Birds of a Feather (38 page)

Maisie nodded. Yes, she understood.

“I made some friends, other girls from the school. Rosamund, Lydia, and Philippa. It was the sort of school where girls were ‘finished’ rather than educated. I felt humiliated, as if he thought me only good for arranging flowers, buying clothes and knowing how to correctly address servants. Then, when war was declared, we all came home to England. Of course, my father, the great man of commerce”—Maisie noticed the sarcasm in Charlotte’s voice—“had already secured government contracts to supply army rations.” Charlotte looked up thoughtfully. “It’s amazing, when you think of it, the people who do well out of war. My clothing allowance came courtesy of soldiers being fed by Joseph Waite.” She looked away and for a while they sat in silence until Charlotte was ready to take up her story again.

“After we’d returned home, the four of us were pretty much at a loose end. We tried knitting scarves, socks, that sort of thing. Rolling bandages. Joseph was working at the warehouse. He’d started off at the lowest rung and at that time was a clerk in receivables. Mind you, he had apprenticed with the butchers, taken the deliveries out, and he was the blue-eyed boy of the whole business. Everybody loved ‘Young Joe.’” She mimicked a south London accent, which made Maisie look up suddenly.

“How did you get along with Joe after your return?”

“Very well, actually. When I asked to work for the business and my father refused, Joe stuck up for me, said it would be a good idea, a good example.” Once again, she looked into the distance. “He was a wonderful young man, Joe.”

Maisie said nothing while Charlotte paused to gather her thoughts.

“So, there we were, young girls with few skills, time on our hands and—for my part—nowhere I seemed to . . . to . . .
belong
.” Charlotte exhaled deeply. “Then I found out about the Order of the White Feather. I saw a bill posted. So I persuaded the others. It didn’t take much. We went along to a meeting.” Charlotte held out her upturned hands helplessly. “And that was the beginning.”

Maisie watched Charlotte.
A natural and decisive leader.

“Then the game went on, and we were more than willing players. Each day we would venture forth with our little bags of white feathers, and we’d hand them out to young men not in uniform. We each took out an equal number of feathers and when we saw one another later, we’d see if all the feathers were gone. Of course, we thought we were doing the right thing. Sometimes . . . sometimes, I’d walk past an enlistment office and I’d see a young man standing there, or two together, still holding the feathers I’d given them. And I thought,
Oh, good.”

“No one at home knew what I was up to. My father was busy, always so busy, and Joe was working hard at the warehouse. No one wondered what I might be doing. Joe always asked for me as soon as he came home. I think he knew that I was unraveling. But inside me . . .” —she touched the plain belt buckle of her dress with the flat of her hand— “inside me, I was resentful toward Joe. It was as if I didn’t know where to put all the
horribleness
that was festering inside me. It was like a disease, a lump.” A single tear slid down her cheek. “Then, one day, I thought of a way to get back at him—my father—and to get Joe out of the way for a while. The trouble was, I didn’t
think
. I didn’t think that it would be forever.”

Silence descended. Maisie rubbed her upper arms with hands that had become cold once again.
May I not sit in judgment.

“Go on, Charlotte.”

Charlotte Waite looked at her. Some might have thought the woman’s posture arrogant, Maisie knew that she was searching for strength.

“I suggested to the girls, to Rosamund, Lydia, and Philippa, that we should try to place feathers in the hands of as many young men as we could. And I also suggested a means of accomplishing the task. The warehouse, which employed so many young men—the runners, the drivers, the packers, the butchers, clerks . . . an army, in fact—was run in shifts, with a bell sounding for the change between each shift. It was my plan for the four of us to wait outside the gates when the shifts changed, to hand out feathers.” Charlotte put her hand to her lips together, then plunged on. “We handed a feather to each and every man who walked from the warehouse, regardless of age or job. And when we had done that, we went to the main shops, as many as we could get to in a day, and did the same thing. By the time my father found us, I’d handed out all but one of my feathers.” Charlotte’s chin dipped. “He drew alongside us in the motor car, with another motor following. The door opened, and he was furious. He instructed the chauffeur in the other car to take Rosamund, Lydia, and Philippa to their homes, and he grabbed me by the arm and almost threw me into the motor.” Opening her eyes, Charlotte looked again at Maisie. “You are no doubt familiar, Miss Dobbs, with the wartime practice of men enlisting as ‘pals’—men who lived on the same street, worked with one another, that sort of thing?”

