A Death in the Wedding Party

by Caroline Dunford

  ‘Thank you,’ I said and forced myself to stay still as he brushed them from my sleeve and skirt.

  ‘What we need to do is find someone else to blame.’

  ‘Good idea,’ I said carefully. ‘Do you have anyone in mind?’ If at this point he had suggested that the moon was made of small lost cats I would have agreed with him.

  Tipton waved his hands airily. ‘Anyone will do.’

  ‘It might be a good idea for it to be a servant,’ I said. ‘They are unlikely to have anyone to defend them.’

  Tipton approached me and again and pointed a finger at me for emphasis. ‘Excellent idea. Excellent. That’s the kind of thinking I need.’

  ‘Merry knows all the servants,’ I said. ‘I could get her to tell me about them. You know how she loves to gossip and she wouldn’t have any idea why. Then I could pick someone out and let you know.’

  Tipton put his head on one side. ‘She wouldn’t know why we were doing it? I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for Merry and I’d hate to have to …’ This was said in a tone of genuine regret as if we were debating whether or not to invite Merry to a tea party. His casualness frightened me. I kept thinking I must have misunderstood.

  ‘I promise she’d have no idea,’ I said and crossed my heart.

  ‘Good-ho,’ said Tipton. ‘I knew I did the right thing coming to you.’ He unbolted the door and flung it open. ‘Great little chat. I’ll catch up with you later when you’ve got the dirt. Good girl.’

  I walked to the door. He didn’t move. I walked head high out into the garden. As soon as I rounded a corner in the path and was out of sight I lifted at my skirts and ran as fast as I could for the house.

  Chapter Thirty

  Something Wicked This Way Comes

  I sprinted past an alarmed Robbins and made straight for my room. Once I was there I locked the door and popped the key down my neckline. Then I threw myself onto the bed and hugged a pillow to my face to muffle my sobs. I had every intention of seeking help, but not until I was once again mistress of my emotions.

  Robbins must have reported my disgraceful entry to Merry because it wasn’t long before she was knocking at my door. I let her in. She took in the tears on my face and my tattered dress and drew all the wrong conclusions. I ended up explaining the whole story to her, in I admit less than my usual concise manner, and Merry became immediately practical. Being Royalty I had been given a room with an attached bathing chamber. She ran me a bath full of bubbles, more or less pushed me into it, after helping remove my dress, told me to have a good soak and she would arrange for cakes and tea in my room when I was out.

  An hour later I sat down at a little table in my room and Merry poured me tea. She also helped herself to a small, iced cake. She bit into it greedily and icing stuck to her nose. ‘They don’t feed the staff here as well as Mrs Deighton does,’ she said in self-defence.

  It suddenly struck me as funny that we were sitting down eating afternoon tea and it was almost time for the dinner dressing gong. What’s more, I was pretending to be a housekeeper pretending to be a minor foreign Royal, when in reality I was an Earl’s granddaughter whose grandfather was about to sit down to dinner on the floor below; he had even sat beside me without knowing who I was. Moreover, the man I suspected of being a killer, and doing away with Mrs Wilson and possibly Miss Wilton too, had just asked me to help him find a pasty for the girl he wanted to marry, who he was sure had killed her stepmother. It was all too ridiculous. I laughed so hard tears ran down my cheeks. I doubled up with laughter, only pausing to draw breath before I went into whoops again. Before I had only read of going into whoops, but now I was actually doing it.

  The door flew open. Richenda stormed in. ‘What the hell is that noise?’

  Merry jumped to her feet, thrusting the remains of the cake behind her back. The sight of Richenda, nostrils flaring and looking more like a warhorse than ever, was too much. I fell off my seat.

  ‘Cor blimey, she’s lost it,’ said Suzette, peering over Richenda’s shoulder. ‘I told the mistress she was an odd one, but it’s all been too much for the little blighter.’

  The sight of Suzette’s pinched face, she looked as if she had been crudely made out of not enough clay, sobered me dramatically. I sat up, wiped away my tears with the back of my hands. ‘You!’ I said, ‘Your face. I remember that look. You looked … you looked,’ but the memory wouldn’t come back fully.

