Death at Gallows Green (5 page)

Mrs. Pratt's concern might not have been so acute if it were not for the fact that two of the servants—the coachman Pocket and Amelia, lady's maid to Miss Ardleigh—were at a vulnerable age. To complicate matters, Amelia was Mrs. Pratt's niece, her only sister's second daughter. And Mrs. Pratt's worry was not without foundation. Amelia had come in that afternoon, her face flushed, the flounce on her skirt torn, her shoes dirty. She had washed up, helped with tea, and said scarce a word, keeping her eyes on her work the whole while.

By itself, this behaviour might not seem of great consequence. But Amelia was not the first of Mrs. Pratt's nieces to have been in service at Bishop's Keep, and therein was the genesis of Mrs. Pratt's uneasiness. Amelia's sister, Jenny, had been a parlour maid. Remembering Jenny, Mrs. Pratt's lips pinched together and she shivered. Jenny had been a foolish girl, and pretty, but not half so pretty as her younger sister. Her foolishness was in the way of bearing sad fruit when the situation came to the notice of Jaggers, who turned her out. Six months later, the Chelmsford constable had come bearing a little bundle of clothes. Jenny had died in the workhouse there, she and the babe with her. It had been a bitter, bitter thing, for Mrs. Pratt had felt in her soul that she was responsible for Jenny's misconduct. And now there was Amelia, who seemed to be following along the dangerous path of her sister, slipping and sliding to certain ruin.

It was in this preoccupied state of mind that Mrs. Pratt finished clearing the dishes onto a large tray, including the pink-and-white pie dish from which the household staff had eaten every crumb of a fine steak-and-kidney pie, and carried the tray to the kitchen, where she poured hot water from the kettle into the basin and began the washing-up. While she did so, Harriet the scullery tidied the table, swept the floor, mended the fire, and brought in a scuttle of coal, pausing at the last to fill the large china teapot with boiling water for Mrs. Pratt's after-dinner cup.

Mrs. Pratt was polishing the last dish when Mudd came in and poured himself a cup of tea. “Shall ye 'ave a cup too, Mrs. P?” he inquired. There was a more-than-usually-thoughtful look on his thin face. Mudd was only twenty-six, too young to be a proper butler, and had been until year before last a London footman. Mrs. Pratt would have given a good deal to know why he had taken a place in the country, away from the enticements of city living, but so he had, and he had done modestly well. He was uncommonly intelligent, able to speak both the upstairs and downstairs dialects (an unusual ability that he used to clear advantage with both servants and masters), and rather more conscientious than most servants. Mrs. Pratt saw in him a clear promise, if he could keep his mind on learning to butler and cease fancying himself quite the dandy.

“I b'lieve so, Mudd, thank ye.” Mrs. Pratt took off her apron and shook it, then put it back on again, clean side out.

As she took her mug of tea and sat down by the fire, Mudd caught her eye and nodded significantly at Harriet, who was hanging up the pots. Mrs. Pratt took his meaning and nodded back.

“That'll be all fer t‘night, lass,” she said. “Tomorrow'll be fish, if Willie Hogglestock has a decent plaice in his cart, an' you shall cook it.” Upon Jaggers's demise, Mrs. Pratt had been promoted from cook to housekeeper. She still carried out most of the cooking duties, but Harriet (although young) was in training for the place. Whenever possible, Mrs. Pratt gave the girl the opportunity to exercise responsibility.

Harriet's face glowed. “Thank you, Mrs. Pratt.” She swallowed, then emboldened herself. “May I . . . may I take a candle? I 'ud like t' read.”

Mrs. Pratt's hesitation had more to do with the reading than the candle, for Jaggers's passionate injunctions against novels still echoed in her ears as loudly as did the injunction against an open flame in the servants's sleeping quarters. It did seem to Mrs. Pratt that what was printed these days was mostly trash, full of murders and thieving and illicit affairs, not morally fit for a young girl.

But Miss Ardleigh had quite a different attitude. She had instituted daily periods of reading aloud for Harriet and the tweeny, Nettie. They had begun with the newspaper, but the young miss, for Christmas, had given each of them a book: to Nettie a copy of
Little Women,
and to Harriet
Jo's Boys
, both by an American woman named Alcott. Nettie had little interest in her book and soon laid it down. But Harriet (Mrs. Pratt knew) stole a few minutes daily to pursue hers. She had finished it some weeks ago and was now reading Nettie's.

