Читать книгу 3-Book Victorian Crime Collection: Death at Dawn, Death of a Dancer, A Corpse in Shining Armour - Caro Peacock, Caro Peacock - Страница 19

CHAPTER TEN

Two women sat facing me, side by side in gilt-framed armchairs, their backs to a window draped with heavy curtains in peacock-blue brocade. The older woman, in her late sixties, wore a ruffled black silk dress and a white lace cap with lappets framing a sharp little face. The other was the girl from the portrait, twenty years older. The realisation of that, and the feeling that I’d seen her before, made me forget Miss Bodenham’s tuition and stare at her. She was handsome still, but the twenty years had not been good to her. Even with her back to the light, her complexion was sallow, with unmistakeable circles of rouge on the cheekbones. Her eyes met mine and looked away.

‘Please sit down, Miss Lock,’ the older woman said.

A plain chair had been placed facing them. I took a few steps across the Turkey carpet and sat down, aware that every move I made was reflected in large mirrors on the walls to left and right. Behind me as well, for all I knew. It made me feel like a specimen in a scientist’s bell jar. The younger woman – Lady Mandeville, presumably – had a dainty pie-crust table at her elbow with my letter of application and character reference on it.

‘I see you have worked abroad.’

Her voice sounded tired. She picked up the character reference and stared at it, as if having trouble in focusing. It trembled in her hand.

‘It all seems … satisfactory enough, I should say.’

The older woman, whom I assumed to be Mrs Beedle, fired a question at me.

‘What’s nine times thirteen?’

‘One hundred and seventeen, ma’am.’

She nodded. It was Lady Mandeville’s turn, but she seemed to find it difficult to gather her thoughts.

‘You are accustomed to teaching boys?’

An edge of uneasiness in her voice, as if playing a part she had not learned entirely. But why should she be uneasy, mistress in her own grand house?

‘Yes, ma’am. I had charge of Master Fitzgeorge from six to nine years old.’

‘What is the Fifth Commandment?’ Mrs Beedle again.

‘Honour thy father and thy mother, ma’am.’

We went on like that for some time; Lady Mandeville, with that same distracted air, asking questions about my past that I found it easy enough to deal with after Miss Bodenham’s coaching. Her mother was another matter. It wasn’t so much the questions themselves, although they covered everything from the Old Testament prophets to the rivers of America. Her eyes were what made me uneasy. They were dark and shrewd and took in every detail of my appearance from bonnet ribbon to scuffed shoes. When I was answering Lady Mandeville’s questions, I was aware of those eyes on me, as if Mrs Beedle saw through me for the impostor I was.

‘Did your previous employer expect you to darn the children’s stockings?’

Something amiss there. The harmless domestic question came from Mrs Beedle, when I’d expected something more scholastic. With those eyes on me, I faltered for the first time in the interview. Miss Bodenham hadn’t foreseen this and I didn’t know what the answer should be.

‘I … I always tried to do whatever …’

‘Did Mrs McAlison expect you to darn their stockings?’

She’d even remembered the name of my fictitious employer. I felt my face turning red.

‘No, ma’am.’

Mrs Beedle nodded, though whether in approval or because her suspicions had been confirmed, I had no notion. Lady Mandeville murmured something about Betty always seeing to that sort of thing. The two women looked at each other.

‘Well?’ said Lady Mandeville, fingers pressed to either side of her forehead, as if for an aching head.

‘Wait outside, please,’ Mrs Beedle said to me.

I went into the corridor leading to the front door, staying just far enough away to prove I wasn’t eavesdropping. A door opened at the far end of the corridor. It must have led to the servants’ quarters because the footman appeared and held it open for a maid with an armful of dust covers. The two of them were whispering and giggling together, obviously good friends. I caught what the maid was saying.

‘Just wish they’d make up their blooming minds, that’s all. Get it all uncovered, then have to cover it up again. When are they off back down there?’

‘First thing tomorrow she is, and the old lady. Supposed to be the day after, only a letter came from over the water this morning and her ladyship was running around like a hen with its head cut off. New curtains, complete set of new silverware, six dozen of champagne, all to go down in the old coach after them.’

They noticed me in the corridor and went quiet, casting curious looks at me as they passed by on their way to the front drawing room. Soon after that a bell tinkled from Lady Mandeville’s room, which I took as my signal to go back inside. My legs were shaking. I was half-expecting to be denounced as a fraud and handed over to the constabulary. This time they didn’t invite me to sit down. Lady Mandeville was making a visible effort to be businesslike.

