Snobbery With Violence Part 11

"And do you like it?"

"Yes. Ever so."

"Is anyone courting Lady Rose?"

"Not yet. But they will."

"Yes, I suppose she will not stay single for long. Society has short memories."

Although Daisy had promised not to say anything, she thought that promise only concerned the other servants and so told Rose what had happened.

"This is fascinating," said Rose when she had finished. "Do you know what time Captain Cathcart plans to leave in the morning?"

"I could find out from Becket, his manservant."

"Would you do that, Daisy?"

"I'll try. But if he's retired for the night, I can't go to the men's quarters."

"See if you can find him."

Daisy went downstairs to the kitchens where the staff were preparing dishes of sandwiches. "Has anyone seen Becket? Captain Cathcart's man?"

"His master has just rung for him," said the butler.

Daisy went back upstairs from tower to tower, studying the names on the doors until she found the right one. She retreated a little way and hid in an alcove. At last, she heard the door opening and Becket's voice saying, "Seven in the morning. Certainly, sir."

Daisy moved out of the alcove. "Mr. Becket," she whispered. "I need to talk to you."

Harry stood in the courtyard in the morning, waiting for Becket to bring the motor car round.

"Good morning, Captain Cathcart."

He started and turned round. Rose was standing there, heavily veiled, accompanied by Daisy.

"Why are you about so early, Lady Rose?" he asked.

"To accompany you to see the superintendent."

Harry glared at Daisy, who blushed and muttered, "I only told my lady."

"And why should you want to see the superintendent?"

"Because I can be of help," said Rose. Although outwardly calm, Rose was inwardly frightened he would refuse. She was sure he had been invited to try to hush things up and she was determined to see that he did not do so.

He stood looking at her thoughtfully. Then he said, "You may be of use. But do not interrupt when I am talking to the superintendent."

Superintendent Kerridge was just sitting down to a breakfast of black pudding, kidneys, and bacon and eggs when the landlord informed him that there was a party from the castle to see him.

"Send them in," ordered Kerridge.

He stood up as Harry and Rose entered the room. "May I offer you something?" asked Kerridge, "No, we will breakfast later," said Harry.

Kerridge waited until they had seated themselves at the table. He studied the captain. Where was the silly a.s.s he had interviewed in Chelsea? This version of Harry Cathcart looked hard and intelligent. He was determined to go on eating. I mean, he thought bitterly, that was the upper cla.s.ses for you. Drop in and interrupt a good breakfast when it suited them. Well, come the revolution, they'd be singing a different tune. Did they ever stop to think that the food that was no doubt being laid out in the breakfast room of the castle would be enough to feed the poor of this village for months? No, not them.

"You are sneering, Mr. Kerridge," commented Rose.

Kerridge flushed a guilty red. "Bad tooth, my lady. Now, what is the reason for your visit?"

Harry told him about the disappearing lady's maid and of Daisy's brief conversation with her.

"Servants disappear the whole time," said Kerridge.

Harry then told him about the items hidden under the mattress.

"The thing is," said Kerridge after he had defiantly munched a kidney, "I do not understand your interest in this. It is not your lady's maid, Lady Rose."

"I think she has been murdered because of what she knew," said Rose. "I think you should get men from the new fingerprint bureau down here to dust Colette's room. Then you can fingerprint everyone in the castle. The captain's fingerprints will be there, of course, as will those of my maid, but you can eliminate them."

"My lady, I am charmed by your interest in modern police methods," said Kerridge, pointing a sausage impaled on a fork at her, "but what will happen is this. Lord Hedley, I am sure, has phoned several people in high places. Later today, I will be told to close the case."

"But the doctor will not sign the death certificate!" exclaimed Rose.

"No doubt, given the right pressure, the police pathologist will. Deaths from cosmetic a.r.s.enic are quite common."

"But Colette ... ?"

"A lady's maid? A foreign foreign lady's maid? A lady's maid? A French French lady's maid?" lady's maid?"

"I will be open with you, Superintendent," said Harry.

"About time, if I may say so, sir. You played the fool very well when I saw you before about the bombs at Stacey Magna."

"Oh, that," said Harry with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Forget that. This is important. I have been summoned here by Hedley to hush this up."

"Why you?"

"I am considered diplomatic."

"So why didn't you keep the maid's disappearance to yourself?"

"I cannot condone murder, Mr. Kerridge."

Kerridge sighed. "I will do my best in the short time I am sure I have got left. But you can forget about fingerprinting the guests, Lady Rose. Can you imagine the outcry? I wish to keep my job."

