Mrs Ketch slapped her on the other side, harder than Jane had done.
“Juliet you will apologise to Mrs Ketch and to me immediately” said Jane icily “Or you will not merely be leaving tomorrow morning but it will be without a reference at all because I will rescind it; and if any ask I will tell them that I prefer not to discuss your morals.”
Juliet went white.
Servants were plentiful; a good position was dependant on a good reference.
“I’m sorry Mrs Ketch; I’m sorry Madam” she said.
“If I hear any lying rumours about me” said Jane, sweetly “I will take out a classified advertisement in all the papers explaining that you are of a loose nature. Do I make myself quite clear?”
“Yes’m” said Juliet almost inaudibly.
“Good; you are relieved of all duties for the rest of the evening; you will want to pack. I should like you out of my house before breakfast. Fowler will give you your wages to the end of the month” said Jane.
“Thank you Madam” said Mrs Ketch. “And don’t you forget to leave your work clothes my girl; they don’t belong to you.”
She hustled the girl out.
Jane was shaking.
“First serious servant problem?” asked Caleb.
“I dislike confrontation” said Jane. “Oh how I wanted to slap that impudent hussy into the middle of next week! I tried to make it a judicious blow however; it could not be permitted to pass.”
“No it could not. I am sorry that my presence here has caused such a nasty little piece to make up tittle-tattle. It must be very humiliating and embarrassing that she should even think of linking your name to mine” said Caleb.
Jane burned scarlet.
“It – it is not the personage linked” she said in a low voice “But that she would think I would be so improper when – when Frank is not even buried to consider…..any emotional entanglement; it would hurt those who did not know of Frank’s deficiencies or were blind to them.”
Caleb changed colour several times.
“Is – Mrs Churchill; can it be that you are not indifferent to me?”
“Mr Armitage I have been so blue devilled and wrung as well as the – the condition I am in making me ridiculously mawkish that in truth I cannot say what my feelings might be” said Jane “You have been a tower of strength; I would not wish to make any mistake in my feelings a second time purely because I have met someone who seems to my eyes to be everything positive that Frank was not. I have not known you a week; though we have been thrown perforce into close proximity. I should prefer not to throw my cap over the windmill. This does not mean that I should be in anywise averse to you coming calling once this business is all solved.”
He bowed.
“I apologise, Mrs Churchill, for permitting my feelings rule me to ask so improper a question” he said.
“Ah, you are all delicacy; thank you for understanding” said Jane. “Now I pray you that we will not speak of it again.”
He bowed acquiescence.
Chapter 16
Mr and Mrs Weston’s coach arrived at half past eight the next morning; Jane had scarcely risen from her light and unappetising breakfast in bed to settle her nausea. They must have been on the road before dawn!
Jane embraced Mrs Weston and offered her cheek to Mr Weston to kiss.
“Oh my dear Jane!” said Mrs Weston, “we should have come earlier only Mr Knightley so kindly offered to come in our stead and bring Miss Bates; Anna has been fractious of late.”
Jane held the older woman’s hands.
“Oh my very dear Mrs Weston, it is good to see you today; I know you will wish to be back to Anna, for I should hate to leave Frances. And you must take great care of yourself!” she glanced at the gentle curves of Mrs Weston’s gravid figure.
“I had to come however; poor dear Frank!” said Mrs Weston. “What can you tell us? Mr Knightley was unable to say much. You look tired, my poor dear!”
Jane flushed.
“I must break to you the news that only in the last few days I have become certain that I had become with child before Frank died” she said “I have written as much to Mr Jasper Churchill. I do not know if he will come for the funeral or not; it is rather short notice, but even in this weather it is wise to get a – a waterlogged body underground rapidly.”
“Dear God! Did Frank then drown?” demanded Mr Weston, who looked haggard; as well he might, thought Jane, over the death of, as things stood, his only son.
“Oh my dear papa-in-law! Let me have tea sent to us and I will tell you all I may” said Jane. “It is a painful story I fear; for Frank was induced by who knows what threats to engage in less than honest practice; and as Bow Street believe that I may be at risk also I have an Officer of the Law – they do not themselves like to be called Bow Street Runners – staying here to protect me.”