Maisie nodded.

“Well, Waite’s lost a good three-quarters of its workforce when the men joined up as pals within a week of our handing out the feathers. Waite’s Boys, they called themselves. Joe was one of them.”

Maisie’s attention was drawn to Charlotte’s hands. The nails of one had dug into the soft flesh of the other. Her hand was bleeding. Charlotte covered the wound and began speaking again.

“My father is a quick thinker. He saw to it that the families knew that the men’s jobs would be there for them upon their return. He offered wives and daughters jobs, with the promise that they would be paid a man’s wages and he saw to it that each man who enlisted was sent a regular parcel from Waite’s. He’s good at taking care of the families, my father. The trouble is, none of that compassion extended to me. The workers thought he was marvelous, a real patriarch. There were always parties for the children, bonuses at Christmas. And all through the war, Waite’s kept going, doing very well.”

Without thinking, Charlotte inspected her bloody hand and wiped it along the side of her coat. “And they were all lost. Oh, a few came home, wounded, but most of them were killed in action. Joe died. He’s buried over there.” She looked into Maisie’s eyes again. “So, you see, we—I—killed them. Oh, I know, you might say that they would have been conscripted sooner or later, but really, I know that we sent them off to their deaths. Counting the parents, the sweethearts, the widows, and the children, there must be a legion of people who would like to see the four of us dead.”

In the silence that followed, Maisie took a fresh handkerchief from the pocket of her tweed jacket. She held it between Charlotte’s hand and her own, pressed their palms together, and closed her eyes.
May I not sit in judgment. May my decisions be for the good of all concerned. May my work bring peace
.

CHAPTER TWENTY - ONE

M
aisie insisted that Charlotte accompany her back to Ebury Place. It was too dangerous for her to be left alone in Bermondsey. They said little on the drive across London, which included a detour to Whitechapel where Charlotte remained in the MG while Maisie called upon Billy briefly to ask him to meet her at the office the next morning. Sunday was to be another working day, and an important one.

Confident that Charlotte would not abscond now, Maisie settled her into a guest suite on the same floor as her own rooms, before finally finally taking rest. It had been a very long day and would be a long night as her plan, which must be executed soon, took shape. It was past ten o’clock when she went to the library to telephone Maurice Blanche. She heard only one ring before her call was answered.

“Maisie!” Maurice greeted her without waiting to hear her voice. “I have expected your call.”

Maisie smiled. “I thought you might.”

They both knew that Maisie needed to speak with her mentor when a case was nearing closure. As if drawn by invisible threads, they each leaned closer to their respective telephone receivers.

“I was speaking with Andrew Dene this morning.” Maurice continued.

“Oh—did he telephone to talk about my father?”

“No, actually, he came here this morning.”

“Oh?” Maisie was startled.

Maurice grinned. “You are not the only pupil who comes to my house, Maisie.”

“Well, yes, of course.” Maisie was glad that Maurice could not see the blood rising to her cheeks.

“Anyway, Andrew came to see me about several things, including Mr. Beale.”

“And?”

“Nothing of great concern, simply a discussion of how we may best help the man.”

“I see.”

“I expect he’ll be here shortly, in the next day or so?”

“Yes. When this case is closed.”

“So, Maisie, I sense that as far as your assignment is concerned, the case is already closed. You have found Charlotte Waite?”

“Yes. Though Mr. Waite insisted that her return to his home in Dulwich would be the point at which he would consider our work complete.”

“And when will that be?”

