A Bitter Truth

by Charles Todd

  “Yes, of course I will. But when were you invited? I didn’t quite understand?”

  “I ran into someone in London and came down to Sussex with her. A family member died recently, and the stone for his grave is ready to be set in place. The rest of the Ellis family is expected today for a small ceremony. They’d like me to stay.”

  “Darling, I didn’t know you were acquainted with anyone in that part of Sussex. Are you quite sure you’ve told me everything, Bess, dear?”

  “This telephone is in a very public place. Please, ask Simon. He can explain this far better than I, just now.”

  “I don’t know that he’s at the cottage just now. He and your father went off together, and the Colonel Sahib hasn’t returned.”

  “I’ll write,” I said. I had half an hour, I could find hotel stationery and send a short note. “Will that do?” Although any letter would reach Somerset after I did.

  “Darling, don’t worry about it. You’ll be home in a few more days. We can talk then, shall we? You sound tired and more than a little anxious. A party might be just the thing.”

  Depend on my mother to put the best face possible on any situation.

  “Thank you,” I replied, utterly sincere. “I’ll still write.”

  I rang off.

  Finding hotel stationery was simple enough, and I had a pen with me. Finding a quiet corner to sit in was another matter. It was nearly eleven, and people were coming and going as if this were the hub of activity in the town.

  I sat down on a window seat overlooking the street and made an attempt to explain how and why I’d found myself in Sussex instead of Somerset. It was not my best effort, but it would have to do. I wrote my parents’ direction on the envelope, and was about to ask Reception where I could find the post office, when I noticed the door of Bluebell Cottage opening and a man stepping out into the street.

  He was holding a cane, using it to find his way, as if he had done this a thousand times and knew where he was. Turning to his right, he moved carefully but confidently along the pavement, and people passing him greeted him as if he were fairly well known.

  In spite of the hat he wore pulled down to conceal his scars and blind eyes, I could see that he had good bones, a firm chin, and dark brows. Not precisely handsome, but what my mother would call a good face.

  In front of the greengrocer’s shop stood another man in a threadbare, ragged coat two sizes too large for his thin frame, and the shoes on his feet were worn almost to the point of the leather cracking open. I thought perhaps he’d been begging, because as I watched, I saw the greengrocer come out his door and angrily tell him to move on. He shuffled along to the ironmonger’s shop and stopped again. Then he looked up, saw the blind man coming his way, and waited until he was close enough to speak to.

  I couldn’t hear the conversation of course, but it was obvious the poor man was asking for money. The blind man nodded, reached into his pocket, and took out some coins, dropping them into the grimy, outstretched hand. The beggar touched his cap in gratitude, his thanks following the blind man as he walked on.

  Watching this interaction, I’d nearly forgot my letter, and made haste to walk on to speak to the desk clerk. I was halfway there when I all but collided with Roger Ellis coming out of a small parlor just off Reception. I wondered for a fraction of a second if he’d been in a position to overhear my telephone conversation.

  “Going somewhere?” he asked, and I knew then that from the parlor window he must also have seen the occupant of Bluebell Cottage walking down the street.

  “Yes,” I told him. “I was in a hurry to mail this letter before it was time to meet you.” I held up the envelope, addressed and sealed but without a stamp. “Do you suppose we could stop at the post office?”

  I watched him scan the address. “Of course,” he said, and we moved outside again into the chill December. He opened the door of his motorcar for me, and I noticed over his shoulder that the blind man had disappeared from view. But I saw the beggar stopping another man in front of the pub farther along the street.

  We paused at the post office, I purchased a stamp, and my letter was dropped into His Majesty’s red post box. We drove back to the main street and headed toward the Forest. We had nearly reached the outskirts of Hartfield when we both saw the occupant of Bluebell Cottage about to cross the street. But Roger Ellis hadn’t slowed his speed, and I thought for a moment he intended to knock the man down. Someone just behind the blind man caught his arm and spoke to him, and then we were past.

  “That was cruel,” I snapped. “You could have hurt him.”

