Abdication: A Novel (30 page)

E
vangeline had been spending a lot more time down at Cuckmere now that circumstances had changed. John Hunt had advised Philip that perhaps Joan would be better off in the nearby excellent cottage hospital where a full complement of nursing staff could assess and note even the tiniest of changes in her condition and Philip, wearied by the length of time it was taking for his wife to recover, had reluctantly agreed. With Joan no longer resident in the house, Evangeline was relieved to think she could stay at Cuckmere without the guilt of avoiding the invalid.

Evangeline’s mother had always said that August was a wicked month and Evangeline was hoping that the monthly characteristic would hold true this year. She felt she could do with a bit of wickedness. Checking the contents of the silver dishes on the sideboard, she placed two sausages, a spoonful of kedgeree, three rashers of bacon and a grilled tomato onto a plate and settled herself down at the head of the Cuckmere dining room table. An envelope addressed to Joan in green ink was sitting next to a basket of scones. Evangeline was surprised to see scones at that time of day and had quietly blessed Cooky for anticipating how they would be just as welcome at the beginning of the day as they always were at teatime.

Evangeline and Cooky were on excellent terms, unlike Evangeline’s
shaky relationship with Cooky’s opposite number in the Hamilton Terrace kitchen. That particular liaison had never really recovered from the suggestion that London Cook’s marinade of onion and wine-soaked kidneys might be responsible indirectly for poor Wiggle’s “unfortunate demise,” as the Blunt staff referred to it. London Cook remained adamant that any finger of suspicion pointed against her was quite unjustified and Evangeline had been unable to diffuse London Cook’s claims of false accusation. Evangeline had stressed on numerous occasions that Wiggle had long suffered from a congenital heart complaint and that the “demise” was neither the fault of May nor anything to do with a saucer of offal. But London Cook remained affronted and a frost between the two women had continued to hang in the air well into the balmy summer months.

However, it was all sunshine and sugar between Evangeline and Cooky, an important relationship that Evangeline took trouble to preserve. Cooky, a solid monarchist, had been impressed by Miss Nettlefold’s friendships in high places and as a result showed the American visitor an extra degree of respect. And Cooky had another reason for fostering this happy rapport. It made London Cook jealous. Cooky would flatter Evangeline by referring to Wiggle in altogether human terms, asking about the small dog’s “lineage” and assuming a doleful expression whenever there was cause to mention “the passing on.”

“Mark my words, Miss Nettlefold, Wiggle will be given in heaven the soul he was denied on earth,” Cooky assured Evangeline mysteriously but somehow comfortingly.

This reverence for Evangeline’s feelings complemented Cooky’s genius in the pastry department and cemented their mutual regard. All in all, Evangeline was beginning to prefer life in Sussex to that in London. Philip had begun to ask her for a little help with the running of the household. He had sought her opinion on flowers for the weekends, consulted her on menus, even discussed the composition of guests at
one of the recent house parties that he felt professionally compelled to give, despite Joan’s incapacity. Evangeline soon forgot last week’s regrettable occurrence when the maid had walked into her bedroom just when she was hiding the shards of an eighteenth-century French vase beneath the chocolate wrappers in her wastepaper basket. That day Wallis had cancelled an invitation to a formal dinner at Bryanston Court and Evangeline had demonstrated her disappointment by throwing the pretty object at the fireplace.

Now at last she had the chance to host dinner parties of her own. Last Saturday Evangeline had taken Joan’s place at one end of the dining room table as proxy hostess for her godmother, and afterwards Philip had gone so far as to say that he did not know quite how he would manage without Evangeline’s help.

“Thank you, Philip,” she said, risking a small kiss of gratitude on Philip’s cheek. “That means a great deal to me.”

As a result of her unexpected promotion, Evangeline was enjoying a new social confidence. She felt needed. When arranging the dinnerparty placement by pinning miniature handwritten name flags onto a leather-covered corkboard imprinted with the outline of a table, she positioned herself between the guest of honour—the director-general of the BBC, Sir John Reith—and the mayor of Eastbourne.