Mr Weston looked grave.
“They may be rough fellows; many used to be professional free-lance thief takers and they can be unsavoury” he said “Oh, no, Mr Armitage is perfectly gentlemanly in his manner” Jane assured him hastily. “He was invalided out of the army; he was wounded at Corunna. I have nothing whatever to complain about him and he has been very good in lending me escort and I believe he has also seen to reassuring tradesmen that when probate is sorted out all will be paid; Fowler you understand just damns tradesmen for impudence, being used to a household that ran on credit. I dislike it intensely but….. there have been problems.”
“Frank outran the constable by a long measure soon after you were married; care to tell me about it dear Jane?” asked Mr Weston.
Jane flushed.
“I believe he had been gambling,” she almost whispered, “though he seems to have sorted that out. Oh dear Mr and Mrs Weston, you must be told about Dorothy; she is a mere child under the makeup, but she grieves most sincerely…”
“Jane, dear, are you saying that Frank had a mistress and she has foisted herself on you?” asked Mrs Weston gently.
“Hussy!” said Mr Weston.
“Oh no, it is not like that!” said Jane. “I do not know in what way Frank found her more congenial then I; but I went to her lodgings and brought her back here for she was under foul attack by one whom Mr Armitage believes may have been involved in killing Frank; but who unfortunately used the heavy traffic to escape. She is rough of speech and a trifle vulgar but not in any ill natured way; I should be less ashamed by far to claim friendship with Dorothy than with certain of those who might be accepted anywhere in Highbury” she added with some spirit.
“Well if such is true, my dear, we shall greet her and make up our own minds; will we not, my dear?” said Mrs Weston appealing firmly to her husband.
He grunted.
“If you say so” he said.
Jane filled the Westons in on the edited story that showed Frank in the light of being more sinned against than sinning; it did no good to unnecessarily hurt his father and stepmother. Explaining away a mistress was hard; but perhaps he had been persuaded that all smart young men needed a mistress as well as a wife. So Jane put it to the Westons.
Dorothy looked such a woebegone and frightened child over the idea of going to a funeral that Mrs Weston warmed to her; Miss Bates had taken the young Paphian under her wing and Dorothy looked nothing like the Westons’ expectations. Her rapidly sewn plain black morning gown in a serviceable wool, trimmed with a few bunches of black ribbon was just as one might expect of a young girl’s gown; and it might readily be assumed that she was a relative of the family.
The funeral was to take place in that society church, St George’s Hanover Square, being the parish church of the neighbourhood; and the funerary procession would then go to St George’s Fields for the interment. The funeral having been arranged by Mr Chorleigh, Jane expected no hitch; the purpose of hiring solicitors to organise things was to ensure that there would be no hitch.
Certainly the coaches with their magnificent black horses decked out with black
plumes arrived in plenty of time for the mourning party. All the servants were to go to the funeral; returning to the house during the interment to make sure that all was ready for the mourners in the big ground floor reception room that was rarely used since Jane had set out a smaller room on the first floor as a dining room.
The procession trotted sedately to the big Palladian church where so many society weddings took place; it seemed large and intimidating as they alighted by the six soaring Corinthian columns of the frontage. With so classical an array of architecture it was hard to think of it as a church so much as a temple to the wealth of the upper classes, now combined with being a gateway to Hades. Jane thought unbidden of some of the little Latin poetry she knew, an ode by Horace, beginning ‘Eheu fugaces, Postumus, Postumus, labuntur anni’; ‘alas, Postumus, the fleeting years fly past’. Who Postumus might have been she could not begin to guess but the whole poem was about how death came to all and all must travel through the depths of the underworld. It was as grand and depressing as the exterior of St George’s seemed to be to Jane.
