Maeve excerpt — Post-Exertional Mayonnaise

The Alchemists

~ or ~

Economic Consequences of the Peace

Maeve Owen

This book is dedicated to

the memory of

Sally Marks

whom I never met,

and whose research almost ruined this book, which I hope is the better for it.

Also to Sarah,

who has made all this possible.

‘the feeling that nothing,

from the Treaty of Versailles to the rationally explicable universe, is really safe,

the intimate conviction that anything may happen,

anything may be discovered

— Aldous Huxley

Published in 1919 following the Paris Peace Conference, The Economic Consequences of the Peace by John Maynard Keynes condemned the Treaty as a ‘Carthaginian Peace’ demanding exorbitant and punitive reparations which Germany could not possibly afford, an assessment which prevails to this day. His interpretation was hugely influential on the anglophone intelligentsia, who became sympathetic to post-war Germany and critical of an apparently weak Lloyd George and vindictive France.

Dramatis Personae

Greenwood

Apolline Orchard – (pronounced the French way, with a short ‘a’ and a long ‘i’; Ah-po-leen)

Inigo Orchard - her older brother, gentleman farmer (pronounced with short ‘I’s and a long ‘o’; Ih-nih-go)

Maria Feuerstein - their younger sister, widow (pronounced the old-fashioned English way; Ma-rye-a)

Alice Ineson - cook-housekeeper, previously the siblings’ nurse and before that maid to the late Mrs Orchard

Grace Daring – housemaid

Nethercott village and surroundings

John Alder - unsociable inventor, patron of Frank Younger

Jed Causley – postman

Dr Foxworthy - general practitioner

Mr Holberton - sub-postmaster

Herr Leitner - Swiss botanist, visiting Dartmoor to make a study of lichens

Imogen Penwell - successful author and divorcée

Abigail Quaintance - wise woman

Violet Tapley – schoolmistress

Edwina Widger - private landlady and accomplished baker

Frank Younger - inventor, Communist, veteran of the Great War

Edgemoor town

Dr Ada Luscombe – medic

Dr Charles Luscombe - her husband, honorary medical

officer to the cottage hospital

Rev Tobias Wakeham - Methodist minister

Mrs Olivia Wakeham – the minister’s wife

Elsewhere

Michael Follett – member of His Majesty’s Diplomatic Service

George Love - detective sergeant of Exeter Criminal Investigation Department

Fiontann MacMurchaidh - Irish republican

Nicholas Orchard - cousin of the Greenwood Orchards

Deceased

Maximilian Orchard - eldest of the Greenwood siblings, killed in the Battle of Jutland in 1916

Verity Orchard - his mother, died from Encephalitis in 1917

Clement Orchard - her husband, died from grief in 1918

Felix Feuerstein – Maria’s husband, died from influenza in 1918

Saturday, 25th March

an unusual occurrence

The post did not come.

As anyone who has been unfortunate enough to experience such an event will know, an absent post is keenly felt. It being the 26th of March, many of the villagers laughed that the postman, having spent the previous week reminding each household that summertime would begin that Sunday, had at last forgotten and overslept himself. However, once the news had reached Mrs Causley that her husband had made no deliveries that morning, and she had assured her neighbours that she had seen Mr Causley off at the usual hour in accordance with British Summer Time, those smiles became somewhat anxious, and people began to ask what could have befallen their postman, and some feared the worst. The worst had not happened, but what did occur caused a sensation nonetheless.

1922; the sun never sets on the British Empire, which has never been so vast nor so unstable. It is still the envy of nations, with its ‘five hundred million of people, its mighty navy, its flag on every sea, its stronghold on every continent, its power and glory shining splendid.’[1] The imperialist heart thrills at the new mandates in Mesopotamia, Palestine and Trans-Jordan. But it is not what it once was. India, jewel in the crown, the archetype of empire, is once again restive under the Raj. When Home Rule had been asked for, the Indian National Congress considers dyarchy a rather anaemic response to seventy-four thousand soldiers killed in Europe’s war. The ascetic Mr Gandhi, with his egalitarian vision of independence which celebrates the sub-continent’s multiplicity of regions, religions, languages and traditions, inspires the peasantry as institutional politics never has. Five thousand miles north-west, right at the beating heart of the Empire, from within the United Kingdom itself, Ireland, the oldest colony, is struggling to hack itself free from seven centuries of subjection, but has left the north-west of itself behind.

