Snobbery With Violence - M. C. Beaton [19]
They heard Daisy say in a weak voice, “The angels are coming for me. I hears the beating of their wings. Is that a light in the sky? Is that you, Mother?”
Oh, Lord, thought Rose bitterly. She’s overdoing it. She put a handkerchief over her face and walked past the footman and into the room. “There, now, dear girl,” she said firmly. “You must not tire yourself by talking. Sleep now.” She flashed a warning look at Daisy, who subsided into silence.
“Come away, Sir Andrew,” ordered Rose. “It is dangerous to be so close to the infection.”
“Doesn’t seem to bother you, hey?”
“It is my Christian duty to do what I can,” said Rose firmly. “Your arm, sir.”
He reluctantly held out his arm and Rose took it and urged him back along the corridor.
A week later, the earl was informed by telegram that the king would be visiting him in a month’s time. “I’ll send that wretched girl packing. It’s her fault the trick didn’t work,” raged the earl, erupting into the schoolroom.
“A word with you outside, Pa, if you please.” Father and daughter walked outside and down the corridor a little way. “Pa,” said Rose firmly, “I do not wish Daisy to leave until I have taught her how to read and write.”
“Stuff and nonsense. Didn’t do you much good, did it?” “I beg you to let her stay. I have nothing else to occupy my time. Unless, of course, I do some work for the suffragette movement.”
“Don’t you dare!” yelled the earl. “Oh, keep your latest toy. I’m wiring Cathcart.”
FOUR
As a rule, the men-servants in large houses expect gold. These gratuities are really a great tax on peoples purses; and the question whether to accept an invitation is often decided in the negative by the thought of the expenses entailed, not by railway tickets and cabs, but by the men and the maids.
-LADY COLIN CAMPBELL,
ETIQUETTE OF GOOD SOCIETY (1911)
“I wonder why our king got suspicious,” said Harry to his manservant after reading the earl’s telegram.
“Perhaps one of his servants talked.”
“He assured me they were all very loyal.”
“A royal visit would mean a great deal of money in tips for the servants, not to mention the prestige of having served His Majesty. They may have felt balked and bitter that such a visit was cancelled.”
“We’d better deal with it, anyway. Know anything about dynamite, Becket?”
“Nothing, sir.”
“Where would I find out?”
“I read somewhere, sir, that they were blasting a new railway tunnel on the underground railway at Liverpool Street Station.
Perhaps one of the workers there might be able to supply you with some dynamite and instructions as to how to use it, if discreetly bribed.”
“Good man, Becket.”
Harry, disguised in clothes purchased at a second-hand clothes store, made his way late in the afternoon to Liverpool Street Station. He located the site of the new tunnel, located the gate where the workers would come out and waited patiently. At seven o’clock, dirty, weary men began to file out. Leaning against a hoarding, Harry studied their faces. He at last picked out a man older than the rest. His face was crisscrossed with broken veins and his nose was bulbous, all the signs of a heavy drinker. He followed him as he walked from the station, keeping a steady pace behind him. He was feeling decidedly weary as he trudged along, his bad leg aching, wondering if the man lived at the ends of the earth, but his quarry finally opened the doors of a pub in Limehouse and walked in. Harry gave it a few minutes and then walked in as well.
The air was full of the smell of pipe smoke and cheap cigarette smoke. The smoke lay in wreaths across the dingy pub, which was lit by flickering gas lamps.
The smell of unwashed bodies struck him like a blow in the face. He went to the bar and ordered a pint of porter and looked around. The man he was chasing was carrying a full pint to a corner table. Harry picked up his drink, walked over and sat down.
“I want to talk to you,” he said.
“What about?” The man took a pull at his beer. “Who are you?” he growled. An