’m not about to dig for it.”

  Tabitha barked below, apparently having heard us talking.

  “Stay, girl,” Sidney called down through the door in the floor, and the collie settled back down, resuming her patient vigil.

  “How did you find me?” I said into his chest.

  “Your father sent me. He thought you might have need of me. And if that were true, I knew there was only one place you would have gone.”

  I trailed my fingers over one of the buttons fastening his coat. “I miss him,” I admitted simply. “I miss them all.”

  “I know,” he replied, needing no further explanation. “I miss them all, too.”

  All. All those we’d loved and cared for who were now lost to us. At least on this earth.

  We both sat silently, remembering them. Grieving them. Wishing they were still with us. But there were some acts that could not be undone, some planes that could not be crossed. Not until our time had also come. But not yet. Lord, not yet. And so we pressed on. Without them.

  Sidney’s hand lifted to my chin, gently tipping my head back so that he could look into my eyes. I wavered a moment before meeting his gaze, feeling exposed and vulnerable. All the walls I placed between myself and others were down, some of them crumbled to dust. There was nothing to shield my thoughts from him.

  As if aware of this, his fingers played over my skin with the lightest of caresses. “Verity, I’m sorry I pushed you. You were right. I did make this about me.” The emotions swimming in the depths of his deep blue eyes were as clear and unfettered as I’d ever seen them. “The truth is, I feel guilty for having left you alone to deal with all of this for so long. Yes, I was at war and then pursuing traitors,” he admitted, voicing the argument I was about to make. “But I still hate that I couldn’t be there when you needed me most. And that I only added to your pain with my own deception.” The rough callus of his thumb rubbed across my bottom lip. “I knew how upset you were with yourself for avoiding your family for so long, and how deeply you were grieving Rob, and I . . . I wanted to be there for you like I couldn’t be during the war, yes.” His face scrunched in pain. “But I also somehow got it into my head that if I could help you heal, then maybe that meant that eventually I would be able to heal, too.”

  “Sidney,” I murmured, understanding now why he’d placed so much stock in helping me grieve for Rob. “I hope you realize now that one doesn’t necessarily follow the other. That grief isn’t something that ever truly ends. We grow and we heal in stages, but that doesn’t mean we’re ever completely whole again.”

  He nodded. “I should have let you lead, not tried to force you to grieve how I wanted you to, and at the pace I set. I simply should have supported you.”

  “And I should have let you support me. I should have let my family,” I admitted in a voice grown hoarse from all my crying. “I’m no better, you know. I suppose I got so used to having to be strong and do everything on my own, that I forgot what it means to have others to lean on for emotional support.” My gaze dipped to Sidney’s square jaw as I swallowed, feeling tears threatening again. “I’ve always been the resilient one. The one others turn to.”

  He lowered his chin, forcing me to look him in the eye. “But Verity, everyone has their breaking points. That’s not a weakness. It’s just evidence of your humanity.”

  I blinked as tears burned my eyes again. “I’m just so angry at myself for not handling Rob’s death, and your death, and everyone’s death better. For causing everyone more pain.”

  “You need to let that go. You did the best you could. I know deep inside you know that. And that’s all you can ask of yourself.” He swiped away a tear as it fell from my eye. “War is hell. No one comes out unscathed. No matter how hard we try.” His eyes shimmered with intensity. “Give yourself the same grace you give all of us.”

  His words hit me squarely in the chest, and I felt myself exhale for what seemed like the first time in years. I pressed my hand to his cheek, feeling the bristles along his jaw abrading my palm, and nodded in acceptance. His mouth found mine, and I reveled in the reassurance and love he offered me in that kiss.

  We sat wrapped in each other’s arms for a short time longer. Long enough for me to steady myself and to regain some of my strength from him. But the cold and discomfort of the hard floor soon recalled us to our senses.

