by Anne Perry
“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.
“Buder’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 eyebrows. 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 unc
omfortable.
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 discreedy 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 turned 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—”
Beatrice winced with revulsion. “Really, Minta.”
“I know it is sordid,” Araminta said more gently, assurance gathering in her voice. “But it seems that someone in this house killed her-which is very hard, Mama, but we won’t alter it by pretending. It will only get worse, until the police find whoever it is.”
Beatrice narrowed her shoulders and leaned forward, hugging her legs, staring straight ahead of her.
“Mama?” Araminta said very carefully. “Mama—do you know something?”
Beatrice said nothing, but held herself even more tightly. It was an attitude of absorption with inner pain which Hester had seen often before.
Araminta leaned closer. “Mama—are you trying to protect me … because of Myles?”
Slowly Beatrice looked up, stiff, silent, the back of her bright head towards Hester, so similar in color to her daughter’s.
Araminta was ashen, her features set, her eyes bright and hard.
“Mama, I know he found Tavie attractive, and that he was not above”—she drew in her breath and let it out slowly—“above going to her room. I like to believe that because I am her sister, she refused him. But I don’t know. It is possible he went again—and she rebuffed him. He doesn’t take refusal well—as I know.”
Beatrice stared at her daughter, slowly stretched out her hand in a gesture of shared pain. But Araminta moved no closer, and she let her hand fall. She said nothing. Perhaps there were no words for what she either knew or dreaded.
“Is that what you are hiding from, Mama?” Araminta asked relentlessly. “Are you afraid someone will ask you if that is what happened?”
Beatrice lay back and straightened the covers around herself before replying. Araminta made no move to help her. “It wo
uld be a waste of time to ask me. I don’t know, and I certainly should not say anything of that sort.” She looked up. “Please, Minta, surely you know that?”
At last Araminta leaned forward and touched her mother, putting her thin, strong hand over hers. “Mama, if it were Myles, then we cannot hide the truth. Please God it was not—and they will find it was someone else … soon—” She stopped, her face full of concern, hope struggling with fear, and a desperate concentration.
Beatrice tried to say something comforting, something to dismiss the horror on the edge of both their minds, but in the face of Araminta’s courage and unyielding desire for truth, she failed, and remained wordless.
Araminta stood up, leaned over and kissed her very lightly, a mere brushing of the lips on her brow, and left the room.
Beatrice sat still for several minutes, then slowly sank farther down in the bed.
“You can take the tray away, Hester; I don’t think I want any tea after all.”
So she had not forgotten her nurse was there. Hester did not know whether to be grateful her status gave her such opportunity to observe or insulted that she was of such total unimportance that no one cared what she saw or heard. It was the first time in her life she had been so utterly disregarded, and it stung.
“Yes, Lady Moidore,” she said coolly, and picked up the tray, leaving Beatrice alone with her thoughts.
That evening she had a little time to herself, and she spent it in the library. She had dined in the servants’ hall. Actually it was one of the best meals she had ever eaten, far richer and more varied than she had experienced in her own home, even when her father’s circumstances were very favorable. He had never served more than six courses, the heaviest usually either mutton or beef. Tonight there had been a choice of three meats, and eight courses in all.