Look back a moment, past the Great War, to the turn of the century and the existential shock of the Boer War. How could it be that a few thousand Boers had stood out against the full imperatorial might for thirty-two long, grinding, bloody months? A pyrrhic victory it was, which robbed Britain of its taste for glory; when germinated the seed of disillusionment in the bedrock of imperialism, whose branches will grow up through the class hierarchies which support the empire, whose roots will one day grow so mighty as to crack the foundations of what once seemed an indefatigable fact. But not yet.

In the motherland, suffice to say that the young men (and women) who would once have gone empire building have little appetite for adventure now. Those who survived the War To End All Wars came back to Blighty with a wish to settle down and enjoy those ideals they had been defending - peace, liberality, self-determination. So what if Britain now ruled the Holy City, or the land of the Garden of Eden? The Middle East stuck in the mind for the squalid siege of Kut al Amara and the tragic farce at Gallipoli. Give us rather homes fit for heroes. But that hope has been cut down by the Geddes Axe. The last man was barely demobbed before the peace boom was over. Two years of slump, and though wages are up so are strikes, and jobs are very much down. Many a man who was still deployed in December 1918 and didn’t get to cast his newly-bestowed vote has taken ‘direct action’ as a means of making his politics felt. The governing classes are consumed by the potential catastrophes of the country’s enormous war debts and the failing recovery of its own European debtors, a resurgent Turkey, an expansionist Japan, nationalist colonies, lack of capital, a feeble pound, and most luridly of all, the contagion of Bolshevism. Bolshevism, a term which has come to encompass everything from bloody revolution to a higher rate of National Insurance. The trouble is that the working classes now have votes, and no tradition of voting Liberal or Conservative. The war has left them better travelled, better educated and better paid; less willing to accept what their betters give them and be thankful; and the Labour Party is still an unknown quantity.

But these are the affairs of nations. We for the moment are concerned with a small Dartmoor village and the whereabouts of its postman. He has been found, unconscious, in a hedge.

The village of Nethercott is situated in the northern part of the moor, not far from the bounds of the ancient royal forest. It is a pretty place, with all the usual integrants one would expect to find in an English village; charming stone cottages inhabited by fresh-faced rustics; a few larger, more regularly proportioned buildings housing the bourgeoisie; a bakery and dairy, a butcher’s, a forge, the Three Hares Inn and, most fortunately for our story, a post office and general store. A tearoom opened in last previous century when the railway was extended to Edgemoor (a town approximately four miles of good road to the east) and it overlooks the large village green dotted with mature beech trees, which offer shade in summer and shelter from the rain in all seasons. The Georgian-built Rectory likewise fronts the green, and situated behind it is an unusually grand church for such a small village. The church house, constructed principally in the sixteenth century, was long ago the scene of parish brewing and feasting, all profits of which went to the church rather than the feudal lord. Such diabolic practices were extinguished by Cromwell’s Protectorate and, following the Restoration, it was converted to almshouses. Since Victoria’s coronation it has been the village school - those individuals then in a position to sponsor such an enterprise, and believing education to be a public good, considering the walk to Edgemoor too far for little legs.

Several farms skirt the village and moorland spreads out in every direction, the dull green slopes criss-crossed by dry stone walls, sprinkled with snowy sheep, shaggy black and brown Galloways, and small, sturdy Dartmoor ponies. Spitchwickard Hall, the great house located two miles north of the village, is home to the eponymous squire and his family. Their estate extends over most of the parish, including most of the village buildings, and much of the livestock to be seen grazing the thin grass, lying in the heather, and skirting the sharp gorse, belongs to their tenants. One of the few farms not owned by the Spitchwickards is Greenwood, twenty minutes’ walk westwards from the church. To the south- east, on the far side of Cameldown hill, is Edgemoor Quarry, where many of the farm labourers find employment during the winter months.

It would not be quite fair to say that there was no post that morning. The few cottages on the road leading out of the village towards the south-lying farms had all received their letters, as had most of the farmhouses. At last a search party was got up and followed Jed Causley’s usual morning route, calling for him as they went, the two dogs that accompanied them running ahead and skipping back as though to chivvy the men along.

