Peace Comes to Honeyfield Read online

  ‘I agree. But if they see us leave they’ll follow us to Westcott. They must know where our country house is.’

  ‘We might be able to trick them into thinking they see you leave the house, so they’ll follow, then we could perhaps go to Westcott and spend a short time there before moving on somewhere else.’

  He stood back to study her. ‘If we make you look different, you and I can slip out openly. The trouble is, your clothes are all very expensive and that shows. And your hair’s rather distinctive, too. Men will notice it.’

  ‘I think that’s a compliment.’

  ‘Definitely.’

  Georgie looked at him speculatively. ‘Actually, I own a pair of trousers, which I bought when I was going to join the VADs.’ She went to fetch them and held them against herself to show him. ‘Father threw a fit when I showed them to him, but if I wore them and pinned my hair up under one of his country hats, people might not even realise I’m a woman.’ She waited for his answer.

  She was rewarded with a quick, speculative glance at her body and a chuckle. ‘Good idea. Though you’d only fool people at a distance. You’re very … um, feminine in shape.’

  Mathers came back just then so she hoped her blushes hadn’t shown.

  Patrick explained their idea to him and she showed him the trousers.

  ‘Your father won’t like it, miss. He asked Nora to sneak those trousers out of your room so that he could get rid of them, but she couldn’t find them. You must have hidden them well.’

  She’d only put them on top of the wardrobe and Nora must have seen them, but Georgie didn’t say that. ‘I’d just have bought another pair if those had vanished. I’ve tried wearing them around the house and I must say they’re very comfortable to move about in. You men are so lucky.’

  Mathers gave the offending garment a disgusted glance. Clearly he shared her father’s views on women wearing trousers. ‘Hmm. Well, as it happens those things might come in useful today.’

  After a moment’s thought, he added, ‘Perhaps we should let the captain know what we’re doing?’

  ‘I’m not giving that man a chance to stop us leaving. I don’t intend to spend days, maybe even weeks, shut up in this house or shut up somewhere else he wants to put me. Not only would I go mad from boredom but I’d be a sitting target and eventually these villains would find a way to get at me, I’m sure.’

  She picked up the trousers and went next door to her room to put them on. She couldn’t help feeling a bit shy as she came back and the two men studied her. It was one thing to consider yourself a modern woman, quite another to wear trousers for the first time in public without a long tunic over them like young women working on the railways and doing other manual jobs wore.

  ‘You might get away with it at a distance,’ Patrick said.

  Mathers grimaced. ‘Yes. You might. And I’m afraid you may be right about the need for a disguise. But I still don’t like you going out in public dressed like that.’

  ‘Miss Cotterell’s safety must come first,’ Patrick said diplomatically. ‘We need to work out how to trick anyone watching into thinking they’ve seen her leave the house and let them follow that person. One of the maids, perhaps?’

  ‘I could ask Rosie to wear your clothes and escort her out of the house myself. If you wouldn’t mind lending her some of your older garments, that is, miss?’

  ‘It won’t work. I’m much taller than she is.’

  ‘Just try it, miss. You might have something that will fit her.’

  Nora was sent for to help Rosie don the disguise and the three women went into Georgie’s room.

  ‘What’s it like to wear trousers, miss?’ Rosie asked.

  ‘It feels a bit strange but they’re very comfortable. Never mind that, let’s try these on you.’ She handed over one of the new shorter skirts, which she hadn’t dared wear in front of her father yet, and a blouse which had shrunk in the wash.

  Rosie blushed as she shed her own clothes and exposed ragged underwear.

  Georgie stood back to look at her. ‘You’re much shorter than me and so thin that even my smallest skirt nearly drowns you.’

  The other two nodded.

  ‘They might fit Nora, though.’ Rosie studied the older maid. ‘Why don’t you try them on?’

  Nora did this and Georgie gave her a hat with a wider brim, which partly concealed her face. Then she found an old jacket and a country hat in her father’s room to complete her own disguise.

