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Vera was alone in the drawing room, sipping tea from a chipped cup with a gold rim and the Southwold crest emblazoned on one side. Obviously, she had risen in importance since the last time she had taken tea at Southwold Hall. This time she was being given the best china, a dubious honor, considering that it was in such poor condition. They really need the Harrigan millions, she thought. Her thought was not clouded by any sense of shame. Anita, or Celeste as she would now be called, would be heir to all of this, and Harry Harrigan would preserve the estate for her and fund her for the rest of her life. Nothing to feel guilty about!
She looked at her watch, the one that she had purchased in New York with Harry Harrigan’s money. Three o’clock and still no sign of the lawyer, or the Harrigans. She had hoped to catch the four o’clock train and be in London by nightfall. She had no wish to spend the night in the village, or run the danger of encountering her mother. God, that would be a scene! Her mother would never be fobbed off with some story about Vera being in Brighton and taking the wrong baby by mistake, but there would be nothing she could do about it once Vera was gone.
Shame would keep her quiet so long as Vera was nowhere in sight. She would never understand that Vera, in her own mind, had actually done a good thing. She’d helped out a friend in trouble and helped herself into the bargain, and now it was all coming right. She just didn’t want to hear what her mother had to say about it.
She took another sip of tea from the chipped cup.
“Mrs. Malloy.”
Vera looked up and saw Blanche Harrigan hovering in the doorway. Vera gave her a casual American greeting. “Hi.”
“Can I talk to you?”
“Sure. Do you want a cup of tea?”
“All right.”
Blanche perched on the edge of an armchair while Vera poured tea into another of Southwold’s prize porcelain teacups. This one was not chipped, just slightly cracked.
“Milk?”
“No, thank you.”
Vera handed over the teacup. “There’s no lemon,” she said. “I guess they’re still not importing lemons.”
“I suppose not.”
Silence settled into the room. Vera waited. Blanche sipped nervously and glanced up at Vera with red-rimmed eyes. She had been crying. Vera had no intention of asking why.
Eventually Blanche managed a few words. “I wanted to talk to you about the young woman who came with you.”
Damn! She had seen Carol. Well, no use denying it. If the woman had seen her, there was no point in saying that Carol had not been there.
“Just someone from the village,” Vera said.
“I thought ...” Blanche took another nervous sip of tea. “I thought ...”
Thought what? Thought she looked like Anita? Thought that Anita looked like Carol? Thought that the whole idea of Anita being the child of Lady Sylvia and the deceased Jack Harrigan was a ridiculous charade?
Blanche placed the cup and saucer carefully on a side table and drew in a shuddering breath. “I thought that she looked like Celeste.”
Celeste? Oh, yes, Anita’s new name.
“Really?”
“Yes, I really did. I thought there was a strong resemblance.”
Vera sensed a hint of iron behind Blanche’s softly spoken words. Her mind was racing. This had to be settled here and now. No time to consult Lady Sylvia or Mrs. Pearson. This was up to Vera. She fell back on the rumors she had heard so often, on the many times a child had been said to resemble one of the old Earls, on the fact that she herself had the same build and coloring as the Countess, and she laughed.
“So you noticed?”
“Yes, I did.”
Vera laughed again. “That’s the way it is in a little village like Rose Hill. The old Earls used to sow their wild oats pretty close to home.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The woman you saw, my friend Carol, she probably has the same grandfather or great grandfather as Lady Sylvia. I’m sure I do. We all do. We all look the same.”
“No,” said Blanche. “You don’t look the same. I mean, I can see a resemblance between you and Lady Sylvia, but this other woman ... no, I don’t see it.”
“It looks different in every generation,” Vera said airily, “but the reason is the same. You’re probably being confused by Carol’s red hair, but we’ve had redheaded Earls in the past.”
Blanche continued to look doubtful.
Vera pasted an anguished expression onto her face. “Mrs. Harrigan, I made a terrible mistake in taking Lady Sylvia’s baby, your little granddaughter, but it was a genuine mistake. You’ve never been bombed, have you?”
“No, of course not. We weren’t bombed.”
“Then you really wouldn’t understand. The bomb landed on the nursery. It was terrible. I expect Lady Sylvia already told you.”
“She didn’t say very much about it.”
“I’m sure it’s as painful for her as it is for me. She spent all these years grieving and thinking that her child had died, and I thought my child had survived. I thought Anita was mine.” Vera leaned forward and grasped Blanche’s hands. “Mrs. Harrigan, it’s my turn now to grieve for the child I lost. Please don’t make it harder by suggesting that we are all ... all ...”
“All what?”
“All lying.”
“Oh, I wasn’t.”
“I think you were.”
Vera looked at her watch again. She really had to get out of here. Sign the papers, take the money, and run. Minutes ticked by with Blanche Harrigan perched on the edge of her chair, apparently afraid to speak for fear of further offending Vera but also unwilling to leave.
As the clock on mantelshelf chimed the quarter hour, Lady Sylvia made her entrance into the room, checking the time on the clock against the time on her own wristwatch.
“I don’t understand what’s happened to Mr. Whitby,” she announced.
As always, Mrs. Pearson was close behind. “He’s late.”
Lady Sylvia shook her elegantly coiffured head. “No, he’s here somewhere. His car is in the stable yard.”
“Perhaps he left it here and went somewhere else on foot.”
Lady Sylvia deposited herself in an armchair and indicated that Mrs. Pearson should pour tea.
“Why would he do that? Why would he leave his car here?”
“I have no idea,” Mrs. Pearson replied. “He’s a very unreliable young man.”
“Are you sure he’s not somewhere in the house?”
“I’m quite sure.”
Lady Sylvia accepted a teacup with only a tiny chip along the rim. “Mrs. Pearson, would you ring Mr. Champion and have him come out in person? You can send Price in the Bentley to fetch him. We can’t wait any longer. Mrs. Malloy wants to be in London this evening.”
Yes, I do, Vera thought, and you want it just as much as I do.
Harry Harrigan strode into the room and brought with him an air of masculine determination. He reminded Vera of the way the Malloy men had looked as they made ready to go hunting.
Harrigan looked at his wife. “Did you ask her?”
“It’s all right, Harry.”
“Did you ask her?”
“I didn’t need to. She explained about the bombing and how dreadful it was.”
“We’re not talking about the bombing. What about the red hair?”
“Who has red hair?” Lady Sylvia asked.
“Your daughter does,” Harry snapped.
“I wouldn’t say it’s red,” Lady Sylvia argued. “It’s gold, like Jack’s.”
“It’s red like the woman my wife saw this afternoon.”
Lady Sylvia looked up at her housekeeper. “Go and ring Mr. Champion, and make sure he comes immediately.”
“Yes, Your Ladyship.”
“Immediately.”
Vera leaned back in her chair. “I explained to Mrs. Harrigan that the old Earls had a terrible habit of making free with the village maidens. We all have the same face, don’t we? Just look at how alike we are, Your Ladyship. It’s not surprising, is it, that someone else in the village would have some slight resemblance?”
“No,” said Her Ladyship. “Not surprising at all.”
Harry surveyed the tea trolley with its small plate of tea sandwiches. He looked at Lady Sylvia. “What’s in these?”
“Cucumber.”
“What else?”
“Nothing else.”
“Cucumber and nothing else? No wonder we had to help you win your war. You can’t grow soldiers on cucumber sandwiches.”
He placed a handful of sandwiches on a tea plate and sat down next to his wife. He patted her hand. “So, you believe this story about a redheaded Earl sleeping his way around the village?”
“I do.”
“Okay. Enough said. Let’s get on with it. What are we waiting for?”