The spring of 1922 was not a pleasant one. It was as though Winter, having spent January and February rather idly, had decided to make up for lost time. The cold morning was blustery and changeable. Patches of white cloud were blown rapidly across the sun by north-westerly gusts and clustered together above Cameldown. In a short time the dogs led the search party to a pair of boots sticking out of the hedge growing over a stone wall, the spot clearly marked by the bicycle leaning beside it. The boots were smartly polished, though recently smudged with mud, and laced up to the ankle, and the tops disappeared into a pair of dark blue trousers. Further investigation established that the rest of the postman was also in the hedge, his head and shoulders in fact had fallen through to the other side, soundly asleep. Two men held his ankles, two more reached through to grab hold of his upper arms, and on the count of three they hauled him out, droplets of water shaking from the foliage and splashing the nape of the neck in a most unpleasant way. They propped him on the wall where he had obviously been sitting when he fell asleep, and when rousing Causley proved surprisingly difficult a lad was dispatched to run back to the village and fetch Dr Foxworthy, while the remainder continued their efforts.

When he at last came to, Jed Causley was very confused. He gazed with bewilderment at the semi-circle of grinning farmers in front of him, at the bedraggled state of his clothes - he looked indeed as though he’d been dragged through a hedge backwards - at his service wristwatch which seemed to be telling him it was ten o’clock. While they related the narrative of his disappearance and discovery to him, Causley made several movements which suggested he was looking for something, though as he didn’t say what nobody asked him.

Eventually he interrupted them; ‘My flask is gone.’
‘What flask?’
‘You must’a dropped it when you fell asleep.’
He stood up to begin a search of his own, and swayed dangerously. Someone steadied him under the arms, and helped him stagger back to the wall. He moved his head slowly as though trying to clear it, or to shake away the buzzing noises of amused concern coming from his audience.

‘I weren’t asleep,’ he insisted. ‘I couldn’ta been.’

‘You must’a been, we found you in the ‘edge!’

‘But ‘ow—!’

At this point the doctor was seen cycling down the lane, the postmaster running heavily several yards behind him. Dr Foxworthy listened to a garbled history of the patient’s condition on discovery while examining his head for contusions. He examined the patient’s pupils, asked him to count the number of fingers the doctor held before him, pronounced him apparently healthy if somewhat chilled and disorientated, and recommended the postmaster finish his round. Causley got to his feet a second time, but still it was no good; he staggered again and grabbed hold of the doctor’s shoulder as a fixed point in the universe. Dr Foxworthy suppressed a wince and sat the patient down again, enquiring if he had eaten that morning. Causley described the breakfast his wife had cooked, and the tea in his flask. Dr Foxworthy asked if he had added anything to his flask - after all, the days were cold and gloomy when the postman began his work, no one could blame him for adding a nip of something to keep off the chill. The postmaster looked scandalised at this, and Causley strenuously denied doing any such thing, he took his duties as postman very seriously. What was more he had taken the pledge some years ago, and in any case he hoped even a teetotaller could hold out against a drop in his tea. Dr Foxworthy frowned and allowed the strength of this argument. He sent one of the assembled men to ask for the use of a cart from — Farm to convey Causley back to Nethercott, as he was still unstable and if he stayed out much longer the cold might do him real mischief, and told the rest of the small crowd that they could go back to work.

‘Well Jed,’ said the postmaster as the audience dispersed, ‘why don’t you tell us what ‘appened.’

Causley began relating his journey out of the village that morning, which houses had received how many letters, and how cycling along the empty Cameldown Road the light grew stronger and the moorland colours came to life. He had stopped, as he did every morning, on the wall where he sat now; it was an ideal spot for his first break, south-facing so that he got the sun’s warmth on the days when it shone, and sheltered by an arbour-like hollow in the hedge which kept the rain off. He’d taken his Thermos, a present from Mrs Causley last Christmas, from a pannier and poured himself a cup of tea. He remembered blowing on it, taking a sip, and then another, and then . . . and then he wasn’t sure what had happened.
‘And then you must have fallen asleep,’ remarked the doctor.
‘But I can’ta done!’ insisted the patient. ‘Even if I ‘ad, if I ‘ad gone asleep, surely I’da woken up when the branch gave way. I put nothin’ extra in my tea, doctor, Mr Holberton. Nothin’.’

