Simon asked, “I know a Roger Markham from Sussex. Royal Engineers. Is he by any chance your husband?”

“Oh, no. No. His name is Ellis. Roger Ellis.” She added his rank and regiment.

How simply Simon had discovered that!

“He’s home on compassionate leave,” she went on when Simon said nothing more. “His brother Alan died a fortnight ago. Alan is-was-a Navy man, torpedoed off Ireland. He was severely wounded, but there was hope for a time. And then the doctors could do no more, and we brought him home to Vixen Hill. It was rather awful. I shouldn’t have quarreled with Roger, under the circumstances. It was foolish of me.”

We were coming down the street to Mrs. Hennessey’s house now, and Lydia added wistfully, “We were all so fond of Alan.”

We thanked Simon as he walked with us to Mrs. Hennessey’s door, and Lydia preceded me up the stairs, giving me a moment alone with him.

I could say very little-she was within hearing-but I asked, “You’ll stay over in London tonight?”

“Yes, of course,” he answered. “I’ll come in the morning.”

Just then, Lydia paused on the stairs, and I turned quickly to see her leaning against the banister, her head down.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, seeing my alarm. “I seem to have hurried too much and given myself a headache.” She went on up the stairs more slowly, and I heard the door to the flat open.

“Go ahead, make sure she’s all right,” Simon told me, and then he was gone.

I followed her up the stairs and into the flat. “When did your head begin to ache?” I asked.

“It was a sharp pain, catching me off guard. It isn’t as bad now.”

“Lydia. Sit down and let me have a look.”

Removing her coat and hanging it on the tree, she did as I’d asked. With the light from the lamp trained on her face, I examined the bruising and the swelling around her eye. “Where was the sharp pain?” She pointed to the side of her head just above and a little behind her ear. I carefully ran my fingers over the area, and she winced just as I touched what appeared to be a raised wound. Parting her thick, fair hair, I saw that it was actually an open cut that had bled a little and then clotted.