Chapter Five #2
He beamed at her. “Just what I think, dear lady! And that reminds me, I brought the post with me, and there was a letter for Lady Dalrymple, as well as one or two for your father, Miles. And the newspapers. They are on the hall table. Godfrey doesn’t take a newspaper, so I generally bring a couple when I come over.
I expect you’d like to see the Times, Mr. Fletcher. ”
Alec agreed, though his usual paper was the Daily Chronicle, a shockingly liberal choice for a policeman. They chatted about the news of the day for a few minutes, until a maid came in and said to Daisy, “Please, madam, her ladyship wants to see you.”
“Right-oh, I’ll go up in a minute. Thank you…?”
“Jenny, madam. Right away, madam, her ladyship said. Her ladyship’s in a proper state, madam, and I’m sure I hope ’tis not something I’ve done; but I weren’t trained up for a lady’s maid and that’s the plain truth of it.”
“She’d have left you in no doubt if it were your fault, Jenny.” Regretfully Daisy abandoned what little remained of her sausage and toast. “Oh dear, what now, I wonder?”
“I reckon it’s that letter, madam,” Jenny said, as they left the dining room.
“Knowing Mr. Tremayne were come, and him sometimes bringing the post, I looked and saw it on the table when I were going up to get her ladyship’s breakfast things, so I took it up to her ladyship.
She sent me to run her bath, and she were opening it when I left, and when I come back she were in a state. ”
“I’m sure it must have been the letter. Thank you, Jenny, you can go now. I’ll ring if you’re needed.”
Hurrying up the stairs, Daisy wondered whom the letter was from and what on earth it said that was so upsetting it required her immediate presence. Surely not Violet! If anything had happened to her or the baby, she or Johnnie would have written to Daisy first and let her break it to their mother.
“Mother, what…?”
“Daisy, how could you be so remiss, so utterly lacking in duty to your only parent, as to leave me to learn the truth from a stranger?”
“Mother, I’ve already explained that Westmoor didn’t tell me he wasn’t going to be here for Christmas, though I gather he’s spent Christmas at Tavy Bridge for years. And I didn’t know Mrs. Norville was Indian, either.”
“Indian!” Lady Dalrymple snorted and waved the offending letter. Sitting up in bed in a powder blue quilted satin bed-jacket, she was a study in outrage. “That is the least of it!”
“Whom is it from?”
“Eva Devenish. An utterly reliable source.”
“Blast!” Daisy muttered. Lady Eva never invented gossip; she didn’t need to.
She had at her fingertips every scrap of scandal which had shaken the aristocracy in the past five or six decades.
No use Daisy trying to cast doubt on whatever she had raked up this time.
“Lady Eva’s not exactly a stranger, Mother, even if she isn’t family. But how did she know you were here?”
“I happened to run into her at Claridge’s, where I spent Saturday night, since your husband’s house is not suitable for inviting your mother to stay when she is in town.
We spoke briefly, as she was rushing off somewhere—and how she manages it at her age I cannot imagine.
There’s really something quite indecent about it—but I mentioned that I was to be Westmoor’s guest at Brockdene.
If only she had had the common courtesy to enlighten me there and then! ”
“Enlighten you about what, Mother?”
“I suppose you believe the Indian person is the widow of the sixth earl’s youngest son.”
“Honestly, I never thought twice about whose widow she is.”
“She’s not.”
“If you want me to understand, you’ll have to be less oracular,” Daisy said, patience wearing thin.
Momentarily, the dowager looked flummoxed, as if she wondered what “oracular” meant.
She knew when Daisy was being unfilial, though.
“I’m afraid being married to a policeman has not improved your manners, Daisy.
Eva says it was all well known at the time.
I was much too young to hear about it, of course. ”
“Of course, Mother,” said Daisy, less to redeem herself than in the hope of speeding the awaited revelation.
“It was in the ’70s. Albert Norville was a subaltern in India.
His commanding officer wrote to Westmoor, the sixth earl, that Albert was involved with a native woman and had even had a child by her.
Naturally Westmoor summoned Albert home.
” Lady Dalrymple scanned the letter to refresh her memory of the misdeeds of the unfortunate Albert.
“His ship arrived in Plymouth some months later.”
“He came?”
“Naturally. In those days one did not lightly disobey one’s parents.
According to Westmoor’s man of business in Plymouth, Albert called on him and learnt that his parents were in London, but his eldest brother, Lord Norville, was here at Brockdene.
He announced his intention of sailing up the Tamar to win Norville’s support before he faced Westmoor. ”
“How on earth did all this become known?” Daisy demanded.
“According to Eva, the sixth countess was a thoroughly indiscreet woman, even a trifle underbred. Of course, the shock must excuse a certain lack of self-control,” Lady Dalrymple said with conscious tolerance, “though I should never allow myself such latitude.”
“What shock, Mother?”
“They were both drowned.”
“What! Who?”
“Albert and his brother. The servants here reported that they quarrelled bitterly, and the sailors who took them down the river said they actually came to fisticuffs on the boat. They fell overboard and could not be saved.”
“How dreadful!”
“The middle brother became the seventh earl, and the present Lord Westmoor is his son. I shall write him a stiff letter, a very stiff letter indeed. I consider his conduct towards me unconscionable.”
“He does seem to have gone a bit too far,” Daisy conceded.
“He’s become downright eccentric since the War!”
“But how did Mrs. Norville end up living here at Brockdene, Mother? Surely Lady Eva hasn’t left you in suspense.”
“‘Mrs.’ Norville turned up in England some months later with two children, claiming to be married to Albert. She offered no proof, and the sixth earl didn’t believe her for a moment; but to keep her quiet he gave her an allowance and a home here as long as she made no claims. Can you imagine the scandal if the newspapers had got hold of the story? ”
“They would have had a field day,” said Daisy, trying to imagine the feelings of the unhappy girl, arriving in England with two little boys to find her husband dead and his family refusing to acknowledge her—always supposing Albert had actually been her legal husband.
Surely she would have had some sort of proof, though.
Perhaps he had just gone through some sort of Hindu ceremony with her.
“I presume the earl left provision for her in his will,” her mother continued, “to save his heirs from any unpleasantness. But what possessed Westmoor to suppose I would consider the woman an acceptable hostess is beyond me! I have a very good mind to leave immediately.”
“What an excellent idea, Mother. I’m sure you could spend a very comfortable Christmas at Claridge’s…
” Daisy’s voice trailed off. She swallowed a sigh.
“Only even if we could summon a boat to take you to Plymouth, the weather’s already foul and there are gale warnings on the wireless. I’m afraid you’ll have to stay.”