  ‘Very sad, milady,’ said Suzette. ‘I’m sure her maid can contain her. It’s time for me to dress you for dinner.’

  Richenda gave me a pitying look. ‘Don’t let her come down tonight, Merry. I’ll say she is indisposed.’

  I stood up, drawing my dressing gown around me in what I hoped was a regal manner, and said, ‘It is not your place to order me around, Richenda.’

  ‘How dare you?’ screamed Richenda. ‘How dare you address me like this!’

  ‘Not two hours ago I was with your beloved in the summer house,’ I said suddenly calm as ice, ‘and he told me that you murdered Lady Stapleford.’

  ‘What!’ cried Richenda. ‘Tippy would never say anything like that!’

  ‘He asked me to help him find someone to fit up for the crime.’

  Richenda went deathly pale. ‘He can’t … he can’t … but that would mean … Oh my God,’ she cried and fled from the room. Suzette followed at once, slamming the door.

  ‘I reckon she thought Tippy had done, don’t you?’ said Merry.

  ‘Yes,’ I said slowly. ‘I think she did and the two idiots have been trying to protect each other.’

  ‘Well, your hysterics were good for something after all.’

  ‘If we’re right,’ I said, ‘it means we need to rethink what we know about the crime. We’ve just lost our two main suspects.’

  ‘Look,’ said Merry, ‘if you’re feeling okay then I reckon you should go down to dinner. It might be that …’

  ‘Something is revealed over the oysters?’ I said, feeling a bubble of mirth rising within me again.

  ‘Now, stop that at once,’ said Merry. ‘I’m going to go below stairs and tell Rory about your latest adventure and if that doesn’t wipe the smile off your face you ain’t got no sense. He’s going to be downright furious with Tipton and you!’

  ‘It wasn’t my fault!’

  ‘You keep swanning off on your own and you keep getting pounced on. See any connection? ‘Cos if you don’t I’m sure Rory will.’

  ‘I am definitely going to go hide among the Earls,’ I said. ‘Help me dress, Merry.’

  As she finished my hair Merry said, ‘It’s nice Tipton liked me, isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ I responded, ‘he said he’d actually regret killing you.’

  Merry froze for minute, not in shock as I first thought, but in thought, ‘He’s quite mad, isn’t he? I mean really mad. Do you think we should stop this wedding?’

  ‘I think someone already has that well in hand,’ I said. ‘We just need to find out who and why.’

  ‘Same old, same old,’ muttered Merry as she hustled me through the door. ‘Now don’t you go getting locked in with anyone else! No wondering off on your own!’

  The effect of these strictures was to make me feel like a six year old playing dress up at an adults’ party. People were gathering the hall for drinks before dinner. From the top of the staircase I could see all the original faces I had seen when I first arrived, but this time voices did not echo around the chamber. Instead the conversation was more of a dull buzz. Many of the drinkers cast glances over their shoulders every third or fourth sip as if they expected an assassin to creep up on them from behind.

  The Earls and the Countess stood alone to one side. All three countenances reflected a dismay and distrust of the situation before them. Richenda sat in one of the few grand chairs. Tipton hovered attentively at her side. From time to time the two regarded each other in a way that extinguished my already small appetite. While I dressed they had clearly forgiven each other of
all suspicions. I had no more time to pick out anyone I had reached the bottom stair.

  Immediately my arm was taken. ‘I have been hearing about your unfortunate times,’ said Fitzroy/Milford. ‘Come through this way and I will get you a proper drink.’

  I instinctively stiffened. ‘Don’t worry,’ said Fitzroy, ‘not only will everyone see you leave with me, but I am probably – no definitely – the safest person you could be with right now.’

  I did not go with him because of this argument, but rather because I feared making that total social faux par, causing a scene. As I accompanied him into one of the side chambers which proved to be yet another small study I reflected that if Fitzroy wanted me dead he would undoubtedly accomplish it more discreetly.

