Chapter 12
I folded the note and slid it into my pocket, reflecting that Hannah was determined to pry me from this kitchen and have me behind a table selling pastries as soon as possible. Truth to tell, I was excited about it myself.
I sat down and pulled out my notebook, turning it to the pages of notes I’d made about my new stall.
I’d already had the idea to begin with the meat pies Mrs. Bywater pretended to turn up her nose at, which could be served cold. Fruit tarts could as well, though they were a bit messier.
However, if I folded a tart crust over the fruit and baked them that way, like a pasty, they could be eaten from one’s hand. I could do savory pasties with the meat filling as well.
So many decisions to make.
No matter which form the pies took, I’d need the ingredients for each. I began to make a list, letting my cook’s mind take over. I’d have to spend my own money for these things, and Joanna was right that I ought to use her kitchen to bake my goods in, at least for now.
I tried to push from my mind that Grace would soon depart. I’d not fuss, I’d decided. I’d let her go with dignity, and plan for taking her in for good next summer.
The practical part of me commended me for my self-control. The part of me that was still the terrified young mother wanted to break down and weep.
Tess watched me from the other end of the table, clearly wondering why she was suddenly doing all the work herself.
“Everything all right, Mrs. H.?” she asked with an edge to her voice.
“Pardon?” I raised my head, dragged back into the present. “Oh, I am sorry, Tess. I’m caught up in my own thoughts.”
I made myself drop the notebook and pencil back into my pocket and take up a knife to slice carrots.
“It’s the potatoes what need the chopping,” Tess pointed out. “I’ve already done enough carrots.”
“The pan juices can’t have enough carrots,” I said glibly. “Might as well finish this one.”
“If you say so, Mrs. H.”
I’d made her cross, which I regretted. “Sit down a moment, Tess. You’ve done all the work today.” As Tess only stared at me, I carried on. “I am about to ask you to contribute more labor, but for me, personally. Would you like to help me with my new market stall?”
Tess’s mouth became a round O. “Market stall?”
I explained to her what I’d done—I’d committed myself well and truly now.
“It will mean more work for you, so I understand if you don’t agree,” I finished. “But I am realizing I’ll need help with it, if I’m to create enough food to sell. Mostly I will need assistance preparing the ingredients, and it will have to be done when you have time of your own.”
Tess’s wide grin had blossomed as I’d spoken. “I’d love to, Mrs. H.,” she gushed. “I could do things on a Sunday, whenever Caleb ain’t free. Which is much of the time now.” Her smile faded.
“A policeman’s lot is never easy,” I said in sympathy. “I would welcome your help, Tess.”
Tess returned to the potatoes with enthusiasm.
I was well aware that I’d need to pay Tess something for her time and trouble. I hoped Hannah’s optimism for the market stall proved true, and I could make enough to buy all the supplies and pay Tess without wiping away my savings.
But those were considerations to think about later. For now, I continued helping Tess prepare, pleased to see her smiling and excited.
* * *
On Friday morning, when I sent Tess to the market, I gave her an extra list of supplies for the stall and a coin purse of shillings to pay for them.
These were basic things she knew how to choose—flour, salt, arrowroot, sugar, and other pantry goods.
She’d learned from me how to make certain the flour sacks weren’t filled out with powdered plaster, the sugar with sand.
When it came time to select the fruit, meats, and vegetables, I’d pick them out personally. Tess had learned much, but I wanted to make certain I obtained the best possible.
I gave Tess Joanna’s address to have the grocer deliver the things to and included a note for Joanna as to where to store each item and how. I imagined Joanna’s exasperated amusement when she read my instructions.
While I prepared for the coming week’s main meals and another tea Mrs. Bywater had decided to give her friends, Tess nipped to the market and back. She presented me with the receipts for what she’d obtained for me, proud of her work.
On Saturday, I purchased the fruits and meats when I went out to procure produce for the weekend, sending my purchases on to Joanna’s again.
The grocer had run out of the damsons I’d bought from him before but said he might have more Monday morning.
I bade him send me word at the Mount Street house when he did.
I’d have to find another place to bake once Joanna and family departed for Basingstoke, I reflected as I trudged home again. I had a few ideas about that and hoped it would not come to too much more expense.
