The Marlows

by Rosalind Laker

  She felt sick. For a whole week she would have to put up with this evil little man eating in her kitchen. She had yet to discover who was the worst of the two men, the master or the servant, but for the time being Silas was in the lead.

  She had just taken the tea and toasted muffins in to Hedley when other guests began to arrive. By dinnertime they had all gathered, being twenty in all, one gentleman having brought his wife without advance notice, but Tansy was able to switch them to a larger room, and five more servants had come to join Silas in being fed in the kitchen and allotted sleeping space in the stable loft. Among the guests who came without a manservant, arriving on a fine chestnut mare, was a lean, elegant man with prematurely white hair, which was singularly attractive with his olive-skinned, youngish face. There was something about him that made Tansy feel she had met or seen him somewhere before, but how or where she could not recall, the certainty bothering her as the tongue worries a broken tooth. Not even his name meant anything to her: Thomas Brett.

  Hedley, however, recognized him instantly and greeted him with a geniality that was belied by the steely look behind the jovially crinkled eyes. “Ah, Mr. Brett, I do declare! Ain’t seen you in quite a while! I trust you are in good health.”

  “Excellent, I thank you.”

  “Good! Capital! Wouldn’t like to see you ailing. What would happen to the Turf if you weren’t around?” His laughter rumbled deep in his chest and he clapped Brett’s shoulder with a familiarity that was obviously resented by the recipient, whose thin, aristocratic mouth tightened considerably.

  Tansy, who witnessed the whole incident from where she was waiting by the dining-room door to show her guests through, saw how quickly Brett drew ahead of Hedley and made sure of sitting at the opposite end of the table to him. He exchanged greetings with the other racing gentlemen, all of whom knew him, but Tansy could tell he was one to keep to himself and his conversation was restrained.

  She was proud of the menu she had planned and grateful for the advice she had received from Dominic’s housekeeper as to the dishes that would be appreciated, as well as to the rates she should charge her guests for their bed and board. Clear Royal soup was to be followed by sole with cream sauce and some of Judith’s delicious lobster patties, which had been one of Oliver’s favourite delicacies, on the side. Then would come fried sweetbreads, the beefsteak and oyster pie, the saddle of mutton, the roast pork, the veal fillets, the braised venison, and the stuffed woodcock. To round off the meal, after the cherry pie and the wine jellies, there was a dessert course of fruit both fresh and crystallized, as well as bonbons and biscuits. Not nearly as many courses as would be served at Ainderly Hall and the other grand houses around, but a well-planned menu with plenty of everything.

  It was when she was serving the beefsteak and oyster pie, which Judith was cutting up into slices for her, that it came to her where she had seen — no, not seen, but heard — Brett before. It was a slight deepening in the timbre of his voice as he addressed another guest across the table which triggered off her memory. The plate she was holding wobbled in her hand and she set it down hastily in front of the person for whom it was intended. Brett had been the unidentified stranger in the carriage when she had overheard Dominic talking to him in the darkness at the roadside. Was it possible that she had two of Dominic’s fellow conspirators under her roof? What game were the three of them playing?

  The talk around the table was all of racing and the betting ring. She heard that Merry Day was established as the favourite for the Derby, the odds having been shortened against the filly since her success at Newmarket and subsequent wins at other meetings, and the general feeling around the table appeared to be that it would not be for lack of courage or fighting spirit if the stouthearted little Merry Day failed to win the greatest race of them all. When the conversation flowed on naturally to the chances of the other local entry, Wild Wind, several shook their heads and there was little interest. Hedley was not slow in voicing his opinion about everything, although whether what he said reflected his real ideas was another matter, for he was decidedly cagey when certain pertinent questions were put to him, but his voice boomed out continually as he shovelled food into his mouth, his appetite gargantuan and his thirst apparently unquenchable, his wineglass ever in need of replenishing. He moved with some difficulty from his chair when all rose to go into the long drawing room where coffee was to be served. The one lady in the company, who had left the table before the port was brought in for the gentlemen, returned to the dining room where Tansy was clearing glasses from the table.

