The Shattered Tree

by Charles Todd

  “Half an hour more won’t matter.”

  He followed me to the library, and Inspector Duplessis rose as I came in. The policeman’s gaze took in Simon, then turned to me.

  “Does Matron approve of such late hours? Is it part of your recovery?”

  I smiled. “Actually, I spent the day in the country. It’s considered to be good for one’s health.”

  To my surprise, he smiled in return. Then it vanished as he said, “I have searched the files for the inquiry you spoke of.”

  “Have you indeed?” We sat down, Simon just to one side of me and the Inspector across a small table. “And what did you learn?” I tried to keep my voice casual, afraid I might betray what I’d heard in Paul Moreau’s sitting room.

  “That Philippe Moreau was taken into custody for the murders. But not straightaway. The police had collected preliminary statements from the outdoor staff, and the rest of the house staff who had the afternoon off. Apparently no one had seen or heard anything. They had asked the Lavaud child what he knew, and he told them he’d quarreled with the younger Moreau child, and he thought perhaps Paul Moreau had killed everyone.”

  “Paul?” I repeated. It was unexpected.

  “Yes. He’d been taken to one of the cottages as soon as he returned from riding. It was a kindness. His mother was sent for. Mercifully she was in Paris, and she arrived within a few hours. After speaking to both of her sons, she told the police that Philippe had confessed to her.”

  “He what?” I sat there, shocked. Paul Moreau hadn’t told us that.

  “She was weeping. They believed her. And allowed her to take her younger son away.”

  “But why? Why would the older child have done such an awful thing? Why would she not stay there with him?”

  “She told the police he had a pocketknife given him by his father. And Monsieur Lavaud had taken it from him. We had already learned that Monsieur Lavaud had quarreled earlier in the day with his own son, about returning to the school for next term. Philippe was upset about that as well. He and the Lavaud child were friends. He went down to the room where the hunting rifles were kept, but they were locked in cases. He took a knife instead. When one of the maids tried to stop him, he killed her, as well as the other maid in the pantry. And after that he killed the family.”

  A twelve-year-old boy? It was possible, yes, because the attack would have been unexpected.

  “They were found in different rooms. The dead. He had stalked them.”

  I sat there, finding it hard to believe what I’d heard. Whatever she had felt about the boy brought into the household by her husband, how could Madame Moreau have abandoned him to the police with such callousness? And then she had left him to his fate. But even if she was telling the truth, had she also realized that she had a chance, finally, to rid herself of someone she hated? After all, gloating, she sent the cutting to the fräulein.

  “You seem surprised,” the Inspector said.

  “I never knew these details. I didn’t know Madame Moreau had spoken to her son.”

  “Yes, it struck me as rather pitiless as well. Still, I expect that’s why the authorities were willing to believe her. It would seem she had come forward at great sacrifice to herself, to tell them the truth.”

  I shivered. What on earth had gone through Philippe Moreau’s mind when faced with the knowledge that his own mother had turned him in? Granted, it was an horrific crime. But surely she would have stood by him, throughout the inquiry and the trial, if only to see that he was treated well and represented by a competent lawyer? Instead he’d been abandoned to the mercy of strangers.

  “This also means,” Simon commented, “that there is no certainty that the boy had done what he was accused of. If there was no further investigation of the facts.”

  “Yes, I’ve thought of that as well. There were additional suspects, several more likely than the others, but once the boy had confessed, there was little point in pursuing those avenues. After all, he’d been found with blood on his hands. The problem is, even I can think of no reason why Madame Moreau would tell such lies about her own child, if it were not true. Perhaps it is time that the matter was looked into more thoroughly.”

  “It won’t be easy, after eighteen years, to get at the truth. Madame Moreau is dead, for one thing.”

  He turned to me again. “There is the nun, who appears to be at the center of this matter. I must ask you now, Mademoiselle, if you know this man’s whereabouts?”