Saturday afternoon, I sent up the platters for the tea—Mrs. Bywater had been so enamored of what I’d done the week before that she insisted I repeat the offerings. I turned from the dumbwaiter once the treats had been cranked up to the dining room to find Daniel in the kitchen.
I tried to hide how pleased I was to see him, and I’m certain I failed miserably.
“What news?” I asked as he set down the bushel of potatoes I’d ordered for the following week. “Did Mr. Thanos agree to help?”
We spoke in low voices, mindful of Elsie peeking in from the scullery and the footmen arguing in the servants’ hall.
“He leapt at the chance,” Daniel said. “He declared he could prepare his lectures and search the archives at the same time. What a nice, quiet place to work, Somerset House, he said.”
We both smiled. I imagined Mr. Thanos with his spectacles sliding from his nose while he eagerly perused ledgers and made notes, likely smearing the whole proceedings with ink.
“Lady Cynthia could help him,” I said. “She was roped into tea with her aunt today, but I can send her when he goes back.”
Perhaps, in the middle of a quiet reading room, the two might grow closer. It was my fond wish—though, like Daniel and me, they’d have little to live on if they rushed into wedlock.
“I’ve been staying away from Bethnal Green, fear not,” Daniel said before I could task him with this very thing.
“I’ve been focusing on Banks. Who he was, why anyone would kill him for wanting to speak to me, or for any other reason.
I did manage to persuade the landlady to let me into his rooms, but they told me nothing. Do you have the medal you found?”
“Upstairs.” I’d tucked it away to keep it safe. “Do you want me to fetch it?”
“If you wouldn’t mind. I—”
He broke off, and I felt an icy presence behind us.
Mr. Davis had halted in the kitchen doorway and now gave Daniel a stare worthy of a basilisk. I recalled that monster from Grace’s childhood picture books, and Mr. Davis might have stood for a model. The fury in his eyes at the moment was matched only by his coldness.
“Mr. Davis.” Daniel greeted him with his usual congeniality. “Glad you are here. May I speak to you a moment?”
“I hardly have the time,” Mr. Davis returned, his entire body stiff with butler’s hauteur. I was surprised he’d answered Daniel at all.
“This will not take long. Please.” Daniel’s voice held a hint of steel, one that made hardened criminals flinch from him.
Mr. Davis gazed at him for a time, ignoring me completely, then gave him a minute nod.
Daniel gestured for Mr. Davis to lead on. Mr. Davis began to step into the servants’ hall, even with the footmen’s continued presence, but Daniel more or less steered him down the corridor toward the butler’s pantry.
Both Tess and I craned from the kitchen door to watch them go. Daniel firmly closed the door behind them, shutting them into Mr. Davis’s room.
“Mr. McAdam looked grim, didn’t he?” Tess asked worriedly. “Is he going to thrash Mr. Davis for being rude to you?”
“Of course not.” I spoke with conviction but hoped that would not be the case. “Mr. Davis is not happy with my intentions toward Daniel, or his toward me. I believe Daniel is trying to bring Mr. Davis around to our way of thinking.”
Tess gave the hallway another glance before returning to the table. “Mr. Davis knows, then? Is that why he’s in a bother?”
“He discovered our secret, yes.”
I’d broken the news to Tess a few months ago, wanting to give her time to grow used to the idea. She’d been ecstatic for me and had also burst into tears, not wanting me to leave her on her own.
Tess had kept the confidence since then, though every now and then she broke into a panic at the thought of me leaving, even if the event would be months from now.
Daniel remained in the butler’s pantry for quite some time. At one point, I thought I heard raised voices, but the footmen were still being raucous across the hall, and I couldn’t be certain.
I showed Tess how to create pastry dough that could be formed into casings, making it a little thicker and stronger, so the filling wouldn’t leak out. We rolled out and cut a dozen of these and then filled them with the hearty fig jam I’d made earlier in the week.
The jam turnovers were most of the way baked before the door to the butler’s pantry opened and Daniel emerged. He tramped down the hall alone, pausing at the kitchen doorway.
“Something smells wonderful.” Daniel closed his eyes and inhaled in delight. “Please tell me you’ll save a piece of whatever it is for me, Kat.”