  “I doubt it. I’ve had a feeling his vision has improved more than he was willing to acknowledge. I’ve watched him walk through the town before this, and he has an uncanny ability to avoid obstacles.”

  “Why should he lie? It’s familiarity that guides him, and remembering the number of steps to this or that place. Besides, however good his vision may be, what right do you have to test it by frightening the man?”

  “Yes, all right, I’m sorry,” Ellis said. “I thought when you first came through the hotel door with that letter in your hand that you were taking it across to his cottage. I was angry.”

  “I showed it to you. It was to my parents.”

  “But you just spoke to them on the telephone, did you not?”

  Exasperated, I said, “I did. And I promised my mother I’d write a note as well. Do you know where that telephone is? Hardly the place for a private conversation of any kind. How could I tell her that I was worried about Lydia having a concussion, without also telling the entire village as well?”

  “I apologize,” he said again. “It’s my shoulder. It hurts like the devil in this weather and after a while it begins to make me short-tempered.”

  I didn’t know if that were true or an excuse for his behavior. I said only, “Where were you wounded?” Lydia had told me it had happened soon after he reached France.

  “Near Mons. It’s healed well enough, and I have full use of it again. But it’s an excellent barometer. I’m told there are still several shards of shrapnel they couldn’t reach without doing more damage.”

  “Yes, that’s often a problem,” I agreed. “Although I’m told the American Base Hospital in Rouen has an X-ray machine that allows them to locate shrapnel exactly and that makes the surgery far less invasive. I don’t know whether your shoulder will improve with time or not. But you might speak to someone there if it continues to trouble you.” It was a professional assessment, not meant as a personal judgment.

  “I’ll manage,” he retorted.

  “Yes, I’m sure you will,” I answered, biting my tongue. Lydia was right about the fact that this man was moody and unpredictable. I let the silence between us lengthen.

  I was glad to see the turning for Vixen Hill as we came down the muddy track, bouncing and shuddering in the ruts. It couldn’t have helped either Roger Ellis’s shoulder or his disposition.

  I went directly to my room, took off my hat and coat, and sat down by the window for a moment. Trying to imagine how the knot garden must look in summer helped to take the edge off my own mood. It seemed to me that Lydia and her husband had lost the happiness that must have marked the beginning of their marriage, and I wasn’t sure they could find their way back to it now. But at least now I could better understand her reluctance to come home on her own. And I pitied both of them. What troubled me was whether my presence aggravated Roger Ellis’s sullenness for reasons I couldn’t quite fathom, or if something else was bothering him.

  With a sigh I rose from the window to look in on Lydia. But before I could open my door there was a light tap, and then Lydia stepped in.

  “Roger is looking decidedly sheepish. What did you say to him?”

  I thought about our conversations, about the occupant of Bluebell Cottage, and Roger Ellis’s suspicious nature. Hardly something I could pass on to Lydia.

  Instead I said, “I’d written a brief note to my mother, and when yo
ur husband saw it in my hand, he thought I was carrying a message from you to the occupant of Bluebell Cottage. By the time he realized his mistake, I could see that he was more than a little jealous. Have you given him cause to be?”

  She threw up her hands in disgust. “That’s Gran’s doing. I volunteered to read to Davis Merrit. In fact, it was Mr. Harris, the rector, who asked if I had the time to come and read to him. And I’ll be honest, I enjoyed it. He’s an interesting man—Lieutenant Merrit—and the books he chooses interest me as well. Gran disapproves, and it was she who put the idea into Roger’s head that there might be more to those weekly afternoons than meets the eye. No, I’m not in love with Davis. Nor he with me. I suppose we’re both lonely, and there’s comfort in companionship. Such as it is.”

  But sometimes loneliness led to something more. And pity could change to compassion, and compassion to love. Still, if it was true that Gran had made more of a kindness than was justified by the facts, it would have been wise for Lydia to see less of Merrit for the time being.

  I said as much, and she replied, “Yes, I expect you’re right. But it seemed unnecessarily cruel to Davis to punish him just because such things were very different in Gran’s day. After all, we don’t meet in the cottage, we sit in the Rectory or sometimes he arranges for a parlor at The King’s Head. It’s all very proper.”