  They went to show the men, who all nodded approval of the effectiveness of their changed appearance.

  ‘Since Miss Cotterell looks like a man,’ Patrick suggested, ‘she and I could simply walk out of the house. Pity we can’t go in the car.’

  ‘Why can’t we?’ Georgie asked. ‘We’d be a lot safer if we could get away without using trains or buses, and I’m sure Father would agree about that, at least. He has other cars at his disposal.’

  ‘And if you do that, you’ll be able to take one of your friends with you, Mr Farrell,’ Mathers said. ‘If it comes to trouble, you won’t be able to protect her on your own.’

  ‘If we look like a group, won’t they simply follow us?’ Georgie worried. ‘No, surely two people would look more natural than three?’

  Patrick grinned. ‘Martin can crouch down in the back of the car and I can make it seem as if there’s something wrong with the car engine. I can talk loudly about having it repaired as we’re getting it out of the stables.’

  Georgie noticed that Mathers was looking at him with increasing respect. She too was impressed by the way Patrick kept offering practical solutions to problems.

  ‘If we want to keep all three bodyguards with Miss Farrell, we could arrange to meet Dennis somewhere as well,’ Patrick went on. ‘He could leave the house first, with Rosie and a shopping basket, and give anyone following him the slip at the shops.’

  Everyone fell silent, considering this, then Mathers said reluctantly, ‘It might just work. You could arrange to meet him and Rosie somewhere, Mr Farrell. I can give the two of them directions to one of the diversions your father uses sometimes – no one will know where they go after they leave here.’

  ‘Why put poor Rosie in danger?’ Georgie protested.

  ‘I’m sure your father would prefer you to be accompanied by another woman.’

  She opened her mouth to question this then shut it again. He was right. But she only intended to spend a couple of nights in her father’s country house while making better plans for finding a long-term refuge. Unless her father reappeared in the meantime, of course.

  Where on earth was he? Was he safe?

  Dennis and Rosie left first, with him carrying a big, covered shopping basket. They visited the nearby grocer’s to place an order, then walked along to an address Mathers had given them.

  Inside the house they were questioned carefully, but they’d been given a special password and it was accepted. One of the men on guard there took them down to the cellars.

  ‘I went through a place like this with Mr Mathers,’ Rosie whispered. ‘Who’d have thought these passages were hidden here under London?’

  They were taken quite a distance underground then up some stairs where their guide unlocked a heavy iron door that led into a scullery. After checking that all was clear in the narrow street outside, he wished them well and went back down to the cellar.

  They’d left the basket behind, Rosie had changed her hat and added a different scarf to her outfit and she now took Dennis’s arm, as if they were a courting couple.

  ‘We’ll go and wait in the park, as agreed.’ He glanced up at the sky. ‘I hope the rain holds off.’

  ‘It’d be worth a wetting to get Miss Cotterell away safely,’ Rosie said. ‘She’s been that kind to me.’

  ‘Yes. Patrick’s the same. Help anyone, he would. Just a friendly word from someone who doesn’t look at you as if you’re a scary monster helps sometimes.’

  She patted his arm. ‘You’ll look better in
a year or two. My cousin got scalded and that’s what happened to her. The scars fade, but only slowly.’

  ‘Do you really think so?’

  ‘I know so, saw it happening with my own eyes.’

  ‘Well, thank you for that, lass. It cheers me up. It can be … difficult, facing people who stare.’

  ‘Any decent person would be grateful for what you’ve done for your country.’

  Dennis gave her hand a squeeze. ‘You’re a real tonic, you are, Rosie.’

  Once Martin had curled up on the floor in the back of the large car, covered by a blanket, Patrick went to fetch Georgie.

  ‘I’ve got my things and I’ve packed Rosie’s too.’ She’d added some of her own underwear to the bundle because Rosie had so little.

  ‘Good thinking. Can you crank the car engine?’ he asked. ‘I know a few tricks to make it seem as if the engine isn’t going properly, but I need to be at the wheel to do that.’

