UPON RETURNING TO the office, Maisie threw her coat across her desk, dragged a cushion from the one armchair, pulled her dress up above her knees, and sat cross-legged on the floor. Calm down, calm down, calm. . . . She repeated the mantra over and over again. She was appalled at herself, disgusted by her outburst. She might occasionally speak stridently where her work was concerned, and of course there was the argument with Maurice last year, but she had never, ever, taken a comment with such passion. Clearly Priscilla did not mean to insult her. Her friend’s confidence in their friendship allowed her to speak honestly, though she knew her error and apologized immediately. Why did she affect me so? Maisie breathed deeply, keen to compose herself before taking Billy’s telephone call.
As if on cue, the telephone rang. Maisie came to her feet, brushed down her dress, and reached for the receiver.
“Billy?”
“That you, Miss?” The line crackled.
“Of course it’s me.”
“Sorry, only you didn’t say the number—took me by surprise, it did.”
“What’s happening?”
“I wish I could tell you all of it, but the cat’s been put among the pigeons down ’ere, and if this goes on—”
“If what goes on?”
“Two lads from Shoreditch—’op pickers—’ave been nicked for burglary and vandalism up at the big house on the estate. They say they were just outside the gates trying to get at conkers to get a game going, but there were broken windows and some silver’s missing so they’ve been taken into custody. All the Londoners are up in arms about it, Mr. Dickon just wants the ’ops picked, and everyone reckons it was them bleedin’ gypsies what done it, which don’t make it easy for me and Doreen.”
“I’m not following you.”
“We’d not been ’ere five minutes when Doreen passes one of the gypsy women with a little girl, right little cracker, just like our Lizzie, apart from the fact she’s got curly black ’air. So, even though Doreen can barely understand a word the woman’s saying, she stops to pass the time of day when they go to the tap for water, and she takes ahold of the baby—Boosul’s ’er name; what kind of a name is that?—and so she’s looked upon kindly by the gypsies. Nothin’ wrong with that, but now me own kind are turning, callin’ us gypsy kin.”
“Boosul means beautiful. It’s a kind of slang, a derivation of the word over the years.”
“ ’ow do you know that, Miss?”
“I’ve heard it before. What else is going on?”
“The locals are a funny lot, make no mistake. And it’s not as if I’m a stranger to this sort of goings-on, but these people are another thing altogether. The ones out ’ere pickin’ are sayin’ they didn’t see anything, but are pointin’ the finger at us anyway and at the same time sayin’ they don’t want the filthy pikeys on the farm neither.”
“Sounds like rather a mess to me, and not helped by a lot of unrest among the warring tribes, so to speak.”
“You’d’ve thought we got over that when the Vikings left.” He paused. “And it’s worse than you think, Miss. These boys could be sent down for a year or more. That Sandermere bloke is askin’ for the maximum penalty—as an example, so ’e says. And the man also said there’ve been threats sent to ’im, so the police’ve been crawling all over the place. I think you should come down, Miss. There’s no one to look out for these lads—only youngsters they are, too young to weather bein’ put away. I know their families, they’re good people, and they put in a good day’s work every day for the sake of their own. You’ve got the right words, if you know what I mean. You can talk to solicitors and the police, help speak up for the lads—and you’re a Londoner. You’ll be trusted.”
Maisie sighed. She’d hoped the investigation for James Compton might be easier than this, but as it stood there were complications before the ink was dry on the contract. She reflected on the fact that, in her work, the seemingly straightforward cases were often anything but. “Alright, I’ll drive down tomorrow morning, straight to the farm. I can stay with my father at Chelstone for a few nights. It should only take me about three quarters of an hour to get there from Heronsdene.”