The interior was very plain; and more beautiful for permitting the architecture to be seen, the barrel vaulted roof a pure and simple soaring arch. The altarpiece was a painting of The Last Supper by William Kent; though it was hard to see from the high box pews. At least it was more plainly a church on the inside; there was something about the impersonally classical exterior that revolted a granddaughter of the manse used to the traditional stone churches of the English countryside. Jane was glad to be hidden away in a pew, with Miss Bates on one side of her, Dorothy on Miss Bates’ other side, and Mr and Mrs Weston on Jane’s other side. Caleb had gone with the servants; but was loitering outside a pew. He wanted to see who else might turn up; on the offchance that Jane or Dorothy should be under observation by the murderers.
The service was not to be conducted by the rector, Robert Hodgson MA, who was also Dean of Chester; a man of great importance. As there was some impropriety concerning the manner of Frank Churchill’s death the great man had asked another man of the cloth, one Martin Ferry, to be his vicar for the occasion. Jane could not blame him; and it was some relief not to have to listen to the usual eulogies from a great man like a Dean.
The main obsequies passed over Jane’s head almost as if it were happening to somebody else; she made the correct responses at the right time and stood or kneeled when she was supposed to stand or kneel but had she been asked to describe the service she would have been hard pressed to do so. Dorothy was sobbing quietly into a handkerchief; Mr and Mrs Weston and Miss Bates all made resort to their own kerchiefs from time to time; but Jane felt nothing. All she could think was that she hoped it was the correct coffin and that they were not praying over a stranger. Or – a fantastic and whimsical thought! – that Frank had somehow been used one last time and his coffin be used to store and hide stolen jewellery!
I am become too fanciful, Jane told herself severely. It is akin to hysteria and unladylike.
She composed herself firmly; and was ready to go with the others, now joined by the clerks and solicitors of Chorleigh, Wright and Jekyll, to go to the graveside.
And Caleb was there to give her a reassuring smile and to shake his head; he managed to whisper, as he handed her up into the carriage, “Nobody more suspicious than those Friday-faced word mongers” nodding at the solicitors.
Jane bit back a hysterical giggle. Trust Mr Armitage to be able to make her smile with an irreverent description!
The day was cold and wet with sleet in the rain; and Jane was glad that she had a dark pelisse to wear and that she had an older one too for Dorothy. Miss Bates was bundled well up in shawls as they stood at the graveside for the final obsequies. The coffin was lowered on ropes by the four hefty pall bearers; the time honoured words were at last all spoken; the first handful of earth thrown in as the appropriate words were said by the parson; and then the mourners might leave and let the sexton do his job of filling the grave in.
Again Caleb’s strong arm was there for support, not just for Jane but for Dorothy and particularly for Miss Bates.
“We want to get Miss Bates in swiftly” said Caleb. “Here, Dorothy my girl, you’re a good gal; you sneak Miss Bates up to the parlour in front of the fire and get her some rugs and a hot toddy; Molly will help you in the kitchen. She don’t need to do the polite to them fellows from the office.”
“’Course I will, Mr Armitage” said Dorothy.
Jane reflected again how thoughtful and how clever he was; Aunt Hetty was fagged to death and frozen and needed taking care of – that the widow might not do for needing to be on display. And that kept Aunt Hetty looked after and too placed Dorothy out of the way where nobody might upset or embarrass her by asking too much about her. She smiled at Caleb in pleased gratitude for his thoughtfulness.
Caleb reflected ruefully that when a man who has been asked not to speak of his feelings receives so dazzling a smile from the woman who has rapidly become the centre of his world it is both heaven on earth and sheer torture not to shout for joy and kneel to offer his heart and hand to her forthwith.
Dorothy duly saw Miss Bates to the comfort of the fire; and on finding that she preferred tea to a hot toddy went down to beg the key to the caddy from Jane to make a pot and, as she described it to the little lady, ‘prigged some eats for us too which would do us more good than napping our bibs’.
It may be said that Miss Bates had very little idea of the meaning of much of this idiom beyond being vaguely aware that napping the bib was a vulgar euphemism for crying; but smiled kindly on Dorothy and delighted her with another long tale of Mrs Jane’s cleverness when she was a little girl.
