Page 79 of Fire Must Burn

‘It wasn’t as much fun as it sounds,’ said Mrs Bainbridge.

‘No, I suppose not. Oh, goodness, I haven’t properly introduced myself to your friend, have I? Forgive me, I’m Mrs Jeremy Kendall, but please call me Lucinda.’

‘How do you do?’ replied Sparks. ‘Miss Iris Sparks, and thank you for seeing us.’

‘Not at all, it’s lovely to be speaking to some fully grown humans at this time of day,’ said Mrs Kendall.

A housemaid came in with an opened bottle of Riesling in a silver ice bucket along with three wine glasses. Mrs Kendall filled the glasses and handed them around.

‘To adult conversation,’ she said, then she took a long sip and sighed contentedly. ‘I believe you said on the telephone that it was a personal matter, Gwen?’

‘I did. A mission of mercy for a friend.’

‘That sounds rather serious,’ said Mrs Kendall, looking back and forth between the partners.

‘I’m afraid so,’ said Mrs Bainbridge. ‘He recently returned from a long sojourn overseas, but unfortunately met up with a severe accident. He’s in extremis, I’m sorry to say, and was hoping to be reunited with some of his old friends while he still may. I’ve been trying to locate them. Iris was a classmate of his, and recalled that one of his friends had some older sisters, which led us to you. We were hoping that you might know where we could find your brother.’

‘My brother?’ exclaimed Mrs Kendall. ‘Do you mean Kevin?’

‘Yes,’ said Sparks.

‘You mean you haven’t heard?’

‘Heard? Heard what?’

‘Oh, dear, I could have saved you the trip,’ said Mrs Kendall. ‘Kevin died at Anzio back in ’44.’

‘Kevin’s dead?’ cried Sparks. ‘Oh, no!’

She burst into tears as Mrs Bainbridge turned to her in alarm.

‘Iris, are you all right?’

‘Sorry, sorry,’ sobbed Sparks, pulling a handkerchief from her bag. ‘I didn’t know about Kevin. We were friends in Cambridge. More than friends briefly.’

‘Ah,’ said Mrs Kendall, nodding sympathetically. ‘One of those. He cut quite the swathe through the female populace for a while.’

‘God, I had no idea I would react like that,’ said Sparks, wiping her eyes. ‘It was rather a torrid— no, I shouldn’t say it. You’re his sister.’

‘No, it’s all right,’ Mrs Kendall assured him. ‘I’ve heard many such stories about my baby brother. I consider your tears a tribute to his, ah … let’s say his virtues.’

‘I still remember sitting across the breakfast table from him at your house, thinking what a gorgeous man he was,’ said Sparks.

‘You were at our house?’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Sparks. ‘He threw a party, when was it? Spring of ’36, I think. He had the whole massive place to himself.’

‘Oh, you were atthatparty?’

‘You heard about it?’

‘Not in great detail,’ said Mrs Kendall. ‘But word reached Daddy, and there was quite the to-do when he came back.’

‘Sounds like it must have been some bash,’ said Mrs Bainbridge. ‘Were there frequent parties back then?’

‘Oh, Kevin took full advantage of being a Pickard while the parents were away, which was a frequent occurrence, thank God,’ said Mrs Kendall. ‘We all did, I suppose. They weren’t particularly concerned with our upbringing once they had us, especially when they finally manufactured a son and heir after the disappointments of two daughters, so we had free rein back then.’

‘Why do you think this particular party drew your father’s ire, then?’