The call ended. Maisie replaced the receiver and returned to her cushion. She decided that, on her way out of London tomorrow morning, she would leave a note for Priscilla at the Dorchester’s reception desk, apologizing for her outburst. And she would also pen something to Margaret Lynch, though she would take care with the composing of such a letter. Having made her plans, she closed her eyes, and an image of her grandmother came to mind, as it had during the conversation with Billy. She remembered her mother laughing as her father lifted her from the horse-drawn cart that brought them from the station to her grandparents’ cottage alongside the lock. Her grandmother’s gray hair, which was once as jet as her own and her mother’s hair, was drawn back in a long braid. And though her clothes were much like those of other women of the time, she wore rings of gold in her ears, rings that Maisie’s fingers sought out as soon as she was swept into her grandmother’s arms, always to the same refrain: “Oh, my boosul girl, my boosul little girl, come to see the old old aunt.”
THREE
Maisie loved driving, loved the feel of the wind in her hair when the weather was sufficiently fine to draw back the MG’s roof, as it was today. There might be a nip of autumn on the breeze first thing in the morning, but the days were balmy, a pleasant warmth with a low sun in the sky that glinted across newly harvested fields as she made her way toward Heronsdene.
Taking the road from Tunbridge Wells to Lamberhurst, she turned at the sign for Heronsdene and slowed to a crawl when she came to the village, the road flanked by a variety of architecture, from medieval cottages to terraced houses built in Victoria’s reign. On her left, the beamed exterior of the local inn looked warm and inviting, and farther along to the right a Norman church stood buffeted by the wind as it whipped up the hill from Horsmonden. There was an assortment of small shops, a butcher, a general store, a hardware shop, and—in the middle of the street close to the church—a war memorial. The road had been divided and rerouted to accommodate this monument, erected to honor the men and boys of the village who lost their lives in the years 1914-1918.
To the left, there was a gap at the end of a row of detached buildings where Maisie might have expected to see another house, or even a shop, but the area was overgrown with weeds and a few clumps of Michaelmas daisies. The daisies were abundant at this time of year, growing along railway lines and on waste ground, and they brought color to an otherwise dull corner of the village. The road intersected here, with a sign to Dickon’s Farm indicating a turn to the left.
Maisie swung the car in the direction of the farm, passing freshly picked hop-gardens on her right. The overhead lines from which strings had been woven in spring, up and down, up and down, for the young hops to grow into fully fledged bines, were empty now, with perhaps a lone sprig of hops left high on the wire. Piles of spent bines lay in heaps, the pickers having moved on to the next hop-garden.
Pulling into the farm, Maisie parked the motor car off to the side of the rough road and went ahead on foot. The last thing she wanted was an expensive repair to the underbelly of her beloved MG. She’d prepared for such an outing, wearing a walking skirt of heavy linen with kick pleats front and back, a pair of stout shoes, and a cotton blouse the color of nutmeg. She carried a knapsack in which she’d packed sandwiches, a cardigan, a wedge of index cards tied with string, and a notebook and pen. She’d tucked a small drawstring pouch containing some tiny tools into the front compartment of her knapsack, and her Victorinox knife was nestled in the pocket of her skirt.
She walked on along the sandy farm road, stopping when she came to the oast house. A trailer of filled-to-the-brim hop-pokes was being unloaded, carried in one by one for the hops to be dried in the kiln before being packed in pokes once again and sent to the breweries. The “reek”—a pungent aroma of fresh and drying hops mixed with sulfur—filled the air, a
nd Maisie watched for a few minutes before calling to one of the men.
“Excuse me, but can you direct me to the hop-gardens being picked now?”
The man stretched his back as he answered, taking off his flat cap and wiping his brow with a hop-stained handkerchief. “They’re in Railway and Folly—all the hop-gardens have names. Railway runs alongside the railway lines, as you might have thought. Follow this road on for another half a mile, walk through the unpicked garden on your left, and you’ll find it. Folly is on the other side of this road. Pass two hop-gardens on your right, and it’s the third one you come to.” He replaced his cap while taking her measure as he continued. “Looking for anyone in partic’lar?”
“Yes, I am, Mr. and Mrs. Beale and their family—Billy Beale.”
“Fair-headed going on ginger? Got a bit of a gammy leg?”
“That’s him.”
“Railway. He’s working there with some other Londoners at the top. Gyppos are at the bottom working their way up, so mind where you go.”
