The Dead Queen's Garden (10 page)

A
LETTER WAS
waiting for her when Charlotte walked into the drawing-room at Rowan Lodge and found Lady Frampton resigned to their impending removal to the manor. ‘What’s this?’ she frowned. ‘I don’t know the handwriting.’

The old lady shrugged her massive shoulders. ‘It was delivered by hand an hour or so since,’ she explained.

‘Good God!’ Charlotte had briefly scanned the short missive and now raised startled hazel eyes to her aged relative. ‘It’s from Miss Nightingale, of all people.’

‘You don’t say?’ Lady Frampton swivelled round in her chair to stare. ‘Well, girl, get on with it. What does she want with you?’

‘She’s offering me a situation,’ announced Charlotte, looking blank. At the old lady’s astonished outcry, she nodded and went back to the letter. ‘I know, it sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? But apparently she is serious. Listen to this, Gran:
“I was impressed by your sensible behaviour and quiet competence in an emergency and would be glad to make use of these qualities which are sadly lacking in most young women I have encountered. As you may recall, I mentioned that I am collecting funds with the aim of establishing an order of nurses so that the disastrous inefficiency of the hospitals, as demonstrated in the late war in the Crimea, may be avoided in future.

“With this in mind, I wish to offer you a senior post in an administrative role, as yet to be defined, in the proposed nursing organisation. From enquiries I have made, I understand that you have no ties other than your late husband’s family at Finchbourne Manor, so I am confident that you will see the good sense of accepting my offer.

Believe me, yrs, etc, etc….”

‘What in the world am I to make of that?’ Charlotte looked up
from the letter and was dismayed to see that the old lady was looking upset. ‘What is it, darling Gran? Are you not well?’

‘No, no, me dear,’ the old lady patted her hand and gave a mighty sniff. ‘I’m well enough. T’was just the thought that you might be goin’ off to join ’er ’igh and mightiness.’

‘You foolish old lady,’ exclaimed Charlotte, fondly embracing her grandmother-in-law. ‘As if I would dream of doing such a thing. Lay that fear aside at once, I could no more work with Miss Nightingale than I could work with Melicent Penbury. But it’s quite flattering, is it not? I suppose she means me to work at this new hospital at Netley that the Queen has just opened? Just fancy: I am sensible and quietly competent!’

‘And so you are, me dear, but don’t tell our Lily or she’ll be jealous as a cat.’ Lady Frampton, beaming with relief, was now ready to appreciate the situation. ‘Whatever you do, don’t mention the new horspital to Miss Nightingale if you meet ’er again, she can’t abide it. Probably because they won’t build it the way she told ’em to.’

‘Put it out of your mind, Gran,’ Charlotte reassured her with a smile. ‘I admire Miss Nightingale, of course I do, but I’m far too independent and downright stubborn myself, to buckle down under her iron rule. Why, I thought Lady Granville a terrifying enough woman when I first encountered her, but in comparison with The Lady with the Lamp, she’s a woolly lamb.’

Dinner at the manor proved something of an anti-climax as far as Charlotte was concerned. Barnard’s bluff hospitality masked the abstraction of their two unexpected guests and Lily was happy to be queening it over a full table. Lady Frampton’s temper improved visibly as she tucked in to a hearty helping of roast beef, preceded by an array of what the old lady stigmatised as ‘kickshaws’. Nonetheless, Charlotte observed with a smile, her dear relative sampled every dish so that by the time the pudding made its appearance, Lady Frampton was positively mellow.

By tacit consent, the death of Maria Dunster was not mentioned, any more than that of young Mrs Chant, and Captain Penbury must have had a word with his irritating wife because the lady was
on her best behaviour, nodding and smiling at everything her host said. I don’t know which is worse, sighed Charlotte, Melicent being a cat, or Melicent in this odiously compliant mood.

It lasted a mere half hour until Lady Frampton made some remark about the handsome new carpet in the bedroom she always used at the manor, nodding her thanks to Lily.

‘Do you not find there is a risk of accident, Lady Frampton?’ Melicent turned to the old lady. ‘Not having the carpet nailed down, I mean? I always think there is something a little shabby about a room that has the boards showing.’

