Chapter Fourteen #2
She slumps into the chair at her desk. The triangle is the tenth clue so there will be three more by Winifred’s reckoning.
Araminta scrabbles to find the notebook Johnathan gave her when she left London.
She recalls what Sister Winifred said about covering her tracks but she has always needed to write things down to puzzle them out.
At school her diary was peppered with algebraic calculations and Latin phrases.
This is becoming complicated and she requires clarity.
She opens the first page, the silver pencil poised, and writes:
Aunt Eilidh left me a tartan kerchief.
Clue 8 led to the castle.
Clue 9 from the castle to Heriot’s: a third point on the triangle.
Clue 10 the triangle led to a house on the High Street.
She sits back to consider this, then jumps at a smart knock on the drawing room door. She hurriedly shoves the map and the notebook into the desk as Eleanor enters. The maid cried most of last night and her eyes are still pink.
‘I wondered what you want me to say, ma’am? When I go to Mr McGhie’s later? He’ll be expecting me.’ Eleanor is fully resigned to the fact that she’s lost the trust of her mistress and has not got out of this onerous duty either.
Araminta removes to the sopha. She sets her mind to the task. The lie must take up the men’s time.
‘They’ll know you took the carriage,’ Eleanor adds. ‘At least they knew before.’
‘You must say I was summoned,’ Araminta ponders, wondering what Sir Walter Scott would make up in this situation.
Not that Sir Walter would find himself in a quandary such as this.
Perhaps from what her aunt says, Robert Burns would be a more likely co-conspirator.
‘You must say I’ve been summoned by a lord and you don’t know his name, but that I wore my best dress and spent an hour on my toilette. ’
Eleanor’s wide eyes betray her confusion. ‘A lord, ma’am?’
‘Yes. Then these men of yours shall try to find out who this lord might be, and Edinburgh being the town seat of a great many aristocrats, it will take a deal of time.’
Araminta feels pleased with herself. Eleanor less so.
‘And you were summoned?’ she confirms.
‘By a missive that came this morning, upon which you did not lay eyes. But by which I was exercised. Excited, you see.’
Eleanor nods slowly.
‘You will also tell them that I’ve enquired after our passage back to London.’
‘We’re going home?’ Eleanor feels her shoulders relax.
‘No. But they needn’t know that. You may tell them that I’ve said my business is almost done. You can go now.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Eleanor gives an odd little curtsey and takes her leave.
This story feels wrong. She wouldn’t believe it.
It’s like something out of a book in which the mistress is a scatter-brained heroine.
The maid cannot quite resign herself to simply doing as she’s told, when what she’s been told to do niggles.
Besides, something deep inside Eleanor Thrale wants to recapture Araminta’s trust.
Downstairs, Hester has finished cleaning and the scent of vinegar lingers in the hall. She and Agnes are now engaged in energetically blacking the fireplace in the dining room, which Araminta has yet to put to use. Eleanor tarries in the doorway.
‘Are you idling?’ Agnes spots her.
Eleanor shakes her head. ‘I’m on an errand. I’ll fetch my coat.’
‘You seem sad today.’
Eleanor bites her lip. ‘The mistress is awful cross with me,’ she admits.
‘Mess up her ribbons did you?’ Hester jokes. ‘Mislace her stays?’
‘It can’t be all that bad,’ Agnes adds, a smudge on her cheek. ‘Wear everything you’ve got. It’s cold out.’
Downstairs, Eleanor doesn’t remove her linen apron.
She pulls on her coat, then her scarf and hat.
As she emerges from the basement door the freezing air stuns her lungs.
She stares up at the long drawing room windows with tiny, ornate, cast-iron balconies.
The glass shines like mirrors in the sun.
It’s not that she objects to lying to Mr McGhie and Mr Thom, but Araminta’s story is as irritating as a scratchy, old semmit.
It takes her back to the day in Richmond months ago when there was uproar in the kitchen over a pie that was taken from the pantry and Eleanor knew, without reasoning it out, that the first footman must have snatched it, for he was courting a maid at a house by the river and it had been that girl’s monthly day and a sunny one besides.
Eleanor can’t read books or letters but she’s good at reading situations; her current fix notwithstanding.
Now she looks up and down the street to check if anyone is watching the house but there’s nobody in her line of view.
She starts to walk and checks again, for once she reaches the corner, anyone watching number four Glenfinlas Street would have to show themselves.
But still there’s nobody. Not behind her nor ahead, on the square.
Suddenly, it pops into her brain that the house is not being watched; not exactly.
Not from anywhere outside. The truth must be that she isn’t the only member of Mrs Moore’s staff on the gentlemen’s payroll.
There’s a reason the gentlemen knew she and Mrs Moore had gone to the castle but didn’t know what had happened inside.
Yes, she thinks, there can’t be a person on permanent watch.
They’d never follow quickly enough to fall in behind the carriage.
Besides, Charlotte Square has scarce a nook or a cranny to hide in.
The gentlemen’s informant has to be someone working at number four Glenfinlas Street, and, she reasons, given they knew where the coach had gone, that member of staff has to be the coachman.
If Eleanor continues blindly with the story Mrs Moore has just planned, the coachman will not back it up.
Pausing, the girl takes stock. Mrs Moore is distrustful of her and rightly so, but that does not cancel Eleanor’s moral duty to do the right thing.
She wishes, in fact, that she’d come clean to Araminta earlier, without the nun having to pinch her by the ear.
Then, perhaps, there’d be a better chance of redeeming herself.
Now she must do what she feels is best and present the mistress with a job well done.
So, instead of heading to Princes Street, Eleanor slips down the side of St George’s and into the mews.
On the far side of the courtyard, the door to the McKenzie stable is closed.
She doesn’t knock, but instead creaks open the latch.
‘Does she want me again?’ the coachman asks, scarcely looking up to see who’s come from the house.
Eleanor shakes her head. ‘I’m Eleanor,’ she introduces herself. They’ve nodded at each other, but never properly met.
The coachman raises his eyes and leans forward on the stool beside the stove where he’s been polishing the carriage brasses. The English maid calling on him is a promising development. He likes a girl with green eyes. ‘Davey,’ he says, putting down the woollen cloth that buffs up the shine.
Eleanor closes the door. She’d give this man all her savings if he’d treat with her for what she wants. But she knows the deal she makes has to win him over for goodness, or at least something that speaks to the person he wishes to be. Money won’t be enough.
Davey smirks. ‘Would you like a cup of barley wine, lass? Cook keeps me well supplied.’
Eleanor ignores the offer. She waits a moment. ‘They’re giving me two shillings a visit,’ she says. ‘The gentlemen, that is. Tell me, Davey, how much are they giving you?’