‘I understand from your letter that you are free to take up your duties immediately. We are living in the country at present.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘Your wages will be forty pounds a year …’

‘Payable six monthly in arrears,’ Mrs Beedle added sharply.

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘You will please make your own way to Windsor. You will be met at the White Hart, near the Castle, at two o’clock tomorrow. Have you any questions, Miss Lock?’

‘No, ma’am.’

So I found myself going down the steps, engaged as a governess, within half an hour of entering the house. I’d known women take longer to choose a pair of gloves. And what, if anything, had I discovered in that half-hour? One, that Lady Mandeville was unhappy. Two, that her mother, Mrs Beedle, was a woman to be treated warily. Three, the household was confused and on edge because of changes of plan. Four, and probably most important, her footman attributed the latest change of plan to a letter from over the water. When people said ‘over the water’ they usually meant the Channel. Therefore it was possible at least that the letter had come from France and … Yes, you see where I am headed and are no doubt saying to yourself that hundreds of letters come to England from France every day and there is no logical connection at all with the fact that my father died there. Bear in mind, though, that Blackstone had said that my post as spy in the household was somehow connected with his death. Still no logical connection? Very well, I admit it. But then, logic is a plodding horse and now and then you need one which will take a leap.

As I turned the corner into Store Street I added a fifth fact to my list: judging by the silverware and the champagne, the Mandevilles were preparing their country home for entertainment on a grand scale. Presumably this was the ball or reception that interested the black one. How had he known? Perhaps I was only the latest filament in a whole web of spies, but if so, what made Sir Herbert Mandeville and his household so interesting to Blackstone? No point in asking Miss Bodenham. She’d made it clear that I’d get no information from her. Indeed, she hardly looked up from her copying when I climbed the stairs and told her I’d gained the position.

I spent the afternoon booking a seat on the first stagecoach I could find leaving for Windsor next morning and shopping for necessities. Of the money that Blackstone had given me, I had three pounds, two shillings and a few odd pence left after paying my coach fare. By the end of the day my purse contained only two shillings, three pennies, a halfpenny and a farthing. My battered bag was plumper by a plain green cotton dress, a pair of black shoes that were serviceable but unlovely, two white collars, a white muslin chemise, two pairs each of cotton pantaloons and white thread stockings. It went to my heart to spend the last of my money on clothes so dull.

My farewells to Miss Bodenham early on Thursday morning did not take long. I shook her hand and thanked her and she said, ‘You have nothing to thank me for.’ By the time I’d pushed my bag through the door, she’d gone back to her copying.

I hired a loitering boy to carry the bag and arrived in plenty of time to take up the seat I’d reserved on the Windsor coach, only to find the vehicle surrounded by a crowd of people pushing, trampling on each other’s toes, waving pieces of paper.

‘… sent my man to reserve seats three days ago …’

‘Quite imperative that I arrive in Windsor by three o’clock or …’

‘… travel outside if need be, but I must get to Windsor …’

A couple of harassed ostlers were trying to hold them back, while the coach guard slowly spelled out names on a list. For some reason, half London seemed possessed of a desire to travel the twenty miles or so to Windsor. It was only when I’d claimed my place, after some unladylike elbowing and shoving, and we were going past Hyde Park Corner that I recalled the reason for this migration of people. They all hoped for a chance to see the new queen. As far as anybody knew, she was still in London, but was expected any day to travel to her castle at Windsor. I was wedged in between a lawyer-like man with an umbrella and an Italian confectioner with – of all things – a large cake on his lap. In spite of the crush, with two extra passengers crammed inside the coach, he couldn’t resist unwrapping it to show us all. It was marzipan-striped in red, white and blue, with gilt anchors, bells, and a tiny sugar replica of Westminster Abbey.

‘For Her Majesty.’

‘Has Her Majesty asked for it?’ the lawyer-like man said.

‘Poor little Vicky,’ said a man in the corner, who seemed at least three parts drunk. ‘Such a weight on such young shoulders.’

