“Can I eat with you, Mama?” Bobbie asked when the job was done.
“I hope you don’t plan to make me eat alone!” Delsie exclaimed. No other course had occurred to her. “Miss Milne, you will join us as well, I hope?”
Miss Milne seemed pleased at the invitation, and the three went down together to wash up. When Bobbie twice addressed her new stepmother as Mama, Delsie smiled in contentment and said nothing. To put the matter on a settled basis, Bobbie herself brought up the point. “Since you’re in Mama’s room now, I must call you Mama.” So she explained her action,
“Of course you must, my dear,” Delsie replied matter-of-factly.
Mrs. Bristcombe had not actually said she knew how to make an omelette, which perhaps accounted for the greasy mess served up at that meal. While taking the housekeeper to task on that account, the widow forgot to ask the woman to please make up her bed, but really, the poor woman did seem to be overworked. There did not appear to be another female servant in the house, except for the governess, who obviously could not be expected to do it. She would find clean linen and do it herself.
After luncheon, it was time to turn Bobbie over to Miss Milne for lessons, but before doing so, she discovered of them the location of the linen closet. It was a large walk-in cupboard, with several rows of shelves, nine tenths of them empty. When she took her own linen, there remained in the place exactly two towels, and no bed sheets. Must ask Mrs. Bristcombe about this.
When the bed was finished, she went to the study to meet the housekeeper on the matter of the accounts, and they had an unpleasant conversation over unpaid bills of such staggering sums that Delsie was surprised the grocer had not set up a public clamor. When queried about the lack of linens, the woman said firmly there was not another bit or piece of material in the house. Nothing had been replaced since Mrs. Grayshott’s death, and the old ones were so full of holes, with no one to mend them, that she’d torn them up to use for rags.
“It seems very strange to me,” Delsie said severely, not willing to relinquish a single point to her adversary. “I suppose I must get some new ones.”
“If you think it’s worth your while,” Mrs. Bristcombe answered mysteriously, then arose and left.
Delsie sat pondering that statement. It sounded strangely as though the woman didn’t think she’d be staying long. When the front-door knocker sounded, she went herself to answer it. Unaccustomed to servants, she did not find this so strange as a lady from a well-ordered home would have done.
DeVigne was surprised to see her come to the door, and asked where Bristcombe was.
“Does Mr. Bristcombe work here as well?” Delsie asked. “I haven’t a notion where he may be. I have not had the pleasure of meeting any of the servants except Mrs. Bristcombe, and I use the word ‘pleasure’ in its loosest sense, I assure you.”
“She should have assembled them for your inspection and orders,” he mentioned.
Delsie was intelligent enough to realize then that she should have had this done, but how was she to know? She had never had a single servant to command. “Shall we go into the study? I have had a fire laid there, where I have been going over accounts with Mrs. Bristcombe. A harrowing pastime, I might add.”
They entered the study and took up the two uncomfortable chairs nearest the grate. “Things are in a muddle, are they?” he inquired. “I can’t say I’m surprised. Andrew was in no case to attend to business, and resented any interference. Have you managed to figure out the extent of his debt?”
“If I have all the bills. They were handed to me in a box, loose. No records of any sort kept. I make it roughly a hundred pounds!” she said, wide-eyed at such a sum. “That is a whole year’s salary.”
“A teacher’s salary?” he asked, his lips unsteady.
“That is what I was paid at St. Mary’s, though I believe Mr. Umpton made considerably more.”
“Of course he would. He is a man,” deVigne answered, unwisely.
“He was not hired as a man, but as a teacher, like myself. Of course a man must support a family,” she added grudgingly. It had pestered her, this fact of Umpton’s making twice the salary she made, for doing half the work.
“You will be happy to hear you are better situated financially now,” deVigne informed her. “I have been to the solicitor, and wish to discuss money matters with you. Louise’s portion was twenty-five thousand pounds. The interest of that amounts to twelve-fifty yearly for the running of the Cottage. It is not a large sum, but-”
“Not large? It is a fortune!” Delsie contradicted bluntly. “Of course, the expenses on such an establishment as this must be considerable. Is there a mortgage on the house?”
“No, the family built the house as a summer cottage for Louise and Andrew as a wedding gift. It is Roberta’s now, in trust till her maturity. The expenses certainly are considerable. There are the servants to be paid and kept. Louise’s portion was never meant to carry the whole. Andrew was well fixed when they married, but he ran through his capital with gambling and mismanagement after his wife’s death. You know the story. The Bristcombes have been receiving two hundred annually, along with their room and board, and the governess is paid seventy-five-less than a teacher,” he pointed out with a mischievous smile. “When we are fortunate enough to have a governess, that is. The other servants-”
“Excuse me, milord, but I have been wondering about that, I don’t see any other servants about. Mrs. Bristcombe does everything-everything that gets done, that is to say. She does the cooking and ordering of household supplies, and it was she who laid the fire. There doesn’t seem to be another soul in the house, except Miss Milne.”
“This is absurd,” deVigne said at once. “There is Betsy Rose, the downstairs maid, and I’m sure there was an upstairs maid as well. Naturally Andrew’s valet, Samson, has left, but there was used to be a footboy to help Bristcombe, though I think he left some while ago. The Bristcombes cannot be doing the whole of the work themselves.”
Delsie ran a finger along the top of a table, and it came away covered in dust. “I cannot believe there is a Betsy Rose here any longer,” she said.
“We shall certainly have to see about that. I had thought the total costs for servants would amount to about four-fifty, which would leave you eight hundred to run the place. Do you think you can do it? There is food and fuel, but much of both come from the Hall. There will be general household costs and maintenance, along with stable expenses… No, it can’t be done. You will do better to use my carriage, unless you wish to use your own money to set up a tilbury or landau.”
“My money?” she asked, startled, then looked away in embarrassment. Where had he taken the idea she had any money of her own? Surely he must have realized from her style of living that she had none. “I don’t have any money,” she said simply.
“You have five thousand pounds,” he told her. “I explained when we discussed your marrying Andrew that a small settlement would be made on you. It is not much, but it is your own, to do with as you wish. You would be wise to leave the capital intact and use only the interest, but that, of course, is quite your own affair.”
She was on her feet in revolt. “I cannot possibly take such a sum! It would be-immoral!” Oh, but wouldn’t it be lovely? Fifty years’ salary.
“It is business, Mrs. Grayshott. We agreed to the settlement. It was inherent in our deal. In fact, it is done. I told you I had been to the solicitor. Your actual salary, if you use only the interest, will not be so much greater than your stipend at St. Mary’s, and your costs, I fear, will be higher. Well, a carriage for one thing, and you will want to buy some personal effects, very likely.”