  Put on the spot in such a fashion, I was very glad I could answer truthfully, “I’m sorry, Inspector. I don’t have any idea where he may be.”

  To my astonishment, he believed me. I hadn’t expected him to give up so easily.

  “It’s too bad,” he said, nodding. “I had hoped we might settle this matter tonight.”

  I said, unable to stop myself, “From everything I’ve learned about the family, Madame Moreau hated her adopted son.”

  His eyes narrowed as he took that in. “Did she indeed? I wonder why.”

  I suddenly realized what he was thinking. That to protect the younger child, she had given the police the older boy.

  “I can’t tell you whether Paul Moreau was guilty of the crime or not. But I don’t think it mattered to his mother. I don’t know that the truth mattered to her either.”

  “Indeed.”

  A few minutes later, he thanked us and took his leave.

  I listened to his footsteps receding down the passage. Then I said to Simon, “Paul Moreau will be very unhappy about this turn of events.”

  “It can’t be helped. I can’t believe that he ever knew what his mother had done.”

  “No.” I sighed. “She must have been an awful woman.”

  “Why didn’t Juliane Theissen come to his defense? If she was his mother—or even his sister? Despite what he was said to have done.”

  “That’s a good question. Perhaps she couldn’t. She had to earn her living. But I can’t help but wonder if she stayed away because she wanted to help Philippe get away without being suspected. She must have felt strongly, all the same, to come back to Petite-Beauvais and live within a stone’s throw of the Moreau family home.”

  “It could well be her way of reminding them of what had happened. Still, the governess had given up the boy herself, once. Either willingly or under pressure.” He walked across the room to stare down at the dying embers of the fire. “One could almost feel sorry for Philippe Moreau.”

  “Yes. I know. Do you think Inspector Duplessis will reopen the inquiry?”

  Simon turned back to me. “It will depend on whether or not he finds sufficient cause to pursue the matter. Or if he thinks he can find Moreau. If he’s even still in Paris. Meanwhile, you’ve done enough, Bess.”

  “There’s the court martial.”

  “I know. Pass the word through someone here. Barkley or the Intelligence officer. Let them take it forward.”

  Before I could answer him, the library door opened, and the orderly poked his head around it. “Matron is starting her last rounds,” he said in a whisper. “Thought you should know.”

  “Yes, thank you.” As he closed the door behind him, I smiled at Simon. “I wish you didn’t have to go back to England.”

  “You have no idea how much I regret it,” he said grimly. “But Colonel MacInnes took me on for your mother’s sake, and I can’t make trouble for him. Besides, she’ll probably be at the dock in Folkestone or Dover, waiting for me to land.”

  “It would be just like her,” I agreed, and walked with him to the door.

  “Don’t go wandering about on your own, Bess. Promise me that. If it’s Philippe Moreau who tried to stab you, he won’t give up so easily. For that matter, I wouldn’t put it past his brother to do what he could to keep you from stirring up the past.”

  “I’d thought about that too,” I said. “Captain Barkley will be up and about soon enough. I’ll try to be sensible until then.”

  I walked with him through Reception
and out into the courtyard. The wind was cold tonight, and I wrapped my arms around myself to stay warm as he cranked the motorcar.

  And then Simon came back to where I was standing, put a hand on my shoulder, and said, “I’ll be glad when this war is over, and you’re safely back in Somerset.”

  He refused to leave until I had gone back inside. But I stood in the doorway and watched the motorcar disappear from sight, and Simon with it.

  It was close to dawn when I awoke, alarmed.

  Then I realized that it was Madame Ezay, shaking my shoulder.

  “Mademoiselle, you must come. There’s someone from the hospital downstairs. You’re needed.”

  I shook my head to throw off the last vestiges of my dream. I’d been at home in Somerset, helping my mother and Iris put up the last of the damson plums, the kitchen filled with the rich smell from the pans on the cooker while the scalded jars sitting in tubs of hot water gave off additional heat.

  The past faded as I sat up. “Who is it? What do they want? Did they say?”

