A Lesson in Secrets_ A Maisie Dobbs Novel - Jacqueline Winspear [77]
And then there was Stratton—Stratton who had burned a torch for Maisie at one point, who had shown interest again when she parted from Andrew Dene, but who now seemed subdued in her company since it was known she was walking out with James Compton. MacFarlane had seen Stratton looking at Maisie and had known of his hidden affection. As far as Maisie could see, MacFarlane exploited that knowledge, with a comment here, a prod there. He was not an unkind man, but he was not above using another person as a source of fun—as Maisie knew only too well. “Staid, indeed,” she said aloud.
Parking outside the Groom’s Cottage, Maisie was surprised when her father did not immediately appear at the door. Though she had not telephoned in advance—she had thought to surprise him—Frankie was always there at the door when she arrived, as if he had one ear to the wind, waiting to hear the crunch of the MG’s tires on the graveled lane that extended from the main driveway to his cottage. There was no sound of a bark from Jook, his dog, so she wondered if he was at the stables. She went to open the door, and was surprised to find that she felt as if she should knock. But this is my father’s house, she thought. Instead she walked around the house, towards the back door. The sound of laughter caught her ears even before she came alongside the kitchen window. She stopped. There was her father’s throaty laugh, the laugh she remembered from her childhood. Has it been so long? Surely he has laughed like that since Mum died. It was the laugh she’d heard as a girl, after he’d told a story of something that had happened at the market. She could see him now, sitting at the kitchen table at the little house in Lambeth, she and her mother listening, waiting for the next tale. “What do you think of that, my Maisie, what do you think of that one?” And he would tickle her ribs, then lean across and pull her mother to him. “My girls, my girls . . . ” And he would laugh and laugh, a man who loved and was loved in return by wife and daughter both. How much it had changed their lives when her mother died. Was that when the dragon first raised his head and was subdued, controlled so that he could not cause havoc? Maisie felt she might weep when the hearty laugh echoed from the kitchen again.
“And you should have seen that horse take off with him, Brenda, I tell you, he fair launched himself around that track, took the stable boy right across the road. Well, I’d never seen the like of it. Bill Webber, the trainer, he just walked up to that horse when he was done—munching away in a field while the jockey tried to get himself out of the hedge—he took that bridle and I swear, he got that horse by the end of the nose and looked as if he would twist it off. ‘Do that again, my lad, and it’s the glue factory for you,’ he said. And I saw him wait there like that, him and the horse, standing there, looking at each other, until the horse dropped its head. Old Bill let go, and rubbed the horse’s neck. Followed him all the way back like a pup, did that stallion. And the jockey was still stuck in the hedge.” He laughed again.
“More tea, Frank?”
Maisie felt her eyes widen. Mrs. Bromley. Her housekeeper. Brenda? She stepped back to the gate, unsure of what to do, then shrugged. She’d come down from London to visit her father, a drive of almost an hour and a half. This was no time to turn back. She coughed twice, then again for good measure as she approached the back door. She cleared her throat again before reaching for the handle. I cannot believe I am doing this, she thought. As she was about to turn the handle, the door opened. Her father stood in front of her, his cheeks bearing a faint pink blush.
“Maisie, what a surprise—a lovely surprise, mind.”
“It was a good morning for a drive, so I thought I’d come down—where’s Jook?”
“Oh, sleeping under the table. Mrs. Bromley’s here—she came with some