It looked as though Brockley’s hope was not to be fulfilled. The very next day, Dale fell victim to the complaint that had already felled three of Frost’s employees. It seemed to be a kind of chesty cold. Sybil and I looked after her, in the intervals of continuing with the embroidery lessons. Sybil and the twins had developed a beautiful design based on the parterre garden and I introduced the girls to the technique of couching, in which a group of long stitches are fixed to the fabric by other stitches laid over them, crosswise and close, to make a smooth raised surface.
We were not surprised by Dale’s illness since she was prone to this type of thing, and fortunately none of us succumbed. The maidservant Bessie did, but mildly and she was soon about again. Dale’s attack was also quite mild. She was out of bed and attending to her duties, albeit wanly, on the Wednesday of the next week.
The manservant in the attic, however, was not so lucky, and throughout all the time of Dale’s illness he remained in his bed and we had no chance at all of investigating the attics. But on the Sunday, we did not go to church and Brockley searched Lambert’s room and the Hambles’ quarters while Lambert was holding a service in the chapel. The twins and Susie all attended too and I made a hurried search of their rooms as well.
We found nothing suspicious, but by then we were all certain that if the chest was hidden anywhere, the attics were the place to look.
For the time being, however, we couldn’t. So on the Monday, when I was sure that Dale was recovering properly, I took a day off, left her with Sybil and rode with Brockley to Hawkswood, where we collected Dr Joynings, and went on to Guildford to look in at Julius Stagg’s premises and inspect the progress of the new window. I was pleased with what I saw and so was Joynings. The design was finished and the making of the glass panes under way. I had already had a chance to look at the examples of Stagg’s work in the Knoll House chapel and knew it to be good. Brockley and I accompanied Dr Joynings back to his home beside his church. We then rode on to Hawkswood House to make sure all was well there and talked to Adam Wilder and Gladys, who both asked what the new window would look like. Gladys was grumpy about it.
‘I shan’t ever get to see that window close to. I’ll only see it from inside the church, where it’ll be up over my head – too far off for my old eyes to see rightly.’
Stagg had explained that when the panes were ready, the window would be assembled in his workshop and brought to Hawkswood by cart – ‘A very slow cart, with a placid pony in the shafts and the window safely wrapped in lambswool.’ I promised Gladys that when the cart arrived, she could be there to see it unpacked. Before leaving, I gave both Dr Joynings and Adam Wilder instructions to that effect, as I did not know if I would still be at Knoll House. If I was, then I could not be certain of getting home at any given time.
On the following evening, Master Frost returned. It was a wet, windy day and both he and Vaughan came in looking damp, mud-splashed and tired. And in Frost’s case, irritable. In a loud, cross voice, he demanded hot water and clean towels, then withdrew, escorted by Vaughan, so that they could both become presentable. They presently reappeared, washed and barbered, Frost first and then Vaughan, who I suppose had had to remain damp and travel-stained until he had refurbished his master.
Vaughan was neatly beruffed and in a suit of black with shoes of gleaming leather and discreet silver buckles. His master was in a chestnut velvet gown trimmed with squirrel fur, an open-necked shirt and soft slippers. Yet it seemed to me that, though a recent invalid, the formally clad Vaughan looked the most refreshed. While Frost, despite his comfortable and informal clothes, still seemed irritable and weary.
Vaughan retired to the servants’ hall and Frost joined the rest of us in the great hall, where we were awaiting supper, and sat down by the hearth. Mrs Hamble brought him some mulled wine and his daughters hovered, anxious to soothe his obvious ill humour but not sure how. It was Sybil who, in her gentle, gracious way, commiserated with him on having to travel through such unpleasant weather and asked if his business in London had gone well.
‘Not too well,’ he told her. ‘The market for some of the goods I took to my brother is not as promising as we had hoped, and also I received news that there may be difficulty in obtaining more of the silks, which do seem to be popular. I shall face difficulties on my next voyage.’
‘But that won’t be until next spring, will it?’ I asked politely. ‘Did you not say that you lay your ship up in the winter? Perhaps things will have changed by then.’
‘And you will think of new ideas,’ Joyce comforted him. ‘You always do, Father.’