  ‘Yes, of course I can crank the engine. My job was driving around London, don’t forget.’

  ‘There’s no “of course” about it. Most women haven’t got the necessary strength.’

  ‘I had to be able to start a car to do that sort of war work. There were no weaklings among us.’

  ‘All right. We’ll open the doors of the stables and—’

  ‘If you’re the driver, it’s up to me to open the doors.’

  As she was doing that, she caught sight of a man’s shadow on the ground stretching out from the place where the watcher was hiding. He wasn’t very good at this. Not giving any sign that she’d noticed it, she swung the cranked handle a few times and got the engine started. Then she waited for Patrick, who drove the car out in fits and starts.

  As she closed the garage doors, she heard someone inside bolt them: Mathers no doubt.

  ‘This car’s still not firing properly,’ Patrick called out to her as agreed. ‘We need to get that mechanic to check it as quickly as he can in case it’s needed. Hurry up, damn you!’

  She got inside and they drove off down the back laneway.

  ‘Sorry about the language.’

  ‘I’ve heard worse.’

  No one tried to bar their way as they left the lane. No other vehicles were in sight in the street, either. Indeed, it was early enough for most residents and their servants in this suburb to be having breakfast still.

  The watcher hesitated but two men, clearly servants of some sort, weren’t what he’d been told to look for, so he had a quick pee behind a nearby dustbin and settled down again to keep watch.

  He didn’t like the idea of them going after Cotterell’s daughter, but he had no choice. He had to do as he was told. He owed too much money.

  Mathers went back into the house and hurried upstairs to join Nora in the room where Patrick had slept.

  ‘They’ve driven down the lane and that man is still there. Dirty devil he is, went and relieved himself against the wall.’

  ‘Well, he can hardly go and do it somewhere proper if he’s been told to keep watch here.’

  Nora looked at herself in the mirror again. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I think you look ready to go shopping, Miss Cotterell.’

  She smiled at being addressed by her mistress’s name, studied herself in the dressing-table mirror and pulled her hat lower down. ‘Must be nice to wear clothes like this all the time.’

  Mathers went to hail a taxi, then ushered the ‘young lady’ into it and locked the front door, before joining her.

  As they pulled away from the house another car fell into place behind them and stayed behind them all the way to Lady Berrens’ house.

  The front door opened without them needing to knock and a burly man came out to open the car door for ‘Miss Cotterell’. A man who’d slipped out of the rear seat of the vehicle following them got hastily back into it again.

  ‘I reckon they were going to snatch her off the street!’ Mathers exclaimed as he hustled Nora inside quickly. ‘That must mean you fooled them. I hope she and Patrick stay safe.’

  ‘There’s nothing you can do to help her now, Mr Mathers, except pray,’ Nora said.

  Lady Berrens came to the doorway of a room at the back of the house and beckoned to them. ‘Come and tell me what’s going on. Why did you phone for someone to be waiting to let you in quickly, Mathers?’

  She listened in shock. ‘I do hope those men can keep poor Georgie safe. Where can Gerald Cotterell be?’

  ‘He knows enough to look after himself,’ Mathers said grimly. ‘He usually takes me with him on his little trips.’

  She frowned. ‘They must want to get at him through her in the chaos following the Armistice and then use him to influence negotiations.’

  ‘That’s what I thought, my lady.’

  ‘I’m sure he’ll have a good reason for not taking you with him this time. Will it be safe for you to go back to his house or do you want me to find somewhere else for you two to stay?’

  ‘Nora and I will go back and I’ll bring in someone I know to help guard the place. We can’t leave it unoccupied. We ought to stay here for a little while as if it’s Miss Cotterell making a normal visit, though. Would that be all right, my lady?’

  ‘Of course. But if Nora is supposed to be Georgie, you can’t go to the servants’ hall, so you’d better come and join me in the morning room. I have another visitor there, my friend Mrs Tesworth. She’s used to helping people in trouble, because she works for the Greyladies Trust, so she won’t blink an eye at having you there.’

