A Lesson in Secrets_ A Maisie Dobbs Novel - Jacqueline Winspear [37]
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Greville had a responsibility to ensure the financial viability of the college, and to that end he took his acquaintances quite seriously. I am sure your Dr. Blanche accommodated a request for a contribution to our cause.”
“And I assure you he did not.” Maisie steadied her breathing; she did not want to rush to Maurice’s defense and in doing so make a comment she would regret. “I have some knowledge of Dr. Blanche’s philanthropic expenditures—all of which are in favor of the clinics he founded. If he was in contact with Dr. Liddicote, it was due to their mutual intellectual interests.”
Roth sighed. “In any case, the police are treating his death as suspicious—that is their language, as I am sure you are aware—and they will be speaking to staff and students over the next few days. I daresay they have already interviewed you.”
“If they are to interview staff, then I will be included, of that you should have no doubt.” Maisie paused again when she realized that Roth’s eyes were filled with tears. “Are you all right, Dr. Roth?”
He nodded. “It has been a troubling night, Miss Dobbs, and a difficult morning thus far.”
“Dr. Roth, may I ask a question of you?”
He waved his hand, as if he had lost all energy. “I have been answering questions for half the night, so a few more won’t do any harm.” In his fatigued state, Roth’s accent had become increasingly guttural. Until that point his English pronunciation was almost regal—it was not commonly known that the royal family spoke their native language with more than a hint of Germanic inflection.
“How did you come to know Dr. Liddicote? You must have been acquainted when the college was in the early stages of planning.”
Roth removed his spectacles, folded them, and placed them on the desk in front of him. His movements seemed precise and measured. “Lack of sleep, Miss Dobbs.” He rubbed his eyes. “And I fear my vision is becoming quite inadequate for my purposes.” He sighed as he replaced the spectacles, blinking as if to refocus. “In 1916, when I was thirty-two years of age, I was an officer in the German army on the Western Front. It was not my choice to go to war; it had never been my desire to fight. But when I saw my students—fine young men, and not one of them a warrior—conscripted from their classes and sent to France to fight after barely six weeks of training, I could not see them go unless I, too, went forward to do my part. My rise through the ranks was as swift as it was for many of your young men—attrition begets opportunity, if one can call it that. Our leaders, such as they were, were all swept away by a tide of complete and utter stupidity—just a year before I joined the army, my students and I were welcoming our counterparts from France, Austria, Spain, Great Britain, and Sweden for a summer school in which we shared our knowledge and understanding of the great philosophers.” He coughed and removed his spectacles, and rubbed his eyes once more. “But in 1916, there I was, in this cold, ugly stench of war. We had just taken a ridge that had been greatly contested—just a small ridge, a few feet for a few thousand French, British, and German lives—and when we went into the trenches, the vision of those boys—boys whom we had killed, boys who looked so much like our boys—all but broke my heart. We moved and buried the bodies as reverently as we could, in the circumstances. I stopped alongside one of them; I had an urge to know more about him, to know who he was, if there was a letter from his mother or a photograph of his girl. Instead I was taken with a book in his pack. It was a children’s story by Greville Liddicote. All around me was the . . . the . . . sickness of war, and here in my hands was a children’s book. And I sat down in that mud and wept. Not one of my men stared at me, not one stopped what he was doing. They just went about their business, and as soon as I was able to conduct myself as an officer, I went about mine.”
Maisie nodded. “And after the war you sought out the author.”
“I went back to my teaching position