A Dangerous Mourning Read online

  He stood up and turned his back to her, looking out of the window, still apparently oblivious of Hester standing in the dressing room doorway with a peignoir over her arm and a clothes brush in her hand.

  “You are a great deal more fastidious than most women, Beatrice,” he said flatly. “I think sometimes you do not know the difference between restraint and abstemiousness.”

  “I know the difference between a footman and a gentleman,” she said quietly, and then stopped and frowned, a curious little twitch of humor on her lips. “That’s a lie—I have no idea at all. I have no familiarity with footmen whatsoever—”

  He swung around, unaware of the slightest humor in her remark or in the situation, only anger and acute insult.

  “This tragedy has unhinged your mind,” he said coldly, his black eyes flat, seeming expressionless in the lamplight. “You have lost your sense of what is fitting and what is not. I think it will be better if you remain here until you can compose yourself. I suppose it is to be expected, you are not strong. Let Miss—what is her name—care for you. Araminta will see to the household until you are better. We shall not be entertaining, naturally. There is no need for you to concern yourself; we shall manage very well.” And without saying anything further he walked out and closed the door very quietly behind him, letting the latch fall home with a thud.

  Beatrice pushed her unfinished tray away from her and turned over, burying her face in the pillows, and Hester could see from the quivering of her shoulders that she was weeping, although she made no sound.

  Hester took the tray and put it on the side table, then wrung out a cloth in warm water from the ewer and returned to the bed. Very gently she put her arms around the other woman and held her until she was quiet, then, with great care, smoothed the hair off her brow and wiped her eyes and cheeks with the cloth.

  It was the beginning of the afternoon when she was returning from the laundry with her clean aprons that Hester half accidentally overheard an exchange between the footman Percival and the laundry maid Rose. Rose was folding a pile of embroidered linen pillowcases and had just given Lizzie, who was her elder sister, the parlormaid’s lace-edged aprons. She was standing very upright, her back rigid, her shoulders squared and her chin high. She was tiny, with a waist even Hester could almost have put her hands around, and small, square hands with amazing strength in them. Her cornflower-blue eyes were enormous in her pretty face, not spoiled by a rather long nose and overgenerous mouth.

  “What do you want in here?” she asked, but her words were belied by her voice. It was phrased as a demand, but it sounded like an invitation.

  “Mr. Kellard’s shirts,” Percival said noncommittally.

  “I didn’t know that was your job. You’ll have Mr. Rhodes after you if you step out of your duties!”

  “Rhodes asked me to do it for him,” he replied.

  “Though you’d like to be a valet, wouldn’t you? Get to travel with Mr. Kellard when he goes to stay at these big houses for parties and the like—” Her voice caressed the idea, and listening, Hester could envision her eyes shining, her lips parted in anticipation, all the excitement and delights imagined, new people, an elegant servants’ hall, food, music, late nights, wine, laughter and gossip.

  “It’d be all right,” Percival agreed, for the first time a lift of warmth in his voice also. “Although I get to some interesting places now.” That was the tone of the braggart, and Hester knew it.

  It seemed Rose did too. “But not inside,” she pointed out. “You have to wait in the mews with the carriages.”

  “Oh no I don’t.” There was a note of sharpness in his voice, and Hester could imagine the glitter in his eyes and the little curl of his lips. She had seen it several times as he walked through the kitchen past the maids. “I quite often go inside.”

  “The kitchen,” Rose said dismissively. “If you were a valet you’d get upstairs as well. Valet is better than a footman.”

  They were all acutely conscious of hierarchy.

  “Butler’s better still,” he pointed out.

  “But less fun. Look at poor old Mr. Phillips.” She giggled. “He hasn’t had any fun in twenty years—and he looks as if ’e’s forgotten that.”

  “Don’t think ’e ever wanted any of your sort o’ fun.” Percival sounded serious again, remote and a trifle pompous. Suddenly he was talking of men’s business, and putting a woman in her place. “He had an ambition to be in the army, but they wouldn’t take him because of ’is feet. Can’t have been that good a footman either, with his legs. Never wear livery without padding his stocking.”

