“We hadn’t set one.” Thomason fiddled with an empty coffee cup, his thumb looped through the handle. Agnes was afraid the delicate china might break, he was so tense. He took a few short, deep breaths and seemed near to tears, then he spoke in a burst. “Sod it. We weren’t absolutely engaged. I asked her and she wanted time to decide. She was worried about my parents. I think I’d made them sound too cold, and told her too many stories about my sisters locked up there in the north, ready to marry men just like my father. Maybe she thought I would change once we were married. She knew that I would eventually inherit Harley House, but I promised that we could always live in London. I swore to her we would stay there, but maybe she was right, maybe I would have changed my mind and wanted to live on the estate once it was mine.” He turned to Vallotton, his voice shaky. “You understand. Why can’t it be both ways? Who wouldn’t want to live there? I would go back and make my mark and I wouldn’t have to be like my father. She and I could have put our own stamp on the place. But she was worried, she wanted time, and I gave her that time and now she’s dead and I know we would have been married. I know she would have said yes.”
Anguish aged his face and for a moment it appeared that he would lose control, but he placed the tips of his fingers on the edge of the dining table and focused on them. He took a deep breath and blinked several times then looked at Agnes. She hesitated and felt Vallotton shift in his chair. She knew what he wanted; they had to tell Thomason the rest, they couldn’t justify keeping these details from him. Thomason had to be near thirty, but she could tell that he had lived a sheltered life and for him love was simple and sweet. This would be the final blow to his innocence. This would in some ways be worse than death. She drew a deep steadying breath.
“The local police in Britain have spoken with Felicity’s parents and her sister.” Agnes spoke forcefully, but was careful to keep her voice emotionless. “I’m sure the family will want to meet you once you return. They had been estranged from Courtney—that was her birth name—for years, at least a decade. They don’t know anything about her life in London. The news of the promise of a happy future with you will be a double-edged sword. Sorrow for what is lost, tempered by the thought that their daughter had the chance at happiness.” She doubted Courtney’s family and the young man in front of her would find anything in common, but it wasn’t for her to decide.
Thomason’s face drained to white with shock. Petit shifted in his chair as if preparing to catch the other man if he collapsed. Agnes knew she had to ask Thomason about the baby.
“How … who…” Thomason’s words were choked and barely audible. He shoved away from the table, his chair falling backward. Some deeply ingrained reflex made him apologize to Vallotton, then he abruptly fled the room. Vallotton glanced at Agnes, then walked after the young man.
Agnes watched Petit close his notebook carefully.
“I’ll go check the tunnel now if you don’t need me anymore,” he said.
She nodded, wondering if he was getting too strong a lesson in the possible pitfalls of parenting. Alone she picked up a heavy silver knife and balanced it in her hand, thinking that her heart was so heavy she could understand how an end to suffering was appealing.
Twenty-four
“This trip gets more and more interesting,” Doctor Blanchard said, pulling on his outdoor gear. “What you need is a forensic pathologist, but you also needed a regular pathologist so I’m as good at standing in for one as for the other. Actually, I’m a bit more interested in this problem. Occasionally people find bones in the woods or in a field in my village and they need to know the story. Usually animal bones.” Coat, hat, and gloves in place, he decided he needed a last sip of hot coffee. Agnes didn’t blame him and tried to stem her impatience. She was so tired she thought she would fall asleep if she sat down, but more coffee was out of the question. Her hands were nearly shaking with caffeine.
“’Course then they have a question because there’s only one or two specimens. I think anyone would recognize a whole cow if they found it.” Blanchard snorted a laugh. “Bones are interesting when you start to compare the diets and other factors that—”
Before he could get too far into his lecture, Agnes asked what he proposed they do with their skeleton.
“Julien Vallotton told me he has a good camera so we start with that, and then I’ll plan to remove the remains before they are overly exposed to the elements or an animal hauls them away. Who can help?”
Twenty minutes later, Agnes watched from an upper window of the chateau. Carnet and Doctor Blanchard walked to the damaged grove carrying a camera, small shovel, broom, and plastic tarp. She was thankful she was seeing Carnet again for the first time at a distance. She leaned closer to the window and something moved against her leg. Patting her coat pocket, she remembered the small book she had taken from Arsov when he collapsed. She pulled it out, noting the age and condition of the delicate leather cover, careful not to damage it. The front pages of the book were stuck together and she opened it near the middle. The pages were covered with handwriting. It wasn’t Arsov’s; that was clear. The old-fashioned script was a woman’s. A young woman’s or girl’s, she amended, studying the careful rounded flourishes. She skimmed a few pages, excerpting only bits and pieces, when something made her stop. Dates. This was a diary. She was reading in February of an unknown year during the Second World War.
I’ve counted the days since my last period and there are too many days and I know that my health is poor. Madame already worries too much about me and there is nothing to be done. There is too little food, and I worry constantly. When I am in bed, alone in my room and cannot sleep, I think of her strength and try to emulate it, but I always fail when morning comes. The only thing that can distract me when my cough erupts is thinking of him.