by T E Kinsey
CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright
also...
One - The Farmer's Revenge
Two - The Ghost of the Dog & Duck
Three - The Trophy Case Case
Four - The Last Tram
The End
Author's Notes
THE SPIRIT IS WILLING
T E Kinsey
Copyright © 2015 T E Kinsey
All rights reserved.
Lady Hardcastle and Florence Armstrong also appear in
A Quiet Life in the Country
ONE
The Farmer's Revenge
It had been a difficult winter. Lady Hardcastle had recovered very slowly and it was only now that the spring of 1909 was approaching that both body and mind had healed sufficiently for her to feel able to recommence our regular walks through the fields, lanes and woods around our Gloucestershire home. She was never one to be easily rattled, but even she was more than a little shaken up by being shot and left for dead by an assassin the previous autumn.
The assassin had been led to her by a network of German spies at the heart of our own government which our own actions had eventually unmasked. And so, bundled up in a cloak and blanket, Lady Hardcastle had been a witness at the top secret trial at the Old Bailey. Actually, we both had. For reasons of national security and to protect the identities of some of His Majesty’s most important agents (Lady Hardcastle and me to name but two) the trial had been held entirely in camera. I’m still bound by the Official Secrets Act not to reveal further details but it’s no longer a secret that the ringleader was hanged shortly before Christmas. What’s not so well known is what happened to the network of spies and informants, but I can comfortably reveal by now that the knowledge gained about that network during the course of the trial was of immeasurable help in the ensuing years.
But after all that, and the almost inevitable melancholy that followed the shooting, I was pleased as Punch on that glorious spring morning when she finally said, ‘Come on then, Flo, what about a nice Wednesday walk?’
‘I should be delighted, my lady,’ I said, getting up. ‘I shall fetch your coat.’
‘And boots, hat, gloves and stick, please, pet,’ she called as I went out into the hall. ‘And a flask of brandy. And…’
I returned with the required items. ‘Would you like me to carry you as well, my lady?’
‘I say, what a good idea,’ she said. ‘But if you’re doing that, could we pop into the village, too - we could pick up a few things from the shops.’
It was good to have her back.
We settled on the idea of a stroll into the village and set off down the lane towards the green. The trees were already in bud and I was still blissfully incapable of identifying any of them. The sunshine was weak and the temperature was struggling to reach the bearable side of chilly, but there was a definite promise in the air of the summer yet to come.
We walked slowly, with Lady Hardcastle relying rather more on her stick than I thought she would. Her wound had been healed for quite a while and we had been doing the gentle exercises that we had learned in China to try to return the strength and flexibility that she could so easily have lost for good.
‘Might I ask you a personal question, my lady?’ I said as we rounded the last bend and the village green came in sight.
‘What an odd thing to say,’ she said. ‘Of course you may.’
‘That stick,’ I said. ‘How much do you really need it?’
‘For walking? Hardly at all. Fit as a flea, me, dear thing, fit as a flea.’
‘And yet…?’ I said.
‘Ah, yes. Well. Now. You see, there’s the thing. I still sort of feel I need it. For show, you understand.’
‘Not entirely, my lady, no. If it’s not helping you to walk, what use is it?’
‘I’m not sure, dear. It’s like… I don’t know, it’s like a badge. People have been so kind and solicitous over the past months and I would feel something of a fraud to go skipping into the village like a schoolgirl. I felt I needed something that might reassure people that their concerns were well founded and that I really was as poorly as they thought.’
‘You nearly died. Isn’t that poorly enough?’ I said, indignantly. I could still vividly remember the long bedside vigils I shared with her brother Harry while we wondered whether she would ever wake.
‘Yes, dear, of course,’ she said, patting my arm with her free hand. ‘But they didn’t see the immediate aftermath, they just heard what had happened. I just feel they need a little visual clue that all was once rather serious but that it’s getting slowly better.’
