Another five minutes later, Maisie ran from the church, and took her seat in the motor car. Lawrence pushed down on the accelerator, and was soon driving at speed. He never said another word to Maisie, and she said nothing to him. At the landing field, the Lysander’s engine was already running. Maisie leaped from the motor car, followed by Lawrence, who helped her clamber on board. She did not look back, did not offer thanks, but as the aircraft took off into the air, she looked down and waved before the Lysander merged into the clouds.
It was on that flight home to England, as the coastline came into view, that Maisie wondered whether Father Bonhomme’s very name had dictated his path into the church. Bonhomme—good man. As far as Maisie was concerned, in a moment of difficult choice, he had been a very good man.
Chapter 18
“I’m glad to see you, miss—I was worried sick. I mean, I guessed you were going over there on the QT, but all the same, I’ve been on the edge of my seat.” Billy looked at his watch. “You’re later than I expected.”
“I’m back now, and I’ve an important telephone call or two to make,” said Maisie.
Billy pushed back his chair and stood up, grasping his notebook. “Miss, I think I’ve found her—the old lady who was with the little girl.”
Maisie stopped at the threshold of her office, endeavoring to compose her features to reflect excitement, and not the dread she felt upon hearing Billy’s words. She turned to Billy. “That’s wonderful news. Well done. Come in, tell me what you’ve discovered.”
The case map was already laid out, but neither Maisie nor Billy looked at it. They took their usual chairs alongside the table. Maisie turned to Billy.
“I reckon she’s the one,” said Billy. “I went to all the hospitals she could possibly have gone to, though I think she’s a woman in St. Giles’ Hospital. Apparently when she came in, she gave her name as Louisa Mason, from an address in Camberwell—more about that in a minute. Gave her age as sixty years old, and widowed. She said she had no dependents—and I’ll come back to that too, in a minute. She’s in a special ward, as she’s got some sort of lung disease. It’s not consumption, but it’s serious—very serious—all the same. She hasn’t got long. I asked the nurse what ‘not long’ meant, because it’s not exactly a medical term, now is it? She said, ‘Weeks, not months.’ I said to her, ‘So about three weeks, then?’ and she said it was hard to say, but three weeks sounded about right, perhaps a bit longer or shorter. I managed to get Mrs. Mason’s address—they weren’t going to let me have it, but I just told them the truth, that I was looking for an elderly lady who’d been seen putting a little girl on an evacuee train, and the child is in a bit of a state, and we need to find the woman. All right, so I over-egged the puddin’ when it came to describing Anna’s distress, but it did the job. The nurse in charge let me peer over the notes, and I caught the address straight off. So I went down there, to Rye Grove—she had two rooms and a scullery in a terrace house there, with the WC outside, like they all have.”
Billy paused, in case Maisie had questions, but she nodded for him to continue.
“It’s not exactly London in its prime, if you know what I mean. But I spoke to a neighbor who saw me looking and called me over—she thought I might be from the Ministry of Health or something like that.” Billy raked his hands through his hair as he studied his notes. “Here’s what I got from the neighbor, a Mrs. Headley. The old lady lived in the house—her rooms, that is—with the little girl. It used to be just her and her daughter, Mary. The father died when Mary was about thirteen—and already looking twenty, by the sound of it. And I say ‘died,’ but apparently the father topped himself—hadn’t been right since he came home, after the war.” Billy paused. “Are you sure you haven’t got any questions yet, miss?”