‘Got in where?’ said Stanley, suddenly looking very nervous and glancing about himself.
‘Where do you think? Into the house. From the mews. Through here.’ The grin returned then.
‘Oh, so you think somebody came in from outside, do you?’ he said. The rocking had started again. ‘Where did you get that one, then?’
‘Look, do you actually know anything or are you just being annoying, as usual?’ I asked him and was rewarded with a trace of a frown passing over his face. He really was a most unappealing young man. ‘If you know something, it’s your duty to tell someone. Tell Superintendent Hardy if you want the glory of it. Tell mistress and she’ll no doubt reward you. But you must tell someone.’
‘Help the police? I’d no more help a dog bite my own backside. That rotten devil deserved everything he got.’
‘Why?’ I said. ‘What did he do to you?’ I felt a small flutter of triumph. If Stanley had a tale to tell of misuse at the hands of his master, I should have got the full set.
‘He refused to give me time off to visit my own father when he was at death’s door,’ said Stanley, and his large eyes glistened with instant tears. ‘Not even a day.’
‘Oh,’ I said, regretting the sparring at once. ‘That was unspeakable of him. I’m very sorry.’
Stanley sniffed and nodded in acknowledgement.
‘I never forgave him,’ he said. ‘He told me he couldn’t risk me bringing it into the house and if I went home to visit I needn’t bother coming back again. And I knew a widowed mother would need whatever I could send her, so I stayed put. My father could have died without me ever seeing him again.’
‘Could have?’ I said, latching on to this clue that Stanley was overdoing his tale.
‘He rallied, as it happens. But master wasn’t to know that and I’d have got called all the names under the sun at the funeral.’
‘That certainly is a consideration,’ I said, drily, thinking it would only occur to the most monstrously self-centred of sons. From sheer dislike, I wished I could suspect him of the murder, but his squeamishness and his servility – each undoubtedly real, as well as the very habit of dropping sly hints, combined to trumpet his innocence. No murderer in his right mind would dare to be so infuriating to those around him.
‘But he threw it off in the end,’ Stanley said. ‘And he has forgiven me. I never told him why I didn’t come, of course. A good servant would never carry home tales that reflect ill on his master. And I daresay master couldn’t help being a fastidious man.’
Even though it came from Stanley, I could not help boggling a little at this. How could anyone rejoice that the rotten devil was dead and still praise the same man for being a ninny over a germ or two?
‘Was it the flu?’ I asked. Pip and Lollie had only been in Heriot Row four years but I could not think of anything else contagious enough to excuse such precautions.
‘Consumption,’ said Stanley.
‘But that’s ridiculous,’ I said. ‘You can’t catch consumption as easily as all that. Why, I can’t count how many soldiers I saw through it in the war.’
‘That’s why I’ll never forgive him,’ Stanley said.
11
‘So, Fanny,’ said Mrs Hepburn, ‘Ernest tells me you’ve got something to say. No. not like that, Mollie-moo. Watch Eldry and copy what she does.’ The tweenie and scullerymaid were engaged on some mysterious task at the table, with sheets of waxed paper and large pairs of scissors. Millie put down her scissors and her paper – in tatters after her efforts – and bunched her hands together under her chin. She gazed at Eldry with devoted attention and Eldry, snipping neat fringes into her own paper strip, could not help beaming back. Really, I thought, every servants’ hall should have a Millie, someone to make the others feel suave and competent and give them scope to be kind.
Mrs Hepburn was holding the enormous teapot over the collection of cups, with her head cocked, and as soon as she heard Clara’s clogs on the passageway flags she started pouring.
‘Mattie,’ she said. ‘So weak it’s not worth dirtying a cup for and no more than three sugars mind, for that Calvert’s powder cannot work miracles and I’m not sending you back to see your mammy with those wee pearlies all ruined.’ Mattie smiled as he took his cup of dishwater tea; he did indeed have sparkling white teeth and I sympathised with Mrs Hepburn about the guarding of them. Clara arrived with a large platter covered in a teacloth and set it down.
‘Miss Rossiter?’ said Mrs Hepburn, with the pot poised.
‘I’ll have a good dark cup today, Mrs Hepburn,’ I said, for I had fast learned that the strident Indian blend beloved of the servants’ hall could not be outwitted by dilution and was best got over one’s gullet strong, milky and sweet, so that one might pretend it was not tea at all but some kind of exotic soup.
Mr Faulds reached across from the head of the table and twitched the teacloth from on top of the plate, revealing a mountain range of warm scones, flour-dusted, current-studded and steaming gently. There was a murmur of appreciation from all around the table as the scent of them wafted over us, and Phyllis began dishing out tea plates, a large pat of cold butter on each one.
‘Food of the gods, Kitty,’ said Mr Faulds as he bit into his first one. ‘I never thought I’d say it, but I don’t miss jam and cream when it’s your scones under my butter.’
John gave a snort of laughter and, indeed, there was something inexplicably lewd-sounding about the compliment. Mrs Hepburn tutted, but with a twinkle in her eye.
‘Make the most of the scones and the leisure,’ she said, ‘because there’ll be no more of either after today.’ She filled another three cups and Harry pushed them across the table to their destinations. ‘I’ve two cakes to mix when the tins are dressed and they hams to glaze and the whole house to get ready for the funeral with no kitchener, and there’s you-know-who on her way. I’ll tell you this, Fanny, that woman doubles the work of the house single-handed.’
‘Mrs Lambert-Leslie?’ I said.
‘Aye, Great Aunt Goitre,’ said Clara. ‘Maybe she’ll have learned to use a handle by now, eh?’
‘Some chance,’ said Phyllis. ‘You know, Miss Rossiter, she shuts every blooming door and drawer and cupboard with one of her big fat hands flat against the wood. Smears the mahogany in her bedroom like you wouldnae believe if we told you.’
‘And it’s your turn to do her feet this time, Phyllis,’ said Clara, ‘because I did them at Christmas and wrote it down and got Mr Faulds to sign it.’
‘Please, girls, not while we’re eating,’ said the butler. Stanley was looking pained and moved a mouthful of scone from one cheek to the other without swallowing any.
‘And if she’s brought a boot-load of washing with her she can raffle it,’ said Mrs Hepburn. ‘Treating this place like a laundry and never leaves a penny tip behind her. But there, she’s an old woman on her own and nobody presses a lace edge like Eldry, so let’s see if we can’t look after her even better this time. She’s mistress’s only living relative now.’
‘Speaking of which,’ I said, although whether I meant living relatives or witnessed documents I could not say, ‘mistress has said I can tell you what happened at the lawyers’ this morning. And Mr Hardy wants you all to know too, before he speaks to you again.’
‘Well?’ said Mr Faulds. He had his curled fists resting on the table, looking like the chairman of the board.
‘Master’s will had a very nasty surprise in it,’ I said. ‘Mistress has been cut right out altogether.’ I paused to allow this to sink in.
‘The devil,’ said Mrs Hepburn. ‘Oh, the fiend!’
‘What, cut off with nothing?’ said Harry. ‘Not a shilling?’ He was frowning at me. I had determined to gloss over the matter of Josephine Carson, trusting that no one of the servant class would be acquainted with the details of testamentary law, but now I wondered whether the valet knew too much about wills and succession to let this go by.