From the murmur of approval round the carriage, he did not mean the cake. Their voices mingled like pigeons in a loyal cooing: so young, so beautiful, so alone, so dignified. All the men in the coach were wearing black cloth bands on their sleeves in mourning for the king and the lawyer had a black streamer round his hat, but grief for William seemed lost in excitement over little Vicky. I said nothing. Even if my own world had not fallen apart, I could have raised no great enthusiasm about a grand-daughter of mad King George succeeding to a thoroughly discredited crown. Of course, that was the kind of thing said by my father’s friends, but even to hint at it in this patriotic coachload would bring down on my head accusations of republicanism, atheism, treason and revolution. ‘Well, that explains the six dozen of champagne, at any rate,’ I thought. Lady Mandeville’s haste and anxiety, the disruption of her household, were no more than symptoms of royalty fever. Any person of consequence living within an easy drive of Windsor Castle would be expected to entertain housefuls of guests drawn by the mere chance of seeing Her Majesty riding in Windsor Great Park. The advantage was that, in the middle of such a stir, nobody was likely to pay attention to a new governess. The disadvantage, from a spy’s point of view, was that one of the puzzles had such a simple explanation.

We reached Windsor half an hour late because of the amount of traffic on the outskirts and unpacked ourselves from the carriage. The confectioner strode away through the crowds carrying his preposterous cake like the Holy Grail. I hoped the flunkey who received it would treat him politely at least.

There is no getting away from the castle at Windsor. Its old grey walls tower above the little town like the slopes of the Alps. The narrow streets were crowded with people in their best clothes, most of the respectable sort looking hot and uncomfortable in black, but with a carnival sprinkling of parasols and brightly coloured frocks. I stood outside the inn where the coach had put us down, wondering how I was to recognise the vehicle from Mandeville Hall in the confusion of broughams, barouches, fourgons, calèches, landaus and every other type of conveyance that clogged the centre of town.

‘You Miss Lock, the governess?’

A phaeton drew up beside me, drawn by a bay cob with a grey-haired coachman in the driving seat. It was crowded with packages and parcels, a large fish kettle, crates of bottles.

‘Where you got to?’ the driver grumbled. ‘I been looking for you an hour or more. Now we’ll be back late and they’ll say it’s my fault as usual.’

It was no use pointing out that it wasn’t my fault either. I managed, without his help, to find a gap for myself and my bag between a box of wax candles and a large ham, and settled back for a ride through the Berkshire countryside. For much of the journey we went through Windsor Great Park, with cattle grazing under oak trees old and gnarled enough to have seen Queen Elizabeth out hunting. Every time I looked back, there was the castle, silver in the sun, dwindling gradually into a child’s toy castle as we trotted in a cloud of our own white dust between hedges twined with honeysuckle and banks of frothy white cow parsley, though in that royal county it probably goes by its country name of Queen Anne’s lace. The smell of strong tobacco from the driver’s clay pipe mingled with the chalky dust, flowers and ham. I’d thought that once we got clear of the town he might turn and speak to me and I could ask him about the family, but he never once looked back.

We came out of the parkland alongside an area of common land that I guessed must be Ascot Heath. The horse races had been run earlier in the month, while the old king was still alive, but a string was at exercise in the distance, stretching out at an easy canter. I thought of Esperance and longed to see her. The racing, and the nearness of Windsor, had clearly attracted the gentry, because there were some grand houses close to the heath. I thought any of them might be Mandeville Hall, but we trotted on past various walls and gatehouses until we came alongside a park railing. The uprights of it flickered into a blur in the sunshine and it was a while before my eyes cleared. They focused first on the railings themselves, newly painted, topped with gilt spearheads. Three men were at work with pots and brushes, re-gilding the spearheads. As we went past, one of them shouted at the driver and looked angry, probably because our dust was spoiling their work. He took no notice. Behind the railing an expanse of parkland sloped upwards, with oaks like Windsor Castle’s but much younger. At the top of the slope was …

‘Good heavens, another castle.’

I said it aloud, to the ham and the fish kettle. At second glance it wasn’t quite a castle, only a very grand notion of an Englishman’s country house. It had enough towers and turrets for a whole chorus of fairy-tale princesses and was bristling with battlements and perforated with arrowslits as if ready to take on an army. In reality, an army of boys armed with catapults could have done it mortal damage because the front was more glass than stone. Three storeys of windows dazzled in the sun, most unmedieval. The whole thing was a perfection of the modern Gothic style, as much antiquity as an ingenious architect could pile on without sacrificing the comfort of the family who were paying his fee. We slowed to a walk, approaching two open gates. They were wrought iron, twenty feet high, freshly painted and gilded like the railings. Cast-iron shields, as tall as a man, with the device of three perched birds were attached to each gate. A small lodge stood beside the right-hand gate, built like a miniature Gothic chapel to match the house.