Maisie was about to speak but, reflecting upon yesterday’s meeting with Priscilla, thought better of it, adding, “I have nothing to fear—and thank you. I am sure I shall find Mr. and Mrs. Beale with no trouble at all.”
The man shrugged and shook his head as she walked on, raising her face to the sun to feel the soft warmth on her skin. The hop-garden named for the railway was easy to locate, helped, in this instance, by a train passing. Puffs of coal-laced steam bursting up through the trees provided a marker for Maisie to follow, and soon she was walking along a row of hop-pickers, whole families gathered around a stretcher-length bin made of wood and sacking that could be moved on as they picked. Normally, she would expect to hear laughter, the odd voice calling out, “What about this one?” and the sing-song that followed to pass the day.
She remembered her father’s stories of his boyhood, often told as they sat next to the cast-iron kitchen stove on her afternoon off from work, the warmth of both his voice and the coals soothing her. These were the stories he shared in the months following her mother’s death, and she wondered, now, if in speaking of his childhood he had been anchored in some way, or perhaps he wanted to draw out her own years of innocence, now that at the age of thirteen she was working long days below stairs at the Ebury Place mansion of Lord Julian Compton and his wife, Lady Rowan. Frankie Dobbs had told of the jokes shared while picking and laughed when recounting the way opinions on the way of the world were exchanged or a jocular back-and-forth interrupted when a wail signaling that a small child—put down to nap on a coat draped across a pile of old hop-bines—had woken from sleep.
Today, though, the temper of the folk picking hops was subdued. For several moments Maisie stood at the edge of the hop-garden, watching, wondering, gauging, for she felt their anger touch her as if their depression were solid, a rain cloud formed of concrete. She continued on; twice she stopped to ask for Billy, each time to be told she was nearly there, he was just along the row, and a hop-stained finger would be pointed in his direction.
Finally, she saw them: Billy and Doreen leaning over the bin picking hops with speed and dexterity, and Billy’s aging mother, her arthritis-gnarled fingers taking leaves off a sprig of hops, then using a hand to shuck the clean hops into the bin. The boys, Billy and Bobby, picked into an old laundry basket, which, when full, would be tipped into the bin. Every little bit helped, especially with piecework. Billy drew back his sleeve and checked his watch, then spoke to his wife, who looked around. As Maisie approached them, she heard a deep voice call across the hop-garden, “Get yer ’ops ready!” And each family picked with greater speed, the children being called to pull leaves from the bin, for the farmer wouldn’t accept hops that weren’t clean.
“Miss!” Billy looked up as Maisie approached. “Just give me a minute, the tallyman’s on ’is way and these boys’ve put in more leaves than they’ve taken out, I should say.”
“I’ll help,” said Maisie, setting down her knapsack and rolling up her sleeves. She greeted Doreen with a smile and rested a hand on her arm for a second, mindful of the bond formed between them when little Lizzie died. Then she set to work. There were six pairs of arms in the bin now, with hands seeking out the rough, prickly leaves for which the farmer would issue a reprimand.
With the tallyman only two bins away, Billy said, “Right, that’s it. I reckon we’ve got ’em all out,” and leaned away to look along the row, his lips silently following the counting. Maisie inspected her hands, already stained after only a few minutes, then watched the tallyman at work.
“And-a-one . . . and-a-two . . . and-a-three. . . .” He would plunge his measuring basket into the bin and out would come a frothy bushel of fresh green hops, which he slung into a hop poke held at the ready by another man; then in went the basket again. “And-a-four . . . and-a-five. . . .”
Maisie saw that as the tallyman approached it wasn’t just Billy—everyone was watching, counting along with the counting, making sure that no one was shorted, that the tallyman not only counted without favoring some with a less-than-full basket but that the correct number was entered in the picker’s book. And then he moved on. When he reached Billy’s bin, Maisie closed her eyes, the full peppery smell of hops enveloping her as the counting began, stirring up pollen and dust and almost banishing the mood that had seeped up under her skin when she walked into the hop-garden.