  He poured and handed me a small Scotch with instructions to sip it slowly. ‘You don’t need to tell me you’re not used to that kind of drink,’ he said.

  ‘Not exactly a lady’s tipple,’ I replied, trying to suppress a shudder as the strong liquor hit my stomach. ‘Not what is it I can do for you?’

  Fitzroy pulled forward a couple of chairs and indicated I should sit. He waited for me to sit first in the manner one would have done with a real lady, but then he knew who I was.

  ‘I don’t have all the facts,’ he admitted much to my surprise, ‘but I am hearing alarming rumours about the situations you have recently found yourself in. I brought you through here to advise you to leave the Court. I can arrange for a suitably impressive carriage to pick you up.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said sincerely. ‘I know it is unlike you to engage yourself in such minor matters.’ Fitzroy gave a little snort of laughter. ‘Touché,’ he said.

  ‘I didn’t mean to be rude,’ I said struggling for the right words, ‘I meant that I understand that you are here to work and that you mustn’t compromise your identity.’

  He nodded. ‘Correct. I wouldn’t interfere unless I felt you to be real danger.’

  ‘Even that surprises me,’ I said candidly.

  A very faint blush stole into his cheeks. ‘You have been useful to us and I would like you to remain alive, so you can be useful again.’

  I smiled with genuine appreciation and he broke off his gaze at me. ‘I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your offer,’ I said, ‘but the truth is I have nowhere to go but Stapleford Hall and I do not think my employers would thank me for abandoning them.’

  ‘Those damn bloody people!’ said Fitzroy. ‘Why the hell did you have to go and work there!’

  ‘They were the only people who would accept me without a reference.’

  ‘Which should have told you something!’

  ‘It told me,’ I said coldly, though I boiling with fury inside, ‘that I might have a chance of preventing my mother and younger brother from falling into destitution. My mother wrote repeatedly to my grandfather over the years and he never replied. Not even when he knew father was dead and we were homeless would he interest himself in us.’

  ‘Man’s a stupid oaf,’ said Fitzroy. ‘I could talk to him for you.’

  ‘You’d do that?’ I said amazement diluting my anger.

  ‘You have a remarkable ability to make me want to do things that I would normally not contemplate for anyone else.’

  ‘Good heavens,’ I said ironically, ‘is this a declaration of affection, Mr Fitzroy?’

  ‘Milford,’ he corrected automatically. ‘No, I don’t have time for romance in my business, but you remind me of myself. Or how I was when I first entered the service. You’re a survivor. You adapt to what life throws at you. It’s a skill that is all too rare. I appreciate your determination to seek justice even when the rules don’t seem to allow it ever to be found. What worries me is that you are untrained and unfit for the situations you blindly thrust yourself into.’

  ‘Tipton and Richenda have accidently alibied each other,’ I said. I succeeded in diverting him.

  ‘Really. And you believe them?’

  ‘Tipton asked me to find someone to take the fall for Richenda and when Richenda learned Tipton was trying to do this she immediately mended her argument with him.’

  ‘So she thought he had done it,’ said Fitzroy and gave a low whistle. ‘I must admit I didn’t see that coming. This is a far greater tangle than I had imagined. Whoever is behind this all is playing their hand with great skill.’

  ‘I agree,’ I said. ‘He or she is a formidable opponent.”

  His face split into a grin. ‘I’m not going to get you to leave this alone, am I?

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘But I do appreciate the offer. Very much.’

  ‘I’ll watch your back as much as I can,’ said Fitzroy, ‘but I cannot promise to be on hand when the pieces start falling. You cannot rely on me.’

  I stood up and held out my hand. ‘Oh, Mr Fitzroy,’ I said, ‘I would never do that.’

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Not Going Into the Garden

  Fitzroy left the room before me and I chose to wait for a few moments before following him. He left the door slightly ajar, so I could hear the hum of pre-dinner conversation. I slipped out and went to stand at the back of the hall. I took a drink from a servant for form’s sake, but only let it wet my lips. I had a feeling that I would need to keep my wits very sharp from now. Fitzroy’s incredible offer only confirmed to me there games afoot that I knew little about.

