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course.”
    Maisie turned to leave, and as she reached the door Maurice called after her.
    “You might bump into James Compton tomorrow. He’s home too.”
    “Yes, I suppose I might. See you tomorrow, Maurice.”
     
    M aisie planned to leave Chelstone at eleven o’clock, to be back at her office by one at the latest, so she was surprised when the telephone rang in her father’s cottage at half past eight the followingmorning, and her father announced that Billy Beale wanted to speak to her.
    “Billy, is everything all right?”
    “Sorry, Miss. I know you’re going to be back this afternoon, but I thought you’d want to know straightaway that we’ve had the police here this morning already.”
    “The police? Whatever’s happened?”
    “It’s terrible, Miss—Mr. and Mrs. Clifton were attacked in their hotel room yesterday afternoon; left for dead, they were. They’re in St. George’s Hospital under police guard, and they’re both very, very poorly. Mrs. Clifton’s at death’s door. And the police seem to think you might know who did it.”

THREE
    I n haste Maisie gathered her belongings, packed her case, and loaded the MG. She ran up to The Dower House to see Maurice, who had not yet risen, so she penned a note to him:
    My dear Maurice,
    I must return to London immediately. Word came this morning that Mr. and Mrs. Clifton (parents of the young man whose postmortem we discussed yesterday) have been subjected to a most vicious attack at their hotel and both are seriously injured. I will return to Chelstone on Saturday, so expect me to call upon you in the afternoon.
    Wishing you well, as always.
    Maisie faltered when it came to closing the note; she felt her throat tighten at the thought of Maurice so compromised in health, and at the same time she was shocked by the news from Billy. She swallowed backa fearful anticipation of what she might have to face in the coming days and, holding the pen above the paper, wrote:
    With fondest love,
    Maisie
    She folded the letter, placed it in an envelope, and passed it to Mrs. Bromley to give to Maurice on his breakfast tray.
    Later, as she started the MG and waited for the engine to warm before driving away from her father’s cottage, Maisie pondered the words she had chosen to sign off the message to Maurice. Her love and regard for him was without question, though neither had ever said as much. He was not her father, and her adoration of Frankie Dobbs was beyond measure, but she knew that Maurice, in his way, was parent to her intellect, to her understanding of the world she inhabited. Without Maurice she would not have become the person she was today, for better or for worse. He had guided her along the path of her growing, was witness to her successes and failures, and showed her the world that could be hers if she set out to stake her claim.
    Reversing the motor car onto the driveway, she changed gear to drive out along the carriage sweep, but swung over to the left to allow another motor car to pass. Maisie was not familiar with the vehicle, and was surprised when the driver pulled up alongside and wound down the window, though the cloth top was already drawn back despite the cold morning.
    “Maisie Dobbs—off so soon? When I saw your little motor parked here last night, I thought I might catch you this morning.” James Compton was wearing a leather jacket over an Aran jersey, with a cream woolen scarf wrapped around his neck and reaching up almost to his nose. His fair hair had been rendered unruly in the wind, his nose was red, and his eyes—the gray-blue of a winter sky—watered from the chillair. He pulled down the scarf to speak. “I wanted to see if you were up for a spin in the old girl here.”
    Maisie was anxious to leave, but at the same time, she had known James for years and had also accepted investigative work from his company in the past, so thought it best to exchange at least a few words. “Sorry, James, but I have to return to London as a