India Black and the Widow of Windsor (18 page)

“That would wear on anyone. At least the Queen doesn’t snort castor sugar and spray it all over her dining companions.”

That got a laugh, as I knew it would. “By the way, what does the Earl of Dalfad do while his wife gallivants around with the Queen?”

Effie put down her teacup and gave me a look of severe disappointment, like a sixth-form schoolmaster who’d just been told that Epicurus was some Roman chappie with a propensity for hair shirts and self-flagellation. “There is no Earl of Dalfad.”

“Is he dead? Is she actually the Dowager Countess?”

Flora looked a bit shocked as well. “Didn’t you know, India? There is no Earl of Dalfad. The countess has never been married. She holds the title in her own right.”

Their reaction made me uneasy, not to mention puzzled. Every Englishman knows that a countess is a countess because she married an Earl, and that titles pass only along the male line. This means that Dear Old Blighty is run by a small, very select group of braying, inbred nincompoops who inherited their estates and titles by virtue of being the first infant with a penis to pop out of the womb. In this scheme of things, women are just so many brood mares, chosen for their bloodlines or fortunes, and if they’re lucky, they acquire in the marriage process a title and a husband who doesn’t spend much time at home. I was dying to know how the countess became a countess, but as Flora and Effie had reacted as though any fool would know the answer, I didn’t fancy asking more questions. I’d drawn enough attention to myself.

 

 

 

I had attended to my duties, smartening up the marchioness for tea and dinner, filling her snuffbox, sponging the wet snuff from her tea gown and then her evening gown, listening to her croak admiringly of the sweetbreads and meringues she’d shoveled into her gullet, and finally bundling her into bed with a hot water bottle at her feet. I’d collapsed into my own narrow cot, having had a rather long day. I’m a Londoner, born and bred, and probably don’t walk four blocks without calling a hansom cab. An hour spent straggling over rocks and hills in the cold air had left me exhausted. I snuggled under the covers and was asleep before I’d pinched out the candle.

I slept soundly until roused by a hammering at the door.

“Miss Black?”

By now I recognized Robbie Munro’s voice. I groaned.

“The Marchioness?” I asked. Unnecessarily.

“Yes. She requires your presence.”

I struggled upright and into my clothes, wiping the sleep from my eyes and hoping that the old lady hadn’t forgotten we’d already read
Troilus and Criseyde.
There was no way I could endure that again.

My employer was propped up in bed with a shawl around her shoulders and a glass of whisky in her hand, which she waved vaguely in my direction, leading me to believe that she’d indulged in a glass or two of the stuff already.

“There ye are, Iphigenia.”

Iphigenia?
I was beginning to feel like French. Correcting the old lady, however, was just so much wasted breath.

“What can I do for you, my lady?”

“I’m in the mood for a story tonight. Fetch the Bible, and ye can read me the tale of Samson and Delilah.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. I had only to plough through three chapters of the Book of Judges. With luck, the old lady would be asleep before Samson got hold of the pillars and buried the Philistines in a heap of rubble. Besides, I quite like Samson, being a towering oak of a fellow and a womanizer who consorted with harlots and ripped lions apart with his bare hands. I’m not sure I buy the part where he slays a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass, or ties torches to the tails of three hundred foxes so they can scamper across the Philistines’ fields and set them alight. I suppose a donkey’s jaw could be an effective weapon initially, but it would be smashed to bits after crushing twenty craniums or so. And as for the foxes, well, hard to imagine how the first two hundred and ninety-nine occupied their time, waiting for the three hundredth to get prepped and ready (“I say, old chap, ready for a run? Makes a bit of a change from the hounds, what?”) But it makes for a good story, and I’d rather read about a hairy brute with superhuman strength than that milquetoast Troilus any day. But I digress.

The marchioness sipped her drink, and I started in with chapter 13, the most boring bit where Manoah and his wife (never identified by name, but you’ll find that quite common in the Good Book: the most inconsequential fellow has a moniker and his poor barren wife, who has to do the hard yards, remains anonymous) get a visit from an angel informing them they’ll have a son, but for God’s sake, whatever you do, don’t cut his hair. Things pick up after that, what with the jawbone incident and the foxes and Samson getting married but being betrayed by his wife (another woman who shall remain anonymous because old Samuel the author was either a misogynist or an amnesiac).