‘I daresay.’ He sighed and then smiled, stretching his feet towards the warmth. ‘I am a grumpy man tonight. I shall feel better when I have eaten. Shall we have some music after supper? I have hardly heard you girls play your lutes of late. I will hear you two this evening. Have you made good progress with your needles? Have you begun on the gold and silver work yet?’
‘Not yet,’ I said. ‘I thought it best to practise all the basic stitches first, to lay a foundation of skill before tackling the art of gold and silver stitchery. It has its difficulties.’
‘But we are learning much about the art of design,’ Joyce said. ‘Father, I hope you will like the one we are working on – the one based on the pattern of the parterre garden. I have told you about it, I think. It’s full of colour. It would make a wall-hanging, either as an embroidery or even a tapestry.’
‘We’ve never tried tapestry work,’ said Jane. ‘It would be interesting!’
‘But to get back to this evening’s entertainment,’ said Frost, ‘what songs shall we have? Have you practised anything new of late?’
Jane looked worried. ‘I don’t know where my lute is. Joyce has hers, but yesterday I couldn’t find mine when I looked for it. I thought I might have left it still in the big hamper where Susie put my summer gowns. We hadn’t emptied the hamper yet. So I helped Susie to see to it yesterday, but the lute wasn’t there.’
‘There are still many things not yet unpacked, Mistress Jane,’ said Mrs Hamble, who had just brought in some more mulled wine, this time for all of us. ‘Moving an entire household is such a business! There are still some hampers and boxes in the attic, put there to be out of the way while the big items of furniture were being carried in. I fancy you will find your lute there, Mistress Jane. Perhaps it was remiss of me not to mention it before, and to leave things unopened for so long. I do apologize.’
Jane got up. ‘I shall ask Susie to go up and look for it.’
Across the room I caught Brockley’s eye and we exchanged silent messages. ‘No need to worry about the things in the attic tonight,’ I said easily. ‘You can use my lute. It’s dark now and it will be difficult for Susie to find things up in the attic, and not very pleasant, either. You and I can look for it together in the morning. I’ll help you, Jane.’ I stood up. ‘I’ll fetch my own lute now.’
We had a very pleasant musical evening, even though it was disturbed at times by the sound of the wind hurling rain against the windows, apparently by the pailful, and the angry splutter when the downpour found its way down the chimney into the fire. I discovered that both of the twins were skilled with the lute and that Jane had an attractive singing voice, not loud but tuneful and clear.
We had finished our entertainment, and were thinking of saying goodnight, when Master Frost suddenly said: ‘I am intrigued, Mistress Jester, by this idea you are working on with my daughters, concerning an embroidery or tapestry design based on the parterre garden here. I would like to see it. Joyce has mentioned that it would make a wall-hanging. Are you planning it as a decoration in what, after all, is now my house?’
Sybil hastily began to explain that of course there would be no thought of hanging the finished pattern anywhere without his approval; it was just that it was likely, when finished, to be suitable for such a purpose.
Frost waved all this aside. ‘There is no need for apologies, Mistress Jester. I am sure you would never put up new decorations without my consent! In fact, I am most intrigued by what you have told me. May I see the design – is it far enough developed? Could you bring it to my study? Now?’
‘I have drawn it freehand and in colour,’ Sybil said. ‘We have only just begun to draw it in a form that is ready for the stitchwork. That is a more careful business. But my original drawing does give a clear impression of it, I think. I can certainly bring it to your study. But will the light be sufficient?’
‘Certainly it will.’ Frost strode to the door and shouted for Mrs Hamble. When she appeared, he said: ‘I want a good light in my study, at once. Bring two of those branched candelabra from the ballroom.’ She hurried away and he turned to Sybil, waving her to precede him through the door. ‘You fetch your drawing and I will meet you in the study. You know where it is by now, I suppose?’
‘Yes, Master Frost,’ said Sybil, for all the world as though she hadn’t helped to search it in the small hours of a recent morning.
The rest of us collected our bedtime candles, which had as usual been set out on top of the cupboard in the entrance hall. We lit them from the big candles in the wall sconces and made our way upstairs.