Chapter 17
“I should be obliged for a word with you and Mr Armitage, Mrs Churchill” said Fowler quietly. “A matter arising from watching them interlopin’ footmen as you might say.”
“Will it wait until I have bid Mr and Mrs Weston ‘Godspeed’ when they leave?” asked Jane. Fowler considered.
“Yes ma’am; Mrs Ketch and I have it well in hand. But if you don’t mind I shall seek out Mr Armitage; he said he was going to check over all the house just in case.”
“Send Molly to look for him” said Jane. “She can leave her duties running errands for the footmen.”
Fowler gave a little bow and withdrew.
“Is there a problem Jane? Should we stay?” asked Mrs Weston anxiously, coming over to Jane.
“Oh nothing serious my dear Ma’am; just a little matter arising from the tensions between my servants and those we hired in for the day; Fowler felt I should be apprised of a potential upset. He is dealing with it” said Jane.
“He sounds an invaluable man” said Mrs Weston.
“He is; he should be promoted to butler by rights” said Jane. “Well we shall see how the finances go when all has been sorted out. I should like to give him due recognition for his support and aid; he has risen to the occasion very well.”
She saw Mr and Mrs Weston out to their carriage; the mews had not yet been hired out so their coachman had been able to stable the horses during the funeral. It might be nice to have a coach; but on the other hand it would also be nice to have the rent on the mews over the Season which, thought Jane, was going to bring in more than the cost of the odd hackney carriage. One had to be hard headed over these things. If she had only thought of it they could have hired out some of the unused space last season; but doubtless Frank would not have heard of it.
Well he was buried; and if the worst came to the worst she might sell this fine house, or again, let it for the season, and perhaps rather than being a governess she might sew. The wages were lower but the abuses less. And with the experience she had gained copying modish gowns she might get a position with a modiste not merely take in sewing. If she let the house complete with Mrs Ketch, Fowler and Molly they would keep their positions; and though it would break her heart to send her away, Frances might go with Annie to stay with the Westons. Yes, there was a way a
round every potential problem. And the problem would be in the way that Mr Churchill took his nephew’s death, troubles, and hasty funeral. She had written to him straight away on Monday; it must travel two hundred miles. That would take some twenty five hours; the full day round. He would have got the letter Tuesday evening. Of course he would want to post down; he had his own chaise, he would probably however hire post horses at each inn for a speedier rate of travel but he would not travel day and night as the mail did. Indeed he would almost certainly not set forth until the Wednesday; being elderly he would not travel more than six hours a day for he was not fond of the motion; and he would not travel on the morrow, being Sunday; so in all probability he would arrive on Monday. It would be embarrassing if he did push on hard enough to have arrived just in time to miss the funeral today; but if he did, that was just too bad. Jane was quite out of charity with Uncle Jasper, who should have apprised her that his nephew was in financial difficulties.
She might now see what difficulties Fowler had encountered whilst the footmen – one less than there should be she noted – cleared away.
She left the solicitors and clerks enjoying their meal at the expense of another and slipped away.
Caleb grinned at Jane; he and Fowler had a grimy and well trussed footman between them.
“Ah, Mrs Churchill” said Caleb “Thanks to the vigilance of Mr Fowler here, we have a would-be thief; whom Fowler caught creeping out of the coal cellar.”
“What did he think to steal in there, Mr Armitage?” asked Jane.
Caleb chuckled.
“Ah, not so much to steal nowise” he said “But dahn in the dark he found a certain trapdoor, with certain bolts on it which he thought to loosen and draw back; so later his villyunous friends might come in to prig anythink wot took their fancy, ain’t that so, Jimmy boy? James Ripon is what this ‘ere dubber of jiggers, that’s an opener of doors, is called; account o’ how Mr Fowler has all their names to sign off that they came and did their work satisfactory-like. Which nowise this cully seems to have done; looks like he’s definitely on the ken-slumming lay.”
Death of a Fop (Bow Street Consultant series Book 1) Page 11