I had just gotten to the part where Samson makes the fatal mistake of marrying that trollop Delilah, when the marchioness sat up straight and cackled into her whisky glass.

“Have ye noticed, Iphigenia, that the fair sex always brings a man to his knees?”

I could have elaborated on that theme, but I didn’t think the marchioness was strong enough to hear the catalog of sexual positions available at Lotus House.

“Mmm,” I murmured in agreement.

“There’s Samson, as strong as an ox”—and about as smart as one, I might have added—“and he falls for some little bobtail who’s willin’ to deliver the secret of his strength to the Philistines.”

“Well, the remuneration was tempting,” I said. “Eleven hundred pieces of silver from each of the lords of the Philistines if Delilah discovered Samson’s secret. I mean, even I might find that too enticing to pass up.”

The marchioness peered at me over the rim of her glass. “I’m not surprised that Samson is taken in by Delilah, for when it comes to women, most men have the brains of a stag durin’ the rut, which is to say, none at all. Samson should have confirmed his choice with another lass. She’d likely have seen through Delilah’s charms and saved Samson from endin’ up as the afternoon matinee for the Philistines.”

“You think women are better judges of character than men?” I asked.

“I am,” she announced. “I hope ye are as well.” She looked uncharacteristically sober for a moment, with the shawl tucked up under her chin and the tumbler of whisky trembling in her hand. “I don’t think either of us would have been deceived by Delilah.”

I turned a few pages while my mind worked furiously. Had the marchioness rumbled me? If not, why this pointed conversation about treacherous sluts lining their pockets with ill-gotten gains? It was enough to make me wonder if I had allowed my disguise to slip in some way. But even if I had, surely the old topsy was too dotty to have noticed that my service as a lady’s maid left something to be desired? And how could she have made the leap from servant to whore? It beggared belief that a woman who couldn’t tell snuff from face powder had the wit to uncover a bint in the castle.

I did not have to confront this issue, however, being saved from doing so by the sound of running footsteps thundering past the marchioness’s door.

“Who can that be at this hour?” said the marchioness. “Don’t they realize people are tryin’ to sleep?”

I bit back a response that would have included acid agreement on the lack of consideration on the part of those who disturbed the slumbers of others.

“Don’t just sit there like a dolt, Iphigenia. Get up and see what’s goin’ on out there.”

I put down the Bible and cracked the door. Officious-looking servants were bustling along the hallway, and I saw the nightcapped heads of half a dozen guests popping out of their rooms. Effie, Lady Dalfad’s maid, came scurrying past, her lips pinched and her face colourless.

“Psst, Effie,” I hissed. “What’s happening?”

She hesitated, torn between ostentatiously going about her duties and being the first to spread the gossip. “It’s the Queen. She’s fallen ill. Lady Dalfad has been summoned. And Doctor Jenner, the Queen’s physician.” She scuttled off with an air of self-importance.

“Well?” the marchioness demanded.

“Her Majesty is ill. The doctor has been summoned.”

The marchioness snorted. “That idiot Jenner? His idea of treatment is to bring out the leeches and then go off to smoke his pipe. Hope it’s nothin’ serious; God help the poor woman if it is. Nothin’ we can do, of course. I was just about to nod off until all that uproar occurred.”

I cursed under my breath.

“I don’t believe we’d finished Samson yet. Start again, will ye? At the part where Delilah fastens Samson’s hair with a pin. That always gives me a laugh.”

So I read the old lady to sleep but not before we’d finished the story of Samson and Delilah, and plodded through several more uplifting stories from the Old Testament. The marchioness was a great one for fire and brimstone, and she kept me at it through the destruction of one city after another by sword and treachery until she finally fell asleep with her empty glass clutched in her hand and her mouth open. I pried the glass from her grasp and smoothed the covers, then slipped off to my own bed. The corridors were silent but for a few grim-faced coves wondering about and conversing in low whispers. As I turned into the servants’ stairwell, I caught a glimpse of Dizzy and French conversing by candlelight. I considered trying to attract their attention, but a stern-visaged footman carrying a ewer and a towel was bearing down on me, and I decided to retreat to Flora’s room. If French needed me, he knew where to find me.