  Hester knew Percival did not have to add any artificial enhancement to his calves.

  “His feet?” Rose was incredulous. “What’s wrong with ’is feet?”

  This time there was derision in Percival’s voice. “Haven’t you ever watched ’im walk? Like someone broke a glass on the floor and ’e was picking ’is way over it and treading on half of it. Corns, bunions, I don’t know.”

  “Pity,” she said dryly. “He’d ’ave made a great sergeant major—cut out for it, ’e was. Mind, I suppose butler’s the next best thing—the way ’e does it. And he does have a wonderful turn for putting some visitors in their place. He can size up anyone coming to call at a glance. Dinah says he never makes a mistake, and you should see his face if he thinks someone is less than a gentleman—or a lady—or if they’re mean with their little appreciations. He can be so rude, just with his eye-brows. Dinah says she’s seen people ready to curl up and die with mortification. It’s not every butler as can do that.”

  “Any good servant can tell quality from riffraff, or they’re not worth their position,” Percival said haughtily. “I’m sure I can—and I know how to keep people in their places. There’s dozens of ways—you can affect not to hear the bell, you can forget to stoke the fire, you can simply look at them like they were something the wind blew in, and then greet the person behind them like they was royalty. I can do that just as well as Mr. Phillips.”

  Rose was unimpressed. She returned to her first subject. “Anyway, Percy, you’d be out from under him if you were a valet—”

  Hester knew why she wanted him to change. Valets worked far more closely with laundrymaids, and Hester had watched Rose’s cornflower eyes following Percival in the few days she had been here, and knew well enough what lay behind the innocence, the casual comments, the big bows on her apron waist and the extra flick of her skirts and wriggle of her shoulders. She had been attracted to men often enough herself and would have behaved just the same had she Rose’s confidence and her feminine skill.

  “Maybe.” Percival was ostentatiously uninterested. “Not sure I want to stay in this house anyway.”

  Hester knew that was a calculated rebuff, but she did not dare peer around the corner in case the movement was noticed. She stood still, leaning back against the piles of sheets on the shelf behind her and holding her aprons tightly. She could imagine the sudden cold feeling inside Rose. She remembered something much the same in the hospital in Scutari. There had been a doctor whom she admired, no, more than that, about whom she indulged in daydreams, imagined foolishness. And one day he had shattered them all with a dismissive word. For weeks afterwards she had turned it over and over in her mind, trying to decide whether he had meant it, even done it on purpose, bruising her feelings. That thought had sent waves of hot shame over her. Or had he been quite unaware and simply betrayed a side of his nature which had been there all the time—and which was better seen before she had committed herself too far. She would never know, and now it hardly mattered.

  Rose said nothing. Hester did not even hear an indrawn breath.

  “After all,” Percival went on, adding to it, justifying himself, “this isn’t the best house right now—police coming and going, asking questions. All London knows there’s been a murder. And what’s more, someone here did it. They won’t stop till they find them, you know.”

  “Well if they don’t, they
won’t let you go—will they?” Rose said spitefully. “After all—it might be you.”

  That must have been a thrust which struck home. For several seconds Percival was silent, then when he did speak his voice was sharp with a distinct edge, a crack of nervousness.

  “Don’t be stupid! What would any of us do that for? It must have been one of the family. The police aren’t that easily fooled. That’s why they’re still here.”

  “Oh yes? And questioning us?” Rose retorted. “If that’s so, what do they think we’re going to tell them?”

  “It’s just an excuse.” The certainty was coming back now. “They have to pretend it’s us. Can you imagine what Sir Basil would say if they let on they suspected the family?”

  “Nothing ’e could say!” She was still angry. “Police can go anywhere they want.”

  “Of course it’s one of the family.” Now he was contemptuous. “And I’ve got a few ideas who—and why. I know a few things—but I’d best say nothing; the police’ll find out one of these days. Now I’ve got work to do, and so ’ave you.” And he pushed on past her and around the corner. Hester stepped into the doorway so she was not discovered overhearing.

