The Girl at Rosewood Hall (A Lady Jane Mystery)

by Annis Bell

  “Floyd?” Jane called down the corridor, and the butler’s familiar face appeared at the doorway of the second, larger bedroom.

  “Ah, my lady! Wonderful to see you back. What would you say to our turning this room into your husband’s bedroom?”

  Jane went to Floyd and looked into a brightly lit room, slightly smaller than her own bedroom but with large floor-length windows exactly like hers. A door connected this room to her own. “Yes, why not. Tell me, Floyd, how are you getting on with Mr. and Mrs. Roche? Do you have the impression that they treat the staff here decently?”

  Floyd scratched his chin. “I am not exactly in anyone’s favor here, as you know.”

  “That will change fast enough. There seems to be a new girl in the kitchen. I want to be sure that she is being treated well. I heard a cry in the kitchen just now. Would you take care of that, Floyd?” Jane stepped out of the room and heard Hettie’s cheery voice and laughter coming from the hallway below. Instinctively, she smiled. At least one person here had had a good day.

  “Of course, my lady. And about the furnishings?” Floyd had followed her into the hall.

  “I will leave that up to you, Floyd. Put in whatever you think is right. Oh, and tomorrow I will be driving to Bromfield Manor. Lord Hargrave has invited me to tea. His sister and the Duke of Rutland and his wife will also be there.”

  If Floyd was surprised, he did not show it. “Very well, my lady. I am familiar with Lord Hargrave and the duke from previous visits at your uncle’s side, if you will allow me the observation.”

  “Oh?”

  “Lord Hargrave enjoys the reputation of being a connoisseur. Valuable objets d’art and . . .” Floyd cleared his throat. “Well, he is known for his . . . profligate lifestyle. I only want you to be aware of that, my lady. But there are to be other guests in attendance, as you said.”

  “Thank you, Floyd. I really feel rather naïve.”

  Her butler looked at her sympathetically. “Oh, no, my lady. Your uncle would have told you the same, or your husband, if he were here.”

  She could not explain to him that her husband bore no blame at all, that she herself had come to this arrangement with him, for she heard the unspoken accusation in Floyd’s words.

  “Ma’am!” Hettie came up the stairs at a rush, her cheeks flushed. “There is so much to tell!”

  11.

  Mary

  The sun shone warmly into the orphanage courtyard. It was a rare thing to hear the happy laughter of children from inside those walls, but on that day the youngsters romped across the patchy grass, playing tag and throwing balls. Mary and Fiona sat on a tree trunk that had been laid alongside a wall to serve as a bench, and let the sun simply shine down onto their pale faces.

  “’ow you feeling today, Mary?” Fiona asked, her red hair shimmering like flames in the bright light. She was plucking the petals of a tiny white flower and flicking them carelessly onto the grass.

  Mary automatically raised one hand to her ear, from which a gauze wick soaked in lavender oil still protruded. The moment a draft of air or the cold found its way inside her injured ear, the pain began again. She had had to stay in bed a full six weeks. The pain had been unbearable, unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Her entire head had seemed about to explode. And then came the terrible attacks of dizziness.

  “The dizzy feeling’s gone most of the time now. There’s just the buzzing. I hope that stops soon. It’s worst when I’m in the workrooms. Hearing sounds from inside and outside drives me barmy.” Mary looked at her friend uneasily, her eyes wide. “Am I going barmy?”

  Fiona grinned. “No, silly. The master ’urt your ear, the old gobshite. That’s what ’appens when you get hit really ’ard. Ratface, one of the boys in our gang, got whacked like that on ’is ear by a copper. But the poor bugger didn’t ’ave a safe bed to rest in, so he numbed ’imself with sleep medicine. Till the day ’e didn’t wake up again.”

  “Oh my gosh. Then we’ve got it good here.” Mary plucked at the bow on her tattered skirt.

  “I still don’t want to stay ’ere, Mary. With Mr. Gaunt gone, it ain’t the same,” said Fiona.

  “And Miss Fannigan’s leaving soon, too. She’s been so quiet, and she’s changed since Mr. Gaunt left. She misses him. I think they rather fancied each other.”