Ever since Evangeline’s arrival in England, she had found dinner parties something of an ordeal. The British adhered fiercely to the etiquette of having equal numbers of each gender around a dining table although the rule was treated with laxity by the Blunts. Even so, women guests entering the dining room either at Hamilton Terrace or Cuckmere Park would raise an eyebrow when they saw that their name card had been put next to that of Evangeline; her single status invariably threw the numbers out of kilter. In London the search for a spare, single man was less of a challenge. Several distinguished individuals, mostly confirmed bachelors, were happy to fill the role.
The choice in the country was more limited and had become an even greater problem for the Blunts since the Cuckmere vicar’s announcement that he would no longer be available for that purpose. His wife was so fed up at being left at home that she had threatened to stop doing the church flowers.

The day before the dinner, Sir John’s secretary had telephoned to say he would be coming alone, and even though Bettina had already been persuaded to come down to Cuckmere on one of her rare visits, Evangeline and Philip found themselves a woman short. At the last minute the headmistress of the village school had been asked to occupy the spare chair between Rupert and the senior librarian from the London Library, who was in residence cataloguing Sir Philip’s books.

“Do you think Miss Dobbs will have the right clothes?” Philip asked Evangeline at teatime. He was uncharacteristically nervous, his uncertainties about such matters no longer eased by his wife’s reassurances. “I hope she wears something other than those moth-eaten trousers, and remembers to brush that chewed hair. Honestly, sometimes she looks more like a Mr. than a Miss.”

Evangeline was too preoccupied with thoughts about her own gown to be much interested in Miss Dobbs’s dress sense.

“Between us,” Philip continued, “I have instructed Mrs. Cage that Miss Dobbs is not to be given too much wine. You never know when tongues unaccustomed to alcohol may run away with themselves, do you?”

Evangeline finally gave Philip her attention.

“I think you have nothing to worry about, my dear. I am certain the evening will go with a swing. And Miss Dobbs may surprise us as a marvellous addition to the table. Don’t they say teachers and librarians go together like …” Evangeline sought for a comparison, “… like a spoon and fork, or toast and marmalade? And now, if you will excuse me?”

And after giving him what was threatening to become a habitual peck on the cheek, Evangeline headed upstairs to begin the preparations for her evening toilette. Philip made sure she was out of sight before looking in the mirror and touching the spot where Evangeline’s lipstick had left an imprint the colour of a holly berry. As he wiped his cheek with his handkerchief he resolved to treat her with more kindness.

By the time the quails’ eggs had been cleared away, Evangeline was doing her best to fulfil her duties as a hostess. She had succeeded in feigning a rapt interest in the mayor of Eastbourne’s plans for new town housing. It had not been easy. Every time he lifted a forkful of egg to his mouth, the gold mayoral chain would swing forward and hit his plate with a clang. As soon as the plate of shellfish and asparagus was placed in front of her, Evangeline turned her attention to her right in relief. Sir John Reith had barely touched his first course and, as he watched Evangeline helping herself to a generous dollop of hollandaise, he explained that he suffered from “the terrors of a poor Scottish digestion.”

Sir John’s physical indisposition prompted a discussion between them of a case featured in the past few days in the newspapers. Recently a backbench MP representing a Leicestershire constituency had died in puzzling circumstances. Although the MP had been a married man it emerged that he had been having a secret affair with his much younger constituency secretary. For several years he had complained to his cook of breathlessness and had eventually died in some agony. A postmortem revealed that the cumulative effect of small quantities of mercury in his stomach had caused his death. The cook had reported her suspicions to the police and the MP’s wife was arrested on suspicion of poisoning her husband.

“I would conclude several things from the case,” Sir John said, rubbing his stomach. “First of all, infidelity is not a good idea. Secondly,
murder is hard to get away with. And thirdly, make sure all poisons are hidden from would-be assassins.”

His lack of interest in food freed up Sir John’s attention, allowing him to concentrate on his companion as she surprised him with a thorough knowledge of the differing strengths and weaknesses of various poisons.