  “Allow me to thank you for a most excellent dinner, Miss Marlow. I cannot remember when I last tasted so delicious a sole in cream sauce or such tender roast mutton.”

  Tansy thanked her for her praise and the lady, whose name was Mrs. Wyatt, chatted on about recipes, obviously having been bored by the earlier racing talk and thankful to turn to a more feminine topic. Being a sensible person without pretensions she began almost automatically to help Tansy remove the glasses to a trolley, which Roger had made in his spare time to help speed the dishes from the kitchen, but she held back from Hedley’s glass grimacing distastefully at the mess of spilt wine and spat-out grape pips and skins left in his place. “That revolting man! I declare my heart quite sank at the sight of him. He is one of the most notorious characters on the Turf today.”

  Tansy paused in the clearing up. “In what way, Mrs. Wyatt?” she asked with interest. “I never set eyes on him before this afternoon.”

  Mrs. Wyatt put a finger to her lips, went to the door to look out into the hall, and then closed it before returning to speak in a lowered voice. “One cannot be too careful. That vile servant of his creeps about and listens in for him and spies on other men’s horse trials to discover when a possible winner is coming to light. For the sake of politeness and out of courtesy to you Hedley was accepted into the conversation around the table this evening, but my husband for one — and I should say more than half the others — would not normally pass the time of day with him under any circumstances.”

  “But why?”

  “He was mixed up in that dreadful scandal at the Derby four years ago when the horse Running Rein won. It turned out that the horse was a well-developed four-year-old impostor — not the real three-year-old Running Rein at all but another called Maccabacus. Naturally there was a disqualification, but nothing was proved against Hedley, who had stood to win fifty thousand pounds, but his partner, a rogue named Goodman, bore the brunt of the blame and had to flee the country. That’s the sort of man Hedley is.”

  “I read of a similar case of substituting an older horse for a younger one at Newmarket earlier this year. Is it a common trick?”

  “It probably takes place more often than anyone realizes. It’s a great shame that Hedley and others like him give the Turf a bad name. The Jockey Club, an organization made up of gentlemen of honour, is vigilant in its attempt to banish crooked dealing from the racecourse, but my husband says there will be no improvement until it is given more power and the rings of villainy cracked up once and for all. Mr. Brett is an investigator for the Jockey Club. He’s respected, but not much liked, I’m afraid, but there’re many who fear his probing.”

  Tansy stared at her, aghast at what she had heard. Brett was the biggest scoundrel of them all, secretly lining his own pockets while publicly rooting out the knavery of others! Had she not overheard his plotting with Dominic she would never have believed it possible. Then, before she could make any sort of reply, the door opened and Silas put his head into the room. Both she and Mrs. Wyatt started at the intrusion.

  “Your doorbell was ringin’, Miss Marlow. I took the liberty of answerin’ it. Mr. Reade to see Mr. Hedley. They’ve gone into the small drawing room to talk private. They’d like brandies sent in. Right?”

  “Er — yes. Thank you. I’ll see to it.”

  He gave them each a sly look before withdrawing again, almost as if he had guessed what the talk had been or h
ad even overheard part of it. Mrs. Wyatt gave a little snort. “Mr. Reade indeed. A name unknown to me, but another bird of the same feather, I’ll be bound!”

  As Tansy approached the small drawing room with the two brandies on a tray she passed Brett, who was strolling toward the foot of the stairs, taking his time over lighting a cigar. Silas was also in the hall, leaning his hand on one of the double doors of the room into which she was to go, absently biting his fingernails and spitting out the bits.

  “I’m just waitin’ to see if Mr. Hedley requires anythin’ else,” he said blandly. “I like to think of meself as his faithful shadow. You won’t never find me far from his side.” Then his sandy eyebrows shot up as from within the room there came the sound of Dominic’s voice raised in anger.

  “No, damn you! No!”

  The doors were wrenched open, Silas stepping back quickly, and Dominic came striding out, his face like thunder. He paused briefly when he saw her with the tray.

