Ha'penny by Jo Walton Page B

years now,” Mercedes replied.
    “Your English is very good,” Carmichael said.
    She smiled. “When I came it was very bad.”
    “Why did you come here from Spain?”
    “Lauria was playing in Barthelona, and she stayed in the house where I was then working. My mistress lent me to her, to help her dress, and we liked each other. When she left she asked me to come with her, so I came.”
    “Do you like England?”
    “London, I like. I like the cinemas and the shops and the Tube. Other parts of England I have seen when Lauria is on tour, I do not like so much.” She gave a little shudder.
    Carmichael noticed that Royston nodded approvingly and Jacobson went so far as to give a sympathetic shudder. Lancastrian that he was, Carmichael still had sufficient sympathy to smile at the girl. “Now, tell me what you did for Miss Gilmore.”
    “I looked after her clothes and her hair and helped her dress. She was beautiful, but she was getting older, and when you get older beauty takes more effort and time. I used to read the papers for her, Vogue and the papers from Paris, and if there was anything that would do for her I would show her. Making her look good was our shared project.” She smiled, then stopped smiling abruptly. “I can’t believe she is dead. She was very good to me. She helped me so much. I had plenty of time to myself, not like in Spain. When I first came she had one of her friends act as tutor to help me learn English. And she always took an interest in my affairs. She was a friend as well as an employer. She helped me get papers.”
    “I suppose I should look at your papers,” Carmichael said, and extended a hand. She produced them from her bag. Carmichael had expected to see a work permit, and was surprised to see that they were British identity papers, proclaiming her place of birth as Barcelona, her parents as Spanish, and her religion as Roman Catholic, but nevertheless recorded her as a naturalized British citizen. Lauria Gilmore had certainly not stinted her help with papers.
    “Will you go back to Spain now?” Carmichael asked, looking up again.
    “I? Spain?” For a moment she looked almost afraid, perhaps realizing how empty her future was without Lauria Gilmore. Then she smiled. “No. I will look for work here. I like London too much.”
    “Do you have any idea why Miss Gilmore might have been killed?”
    She shook her head. “None. I was shocked when I saw it in the Standard . Why would anyone bomb Lauria? She was kind and good.”
    “Did she ever talk to you about bombs?” Carmichael asked, though it was a long shot.
    Mercedes looked puzzled. “You mean the Blitz? Yes, sometimes, stories about the war. She worked in a canteen.”
    “What were her political views?”
    “She hated Mr. Normanby.” Mercedes smiled again. “How she would go on about how she hated him. She hated Hitler in Germany too, and Franco in Spain, Stalin in Russia, and all the others. She liked democracy, voting, that’s why she got me my papers, so I could vote. She liked little people, underdogs she called them. She liked Mr. Bevan, very much, and Mr. Atterly.”
    “Atterly?” Carmichael asked.
    “Attlee, she means, sir,” Royston said, looking up from his notebook. “I’ve written down Attlee.” Attlee, the leader of the Labour Party, the Official Opposition, a colorless man who Churchill had once described as “a sheep in sheep’s clothing.”
    “Atterly, yes,” Mercedes confirmed, smiling at Royston.
    “Did she know them personally?”
    “She had met, yes, at parties, you know how it is, theater people, political people meet sometimes. She had to sit at dinner once next to the one who was killed, Thirkie, she told me about it after. She said he was the best of a bad lot.” Carmichael could hear the echo of the mistress saying it in her maid’s voice.
    “So, yesterday,” Carmichael said. “Was Saturday usually your day off?”
    “Not usually, but if I want a day, Lauria usually lets me