  Sidney insisted on descending the ladder first, to catch me lest I lose my grip. It wasn’t until I was about halfway down in my descent that I realized Tabitha was no longer barking or circling below us. Confused, I turned my head to the left and then right, searching for her, wondering if she’d run off after a hare or a fox. That’s when I saw them. The footprints in the snow. Coming from a different direction than the house.

  CHAPTER 29

  “Sidney, the footprints,” I murmured, moments before a man emerged from behind the wide tree trunk.

  He appeared to be unarmed, but there was a wildness in his eyes, a stark detachment that made me nervous and uncertain what he would do. An impression that was only emphasized by the fact that his clothes were worn and dirty, likely from sleeping it rough.

  I felt Sidney reach up to grasp my waist, steadying me. Then his hand slid into the pocket of my coat where the weight of his Luger pistol still rested.

  “What did you do to Tabitha?” I asked the man, anxious to keep his gaze on me and not on what Sidney was doing. “The dog? Der Hund?”

  “I gave dog food. From house. Dog is safe,” he replied in a thick German accent, struggling to translate.

  “What do you want? Why are you here?” I asked in German as I continued down the ladder. The man’s intent would be clearer conveyed in his own language, and while Sidney was not as fluent in German as I was, he was certainly better versed than this fellow seemed to be in English.

  “I apologize for sneaking up on you, particularly under these circumstances.” His pale eyes glittered with sympathy as they flitted over my strained features, making it obvious he’d been here long enough to understand I’d been sobbing. “I mean you no harm. So you have no need of that pistol.” He nodded to my hip, where Sidney’s hand gripped the gun inside my pocket. “I simply want to talk.”

  I could see Sidney weighing his options, trying to decide whether to trust this man’s word. As I reached the ground, I felt his hand release its grip on the pistol, leaving its heft behind.

  Meanwhile, I had been scrutinizing the German fellow’s face. He had the shaggy straw-colored hair I’d expected, but there was also something else about him that seemed familiar. The sun had sunk low in the sky behind him, so that his face was cast in shadow, but I could still see well enough to note that there was something in the tilt of the tip of his nose, in the shape of his eyes, and the heaviness of his brow that pricked my memory. I was also startled to realize I’d seen him before. At the church in Hawes, yes, but also before that. In London on the street outside our building. Bauer had been talking to him, and I had thought him to be an importuning bloke.

  But there was more. I had seen those features before on another face. I had seen the same solemn frown. And just like that, some of
the pieces to the puzzle began to slide into place.

  “You’re Anni Bauer, or should I say, Anni Becker’s cousin.”

  Sidney’s gaze darted to me sideways in surprise, but the man before me did not seem astonished.

  “Yes.”

  “You’re Heinrich Becker’s nephew.”

  He nodded once in assent. “Right again. I am Kurt Becker.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “And you are the second deserter who appeared at my great-aunt’s home.”

  He looked to the side. “Yes, well, it seemed a necessary ruse at the time.”

  But not because he was himself deserting. No, it was far more personal. “You were searching for Herr Becker.”

  He shrugged. “It was the logical place to start.”

  “Wait a moment,” Sidney interrupted. “I’m struggling to follow. Heinrich Becker, as in the first deserter? The man you led to your great-aunt’s in Monschau?”

  “Yes. Do you remember me telling you that I’d learned that Herr Becker had been successful in his first mission? That he reported to the British in Holland and then was given another task, but was then never heard from again?” I turned to Kurt. “Well, I presume he made a visit to his home at some point during that first mission.” We’d surmised as much after reading Anni Becker’s journal and seeing all the information she’d possessed.

  “He did, and explained to his wife what he was doing. Anni overheard their conversation, and was very angry at him for deserting the army and taking the British’s money. She’d had it drilled into her brain at school every day how important the German ideal was, how Germany’s honor must be upheld.” He sighed, shaking his head. “She had no idea of the real toll the war was taking on her countrymen other than the increasingly meager amount of food they had to eat. But even that was something to be endured for the good of the country.”

  That sounded remarkably like many of my fellow countrymen, minus the near-starvation conditions.