A Cruel Deception Page 4

  And meanwhile, my presence might offer some protection for Marina’s good name. I could see, even in such a brief encounter, that she had neither the experience nor the strength to work with the Lieutenant. She felt an obligation, a strong sense of duty, but I gathered that her determination hadn’t been enough to stop him from using the drug.

  I took off my coat and put it in the armoire, feeling the chill in the room as I did.

  Calling on my training, I began to assess the situation.

  Marina had indicated that the change had been sudden, not gradual.

  What had happened to Lieutenant Minton? He didn’t strike me as shell-shocked, and Marina had just told me that he’d got over his wound without any problems. He’d been attached to the English delegation to the peace conference, which meant that he was not taking drugs then, or showing signs of any emotional distress. I think Marina would have known if there had been a romance that went wrong.

  Removing my hat and putting on my cap from my valise, I went to the window and looked down at the street below. The houses across the way were, from the look of them, still unoccupied.

  If there was no money for coal or food or common necessities, that must be my first responsibility. Thank heavens Matron had given me access to funds. I was going to need them. But how was I to explain my use of them, without telling her what I’d walked into here?

  Chapter 2

  THE WATER IN the pitcher that Marina brought up to me was lovely and warm, and I washed my face and hands, then tidied up my hair and set my cap on again.

  There was nothing for it now but to go back down to the front room and confront Lieutenant Minton.

  But he wasn’t there.

  I went in search of Marina and found her in the large kitchen.

  “Where has Lieutenant Minton gone?”

  She sighed. “He locks himself in his room when he doesn’t want to talk. I have grown accustomed to it.”

  Looking around me at the empty kitchen, I asked, “Why doesn’t he contribute to the expenses of housekeeping? If he isn’t drawing his regimental pay, surely he must have money of his own.”

  “I think he may be in debt.”

  “Gambling?” He wouldn’t be the first officer to have taken up gambling, only to find themselves in over their heads.

  “I don’t know. He won’t talk to me about his troubles, you see. But I don’t believe it’s cards.” Her eyes filled with tears, and she brushed them away angrily. “There’s something wrong, Sister Crawford. I don’t know what it is. But I think he’s desperate. Despairing. I worry that he will do something foolish. That’s the other reason I brought him here, where I could watch over him. And I thought it would make a difference, somehow, being away from Paris.”

  “Is he being blackmailed because of his addiction?” I asked, for surely that would explain a little of his actions.

  “I don’t believe so. I think—whatever it is, it has to do with the war. And yet how could it be that? The war is over. Has been over for months.”

  I took some francs from my pocket. “His mother has provided me with money, in the event I needed it to help her son. The first thing we must purchase is food. And some coal, if you can find it. Can you cook?”

  She smiled a little. “In the war, I learned to do many things that I’d never expected to do. Yes. I can cook.”

  “Then find something for our dinner. Something you believe the Lieutenant might like.”

  “He has a very small appetite. And there isn’t much in the shops yet. A few eggs. A little cheese. And even these things are expensive.” She sighed. “It will be better when we can grow crops again. Still, it will be months before a harvest.”

  “We must eat. Go on and see what you can find.” I hesitated. “Do you live mostly in Paris? Or here?”

  “I was a teacher in a school in Paris. My father was an artillery officer. He was captured early in the war, although for two years we thought he was missing, perhaps even dead. But he’d sent my mother to Lyon, the house of her sister, out of harm’s way. The Lieutenant helped us find out what had happened to my father, and when a few very ill prisoners were released, he made certain Papa was amongst them. It was a good thing. He had been wounded, and it hadn’t been cared for, that wound. He may still lose his leg.”

  “Why are you here, and not at your post in the school?”

  “I lied,” she said, not looking at me. “I told them I was needed to care for my father. But it was really Lawrence—the Lieutenant—who needed me. They believe I am in Lyon, and so the Head Mistress is holding my position for my return.” Turning to face me, she added more than a little defiantly, “There was no one else to care for him, you see.”

