‘I believe I am, pet, yes. Let’s go snooping.’
I locked the front door while Daniel helped Lady Hardcastle into the car and then clambered in beside her while Daniel settled into the driving seat.
It was a perfect driving day as well as a perfect drying day and the half-hour journey was exhilarating and all too short. The Seddons lived in a grand Georgian house on the main road into Chipping Bevington and as the Rolls scrunched onto the broad gravel drive, Mr Seddon himself appeared at the door to greet his guest.
‘My dear Lady Hardcastle,’ he gushed as Daniel helped her from the car. ‘How wonderful of you to come.’
‘Good afternoon, Mr Seddon. It was charming of you to invite me.’
Daniel was sweet enough also to help me while this pantomime continued and I was out of the car in time to see Mrs Seddon greeting Lady Hardcastle with equal effusion. Daniel winked at me.
‘Leave the car there, Daniel,’ said Mrs Seddon, brusquely, ‘and take Lady Hardcastle’s maid...’
‘Miss Armstrong, madam,’ said Daniel, quickly.
‘Quite. Take Armstrong to the kitchen. Cook has some lunch for her, I believe. Does that suit, Lady Hardcastle?’
‘That will be fine, Mrs Seddon,’ she said. ‘Enjoy your lunch, Armstrong. I’ll ring through to the kitchen if I need you.’
‘Yes, my lady,’ I said with a slight curtsey and followed Daniel round to the rear of the house where I was warmly invited into the kitchen by the cook, Mrs Birch.
I was led to a large, oak table which had been set for a lavish lunch. I was treated as the guest of honour and was seated at one end of the table, in a wonderfully comfortable chair.
In private Lady Hardcastle and I usually ate well and had shared some splendid meals, but when she was staying away from home and I was dining with the household servants, the best I could usually hope for was “hearty and satisfying”. “Meagre and grudgingly served” was more common, but this lunch was utterly magnificent. Pies, cold meats, poached salmon, scotch eggs, fresh salads, fresh breads... all prepared with exquisite skill. It was like the most wonderful picnic. There was even a bottle of champagne.
The kitchen was spacious and well equipped and the atmosphere friendly to the point of rowdiness. To my immense surprise I was welcomed as a fellow professional by the staff and was taken immediately into their confidence as one after the other the cook, valet, lady’s maid, housemaid, kitchen maid and chauffeur each shared with me their joy at meeting the servant of a “real lady” and their dismay at the their own arriviste employers.
‘Blimmin Lady Muck and her airs and graces,’ said Mrs Birch through a mouthful of pie. ‘She was a shop girl when she met him. A blimmin shop girl. And now she swans round here like the Duchess of Blimmin Lah-di-Dah, treatin’ us like the dirt on her shoe. That’s not proper class. She don’t know how to behave.’
The others nodded their agreement. And one by one added their own descriptions of their employers’ shortcomings. I wasn’t completely sure that any of this was appropriately professional, but I also got the feeling that I was providing an important service as a sort of safety valve. I’m not at all sure I would ever have complained about my employer to anyone, much less a complete stranger, but as they told their tales of extravagance, rudeness and generally gauche behaviour, I realized that they felt besieged and just needed to tell someone that might understand. I let them talk and carried on eating.
Mrs Birch had noticed my surprise at the extravagance of the meal. ‘We might as well treat ourselves, my dear. She don’t know what goes on, nor care overmuch, I’m sure. She don’t deign to come into the kitchen and talk to the likes of me; I gets summoned to her study to discuss menus, then sent off to crawl back to my proper place. She pays the bills without looking at them. I overheard her talking to one of her friends once. “If one has to worry about the bills,” she says, “one can’t afford them anyway.” So if that’s the way she sees it, I makes sure to slip a little treat in for us now and again. Nothing too much, mind – I i’n’t no thief – but a nice treat once a month is only what we deserves after putting up with her.’
As our eating slowed in pace and the savoury course drew to a natural close, the bell from the dining room rang and the housemaid slipped out, carrying a tray of cakes and pastries.
They asked me about Lady Hardcastle, where we’d come from, how we were settling in, and what we were up to now. I answered truthfully as much as I could, but not fully. I did let them know we were trying to find out about the murder of Frank Pickering, though.
‘Ah, yes,’ said Langdon, Mr Seddon’s valet. ‘Poor Mr Pickering. He worked for Seddons, you know. A fine young man. More of a gentleman in manner than his employer if you ask me.’
‘You met him?’ I asked.
‘Yes, once or twice. I usually accompany Mr Seddon on business trips and Mr Pickering was sometimes there or thereabouts. He came to the house once.’
‘To the house? Isn’t that a little unusual.’
‘It was, rather. It was quite recently, too.’
‘Have you any idea why?’
‘None at all, I’m afraid. Sadly this is quite a robustly built house and opportunities for eavesdropping aren’t quite what they were in some of the houses I’ve worked in. Thick walls and doors, you see. But he didn’t seem in the best of spirits when he arrived and he saw himself out, slamming the door as he went, so I can’t presume it was a joyful meeting.’
I was about to try to press him for more details when the bell rang from the dining room again.
‘I expect that’ll be for me,’ he said, getting up. ‘Please leave me a piece of trifle if you can spare it. I’m rather partial to trifle.’
He went off towards the dining room and our conversation lightened once more, turning to stories about the antics of the younger servants. We were still laughing at a story told – with actions and comic voices – by Doris the kitchen maid, when Langdon returned. He came over to my chair and spoke discreetly in my ear. ‘It was for you, actually, my dear. Lady Hardcastle asks if you’d take her her pills.’
‘Of course. Thank you,’ I said, rising from my chair. ‘Please excuse me, everyone. Duty calls.’
I found my bag and rummaged inside. Lady Hardcastle didn’t take “pills” but she clearly wanted me in the dining room for some reason. I carried a box of aspirin which would suffice and I took out two of the little pills and went towards the door I’d seen Langdon use.
‘Straight up the passage, turn right and it’s the second door on the left,’ said Mrs Birch. ‘Follow the sound of self-important bragging and you won’t go far wrong.’
The others laughed and I made my way out.