  He saw Nora look uneasy as her ladyship said that. He felt uneasy himself to be sitting down with a titled lady, not to mention her friend. These were strange times. Well, he’d had a strange war. Some would think he hadn’t been in danger, but they’d be wrong. He had seen some of what Mr Cotterell had done in the service of his country and admired his employer for that, been proud to help out.

  Whoever these traitors were, they were going to a lot of trouble to try to get hold of Mr Cotterell. Did the secret machinations of the various nations involved in making peace ever cease? he wondered. Vicious, some of them could be.

  Chapter Six

  Patrick drove slowly and carefully, not wanting to attract anyone’s attention. ‘Martin, are you all right staying hidden in the back of the car for a while?’

  ‘Hell, yes. I’ve crouched in far worse places than this in the trenches.’

  How often they all still referred to those dreadful days! Patrick thought. Would the memories ever fade? Not completely. Some things were etched in your very soul. ‘Good lad. I told Dennis to wait in that park we’ve sat in on fine days. He and Rosie can stay out of sight among the trees at the back.’

  ‘Good choice.’

  Once he felt to be beyond any watchers who might be lurking near Mr Cotterell’s house, Patrick told Martin he could get up from the floor.

  ‘Where exactly are we going?’ Georgie asked.

  ‘I’m taking us to the workshop of an old friend, who’ll help me out with whatever I need.’

  ‘What do we need? Is there something wrong with the car?’ Georgie asked anxiously.

  ‘Nothing wrong at all and you may think I’m being too cautious, but I’m going to borrow Chad’s van to pick up the others. That means the whole operation will take us a bit longer, but the most important thing of all while we’re still in London is to keep this big car out of sight.’

  ‘I should think the watcher will still be expecting you to bring it back after it’s been repaired. He won’t be suspicious for quite a while.’

  ‘We’ll be well out of London by the time he starts to worry. Once we’ve got my friend’s van, you can stay here with Chad while I make my way to the back entrance of the park and pick up the others.’

  ‘I think we should all drive there together,’ Georgie said. ‘After you’ve parked your friend’s van, Martin and I can stay in it and keep the doors locked.’

  ‘It’s too dangerous for you to stay in full view of
people passing, Georgie. You don’t look like a chap from close up.’ A quick glance sideways showed him that the stubborn look had returned to her face, not to mention that stubborn tilt to her chin, so her next words didn’t surprise him at all.

  ‘It’ll be much safer to leave someone in the van, you know it will, Patrick.’ Their gazes clashed and she added, ‘Let’s get one thing clear: I spent most of my life letting other people tell me what to do, the more fool me. Nowadays I make my own decisions, or at least I join in any discussion about what’s best for me to do.’

  As they stopped to let a lady with a small child cross the road, she fell silent but not before he’d seen anger flash in her eyes. It didn’t seem to be aimed at him because she was staring straight ahead now. Perhaps it was anger at something that had happened in the past. Most folk had regrets about something or other, when you really got talking.

  He stopped arguing. No use beating your head against a brick wall.

  When they set off in the van, Martin said suddenly, ‘I think Georgie’s right. It’s safer for us to stay together and have someone in the van. If there’s any trouble, I can hold my own in a fight as well as you, though I doubt anyone will come after us in this. Maybe you’re being a bit too cautious, my old lad. They don’t even know we’ve got Georgie out of the house yet, and we’re in a different vehicle with three people who look like men in it.’

  ‘I suppose I am being cautious, but there’s a lot at stake. Nonetheless, keep your revolver to hand every minute I’m gone, Georgie.’

  ‘You think they’ll come after us with guns? In the centre of London?’

  ‘Who knows? I’m not prepared to take any risks. There are plenty of former soldiers who’ve smuggled guns home with them. They claim to have lost them in the mud or else they really do find guns in the mud.’

  A short time later he added, ‘From the way Captain Jordan spoke of him, your father must be a very important person behind the scenes.’