  A ball landed at Fiona’s feet, and she picked it up and threw it back to the boys. “The teachers and other staff aren’t allowed to carry on. It’s against the rules. As if anyone ’ere sticks to the rules. It wouldn’t make no difference to no one if they ’ad something going.”

  “Maybe someone from the Poor Law Union was here and said something. Or the master was afraid they’d cut off his money if something like that got out,” Mary conjectured.

  “Codswallop! Just think of the men that Sister Susan lets into the dorm. The master’s not afraid of nothing, not ’im.” Fiona looked around for a moment, but there was no one close to them apart from the very small children. “Mr. Gaunt vanished overnight, right? They told us ’e’d found a better job up north. But I think it’s something completely different. I saw Mr. Cooper stuffing Mr. Gaunt’s jacket into a sack.”

  “He could have forgotten it,” suggested Mary.

  Fiona gave her a pitying look. “It was ’is good jacket.”

  “Oh. Where is he then?”

  Sighing, Fiona stood up and held out her hand to help Mary up. When her friend was standing beside her, Fiona whispered in her healthy ear, “I’d like to know that, too, but I’m afraid to find out . . .”

  The bell rang to signal the next hour, and Fiona took Mary’s hand in hers.

  After the usual evening meal of old bread, a piece of cheese, and a cup of milky tea so thin you could hardly taste it, Fiona and Mary stood at the window of their dormitory and looked out onto the street. The entire complex of buildings was surrounded by a grass verge and a wall. Sharpened iron spikes on top of the six-foot wall were supposed to keep the inmates inside and uninvited guests out. A porter at the main gate was the eye of the needle that anyone wanting to enter any of the buildings had to pass through.

  With the warmth of spring, the days had begun to grow longer. Nature reawakened, insects whirred through the air, and bats fluttered among the gables in the twilight.

  The two girls stood shoulder to shoulder at the open window, and Fiona furtively produced a wrinkled apple from the pocket of her skirt. She held the apple closely under Mary’s nose to prevent the other children, most of whom had already fallen into an exhausted sleep in their beds, from seeing it.

  With her eyes closed, Mary inhaled the delicious smell. It was an odor she only rarely had the chance to enjoy. “Where did you get that?” she whispered.

  Fiona grinned, bit off a chunk, and handed the apple to Mary, making a gesture with her hands as she did so, like a street magician talking up a trick. But her attention was suddenly caught by a movement on the street. “Look! A coach!”

  Coaches only rarely pulled up at the orphanage, and as good as never at the poorhouse. When they did, it was normally a representative from the Poor Law Union, and they didn’t come at night.

  “The men were here just yesterday. Who can it be?” Mary murmured and handed the apple back to Fiona. The sweet taste of the overripe fruit was delicious, and she kept the flesh of the apple in her mouth as long as she possibly could.

  Mary and Fiona were the eldest of thirty girls in this dormitory. They were expected to look after the little ones if they woke up at night and began to cry. They were also expected to know when the smallest children needed to use the pot. But knowing that was plain impossible and if, in the morning, one of the beds stank of urine, then Mary or Fiona was caned on the hands or calves for it. But they took it all in stride, and gladly so. Anything was better than having to go into the small dormitory where the men came to visit.

  “I meant to
tell you, Mary.” Fiona, when she wanted to, could put on the cockney accent of London’s working class. She used the talent to talk to the men and women from London that she met in the workhouse, to find out news from the capital.

  “There was a cobbler in over there last night. ’e’d come from London looking for work, and ’is family lives on the coast. Anyway, ’e told me that there was a story in the papers about a lass who suddenly appeared at some lord’s place in Wiltshire and then promptly died. The young lady of the ’ouse went to a lot of trouble and paid for ’er to be buried in the village cemetery. ’e said it stuck in ’is mind ’cause ’e’d been working for a shoemaker in Salisbury at the time.” Fiona nibbled on a morsel of apple and passed the rest back to Mary. “’ere, finish it off. Oh, yes, and the lady who lives there is called Lady Jane. That’s a pretty name . . . The cobbler said she was well-liked, and the people there felt sorry for ’er ’cause after that, ’er uncle, the old lord, died and—” Fiona stared at the gate. “That coach is driving in! Well, if that ain’t some lord or other. Lovely ’orses.”