‘Is this Mandeville Hall?’ I asked the driver, appalled at this magnificence. He nodded, without turning round.

‘Built on slavery,’ I whispered to the ham, desperately trying to keep up my spirits. I knew the Mandevilles lived in some style, but had expected nothing as bad as this. The memory of my father’s body in the morgue came into my mind and I felt a black depression. I was wasting my time. How could his life or death be connected with all this pomp?

A man in a brown coat and leggings came out of the lodge, through an arched gateway between two haughty stone saints. He glanced at me, simply registering my presence, and then away. The driver leaned down from his seat and gave him something in a twist of paper, probably a roll of tobacco. They seemed like old friends as they filled their pipes and started muttering together. I caught the words ‘new governess’ and a moan about the traffic in Windsor. The driver jerked his head towards the house and asked, ‘They back, then?’

‘She is. He isn’t.’

‘When’s he expected?’

‘No telling. I haven’t slept these two nights past, listening for him. You know what he’s like if he has to wait while the gates are opened.’

The driver nodded and tapped out his pipe on his seat.

‘Seeing as they’re open, might as well go up the straight way.’

‘Better not. What if her ladyship sees you?’

‘See two of me, if she does.’

The driver made a tilting motion with his elbow and they both laughed. He jerked the reins and the cob, tiring now, went trotting slowly up the steep drive towards the castle. We hadn’t gone more than a few hundred yards when a shout came from the gate lodge behind us. I turned round and there was the gatekeeper, waving his arms and pointing back the way we’d come. The driver turned too and his face went slack.

‘That’s done it.’

A great cloud of white dust was coming along the road from Windsor, a much larger one than we’d made. At the centre of it was a travelling carriage drawn by four horses, coming at a fast canter. At that point they must have been a half mile away, but we could already hear the harness jingling, the thudding of their hooves and a whip cracking. My driver seemed frozen, irresolute. Then he swore and jerked at the cob’s head, as if intending to go back down to the gate lodge. But it was too late. The carriage was thundering between the gates, at a trot now but still fast. The gatekeeper had to jump aside. There were two men on the box, one in a plain caped coat, the other in a burgundy-coloured jacket, with whip and reins in hand. My driver tried to pull our phaeton off the drive and on to the grass. The wheel must have stuck in a rut because it lurched and wouldn’t go. He struck at the cob with his whip, swearing. By now the carriage was so close the air was full of the sweat of the four labouring horses. The face of the man driving it was red and sweating, his black eyebrows set in a bar.

‘Oh God.’

It was the gentleman who’d disputed his bill in the hotel at Calais. He must have seen that the phaeton was stuck in his path, but he was still whipping up the horses. I don’t know why I didn’t jump out. Perhaps I believed that the driver of the carriage must swerve at the last minute. But he didn’t. The phaeton lurched and juddered as the cob, writhing under the driver’s lash, tried to drag us clear. Then the world came apart in a confusion of whinnying, swearing and splintering wood, and I was in the air with a great downpour of wax candles falling alongside, making splintering sounds round me as I landed with my face on the gravel of the drive and my knee on the fish kettle.

When I managed to get to my feet I found that the cob had saved us at the last second by managing to drag the phaeton out of its rut and far enough on to the grass for the carriage to give us no more than a glancing blow. But the blow had been enough to tear the nearside wheel from its axle and throw the phaeton sideways. The cob, trapped in the shafts, had gone with it and was threshing on his side. The driver was slashing at the harness with a knife, trying to release him, letting out a torrent of obscenities. I limped over to them.

‘Sit on his head, for gawd’s sake,’ he yelled at me.

As instructed, I sat on the cob’s head. That kept him still enough for the driver to release him. When he told me I could get up, the cob scrambled to his feet. His face and neck were grazed, his eyes terrified.

‘He’ll live,’ said the driver, after running his hands down his legs.

‘He could have killed him. He could have killed all of us.’

I was boiling with the anger that follows terror. The driver felt in his pocket for his pipe, found it broken, threw it down on the grass.

‘Shouldn’t have been coming up that way, should we. Only it’s another mile round by the back way.’

At least our danger had made him more conversational, though depressed.

‘But he must have seen us,’ I said.

‘Oh yes, he saw us all right.’

‘Is he a guest here? Surely Sir Herbert will be angry that …’

He was staring at me as if I’d said something stupid.

‘What are you talking about, girl? That was Sir Herbert.’