Excerpt from Chapter 6

Saturday, 1 April

troubles

This Saturday afternoon found Grace at the kitchen table with Apolline, polishing the silver. This evening they would serve celery soup, baked chicken with noodles and spring greens, and steamed lemon pudding, the pale colours and fresh flavours reflecting the lengthening days while hinting at the brighter shades of spring still to come. Grace selected the embroidered tablecloth, as the subtle hues of the food would be nicely complemented by the delicate white stitching. It was a difficult time of year for flowers, too late for snowdrops but too early for much other than narcissi unless it had been particularly warm, but on Thursday she had asked the gardener to pot up several white hyacinths from the cold frame on the point of flowering, and they had unfurled in the warmth of the kitchen. She carried them through to the drawing room and placed the brass bowl on a sideboard against the long wall opposite the fireplace. The curling petals glowed before the rich dark tones of the wallpaper, and their sweet, fresh scent diffused through the room. She crossed to the grate and set a match to the arrangement of newspaper and kindling, watching the pine cones become consumed by flame before placing the logs on top. Emerging back into the hallway she met Apolline, elegantly dressed in ochre silk.

‘Do you have a moment, Grace?’

‘Yes, of course.’

Apolline led her back into the dining room. ‘I have invited Herr Leitner to join us this evening because I want to,’ she paused, seeking the right word, ‘take his measure. I’d be very grateful if you could keep half an eye on him.’

‘Miss?’

‘No special attentions or anything like that, keep him on a long lead; just if you happen to notice anything I don’t, afterwards to let me know.’

‘Of course...’

‘Nothing to worry about,’ she smiled reassuringly and looked around the room. ‘Goodness, it’s lovely in here. You’ve done a wonderful job, as always.’

Grace gave her a gratified smile and returned to the kitchen.
When she went into the drawing room a little while later she found Apolline and Inigo seated beside the fire, discussing Maria’s birthday.

‘Why don’t we get her a gramophone?’

‘Really?’

‘Yes.’

Inigo frowned.

‘We’ll let people know, discreetly, and they could give her records,’ Apolline smiled encouragingly.

He continued to look sceptical.

‘Don’t worry,’ she added, ‘I’ll do all the leg work, I’ll go to Exeter and choose the right model.’

‘Are you sure Maria will like one? Being musical herself, I mean.’

‘You’re worried you won’t like it. This is the same argument we had over the car.’

‘Not quite; I understand the utility of the car,’ Inigo began, eyes moving back to his reading. ‘What point the gramophone?’

‘The point...? Enjoyment, entertainment, fun.’

Inigo looked over the paper at her, eyebrows raised, and she saw that he was joking. ‘Am I really such a desperate case?’ he asked.

Smiling to herself, Grace set down her tray of glasses. As the clock in the hallway finished striking six there were sounds of approach on the gravel and Grace went to answer the door.

‘It isn’t fair of you to tease me,’ Apolline protested. ‘I can never tell whether you’re serious or not!’

‘A gramophone is an excellent idea.’

Tuesday 18th April

busman’s holiday

Nothing came of Causley’s actions for more than a fortnight you will recall, [easter farming observance] and in fact it was not until the Tuesday after Easter that the first consequences became manifest.

This was not because Jed Causley was in any way behindhand in reporting his concerns to the postmaster, and Mr Holberton promptly passed on the suspicion of interference with His Majesty’s mails to the Edgemoor police, who forwarded it to the Criminal Investigation Department at Exeter. The trouble was that the minor inconvenience of a parcel apparently going missing for a few days before being found and promptly delivered was not considered to be a police matter after all. When the Nethercott post office had heard nothing for over a week, Mr Holberton placed a call to Exeter CID himself and insisted on speaking to a detective regarding this very serious incident. This occurred on the Thursday before Good Friday, and there was some excitement over Easter at the prospect of a real detective coming to do his investigating in Nethercott, but it was not until Tuesday that Detective Sergeant George Love was instructed by his superiors to take the train out to Dartmoor and find out what was troubling the yokels.

DS Love arrived on a glorious April morning, the landscape glistening from early showers and lemony with sharp sunshine. This case had been given to him as a sort of treat for being on duty over Easter, there was nothing more serious on his plate back in Exeter than a few burglaries, and he stepped off the 9.45 in something of a holiday mood. It is true that he had not been exactly cheerful since 1916, but he was capable of enjoying a fine spring day on the moor.

