by Carola Dunn
“How on earth did you come to meet Mrs. Gooch, out in the wilds?” Miller wanted to know. It seemed as unlikely as his own meeting with Gwen.
“Ellie came out west the year after they put the water pipeline in, in ’04, with a bit of a stake, looking to buy into a business. She wasn’t hardly more than a girl, but she’s a bonzer businesswoman, my Ellie,” Gooch said with pride and a fond glance at his wife. “She reckoned there was more opportunity in the west and she turned up just when I was looking for a bit of capital to expand. But Coolgardie ain’t bush, or the wilds, as you said. She’s a beaut town and only around three hundred and fifty miles from Perth.”
“Three hundred and fifty miles!” Miller echoed. “They’re both in Western Australia?”
“That’s nothing. From Coolgardie east to the South Orstrilia border is another five hundred miles or so, and north to south, she’s about twice the width. Course, half is desert, but that still leaves a lot of outback to get around in.”
“It sounds as if you’re ripe for air travel.”
“Too right. Fellow started a regular service up in the Kimberley in ’21 and extended it to Perth just this year.”
The men started discussing the future of aviation in Western Australia. Turning to the other end of the table, Daisy saw that Gwen was listening to Miller with a look of fond pride, very like Gooch’s for his wife. Jack and Mrs. Gooch were getting on like a house on fire. It sounded as if Jack was telling her the story of his life. Daisy thought hers must be much more interesting, but she was listening with apparent fascination to his tales of university life.
Babs, her business completed, came over and was introduced. As soon as she found the Gooches were not involved in farming, she lost interest. “Time we were heading home,” she proposed.
“Not yet,” Jack objected, pulling up another chair. “Have a seat, Babs.”
“I’d rather—”
“I’ll run you all home later, so you don’t have to walk up the hill. We can all squeeze into the old bus.”
“I really don’t—”
“No need to squeeze,” said Mrs. Gooch. “We’ve got a hire car, a big Vauxhall. Jimmy’ll take you, won’t you, Jimmy?”
“Or’right, Ellie.” Gooch sounded resigned. “Let’s have another round, my shout. What’s yours, Miss Tyndall?”
Babs gave in and settled for a bottle of pale ale. Daisy refused another drink, as she hadn’t finished her first. She was making it last, having no desire to have to go in search of what was almost certainly an outside lav, frequented by pub patrons, in the dark.
Polite if indifferent, Babs asked what the Gooches had seen on their visit to England. Since landing at Southampton, they had spent a fortnight in London. In the ensuing discussion of the sights of London, Mr. Gooch stoutly upheld the superiority of Perth on every count save that of antiquity.
“Which I don’t call such an advantage,” he pointed out, “when it means you got a whole lot of crook buildings, dirty, cramped cubbyholes that ought to be pulled down.”
The landlord called for last orders. As they finished their drinks and got up to leave, Mrs. Gooch said eagerly, “Is it really all right for me and Jimmy to go to the fireworks?”
“Of course,” Gwen assured her. “People come from the farms roundabout, as well as the villagers.”
“I’ll tell you what, though,” Jack said. “Why don’t you both come up to the house? Even with the bonfire, you’ll freeze down in the meadow, coming from a warm part of the world such as Mr. Gooch assures us Perth is. A couple more won’t throw off your housekeeping, will it, Gwen? It’s a buffet supper.”
Gwen and Babs exchanged a glance of dismay, but Gwen said, “Of course not. There’s always plenty.”
“Well, it’s mighty kind of you,” said Mr. Gooch, “but we wouldn’t want to intrude amongst the flash society folks, would we, Ellie?”
“Oh, Jimmy, do let’s go!” Mrs. Gooch’s lips quivered. “Just for once. What harm can there be?”
The Tyndalls were far too well brought up to rescind an invitation once given.
“You needn’t worry about evening dress,” said Gwen. “People wear their warmest because we watch from the terrace.”
Under their reassurances, Mr. Gooch capitulated. “Good-oh,” he said. “Or’right, I’m off to bring the car round to the door for them that’s in need of a lift. Won’t take two ticks. Starts like a dream, that car.” He went out.
It was decided that the ladies would take advantage of the comfort of the Vauxhall while Jack drove Miller in the Triumph. They all took their leave of Mrs. Gooch, Jack with especial warmth, as if to banish any suspicion that the Gooches might not be entirely welcome at Edge Manor. She went upstairs, smiling.
Daisy, Miller, and the Tyndalls stepped out into the street.
“Jack, how could you!” Babs exclaimed. “Father will be furious. If you want his blessing to go off and build aeroplanes, inviting a couple he’ll strongly object to isn’t the way to go about it. And tomorrow, of all times, when the cream of two counties will be there to meet them!”
As the Vauxhall touring car pulled up before them, Jack said with youthful exuberance, “Don’t worry, Babs, we won’t tell the parents they’re coming, and we’ll keep them apart. Wait and see, it’ll be all right on the night.”
Having been advised that Lady Tyndall always had breakfast in bed, Daisy decided to follow suit the next morning. When she got up, the sun shone in a pale blue sky without a hint of a cloud. From her bedroom window, she saw three men and two small boys down on the lowest terrace of the gardens.
Several more figures moved about in the meadow beyond, where the bonfire had visibly grown. From their motions, she guessed they were pitchforking faggots on top of the heap.
She put her notebook and a couple of pencils in her handbag and went downstairs. In the hall, servants scurried about, dusting and sweeping in last-minute preparations for the party.
