For in spite of everything, I felt that I was betraying Simon.
I paced the veranda before lunch and after tea, and happened to see Mrs. Campbell leave the hotel, the manager himself seeing her into her hired car. Had the whispers been too much for her?
Two days later I scolded myself for my reluctance to post that envelope. My parents would be returning to Eastbourne shortly, and I would surely lose my nerve altogether once they were there to persuade me in person. I was on my way down to Reception to see to it personally when I met Simon himself just coming through the hotel door.
It had been raining somewhere along the road, for the shoulders of his coat were wet. His face was grim, and I suddenly had a premonition of bad news.
Nodding to me, he took my arm and said, “Shall we walk along the seafront? It won’t rain for another hour or more. You won’t need a coat.”
“Yes, I- Simon, what’s wrong?”
“Not here.”
And so it was we walked down to the water and stopped halfway to the pier, standing for a moment to watch dark clouds building far out to sea. Lightning was playing in them, bright flickers against a gunmetal sky. The air was oppressively warm, even though the wind was just picking up.
We were out of hearing of anyone. Simon, leaning his shoulders on the parapet of the seawall, seemed lost in thought.
My mind was running through a mental list of our acquaintance. Who was dead? Why couldn’t he find the courage to tell me?
“Please,” I said baldly. “Don’t-I’d rather you didn’t try to find the right words to break the news.”
He straightened and looked down at me, as if he hadn’t realized that I was there. “No, it isn’t bad news, Bess… it’s… I don’t quite know what to make of it.” He turned and led me to a bench. After we’d sat down, he said, busy with his driving gloves, “I inquired of London where Private Wilson could be reached. I thought perhaps you could write to him, even if you couldn’t return to France. My contact was reluctant to tell me anything at first, and I had to use your father’s authority to pry the information out of him. Which was odd in itself. But then I understood why. The Army isn’t eager to give out such information. It seems- I was told that Private Gerald Wilson, who was an orderly in the hospital where you were working when you fell ill-a man close to forty-one years of age, just as you’d described him to me-was found hanged in the shed where bodies were left to await burial. The doctor who declared him dead felt that his work had turned the man’s mind. Fearful of falling victim to influenza himself, he’d decided to die by his own hand.”
I sat there aghast.
After a moment I said, “Are you sure you were given the correct information? There must be a dozen men by that name and of the same rank.” But looking at Simon’s face, I could already read the answer.
“I knew him, Simon,” I said earnestly. “I worked with him every day. He wasn’t the sort to kill himself. He recognized the sadness of his work, but he understood too that a man of his age was more useful as an orderly than at the Front. He handled the dead-wounded and influenza victims. He knew the risks.”
I realized that I had fallen into the past tense, as if I had already accepted the truth. But I refused to believe it.
“It’s in the official record, Bess.”
“Yes, but it’s wrong, I tell you. It must be wrong.”
We sat in silence while I dealt with the turmoil in my mind. Finally I said, “It isn’t true. Yes, it may well be that Private Wilson was found hanging, that part I can’t question because I wasn’t there. And, of course, someone had to cut him down, which means the record is correct-as far as it went. But it wasn’t suicide. He must have been killed because he’d seen that body in the shed. When I fell ill so suddenly, he must have had to speak to someone else. And so he had to die.”
“Bess, you’re assuming what you dreamed was real. The official report on Carson’s death was shrapnel wounds. I looked into that as well. They wouldn’t have got that wrong either.”
“Very well. I won’t go on claiming it was Major Carson I saw. But part of my dream must have been real. I must have seen a body. I must have done. And there were no other wounds. Only a broken neck. Which means whoever he was, he was murdered. Why else would Private Wilson be killed? Simon, I was thought to be dying, and so I was no danger to anyone. But he was. Someone made certain that what he’d seen was never reported. The killer was still there, waiting to be sure the body was buried.”
It occurred to me just then that if I hadn’t fallen ill, I might also have been killed because I’d been in that shed. What’s more, the burial detail would have come and gone, and the fifty-seventh body would be well out of reach if by chance I did survive and remembered some wild and feverish tale.
Instead of relieving my mind, Private Wilson’s suicide seemed to confirm that what I thought I’d dreamed was true.
I thought about that kindly man who saw to the dead with such infinite gentleness. Could he have seen too many bodies, could he have been driven to killing himself to stop having nightmares about the rows and rows of dead that he dealt with day after day?
It was possible. Of course it was. But the two deaths in tandem?
All the more reason to hurry back to France and find out.
As if he’d followed my reasoning, Simon said quietly, “Even if you go back, you can’t be certain you’ll be sent to the same hospital.”
And that was true. Assignments were based on need, not personal preferences. Still, I’d be in France. I could eventually find out what I wanted to know about Private Wilson.
Again Simon followed my logic.
“It isn’t Wilson’s death that matters, is it?” he asked. “That’s to say, he wasn’t the primary target, was he? Carson appears to have been. If this is true, why should anyone kill him? He was a respected officer, and careful of his men.”
“I have no answer to that,” I said slowly.
“Who are his enemies?” Simon pressed. “Who stands to gain the most from his death?”
I sighed. “Since he died in France, it could be that someone at the Front wanted him dead. It’s happened before that scores have been settled there. If it wasn’t in France, then the reason will lie in Somerset, where Major Carson lived.” I remembered Mrs. Campbell and Lieutenant Banner. “Do you know if the Carson marriage was a happy one? He wouldn’t be the first soldier to fall in love with another man’s wife. She wouldn’t be the first woman to fall out of love, after a hasty wartime marriage.”
“I can’t believe that of either Julia or Vincent.”
I couldn’t help but think that neither of the Carsons would have told Simon if there was marital trouble. Or my parents, for that matter.
“I understand, but-”
“Stay out of it, Bess. The last thing you want to do is cause Julia Carson any more grief. And I’ve told you, there’s no proof that there was anything or anyone in that shed. Or that Private Wilson killed himself. Too much time has passed.”
“I would never hurt her. But what about Private Wilson’s family? How do they feel about his death?” I took a deep breath. “If I don’t pursue this, who will?” In my pocket was the letter I’d written. I handed it to him. “What shall I do, Simon?”
“All right. Go to Somerset and learn what you can about Carson. Julia likes you, she’ll talk freely to you. And if you discover anything, come to me. Let me handle it.”
“That’s fair. If it’s possible to clear Private Wilson’s name of the charge of suicide, I’ll find it. In his own way, he’d been a very brave man.” A thought struck me. “What was the date of his death? Do you know?”
With reluctance, Simon told me. It was the night after I fell ill.
“Where did Private Wilson come from? Before the war?” I was ashamed that I didn’t know, had never thought to ask.