Daisy frowned in thought. Then she said, “They’ll assume I have gone to work. I’ll get into your bed and pretend to be you and say I’m not feeling well and wish to he left alone.”
“But if I go to the bank with stories about me all over the newspapers and draw out money, the manager may well phone my father.”
Daisy sat back on her heels. “I’ve got it,” she said. “There’s quite a bit of money in the safe in the office.”
“Pa’s money! No, we couldn’t.”
“Yes, we could. I’ll rob it and leave a note saying we’ll pay back everything when the fuss has died down. That way, it wouldn’t really be stealing.”
“But luggage! How do we get it out of the house?”
“We’ll pack up tonight and when everyone’s asleep, I’ll leave it behind the shed in the garden and put a ladder against the garden wall.”
“How will you get into the safe?”
“Easy. Matthew Jarvis has the key in a desk in his office. It isn’t one of the newfangled ones with a dial.”
“And where will we go?”
“We’ll go to Paddington and take a train somewhere. You’ll need to be heavily veiled so that no one recognizes you.”
“I’m such a coward,” said Rose. “But I cannot face the captain. I cannot face seeing the press outside the door.”
“So we’ll do it,” said Daisy, hoping privately that Becket would be so alarmed at her disappearance that he might come to his senses.
♦
As dawn was breaking, Rose and Daisy sat in a first-class carriage as the train to a small seaside resort called Thurby-on-Sea pulled out of Paddington station. Rose could only be glad that they had the compartment to themselves because the heavy veil she was wearing was stifling her. Daisy lowered the blinds on the corridor windows. “I brought a packed lunch,” she said. “We daren’t go into the dining room because you’d need to raise your veil to eat.”
The train roared south, Rose lowering her veil every time it stopped at a station in case someone joined them in the compartment, but they were left alone until they reached Thurby-on-Sea.
“Why Thurby-on-Sea?” asked Rose wearily as they finally stood on a small windswept platform.
“I’ve never heard of it,” said Daisy cheerfully, “so I suppose most people haven’t either. Porter!”
♦
Once settled in a cab, they asked the driver to take them to a good hotel. He drove to the Thurby Palace, which was smaller than its grand name suggested. It was situated on a promenade along which a gale whipped with increasing ferocity.
Daisy checked them in under the names of the Misses Callendar. “Why Callendar?” whispered Rose.
“It just came to me,” Daisy whispered back. “I used to dance with a Scotch girl who came from there.” Daisy had once been a chorus girl.
They were ushered into two bedchambers with a sitting room in between.
Rose walked to the window of the sitting room and looked out at the plunging waves, which were now sending spray up over the promenade.
“It’s cold in here,” complained Daisy. She pulled the bell rope beside the fireplace, and when the porter answered the summons asked him to light the fires.
He looked curiously at the heavily veiled figure of Rose standing by the window.
“Get on with it,” snapped Daisy.
They waited until he had left. Rose unpinned her hat and veil and sat down by the sitting room fire, stretching her hands out to the blaze.
“I brought some stuff from the masquerade box,” said Daisy. “I’ll disguise you so that we can go down to the dining room and get something to eat. It’s just noon.”
Rose stifled a yawn. The train had taken four hours, stopping at innumerable tiny stations before creaking into Thurby-on-Sea on the Essex coast.
Daisy was unlocking their luggage. “Here!” she said triumphantly. She held up a grey wig and a pair of spectacles. “Put these on. No one will recognize you from your photo in the newspapers.”
“Is my photo in the newspapers?”
“Bound to be, but I thought it would be best if you didn’t know what they were writing about you. I’ve got a wig for meself,” said Daisy. “The minute we’re found missing, the police’ll be looking for me as well.”
What have I done? thought Rose, suddenly appalled. We have robbed my father and run away. I am a coward. What will Captain Cathcart think of me?
She suddenly remembered Dolores Duval’s dead body and burst into overwrought tears.
“There, there, I’m here,” cooed Daisy.
“I-I am s-such a weakling,” sobbed Rose.
“Now, then, it’s only for a few days, until those dreadful press people have given up.”
Rose dried her eyes and turned a white face up to Daisy. “But I have just realized that in running away, I will now make Mr Kerridge sure that I am guilty.”
Daisy looked at her uneasily. Then she said bracingly, “Food is what we need. We didn’t have any breakfast. Let’s put on our disguises and go downstairs. Have you ever seen such an old-fashioned set of rooms? I don’t think they’ve been changed for half a century.”
The sitting room was overfurnished. The mantel was draped with cloth and the chairs were also draped with long cloth covers to hide their embarrassing legs. The Victorians of the last century had even found the sight of naked chair legs slightly disreputable. A badly executed oil painting of Queen Victoria glared down at them accusingly.
Rose went through to one of the bedrooms and sat down at the dressing table. She arranged the grey wig over her hair and put on the glasses, which had unmagnified lenses. Daisy came in carrying two hats. “I packed us two of the most dowdy ones. Don’t want to occasion comment by looking too smart.”
They waited until they heard the luncheon gong sound and then went down the stairs and into the dining room. Rose heaved a sigh of relief. The only other diners were an elderly couple.
Daisy shook out her napkin. “I hope the food’s not too bad,” she said. “I really don’t think a dump in a backwater like this can afford a good cook.”
The meal came as a pleasant surprise. They started with a good vegetable broth followed by poached haddock and then tucked into a large dish of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. The dessert was spotted dick with custard.
“Goodness,” said Daisy when they had finished. “Can’t wait to get upstairs and take me stays off.”
The elderly lady and her husband exchanged shocked glances.
“Do be quiet, Daisy,” hissed Rose. “You’re drawing attention to us.”
But it was a relief to be back in their rooms again and to be able to undress and climb into their respective beds.
Rose’s last thought before she fell asleep was of Harry. He would be so angry with her.
∨ Our Lady of Pain ∧
Three
So, naturalists observe, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller fleas to bite ‘em,
And so proceed ad infinitum.
– Jonathan Swift
“You what?”
Kerridge shifted uneasily but stared defiantly at the head of Scotland Yard, Sir Ian Wetherby.
“The lady’s maid, Thomson, thought that Miss Duval might have been expecting a visit from a royal personage.”
“Drop that line of investigation immediately, do you hear?”
“Yes, sir. But this is murder.”
“Leave it alone. Why are you fiddling about with this? Lady Rose Summer is found standing over a body with a gun in her hand. Arrest her.”