“Nice lot today, Mr. Beale. Nice picking indeed.” The tallyman handed Billy’s book back to him and moved on, parting the wave of workers as he approached the next bin. “And-a-one . . . and-a-two. . . .”
“Right, Miss, let’s go and brew up a cuppa. Got someone I want you to meet on the way.” He nodded to Doreen, who returned his gesture, and then moved on through the rows of pickers. Maisie followed, her knapsack across her shoulder. Billy stopped at a bin close to the edge of the hop-garden, calling across to the man of the family, “George, over ’ere. Come and ’ave a chat with Miss Dobbs, the lady I was tellin’ you about.”
George touched the peak of his cap. “Right you are.”
Maisie noticed the shadows under the man’s eyes, at a time when he should have seemed a little more carefree. He reminded her of her father, with his shirtsleeves rolled up above the elbow, a jaunty waistcoat, and a red kerchief tied at the neck. But his demeanor revealed concern, worry, and—-she hated to see such an emotion—a melancholy that suggested defeat.
Introductions were made, and the trio walked toward the hopper huts, where Billy started a paraffin stove and set a kettle on to boil. As she waited, seated outside on an old chair, Maisie looked into the hut. It comprised one small room, a bed at the far end and another along one side. She suspected that the younger boy, Bobby, slept with Billy and Doreen, and the elder with Billy’s mother. Opposite the second bed, a washstand held an enamel ewer and bowl, and in the middle a whitewashed table was set with an embroidered cloth and a vase of Michaelmas daisies. The inside of the hut was neat and clean, with the hopping furniture brought from the Beales’ cellar and painted each year before the family left London for Kent.
“George, you tell Miss Dobbs ’ere what went on with your Arthur and Joe.”
George placed his cap on one knee and reached for the tin cup filled with strong scalding tea that Billy passed to him. He blew across the top to cool the liquid, then set the mug on the ground at his feet. As Maisie watched him, she knew he was buying time, perhaps composing the story in such a way as to shed the light of innocence on his sons—she assumed the boys in question were his.
” ’appened Monday. Only been down ’ere three days, we ’ad. We finished pickin’ at four on the dot, after the last tally, then come back to wash and start a bit o’ grub going.” He pointed to a low brick building with a chimney at one end intersecting the hopper huts. “Me and the wife, Audrey, we was in the cook ’ouse—we’d both ’ad a bit of a sluice to get the dust off our ’ands and faces and left the boys to do the same. They’re good boys, but they’d been talking
all day about the chestnut trees this side of the fence around the Sandermere place—you know what boys are when it comes to a game of conkers. All they want to do is find the biggest conker, polish it up, bake it ’ard, polish it again, and see ’ow many times it’ll last when it’s whacked by another lad’s conker.” He picked up his tea, blew across the rim of the mug again, and sipped. Then he drank several more gulps before turning to Maisie once more. “Me missus calls ’em for their tea. No answer. Then again. So out I went lookin’ for the little whatsits—they’re twelve and thirteen, out of school and workin’, but that don’t make no difference, they’re still young lads.” He sat upright, held out one hand, palm up for emphasis, and continued. “Next thing I know, I’m standin’ under a tree full of conkers, and there they are, in the old cuffs, off with two coppers who’re sayin’ they’re bein’ nicked for breakin’ and enterin’, theft and malicious damage. The poor little sods are in tears, but that don’t make no difference. And there’s that Sandermere, mister ’igh-and-bleedin’-mighty, sayin’ it’ll be a lesson to them, bein’ put away, goin’ down for a few years.” George pressed his chest before speaking again. “My Audrey took a turn, dropped to ’er knees when I broke the news. All we want is to go back to the Smoke now, get away from all this—but we need the money, and we can’t get away with the boys in clink.”
Maisie nodded, remaining silent for a moment, mainly to gather her thoughts but also to allow the man to say more, if he should need to. When she spoke, it was with a soft voice, measured and slow. “George, I must ask you this question, so please do not be offended, but what evidence do you have that it was not your sons and what evidence do the police have that it was?”
“I know my sons, miss!” The man stood up, dropping his tea as he came to his feet.
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