‘I’m still not sure I understand, my lady,’ I said. ‘But if it makes you feel better, then by all means carry on. It makes progress a little slow, but I suppose it will make an excellent cudgel if things cut up rough.’
‘That’s the spirit. Though I doubt we’ll meet any footpads at the butcher’s.’
‘I don’t know, my lady,’ I said. ‘Them’s strange folk in they rural villages. They can turn on strangers.’
She laughed. ‘We’re still strangers, do you think?’
‘I really don’t think we are any more, my lady, no.’
‘I don’t think so, either. But just to be on the safe side, we shall avoid Mr Spratt’s butcher’s shop and make instead for the pub. I wonder if Old Joe would make us a cup of tea.’
‘Tea, my lady? At the pub? What a peculiar notion. If you fancy tea, perhaps we should see if we can rustle up a lift from someone to go to the tea shop in Chipping Bevington?’
‘You’re probably right, but it’s a bit of a trek just for tea. How about some nice fresh buns from Mr Holman and you can make the tea when we get home?’
‘Very well, my lady.’
‘Splendid. Come then, servant. To the bakery.’
We made our slow progress around the green, which was still too dew-damp to walk across at our slow pace, and were just about to enter Mr Holman’s bakery when we were hailed.
‘I say, Emily! How wonderful to see you up and about.’
It was Lady Farley-Stroud, the local landowner’s wife.
‘Good morning, Gertie,’ said Lady Hardcastle with a smile.
‘It’s a joy to see you, my dear,’ said the older lady, kissing Lady Hardcastle’s cheek. ‘And you, too, Armstrong. Is she treating you well? Don’t forget there’s always a job for you up at The Grange if you tire of the dangerous life.’
‘Passing well, my lady,’ I said. ‘She can be cruel and demanding at times, but a maid has to do her duty.’
Lady Farley-Stroud gave a throaty chuckle. ‘Jolly good. But now that you’re back on your feet, m’dear, you really must come for dinner at The Grange. Could do with some company. Hector and I just rattle about the place. Do say you’ll come.’
‘I should love to, Gertie, really I should.’
‘Splendid. I shall consult “the lord of the manor”.’
Even I could see the ironic quotation marks hanging in the air as she said it, but there was affection in her voice. There was no doubt who really ran The Grange, but they were a charming old couple and still obviously terribly devoted to each other.
‘Thank you, dear,’ said Lady Hardcastle with a warm smile. ‘I shall look forward to it.’
‘Splendid, splendid. I say!’ she said abruptly as a thought struck her. ‘I’ve had the most wonderful idea. Have you ever been to a cattle market?’
‘A cattle market?’ said Lady Hardcastle with no small amount of surprise. ‘No, I honestly can’t say I ever have.’
‘I pop
over to Chipping Bevington on market day whenever I can. It really is quite the best day out. We’re selling a few head tomorrow and I thought I’d make one of my regular appearances, you know? Show the old face, what? Our estate manager will be doing all the real work, of course, but I do so love it. And we have lunch in The Hayrick with all the famers and cattle brokers. It really is the most fun. And the language! My word, you’ve never heard the like. Oh, my dear, you really must come.’
I’d never heard Lady Farley-Stroud become so animated upon any subject before. Even if pressed, I’m not sure I could come up with a particularly long list of things I’d rather do less than attend a cattle market, but the girlish gleam in her blue-grey eyes made me wonder if even I might enjoy a day out at Chipping Bevington on market day.
Lady Hardcastle was clearly similarly affected. ‘Well if you put it like that, Gertie dear, how could I possibly demur?’
‘Oh my dear, how wonderful,’ said Lady Farley-Stroud with quite the hugest smile on her plump, lined face. ‘Please bring Armstrong, too, she’ll be company for Denton. We’ll make a day of it. I’ll send Bert over with the motorcar at eight tomorrow morning. Oh, I’m so excited.’ And with another kiss on Lady Hardcastle’s cheek, off she went. I watched as she met her own lady’s maid, Maude Denton, coming out of Pantry’s Grocery. She was obviously telling her the good news and Maude looked over and gave me a grin.