  Mary chewed every single apple seed with delight. She found them sweet, and they tasted of almonds. “And?”

  “I don’t remember much more. Something about the lord’s son. Don’t make no difference, they’ll get along. They’ve all got their upkeep taken care of. Look at the man getting out!” Fiona whistled through her teeth. “Now that’s a fine gentleman. No, ’ang on, the gentleman’s still sitting inside. That’s just ’is servant. Talk about class!”

  Master Ledford bowed at the open door of the coach, and Mary giggled. “If the master grovels any lower, his nose will touch his shoes.”

  Now the mistress joined him and curtsied nicely, but her husband shooed her back into the house. The girls waited excitedly for what would happen next, but the coach simply stood where it was. The coachman climbed down, gave the horses some oats, then took his place back on the seat.

  “Why did you tell me that about the girl in Wiltshire, Fiona?” It suddenly occurred to Mary to ask. A dark suspicion made her stomach tighten.

  “The cobbler said there was rumors flying ’round that the girl might’ve been an orphan who took off from an ’ousehold. He was talking to a worker at the station in Salisbury.” Fiona paused and took Mary’s hand. “The girl ’ad blond hair and blue eyes, and she’s supposed to ’ave said something about a Mary.”

  Mary groaned aloud and shook her head. “No. No, Fiona! It can’t be true, never. That wasn’t my Polly. That’s what you were trying to say, wasn’t it? You think it was Polly? No, Polly’s in a nice house and helps in the kitchen or carries white lace up to the rooms.”

  “Mary.” Fiona squeezed her hand. “I wanted to tell you so you’d know what might ’ave ’appened. Maybe a letter from Polly will come tomorrow, and we’ll see we’ve been fretting for nothing.”

  “Look, Fiona! They’re taking Molly out!”

  Both girls gazed spellbound out the window and watched as Master Ledford hauled petite Molly, twelve years old and with her head bowed, from the dormitory nearest the coach. The gentleman remained out of sight. All Mary and Fiona could see was one white glove reaching out through the door. The glove gestured to Molly to turn around so that the gentleman could see her from all sides. She even had to show her teeth.

  “They give us the once-over like we’re cows. That’s all we are, ain’t we? Cattle to be bought,” Fiona said bitterly, growling through her teeth.

  “I bet he’s looking for a new servant girl. Molly’s in luck, Fiona!” Mary said as she gazed at the beautiful coach and the nervous, prancing horses. “Oh, I would love to get a position in a lovely house one day and not have to live in this filth anymore.”

  Just then, the lice in Mary’s hair bit into her scalp, as if they had heard her, making her scratch. The stink of her old clothes suddenly seemed unbearable, and she hated the bugs that crawled out of their lairs in the dark and attacked her. The screams of the little ones who didn’t know what it was nipping them in their diapers, and those who scratched their little arms until they bled, the nauseating stench from the chamber pots, and the green meat that was the only meat they had to eat—all of it made her choke. Why shouldn’t it get better if they entered domestic service somewhere? It could not be worse than here, surely! And she pushed aside any thoughts that leaving the orphanage had perhaps not turned out as well for Polly as she had hoped.

  12.

  While Hettie helped her mistress undress, she babbled away with all her news. Jane listened to stories about countless family members and was happy for the young woman, whom she had not seen this merry in a long time. The black skirt was set out to be dried and brushed on a wooden frame.

  “You want to invite Lady Alison to visit, ma’am. She’s your friend, after all. Then you would have someone to talk to. Lady Alison is always so lively,” said Hettie, who suddenly seemed to realize that Jane was very quiet.

  “Hmm, yes. But later. This house still has all the charm of a mausoleum,” Jane replied as she slipped into a plain black housedress.

