“Are you all right, Billy?” asked Maisie, after the Alvis was parked and they had set off along the track.
“It’s these old roads that get the leg a bit, but otherwise, yeah, I’ll be all right.” Billy looked across to another hop garden as he stopped to rub his lower leg, where shrapnel shards from his 1917 wounding remained embedded deep in his flesh. “It’s mostly women who come down to do the hopping now, so I reckon any blokes out here are old soldiers like me, and more than a few with a fair bit of shrapnel in them. Best not to moan.”
Maisie slowed to allow for Billy’s limp, now more apparent on the uneven ground. They found Harrington hop garden, and after two inquiries, located Leonard Peterson, sitting next to a young woman on a hop bin. He wore faded olive-green corduroy trousers, a collarless shirt with the sleeves rolled up above the elbow, a brown weskit, and a patterned neckerchief. Atop his head he wore a flat cap. Two older women picked alongside them, and a child of no more than three years of age sat on the ground, picking a sprig of hops into a wicker laundry basket.
Maisie established that the man was indeed Leonard Peterson, and asked him if she might have a word in private, regarding an old friend of his.
He shrugged and agreed, pointing across to coppiced woodland flanking the hop garden. Peterson pulled a half-smoked cigarette and a box of matches from his weskit pocket as he walked through a tunnel of hop bines ready to be picked, Maisie and Billy in his wake. When they reached the side of the wood, Peterson lit his cigarette and returned the box of matches to his pocket.
“What can I do for you? You with the police? You look official,” said Peterson.
Maisie looked at Billy. Peterson’s accent seemed pure London.
“Mr. Peterson, I am grateful for your time. I realize you’re a newlywed and probably want to spend time with your wife, but—”
“Don’t worry—it’s nice to get away from my mother-in-law and my wife’s sister and her boy. Gave me a nice break, you coming along.”
“Oh, dear,” said Maisie. “But just so we don’t waste your time, may I ask if you were originally known as Lucas Peeters?”
Peterson’s stance changed. He stood more upright, his shoulders drawn back. Maisie knew the doubt he’d shown had been replaced by a readiness to fight—with his fists, if need be.
“We’re not from the government, or the police, or from any authorities that might do you harm, Mr. Peterson.” She did not take a step back, but tempered her breath so that her body became relaxed. Billy did the same. Peterson’s body seemed to soften. He took another draw on the cigarette, blowing smoke to the side as he exhaled.
“What do you want, then?”
“You came here to England when you were, what? Fourteen years of age?”
“About that.”
“And you left your family in Belgium.”
“Yes.”
“And you never wanted to go back.”
Peterson shook his head. “Got used to it here. Started a little plumbing business a few year ago, and I’ve done well for meself.” He did not render “year” into a plural—Maisie thought he sounded even more like a Londoner.
“Do you know Frederick Addens, Albert Durant, and Carl Firmin?”
“Didn’t keep in touch, but I knew them. Not well—they were a bit older than me, and it counts at that age.”
“But you came to this country with them.”
“I ended up with them. It’s not as if we were a little gang. I was on a boat at the same time as them, and we were placed together for a bit. Worked on a farm the first summer, and then that was it. Not seen them since.” He drew on his cigarette again, pinched off the burning end, and placed the small stub back into his pocket. “Why? What’ve they done? Robbed a bank?”
“They’re all dead, Mr. Peterson.”
Peterson’s color heightened, then drained, and for a brief second, Maisie thought he might faint.
“Dead? What happened? They catch something?”
“Addens and Durant were likely assassinated, and Firmin was possibly also a victim, but it was originally assumed he’d taken his own life.”
Peterson looked from Maisie to Billy. “You reckon I’m next on the list, don’t you?”
“It’s a risk, Mr. Peterson—I can’t deny the possibility. It depends upon what you know.”
“What I know about what?”
Maisie looked at the ground, drew breath, and brought her attention back to Peterson. “Addens. Durant. Firmin. What do you know about them?”
“Well, they were tight. But what can I say? They knew each other well, I think, but beyond that, we were all scared, tired, fed up, and wondering if we’d be allowed into England. The Germans were marching, and—well, I know those boys had something to worry about, now I come to think about it. I can’t remember much, to tell you the truth, but I think it had to do with a bloke called Bertrand.”
“Christian name or surname?” asked Billy.
“Surname. Don’t know the Christian name.”