Keeper of the Mill

by Mary Anne Kelly

  The wedding tent rustled, unshackled, in the wind. It sounded like a flight of birds taking off.

  “Did you ever meet Puffin’s mom, Temple?”

  “No, never.” Temple blushed. “Puffin always said she was delicate. Didn’t take company.”

  “Was she German?”

  “No, she was British. Puffin always talked about how posh she was. ‘The shabby gentile’ he always called her, because she was too tight to buy new bedroom slippers. ‘Mrs. Brown and her worn-out Bee-Bops.’” He shrugged. “I always figured I was too, well, shanty, to be introduced.”

  “But could she have been German? Lower-class German? I mean, didn’t you ever talk to her on the phone? In all those years?”

  “No. No, I never did. You mean the housekeeper. I only ever met the housekeeper. Many a cup of tea I had with her. Puffin didn’t want anyone to bother his mum. Wait. Once I did call her. I couldn’t get hold of him, and we had to leave for Cannes. But, no, she wasn’t there. Only her housekeeper was there.”

  “Was she German? The housekeeper?”

  He looked at her. “Yeah. A strange old bird. Makeup, feathers. Uri. What’s going on?”

  “That’s it.” Claire sank down onto the car bumper beside Temple. “That wasn’t the housekeeper. That was Puffin’s mother, Ursula Brown, née Ursula Braun. So that’s it. Jesus, I’m a total idiot.”

  “Wait. Ursula Braun wrote Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time.”

  “No. Puffin did. He just used his mother’s real name.”

  “Hold on now. What do you mean? Do you mean like for poetic justice? Oh, come.”

  “Yes, I do mean that. Temple, what happens at the end of the story? What’s the last scene of Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time?”

  “It’s where the main character gets justice. It’s during the war. Venus and Folly are pierced by Cupid’s arrow. It’s all symbolic. Time teaches them. In the words of the book, ‘Venus and Folly knelt, embracing. Though madness shrieked for watching them, they would remain serene. They had no choice, those two, the children of sin. Time held out the forgiving cloak of eternal blue sky with which to cover them. And I, at last, would be fathered and free. Free as the pealing of bells.’”

  Claire stood up. “I wonder where Stella and Cosimo are?”

  “I know where they are. Puffin just went off to meet them. He said it was only right that he show them the beginning of the story. He took the cane to give Cosimo.”

  “Why did you give it to him?”

  “Because he asked me to.”

  “I wish I didn’t have such a bad feeling.” She couldn’t sit still. She walked around, then came back and stood in front of him. “Temple,” she said, “I don’t suppose Puffin could be insane.”

  “What?”

  “I mean, did it ever occur to you that he might be … insane?”

  Temple looked at her. He didn’t answer her, they just kept looking at each other, all the while Temple’s mind going a mile a minute. Finally, he said, “It can’t be. Why would he?”

  “I don’t know. I’m as confused as you are. I only am sure of one thing: Puffin Hedges did write that story. He did. He had to have. And his mother is Ursula Braun, who lived here at Saint Hildegard’s Mill in 1938.”

  “But why would he never tell me?”

  “Temple, anyone whose mother convinced them they were the rightful heir to half the Mill would have a whole bevy of secrets.”

  “What heir to what mill? This mill?”

  “I don’t know. I’m just thinking it through. Could it be that Puffin believes himself to be the rightful heir?”

  “You mean like in the script?”

  “Is that what happens in the story?”

  “Yes.”

  Temple wrenched her shoulder and made her look at him. “What are you thinking?”

  “I think it was Puffin. I think he killed Hans. And then Bibi Wintner because she suspected.”

  “You’re mad!” Now he turned away.

  Claire touched him from behind. “But it could be. It had to be.”

  “Puffin has been kinder to me than my entire family. Of all the people I’ve ever known, he’s the only one who ever—”

  “That’s why there were checks going out to England every month. Maybe Ursula Brown was blackmailing Hans. Just the way she’d blackmailed the father, Adam. Maybe Bibi Wintner found out.”

  “But why would she blackmail him? What could he have done to her?”

