Maisie lingered for a while in the office before leaving, closing the door behind her, and making her way along the hallway to another unmarked door. Here she took a key from her pocket and entered the room. Home. She had moved a few weeks before, when it was clear that she needed to be closer to her work. The bed-sitting room was small, but all that she required was within the walls of this room. And when she needed some respite from the dour familiarity of such spartan accommodations, there was usually an invitation to stay at Ebury Place, or she would go down to Chelstone, to spend time in the calm and comforting company of her father.
'There. Reckon I've got everything.'
Billy Beale placed one more bag in the luggage compartment of Lady Rowan's car, and stood to watch Maisie, who was securing her navy blue beret with a long pearl-tipped pin. Her corduroy jacket had been thrown around the shoulders of the driver's seat, giving the impression of a rather stout old man who had just sat down. An observer might have considered the young woman 'fast,' for today Maisie was wearing a pair of long beige cuffed trousers, with a linen blouse and brown walking shoes. Maisie looked at her watch and took her place in the driver's seat of the MG.
'Good. Not too late. We'd better get a move on. We need to be at Chelstone by noon.'
Billy Beale hesitated.
'What is it, Billy?'
'Nothing really, Miss . . . it's just that . . .' He took the cap from his head and looked up at the sky.'It's just that this is the first time I've left London since I got back from the war. Couldn't face it. O' course the missus 'as been away with the nippers. Been down to Kent with 'er people 'op-picking, and o' course to 'er sister's in 'astings. But not me, Miss.'
Maisie said nothing, made no response. She understood the power of reflection well, and as she had done with Celia Davenham just a few short weeks before, she made no move to soothe Billy Beale, allowing him the time he needed to step into the car.
'But you never know, at least I might get a good night's sleep down there in the country.' Still he hesitated.
'What do you mean, Billy?'
Maisie shielded her eyes from the morning sun as she looked up at him.
Billy sighed deeply, took a breath, opened the car door, and sat down on the passenger seat. The claret leather of the hardly used seat creaked as Billy moved to make himself comfortable.
'Just can't sleep, Miss. Not for long anyway. 's'bin like that since I got 'ome from France. That many years ago. Soon as I close my eyes, it all comes back.'
He looked into the distance as if into the past.
'Blimey, I can almost smell the gas, can 'ardly breathe at times. If I fall asleep straight away, I only wake up fighting for breath. And the pounding in my 'ead. You never forget that pounding, the shells. Mind you, you know that, don't you, Miss?'
And as he spoke, Maisie remembered her homecoming, remembered Maurice taking her again to see Khan, who seemed never to age. In her mind's eye she saw herself sitting with Khan and telling her story, and Maurice sitting with her.
Khan spoke of bearing witness to the pain of another's memories, a ritual as old as time itself, then asked her to tell her story again. And again. And again. She told her story until, exhausted, she had no more story to tell. And Maisie remembered Khan's words, that this nightmare was a dragon that would remain alive, but dormant, waiting insidiously to wake and breathe its fire, until she squarely faced the truth of what had happened to Simon.
'You all right, Miss?'
Billy Beale placed a hand on Maisie's shoulder for just a second.
'Yes, yes, I was just thinking about what you said, Billy. So what do you do when you cannot sleep?'
Billy looked down at his hands and began pulling at the lining of his cap, running the seam between the forefinger and thumb of each hand.
'I get up, so's not to wake the missus. Then I go out. Walking the streets. For hours sometimes. And you know what, Miss? It's not only me, Miss. There's a lot of men I see, 'bout my age, walking the streets. And we all know, Miss, we all know who we are. Old soldiers what keep seeing the battle. That's what we are, Miss. I tell you, sometimes I think we're like the waking dead. Livin' our lives during the day, normal like, then trying to forget something what 'appened years ago. It's like going to the picture 'ouse, only the picture's all in me 'ead.'
Maisie inclined her head to show understanding, her silence respectful of Billy's terrible memories, and of this confidence shared. And once again she was drawn back, to that year in the wards after her return from France, working to comfort the men whose minds were ravaged by war. Small comfort indeed. Yet for every one who could not bring his mind back from the last vision of a smoke-filled hell, there were probably dozens like Billy, living now as good father, good husband, good son, good man, but who feared the curtains drawn against darkness, and the light extinguished at the end of the day.
'Ready, Billy?' Maisie asked when Billy put the cap firmly back on his head.
'Reckon I am, Miss. Yes, I reckon I am. Do me the world of good will this, Miss. Bein' useful like.'
They spoke little on the journey to Kent. Occasionally Maisie asked Billy questions as they drove along the winding country roads. She wanted to make doubly sure that he understood everything that was required of him. Information. She needed more information. A feel for the place. How did it work when you were on the inside? Was anything amiss?
She spoke to him of intuition, abbreviating the teaching she had received from Maurice and Khan many years before.
'You must listen to the voice inside, Billy,' said Maisie, placing her hand to her middle. 'Remember even the smallest sensation of unease, for it could well be significant.'
Billy had been quick to learn, quick to understand that his impressions were important, just as relevant as facts on a page. As Maisie knew from their first meeting, Billy Beale was sharp, an acute observer of