He dropped in at the Edgemoor police station out of courtesy to the local sergeant, and with the unspoken hope that someone would give him a lift to Nethercott. PS Collamore himself drove them in the station trap, and explained on the way that Holberton, though liable to be a bit old-womanish, was a sensible man at bottom. However it was Collamore’s understanding that the matter concerned a postman who’d had one measure too many to keep out the cold and he was damned if he could see why they were bothering CID about it. He also informed Love that Nethercott’s only resident alien had permission to travel to London this morning - had left first thing and probably passed Love at Exeter St. David’s - and would not return until tomorrow.

Having said his piece, Collamore was quite capable of silence and so for the remainder of the journey Love enjoyed the crystalline air and pastoral sounds of chirping birds and clopping hooves, only slightly marred once by the distant klaxon of the quarry warning of imminent detonation. It was colder up here, and he noticed that the spring flowers were a few weeks behind his own garden. Collamore set Love down by the Nethercott post office and general store, and he soon found himself closeted with the ultimately sensible Holberton and his errant postman.

Jed Causley, evidently aware of the ethanolic rumours, was quick to refute any suggestion that he had been drinking. He gave Love the history of his adventure, supported with observations about stamps, the absence of his thermos, and the testimony of the postmaster when possible. Having established that the post office had no ideas as to who might wish to interfere with the course of their duties, Love said that he thought he had better interview the parcel’s recipient, one Miss Apolline Orchard, in case she could shed any light, and was promptly furnished with directions to Greenwood.

‘They’re a funny lot,’ Holberton reflected aloud, once had finished describing the meanderings of the road. ‘Young Mr Orchard’s righ’ enough, Methodist, proper gentlemanly, though that don’ stop ‘im gettin’ ‘is ‘ands dirty and doin’ a bit o’ real farmin’. My cousin Job’s one of ‘is labourers and ‘e treats ‘em very ‘andsome. That youngest sister’s a one though, went abroad at 17 an’ married a German Jew.’

‘He weren’t German,’ Causley interrupted. ‘It was Austria they went to.’

‘Same difference ain’t it,’ said Holberton dismissively, ‘and a Hebrew just the same. He’s dead now but it makes you wonder. Both the Orchard girls came back in ‘nineteen. Shameful, some said, how they weren’ ‘ere to see their parents buried, but tha’ were before the Armistice so I don’ rightly see ‘ow they could ‘ave, for they were out the country the ‘ole war.’

‘Now I’ll agree wi’ you there, Mr Holberton, an’ I’ll go further. My wife’s niece Gracie is ‘ousemaid up at Greenwood an’ they treat ‘er right as right, pay ‘er so well she could live ‘ome but that she prefers it there,’ said Causley, in a tone which seemed to ask if anyone ever heard of anything more remarkable. ‘Alice Ineson as came with Mrs Orchard as ‘er maid, back in the nineties when old Mr Orchard brought ‘is bride home, she’s ‘ousekeeper now and Gracie says as she loves that family more than ‘er own back up north.’

‘They’re a wealthy family, then,’ asked Love, thinking he’d hit on the reason such a fuss had been made over a bit of delayed post.

‘Well you wouldn’t call them church mice,’ chuckled Holberton.

‘They’re well off,’ said Causley with more consideration. ‘They’ve a motor car and a telephone, but I don’t know as you’d rightly call ‘em wealthy. They aren’t up with the Spitchwickards —‘

‘Though p’raps the land tax made ‘em more or less even,’ Holberton put in.

‘Seems to me the only thing you might really call extravagant is what they pay their servants. Gracie ‘as ‘er own bedroom, an’ a little parlour, a righ’ little establishment she’s got up there.’

‘Still, the slump’s be hard on a lot of people. Where does their money come from?’ A Dartmoor village seemed an unlikely spot to find war profiteers, but you never knew.

Causley shrugged. ‘They always ‘ad plenty.’

Holberton cut in with his superior knowledge. ‘[X] Orchard what built the ‘ouse back in eighteen-oh-some’in made ‘is fortune in the navy. Won the farm off [Y] Spitchwickard in a game o’ cards.’

Love raised his eyebrows. ‘And more recently?’

‘O’ course there’s no money in farmin’ these days, but money sticks to money, don’ it.’

If their comfort was sustained by war profits, clearly it wasn’t generally known.

