Page 9 of Blackmail at Beckwith Place
Or perhaps it was due to the tension between father and son that I had noticed take shape over the past few months.
They’d never been particularly close. Just as Uncle Harold had never really seemed warm towards Aunt Charlotte, he hadn’t seemed warm towards Crispin, either. Their relationship had always seemed more like viscount—now duke—and heir than father and son. But since Aunt Charlotte’s death, I had noticed things becoming rather more tense than even they used to be.
Perhaps she had been the buffer between them, and without her, all their sharp edges collided.
Or perhaps it wasn’t the loss of Aunt Charlotte at all. Perhaps it was the conversation—or shouting match—that Christopher and I had overheard in April, during which Uncle Harold had refused, point blank, to entertain the idea of letting Crispin marry the woman he claimed to be in love with. Not a suitable wife for the scion of the Sutherlands, apparently. Too poor, too common, too foreign.
Uncle Harold had made the suggestion that Crispin should take a different wife, and then make the girl he loved his mistress. Crispin had been appalled, I’m happy to say. I was appalled, too. The whole incident had made me feel rather more kindly towards him, and rather less kindly towards his father.
At any rate, it might be that.
And honestly, it didn’t matter in the slightest. They were both here, and that was really all that was significant.
“What about that?” I inquired, indicating a vaguely familiar-looking Crossley Saloon in burgundy.
“Constance’s mother’s car,” Francis said. “Marsden was kind enough to drive it up.”
My stomach sank. “Marsden? Not?—?”
“Lord Geoffrey, yes.” He flicked a look at me. “His parents are here, too. That’s theirs.” Francis indicated an elegant dark green Daimler.
“Whose idea was that?”
“Mum’s,” Francis said with a grimace. “You know how she is. They’re the only family Constance has left. I don’t thinksheparticularly wanted them here, but Mother thought they should be invited. If they chose not to come, that would be up to them. But…”
But of course they’d come. I made a face.
Christopher glanced at me. “What about Lady Laetitia?”
“She’s here, as well,” Francis confirmed, and added apologetically, “Sorry, Pipsqueak.”
“I’m more worried about him than her,” I said. “She’ll monopolize St George’s time to the degree that we’re not likely to see much of either of them, which is all to the good. But if Lord Geoffrey tries to touch any part of my anatomy again, I’ll hit him, and I’m sure his parents won’t like that.”
I had refrained from resorting to violence the last time Geoffrey Marsden had squeezed me into a corner of the sofa, because we had been on the Marsden estate and I hadn’t wanted to cause a scene, but I’d be damned if I let him feel me up in my own home without doing something about it.
Christopher nodded. So did Francis. “Don’t worry, Pippa. We’ll make sure nothing happens.”
“Someone should warn the servants,” I said. “Constance told me that they can’t keep staff at Marsden Manor, because Geoffrey moves through them at such a rapid pace.”
“I hardly think Cook or Hughes will appeal to him,” Francis answered with a snort, and I tilted my head.
“Hughes? Aunt Charlotte’s lady’s maid, you mean? She’s here?”
“Traveled up with Uncle Harold and Wilkins,” Francis confirmed. “I assume Uncle Harold doesn’t have a need for her anymore, with Aunt Charlotte gone, so he’s dumping her on Mum. Or perhaps she decided to leave on her own. However it came about, she’s here now.”
“To stay? I didn’t think Aunt Roz needed—” or wanted, “—a lady’s maid, either.”
Unlike Aunt Charlotte, who had kept her long hair and Edwardian dress—including corsets—until she died, Aunt Roz has embraced the ease of drop-waist frocks and a shingled bob, and didn’t require help dressing herself or her hair.
“Probably feels bad for Hughes,” Francis said. “You know how Mum is. Hughes is getting on in age, and she had been with Aunt Charlotte for a long time. It wouldn’t be easy for her to find another position. Almost everyone’s like Mum these days, dealing with their own clothes and hair. Constance’s aunt didn’t bring a lady’s maid, either, nor did Lady Laetitia. Nor did Constance’s mother, for that matter, when they came to Sutherland for the funerals in May.”
“Lady P’s maid up and left,” I informed him. “Got a telephone call one night, a week or so before the funerals, and was gone the next morning. Or so Constance told me.”
“How strange.”
I nodded. “I’m sure Lady P would have brought her otherwise. She didn’t strike me as the type to forego the use of a maid. But I take your point. Most women have less use for them than before. I suppose Hughes would have been left on the street if Aunt Roz hadn’t taken her in.”
“I think she came from Marsden originally,” Francis said. “Constance’s mum and Aunt Charlotte swapped maids at some point—they were friends, you know—and Hughes ended up at Sutherland House. Perhaps she’s hoping to talk the Countess into taking her back to Dorset.”