  “I’m sorry. I’ll not be staying for the brandy after all.”

  He half-thrust Silas aside and snatched up his hat from the chair. Although his wrathful gaze swept past Brett, who was sending a cloud of cigar smoke billowing, not a sign of recognition passed between them. He went slamming out of the house.

  “Temper, temper,” Silas mocked under his breath in a singsong taunt, aping Dominic’s departure.

  From a chair in the small drawing room Hedley snapped his fingers at Tansy. “Bring me the brandy, my dear. It shall not go to waste, I promise you.” He saw his servant hovering and made a gesture of dismissal, which was promptly obeyed. Tansy took the brandy across to him where he sat with his bulging, food-stained waistcoat well exposed, his legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. He poured one brandy into the other glass, which he then raised to her. “To you, ma’am. A filly to beat ‘em all!” She made to move away, her duty done, but his hand shot out and caught her by the wrist. “Don’t go,” he coaxed with a wet-lipped smile. “For a kiss I’ll place a sovereign for you on the Derby winner that’ll bring in enough of them to match up with every bright hair on your pretty head!”

  She saw that he was drunker than she had realized and quite prepared to take by force what he had asked of her if she did not act with caution. His hand was clamped like an iron shackle on her and it was all she could do not to claw at it in what would be a vain attempt to release herself.

  “That’s an idle boast,” she said mildly, hoping to bring him off guard with a slackening of his hold. “No one knows what the result will be.”

  “I have the gift of foresight,” he said thickly, his gaze running over her. “For more than a kiss I’ll guarantee you a fortune of your own —”

  He broke off, a step having sounded in the still-open doorway. Brett stood ,there. “Could you spare me a moment of your time, Miss Marlow?” he inquired in his quiet, cultured tones. “I should like to know how early I might breakfast tomorrow morning.”

  With a grunt Hedley released his hold on her and gratefully she went with Brett, out into the hall. “As early as you like,” she declared. He gave her a quiver of a smile. “Eight o’clock will do me well enough. I just thought to make sure.”

  As he went strolling off to join the rest of the company in the long drawing room she gave him a thoughtful glance before returning to the kitchen to help Judith with the washing-up, convinced that he had made the interruption deliberately on her behalf. She reflected on Hedley’s boast that he knew the winner of the Derby, his tongue loosened by the vast amounts of liquor he had consumed and his own lecherous thoughts. Did it mean that once again the great race was to be tarnished by evil-doing? But it could not be with the substitution of one horse with another this time, for the stewards would be alert to that kind of mischief with the affair of Running Rein being comparatively recent. Some other plan must be in the wind, and it seemed very much as if Dominic and Hedley had quarrelled about how it should be carried out. And why had Dominic not acknowledged Brett, who had shown an equal lack of recognition?

  Later, going from bedroom to bedroom to turn down the sheets for her guests, she entered Hedley’s quarters with some reluctance even though she knew him to be safely installed downstairs. She was unable to put down the lamp she was carrying on the table beside his bed, seeing that its space was taken by a medicine chest of polished mahogany, the type that doctors invariably took with them on their rounds for emergency dispensing. Was Hedley a hypochondriac? From the way he ate and drank, if this evening was anything to go by, it was more than likely that he suffered from digestive upsets. But so large a chest! It must contain any number of flasks and pillboxes, and the padlock on it was small, but appeared to be a secure fastening.

  She was to remember that chest whenever she saw him guzzling or imbibing with gusto, but if he suffered from dyspepsia afterward and had to resort to the chest’s contents he never showed it and appeared to be continually in the peak of health. But on the whole she was too busy to ponder much on anything except all the work there was to do. The days became a routine of serving large breakfasts, packing picnic baskets, and preparing vast dinners for the evenings when her racegoers returned tired, hungry and thirsty, their mood varying from jubilation to quiet disappointment, sometimes annoyance, and occasionally depression. Hedley alone gave no indication as to how he had fared, his bland smile and jocular attitude being a front behind which the man hid his true self.