Holberton was still talking. ‘There’s none round as ‘ad dealings wi’ that family what ever ‘ad none to complain of, ‘cept the Spitchwickards p’raps, but tha’s generations back. And then Mr Maximilian dyin’ in the war, when ‘e migh’ easily ‘ave got an exemption, very honourable. All the same though, there’s somethin’ about them sisters. A bit of what you might call epileptic, like the Brimblecombe’s girl.’

‘Don’t talk rubbish!’ Cried Causley, unexpectedly. ‘Epileptic?’

‘Little Sally Brimblecome. I should know,’ insisted Holberton. ‘I seen ‘er ‘ave fits, ‘er mother’s my second cousin.’

‘But not the Orchard sisters! Eccentric you mean.’

‘Tha’s as maybe,’ Holberton pushed on, unwilling to be corrected by his subordinate in the presence of a policeman. ‘But there’s many would say they’re peculiar, funny ideas - trousers and universities and unsuitable connections. Faybins too, them an’ their friends - not but what there’s any ‘arm in ‘em, though.’

‘Were you in the war, Mr Causley?’ Asked Love.

‘I was, my three brothers too, and only two of us come back. — regiment. An’ I never ‘ad shell shock, nor war neurosis, nor anythin’ like that,’ he said, becoming emphatic, ‘an’ I ain’t touched liquor since 1918. I’m not imaginin’ things: somebody interfered with that parcel. I know it, and Miss Orchard knew it too.’

‘It might have been a misunderstanding, or a joke even.’

‘Might’a been,’ Causley said laconically. ‘But interfering with His Majesty’s Mails is a crime, if it were meanta be funny or not.’

‘Well, thank you, Mr Holberton, Mr Causley, you’ve been very helpful,’ Love lied. ‘One last thing, are there any other foreigners living in or around the village?’

It was a pleasant walk across the green and down a road lined with thatched cottages, and two ladies sitting together in —‘s tea room watched the stranger with interest. Love soon left the houses behind and began to climb the hill on the far side of the village. The road was walled with high banks of earth from the top of which grew slender ash trees, their branches curving towards each other far above his head, their filigree of spring leaves luminous in the sunshine. He walked briskly, letting his arms swing and feeling his blood rising with the sap, a little short of breath but altogether feeling vigorous and healthy and grateful to be alive. At the top of the hill the banks became hedgerow and a bend in the lane brought him in sight of a gap marked by two stone posts, the simple five-bar gate being left open during the day. The right-hand post which took the latch was more elaborate than its pair, having for a finial the carved head of the green man. As he got closer Love saw a sign on the top bar of the gate painted in gothic lettering: Greenwood.

The house was an elegant Georgian construction, stuccoed, with one large sash on either side of the neoclassical porch on the ground floor, and three slightly smaller windows on the storey above. No one was visible in these front rooms. The gravel crunched as Love crossed the sweep and he listened for barking within, but none came. He had been told that Greenwood was a working farm and speculated that the obligatory dog was out on the land. The wide front door was shut against the chance of rain. It had no knocker, but a bell in the wall beside it with a knob which had to be pulled out to ring. He waited for half a minute, wondering if there would be objections to his not having used the tradesman’s entrance, before the sound of a door opening close within was followed by the appearance of a young woman in maid’s uniform, probably the Gracie whom Causley had mentioned.

‘Good morning, I am Detective Sergeant George Love from Exeter CID,’ he showed his warrant card, ‘here to speak with Miss Apolline Orchard.’

‘Please excuse me, but Miss Orchard is working until half past eleven. You would be welcome to come in and wait.’

Love’s wristwatch showed a quarter past. ‘This really won’t take long.’

‘I’m very sorry, Miss Orchard asked specifically not to be disturbed.’

‘All right then, I’ll wait,’ he said, repressing a flare of irritation, and she showed him into the room left of the front door. ‘You’d be Miss Grace Daring, yes? Have you missed any post or had anything arrive later than expected?’

‘No, sir. All my family live in the village, I hardly ever get letters.’

He declined her offers of refreshment and to take his hat and coat and she left him alone. Absently turning his old homburg over and over, he reflected that her Devonshire accent was very slight, and wondered if this was due to her own effort or an affectation demanded by employers who would not countenance fifteen minutes inconvenience. His own accent had been exorcised from him in grammar school. This picture did not exactly fit with employers who overpaid their servants. Then again, perhaps they were reasonably paid for what was asked of them. He shrugged off his irritation and noticed the room he was standing in.