 

 

 

I was awakened the next morning at dawn (which, I should point out, was only minutes after I had fallen into bed) by the strangled wail of the Great Highland War Pipe.

Flora sighed at the sound. “That’s ‘Hieland Cathedral.’ Isn’t it fine? It’s one of my favorites.”

“I thought it was a calf bawling for its mother,” I said sourly.

“Oh, India, you are a card. You’d think you’d never heard a bagpipe before.” Flora flung off the covers. “Did you hear? The Queen was sick last night. Her doctor had to come.”

I yawned. “I was down the hall with the marchioness when it happened. Do you know what ails Her Highness?”

Flora shrugged. “Dyspepsia, I think. That sounds likely, given how Her Majesty can put away the food. She probably had too much pudding for dinner last night. It’s happened before.”

I rinsed my face and donned my uniform, shivering. Downstairs I helped myself to a cup of coffee and a plate of sausages and sat down at the table for a leisurely breakfast. The mood was subdued, the usual chatter muffled, and the flirtatious exchanges between maids and footmen that I had heard during previous meals were absent. A young footman, hair slicked back and his kilt and jacket immaculately brushed, sidled up to me. He surveyed the room quickly, reaching into the pocket of his jacket.

“Miss Black? I’ve a message for you.” He glanced around quickly once more, then palmed the envelope into my hand.

I slid the envelope into the waistband of my skirt while I finished my breakfast. Then I found a quiet corner and tore open the message. As I expected, it was from French, requesting that I meet him at half past noon in the front parlor. The time did not present an obstacle, but the location did, as I had no idea how to find it on my own. I went off in search of Flora, composing as I went a plausible excuse for needing to visit the parlor.

 

 

 

How French and I were supposed to hold a private conversation in the parlor was anybody’s guess, as another of the Queen’s guests might drop in at any moment, or a maid might take it upon herself to run the feather duster over the furniture at any time. Still, I arrived at the room at precisely the appointed hour (having extracted directions from one of the footmen, saving me from what would no doubt have been a good deal of curiosity from Flora). French had arrived before me and was leaning casually against the mantelpiece, examining a bust of Prince Albert.

“Don’t you get enough of him?” I asked.

“He is ubiquitous,” agreed French, smiling.

“Bit spooky, if you ask me.” I took care to stand a few feet from French, with my hands clasped, just in case anyone wandered in and assumed a tryst, which would earn French points with the other rogue males and mean the end of my employment by the marchioness.

French took a step in my direction and I backed away.

“What are you doing? Come closer so I don’t have to raise my voice.”

I explained why I kept my distance. “Besides, I’m not getting within a foot of you ever again unless you promise you won’t snatch me like an undergraduate on his first visit to a brothel.”

“India,” French said reproachfully. “Do you think I intended to, to . . .”

“Have your way with me?” I asked.

French reddened. “That is not what I meant. I was merely trying to project a plausible image of an aristocrat taking advantage of a servant since the Prince of Wales had wandered into the room. I had no intention of taking it any further than that.”

I had not expected French to ravish me when he had wrapped himself around me like a python in front of Bertie, but I must admit to feeling a hint of disappointment at the news. That hint of disappointment gave rise to a hint of unease; what the deuce was I doing feeling deflated that French hadn’t intended to sweep me up and carry me off like a Viking raider? I was well aware of the effect I had on men, and just such a reaction to my proximity would not be at all unusual. Were my charms fading? Surely not. The Prince of Wales had certainly seemed enamored with me. French, on the other hand, had never done a single thing that might be interpreted as forward, save for that tango we’d performed for Bertie’s benefit. Was that time’s winged chariot I could hear rumbling in the background? If I looked in the mirror, would I find a wrinkle? Had I lost the power to bewitch men? Had I ever bewitched French? And, confound it, why was I asking myself these questions? It was totally unlike me to doubt my abilities and totally unlike me to seek confirmation of my beauty from French. The Archbishop of Canterbury would have adhered to the tenets of Buddhism by the time French even noticed I was a woman. With difficulty, I wrenched my thoughts away from these vexing questions and tried to focus on what French was saying.