“So she told me.” Violet placed the cups in the sink and ran hot water over them. “If you ask me, you’d be daft to let her in there. Gawd knows the damage she’d do. Not exactly that bright, our Polly.”
Elizabeth merely nodded. Her mind was on the subject she wanted to broach and how to word it without upsetting Violet. Absently sifting through the bills, she said carefully, “I’ve decided it might be a good idea to invite Major Monroe to dinner tomorrow night. I thought we could have it in the main dining room. What do you think?”
Violet spun around to face her. “So that’s why you got your hair cut.”
Elizabeth could feel her cheeks growing warm. “Don’t be silly, Violet.”
“You’re the one being silly. I thought you said you wouldn’t be caught dead with a Yank?”
Elizabeth lifted her chin. Violet had been with the family since she was born. After Lord and Lady Hartleigh had perished in a bombing raid while attending a concert in London, Violet had done her best to fill in, and it had been largely due to her efforts that Elizabeth had succeeded in taking over the reigns of the Manor House and its huge estate. Nevertheless, there was a limit to which she would allow the housekeeper’s interference in her personal life, no matter how well meaning.
In fact, Elizabeth was well aware that if her mother were able to witness the familiarity between her only heir and a lowly servant, she would come back to haunt both of them. Mavis Hartleigh had spent the major portion of her life trying to live down the fact that until she’d married the future Earl of Wellsborough, she’d been a servant herself.
“Violet,” Elizabeth said, fixing a stern eye on Violet’s pinched features. “Any interest I might have in Major Monroe is strictly business. He is in command of the men billeted in this house, and there are certain concerns that should be addressed. I merely thought it might be more pleasant to share a meal while discussing our business, rather than the stuffy atmosphere of the library or my office. It would be more conducive for an honest exchange of views, don’t you think?”
“I’ve seen the way you look when his name is mentioned,” Violet retorted, refusing to be intimidated. “Don’t tell me you don’t feel a spark of something when he’s around.”
Elizabeth pursed her lips. Wild horses wouldn’t drag that admission from her, no matter how close to the mark it might have been. “Major Monroe is married,” she said primly.
“Go on!” Violet rushed over to the table and sat down. “When did he tell you that?”
Elizabeth stared hard at the bills in her hand. “I really don’t remember. It came up some time in one of our conversations.”
“Bet that was a disappointment.”
That was something else she wasn’t prepared to admit. Instead, Elizabeth held up a letter. “Look at this! It’s a letter from Uncle Roger.”
Violet’s expression changed to one of contempt. “What’s he want now?”
Elizabeth tore open the envelope, more relieved at the diversion than interest in the letter. She scanned the lines then refolded the flimsy paper. “He’s got a spot of leave coming up and wants to pay us a visit.”
“Probably on the earhole for money or something. We never see him unless he wants something. If I had my way I wouldn’t let him past the front door.”
“If you had your way,” Elizabeth murmured, “no one would get past the front door.”
Violet opened her mouth to answer then snapped it shut as the door to the kitchen flew open.
The elderly gentleman standing in the doorway wore the black coat and gray striped trousers of the traditional, efficient English butler, but there the image ended. Gold-rimmed spectacles hung precariously on the end of his nose, and the few wisps of white hair that adorned his bald pate waved back and forth as his head nodded up and down in gentle agitation. His bowed shoulders shook, and his knees trembled as he stared at Elizabeth, and without a sound his mouth opened and closed like a starving goldfish.
Alarmed, Elizabeth rose from her chair. Martin had served the Earls of Wellsborough since before the turn of the century. Determined that he should continue to do so as long as he so desired, she and Violet went to great pains to convince him his services were still essential to the running of the Manor House.
She largely ignored his occasional lapses into senility as well as his tendency to dwell in the past, but looking at his stricken face, seemingly even more wrinkled and pasty than usual, Elizabeth sensed that whatever had caused his distress this time was more than a simple misunderstanding, which was often the case.
Martin had been unsettled by the American officers being quartered at the Manor House, but since he saw little of them and was largely oblivious to their presence, he’d appeared to accept the situation. Nevertheless, something had upset the old gentleman.
Stepping up to him, Elizabeth laid a hand on his frail shoulder. “Martin? What is it?”
Martin shuddered beneath her fingers. He finally spoke, and his voice sounded as dry and cracked as burned leather. “The master,” he whispered. “I saw him in the great hall.”
“That’s nonsense,” Violet snapped, apparently unsettled herself by the old man’s obvious distress. “You know very well, Martin, that Lord Hartleigh passed away two years ago. You put flowers on his grave just last week.”
Martin drew himself up as straight as was physically possible, and his voice regained strength as he stared at Violet. “His body may be buried in that grave,” he said hoarsely, “but I just saw his ghost walking down the great hall. I’d stake my life on it.”
CHAPTER2
“Didn’t sleep a wink last night,” Violet declared the next morning when Elizabeth walked into the kitchen. “What with that German bomber pilot on the loose somewhere and Martin’s ghost, I was afraid to shut my eyes.”
“What ghost?” Polly demanded, withdrawing her head from the broom closet.
Violet made a sound of disgust. “Mind your manners, Polly. Say good morning to madam.”
Polly gave Elizabeth a cheeky grin. “Oops, sorry. Morning, m’m.”
Elizabeth returned the greeting. “I wouldn’t pay too much attention to Martin. You know how he is.” She accepted the cup of tea Violet handed her and sat down at the table.
“He did seem really upset, all the same.” Violet turned back to the stove. “Even for him.”
“He probably saw one of the Yanks wandering around,” Polly said, hauling her bucket and mop over to the door. “Though I haven’t seem much of them since they’ve been here.”
She disappeared, and Violet shook her head. “Thank Gawd for that. I don’t trust them Yanks. Nor Polly for that matter.”
Martin had placed the weekly local newspaper next to Elizabeth’s table mat, and she picked it up. “You worry too much Violet,” she murmured.
“Someone around here has to,” Violet muttered darkly.
Elizabeth stopped listening to her, her attention caught by the thick black headlines stamped across the front page. German Pilot Escapes! they screamed, and in smaller letters, Dangerous Enemy on the Loose in Hawthorn Woods!
According to the news report, soldiers from the camp in nearby Beerstowe had joined the local constabulary in a manhunt, and residents of the village were warned to stay away from the woods, where the pilot was suspected of having gone to ground.
Aware that Violet was talking to her, Elizabeth tore her gaze from the newspaper. “I beg your pardon?”
Violet crossed her arms. “I was asking if you and your major will be having dinner in the dining room tonight. What’s in that paper that’s so interesting, anyway?”
Elizabeth read the report out loud. “I feel sorry for the poor man,” she said when she was finished. “He looked so young, hardly more than a boy, and he was obviously terrified.”
“I should think so. I’d be terrified, too, if I saw Rita Crumm and her mob rushing at me. Enough to scare Hitler hisself, that woman.” Violet tilted her head to one side. “You never answered me about your major.”