  When it came to the evening before Derby Day, Tansy, who had registered more of Hedley’s moves and actions than she had realized, became almost instinctively alert and acutely observant, knowing that if any racecourse misdeed was to take place it should be within the next few hours of darkness, for little could be done amid crowds of people in the full light of day. She served dinner as usual, and learned that a colt named Surplice had suddenly soared to favourite after being previously condemned by adverse reports, and she recalled Hedley’s boast that for the bet of a sovereign he could make a pile of them. Had he placed his money on Surplice when the odds were as long as they had been, the winnings if the colt should come in first would be considerable. But how could he be sure that Surplice and not Merry Day would win? The answer to that was simple: there was dirty work afoot and he was part of it! So she had been right about that from the start. But what it could be and how Dominic was involved she could not begin to fathom. All she did know was that Dominic had been far from pleased with the plan set out for him, for he had not been back to see Hedley since the night he had stormed out of the house. She felt certain that he would have returned, even just on a pretext to see her, if he had made up his quarrel with Hedley during one day or another at the races. Yet all this was supposition and she had no proof of anything.

  When Hedley asked her for two bottles of brandy late in the evening after dinner and retired with them to his bedroom she experienced a sensation of relief that his nocturnal activities were to be confined to drinking himself insensible on his own and not to setting out on some nefarious venture that would most surely have been beyond her powers to interfere with or prevent, however good her intentions. With this worry eased from her mind she went contentedly about the last task of the day, which was the final tidying up of the kitchen in readiness for the morning. She believed that Silas, together with the other servants, had retired long since to the stable loft, and it was sheer chance that when coming from the pantry after putting away the remainders of a mutton joint, she caught a glimpse of him going out through the back door into the night. As always he had moved silently, and a second later she would only have known he had passed through the kitchen by the quiet clicking down of the latch. But she had seen the way his coat had flapped against his thin body. He had had a brandy bottle in each of the two side pockets in his coat.

  She ripped off her apron and ran for the dark green cloak that she had removed to a peg in a downstairs cupboard since she and Judith had taken up temporary accommodation in the side rooms off the kitchen to set free an extra bedroom for h
er guests. At that precise moment Judith was collecting coffee cups in the long drawing room, most of the guests having already gone to bed, but there was no time to dash in there and let her sister know she was about to go out after Silas or else she might lose all trace of him.

  At first she thought she had already missed him, but her eyes, adjusting quickly to the darkness after the gentle lamplight, soon spotted him, a black, hurrying figure amid blacker shadows of the night, making his way in the direction of the village. He was not walking openly in the lane or on the grass verge, but kept stealthily to the edge of Ashby Woods, making no more sound outside than he did indoors, not as much as a twig snapping underfoot. She began to follow from the opposite side of the lane, keeping about fifty yards behind him, and she kept her cloak drawn closed over her full skirt, for it had a distinctive scarlet lining that could shine and flicker in the gloom. At any other time she would have thought it unusually generous of a master to give his servant two bottles of superior brandy, although accepting the possibility that Hedley had had a lucky day and wanted to be munificent toward his hireling, but this evening it was a different matter altogether, for tomorrow was a day in the year unlike any other day and the giving of the bottles had taken on a sinister significance. After all, why had Hedley taken them up to his room first? He could more easily have handed them over direct to Silas, who had been in the same room when she brought the bottles from the cellar.

  Her mind flew to the medicine chest by Hedley’s bed. Suppose some drug from it had been substituted for the brandy. What more innocent way to carry about a lethal dosage for a horse than in ordinary-looking brandy bottles? But which horse? Not Wild Wind, for they had passed the gates of Cudlingham Manor, and in any case Edward’s colt was said to offer no threat to either Merry Day or Surplice. Then, as she followed Silas on through the village by one of the less frequented routes by the river she realized that he was making for Ainderly Hall. She glanced swiftly over her shoulder, having the uncanny feeling that she was being followed in her turn, but decided that the tautness of her nerves was playing tricks with her imagination.