Last Night's Scandal (The Dressmakers 5)

He called his mind back.

“One takes up so much space,” she said, “and one rustles so.”

“You were speaking of Mains,” he said.

“Yes.” She inhaled the coffee’s aroma and gave an appreciative sigh before taking a sip. “Oh, that is excellent. Better than Great-Grandmama’s.”

“Mains,” he said.

“You are a wonder of single-mindedness,” she said.

“One of us has to be. You wander off in ten directions at once.”

“Yes, I was thinking of food.”

“I’ll fill your plate.” He jumped up and headed for the sideboard, eager to be moving, doing something. “You talk.”

“Yes, very well. He was a puzzle, I’ll admit. I was expecting, as you no doubt were, to find he was completely incompetent. Or a drunkard. Or both. After all, people want work. The village is not exactly thriving. It’s one thing to have difficulty finding a tenant. Not all people would find a fifteenth-century castle inviting, even one in pristine condition and luxuriously fitted out. But for an agent to be unable to recruit men to work, on a property that for centuries was the main source of employment for miles about—that was strange, indeed.”

He returned to the table and set her plate down.

She looked at it. “No haggis, I see.”

“Our cook is French,” he said.

“No salmon, either,” she said. “But I notice he has somehow contrived to create perfect brioche in that abominable oven.”

“Amazing, isn’t it?” he said. He sat again. “As to Mains? You were saying?”

She picked up her cutlery. “You are so single-minded.”

“Yes, I’m on pins and needles. I can tell by the way you’re drawing this out that you’ve something of value to tell me.”

“Several things,” she said. “First, your agent drinks a little and he’s a little incompetent and a little lazy, but none of that is the problem, really. He does his job well enough. But until the last years before his death, your cousin Frederick Dalmay supervised him. Since then, the supervision has come from your father.” She stopped then, and attended to her breakfast.

Lisle didn’t question her further. He didn’t need to. “Father made a muck of it,” he said.

“Some might say so.”

“Contradictory commands,” he said. “Changing his mind a dozen times.”

“So it would appear.”

“I see what happened,” he said. “It wants no imagination. The locals feel the way I do.”

“Rules were imposed that were either unduly strict or contradicted others,” she said. “You’ve lost some tradesmen as a result. The village hasn’t been emptied, but a few families have left. In other cases, the men are traveling a distance to work.” She went on talking between mouthfuls. Lisle let her go at her own pace. He had a great deal to think about.

“I learned from my stepfather and my uncles how one ought to manage an estate,” she said. “You know how seriously Lord Rathbourne takes his responsibilities. From what I gathered, your cousin Frederick followed the same principles.”

“My father doesn’t,” he said. “He couldn’t stick to a principle or a rule if it was glued to his nose.”

“The good news is, we understand why you’ve not been welcomed with open arms.”

“Ill will,” he said. “They don’t know what additional misery I’ll bring down upon them.”

“We have to win their trust again,” she said. “I believe that’s where to start. Then we can tackle the ghosts.”

Before Lisle could answer, Nichols reappeared.

“Your lordship, Miss Carsington, a man is here about a situation,” he said.

Chapter 13

A man named Herrick, Nichols told them, was applying for the vacant butler position.

Olivia looked at Lisle.

“What’s happened?” he said. “Yesterday we couldn’t get anyone near the place.”

“Yesterday, a wee red-haired lassie hadn’t faced up to a savage Frenchman wielding a cleaver,” she said.

“Word can’t have gone out so quickly,” he said.

“It happened yesterday,” she said. “When I do something in London, it makes the rounds by breakfast time next day. Word travels even more quickly in the country, in my experience.”

“But how? Who’d tell them? We haven’t a single villager in the castle.”

“The stables,” she said. “Gossip goes from the house to the stables, and there’s always a local snoop loitering about the stables on one pretext or another. Every village has at least one person who makes it his or her business to know everything about everybody.”

Lisle looked up at Nichols. “If he was a dubious fellow in any way, I know you’d have sent him about his business,” he said.

“He has a letter from Mr. Mains, your lordship, as well as one from his previous employer, Lord Glaxton.”

That would be the castle she’d seen from the roof last night, Olivia thought. She shoved the roof and what had happened there from her mind. If she ignored it very determinedly, maybe it would go away.

“We’ll see him as soon as Miss Carsington finishes her breakfast,” Lisle said.

“I’m finished,” Olivia said.

Lisle looked at her plate. “No, you’re not.”

“I can eat anytime,” she said. “Butlers are not thick on the ground hereabouts.”

“Then I’ll take that brioche,” he said. “Give us a moment, Nichols, then bring him in here.”

She and Lisle left the table to await the prospective employee near the great chimneypiece, the warmest part of the room—and a fair distance from the passage to the kitchen, with its eavesdropping servants.

By whatever mysterious powers of timing Nichols possessed—perhaps simply living with Lisle for all these years was enough—he brought Herrick in a moment after Olivia had finished brushing crumbs from Lisle’s waistcoat. Lisle hadn’t noticed them, or didn’t care, but Nichols would. Olivia was sure he’d die of mortification if his master appeared less than presentable in front of a prospective menial.

Herrick certainly looked the part of a butler. He was physically imposing: easily as tall as Aillier but far more fit in physique. His dark hair was neatly groomed and his black eyes were sharply observant. He possessed the calm quietness of a man who knew what he was about. He reminded Olivia of Great-Grandmama’s perfect butler, Dudley.

He reminded her even more of Nichols, though Herrick was so much larger. He had the same unobtrusive manner.

Though Scottish, he spoke English with only a small trace of a burr.

&nbs

p; “You were last at Glaxton Castle,” Lisle said after he’d read the letters of referral. “I do wonder why you would give up that advantageous situation and come to this ramshackle heap.”

“Ambition, your lordship,” said Herrick. “Mr. Melvin is butler there. I was under butler. We did not see eye to eye. Given the unlikelihood of any change in this state of affairs or of his retiring anytime soon, I determined to seek my fortune elsewhere. My month’s notice expired a fortnight ago. I was on the brink of accepting a position in Edinburgh when I learned of the vacancy here. My conversation yesterday with Mr. Mains confirmed my belief that I was better suited to this situation.”

Lisle didn’t trouble to hide his astonishment. He gestured vaguely at their half-furnished surroundings. “This derelict heap?”

“Indeed, your lordship, I view it as a challenge.”

“So do we all,” Lisle said, “unfortunately.”

Olivia decided it was time to step in. “In my experience,” she said, “servants usually prefer easy places. Challenges are not, by and large, their cup of tea.”

“That is the general case, certainly, Miss Carsington,” said Herrick. “It strikes me as a dull and unsatisfactory way to live.”

“We’re not dull,” Lisle said. “Not by half. Perhaps you haven’t heard that our previous butler disappeared in mysterious circumstances.”

“In these parts, one hears everything, your lordship,” he said. “The inhabitants of Edinburgh, especially the servants, know everything about everybody within a twenty-mile radius. Gorewood is well within that range.”

“Our previous butler’s abrupt disappearance doesn’t trouble you at all?” Olivia said.

“If your lordship and Miss Carsington would permit me to speak plainly?” Herrick said.

“By all means,” Lisle said.

“The previous butler was a Londoner,” Herrick said gently—or was that pityingly? “I am not. My family have lived hereabouts for many generations. We cannot be uprooted easily. Or at all.”