Mudd settled himself by the fire. “Let ‘er take hit,” he said, in the strong native Cockney he used on the servants' side of the green baize door. “Won't 'urt 'er, I warrant.” He twinkled up at Harriet, for whom he was known to have a brotherly softness. “So long's ye don't burn th' bloody 'ouse dawn,” he added.

Mrs. Pratt nodded, although with reluctance. The matter of novel reading had become quite vexed since Amelia's discovery, in the young miss's room, of a sheaf of typed pages. It appeared to be a story that Miss Ardleigh was in the process of
writing.
Amelia had spoken of her find to Clara, the new parlour maid, who had told Mrs. Pratt, and well she might, since it was Mrs. Pratt's responsibility to know what went on in the house. The story was entitled
The Conspiracy of the Golden Scarab
and appeared written under the name of one Beryl Bardwell—and a very sensational story, at that. What's more, under the bed they found several other stories under that same name, all published in an American magazine. It was an unsettling discovery.

“Imagine!” Clara had breathed excitedly as she flipped the pages in one of the magazines. “Our young miss is famous! I wonder why she don't let her light shine i' th' world, ‘stead o' hidin' it under a bushel.”

“She has her reasons, I'm sure,” Mrs. Pratt said evasively, although she did not think that the Biblical quotation could be applied to what her mistress was about. And she could not for the life of her imagine why Miss Ardleigh, with the fortune she had inherited, would spend her time hunched over a typewriter, pecking out scandalous stories. But the young miss had stood for her when she needed a friend, and she'd stand for the young miss, as long as need be—although she had to admit to reservations about novel writing and bicycle riding during Evensong.

She pushed the magazines back under the bed. “Stop gabblin' and get t' yer dustin',” she'd told Clara sternly. “An' not a word o' this bus'ness outside th' house, if ye value yer place.” The next morning, all the servants had been warned to hold their tongues, and all had pledged their solemn promise to keep Miss Ardleigh's secret. The fact that Mrs. Pratt had not heard a whisper of it in the village proved that they had been true to their word.

“Well, now,” Mrs. Pratt said, when Harriet had scurried away with her candle, “what's in yer mind, Mudd? Ye look that vexed, ye do.” For with Harriet's departure, Mudd's face had gone dark.

“It's Amelia,” said Mudd.

“What about Amelia?” Mrs. Pratt asked.

“Lawrence,” Mudd said, cupping his mug. “The Marsden's footman.”

Mrs. Pratt felt the stirrings of a deep foreboding. “How d'ye know this?”

“She told me.” He gave her a direct look, and softened his tone. “Steel yerself, Mrs. P. There's been a killin'.”

Mrs. Pratt felt her heart lurch in her chest. “A killin'!” she whispered, scarcely able to comprehend. “A
killin'?”

But before Mudd could elaborate, there came a loud knock at the kitchen door. Mrs. Pratt, still in a state of stunned shock, got to her feet, groped her way to the door, and opened it. On the doorstep before her, as if summoned by Mudd's awful revelation, stood none other than Constable Laken. Mrs. Pratt felt she knew the constable quite well, for she had once spent a night in his gaol and a good part of the next morning answering his impertinent questions pertaining to the deaths of the elder Miss Ardleigh and her sister Mrs. Jaggers. But she had long since excused that impertinence. The constable had only been doing his duty then, as he clearly was now.

“Yer've come fer Amelia,” Mrs. Pratt said, low.

“Yes,” the constable said. He stepped inside. “You know, then?”

Mrs. Pratt closed the door. “The worst,” she replied. Automatically, she went to the teapot, filled a mug, and handed it to the constable. He pulled a chair forward to the fire, warming his hands.

“Pore Lawrence,” Mrs. Pratt said, shaking her head. She had only seen the man a time or two—handsome, he was, with a quick tongue. Little good his looks or his tongue would do him now.

“Yes,” the constable said. “It's very difficult for him, too, you understand.”