  Two male guests whose faces I recognised from the first night, but who had not been introduced to me were weaving their way across the hall. They had undoubtedly tried to take the edge of all events by investing heavily in the joys of Bacchus. I watched their progress with some little enjoyment when one of them caught my eye-line, nudged his partner, who attempted to bend his head to hear what his friend was saying and almost took his eye out on the cocktail stick in his bizarre drink. They stumbled together for a moment then like some kind of hideous four legged monster they adjusted course and made straight for me. It didn’t take me more than a moment to understand that alcohol had lessened their inhibitions for approaching a member of minor royalty and they were headed straight for me.

  I did the only thing I could think of and slipped out into the garden. In my head I could hear Merry’s voice cautioning me about separating from the masses, but the thought of dealing with two drunken upper-class twits, who might at any moment throw up on my shoes was too much to bear. Also they were of an age where they might know some of the real Princess’s friends and, drunk or not, it would be quickly clear that I had no idea what Button-Nose or Squiffy had done last summer. In fact, with the nicknames these people insisted on giving each other I could never be sure if they were referring to each other, their pets or their horses.

  I was not in a sociable mood. Frankly, I was fed up with this set, and if Rory had appeared from behind a tree and suggested we elope at that moment I would happily have gone with him. Moreover I would have made it a condition of our nuptials that we would both leave service and set up in a profession were we were more likely to meet decent people who weren’t forever trying to kill each other. A tobacconist’s seemed like a good choice.

  Once I was in the garden I slipped behind a tree and crept like some weirdly sparkly creature from tree to tree until I was a little way from the house, but not without hailing distance. I would still be able to hear the dinner gong and join the crowd as they headed off to feed. Because goodness knows come hell or high water the upper class must dress for dinner and dine, dine, dine!

  My father’s voice now joined Merry’s warning voice in my head. He berated me gently for thinking so little of my fellow creatures who were after all made in God’s image. This made me thankful my father was not present to hear my answers to such strictures.

  I found a particularly broad tree and smooth backed tree (I had to watch my dress) and leaned back. I started to count my blessings as my father had taught me to do when I was in a vile mood. I couldn’t remember when I had been quite so angry, but as I mentally listed the people I had who cared about me, the
kindnesses I had been shown, I felt unwanted emotion welling up inside me. After all that had happened it made sense that only my anger was keeping me from breaking down and weeping.

  Whether I would have given in to my weaker emotions and whether or not I would have fled the Court down the lane and into a new life will never be known for at that moment I had the hair-raising sensation that I was not alone. Without thinking I hunched down at the foot of the tree as if I might be mistaken for a bush. (My only excuse for this foolishness is that by this point in our adventure I was extremely stressed as I hope you may realise.)

  Fortunately the two people who had joined me in the garden were far too busy whispering heatedly from one another. They were also taking a strange, haphazard route though the gardens and I realised they were attempting to hide from the sight of the guests in the Hall. This made me feel a little easier. Here were two people certainly not hunting me, but in fear of being hunted themselves. I moved sideways into an actual bush and attempted to attain some sort of still squatting position. A shoot tickled the inside of my ear. I then became more worried about the thought that a spider or ladybird might be wandering along this shoot and into said orifice. If I moved I would give myself away. I willed the pair to hurry past.

  As they grew nearer I forgot about the shoot and possible invasion of my ear, Tipton walked side by side with Suzette. Their heads were close and they were whispering furiously, each speaking over the other. I could not make out what they were arguing about, but then they stopped right in front of me. I held my breath, but they were far too busy negotiating to notice me in my bush.

  ‘I’ve kept me mouth shut,’ said Suzette. ‘But your good lady hasn’t offered me no job and a girl’s got to look after herself in this world.’

  ‘I do see that,’ said Tipton.

  ‘I’ve come a long way as you well know,’ said Suzette, ‘and I have no intention of going back.’

  ‘You’ve done well. Extremely well. And Lady S had no idea?’