  “Now that you say that, ma’am, about the mausoleum, well, Jeannie told me something that came as a real shock, I can tell you. I told her about the dead girl, and she looked at me and turned white as a whitewashed wall. ‘Well, I never,’ she said. Over St. Winnow way, not six months back, there was also a young girl found. She was already dead, but very young, and no one knew where she came from. It was a strange affair, said Jeannie, and everyone felt sorry for the poor thing. She was starved thin, and it looked like she’d been mistreated, because there were signs she’d been beaten.”

  “My goodness! Was there an investigation?” Hettie knew nothing of the marks of ill treatment on the body of the girl at Rosewood Hall, and it was better that way.

  “There’s an orphanage in Bodmin. It seems they asked there, but no one knew the girl. Ma’am, there are many orphanages and homes. They can’t ask everywhere, and who’s interested in such a poor thing? It’s sad but true, says Jeannie.”

  “St. Winnow. Where is that?”

  “A few miles up the river on the way to Bodmin.”

  “Hettie, tomorrow I’ve been invited to Bromfield Manor. You’re to accompany me, and while we’re there you can chat with the maid of Lord Hargrave’s sister, Violet. She’s supposed to have an interest in the orphanages hereabouts. I ought to be able to find out more about it from her, don’t you think?”

  Hettie’s eyes lit up expectantly. “How nice! Oh, but what will you put on? Not this horrible black dress?”

  Jane thought for a moment. “The black-violet will do. With the velvet ribbon and the cross.”

  The following afternoon, wearing the elegant and expensive black-violet silk dress, Jane found herself standing in the entrance hall talking to Floyd while she waited for her coach to come around.

  “The new kitchen girl seems anxious, but that is normal, my lady. This is her first time in a manor house,” Floyd explained quietly, and then cleared his throat distinctly.

  A stocky man with a balding pate and surly expression was trying to make his way unnoticed to the kitchen and laundry area from the corridor that led down to the larder.

  “Mr. Roche, a word, please!” Jane called the caretaker back.

  A jolt seemed to run through the man. He turned around reluctantly and came over to her. “Yes, ma’am?”

  Mr. Roche had a beefy face and drooping eyelids, and his expression was not only surly but also guilty. He wore a leather vest over his jacket, and a pheasant feather protruded from one pocket.

  “No one in this house is to be reprimanded with violence. No beatings! Anyone working for me should be happy to work here. If there are problems, they should be directed to Mr. Coleman.” Jane looked firmly at the man, who was at least thirty years her senior.

  “Yes, ma’am. Will that be all, ma’am?” Roche grumbled.

  “
For the time being. Tomorrow morning, the entire staff is to assemble in the kitchen. I would like to speak to you all.”

  “As you wish, ma’am.” Roche considered himself discharged and lumbered away.

  From the outside, Stuart opened the front door and held it for her. “The coach has arrived, ma’am.”

  “I’ll be along directly.” Jane turned back to Floyd and said, “Did you see the feather and the blood on his jacket? Check and see how much game they bag and dress here. Most of it gets sold outside, I’m guessing.”

  Floyd grinned. “I already suspected as much, my lady. One of the tenants was in the kitchen this morning, and the cook often disappears into the village with a full basket.”

  “What’s her name again?”

  “Becky Thomas. She lives with her family in Lansallos. Everyone there seems to be related. The blacksmith’s a Thomas, as is the miller, Becky’s brother . . .” Floyd shrugged. “I shall be ruffling some feathers there soon.”

  “Thank you, Floyd. I am very glad to have you with me.”

  Her loyal butler looked toward the door. “Your coach awaits, my lady. I wish you a pleasant afternoon.”

  Hettie came running down the stairs, the ribbons on her hat flying.

  A light drizzle obscured the view of the gray-green hill. It took the warmth of the first sun of spring to call forth the succulent green that would later blanket the meadows and fields. Here and there, the first delicate buds were appearing on hedges and trees, but for now the gloomy, overcast sky promised no change.

  The coach drove along a low stone wall, sheep grazing on the other side. The wall came to a sudden end, and they turned onto a single-lane track heading unswervingly toward a mansion. With its gray, ivy-covered walls and squat, inelegant proportions, the house did not make a particularly inviting sight.

  “I am very glad we won’t have to spend the night here,” said Hettie.