“I will be meeting Billy at the office tomorrow morning. The three of us will take a taxi-cab to Dulwich.

“You have another plan, don’t you, Maisie?”

“Yes.Yes, I do”

Maisie heard Maurice tap out his pipe and the rustle of a packet of sweet Old Holborn tobacco. Maisie closed her eyes and envisaged him preparing the bowl, pressing tobacco down, then striking a match, holding it to the tobacco and drawing on the stem to light the fragrant leaf. Maisie breathed in deeply, imagining the aroma. In that moment she was a girl again, sitting at the table in the library at Ebury Place, reading aloud from her notes while her teacher paced back and forth, back and forth, then, holding the bowl of the pipe in his right hand, pointed at her and asked out loud, “Tell me what evidence you have, upon which to base such conclusions
.”

“So, what else have to to tell me? And where, if I may ask, are the police?” asked Maurice.

“Charlotte has confessed her part in bringing about the enlistment of a good number of her father’s employees, including her older half-brother, Joe, who was the apple of her father’s eye.” Maisie drew breath deeply and told Maurice the story that she had first heard from the warehouse manager and then from Charlotte. “She believes herself guilty of a crime.”

“I take it that you do not consider Charlotte capable of murder.”

“I am sure she is not the killer, though she may be the next victim.”

“And the man in custody, the man the police believe to be the murderer?”

“I believe him to be innocent of the crime of murder. He may not be a good man . . . but he did not kill Rosamund, Philippa, and Lydia.”

“Stratton seemed a fair man in the past. Has he not heard your protests?”

As they spoke, Maisie felt, not for the first time, a sensation of oneness with the mind of her teacher, an intimacy of intellect and understanding, even as he quizzed her. “Detective Inspector Stratton has brought his prejudices to the case. He lost his wife in childbirth and was left with a son. His inner turmoil has clouded his usual sound judgment. The man he believes to be the killer—Magnus Fisher—is an unlikable character, one who has not treated women fairly. Indeed, he admits that he married Lydia Fisher for her money.”

“Ah, I see.”

“I’ve tried to communicate my suspicions to him on several occasions, to no avail. Stratton will not believe that Fisher is not the guilty man until I hand him the real murderer on a plate.”

“Yes, yes indeed.” Maurice drew deeply on his pipe. “And you plan to trap the killer, do you not?”

Maisie nodded. “Yes, I do.”

Maurice began to speak once more. “Tell me about the means of death again, Maisie.”

“Sir Bernard Spilsbury has concluded that poison was administered, which Cuthbert has identified as morphine. In two of the cases the victim’s death was followed by a brutal stabbing.”

“The weapon?”

“The bayonet from a short-barrel Lee Enfield rifle.”

Maurice nodded. “The killer venting his fury after the death of his victim.”

“Yes.”

“Interesting.”

“Anger, pain, suffering . . . loneliness,” said Maisie. “There’s quite a cocktail of motives there to be going on with.”

“Charlotte is right, Maisie. It could be any one of a hundred people.”

“One hundred people might have reason for vengeance, but not every one of those people would seek revenge in such a way. The killer is a person tormented day in and day out, one for whom there is no respite, not for one minute in twenty-four hours. And that person has discovered, tragically, that in meting out punishment, there has been no escape from the terrible ache of loss. The killer isn’t just anyone in that mass of grieving relatives, Maurice. No, it’s one person in particular.”

Maurice nodded. “And you know who it is, don’t you?”

“Yes. I believe I do.”

“You will take all necessary precautions, Maisie.”

“Of course.”

“Good.”

They were silent for a moment, then Maurice spoke quietly. “Be wary of compassion, Maisie. Do not let it blind you to dangers. Never let pity gain the upper hand. I know this killer must be stopped, that he may not feel that his pain is assuaged even if he kills Charlotte. He may go on killing thereafter. We have together faced great dangers, Maisie. Remember all that you have learned. Now then—go. You must prepare for tomorrrow. It will be a long day.”