Lily swelled angrily and was about to demolish her infuriating guest when, to her surprise, Dr Chant stepped in to her rescue. ‘I think you will find, Madam,’ he addressed himself to Melicent, icily polite, ‘that there is a considerable risk to health where carpets are nailed down, with the accumulation of dust and other noxious irritants. Besides, persons of quality, such as our gracious hosts, are aware – as perhaps you are not – that a house of great antiquity such as Finchbourne Manor, which dates in the main from Tudor times, needs no tawdry decoration.’

After that, it was war. Entirely ignoring Melicent, who was gobbling like a turkey cock, with an angry flush in her pasty cheeks and a lock of lank dark hair flopping on her brow – and the
astonished
but gratified expressions of his hosts – Dr Chant ate his dinner with an air of dignified abstraction and bowed himself away to his bed after the meal, leaving Barnard and the captain to take their port in gentlemanly isolation, safe from the their
womenfolk
. Miss Armstrong, who was understandably pale and had picked at her food, did not hasten away quite so quickly, but followed Lily and the other ladies to the drawing-room.

Melicent spent five minutes sobbing on the window-seat, then finding herself ignored by the other ladies, she tried another tack, throwing out spiteful little remarks about the medical guest and attempting to elicit sympathy for the way she had been spoken to. When she began on the topic of the death at Brambrook Abbey, Charlotte was about to intervene, very reluctantly, when Lady Frampton beckoned the former governess to her side.

‘You will be silent,’ she said shortly. ‘It ill becomes you to make
so much noise in a house where you are a guest. I advise you to recollect your station and to mind your manners. The villain is long gone, the inquest dealt with that poor woman’s death and she ’as been buried, so let ’er lie in peace. And you can stop that
slanderous
gossip about the doctor too, this instant.’

After that, Melicent clearly determined to behave herself so she limped over to the grand piano and announced that she would entertain the company by playing some seasonal music. She then launched into a mercifully quiet rendition of the fine but lugubrious old hymn, ‘Behold the Great Redeemer makes, himself a house of clay’. Charlotte was unable to persuade herself that it was a particularly tactful choice in the present
circumstances
, but glancing across the drawing-room, she surprised an unmistakable glint of amusement in Sibella Armstrong’s eye. Attracted and curious, she moved unhurriedly over and sat down beside the guest.

‘I would ask Mrs Penbury to play something more uplifting,’ she murmured, ‘but I’m afraid it might set her off on to her symptoms again, if she is interrupted, and I simply can’t bear any more details.’

The other girl bit back a smile. ‘I shouldn’t have laughed,’ she said. ‘I’m sure she means well. Please don’t worry, I wasn’t upset by the gloomy music, it’s just that it reminded me of a wedding at my father’s church. Edward, my brother, used to stand in if the organist was indisposed, and he played that hymn because the bridegroom was a Mr Clay.’ The fleeting smile was in evidence once more, ‘Father was furious but the bridal pair took it as a compliment.’

The slight flush that had animated Sibella’s face now ebbed and Charlotte said quietly, ‘I do hope that you will have a real rest while you are at the manor, Miss Armstrong. I know Lily and Barnard are anxious to make your stay as comfortable as possible at this difficult time.’

‘Thank you, everyone is so kind.’ The lighter mood had vanished and there was a slightly awkward pause while Miss Armstrong sat looking at her hands, linked together in her lap, and Charlotte racked her brains as she tried to think of something
unexceptionable as a topic of conversation, but found herself reduced to further condolences.

‘If I can be of any assistance,’ she began. ‘Perhaps I could write to tell your relatives the sad news, to spare you?’

That produced a faint smile of gratitude. ‘Thank you, but my sister and I were the last of our family.’ She bit her lip and looked away, a faint colour staining her pale cheeks, a frown creasing her brow.

‘The last?’ Charlotte was all sympathy and the other woman nodded, then in a sudden burst of confidence, she said, ‘There were three of us. My brother was the eldest, and then I, four years younger. Verena was born when I was five years old, but sadly my mother died a few days later. As I said, my father was a clergyman in Northumberland, near Corbridge, but he died of heart failure when I was seventeen.’

She acknowledged Charlotte’s murmur of sympathy and continued, clearly finding some relief in the telling. ‘My sister was away at school at the time and her godmother, a cousin of my mother’s, agreed to adopt the child, paying for her education and undertaking her presentation at Court. The lady died shortly after Verena’s marriage to Dr Chant, a little over six years ago.’

‘And your brother?’ Charlotte wished she had held her tongue when Miss Armstrong’s face darkened.