  “I’ve seen him, Lydia. He’s rather attractive. And you’re vulnerable, with Roger away for so many years.”

  She glared at me. “If I were intending to have an affair,” she said, the ring of truth in her voice, “I’d look for someone in London. Far away from Ashdown Forest. Davis is the frying pan to Roger’s fire.”

  “You knew what the heath was like, didn’t you? When you married Roger?”

  “I thought I did. Roger had brought me here before we were married, and of course I was in love and this was his home. I hadn’t seen it in the depths of winter.” She smiled at a memory. “On my first visit, I found a nest of mice under a gorse bush. Tiny things, hardly as big as my thumb. I watched them for a quarter of an hour. It seemed magical. I’d never found mice in Bury St. Edmunds.”

  I laughed. “No, I expect not. Shall we go? Mrs. Ellis must be waiting for me to help with the bed in the blue room. I promised we’d see to it as soon as I returned from Hartfield.”

  “Yes, and I’ve left the silver teapot half polished.” She sighed. “Alan wouldn’t have cared for all this fuss, but I know how much it means to his mother. And it’s given her something to keep her mind occupied.” She shivered. “You’d have liked Alan, Bess. He could make you laugh at nothing, and he had the loveliest baritone voice. It was a pleasure to listen to him sing.” As we walked toward the stairs, she added, “Before he went to join his ship in 1914, he put all his affairs in order. I wondered if he had a premonition that he might not be coming back.”

  The first of the guests were expected in time for tea. It was a little later than that when I heard a motorcar on the drive. By the time I’d looked out, I couldn’t see who had arrived. I smiled to myself, thinking that it was too soon for the Colonel Sahib to appear in full dress uniform and a battalion of Household Cavalry at his back. Or at the very least prepared to deploy the full force of his charm. It could be formidable.

  A few moments later, Daisy, flushed with excitement, hurried into the library where I was folding the ironed table linens on the wide desk there to tell me that someone had called to see me.

  “To see me?” I repeated. The Colonel Sahib after all.

  But it was Simon standing in the hall.

  “I should have known. Wild horses couldn’t have kept you away. I’m sorry that you’ve made the journey for nothing. I spoke to my mother this morning. I won’t be coming home until Sunday.”

  “I was sent for from Sandhurst,” he said, and I knew not to ask why. “I stopped at Mrs. Hennessey’s when I got back to London, and read your message. Knowing you, I asked her to pack several dresses for you to wear for dinner. According to her, you’d brought only one with you.”

  “Did Mother tell you I was staying over?”

  He laughed. “She didn’t need to tell me. I had a feeling you’d succumb to pleading. All right, where shall I take your fripperies?”

  “You only came to be sure this wasn’t a den of iniquity,” I retorted. But I was inordinately glad to see him.

  We carried the valise up the stairs to my room, and as he walked into it he said, “Much more cheerful than the hall.”

  “Yes, I thought so as well.” We deposited the valise by the wardrobe.

  He glanced at the open door, then crossed the room to close it.

  “Are you all right, Bess? You know nothing about these people, after all.”

  “Apparently Lydia’s father-in-law had met the Colonel Sahib out in India. That practically makes me one of the family.”

  He smiled but wasn’t put off by my humor.

  “You can’t manage all this”—his hand swept over the two valises, the one I’d taken with me and the one he’d brought—“on a train. I’ll come for you. Or the Colonel will. Is there a telephone here in the house?”

  “No. I put in the call from The King’s Head in Hartfield. Mrs. Ellis has offered to send me home with her son. Or failing that, a family friend, George something, will take me to London.”

  I could tell he wasn’t happy about that, but he said nothing. I explained about the concussion, and he nodded. With a final look around the room, he opened the door, and I led him back to the hall. Lydia was there, and Roger.

  Simon greeted her like an old friend, although I could tell he was silently taking note of the progression of the bruise on her face. Roger flushed a little as Simon turned to him. Lydia made the introductions and said, “We dined with Mr. Brandon while I was in London.”

