‘I would need Luke to confirm it, but in my opinion this is from his lordship’s summer-weight evening suit,’ Bowman said heavily. ‘And you say, Rowsley, that you heard an altercation between a young man and a young woman?’
I nodded. ‘Yes, but on another evening entirely. I thought it was just a lover’s tiff, and decided not to intervene.’
‘A tiff it might have been. But between his lordship and a young woman?’ Mrs Arden put in. ‘Between him and Maggie? Such a relationship is not unknown.’
Harriet went so white I feared she was about to faint. But she kept herself sitting upright somehow or other. Lest others remark on her pallor, I said, ‘I think we must speak to Mrs Billings again. I know Maggie forbade us to reveal her whereabouts, but if the child she’s carrying is his lordship’s it puts an entirely different complexion on the matter. Poor child. Poor, poor child,’ I sighed.
A tap on the door silenced us all. Florrie, fresh from her ladyship’s chamber, was as white as Harriet. She curtsied, but stumbled. Bowman supported her to a chair. ‘Such a rage she’s in! I let slip about the policemen, and I thought she’d kill me.’ She raised her head high and managed a smile. ‘She might have done, except with a couple of bobbies handy down here she might have been caught a damn sight quicker than she liked.’
‘No swearing, Florrie,’ Harriet said absently. ‘Mr Bowman, I fancy that a drop of your medicinal brandy might be in order. Florrie’s had a nasty shock—’
‘Thank you, Mr Bowman, but no, if it’s all the same to you. I’ve signed the pledge. My whole family have. There’s a new Methodist chapel down Dudley way, so we started going. And I know Mr Pounceman doesn’t approve of the demon drink, so I often feel like having a noggin to spite him, but a promise is a promise, isn’t it?’
Unless it was made by an irresponsible man so he could have his way with a girl who allowed herself to believe him.
‘It is, Florrie,’ I said. ‘Now, how did you leave her ladyship?’
She laughed. ‘Quickly! To dodge a hairbrush. Nice silver one, too – I bet it got a nasty dent when it hit the door.’
‘I hope so. Now, answer me truthfully, Florrie – I know this might mean breaking a promise, but sometimes, except when it’s made to God, you have to. Hortense left here with a really bad injury, didn’t she? Do you think that might have been caused by a flying hairbrush?’
She considered. ‘Summat much heavier, I reckon.’
‘Something,’ Harriet said gently.
‘Sorry, ma’am. It’s just that I’m all het up and I forget what you’ve learned us. Taught us.’
‘Good girl. Now,’ Harriet continued, her colour returning, ‘if Hortense wasn’t hit by a brush, what do you think did hurt her? And who? I’m sure she swore you to secrecy but Mr Rowsley is right: we really need to know. Sometimes if someone hurts someone they might want to try again.’
‘Ah, and do a better job – do her in, second time round,’ Florrie agreed, with a sage nod. ‘Don’t reckon as how it’s – don’t reckon that it was her ladyship. Thing is, this might get Hortense into trouble.’
‘She’s left now, so we can’t punish her. And only I know where she has gone to live.’
There was a loud knock at the door, swiftly followed by the entrance of Thatcher. He bowed. ‘Beg pardon for breaking in on your talk. But the policemen are insistent they speak to her ladyship, whether she is ready or not. They want someone to show them up to her room right now.’
Mrs Faulkner got swiftly to her feet. ‘I’ll take them.’
And I couldn’t even scream at her to be careful.
‘Very well, Florrie,’ I said as Thatcher closed the door behind her, ‘Hortense was hit very hard by something, we all agree on that. By what and by whom?’
‘It was a man, and that’s all you’re getting out of me,’ she said, ‘until I hear otherwise from Hortense. But I don’t want those bobbies to go sniffing round asking for her in case the bastard gets wind of it and finds her first. And that’s flat.’ She got up, dropped a curtsy that was as challenging as a gauntlet, and marched out.
Forgetting myself, I mimed a round of applause. In for a penny, in for a pound: ‘If that girl can lose some of her accent and remember the grammar that Mrs Faulkner is trying to teach her, she’ll go far.’
Bowman looked at me curiously. ‘I really believe you approve of her attitude.’
Mrs Arden’s face was unreadable. ‘Do you want Mrs Faulkner or me to accompany you to the lodge, Mr Rowsley? Or Mr Bowman?’
I looked from one to the other. ‘It’ll be obvious if you leave your posts. No one expects me to be here on a Sunday, so I’ll go alone. But I think I should take some food – not quite a bribe, but a little encouragement. Something small and discreet, that will fit in my pockets. Can you help me with that, Mrs Arden? Thank you.’
I do not know how Mrs Billings dragged herself to the gate each time she was summoned. She was nothing but skin and bone: perhaps Dr Page would have known if it was because she did not eat enough or whether some terrible illness had struck her. She leant against the door jamb as if she needed its support – as I feared she would when I had finished speaking to her. I felt my way into the conversation by asking a genuine question.