  “He’s fortunate to have you,” I said, and smiled, trying to soothe her ruffled feathers. I hadn’t meant to upset her, but I had to have some feeling for the situation I had walked into.

  “Meanwhile,” I went on cheerfully, “while you’re away doing the marketing, tell me which room belongs to the Lieutenant?”

  “It’s no use, he won’t come out.”

  “That’s probably true. On the other hand, I ought to try, don’t you think?”

  “The room of my parents. Upstairs, to your right. Third door.”

  Thanking her, I went back up the stairs, found the third door, and knocked. From the front hall came the sound of the outer door opening and closing. I was just as happy not to have Marina as a witness to anything that was about to happen.

  When there was no response, I said, “It’s Sister Crawford, Lieutenant. I’d like to speak to you, if I may.”

  But Marina was right. He had no intention of coming to the door. After a moment, I left. It wouldn’t serve either of us if he thought he could make me beg.

  We ate our dinner—just the two of us—although Marina tried to take a tray to Lieutenant Minton. It was still there when I went up to bed, sitting outside his door. She had found some eggs and cheese and a few potatoes and made an omelet. There had been a cabbage as well, and we steamed that.

  I knocked at his door and said in Matron’s no-nonsense voice, “Lieutenant? You’re being childish, wasting good food.”

  Once more there was no answer. I hesitated, and then reached out to see if the door was locked.

  To my surprise, I found it wasn’t. I opened it and stepped into the room.

  There was no lamp burning, nor had the curtains been drawn. I could just see him stretched out across the bed, dressed in shirt and trousers, and when I went closer for a better look, I found he was sleeping like a man drugged. I’d given enough sedatives to the wounded to recognize the signs. And even though I touched his shoulder and spoke his name, he didn’t respond.

  The room was icy cold. I drew up the coverlet to cover his shoulders and arms, then pulled the window curtain to.

  It wasn’t necessary to tiptoe out of the room. Lieutenant Minton wouldn’t have heard me leave. I doubted that he’d have heard a stampeding herd of elephants.

  I could understand now why Marina hadn’t felt as certain as I had that something could be done for this man. Picking up his tray, I took it back to the kitchen.

  Well, I thought, finally going to my own room, whether he liked it or not, tomorrow we would talk. I had to know more about his state of mind.

  Over breakfast the next morning—the last of the omelet warmed over, and the remains of the cabbage—I chatted with Marina again. It was chilly this morning, and I’d have given much for a porridge.

  First, I asked her to arrange for enough coal for fires in my room and hers, one room downstairs, and to keep the cooker going. And then I asked her if she knew why Minton was at the Peace Conference.

  She shrugged. “He wishes to stay in the Army, or at least he did wish to. He speaks quite good French as well as German. He can translate while someone is still speaking. It’s a gift, to do that. And some of the delegates have no language skills at all. Besides, he is—was—the sort of man people like. Good company, is that what you
say in English? With everyone at the conference seeming to have no patience with the views of anyone else, he was sometimes able to get things done without any fuss. That is also a gift.”

  “How long have you known Lawrence?”

  She picked up our dishes and carried them to the pan in the sink. “Since early in 1916. He came to Paris on a short leave, and that afternoon he called on my brother, who was recovering from his wounds. They had known each other for some time. I was taking care of Pierre, as well as teaching, and so I met Lawrence then. In the end, he spent his entire leave with us, cheering up Pierre. That’s when I asked if he could find news of our father. We had heard nothing for months, and the Army could give us no news. And then in April 1917, Pierre was killed. Lawrence wrote to us to offer his condolences, and he came to call as soon as he could. We corresponded after that. When he was sent to Paris, he looked me up.”

  “I didn’t know you had a brother. I’m so sorry.”