Jugs of hot water had been placed in our rooms. Dale drew off my shoes and helped me out of my gown, ruff and farthingale. I washed and then she dropped my nightgown over my head and brushed my hair. ‘What about Mistress Jester?’ she said. ‘She is still downstairs.’
‘I’ll help her. You go and wash before your water gets cold,’ I told her. ‘Leave all the candles as they are.’
I got into bed, glad to be there, for the night was getting very chilly. The wind had not dropped and it was still hurling rain at the windows, violently, as if in anger. When the door was suddenly flung open I thought for a moment that the wind had done it, until I saw Sybil standing there in the candlelight – a wild-eyed Sybil, with a lock of hair pulled out of its coil at the back of her head and flying loose while the little velvet cap which she wore over the coil had migrated forward to hang over one eye. Even by candlelight, I could see that she was deathly pale.
‘Sybil!’ I was out of bed on the instant. I ran to her. ‘What is it, Sybil? You’ve been talking with Master Frost – he surely didn’t … try to …?’
‘He didn’t want to look at drawings,’ said Sybil, blundering forward into the room and sinking on to the side of the bed. ‘I put them before him, but he said he had only asked me to bring them so that we could be alone because he had something special to say to me. Then he said he wanted to marry me. I was amazed! I hardly knew what to say to him. I didn’t wish to annoy him, but … the only answer I could make was no. I tried to say the right things – that I didn’t wish to remarry, but of course I recognized the compliment … all the correct phrases – but he got hold of me and tried to kiss me, and I struggled away. Then he pushed me down on a stool and started telling me how he would look after me and I was just the kind of woman who would be a good stepmother for his daughters, and he promised me expensive gifts …’
‘Sybil!’
‘You know I don’t want to marry again! Once was enough for me. More than enough. And besides, this man, Frost – when I think what he is, what he does, spying for the Spanish – the idea is appalling! I gasped out that I was fifty-eight years old and that this was ridiculous, but he laughed and said he was fifty-four; what did it matter? We were near enough in age. I managed to get off the stool in the end and kept edging away from him all the time. Finally I got to the door, and escaped from the room and ran …’
‘Sybil! This is dreadful!’
‘Well, we now know why Susie cut the buttons off that sleeve!’ said Sybil. ‘A fit of spite! She said he told her that he meant to marry again – and I fancy he told her that he’d chosen me, though she didn’t mention that to us! As far as I’m concerned, she’s welcome to him! But there was something else, too. Something I couldn’t understand.’
She was shivering badly. I sat down beside her. ‘Something else?’ I said.
‘Just as I got to the door, he … he stopped, backed away and raised a hand as if to say “All right, I give in, I’m letting you go.” And then he said: “Well, I tried. I asked you for your hand. I gave you a chance. Now, whatever befalls you, it’s your own fault. I offered you a way out and you wouldn’t take it. You see, I really like you, Mistress Jester, and so do my daughters, and we could all do so much for each other. But as it is … you have made your choice. Goodnight.”’
‘Whatever did he mean?’
‘I don’t know! I don’t understand! The way he was looking at me,’ said Sybil, ‘his eyes were like blue dagger points! I felt impaled by them!’
Her tone was odd, almost pensive. She seemed aware of it and shook herself as though trying to shake a bad memory away. I wondered if he had attempted more, physically, than she was telling me. ‘I couldn’t believe what I was seeing or what I was hearing,’ she said. ‘His words made no sense! He …’
‘What’s happening?’ The Brockleys (I sometimes thought they had a sense of hearing to match the hearing of cats and owls) were in the doorway, looking at us anxiously.
‘We heard!’ said Dale, her protuberant eyes bulging, full of alarm. She was still pale from her illness and had lost weight but was nevertheless full of concern for us. ‘We heard what Mistress Jester said just now … We heard …’
‘Mistress Jester,’ I said, ‘has refused a proposal of marriage from Master Frost.’
‘And,’ said Brockley, ‘he said something like “I gave you a chance. Now, whatever befalls you, it’s your own fault. I offered you a way out and you wouldn’t take it. You have made your choice …” What choice? A way out of what or where? What is likely to befall Mistress Jester? What’s wrong with this house? There’s a bad feeling in it, and it’s not just because Susie is unhappy and feeling spiteful. It’s more than that.’
To which, none of us had any answer.