Page 52 of The Stranger in Room Six

Mabel

They were in the drawing room, sitting on large chesterfield sofas beside walnut tables with chequered marquetry.

On the walls hung huge oil paintings, from which Mabel’s grandparents peered down with stern expressions, as if they too could not believe the family scandal about to come crashing down.

The Colonel had been in jail for over a year awaiting trial.

He’d been refused bail while the police built their case.

‘The authorities think Jonty has done something wrong,’ wept her aunt. ‘But he hasn’t. He was just trying to do his best for King and Country. They’ve got it all wrong.’

Cook made a noise from the door. Mabel wasn’t sure if it was because she disagreed or because she wanted to alert them to her presence.

‘Lunch is served,’ she said.

‘I can’t eat anything,’ wept Aunt Clarissa.

‘I won’t eat either,’ declared Mabel.

‘You must,’ whispered Cook, coming to Mabel’s side. ‘You need to keep your spirits up. I don’t know how to say this but it’s best if people don’t think you’re too upset about everything that’s happened.’

‘What are you whispering?’ said Clarissa, lifting her tear-stained face.

‘I suggested that Miss Mabel might like to try some of the broth I’ve made.’

‘Go,’ said her aunt, waving her hand. ‘I need to be alone.’

After lunch, Frannie was still giving her cold looks despite her promise that they would be friends again.

‘Will you go for a walk with me after you finish your work?’ Mabel asked.

‘I need to help my mam at home,’ Frannie replied shortly. ‘Besides, I don’t want to walk with a Blackshirt supporter.’

‘I’m not a Blackshirt,’ Mabel declared stoutly. ‘Cook has told me about them.’

Frannie turned on me, her eyes blazing. ‘Then why are you so upset about the Colonel? People like him think Hitler will make them powerful. Some poor people even think they’ll get better living conditions, but they’re both wrong.

That’s what my dad used to say … before he got murdered. Now leave me alone.’

Frannie had to be wrong. The Colonel could be tough at times but on the whole, he was kind. Surely he couldn’t be supporting that wicked man in Germany?

Mabel wandered out to the stables. She needed to do something or she felt her head would burst.

‘Are you all right, my dear?’ asked James the groom when he found her sobbing into Foam’s neck for comfort.

‘I’m so confused about the Colonel. My aunt says he tried his best for King and Country. But now someone – I can’t say who – has told me he’s on Hitler’s side. I can’t believe it. He’s usually so nice to me. He cannot be bad.’

The groom patted her on the shoulder. ‘Sometimes, bad people seem good on the outside. The Colonel is being tried for treason.’ His voice rose with anger. ‘That’s an extremely serious offence.’

‘But he loves England. He’s always saying so.’

‘People can show their love in strange ways, miss.’

‘But if he has done wrong, why can’t they just lock him up instead of hanging him?’

The groom’s lips visibly tightened. ‘Because an example has to be set. Now, why don’t you take Foam for a ride and clear your head?’

It proved good advice. Maybe, Mabel told herself, as she trotted across the fields, the Colonel would be proved innocent and then they could return to normal. Or at least, as normal as life could be in this horrible war.

On her way home, Mabel spotted a man mending the fences around the paddock. For some reason, her heart began to beat.

‘Antonio! What are you doing here?’

‘We have been told to help around the village,’ he replied, giving a bow. So polite!

Then he noticed her tear-stained face. ‘What is wrong?’

Mabel couldn’t help telling him about the Colonel.

‘My father is a count,’ he said. ‘Depending on which way the war goes, he might too be shot as a traitor. Or hanged.’

‘I am so sorry.’

‘You’re sorry? Even though I am the enemy?’

‘I don’t really see you like that,’ admitted Mabel. ‘You seem too nice.’

‘So do you. Although you’re not just nice. You are beautiful.’

Mabel flushed. No one had ever called her that before.

‘Miss!’ The groom was calling from the stables. ‘Your aunt needs you urgently.’

Was she ill? Clarissa had become so pale and thin since Jonty had been taken.

But when Mabel arrived back at the house, out of breath after sprinting from the stables, she found Clarissa dressed in one of her best silk suits and hats.

‘Get yourself ready,’ she commanded.

‘Where are we going?’

‘To court.’

‘I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again,’ tutted Cook. ‘A trial is no place for a young lady.’

‘Hold your tongue, or I will dismiss you,’ snapped Aunt Clarissa. ‘It is not your place to interfere.’

‘Hah! You won’t find anyone else to hire. Not with the gossip that’s flying around.’

‘Then I shall make my own meals.’

‘I’d like to see that,’ muttered Cook walking off.

‘Please,’ said Mabel running after her. ‘Don’t go.’

Cook gave her a quick hug. ‘If it wasn’t for you, child, I’d be packing my bags right now. But I can’t leave you here. Not with her.’

The groom had the car ready. Aunt Clarissa got in without a thank you, then drove at breakneck speed to the court in Exeter.

‘I need to see him,’ she kept saying, urgently. ‘I need to see him.’

Mabel had never been to court before. There were so many people! All shuffling and elbowing each other to get a seat on the benches. Some faces she recognized from the hunt.

‘The Colonel must be a very popular man,’ she whispered to her aunt.

‘He was until the trouble started,’ her aunt snapped. ‘Now they have come to gloat.’

Someone slammed a gavel. The trial was beginning.

It was hard to know what was being said and who was saying it. At times, the lawyers’ voices were drowned out by shouts from the gallery.

When the Colonel was called to give evidence, the crowd hissed and booed. Mabel could hardly hear what he was saying. He seemed to be mumbling. It didn’t even look like him. This man had had his head shaved. Gone was the moustache. He slouched, too, as if he had already been condemned.

‘What have they done to him?’ wept her aunt, clutching the locket round her neck in distress.

Eventually the jury was sent out, only to return a few minutes later.

‘Guilty.’ The word resounded round the court amidst gasps and applause.

The judge was putting on a black cloth square on top of his wig. ‘Lord Dashland, you will be taken from this place and hanged by the neck until you are dead. And may the Lord have mercy upon your soul.’

Clarissa let out such a terrible wail that every head turned towards them. ‘Jonty!’ she called out. ‘Let me talk to him. Please, before you take him from me.’

But the Colonel looked right through her aunt as if he didn’t know her.

‘He doesn’t want us to be implicated,’ she sobbed.

But they weren’t involved. Were they?

‘What will happen now?’ Mabel called out, frightened, as the crowd went crazy around them.

‘No doubt the traitor will try to appeal,’ said a man in front, turning round. ‘But he won’t get off. Not if there’s any fairness. He deserves to be hung, drawn and quartered if you ask me. Sounds like most of the folk here feel the same.’

Then suddenly there was the sound of a blood-curdling scream. It was the Colonel.

‘Oh my God,’ gasped her aunt. ‘Someone’s stabbed him!’