CHAPTER 6

Mallow had received instructions from her mistress to keep an ear out for gossip. Servants always knew what was going on, especially in a place like the Eyrie with a large staff. Of course, one had to give gossip in order to get it, and a proper lady’s maid did not gossip about her mistress. But Lady Frances had approved areas of discussion that were fair game for Mallow to relate to other servants.

Nothing worked with Jenkins, Mrs. Blake’s maid. As they were equals, they might’ve chatted, but Jenkins proved quiet and moody—almost sullen. She had showed Mallow her room and reminded her of when she needed to dress Lady Frances, and that was it.

Downstairs, however, over tea in the servants’ hall, the large staff was more welcoming, and more than a little curious about Lady Frances, a member of a powerful aristocratic family. Mr. Pennington oversaw the proceedings with a strict eye, but allowed a certain latitude to talk to a visiting servant.

The servants were subdued, but not in mourning. Again, most of them hadn’t really known the master, and for the young maids in particular, who didn’t even serve at dinner, the event was more thrilling than tragic. After all, life in the country with a semi-retired master was probably boring day-by-day.

“It must be exciting, working in a great house in London,” ventured a housemaid named Nellie, whose ingrained cheerful nature was not appreciably dampened by the recent tragedy. “All the lords and ladies coming by.”

“I came from the household of the marquess, but now her ladyship and I live in a private hotel for ladies.”

That amazed everyone—even the butler seemed startled. Young ladies did not live on their own.

“Lady Frances likes her freedom,” said Mallow loftily. “She was used to it after attending university in America.”

“Oh, go on,” said a footman. “Ladies don’t go to college.”

Mallow glared at him. “There are colleges for ladies in America, and Lady Frances went to one. She’s very unusual.” And everyone became wide-eyed when she told them about her political work getting the vote for women—they clearly didn’t know Miss Kestrel was also involved in the group. “Lady Frances has also been to police headquarters at Scotland Yard. I’ve even been there with her.” That astonished everyone.

After answering questions, Mallow ventured one of her own. “I suppose Miss Kestrel will come back here from London to live, and Mrs. Blake will return to live with her son?”

Before anyone could respond, the butler said, “It would be unseemly to speculate at this point.” And that ended the conversation.

However, Mallow was able to pick it up later, after tea, when she sat at a small table with Nellie to catch up with their sewing. Nellie made sure Mr. Pennington was not around, then said, “To be honest, we are concerned that Miss Kestrel will not want to return. She’s lived in London for years now, and she doesn’t . . .” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “I’m not sure she’s well-suited to running a house of this size, even if she hired a proper housekeeper.”

“Maybe she’ll get married,” suggested Mallow. “And you’ll have a new master.”

“Maybe. There’s been talk that she might marry her cousin, Mr. Blake—then the two estates would be joined. He visits a lot. A very fine man.” She paused. “I suppose Lady Frances will get married someday, and you’ll move to a fine house.”

“Yes, but right now her ladyship is too busy to get married.”

Well, that was something. Nellie knew women who were too old to get married. Or too poor. But too busy?

Nellie pursed her lips and looked thoughtful. “A friend of the master’s visited once. A young man, from a good family. We thought he might’ve come to possibly court Miss Kestrel and even marry her. But his valet said his master wouldn’t because of some old poet Miss Kestrel liked . . . let me think . . . a funny name . . . I don’t see why he wouldn’t marry her because she liked the poet . . . Oh, it was such a funny name . . . Oh, now I remember . . . Saffy? No, it was Saffo. That was it for sure.”

They chatted a while more, before Mr. Pennington called Nellie away for other duties. However, Mallow was not alone long. Another woman came to join her, but the new arrival did not look like a proper servant. Her hair wasn’t as neat as it could be and Mallow thought her clothes were a little casual for a maid. She was holding a fine evening dress.

“Excuse me,” she said. “We haven’t been introduced, but I was watching you sew and I’ve never seen such perfect stitches. Could you help me?”

“Oh . . . yes, of course,” said Mallow. She took pride in her sewing and was flattered. “Bring a chair around into the light.”

“Thank you so much. I’m Amy, Amy Hopp, although here I’m supposed to be Miss Hardiman, because it’s my mistress’s name. Dumbest thing I ever heard, but if that’s what they do, I guess I gotta go along. Anyway, my mistress is a guest here, with her father, and back home we don’t dress like this so much.”

Mallow was a bit overwhelmed by a servant who so freely offered such sharply worded opinions, but again, she knew her ladyship was relying on her.

“I would be Miss Ffolkes, after my mistress, but—” and she gave a welcoming smile. “My name is June Mallow.”