Mrs. Pratt sat down. “I'd
say,”
she said. She knew the constable to be a man of understatement, but this was remarkable even for him. “What'll happen now?”

“I'll need to talk to Amelia, of course,” the constable said, “Is she here?”

“I'll fetch her,” Mudd volunteered, and left the room.

“Will ye 'rrest her tonight?” Mrs. Pratt asked fearfully, thinking of the cold, dark gaol, and wondering how she was ever going to break the news to her dear sister Rose, who had not yet recovered from sweet Jenny's death. And to Miss Ardleigh. That such a thing should happen when she, Sarah Pratt, was alone with the household, in charge of the staff, and responsible for her niece's behaviour! Mrs. Pratt felt as if she herself had done the unspeakable deed.

“No,” the constable said. “I won't arrest her at all.”

Mrs. Pratt's moral indignation flared. “Not at all!” she cried, her heart swelling for the victim. “Why, man, a murder's been done! Where's yer sense o' justice? If 'twere my own daughter killed Lawrence, I'd have ye 'rrest her!”

“It wasn't Lawrence who was killed,” the constable said. “Where'd you get that idea?” He looked into his cup. “It was Sergeant Oliver, the constable from Gallows Green.”

“Sergeant Oliver!” Mrs. Pratt threw her apron over her head, her dismay unbounded. “Dear Gawd, an' him with wife an' babe! How could she? How
could
she?”

“I hardly think that Amelia is all that much to blame,” the constable said mildly. “All she did was go larkin' with Lawrence. They stumbled on Oliver's body when they went through a hedge on Lamb's Lane.”

Mrs. Pratt dropped her apron and stared at him. “She didn't—?”

But her question was interrupted by the appearance of Mudd and the ashen Amelia, a fact for which Mrs. Pratt would be forever after grateful. She would hate to admit to the constable, or Mudd, or most especially to Amelia, that she had for even one instant considered her niece capable of murder.

By the time the constable had finished questioning Amelia, Mrs. Pratt had fully recovered herself. After showing the constable out, she closed the door and whirled on the girl in full fury.

“The lane!” she cried. “An' wot were ye doing, my fine girl, skulkin' in the lane with a footman?”

Ten minutes later, a contrite Amelia crept out of the kitchen, and Mrs. Pratt, feeling that her duty to her sister, to her mistress, and to God had been fully discharged, went to the cupboard and uncorked the cooking wine.

“O
h, Kate,
DEAR
Kate! I
AM
so very glad to see you!”

“Marriage hasn't changed you one bit, Ellie,” Kate said, returning her friend's warm embrace as they stood in a corner of the Melford drawing room.

“Not at all?” Eleanor Marsden Farley asked with a little pout, displaying a dainty white arm decked with diamonds. Beside her stood a short, stout, wary-looking man of forty or so, wearing a pince-nez on his too-short nose and garbed in a double-breasted frock coat and a white satin waistcoat strained across the buttons. Eleanor took his left hand and pulled him forward, smiling winsomely as she made introductions. “Miss Ardleigh lives very near Marsden Manor, Mr. Fairley. She was a guest at our wedding, you will recall.”

Mr. Fairley might well not recall meeting her, Kate thought, especially since the guests had numbered nearly five hundred. But she could not forget the wedding. The Marsden-Fairley nuptials had been celebrated at fashionable St. Paul's in Knightsbridge, whose wedding register was a roster of social luminaries. It was a glittering event, for which Lord Marsden was said to have laid out the equivalent of a year's rents.

Mr. Fairley peered at Kate over his pince-nez. “Miss Ardleigh, to be sure.” He coughed slightly. “Mrs. Fairley has spoken of you.”

“I'm glad,” Kate said, looking at Eleanor. “I think of her often.” It was true. Life at Bishop's Keep was always interesting but often lonely, for although Kate was surrounded by servants, there was no one to whom she could talk openly. Ellie had not yet proved to be that kind of friend, but she might have been, had they more time together.

“Mrs. Fairley might perhaps enjoy a renewal of her acquaintance with you,” Mr. Fairley remarked speculatively, as if Eleanor were not standing at his elbow. “Perhaps if you came up to London, something might be arranged.”