“If you behave yourself, I will,” I admonished. Before I could ask what on earth he’d said to Mr. Davis, Daniel gave Tess and me a cheery wave.
“Can’t stop. Many things to do. Afternoon, Tess, Kat.” Daniel, whistling, made his way through the scullery, said a farewell to Elsie, and took himself off.
“Blast the man,” I grumbled. Not only would I not know what he and Mr. Davis discussed, but I hadn’t had the chance to fetch Mr. Banks’s medal for him.
“I didn’t see any blood on him,” Tess observed. “Perhaps they just had a friendly chat.”
I did not laugh. “I’ll wager it was more than that, but we won’t know, will we?” I thumped another hunk of dough onto the counter. “Let’s roll some more of these. And not give any to a male creature until they cease vexing us.”
* * *
Mr. Davis reappeared when supper was ready to go up. He gave me a somewhat cordial nod as he checked that all was ready in the kitchen but did not speak to me. His stance was less cold and angry, but still far from friendly.
He continued this way the rest of the evening, never mentioning Daniel’s discussion with him. I missed the Mr. Davis who would sit in the kitchen in the afternoons or after supper, reading out bits from the newspaper and gossiping with me, but at least he’d unbent slightly.
On Sunday morning, Tess took her day out. She’d spend the morning with Caleb and then walk to Joanna’s to begin preparing for my pies. I gave her a list of instructions for how to make the doughs and how to divide them, then for starting the fruit and meat sauces.
I’d finish the final preparations and the baking tomorrow and then cart the things to Portobello Road.
I planned only a small amount of goods, to see how things went.
If no one bothered to purchase them, I’d bring the pies home and feed them to Joanna’s family and the staff here.
The footmen and maids already liked the fig turnovers I’d made, as had the upstairs—the platter of them had come back empty on Saturday night.
While I fretted a bit because Daniel did not reappear, I was busy enough to not let it distract me too much.
Many questions floated through my mind as I worked. Did Mrs. Kerr really take in Daniel when he was a babe? How could Banks have recognized him? Mr. Fielding was correct that Daniel didn’t have any unusual marks on his body, at least none that I’d seen.
I flushed at the last thought. When I married Daniel, I certainly would see. The realization made my heart beat faster, but as I’d said to Joanna the other day, intimacy with Daniel might be no bad thing.
If Mr. Banks only purported to recognize Daniel, using that as an excuse to speak to him, why? What had he wanted to tell him? We had only Mr. Ramsay’s word that Mr. Banks possibly wanted to discuss Mrs. Kerr. Had Mr. Banks’s purpose been something else entirely?
Mr. Grimes had spoken to Mr. Banks prior to his appointment with Daniel and his death. I itched to take Mr. Grimes aside and make him repeat the conversation in exact detail.
However, I could not hunt down Mr. Grimes while cooking for the family and in a bother about my market stall.
A greater question that niggled at me was: If Mrs. Kerr had indeed taken in Daniel, how had he come to be in need of her charity?
Had he been abducted from his rightful home?
Left on her doorstep by his mother, knowing that Mrs. Kerr looked after little ones?
Or had he somehow become lost from his family?
Had they perished, with no one left to take Daniel?
These sorts of conundrums must have been on Daniel’s mind all of his life. My compassion for him deepened as I mulled.
“Mrs. Holloway.”
I was jerked from my ruminations by Mrs. Bywater’s stentorian tones.
I glanced up from where I kneaded dough for the midday meal’s rolls and found her standing in the center of the kitchen. From her expression, she’d been there, unnoticed, for some time.
I reached for a towel to wipe flour from my hands. “I beg your pardon, ma’am. I did not hear you enter.”
“That is apparent.” Mrs. Bywater held up a paper in a stiff hand. “What is the meaning of this?”
As I could not see what the page was, I had no idea. “Meaning of what, ma’am?”
“Do not be impertinent with me, Mrs. Holloway. Of this note I had from the greengrocers. It says he did get in the damsons, and did my cook want them sent to this house or to the other?” Mrs. Bywater’s eyes narrowed.
“What other house, Mrs. Holloway? Why are you sending food there, and what are you getting up to in it? Answer me at once.”