“All of them,” Tom corrected, over the rustling of fabric. “Two years with Francis, one year with Kit, and all of them with Robert.”
“God rest his soul.”
“Amen,” Tom said.
Silence reigned for a minute, only filled by the sounds of sheets and blankets being fitted to the bed. Christopher and I stood like statues in the middle of the hallway, afraid to make a noise for fear they’d hear us and stop talking.
But now Mrs. Mason must have taken her courage in her hands. It wasn’t something a devoted servant should do—they’re supposed to be seen but not heard—but I guess under the circumstances, family friend and all, she decided to make an exception. “Tidwell says it’s possible His Grace, the old duke, was murdered.”
The rustling stopped. Either the bed was made, or they’d stopped trying and were facing one another across the expanse of the mattress.
“It’s possible,” Tom said guardedly. “That’s all we know right now. The police surgeon took him to the mortuary in Little Sutherland. He’ll find out.”
There was a pause. “It wasn’t Lady Roz,” Mrs. Mason said.
I arched my brows. So did Christopher.
“I’m sure it wasn’t,” Tom Gardiner replied, and sounded like he meant it. “Is there a reason you want me to know that?”
“I just wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to Lady Roz.”
“I see,” Tom said, but didn’t say anything more. I wondered whether Mrs. Mason realized that she was making Aunt Roz sound rather more guilty than not by bringing it up, but from her tone of voice, I would guess not. She sounded sincerely concerned that the police, in the person of Detective Sergeant Thomas Gardiner, should understand that Aunt Roz wouldn’t do such a thing.
Nothing else was said, until Tom changed the subject. “I guess we’re done in here?”
“This is it,” Mrs. Mason confirmed. “All three rooms are ready. There’s no one else in this wing except young Miss Darling, and she’s quiet as a mouse. You won’t hear hide nor hair from her.”
“It seems curious,” Tom remarked, “that Miss Darling’s room is here, in a separate wing from everyone else.”
“Oh, Lady Roz and Lord Herbert’s rooms are up there at the end of the central wing, so she isn’t all alone. But Her Grace—Lady Charlotte, that was—was adamant that it was improper for the young lady’s room to be so close to her son and the other young gentlemen. So Miss Darling is in the west wing, and Master Francis, Master Christopher, and Master Crispin are in the east wing.”
“I see,” Tom said. “Her Grace doesn’t have a problem with Miss Darling sharing this wing with Inspector Pendennis, Detective Sergeant Finchley, and myself?”
Clearly she hadn’t, or they wouldn’t be making up rooms directly across the hall from me. I glanced at Christopher, who made a face. It was obvious that Aunt Charlotte’s sense of decorum only extended to her own family, of which I was not considered a member.
By now there was the sound of footsteps inside the room, and Christopher and I looked from one another to the door to my room, which was still farther down the corridor. We could attempt to reach it, but would most likely be seen as we moved past the open door to the room that currently held Tom and Mrs. Mason.
Or we could back up, silently, and pretend we’d just now arrived in the west wing, and hadn’t heard any of the foregoing conversation.
Or we could stand, frozen, like deer outlined in the headlights of a motorcar, when Mrs. Mason and Tom came out of the room. And that’s what we ended up doing, since our silent exchange of options hadn’t given us consensus. Instead of moving forward or back, we stayed where we were, and got caught in the middle of the hallway, no doubt looking very guilty indeed.
Tom Gardiner’s brows arched when he saw us. Mrs. Mason is too well trained to show surprise, so she merely skirted us with a murmured apology and headed towards the servants staircase at the end of the wing, the one that matched the one in the east wing that Christopher and I had scurried up and down so many times over the past day and a half.
The two of them—Tom and Christopher—stared at each other for a moment. Then—
“In here.” Tom turned on his heel and disappeared back into the room he’d just came out of. It hadn’t been made clear whether I was included in the invitation, but I hadn’t been excluded either, and until I was, I wasn’t going to miss out on an opportunity to learn something new. So I put my hand in the middle of Christopher’s back and gave him a push towards the door. He looked down at me, but stepped forward.
“Shut the door behind you,” Tom said. By the time I had nudged Christopher across the threshold ahead of me, Tom had moved away from the door and over to the window. I shoved Christopher a few feet further into the room and shut the door carefully at my back. Then I leaned on it, and surveyed the room.
Tom, meanwhile, looked from Christopher to me and back. “How much did you hear?”
Christopher seemed to have lost his ability to speak, so when he didn’t answer, I took it upon myself to provide the requested information. “Nothing we didn’t know already. You’re staying the night. All of you. Across the hall from me. Which apparently doesn’t bother Aunt Charlotte as much as me sharing a corridor with her son and her nephews.”
And perhaps her husband, but who knew? If Uncle Harold had a habit of chasing women his son’s age, I hadn’t seen any signs of it, but that didn’t mean the habit wasn’t there, just that he’d never exposed me to it.
Meanwhile, Crispin’s reputation with women was legendary, and Aunt Charlotte had probably heard about it. Hard to say whether she was protecting him from me, or me from him, I supposed—either was equally ridiculous, of course—but no doubt it had been in her mind that it would be a good idea to keep us apart. As if I would have touched Crispin with a barge pole, other than to whack him over the head with it if he came anywhere near me.
When Tom didn’t answer, merely nodded, I continued. “Christopher’s grandfather may or may not have been murdered. Aunt Roz is popular with the staff, so they don’t want her to be guilty.”