“Glad to meet you, Junie.” She stuck out her hand and gave Mallow a firm shake. She was a strongly built girl, not especially tall but with broad shoulders and lots of straw-colored hair.

Her mistress had a tear along the seam of her evening dress. For Mallow, it was an easy job, but Hopp was impressed. “I never would’ve done it like that.”

“You have to, if you want the stitches to remain invisible. See? As good as new. You could never tell.” Mallow handed her the dress back.

“Well, wait’ll I tell Miss Hardiman what I learned.”

Mallow leaned over the little table and whispered. “Don’t do that. Take credit yourself. I don’t care, and don’t let your mistress think that there was something you didn’t know.”

Hopp grinned. “Say, aren’t you the clever one! Like I said, back home we don’t dress so fancy.”

“And that would be—America?” asked Mallow. The accent was a giveaway.

“That’s right. Took a ship here, and wasn’t that something. We’ve been mostly in London, kinda fun, more lively than back home. You’re from London?”

“Yes. My mistress is Lady Frances Ffolkes. She’s the daughter of a marquess. They’re a very important family, lords and ladies, bishops and members of parliament. Lady Frances knows everyone, famous writers and artists and actors. Once, the king himself came to dinner at her brother’s house. Lady Frances started talking with him about politics and almost caused a scandal.”

Hopp’s eyes got bigger and bigger. “You sure have more fun than we have, I can tell you.”

Mallow saw nothing but admiration in the maid’s eyes, which thrilled her.

“Do you have moving pictures in your town in America?” asked Mallow.

Hopp shook her head sadly. “No. There’s one in Buffalo, but it’s too far from our house. And we’ve been too busy in London.”

“Well, when we get back to London, on your evening off, you’ll come with me and my friends from other good houses, and we’ll go see a moving picture. Then we’ll have a glass of cider in a respectable establishment.”

“Well aren’t you the best!” cried Hopp.

Now to move in. “So tell me, Miss Hopp, why did you come to England? Is Mr. Hardiman also in government?”

“In government? I don’t really know. I do know he’s very rich. I think he just wanted to travel a bit, and well . . . I shouldn’t really say.” She lowered her eyes.

“Oh, but you can tell me . . . Amy.”

The girl looked around. “Oh, very well. It’s just us. The real reason . . . Miss Hardiman is looking for a husband. That’s why we were staying in London. Going to parties to meet a lord who’d marry Miss Hardiman.”

Mallow nodded. “Your secret is safe with me.”

Hopp looked down at the repaired dress. “I ought to go back upstairs with this. Thank you again, Junie.”

Mallow looked up at this cheerful, sloppy American. “When we are alone together, you can be Amy and I can be . . . Junie. But among others, I will be Miss Ffolkes and you will be Miss Hardiman.”

“It sounds like a silly rule, like I said. First name, last name, it’s all the same to me.”

“They are not silly rules. As a lady’s maid I have earned the right to be called ‘Miss Mallow’ at home. To be called ‘Miss Ffolkes’ when we travel to great houses—it is something I’m proud of. Women must achieve and must proudly insist on recognition of their achievements, no matter what their station in life. Lady Frances says so.”

Amy looked a little stunned at this. Mallow was young, but her words lent a gravitas to her face.

“Are there a lot of English ladies like your Lady Frances?”

“No. Of that I am sure.” When Mallow was just a housemaid in the household of Lady Frances’s parents, she had more than once overheard old Lady Seaforth sigh and say “There is no one like our Franny,” and old Lord Seaforth mutter, “Thank heaven.”

Mallow finished her sewing and then headed upstairs to help Frances get dressed for dinner. It would naturally be a subdued affair, Mr. Pennington had said, but he expected it to be done right. Mallow was going to make sure her ladyship was a credit to the House of Seaforth.

“Getting on with the other servants?” asked Frances.

“Yes, my lady, although Miss Jenkins was a bit standoffish, I must say. They say downstairs she’s a good lady’s maid, very devoted to Mrs. Blake. She knew Mrs. Blake even before her marriage—in fact, she’s from these parts. But still, she keeps herself to herself.”

“Any talk about Sir Calleford?”

“Not much, my lady. No one said he was ever unkind, rather reserved. But they had some things to say about Mrs. Blake. Runs a very tight ship, she does.”

“Cruel or unfair?”

“Not exactly, my lady. But heaven help the maid who forgets to dust a vase or a footman with unshined shoes. You get a dressing down. And a speech. She lectures the servants on the history of the house, and how you’re letting the family down if you’re less than perfect.”

Not just strict, but odd, thought Frances.

“But she can be nice, too. She told Sir Calleford’s valet he could stay on until he found a new position, and has already written him an excellent reference.”