The window he had seen from the front faced east, but the southern wall was twice as long, with two large sashes flanking the generous fireplace and set in to make window seats. The alcoves at each end were filled up with shelves, perfectly positioned for books to protect the spines from sunlight. The late morning sunshine lit up the garden beyond and slanted brilliantly through the three windows to illuminate the furnishings. The drawing room was a model of fine taste in the Arts and Crafts mode, but a taste which had nothing to prove and valued comfort. It had probably been decorated in the last century, he thought. It was somewhat faded, in such a way as did not detract from the whole but rather prevented it from being overwhelming. The walls were papered with an elaborate pattern of large curling leaves, redolent of the green man’s foliage, in a mixture of deep greens and purplish hues which glowed in the sunlight. The preponderance of the furniture looked to be as old as the house, including a magnificent escritoire which reached as high as the picture rail and had more drawers than an apothecary’s cabinet, though an octagonal table and several revolving bookcases looked to be Edwardian. The upholstered seats were covered with shades of green velvet which complemented the paper, while the thick carpet over the slate flags was all warmth. Love relaxed despite himself as the room enfolded him, the leaves seeming to unfurl from the walls and embrace him while an armchair, perfectly positioned to catch the sun, glowed invitingly.

Miss Orchard had in fact made no such specification against interruption but Grace, conscious of her mistress’s habit of wearing trousers when she was not expecting company, decided that Apolline would appreciate more than a moment’s notice that a detective from Exeter wished to speak to her. Having deposited the detective in the drawing room Grace slipped into the library, where Apolline was in truth working, to apprise her of this. Apolline took the back stairs up to her bedroom and several minutes later descended the main staircase in costume with hair and face arranged.

A dark grey cloud sailed inexorably across the sky and the drawing room felt cold in the sudden absence of sunshine. At the sound of the door opening Love turned from the bookshelves whose contents he’d been examining to see a dark haired woman whom he hoped was Miss Orchard. She was.

She was not the officious ageing spinster he had been hypothesising. He put her at around thirty, possibly a sweetheart killed in the war had left her a Superfluous Woman, not ugly but nothing remarkable to look at. If George had been a lesser detective he’d have left it at that. However, he thought, that wasn’t quite right; she had a remarkably bland face - as inscrutable as her plain skirt and beige jersey, which didn’t suit her - difficult, even for his policeman’s mind, to commit to memory. The eyes slid past her somehow, yet he had the indefinable sense that this was an affected expression, that she had been used to making her face a blank which observers might project anything onto.

Love introduced himself and explained his presence, and received an apology for having been kept waiting. ‘Mr Causley tells me you regularly receive packages from Germany, and he believes one of these went missing on’ - he consulted his notebook - ‘Saturday the 25th of March, in what he considers to be suspicious circumstances.’

‘Yes, he’s been very zealous about the matter.’ The voice was as bland as the face; upper middle class and unmemorable. ‘It coincided with a rather unpleasant experience for him. This particular parcel was delivered several days later. Nothing appeared to be amiss with the contents.’

‘What were the contents?’ he asked, a little abruptly.

‘I translate one of Germany’s leading chemistry journals for Alleyn Laboratories, there are two issues a week.’

Love wrote this down. ‘Is there much call for this sort of work?’

‘There has been a boycott of German science since the War, which naturally extends to their publications, but certain industries - pharmaceuticals and chemical dyes mostly - are still German specialities; being much better prepared for war, their industries weren’t suspended or destroyed by it. Most English scientists don’t want to read German literature these days, but it’s sensible to keep an eye on what’s being published all the same.

‘Are your neighbours aware that you regularly receive post from Germany?’

As he questioned her, Apolline noticed, his face was turned towards his notebook as though that were the object of his gaze, while in fact his eyes watched her from beneath a pale brow.

‘It isn’t a secret,’ she said, ‘though I don’t advertise the fact. I’ve discussed some of the articles with friends to whom I thought they’d be of interest, and Herr Leitner has remarked upon them as evidence of my proficiency in German.’

‘You don’t think it’s probable then, that your post has been targeted because of its origin? It seems to be common knowledge that you spent the war in Switzerland, some people may have drawn certain conclusions from that.’

‘I doubt it.’

‘Herr Leitner would be the Swiss gentleman staying in the village?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you friendly with him?’