  “Ursula must have convinced Hans that Puffin was Adam’s son, too. Adam certainly believed it. Otherwise, why would he have sent money all those years? Someone was sending money to England all those years. He must have paid for his schooling. Anything to keep her away. I know Adam despised Ursula. Evangelika told me. Adam would have paid just to keep her and her bastard away from the Mill. Away from his adopted son, whom he loved. Kunigunde’s son. Later, Hans must have known, must have found out after Adam died and he took over the Mill. He wouldn’t want Puffin to come and take his share. Only maybe he got the idea that Puffin wasn’t really the rightful son of Adam. Maybe something made him doubt it. Or someone. What if he’d suggested a paternity blood test, something like that, something they wouldn’t have had years ago. Why should he keep on paying, he probably figured, if there was no reason to!”

  “I can’t… I can’t imagine. Mrs. Brown is a lady. A great lady…”

  Claire turned and faced him squarely. “No. She is Ursula Braun. She’s a common blackmailer, gussied up. Evangelika gave her a diamond years ago, if only she would never come back. Oh, the rage! Imagine Ursula Braun’s rage! Imagine how she must have hated them and raised her son Almut to hate them. Her precious son, Harry Almut Brown. Hans’s second name was Almut, too. Remember? The list of names from Adam’s files had his full name on it, Adam Almut von Grünwald. I knew I’d seen or heard that name Almut before, but I couldn’t put them together. Only now it all falls into place. Ursula told her son his father was keeper of the Mill. Told herself, probably. How much nicer it was to believe.”

  “It can’t be the same …”

  “Oh, Temple, really! It has to be!”

  Temple flared at her. “You are so pleased that it is so!”

  “What should I be? Pleased they’re holding my friend Isolde in prison for two murders she didn’t commit? No, I’ve got to tell you what I know. However much it hurts you. Puffin believes himself to be the rightful heir, and whether it’s true or not doesn’t matter anymore to him. He’s out of his mind.”

  “He’s not!” he cried, knowing, already, that he must be.

  “Don’t you see he planned all this?”

  “Claire, you’ve got to be wrong.” Temple kept shaking his head. “Puffin never would have killed Bibi Wintner.”

  “He had to have,” Claire insisted. “Bibi had an argument with Isolde. Isolde told me she, Bibi Wintner, accused her of having an affair with Puffin. Maybe she only thought that because she saw Puffin in the stairwell near Isolde’s room at the time of the murder. And she knew where the money was being sent to London every month. She found the accounts. She was in charge of them since Hans was killed. She figured it had to be Isolde or Puffin. And Puffin was the one from England. Bibi must have confronted Puffin just the way she confronted me. She was the kind of woman who wasn’t used to being crossed. She had no experience with someone more desperate than herself. Desperate enough to kill. She never would have believed there was no reasoning with Puffin. She couldn’t know just how demoralized he must have been.”

  Claire saw the anguish wrench Temple’s face. She watched it fall, and she knew there could be no happiness for them now. It was the end of both their illusions. He would never forgive her for bearing such a truth.

  “We’d better find Cosimo and Stella,” Temple said.

  A car pulled up the drive. It was full of Müncheners.

  Evangelika stood in the doorway. She knocked on the woodwork to get their attention. “What is it about Cosimo and Stella Gabriella?” H
er face had turned to ashes.

  The carload of customers opened the great Mercedes doors. Loud music and laughter barreled out.

  “Where are they?” Temple called to Evangelika. “Where did they go?”

  “Was?” She cupped one ear. “Wie?”

  “Where are they?” Temple called again.

  Evangelika lurched out the door. The rollicking customers cruised toward them. They were between Evangelika and Temple and Claire when Evangelika slumped against the side of the house and slid to the ground. She sat upright, her open palm kept tapping her cheek. None of the merrymakers stopped; they kept on walking. They hadn’t noticed her go down. Claire and Temple ran across to her and helped her up from both sides.

  Claire said, “Temple, what was the line again? The line at the end of Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time?”

  “‘And I, at last, would be fathered and free.’”

  “No, the line right before that.”

  “‘Time held out the forgiving cloak of eternal blue sky with which to cover them.’”

