“Oh, yes, ma’am. All smiles, she were, when she greeted me and then all but ran to the master as soon as he poked his head out of the drawing room. She’s like that when she’s had a good performance.”
Or when she’s in love?Constance wondered. “Did she leave her bag in the hall for you to take up to her room?”A large bag hiding a dozen red roses, perhaps?
Nancy blinked. “She didn’t have a bag. She just swept in with her cloak billowing—so graceful, she always was.”
No bag? Damn it!
Without a word, Solomon left the room, no doubt going to see if a bag still lurked unnoticed under a hall table or in some other shadowy corner. Nancy’s eyes flickered to him as he passed her, then returned to Constance.
“Did you take her cloak?” Constance asked.
“Didn’t get the chance. She went into the drawing room wearing it and told me over her shoulder we could all go to bed. So I did. Easy enough to finish the breakfast table in the morning.”
“Are you a light sleeper?”
Nancy frowned in quick suspicion. “What does that mean?”
“I mean, does any noise outside or inside the house tend to wake you? Or do you sleep all night without ever being disturbed?”
“Mostly all night, I suppose. Why?”
“Then you wouldn’t have heard any sounds of distress from Mrs. Montague’s room? Or anyone entering or leaving the house?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes I hear Mr. and Mrs. Montague when they come in late. Other times I don’t.”
Constance sighed. She drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair, then forced them to stop. “You won’t want to answer this, because you are clearly a good and loyal servant, but the truth will help Mr. Montague, and even your late mistress. And please don’t tell me it’s not your place to say, because I know you have an opinion. Were Mr. and Mrs. Montague happy together? As a couple?”
The girl’s mouth opened then pressed tight shut on what was no doubt a furious retort. Instead, she said tightly, “Yes, ma’am.”
“Then you never heard them quarrel?”
“No, ma’am.”
A loyal servant would never tell, but Constance, concentrating on the maid’s wooden face rather than on her words, persevered. “Then you saw no signs that either of them ever—er…strayed?”
“What sort of signs?” Nancy asked with undisguised aggression.
“Well, for example, did either of them ever ask you to carry notes by hand, or verbal messages?”
“No, but then they wouldn’t, would they? It ain’t my place to run messages. Besides, he’s got an office full of clerks for that sort of thing, and she’s got Miss Webb.”
“Then Miss Webb took messages by hand for her?”
“I didn’t say that,” Nancy protested at once. “I never saw her do so, and she never told me that she did. Just saying no one askedme. It’s a respectable house.”
Solomon re-entered the room, caught Constance’s gaze, and shook his head minutely. So no bag had been left in the hall. Well, it was more likely that Caterina had fetched any such bag from its hiding place after both her husband and her maid had left her alone.
Constance stood up. “Thank you, Nancy. How many other servants live in the house?”
“Just me, Mr. Collins, Cook, and Miss Webb. Oh, and Fred the boot boy. Coachman lives above the coach house in the mews.”
The boot boy interested Constance, for he had a legitimate reason for wandering the house at night, leaving polished shoes outside doors and collecting any left there.
As though Nancy had heard her thoughts, she said wryly, “Fred’s only ten. He gets sent to bed at nine and does the boots in the morning.”
Constance inclined her head, grateful for the information. “Who keeps the keys?”
Nancy’s eyes widened. “What keys?”