  “He was a flyer. The Germans shot him down. Their commandant wrote to my father, telling him that Pierre was dead before the fire. It was a relief, knowing. One of Pierre’s squadron had reported that his aircraft had burned on impact, and I tried to keep that from my mother. But the Germans had pulled him out of the cockpit in time. It was kind of the commandant to give us that peace.” She shivered. “I’d thought—I’d dreamed of him in that burning aircraft, calling for help as the flames crept closer. Sadly, Pierre never knew my father had been found and was alive.”

  I had treated more than a few flyers with severe burns. Others had died before they could be rescued. It was a horrible fate.

  She changed the subject quickly, but I’d seen the tears she was trying so bravely to hide.

  Lawrence came down shortly after we’d done the washing up, pale, unshaven, and trying to conceal how badly his hands were shaking. He had no appetite, and five minutes later, he shut himself up in the sitting room that had belonged to Marina’s mother.

  “He’s nearly out of laudanum. I don’t know what he’ll do if he can’t find more,” Marina said quietly, watching him go. “He can’t go to the regiment’s medical staff. And one by one the French doctors he saw in Paris refused to give him more. He claimed that there was a piece of shrapnel still there, pressing on his spine. But it’s a lie.”

  I had knocked on the sitting room door shortly afterward, but Lawrence had ignored me, and this time the door was locked from the inside. Frustrated with him, I asked Marina if she had any skeleton keys that would unlock the door from the outside, but she didn’t know of any.

  I went with Marina to buy a little coal, helping her carry the sacks home again, and we were filling the scuttles when there was a knock at the house door.

  My hands were black with coal dust. Marina, glancing at me in surprise, quickly wiped hers on her apron and hurried to the door. I slipped up the back stairs and was just out of sight at the top of the staircase when a male voice spoke to her in halting French. She responded rather coldly, then I heard two sets of footsteps walking back toward the sitting room.

  I couldn’t see the visitor at all, but I thought he must be English.

  She was tapping at the sitting room door, informing Lawrence Minton that he had a visitor.

  I could hear the key turning in the lock, the door opening, then closing. After a moment Marina went on to the front room, shutting that door behind her with what sounded suspiciously like a slam.

  I was already on my way back to the kitchen, hastily washing my hands, picking up one of the full scuttles, and carrying it toward the parlor.

  She was sitting there, staring at nothing, when I stepped in and closed the door behind me. Setting the scuttle on the hearth, I said, “I gather the Lieutenant wanted to see his caller?”

  Marina grimaced. “It’s Lieutenant Bedford. I don’t care for him. I don’t think he’s good for Lawrence.”

  “Did they serve together? Or is the Lieutenant on the staff of one of the delegates to the conference?”

  “I don’t believe they served together, but he is attending the conference and they have flats in the same house. I am not even sure that they are friends—but Lawrence encourages his visits. He’s another reason I brought Lawrence here. But Lawrence wrote to him, telling him where he was. I was quite angry about that.”

  “Why do you receive him then? It’s your house, you could refuse to let him in.” But even as I suggested it, I knew she couldn’t do that. Not if Lawrence Minton wanted to see the other man.

  “He doesn’t take no for an answer. I tried several times, but he simply waits outside until Lawrence sees him, and after he leaves, Lawrence is angry with me.” She lifted her chin. “But this is my home, I have the right to turn visitors away.”

  Lieutenant Bedford stayed for half an hour, and then left. I made it a point to be by a window upstairs, to have a good look at him.

  Rather rakish, I thought, watching him walk down the street. There was a jauntiness in his stride that spoke of satisfaction, and I learned later on that day that he had found some laudanum and brought the bottle to Lawrence.

  There was no doubt about that—Lawrence was in a happy mood, and then slept for several hours.

  While he was still in his happy mood, I confronted him, asking what had brought his friend to the house.

  “That’s none of your affair. Nor is it Marina’s. I’ve told her that.”