  It had been a lunch, but I said nothing.

  “Indeed,” Roger Ellis replied as the two men shook hands.

  “I’ll be off, then,” Simon said. “I’ll tell your mother, shall I, that everything was to your liking?”

  We hadn’t opened the valises. He meant the situation. “Yes, please. And give her my love. I’ll see her at the end of the weekend.”

  He put a comradely hand on my shoulder, a warning I thought to Roger Ellis not to lay a hand on me if he were in the mood to attack women. Then he bade us farewell and was gone out the door. As I heard the motorcar turn in the drive and head for the track through the forest, I felt alone somehow.

  “How long have you known Brandon?” Captain Ellis was asking.

  “Simon? All of my life, I expect. I can’t recall a time when he wasn’t there. He was in my father’s regiment.”

  “A military man, is he?” I knew what he was asking: Why wasn’t Simon in uniform? He was young enough to fight.

  “Retired,” I said simply. “He serves now at the discretion of the War Office.” Turning to Lydia, I said, “I think we’ve done everything on Mrs. Ellis’s list. Should we go up now and change?”

  “Yes, that’s a very good idea. It was nice of Mr. Brandon to bring what you needed. But I would have gladly let you borrow something.”

  Mrs. Ellis came in at that moment and said, “There you are, Roger, my dear. Would you mind running over to the Lanyon farm and asking them to deliver more wood, if they have it? Just to be sure we don’t run short. And that reminds me, I need another dozen eggs. I expect I ought to take the other motorcar and beg Janet Smyth for whatever she has to spare.” She turned to me. “Bess, would you and Lydia mind coming back down here and keeping an eye open for George? He should have been here three-quarters of an hour ago.”

  “He probably stopped at The King’s Head,” Roger said under his breath, but Mrs. Ellis caught the remark.

  “Be a little generous, my dear,” she admonished her son.

  By the time we had returned to the hall, I could hear a motorcar coming up the drive.

  To everyone’s surprise, it was Henry, grinning from ear to ear. Margaret rushed into
his arms with a cry of joy, and then clung to him, as if afraid he’d fly away if she let him go.

  Henry, an artillery officer, was dark and slim, a contrast to Margaret’s fairness, but I saw a nervous tic by his left eye. I found myself wondering if he had come by this leave medically, when a doctor took note of the early signs of exhaustion and stress.

  Soon afterward Alan’s widow arrived, accompanied by her brother, Thomas Joyner, a quiet man with a Naval beard and little to say for himself. He had lost an arm when his cruiser was torpedoed, and was now posted to the Admiralty. We had several friends in common, and he seemed to relax as we talked.

  Finally, George Hughes arrived. From the flush on his face I couldn’t help but think that Roger Ellis was right—he’d stopped in Hartfield for a little Dutch courage. But whatever he’d had to drink there, he was cold sober now. As he turned to greet us, his impeccable uniform was splashed with blood, and across his forehead was a bruised area that was also bleeding, as if he’d struck his head hard against something. The knuckles on one hand were badly scraped. Mrs. Ellis had returned by that time, and he apologized immediately for the delay as she broke off her greeting to stare at his face.

  “But George, what on earth happened—?” she asked.

  “I’m all right, although the motorcar is a little the worse for wear. That bend in the road—you know it? After that long straightaway? I came around it and there was a dead tree toppled directly in my path.”

  “A tree? George, there aren’t any trees just there.”

  “I know. All I could think of was that it had fallen from a cart carrying wood. I can tell you I was damn—very lucky. I think Roger and I ought to move it before someone else comes to grief. I tried, but I didn’t have any rope in the motorcar. It would take that to budge it.”

  “By all means! He’s just coming down. George, this is Sister Crawford, a friend of Lydia’s here for the weekend. You’ll allow her to look at your forehead, won’t you? And what about your ribs? Did you strike the steering wheel? Did you do any damage there? I’d hate to think—they’ve only just begun to heal.”