  Claire gnawed at a cuticle. She looked up. Temple looked up, too. Their eyes both went to the same place, the bell tower.

  “Herr Ober!” the customer from the grand Mercedes, dripping with importance and urgency, signaled Temple over. He mistook him for the waiter.

  “It wasn’t Fräulein Wintner who killed Hans, then,” Evangelika said. “It was someone else, wasn’t it?”

  “Where did they go?” Claire tried to sound normal. All she could think was getting to those kids before something terrible happened.

  “Who was it?” Evangelika tried to stand.

  “Did they go up to the bell tower, Evangelika? Did they go up there?”

  The three of them looked up. There was no flash of movement from the tower. It was still.

  “They’re dead!” Evangelika cried.

  “They’re not dead.” Claire grabbed hold of Evangelika’s chin and looked up at the tower. “The bell hasn’t rung. There’s still time.”

  “Evangelika,” Claire whispered in a voice that sounded calm, “I want you to go to the telephone. Call the police. What was his name? The detective?”

  “Engel.” Temple let Evangelika’s arm go. He was shocked.

  “Martin Engel,” Claire said. “Go to the phone and ask for Detective Sergeant Martin Engel. Tell he must come back to the Mill. All right? Tell him Isolde couldn’t have committed the murders because the murderer is here now. Tell him Cosimo and Stella are in danger.” She ran through the kitchen to the back stairs. Temple came up behind her.

  Evangelika grappled with her legs, then pulled herself along the wall into the house. She moved as in slow motion, but she moved.

  “My God,” Temple said, “it’s just like in the film. My God. He did it, didn’t he? He killed Hans.” He sat down on the bottom step of the spiral stairs and put his head in his hands.

  Claire bounded past him. She took the stairs two and three at a time. By the second floor she thought she might have a heart attack. Still she climbed. The bell was so high up. She reached the third floor and the lighthouse-like steps of the bell tower. Time was indeed on the steps, on and on. Please, she prayed silently, don’t let them be dead. She burst through the portico door.

  They were sitting, the three of them, with their legs over the sides, swinging, easy as you please. They might have been children entranced with the view.

  Claire almost passed out. They looked across at her, astonished.

  All around, the countryside was to be seen. The dismal, bright white light pressed against them. Claire reeled with vertigo. Only the bell itself seemed safe, nestled under its roof. Claire wanted to hold on to something. The bell was too far in. She sat down and held on to the frail wroughtiron rim the others had stuck their legs through.

  “I’ve been telling them a story.” Puffin stood. His lips were very red, his hair slicked back and cut in a straight blunt line at his crisp linen collar.

  “Hey!” the voice of the outraged customer down below reached them. “Was soll denn das?! Ober!”

  Puffin leaned in and ran his finger along the rim of the bell. “Did you know,” he said, “they’ve used the Mill bell ever since they bombed the church.” He might have been a tour guide.

  “Right,” Claire smiled. “You came here as a child.”

  “That’s right.” Puffin’s eyes swam with reminiscence. “I was a little boy. Mum thought Hans and I would play together. I was older, but not by much. A couple of months. And Hans was such a big boy.” Puffin’s eyes clouded over. “He didn’t care for me, though. We had nothing in common, really.” He held his elbows. “Hans was rough. We even came up here once. He threatened to throw me off. He said I was a Mädele, a girl.” Puffin heaved a sigh. “He was coarse, you see. He had no mother. ‘That’s what happens when you have no upbringing,’ Mum used to say. Oh, she knew he’d hurt my feelings. We’d put so much into this trip, you see. It meant so much to the both of us. She told me we were going to go back and meet my father, Adam von Grünwald. But he didn’t like me either.” Puffin’s eyes filled with tears. “We were in the upstairs room, Hans’s room. The father said, ‘Nein.’ He said I didn’t bear the slightest resemblance to him … He said get that ugly brat away from him. That’s what he said! Mum’s heart just about broke.” Puffin rattled his head. “Mum didn’t think I understood, but I did. I understood more German than she thought. Even then.

  “Yes, yes.” Puffin strode along the rim of the tower. He was balanced with his own bravado, unafraid now of the terrible height. “I was always excellent at German,” he muttered. “All languages, really.”