‘Mrs Billings, a week or so a couple of gentlemen, maybe three, arrived at the House very late at night. You must have opened the gate for them. Do you recall who they might have been?’
Her expression was totally blank, but she made an effort. ‘Would they have been in a coach, like his lordship’s, say, or were they riding?’
‘On horseback.’
She nodded. ‘Ah, they’d have no call to rouse me then: leastways, if they knew their way around the estate. There’s a couple of little gaps in the wall, far side of the woods. Tight fit for a horse, mind.’ She did her best to smile. ‘My grandfer used to call them the Eyes of the Needle.’ She seemed happy that I was laughing. ‘As for a coach, gaffer, hasn’t been one since her ladyship’s.’
‘Thank you. I’ll get one of the estate lads to point the gaps out to me.’ Now came the part I was not looking forward to: ‘Mrs Billings, I am sure you told me the truth last time we spoke about Maggie, but I am also sure you did not tell me the whole truth. I don’t know why. I know there is some trouble. Yes?’
Her eyes filled with terror.
‘I also know she does not want to be a bother to you. Actually, I know where she is, but she refuses to let me tell you.’
Her lips moved but I detected no sound.
How did I begin? I thought of my mother: I searched for the words she would have spoken. ‘A kind Baptist minister and his wife are keeping an eye on her. They have some money to make sure she eats well enough for her and for her baby. When her time comes, they can pay for a midwife. All of this is being done in secret. No one will betray her whereabouts, not even to you, unless she permits it. But I will make sure that if you want to send her a message, it will reach her.’ I waited. ‘I promise,’ I added.
I might not have said a word. Was she deaf? Stupid? But then I saw the tears coursing down her face. She made no effort to wipe them away.
‘If ever you have anything else you want to tell me, send a lad to my house and I will come as soon as I can. Mrs Billings, you can trust me. If you know the name of your daughter’s seducer, tell me, and I can bring him to book: I can’t force him to marry her, but I can make him pay for his child’s upkeep.’ And if not, I would do it myself. ‘Now, I fear you are not eating enough,’ I said more briskly, in a slightly louder voice. ‘Here: please accept this.’ I dug in my pockets for the packages of ham, cheese and cake. There was also a packet of tea. ‘These are for you.’
Her tears still rolled; now her mouth worked. But she did not speak, and I had to lift her hands in order to press the gifts into them.
I raised my hat and said softly the words my father would have used, ‘May God bless you, and keep you, and cause His light to shine upon you.’
Rather than head straight back to the House I turned Esau towards the village and Dr Page’s establishment. His maid showed me straight into the garden, where, in his shirtsleeves, he was tending the roses.
We discussed greenfly for a while – more accurately he did, because dealing with pests was an art regarded by my gardener as a secret available only to the initiated. However, I took all Page said to heart, and felt that in future discussions I would be able to do more than nod in agreement to everything the expert suggested.
As the maid brought out a tea tray which she placed, at his request, on a table in an arbour, he put down his secateurs and led the way to the shade. ‘Have you something to tell me about my patient’s progress?’
‘Yes – and to ask you to treat another woman on the estate.’ It was clearly understood that he would invoice his lordship, via me. ‘Hortense was well enough to leave us, and has taken up employment with a lady in Warwick: only Mrs Faulkner knows her whereabouts.’
‘Good. And who is the other lady in question? Another lady’s maid?’ he added meaningfully.
I thought of Florrie and the hairbrush. ‘Not this time,’ I said truthfully. ‘Mrs Billings. She is thinner each time I see her.’
He sucked his teeth. ‘I fear you will not see her at all by the end of the summer. Constant hunger, lack of proper nourishment – how can a woman like that shake off illnesses that would do no more than inconvenience someone in her ladyship’s position? Of course I will talk to her, and give her some pills she will believe will do her good – the mind is a powerful tool, Rowsley, you mark my words!’
‘Pills – good. And I will ask Mrs Arden to ensure a constant supply of food reaches the lodge.’
‘No. Make sure it reaches her, and no one else. It is the way of the poor, Rowsley, to share food in a way you or I would find incomprehensible. The man of the house must eat, even if he is a drunken layabout. Paralysed, in Billings’ case! The sons must eat. So if there happened to be any meat in the meal, that is the end of that. Then any girl likely to get into service must be briefly fattened up: no one would employ a waif, and the family needs both her space and the tiny wage she will send home, remember. Then, and only then, do the other females share the rest.’
When I got back, the staff were about to sit down in the hall: seeing a spare seat, I took it, nodding to Bowman, who was opposite me. Naturally we preserved the rule of silence, though there were questions I was desperate to ask. However, as the four of us adjourned to the Room, I spoke quietly to George, who had been sitting diagonally across from me. ‘My office, good and early tomorrow, please, George – whatever the weather.’
‘This time I’ll bring a change of clothes if needs be, gaffer!’