  “Of course it’s her affair,” I reminded him. “This is her house, not yours. And what would your regiment think, seeing you now? And here, rather than in Paris? If your commanding officer discovers what you’re doing instead of attending the talks, you could very well find yourself cashiered.”

  “I’ve changed my mind, even if no one believes me. Let me make it clear to you as well. I don’t intend to stay in the Army,” he retorted. “I’m sick of the Army, and of Paris.”

  “You’re also abusing Marina’s hospitality. Did you know? There was barely enough money to buy dinner last night. She’s no longer teaching. There’s no income for her to live on.”

  That surprised him. “She has money. She’s told me so.”

  “How long ago was that, pray? Whatever she may have had, it’s gone now.”

  “She can return to teaching, if she wishes it. I’m all right here on my own.”

  “And who will buy your food and cook your meals, if she’s not here?”

  “I’m not interested in food. I’ll manage.”

  “That’s what many people addicted to laudanum tell me. And after a while, they simply die. Is that what you want?” It was severe, but it had to be said.

  He looked at me then, and I saw such anguish in his eyes, I caught my breath.

  “The world would be a far better place without me in it,” he said harshly, and turned on his heel, walking out of the room. I could hear him taking the stairs two at a time, and then the sound of his bedroom door slamming.

  I stood there, his words still ringing in my head.

  This was more serious than I’d expected.

  There were many reasons for addiction. I’d seen them during the war, when men with severe wounds became dependent on something to take away pain that wouldn’t ease or even end. Clearly Lawrence Minton was a different case. Something was driving him, and he was seeking not relief from pain, but oblivion. And yet there was nothing in the information Matron had given me to indicate shell shock. If not that, then what?

  Or did she not know? That was always possible.

  He appeared to be shutting down his mind so that he didn’t have to think or feel.

  And if that was true, his situation was far more serious. He wasn’t looking for escape, the good feeling that opiates offer in the beginning. When the laudanum didn’t give him what he sought, the alternative might well be death.

  If there was any chance of saving him, I’d have to find out what had happened to him and why. Any way that I could.

  That evening over a meager dinner, I asked Marina what she knew about Lieu
tenant Minton aside from what he’d done for her father and her family.

  Considering the question, she said, “When we first met him, he spoke so warmly of his mother. His father had died when he was only fourteen, but he’d loved him very much. I expect that was why he helped my father, so that we wouldn’t lose him too soon. He told us about his parents’ home in the Cotswolds. They went to live in London after the war began, and his mother joined the Queen Alexandra’s. He told me about a setter, liver and white, he had had as a child, the school he went to, his friends. Such a happy childhood. It explained the man he’d become, thoughtful, kind. I liked that man very much.”

  “Yet you have stayed with him, in spite of the changes in him.”

  Marina shrugged. “But of course. One does not abandon a friend.”

  “Did he speak of the war at all?”

  “No. But it is hard for many soldiers to talk about the trenches. I saw nothing wrong with that.”

  “When did you begin to see this change in him? Do you remember?”

  Frowning, she thought about the question. “The war was over, and at Christmas he went to England for a short leave. He went home—not just to London, but to the house where he was a child. And he spent a fortnight there. He came back to France, and I saw him in late January. He was excited about being posted to the conference; he even stayed a few days with us in Lyon. Somewhere he’d found a little coffee—real coffee—and he gave it to my mother tied up with the most enormous bow. At the end of February or perhaps the first week of March, he called and took me out to dine and then to the cinema. It was a lovely evening, and at the end of it, he asked if I’d help him to find a nice gift for his mother’s birthday. That was a Monday. I told him yes, I’d be happy to help. It was only a week away, that birthday, and he was to collect me at eleven the next morning. But he didn’t come that day, or the next. I didn’t know why, I was worried, and by Tuesday of the following week, I found one of his friends at the conference and asked where he was. I’d thought he might have been sent back to England to clarify instructions. Something to do with the conference. But no one had seen Lawrence for days.”