  “They wish to speak to you. It’s a very serious matter, they said.”

  I gave a fleeting thought to Simon’s warning about not wandering about on my own.

  “What time is it?” I asked. My window was still dark.

  “Going on six,” Madame said. “I’ll leave you to dress.”

  She had turned up the lamp, and I had no trouble finding my clothes. I’d discovered when I came up last night that my mended apron and uniform, carefully pressed, were hanging in the cupboard, but I didn’t bother with them, catching up what I’d worn the day before. The fire had burned down to embers, and the room was cold. So were my shoes and my garments.

  It took only a few minutes, and then I was putting my hair beneath my cap, wishing for a cup of real tea, with real sugar and milk.

  The stairs were dark, only the night lamp on each landing guiding my feet. When I reached Reception, I saw that it was Sister Claire who had come for me.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?” I asked, crossing to the door. She already had her hand on the knob, eager to be on her way. “Wait. What is it?”

  “I have a taxi waiting. We must go.”

  “No, tell me now.”

  “It’s Sister Marie-Luc. She has had a reaction to some of her medicines. She’s half out of her mind. Mother Superior thinks you might help her.”

  “But she sent me away—” I began.

  “I’m sure she regrets it already. Please, come.”

  Madame Ezay had followed me down the stairs. I turned to her and said, “I’m going with Sister Claire. But I want you to know where I will be. St. Anne’s Hospital. In the event anyone comes looking for me. I should be back by breakfast.”

  Something in my tone of voice, perhaps the tension I was feeling about this summons, alarmed her. “I will fetch my coat and come with you.”

  “There is no time,” Sister Claire began, but Madame Ezay was already gone. She was back in only a moment or two, nodding to me as she followed us out the open door.

  The night was quiet. The sound of the taxi’s motor echoed off the walls of the houses as we drove down narrow streets, twisting and turning, heading for our destination. Sister Claire was silent, and Madame Ezay stirred uneasily from time to time, as if regretting her decision to accompany me.

  I was glad of her presence, knowing that otherwise I’d have had to make this journey back to the clinic alone when I’d finished at the hospital.

  We were admitted when we arrived, and it was clear that something was wrong.

  I could hear voices from Marie-Luc’s room before I reached it. Asking Madame Ezay to wait outside, where there was a bench for visitors, I went in.

  Marie-Luc was sitting up in bed while two of the nuns were trying to calm her down. I could see that it had been a long night.

  “Marie-Luc? Is everything all right?” I asked, uncertain how to approach her.

  “Thank God.” She freed one hand and reached out for me. “You must go at once to the café. They won’t let me. I need to speak to Madame Karadeg as soon as possible. You must tell her to come.”

  Her words were spilling over each other, and I could see that she was frantic.

  I took the hand she was holding out to me, and with a smile for the two nuns, I stood at the side of the bed. And then one of them brought a chair for me to sit in.

  “Now tell me what’s wrong. I can’t go haring off to the café—it isn’t even open yet, I’m sure. And Madame Karadeg will demand to know what it is you want. Breakfast is one of their busiest times. She will ask if it can wait.” I was trying to be as practical and reassuring as possible, without knowing what I was supposed to be reassuring about.

  Marie-Luc, distraught, clung to my hand as to a lifeline, her fingers crushing mine with her intensity.

  “Tell them to go.”

  I looked over my shoulder at Sister Claire and the others. “Please, could you leave us? I’ll call if I need anything.”

  They reluctantly filed out of the small room, and it seemed to open up without them and their wide, winged headdresses.

  Marie-Luc waited until they had shut the door behind them, and then she said, “I had a visitation in the night.”

  “A what?”

  “A visitation. Jerome. He came to me in the night. I could see him as clearly as I see you. And he said that he had never hurt me, that he was wounded by the accusations that he’d tried to kill me. That it hadn’t been him.”

  “You’ve said as much all along,” I reminded her.