‘It seems,’ said Lady Hardcastle, taking my arm and leading the way inside the bakery, ‘that I have re-entered the social scene and that the two of us are committed to a day of smells, lowing, and impossibly fast chatter.’
‘It does rather seem that way, my lady, yes. And a pub lunch. Do you think there will be pies?’
‘Oh, rather,’ she said. ‘I love a good pie.’
‘Then you have come to the right place, my lady,’ said Septimus Holman, the baker, from behind his counter. ‘Welcome back. It’s lovely to see you up and about. Now, what can I get you? Pie, was it?’
Market Day dawned with a clap of thunder and the sound of torrential rain clattering against the window panes. With the car coming at eight, I had been up since before dawn to make sure that we were both dressed and breakfasted in plenty of time, but whereas it was usually the rising sun peeping through the kitchen window that signalled the true start to the day, this morning it was the apocalyptic deluge outside.
Lady Hardcastle had originally planned to rent “a lovely little cottage, somewhere like, oh, I don’t know, Gloucestershire”, perhaps with “a thatched roof and roses growing round the door”. Instead she had been lucky enough to secure the tenancy of a newly-built house on the outskirts of the village of Littleton Cotterell. One of her old friends had had the place built for himself and his family, but when his business concerns had forced them to remain in India for another few years, he had cheerfully let the house to Lady Hardcastle so that she could look after it for him.
And so we two occupied a house built for a family of six and their household. I never really gave much thought to what advantages there might be in living in a modern house, indeed I often grumbled about how many rooms there were to dust and sweep, but on days like today, with the rain lashing against windows and walls, I was glad to be in something altogether more substantial than a quaint old cottage with straw for a roof. I could very well appreciate the wisdom of the third little pig as the fierce March winds threatened to huff and puff and blow even our house of bricks down.
At precisely eight o’clock, just as we were donning raincoats and galoshes in the hall, there was a ring at the doorbell. I opened it to see a damp and bedraggled Bert, with rain dripping from the peak of his cap.
‘Good morning, Miss Armstrong,’ he said. ‘Car’s here.’
‘Thank you, Bert,’ I said.
Lady Hardcastle poked her head round the door. ‘Bert!’ she said. ‘You’re getting drenched. Do come in for a moment, we shan’t be long.’
‘Very kind, my lady,’ he said. ‘But would you mind if I waited in the car?’
‘Of course not, of course not. We shall be but a few more moments. You get into the dry.’
‘Thank you, m’lady,’ he said. ‘Oh, I bumped into the paperboy on his way up the path.’
He handed me a slightly damp copy of the Bristol News and beetled back to the safety and comfort of his driver’s seat.
‘Are we all set then, pet?’ asked Lady Hardcastle as she checked her appearance in the glass.
‘As we’ll ever be,’ I said. ‘Do you have your vagabond-beating stick? We might need it today to fend off obstreperous cattle.’
‘Do you think that might become necessary?’
‘Well,’ I said, hesitantly. ‘You know, my lady. Cows. Big beasts. Unruly. Dangerous.’
‘Florence Armstrong,’ she said gleefully, ‘I do believe I’ve finally found something you’re afraid of.’
‘Wary of, my lady.’
She laughed delightedly. ‘Fear not, tiny servant, I shall protect you with the Cow-Nobbling Stick of Doom.’ She brandished her walking cane.
‘You may very well mock, my lady,’ I said. ‘But–’
‘May I? Oh, you’re so sweet. I shall.’
I gave her my most disapproving stare.
‘But come,’ she said with a chuckle. ‘We must brave Nature’s drenching fury and hie us to market. Bring the paper – you can read to us on the way.’
We stepped out into the storm, and as I locked the door she hurried down the path slightly more quickly than she had the day before. Bert leapt out and opened the rear door of the car for her and she bundled herself in to sit beside Lady Farley-Stroud. I wasn’t far behind and managed to squeeze into the front seat with Bert and Maude. We were off.
