Chapter Seventeen
The mid-morning meal that the servants called ‘lunch’, after the first rush of work had finished and before other regular tasks began, was the favoured time for chatting.
Everyone gathered round the big table, and normal precedence was relaxed somewhat, as the huge teapots came in along with a sustaining nuncheon – today, thick slices of sultana cake.
At one end of the table Mrs Webster said, ‘Mrs Sebastian is looking well, very much the lady. And so confident now, she’s like a different person.’
‘I was in her room when her maid was unpacking,’ Rose said. ‘She’s got lots of lovely clothes – as good as her ladyship’s.’
‘It’s nice to see them so happy, isn’t it?’ Mrs Webster went on. ‘Mr Sebastian was always a favourite of mine. Of course, we all thought it was odd when he married her, but it’s turned out well.’
Miss Hatto said, ‘Is that right, they’re going to be staying here? What about his house in Henley?’
‘It was always more of a summer place,’ said Mrs Webster.
‘He came and went but always lived more here than there. Her ladyship said they should regard the Castle as their home. I think she’s looking forward to the company, now Lady Rachel’s gone.
Anyway, the Mr Sebastians will be staying here for a few weeks, then going up to Town for theatres and such—’
‘Concerts,’ Rose corrected. ‘It’s music he’s mad for, not plays.’
‘Same thing,’ Ms Webster said dismissively. ‘Then I believe Henley for a bit, but back here for Christmas, and not travelling any more until the baby’s born.’
‘When is it due?’ Miss Hatto asked.
‘April or May, I was told.’
‘But they’ll be here from Christmas on?’
‘Mr Sebastian doesn’t want them to be stuck out in the wilds in Henley in case anything happens.’ Mrs Webster shrugged. ‘Men get nervous about their first.’
Meg, the new nursery maid, who had come down to fetch the nursery staff’s lunch, said, ‘He was up playing with the boys this morning – getting practice, he said. That did make us smile! Ever such a nice gentleman, and it’s pretty to see how fond he is of her.
Is that true, that she used to be a servant in this house? ’
‘That’s not for you to talk about,’ Mrs Webster said sharply. ‘Take your tray and go back upstairs.’
Meg loaded a plate with slices of cake, slowly one by one, lingering for chat. ‘What was their wedding like?’
‘We didn’t see it. It was in Town,’ Rose said shortly.
‘Lady Rachel’s was nice,’ Meg said dreamily.
‘When she was driv off in that carriage with the white horses and all the ribbons and flowers all over it, it was just like a fairy tale! But Eddie said Mr Moss said it wasn’t near grand enough for an earl’s daughter.
She ought to’ve had six bridesmaids, but she only had two on account of only marrying a baronight. ’
Mabel, sitting within earshot, said, ‘A baronight’d be good enough for me if he looked like Sir Angus! Ooh, he’s handsome! And, cor, that grub afterwards was grand enough. I wish we had a wedding every week.’
‘It was lovely for them that the weather was so nice,’ Doris put in. ‘St Luke’s Little Summer, Mr Afton called it. He says funny things, don’t he, Mr Afton? He comes up and sees the boys too, chats away to them. They—’
‘How many pieces of cake are you taking? There’s only four of you,’ Mrs Webster said sternly to Meg.
She paused with a fifth slice waving in the air. ‘I was taking it for the children too.’
‘They don’t get cake in the morning, as you know perfectly well. Put that back and get about your business.’
When she had left, and the other maids had gone back to their own conversation, Rose said to Mrs Webster, ‘If Mr and Mrs Sebastian are going to be living here, that means we’ll be getting Maria as well. That’ll raise some temperatures.’
She, Mrs Webster and Miss Hatto looked towards the other end of the table, where Mrs Sebastian’s new lady’s maid was holding the male servants in thrall with her lustrous dark eyes and enchanting accent.
‘Look at Slow William,’ Rose muttered – her most recent nickname for him.
‘If his mouth hung open any further his chin’d be on the table. ’
Mr Crooks had explained to them on the first evening that, with Ellen being dismissed before they left England, Mrs Sebastian had managed at the start with housemaids and chambermaids.
‘Until we got to Florence, and stayed a night or two with Lady Leake’s mother – such a charming lady, and so very fond of his lordship!
She was so kind as to ask me particularly how he was going on, and I took the liberty of telling her what little I knew.
At all events, she was concerned that Mrs Sebastian had no maid, and as she happened to know that Maria Petrocelli was looking for a place on account of her mistress, the old Contessa di Rosano, having died, and knowing that Maria spoke reasonable English, well, it was all fixed up in no time. ’
At the other end of the table, Maria was saying, ‘And Mr Crooks is very kind. In Paris, he took me to see the Eiffel Tower, and in Rome to the Piazza San Pietro, and there we saw il Papa on the balcony, and he gave us the blessing. It was a great thing to see him.’
