Devlin picked up the case and started up the long drive. The house showed every evidence of lack of money. The long shutters at the windows badly needed a coat of paint, as did the front door. There was a bell pull. He gave it a heave and waited, but there was no response. After a while he picked up the case and went round to the rear of the house where there was a cobbled courtyard. One of the stable doors stood open and there were sounds of activity. He put the case down and looked in.
Lavinia Shaw wore riding breeches and boots, her hair bound in a scarf as she curried a large black stallion. Devlin put a cigarette in his mouth and snapped open his lighter. The sound startled her and she looked round.
‘Miss Lavinia Shaw?’ he enquired.
‘Yes.’
‘Harry Conlon. I phoned your brother last night. He’s expecting me.’
‘Major Conlon.’ There was a sudden eagerness about her. She put down the brush and comb she was using and ran her hands over her breeches. ‘Of course. How wonderful to have you here.’
The well-bred upper-class voice, her whole attitude, was all quite incredible to Devlin, but he took the hand she offered and smiled. ‘A pleasure, Miss Shaw.’
‘Maxwell is out on the marsh somewhere with his gun. Goes every day. You know how it is? Food shortages. Anything’s good for the pot.’ She didn’t seem to be able to stop talking. ‘We’ll go in to the kitchen, shall we?’
It was very large, the floor flagged with red tiles, an enormous pine table in the centre with chairs around it. There were unwashed dishes in the sink and the whole place was cluttered and untidy, the lack of servants very evident.
‘Tea?’ she said. ‘Or would you like something stronger?’
‘No, the tea would be fine.’
He put the case carefully on the table with the bag of cycle lamps and she boiled water and made the tea quickly, so excited and nervous that she poured it before it had brewed properly.
‘Oh, dear, I’ve ruined it.’
‘Not at all. It’s wet, isn’t it, and hot?’ Devlin said.
He poured a little milk in and she sat on the other side of the table, arms folded under her full breasts, eyes glittering now, never leaving him. ‘I can’t tell you how absolutely thrilling all this is. I haven’t been so excited for years.’
She was like a character in a bad play, the duke’s daughter coming in through the French windows in her riding breeches and gushing at everyone in sight.
‘You’ve been in Germany recently?’ she asked.
‘Oh, yes,’ he told her. ‘I was in Berlin only the other day.’
‘How marvellous to be part of all that. People here are so complacent. They don’t understand what the Fuhrer’s done for Germany.’
‘For all of Europe, you might say,’ Devlin told her.
‘Exactly. Strength, a sense of purpose, discipline. Whereas here…’ She laughed contemptuously.
‘That drunken fool Churchill has no idea what he’s doing. Just lurches from one mistake to another.’
‘Ah, yes, but he would, wouldn’t he?’ Devlin said drily. ‘Do you think we could have a look round? The old barn you used for your Tiger Moth and the South Meadow?’
‘Of course.’ She jumped up so eagerly that she knocked over the chair. As she picked it up she said, Til just get a coat.’
The meadow was larger than he had expected and stretched to a line of trees in the distance. ‘How long?’ Devlin asked. ‘Two-fifty or three hundred yards?’
‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘Getting on for three-fifty. The grass is so short because we leased it to a local farmer to graze sheep, but they’ve gone to market now.’
‘You used to take off and land here a lot in the old days?’
‘All the time. That’s when I had my little Puss Moth. Great fun.’
‘And you used the barn over there as a hangar?’
‘That’s right. I’ll show you.’
The place was quite huge, but like everything else the massive doors had seen better days, dry rot very evident, planks missing. Devlin helped her open one of the doors slightly so they could go inside. There was a rusting tractor in one corner, some mouldering hay at the back. Otherwise it was empty, rain dripping through holes in the roof.