‘We’ve had him to dinner once or twice; a stranger in a strange land.’

‘You weren’t acquainted during the war?’

‘I had never met him before he came to Nethercott in February.’

For effect, he consulted his notebook before continuing. ‘Our records have a Frau Feuerstein living at this address, formerly of Austrian citizenship. I’d have thought Herr Leitner would enjoy the opportunity of some German conversation.’

‘Frau Feuerstein, as you so properly call her, is my sister, sergeant, and she has very little German.’

Love wondered how she and Feurstein had managed to communicate to the point of marriage.

‘What’s more,’ Apolline continued, ’I believe Herr Leitner hopes his sojourn here will improve his English.’

‘I see. And Herr Feuerstein?’

‘Deceased.’

‘My sympathies.’ He paused out of respect before continuing. ‘Who else lives here besides?’

‘My brother Inigo Orchard, Miss Grace Daring you’ve met, and Mrs Alice Ineson, our cook-housekeeper.’

‘No Mr Ineson?’

‘No.’ There never had been one, but one can’t call a cook-housekeeper Miss.

‘I see, and none of them have missed any post?’

‘Not so far as I am aware.’

He paused and then, thinking he might as well be thorough, said ‘Feuerstein is a Jewish name, I believe?’

‘Yes.’ Inwardly Apolline was taken aback; this possibility had not occurred to her.

‘Might your post have been targeted because of this?’

‘I shouldn’t have thought so.’

‘Many people blamed the Jews for the War, suspected them of sympathy with the Germans. Perhaps the combination...’

Many people blame the Jews for everything, she thought but did not say. ‘If anyone took that much issue with my sister’s marriage I imagine they would have made their displeasure more directly felt. Besides, the delayed parcel was addressed to me, not Mrs Feuerstein.’

‘As you say. There’s nothing particular, I suppose, about Alleyn Laboratories - it sounds far fetched, but there’s no reason anyone might not want you or your employer to read something in that journal?’

‘There’s nothing missing from it, there have been no problems with delivery since, and, well, if you wanted to keep something secret you wouldn’t publish it. I’m sorry, detective, but I think of more serious concern is what happened to Jed Causley, and I don’t think my parcel can shed any light on that.’

‘Well, thank you for your time, Miss Orchard,’ he said, with a respectful nod. He saw himself out. It was a pity, he thought, that he didn’t have cause to make a search; he’d very much like to see the rest of that house.

DS Love fastened his Burberry and turned the collar up against a chill south- wester. It started to spit as he thumped back down the hill, struggling against the gravity threatening to pull him head over heels. It was gone noon by the time he reached the village again, and he was glad to turn in at the Three Hares for dinner. He ordered the mild ale and decided to try a piece of pigeon pie. Chatting with the landlord Tattershall and the men who’d dropped in for a midday pint it became clear that the mystery of the post was considered in the light of Causley’s misadventure, as Miss Orchard had implied, and Love found that the details of the wandering parcel were not generally known. There was some speculation that one of Causley’s sons had spiked their father’s flask for a joke and now daren’t own up for fear of his life, but it wasn’t serious. Confidentially, he asked Tattershall whether Causley had in fact bought any liquor from him and received a firm negative.

Having drawn a blank at Greenwood, Love got directions to Causley’s cottage, where he discussed with the postman the possibility of a re-enactment that afternoon. It was decided that, for accuracy’s sake, Love should accompany Causley on his morning round the next day. They were to meet outside the Post Office at half past five, whence Love now returned to telephone CID.

Initially, the chief inspector was somewhat sceptical of his sergeant’s proposed course of action. Love stressed that something rather peculiar did seem to have happened to Mr Causley, and that in his opinion the best way to calm the natives was to go into the business as thoroughly as possible. Had Love at least spoken to that Swiss individual staying in the village? Mr Leitner was absent and would not return until tomorrow. The DCI suggested that Love might be milking what was meant to be a day’s easy work for a beano (he had a tendency to mix metaphors). Love asked the DCI if he would like him to return without interviewing Mr Leitner.

‘No. Now you’re there you may as well wait and talk to the yodelling plant- fancier.’ The dead line clicked in Love’s ear.

‘Thank you, sir,’ he muttered, replacing the receiver.

[1] Australian Prime Minister William Morris Hughes, September 1921