  “Yes, yes. But he said he’d been there, and he’d seen who it was. I was so frightened at first, and then I realized that it wasn’t a dream, that he’d come back to tell me, to set my mind at ease, to let me know that he didn’t blame me for what the police had done.”

  She was crying now. I thought it was partly her slow recovery from the infection and partly whatever the doctors had given her for pain that had created her visitation. She had been trying very hard to convince the police that they were wrong about Jerome, and she had felt such terrible guilt over his suicide. Or was it murder? I still wasn’t sure what the police believed. I couldn’t tell her that. It would only add to her own burden of guilt.

  As I found a handkerchief and passed it to her, I opened my mouth to say that it had all been a dream, when I realized that she didn’t want to hear the truth. Her vision had, somehow, absolved her from her remorse, letting her believe that she had been understood and forgiven.

  Her face was wet with her tears, her eyes almost as red from exhaustion as from weeping.

  “What is it you want me to do?” I asked simply.

  “They tell me I can’t leave. But you must bring Madame here. She blames me as well, and I want her to know that Jerome is at peace, that he knows it was not my fault.”

  “Then I’ll sit with you for a while until the café opens. It’s cold outside, Marie-Luc, I don’t want to stand in a doorway for an hour or more.” But I knew the Karadegs were probably already in the kitchen, preparing for the first customers.

  “No, you must go,” she pressed. “What time is it? It must be close to dawn by now.”

  I smiled. “Well, it’s not. Lie back, try to calm yourself. You shouldn’t let yourself get so upset.”

  But she wouldn’t hear of resting until I’d done as she asked.

  “All right,” I told her. “But on one condition. You’ve frightened the other nuns. Lie back and be quiet while I’m gone.”

  “They didn’t believe me. They told me it was the morphine they’d given me to help me sleep. But I know better. I know the difference between opium dreams and reality.”

  I wasn’t sure she did, but she herself believed it.

  Still, I insisted, and when she was finally quiet enough, I said, “It will take me some time to find a taxi and go there. And to come back. You must promise to be patient, and not wake half the other wards wondering where I am.”

  “Yes, all right.” She let g
o of my hand reluctantly, as if torn between keeping me there by her side and sending me on my way.

  She stopped me as I reached the door. “You do believe me, don’t you?”

  “Yes, of course I do,” I said.

  “He couldn’t rest. He said it himself. ‘I can’t rest worrying about you. After all you’ve done for me.’”

  “I will see that the Karadegs understand.” And I was out the door before she could call me back again.

  Madame Ezay was sitting quietly on the bench. The nuns had gone about their duties.

  “I could hear her,” she said, crossing herself. “Poor woman.”

  “I must go to a café on the Left Bank,” I said. “There’s nothing for it. Will you come with me?”

  “I will,” she said, standing and walking with me out to the main door. It took a little time to find a taxi, and I was uneasy walking down the dark streets. Madame Ezay reached out and took my arm, as though she felt it too.

  At length we were lucky, and I climbed into the Renault with something like relief, giving the driver the direction of the café.

  It was already open, busy with its usual clientele. We walked in and took a table near the window that had just been vacated by two workmen who had had what passed for coffee and rolls.

  We sat there for some time. Madame Ezay said, “Why won’t they wait on us? That other pair, over at that table, have already been served, and they came in after us.”

  I knew why. The Karadegs wanted no part of me. I smiled, and shook my head. “We aren’t rushing off to work. They must know that.”

  “It’s more than how we look,” she grumbled. “I could do with a coffee.”

  But we were among the last to be served. When it was apparent that we weren’t leaving, Madame came over herself and asked how she could help us.

  We gave our order, and with poor grace, she went off to fetch it. When it came, it was her husband who brought our plates to us and poured the coffee.

  “I know you aren’t happy to see me here,” I said quickly before he could go away. “But Marie-Luc—the nun—wanted me to come to tell you and your wife that she saw your son in a dream last night.” I could hardly call it a visitation. “He doesn’t hold her responsible—”