“We had a swell teacher at my school back home in Baltimore,” Evangeline told him. “Professor Meredith had a long beard and my favourite lessons were the ones with him in the chemistry lab. Once his beard caught fire in my friend Wallis’s Bunsen burner, although I managed to put it out with water from the goldfish bowl. After that Professor M. kind of took a shine to me. When the other girls were taking extra tennis classes I would go to the lab and help him experiment on the rats with poison.”

“This is fascinating. Do go on,” Sir John said encouragingly.

“Well, sometimes we used a dab of the Brazilian wandering spider venom and that was very effective: loss of muscle control, paralysis and then death. Then there was cyanide, speediest of all, and strychnine—that took a little longer. My favourite was sarin, a kind of gas that we once tried on a rabbit, the size of a puppy. I’ll never forget it.” Evangeline’s voice had become trancelike at the memory. “The rabbit lay down on its back at the first whiff. The professor never let us test mercury as the process takes too long to take effect. Mind you, strychnine and cyanide can both be concealed in drinks, which makes it dangerous stuff as we all have to drink, don’t we, Sir John?”

Evangeline drew a breath, followed by a swig from her wine glass and allowed herself a moment to assess her solo audience. Sir John was a handsome man about the same age as herself, Evangeline guessed, perhaps a year older, but what a position of power he had reached in the same time span!

Evangeline was enjoying herself. Not since her first few weeks in England had anyone been quite as interested in what she had to say, let alone someone who was
such
a someone. Julian, for example, never seemed to listen to her. Of course, at his age Julian did not have the sophisticated maturity of Sir John. That long-ago encouraging wink before Wallis’s dinner party had proved his interest in her, of course, and it had been her own clumsy behaviour that night that had discouraged him from pursuing those feelings. She was pretty certain that he was not committed to his silly girlfriend Charlotte with her unnecessarily suggestive behaviour. No. Evangeline had no one to blame but herself that no matter how hard she tried to command Julian’s attention he appeared distracted. Come to think of it, he was always wanting to go somewhere in the car, whether it be to see Joan in the hospital or be taken to the station. Not for the first time did she consider how dreary it must be spending so much time travelling about in the car on his own with only the foolishly besotted May for company.

However, in her place at the head of the Cuckmere table, Evangeline was able to put Julian from her mind. She also forgot her frustration of earlier in the evening when the flat-chested, androgynous look, currently so in vogue, had persisted in evading her despite all her efforts with a stretchy crêpe bandage. Sir John’s eyes were directed not at the substantial cleft of her chest but on her mouth and the words that were tumbling from it. He was clearly much more than a pinch-and-tickle man.

“Good gracious,” he said, “you have the makings of a most effective detective! I wouldn’t wonder if you are a fan of Agatha Christie stories or should I say Dashiell Hammett from your side of the ocean? Marvellous book that,
The Thin Man
, didn’t you think?”

Evangeline would have been happy to pursue the discussion about crime fiction but Sir John seemed keen to return to her account of life at school in Baltimore.

“You must have been one of the most popular girls there,” he observed confidently as he offered her the use of the silver pepper grinder that lay between them.

Evangeline blushed and smiled as prettily as she could. Perhaps it was the new French style of chignon into which Wallis’s hairdresser, Antoine, had cleverly arranged her lighter coloured wig that was captivating Sir John.

“I understand from Philip that you have been acquainted with Mrs. Simpson since your school days,” Sir John was saying, “although you do not appear to have left those days behind very long ago!”

Evangeline found herself a little more forthcoming than she had intended, realising that she had already drained a third—or was it a fourth?—glass of Chablis. She looked across the table to Miss Dobbs, who was performing admirably in her seat between Rupert and the librarian. Rupert was being at his most Etonian-charming, despite Miss Dobbs’s green tie. Evangeline turned back to her own dinner companion.

“We all wonder a little about exactly what
is
going on there down in the woods at Fort Belvedere,” he was saying, “although it is far for me to pry. What I really want to ask is did anyone ever tell you what a most unusual voice you have? Forgive me my professional interest, but I cannot help but notice a voice. And yours is pure velvet in texture.” Sir John was aligning his unused fish knife and fork in exact parallel with the pudding spoon and fruit knife as he spoke. He was evidently a precise sort of man.