  There was a scuffle behind Claire. The portico door flew open. It was Temple. The magpie, worried about its nest, flew over him and up into the tower.

  Puffin faltered and almost fell. Cosimo instinctively reached out his hand to him. Puffin saw it and stopped. He didn’t take it, but it steadied him. He was safe.

  “That’s just like me.” Puffin smirked at Temple. “I mean that bird. You see, I wasn’t well-named after all. I was never a Puffin. I was more like the shifty magpie. I was always after shiny things.” He pursed his wet lips. His pale eyes went blank. “Robbing other people’s shiny things.”

  Cosimo’s dark brows drew together. He sensed something was about to happen. He took Stella’s hand.

  Puffin sucked in his breath. That he wouldn’t have! He leaned down and removed Cosimo’s hand from his sister’s. “Lucky Cosimo.” He raised one eyebrow tartly. “Always the lucky one!”

  Claire thought, two more minutes. Just keep talking for two more minutes. Someone will come. The police will be here any minute. They’ll know what to do. “It must have been terrible for you,” she said.

  Evangelika, recharged with purpose, came up behind Temple. She cowered behind him.

  Puffin fluffed his hair. “It wasn’t so bad for me. It was Mum. She took it so hard. Especially because Hans had been so cruel to me. She felt for me, Mum did. That the father would rather have a filthy Jew boy for a son than a fine Aryan boy like me.”

  “Don’t tell! Don’t tell!” Evangelika cried in a horrified voice.

  “My father was not Jewish,” Stella said from her small place on the rim. She held her rosary in her hand.

  “Oh yes,” Puffin said, “he was Jewish. That woman Adam von Grünwald married wasn’t really Hans’s mother. What? Did you really believe she was? She was just a replacement. Handy.”

  “Don’t tell,” Evangelika whimpered.

  “What do you mean?” Stella whispered.

  “I thought everybody knew. You really didn’t know?” Puffin glared at Stella and at Cosimo with wicked merriment. “Your father wasn’t Adam and Kunigunde’s child. That was just a trick. Hans’s real mother was a Jew. A dirty Jew. Adam von Grünwald’s dirty Jewish whore!” He spat the words. Blue veins stood out on his neck.

  He’d shocked the fear from all their faces. They gaped at him.

  “My mum told me the
whole story,” Puffin said, “many times.”

  “Oh, don’t tell, don’t tell,” Evangelika crooned. She held on to Temple’s back.

  Puffin eyed her coldly. “That Jewess was ruining everything. She poisoned the Mill with her tricks. With her charms. Playing fancy piano. Having sex with Adam von Grünwald in return for sanctuary.”

  Claire looked at Cosimo. He looked, she realized at once, like Iris.

  “It wasn’t like that!” Evangelika shrieked.

  “She had Adam von Grünwald captivated,” Puffin continued coolly, ignoring her. “He was going to lose the Mill. And it was all because of her. And she, this Iris von Lillienfeld, this Jew, was just using him.”

  “Nein,” Evangelika murmured, “she loved him. And he really, truly loved her.”

  “Oh, he thought he did,” Puffin mimicked in a womanish voice. “But she was a vamp. A sneak. Stealing him away from his own mother!”

  He paced along the catwalk, closer each time he came by.

  Claire hooked one foot under the wrought-iron fence. If he would only come that close one more time, she could grab hold of his ankle.

  “What does it mean?” Stella asked in a small voice.

  Puffin looked at her with disdain. “My mother”—he pulled himself up to his full meager height—“… my mother poisoned her. She poisoned your grandmother the way you would any rat. They were like rats, you know. Those people. Deserting the ship. Taking their money out of the country.”

  “She was my grandmother?” Stella asked wonderingly. “The Jewess was my grandmother?”

  “Liebling”—Evangelika reached out a useless arm across the void to Stella—“Iris von Lillienfeld was not the way he says she was.” Tears were streaming down her cheek from only one eye. The other didn’t work.

  “But Iris’s baby was stillborn,” Claire protested. “The baby died when Adam’s mother poisoned Iris!”