Kind and wise, thought Frances. It was important to keep up the servants’ morale. A house like this would fall to pieces without proper staffing, and a murder was terrible enough without servants worrying about getting dismissed.

And then Mallow proudly launched into her real discoveries, her conversations with Nellie and Amy. Frances listened carefully without interrupting.

“Well done, Mallow! That’s a lot of excellent information. So there was some thought or hope that Gwen would marry Mr. Blake, her second cousin.” Was it just rumor, or had there ever been a real plan? “And speaking of young women getting married, we have Miss Hardiman looking to become a countess or even duchess. Where were they staying in London?”

“At Claridge’s, my lady.” Of course. The most elegant and prominent hotel in London. The perfect place to start meeting the “right people.” Miss Hardiman would not be the first young American woman to trade a huge dowry for a match with an aristocratic but impoverished English family. This was no doubt engineered by Mr. Hardiman. An alliance with one of the great English families would be good for his career as well—especially if it was his goal to ingratiate himself with London’s diplomatic elite. Were there disagreements with Sir Calleford? Something to embarrass Miss Hardiman?

“If I may say, my lady,” said Mallow with a little hesitation. “Miss Hopp, although pleasant and respectable, would not pass muster in England. She would not be more than a simple housemaid or scullery maid in Lady Seaforth’s house.”

“I’m sure you’re right, Mallow. My guess is that the Hardimans are what are called nouveau riche. That means the new rich—people, usually Americans, who had very little money but then suddenly became rich. Now they want to mix with other rich people, those who may have been rich for generations.” Frances’s family had been aristocrats since Kestrel’s Eyrie was new.

Mallow nodded. There were “new rich” people in London, people who had money but no ties to the aristocracy or even the landed gentry—the well-off landholders who had owned large tracks of farmland for generations. The servants knew who these new rich were. Lady Frances numbered some of them among her friends in charitable circles in particular and in the suffragist group. She didn’t care where the money came from, as long as it was honestly made, but her late mother wouldn’t have them at her dinner parties.

And the new rich often didn’t make the wisest decisions in hiring servants.

“And one more thing, my lady. I don’t really understand, but it may be important.” She told how someone said that Miss Kestrel liked some poet too much, and seemed to think this was very funny. “Nellie remembered it, as it was an odd name, my lady, and I wrote it down as best I could, although we don’t know if I got the spelling right.” She produced a piece of paper from her sleeve, and showed it to Frances.

“Saffo.” A close approximation for “Sappho.” Oh my.

“Sappho was a Greek poetess who lived a long time ago. From what little we know about her, she lived a very . . . unconventional life.” That was one way to put it.

“Oh. Like you, my lady,” said Mallow.

“Not exactly. You see, Sappho didn’t like the company of men. She had . . .” Frances struggled to find the words to explain it to Mallow. The poor girl would be shocked. “She had romantic feelings for other women, rather than men.”

“I see, my lady.” She cast a critical eye on Frances’s evening dress, to make sure it was smooth. Mallow was reacting coolly to the whole thing, and Frances realized she had misjudged her maid. There was no telling what Mallow had seen growing up in one of London’s poorest neighborhoods. Behavior was much the same everywhere, Frances had observed, but some things were easier to hide in the large houses of the rich than in tightly packed tenements.

“So I’m afraid that visiting gentleman was suggesting Miss Kestrel was like Sappho,” concluded Frances.

“If I may say, it’s very wicked, my lady.”

Frances turned. “What is wicked, Mallow? The behavior or the telling of tales?”

“Oh, my lady, the telling of tales! What people do is none of my concern. Now if you could hand me one more hairpin, my lady, we’ll be all ready.”

Frances smiled at her remarkable maid. “Thank you. Again, you did very well today.”

And Mallow flushed with pride, while Frances reflected: So at least one other person wondered about Gwen. Who was spreading these tales?

“So, do you like being in a great house in the country, with a big servants’ hall?” asked Frances. “Should I marry a great lord and settle in a grand estate like this?”

“It’s a very nice house, I’m sure, my lady, but since you ask, I think I would miss London.”

“You would miss the cinema, certainly,” teased Frances. “I don’t think the little village here shows moving pictures yet.”

Mallow’s eyes lit up. “Oh, my lady, I would miss them. Miss Hopp sounded so disappointed she lived in a town with no moving pictures yet. I went with Mabel last week, and the stories, and what they can put on the screen—you can’t imagine, my lady. The music hall stage is wonderful too, my lady, but the moving pictures are something special.” She lost herself for a moment. “It’s a very grand house, my lady, but I would miss city life.”

“I would too, Mallow.”