"I would have thought a desire to right a wrong and bring a criminal to justice would be more important than your job," snapped Rose.

"Oh, really? And then what? You lot don't live in the real world. While you're up there stuffing your faces, people in this village are starving."

"You forget yourself," admonished Harry.

"He is quite right," said Rose. "The superintendent shall have our help. I shall find out what I can from the female guests, and you, Captain, can concentrate on the men. Daisy and Becket can find out what they can from the servants."

"We will do what we can," said Harry with a note of irritation in his voice, for he felt Rose was being downright unwomanly. "I would advise you to keep your radical views to yourself in future, Superintendent, particularly in the presence of ladies."

"Oh, tish," said Rose with a dismissive wave of her hand.

"They're up there a long time," said Daisy to Becket as they sat in the empty taproom.

"How do you like being a lady's maid?" asked Becket.

"It's all right. But so much to learn. I've got to wash my lady's silk stockings and I'm frightened I'll damage them."

"You wash them with soap and water and simmer them gently. For a blue shade, put a drop of liquid blue in a pan of cold spring water and run the stockings through this for a minute or two, and dry them. For a pink dye, same process but with one or two drops of pink dye. For a flesh colour, add a little rose-pink in a thin soap liquor, rub them with a clean flannel and mangle them."

" 'Ere!" cried Daisy, her c.o.c.kney accent to the fore. "I didn't think I needed to colour them. And how do you know all this?"

"I had never been a gentleman's gentleman before, so I read a great deal on the subject. I often found myself reading advice to lady's maids as well,"

"What about corsets?"

"You take out the steels in front and sides, lay them on a flat surface and use a small brush and a lather of white Castile soap to scrub the corsets. Run under cold water and leave to dry. Don't iron."

"You're a mine of information. Do you think Colette was murdered?"

"If she knew something, someone might have paid her to go away," said Becket.

After Harry had driven them back to the castle, he helped Rose to alight and asked curiously, "Do you think you will like detective work?"

"Perhaps."

He smiled down at her, a smile which illuminated his normally harsh face. "Why are you so interested in helping me?"

"I would like to give you a worthy motive," said Rose. "It is simply because I am bored."

The light went out from his face and his eyes had the old shuttered look.

Daisy followed Rose up the stairs to their room. "My lady," said Daisy, "It may not be my place to say so, but you must learn to flirt."

"Why?"

"Because one day a handsome man's going to come along and someone else is going to snap him up."

Rose looked amused. "Why are you so suddenly interested in my lack of flirting?"

"It was when the captain asked you why you were helping him and he had ever such a nice smile, my lady, and you said it was because you was bored."

"What should I have said?"

"You could have said it in a jokey sort of voice and dropped your eyelashes like this and then given a little smile."

"I am not romantically interested in Captain Cathcart."

"Would do to practice on."

Rose sat down in front of the dressing-table mirror and stared moodily at her reflection while Daisy took the pins out of her hat and removed it.

"You know, Daisy, it is this pressure of marriage which annoys and depresses me. There are women in London earning their living."

"Not ladies."

"There are respectable middle-cla.s.s ladies working in offices. There is nothing up the middle cla.s.ses. They have sound moral values," said Rose as if commenting on some obscure tribe of Amazonian Indians.

"If you say so, my lady."

"I will now go down to breakfast and see what I can find out. I will start with my new friend, Miss Bryce-Cuddlestone."

"Don't get too friendly, my lady. She could have murdered that Gore-Desmond woman herself."

"Nonsense."

"Poisoning's a woman's game."

SEVEN.

It would be impossible to read poetry properly in these upper-cla.s.s accents; they have such a wretched poverty of vowel sounds: Aw waw taw gaw, Aw waw taw gaw, they seem to be saying. Much of this they seem to be saying. Much of this yaw haw yaw haw comes down to us from the drawl of the fas.h.i.+onable Mid-Victorian 'swells', who were suggesting to their listeners that they were doing them a favour by talking to them at all. comes down to us from the drawl of the fas.h.i.+onable Mid-Victorian 'swells', who were suggesting to their listeners that they were doing them a favour by talking to them at all.

-J. B. PRIESTLEY, THE EDWARDIANS THE EDWARDIANS.

In the breakfast room, Rose helped herself to kidneys and bacon and took a seat next to Margaret.

"Have you heard any news of Colette?" she asked.

"Not a word."

"You should tell the police."

"They will not be interested."

Rose hesitated and then said, "I told them myself."

Margaret stared at her. "When?"