  “Oh yes,” Mary said, her eyes flashing as she flipped out a pillowcase and folded it. “Rose has a rare fancy for Percival. Stupid girl.” She reached for another pillow slip and examined the lace to make sure it was intact before folding it to iron and put away. “He’s nice enough looking, but what’s that worth? He’d make a terrible husband, vain as a cockerel and always looking to his own advantage. Like enough leave her after a year or two. Roving eye, that one, and spiteful. Now Harold’s a much better man—but then he wouldn’t look at Rose; he never sees anyone but Dinah. Been eating his heart out for her for the last year and a half, poor boy.” She put the pillow slip away and started on a pile of lace-edged petticoats, wide enough to fall over the huge hoops that kept skirts in the ungainly but very flattering crinoline shape. At least that shape was considered charming by those who liked to look dainty and a little childlike. Personally Hester would have preferred something very much more practical, and more natural in shape. But she was out of step with fashion—not for the first time.

  “And Dinah’s got her eye on next door’s footman,” Mary went on, straightening the ruffles automatically. “Although I can’t see anything in him, excepting he’s tall, which is nice, seein’ as Dinah’s so tall herself. But height’s no comfort on a cold night. It doesn’t keep you warm, and it can’t make you laugh. I expect you met some fine soldiers when you were in the army?”

  Hester knew the question was kindly meant, and she answered it in the same manner.

  “Oh several.” She smiled. “Unfortunately they were a trifle incapacitated at the time.”

  “Oh.” Mary laughed and shook her head as she came to the end of her mistress’s clothes from this wash. “I suppose they would be. Never mind. If you work in houses like this, there’s no telling who you might meet.” And with that hopeful remark she picked up the bundle and carried it out, walking jauntily towards the stairs with a sway of her hips.

  Hester smiled and finished her own task, then went to the kitchen to prepare a tisane for Beatrice. She was taking the tray back upstairs when she passed Septimus coming out of the cellar door, one arm folded rather awkwardly across his chest as though he were carrying something concealed inside his jacket.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Thirsk,” Hester said cheerfully, as if he had every business in the cellar.

  “Er—good afternoon, Miss—er—er …”

  “Latterly,” she supplied. “Lady Moidore’s nurse.”

  “Oh yes—of course.” He blinked his washed-out blue eyes. “I do beg your pardon. Good afternoon, Miss Latterly.” He moved to get away from the cellar door, still looking extremely uncomfortable.

  Annie, one of the upstairs maids, came past and gave Septimus a knowing look and smiled at Hester. She was tall and slender, like Dinah. She would have made a good parlormaid, but she was too young at the moment and raw at fifteen, and she might always be too opinionated. Hester had caught her and Maggie giggling together more than once in the maids’ room on the first landing, where the morning tea was prepared, or in the linen cupboard bent double over a penny dreadful book, their eyes out like organ stops as they pored over the scenes of breathless romance and wild dangers. Heaven knew what was in their imaginations. Some of their speculations over the murder had been more colorful than credible.

  “Nice child, that,” Septimus said absently. “Her mother’s a pastry cook over in Portman Square, but I don’t think you’ll ever make a cook out of her. Daydreamer.” There was affection in his voice. “Likes to listen to stories about the army.” He shrugged and nearly let slip the bottle under his arm. He blushed and grabbed at it.

  Hester smiled at him. “I know. She’s asked me lots of questions. Actually I think both she and Maggie would make good nurses. They’re just the sort of girls we need, intelligent and quick, and with minds of their own.”

  Septimus looked taken aback, and Hester guessed he was used to the kind of army medical care that had prevailed before Florence Nightingale, and all these new ideas were outside his experience.

