Death at Dawn - Caro Peacock [100]
‘What sort of work?’
He glanced at me over the rim of his wine glass.
‘For one thing, he helped fabricate some of the evidence against the late and unlamented Queen Caroline.’
I held his gaze. If he saw confusion in my face he probably thought it was because of the queen’s alleged and all too probable adultery. But I was thinking, Charlotte again. Caroline was her mother. He put down his glass and looked me in the eye.
‘When Kilkeel is present on any occasion, the prudent man asks himself why. And that is what I am asking myself now, Miss Lock. For some reason, I think you know a lot more about all this than you’re telling me.’
By any normal standards, this was intolerably bad manners. After all, I’d claimed to be a friend of the family. When I got to my feet, blushing I dare say, and asked him to excuse me, he must have thought that was the reason. He was, I think, drawling an unflustered apology as I went, but I didn’t stop to hear because waiters were coming in with trays of roast beef and it was time to keep my appointment with Mrs Beedle upstairs. I walked past rows of black-and-gold footmen to the door, keeping my face turned away from the top of the table. When I heard a commotion behind me, I glanced round, scared that the inquisitive Mr Disraeli might be coming after me. But it was only one of the waiters. He must have slipped and fallen on his back, overcome by the weight of his tureen of vegetables, because his black-trousered legs were sticking out from a knot of other waiters, and peas and carrots were scattered on the floor all round him.
The hall was deserted. I ducked behind the orange tree and went through the door that Mrs Beedle had used. It led into a servants’ corridor that, after a few dozen yards, connected with a back staircase. Mrs Beedle must be familiar with the backstage world of the house. I went up another flight of stairs and into the schoolroom corridor. It felt like home. The schoolroom had come to represent the nearest thing to familiarity and safety I’d known at Mandeville Hall and, with so much bustle and activity downstairs, it was calming to see the glow of a candle lantern coming from Henrietta’s half-open door. In spite of her confidence by day, the child suffered from nightmares and feared the dark. Betty slept in the room next door to Henrietta’s, usually with her own door half-open, to hear and comfort her if she woke. Tonight the door to her room was closed, so she was presumably still acting as maid elsewhere.
Once past Henrietta’s light, the corridor was dim, the door to the schoolroom shut. I tapped on it, softly at first then more loudly, expecting to hear Mrs Beedle’s voice telling me to come in. When nothing happened I opened the door. The curtains were drawn across the window, with just enough evening light coming in round the edges to show the shape of the rocking horse, the three desks, the table. I went towards it and started feeling around for the lamp, intending to light it ready for when Mrs Beedle arrived. She’d said she’d be waiting for me, but something must have detained her downstairs. I couldn’t find the lamp so I moved round the table. My foot caught on something and I fell to one knee, petticoats tangling round the heel of my shoe. A ruck in the carpet, I thought. But even as I thought it, I knew it wasn’t that. It was the smell that warned me. The schoolroom usually smelled of chalk dust, marigolds and custard. Now there was a harsh metallic reek that didn’t belong there.
My knee was nudging against something like a cushion or a bolster, but heavier. Scared now, I leaned forward and let my hand rest on it. A silk upholstered curve, slithery under my fingers. My hand moved along and it wasn’t silky any more, just bare and loose, yielding horribly to the fingertips. Trying to get away from it, I backed into the rocking horse and set it swaying and creaking. For a while I just crouched there under the rise and dip of the wooden head,