With Lady Farley-Stroud in the back seat – a nervous traveler at the best of times – and more rain lashing down onto the roads than I’d seen anywhere other than India during the monsoon season, Bert drove with a slowness and exaggerated care that would otherwise have sent me insane with impatience were it not for the infectious jollity of Maude Denton, Lady-Farley Stroud’s lazy maid. Sorry, “lady’s maid”. We had met the previous summer and although I found her ingenious efforts at avoiding almost all work absolutely infuriating, she was extremely good company.
‘Anything in the paper, Flo?’ she asked, cheerfully.
‘Not much,’ I said. ‘Bristol City look to be heading for the FA Cup… and two trams were derailed in the city yesterday. The police suspect sabotage. Of the trams, not the football club.’
‘Nasty things, trams,’ declared Lady Farley-Stroud from the back seat. ‘Never trusted ’em. Stick to motorcars, that’s my advice. Or horses. Can’t beat a good horse.’
‘Definitely not,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘One should never beat a horse.’
Maude and I exchanged smirks and the rest of the journey passed quickly and with only one near-miss with a milkman’s cart to induce shrieks and earnest entreaties for caution from Lady Farley-Stroud in the back (and barely suppressed giggles from Lady Hardcastle) we were soon drawing up at the top of Chipping Bevington High Street.
I should point out that I learned this only recently and had no idea at the time, but Chipping Bevington had been an important market town since the fourteenth century. History on our very doorstep. Its High Street hosted the weekly Thursday market, and the road broadened at the top to accommodate a small number of stalls.
There was no way through the High Street on market day and so Bert let us out beside one of the town’s six pubs and reversed the car carefully back up the road in search of a parking place. The rain hadn’t abated and the wind was too fierce for the umbrellas that Maude had taken from the car as we got out. And so, with one last check that our hats were pinned firmly in place, we began to battle our way down the street.
Lady Farley-Stroud was well known in the town and apparently well liked. Stallholders and shoppers alike greeted her with a cheerfully informal warmth that I hadn’t expected at all. She always seemed
a bit of a cold fish when I’d seen her at The Grange, but here she was in her element as the Lady of the Manor. There was deference and respect, but a good deal of affection and I began to reassess my opinion of her.
The rain was cold, the wind was harsh, and I was keen to have everything over and done with so that we could get indoors out of the weather, even though that would mean being in uncomfortably close proximity to a large collection of beef on the hoof. Nevertheless we hurried on.
We ducked down a small side street which led us to the livestock market. In times gone by this had been held at the bottom end of the High Street around the market cross, but there was now a purpose-build yard, with covered pens and a large auction hall.
We finally made it under cover and Lady Farley-Stroud looked around.
‘Can’t see McGuire,’ she said, absently. ‘Estate manager. Supposed to be here. Denton, go and see if you can track him down, would you.’
With a bob and a ‘Yes, my lady,’ Maude was off into the growing throng.
‘I say, Gertie,’ said Lady Hardcastle, ‘this is fun. It’s like the markets in Shanghai or Calcutta.’
‘Much colder, though, m’dear,’ said Lady Farley-Stroud. ‘I remember when Hector and I were in Madras in the ’70s. Oh my word, the heat. There was one day–’
Maude had returned with a middle-aged man in farmer’s tweeds.
‘Found him, my lady,’ said Maude.
‘Mornin’, m’lady,’ said the man.
‘Ah, Mr McGuire,’ said Lady Farley-Stroud. ‘There you are. How goes it?’
‘Not bad, m’lady. We got just ten head in today from the dairy herd. Tryin’ to sell ’em as one lot. Second up. Shouldn’t take long. Got a few folk sniffin’ round. Carmichael from up Top Farm looks interested. Alford from over Woodworthy was lookin’, too. Should be some biddin’.’
‘Wonderful,’ said Lady Farley-Stroud. ‘Let’s hope we make a few bob, eh?’