‘My brother emigrated to Australia eleven or twelve years ago,’ was the terse reply, followed by a look of consternation as Lily exclaimed in surprise,

‘Why, what a singular coincidence,’ she cried. ‘Did you not know, Miss Armstrong, that our dear Charlotte is herself an Australian? Perhaps she and your brother are acquainted?’

Charlotte hastily interrupted her. ‘Goodness, Lily. Australia is a very large continent. It is highly unlikely that Mr Armstrong and I should ever have crossed each other’s paths.’ Heaven forbid, she told herself, that I should find myself saddled with yet another potential source of embarrassment. It’s bad enough that I have met up with Bessie once more, fond of her as we all were.

Her dismay was clearly shared by Sibella Armstrong, who said quietly, ‘We heard of my brother’s death a year or so later.’

With relief, Charlotte passed over the thorny topic by diverting Lily on to a recital of what could be expected on what would be her first Christmas Day in England, but she found herself wondering about young Mr Armstrong and his sister’s reluctance to discuss him. She might still be grieving for him, of course, but as Charlotte well knew, relatives of a transported felon would often embroider the journey and refer to it as ‘emigration’. Indeed, she was in the habit of doing so herself, when questioned about her mother, her godmother, and her stepfather and their presence in the Antipodes.

The company broke up early. Although in the rudest of health, Lily was still a very new mother who, to Charlotte’s surprise, had refused to employ the services of a wet nurse. Charlotte liked Lily all the more for this, considering, with a smile, that should she ever find herself in a like situation, feeding the infant herself would make escape so much easier. Oh well, she grinned, while Lady Frampton announced frankly that she was ready for her bed, not much danger of finding myself in that kind of predicament, and – certainly for the present – no need to think of escape.

Miss Armstrong bade everyone a quiet goodnight and Charlotte followed her and the Penburys up the oak staircase. They turned towards the older part of the house, while Charlotte politely conducted the guest to the room next to her own.

‘Pray do not hesitate to knock on my door if there is anything I can do for you,’ she told the other woman. Miss Armstrong nodded her thanks and turned into her room, looking suddenly drained and weary.

As she blew out her candle, Charlotte frowned. Perhaps I
have
met Mr Armstrong at some date, she pondered. If so, it might explain that odd sense of recognition I felt when I saw the late Verena, though we had scant conversation. She shrugged and snuggled down under the covers. Twelve years ago I was a child, she thought. I could easily have met him and forgotten his name, but still find his face drawn to mind. I wonder….

Next morning, Christmas Day, a groom rode over with an invitation for the entire family at the manor, including Lady
Frampton and Charlotte, along with any guests, to attend Oz Granville’s eleventh birthday tea on Boxing Day.

‘Thank heavens,’ Lily whispered. ‘Imagine how awkward it would be if she had not invited them too.’ At that moment, Sibella and Dr Chant entered the dining-room so Lily informed them that the Finchbourne party would be taking tea with a neighbour the next day. Charlotte purloined the letter and grinned to herself as she read the stately phrases. She recalled her own description of the lady, when discussing her with Lady Frampton. A ‘woolly lamb’, was it not? She could scarcely have chosen a less appropriate description for a woman whose air of haggard grandeur emphasised a character whose nature was reticent in the extreme. Still, compared with Miss Nightingale, Lady Granville was almost a human being.

Charlotte was drawn to Lady Granville because of her two obsessions: her son and her magical garden, but she was wary. I’d better be careful, she mused. She certainly won’t like it if I become too friendly with Oz. I must not arouse any maternal jealousy as I fancy she could be a difficult customer and perceive slights and liberties where none was intended. Her colouring is quite
un-English
. I must ask somebody if those dark, haunted eyes and olive complexion suggest any Italian or Spanish blood. If that were so I might even find myself involved in a vendetta of some sort.

I shall be circumspect, she told herself briskly; I do hope Oz will be pleased with his birthday present. The fearsome pocket knife, complete with all manner of attachments had been among the effects of her late, and decidedly unlamented, husband and although she had protested with heart-felt sincerity that she had no need of such mementoes to remind her of Frampton, her sister-
in-law
Agnes, now wife of their vicar, had pressed the box upon her. It had proved simpler to accept it and stow it away in a dark cupboard at the manor, than to make any further fuss, and now here was the knife, the perfect present for an eleventh birthday.