  “Maggie’s a good girl too,” he said with a frown of puzzlement. “A lot more common sense. Her mother’s a laundress somewhere in the country. Welsh, I think. Accounts for the temper. Very quick temper, that girl, but any amount of patience when it’s needed. Sat up all night looking after the gardener’s cat when it was sick, though, so I suppose you’re right, she’d be a good enough nurse. But it seems a pity to put two decent girls into that trade.” He wriggled discreetly to move the bottle under his jacket high enough for it not to be noticed, and knew that he had failed. He was totally unaware of having insulted her profession; he was speaking frankly from the reputation he knew and had not even thought of her as being part of it.

  Hester was torn between saving him embarrassment and learning all she could. Saving him won. She looked away from the lump under his jacket and continued as if she had not observed it.

  “Thank you. Perhaps I shall suggest it to them one day. Of course I had rather you did not mention my idea to the housekeeper.”

  His face twitched in half-mock, half-serious alarm.

  “Believe me, Miss Latterly, I wouldn’t dream of it. I am too old a soldier to mount an unnecessary charge.”

  “Quite,” she agreed. “And I have cleared up after too many.”

  For an instant his face was perfectly sober, his blue eyes very clear, the lines of anxiety ironed out, and they shared a complete understanding. Both had seen the carnage of the battlefield and the long torture of wounds afterwards and the maimed lives. They knew the price of incompetence and bravado. It was an alien life from this house and its civilized routine and iron discipline of trivia, the maids rising at five to clean the fires, black the grates, throw damp tea leaves on the carpets and sweep them up, air the rooms, empty the slops, dust, sweep, polish, turn the beds, launder, iron dozens of yards of linens, petticoats, laces and ribbons, stitch, fetch and carry till at last they were excused at nine, ten or eleven in the evening.

  “You tell them about nursing,” he said at last, and quite openly took out the bottle and repositioned it more comfortably, then turned and left, walking with a lift in his step and a very slight swagger.

  Upstairs Hester had just brought the tray for Beatrice and set it down, and was about to leave when Araminta came in.

  “Good afternoon, Mama,” she said briskly. “How are you feeling?” Like her father she seemed to find Hester invisible. She went and kissed her mother’s cheek and then sat down on the nearest dressing chair, her skirts overflowing in mounds of darkest gray muslin with a lilac fichu, dainty and intensely flattering, and yet still just acceptable for mourning. Her hair was the same bright flame as always, her face its delicate, lean asymmetry.

  “Exactly the same, thank you,” Beatrice answered without real interest. She turn
ed slightly to look at Araminta, a pucker of confusion around her mouth. There was no sense of affection between them, and Hester was uncertain whether she should leave or not. She had a curious sense that in some way she was not intruding because the tension between the two women, the lack of knowing what to say to each other, already excluded her. She was a servant, someone whose opinion was of no importance whatever, indeed someone not really of existence.

  “Well I suppose it is to be expected.” Araminta smiled, but the warmth did not reach her eyes. “I am afraid the police do not seem to be achieving anything. I have spoken to the sergeant—Evan, I think his name is—but he either knows nothing or he is determined not to tell me.” She glanced absently at the frill of the chair arm. “Will you speak to them, if they wish to ask you anything?”

  Beatrice looked up at the chandelier above the center of the room. It was unlit this early in the afternoon, but the last rays of the lowering sun caught one or two of its crystals.

  “I can hardly refuse. It would seem as if I did not wish to help them.”

  “They would certainly think so,” Araminta agreed, watching her mother intently. “And they could not be criticized for it.” She hesitated, her voice hard-edged, slow and very quiet, every word distinct. “After all, we know it was someone in the house, and while it may be one of the servants—my own opinion is that it was probably Percival—”

  “Percival?” Beatrice stiffened and turned to look at her daughter. “Why?”

  Araminta did not meet her mother’s eyes but stared somewhere an inch or two to the left. “Mama, this is hardly the time for comfortable pretenses. It is too late.”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Beatrice answered miserably, hunching up her knees.

  “Of course you do.” Araminta was impatient. “Percival is an arrogant and presumptuous creature who has the normal appetites of a man and considerable delusions as to where he may exercise them. And you may choose not to see it, but Octavia was flattered by his admiration of her—and not above encouraging him now and then—”