‘Your dad lives in Rome?’ Sam queried.
‘She means the Pope,’ Frederick said impatiently. ‘You’ll all be Catholics, of course?’
She gave a little dimpled smile that made William moan inwardly. ‘I am in hopes! Mr Crooks, he is become very interested in the Catolic religion, is it not, Mr Crooks?’ She appealed to him, and he looked embarrassed and nodded. ‘I think we will make a convert of him one day.’
‘It’s an academic interest, my dear,’ Crooks said awkwardly. ‘I’m not sure I’m ready to abandon the faith of my forefathers yet.’
‘Well, in point of fact,’ Mr Moss said, glad to get a foothold in the conversation, ‘the Roman Catholic faith is the older one. This country was once part of the Church of Rome.’
‘It that right, Mr Moss?’ William asked, thinking it out slowly. Was this a way to get to know the enchanting creature? ‘You mean we was all Roaming Catholics once?’
‘Some roamed further than others,’ Mr Afton said, amused. ‘But it wasn’t all plain sailing, was it, Mr Moss? In the days of King Henry VIII you could get your head cut off for being Catholic.’
Wilfrid’s eyes and mouth grew round. He loved tales of horror. ‘Cor! Could you really? When was that, then?’
‘A long time ago,’ Moss said firmly, not having the date to hand, ‘and we’ll not discuss heads being cut off at this table, thank you very much.’
Maria laughed, a sound like birdsong to the male ears. ‘But you are not wanting to cut off my ’ead now, surely?’ she asked, turning her smile on Wilfrid and causing the scorching blood to rush up from under his collar. ‘That would be so unkind! And then I would never smile again.’
Wilfrid could only gibber.
Frederick was observing her from under lowered eyelids, with a faint, contemplative smile. Catching Afton looking at him, he grinned and murmured, ‘Oh, this is going to be fun!’
Afton shook his head at him, though he was amused himself.
Crooks, he could see, was as smitten as anyone else.
And while Maria clearly regarded him as a benign uncle, there was nothing avuncular in Crooks’s heart: he treated her with the slightly proprietary awe of an older man suddenly finding himself possessed of a young and lovely bride.
To rescue the conversation, Afton said, ‘Tell us about Lord and Lady Leake. You were there after the baby was born, weren’t you?’
‘Oh, yes. Such a sweet baby, with lovely eyes like his mother’s,’ Maria said.
‘He will break hearts, that one, when he is older. But the house, it is on the canal, water everywhere – Dio mio! Me, I would not want to have a child in such a place. I would think all the time he will tumble out of a window and drown!’
‘But somehow people in Venice must have children, and bring them up safely,’ Afton said. ‘Otherwise there’d be no-one there.’
‘Because they are used to it, but it is not good sense. In Sicilia they live on a volcano – that is surely very stupid. Me, I like very much England, where there are no canals and no volcanoes and no-one is cutting off the ’eads.
’ She dimpled at Wilfrid again. ‘All is very safe and nice in England.’
‘I’m not sure you’re going to like your new home in Henley, then,’ Afton said. ‘It’s right on the river.’
Her eyes widened and she looked at Crooks. ‘E vero?’
He hastened to reassure her. ‘Oh, the river is there, but yards and yards away from the house. You can’t even see it from most of the windows. No danger at all.’
‘Unless it floods,’ said Frederick, ‘which I believe is not unusual in winter.’
Crooks gave him a furious look, and Afton went to the rescue again, saying, ‘What is the history of Venice, Mr Moss? Can you enlighten us? Who built it and so on?’
Moss swelled with pleasure at being appealed to, only regretting he had not yet studied the entries under V in his A–Z of Universal Knowledge in great detail.
He rummaged in his brain for what he had read in his first dash-through.
‘I believe it was the Romans, Mr Afton,’ he said, clearing his throat, ‘fleeing the invading Visigoths.’
It was such a pity that Visigoths began with V as well. If it had been the Franks or the Huns he’d have been on firmer ground.
The only disappointment of the wedding for Kitty was that Nina and Mr Cowling had declined the invitation.
She had been longing to see her dearest friend, and perhaps the baby too, and Angus had been most anxious that his kind patron should be invited.
But the exciting news was that the King had conferred a barony on Mr Cowling, and the Writ of Summons, which required his attendance at the House of Lords to take the Oath of Allegiance and sign the Test Roll, was unluckily issued for that same day, after which they had been invited for the weekend at Sandringham.