“Do you know where Miss Gwendolyn is?” Daisy asked a housemaid wielding a feather duster.
“In the kitchen, I think, ma’am. Down the passage there, ma’am.” She pointed to a door to the right of the fireplace. “Just across from the dining room.”
An unusually sensible arrangement, Daisy thought, recollecting mansions where the kitchens were separated from the dining room by miles of draughty corridors. Edge Manor, long and narrow, was bisected by a single passageway, its only natural light a large fanlight above the door.
Stepping through, Daisy recognized from a previous visit the dingy watercolours of local landscapes, painted by some long-ago lady of the family. The passage was used mostly by servants and seldom by guests.
To her left were the doors to the drawing room and dining room, and at the end, if she remembered correctly, one to the combined smoking/billiard/gun room, whence a staircase led to Sir Harold’s den. To her right, a row of baize doors gave access to the usual offices: the butler’s pantry (where Jennings must be polishing his silver—or snoozing), the housekeeper’s room, the servants’ hall, kitchens, sculleries, larders, broom cupboards, back stairs and cellar stairs, and so on.
In fact, she was faced with a positive plethora of baize doors, none exactly opposite the dining room door. She was trying to decide between the two nearest when Gwen came out of one, looking harried.
“Oh, Daisy, were you looking for me? I’m so sorry! I’m being a rotten hostess this morning. The thing is, the aspic didn’t set and the mayonnaise curdled and Cook panicked. She just needed soothing. Everything’s under control now. Mother’s doing the flowers.”
“Judging by the displays I’ve seen, she does a wonderful job. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Good gracious no. You’re a guest. But I can tell you, if Father did the catering instead of setting up the fireworks, he wouldn’t be so keen on his Bonfire Night party! It’s not just the buffet supper here: We provide sausages and potatoes for the village people to cook in the bonfire embers, and gingerbread an
d drinks and so on.”
“You mustn’t feel you need to entertain me. I’m not a guest today, I’m a journalist. I’ll just poke around and try not to get in anyone’s way.”
“Bless you, Daisy!”
“It won’t upset Sir Harold if I go down to watch him setting up, will it?”
“I dare say he’ll be delighted. Jack and Martin are down there, too.”
“I think I saw your nephews.”
“I expect so. I hope Father isn’t letting them mess around with the fireworks . . . and that he’s not snubbing Martin too badly. Yes, Jenny, what is it?”
Leaving Gwen to deal with whatever was making the young maid twist the corner of her apron in nervous fingers, Daisy slipped away. She went on into the billiard room, which had a door to the outside and was less likely than the dining and drawing rooms to be overrun by hordes of servants with brooms and dusters.
The room smelled faintly of tobacco smoke. Though smoking rooms weren’t necessary these days, now that everyone smoked all over the place, Jack and Sir Harold probably lit up while playing billiards.
At least, she hoped they didn’t indulge while handling the firearms racked on the walls alongside the billiard cues. A landowner’s daughter, she recognized a couple of rook rifles and half a dozen double-barrelled shotguns of different bores. Less conventional was a glass-fronted case of pistols. There were antique duelling and horse pistols, family heirlooms from the days of highwaymen and duels, but also modern, efficient-looking automatics like the one her brother had worn as an army officer. Apparently, the family’s fascination with fireworks extended to firearms.
The scarred, stained table would be for cleaning and oiling the guns and filling cartridges and such chores. The nearby cabinet must hold ammunition, Daisy assumed. It was as a policeman’s wife, not a landowner’s daughter, that she noted with disapproval the key left in the lock.
5
From the billiard room, French doors led out onto the paved terrace. Before she opened one, Daisy buttoned up the jacket of her warm tweed costume and put on the gloves she had brought in a pocket. Nonetheless, she recoiled as the icy air reached for her. The sunshine was misleading.
A couple of shabby, nondescript mackintoshes hung on hooks near the door. Deciding they were the sort that don’t belong to anyone in particular, she donned one. She eyed the adjacent tweed caps and mufflers, rejected the former and chose one of the latter, striped in navy and white. With that over her head and wound around her neck, she ventured out.
The flags of the terrace were still frosted. The sun wouldn’t reach this west side of the house for some time. Daisy trod with care as she crossed to the steps. Pausing at the top, she realized what a splendid view the guests on the terrace would have of the firework display.
What did they do the years when it rained? She must remember to ask.
Holding the stone rail, she descended to the second terrace, laid out in flower beds with lots of roses. At this time of year the bushes were bare and straggly, though here and there a bloom flaunted, defying the frosts. The third terrace had a gazebo at the north end and a lily pond at the south.
The next terrace was the last, where Sir Harold, Jack, and Miller were erecting a complicated metal framework and a sort of wooden gibbet, “for the Catherine wheels,” as Sir Harold later explained. Reggie and Adrian were taking rockets from a big wooden crate and carefully inserting the sticks into bottles. No messing about under Grandfather’s stern eye.
Actually, the baronet was in a cracking good temper and greeted Daisy effusively. “What ho, Mrs. Fletcher!” he shouted as she came down the last steps. “We’re going to have a ripsnorter of a set piece tonight. ‘Ripsnorter’—that the right term, Jack?”
“That’s it, sir. Morning, Mrs. Fletcher. As you see, we big boys get to play with big Meccano.”
The struts they were bolting together did look rather like giant pieces of Meccano. Miller stopped tightening a nut to wave to Daisy with an adjustable spanner. “Good morning, Mrs. Fletcher.” Even he looked cheerful.
“Useful fellow,” Sir Harold confided in a low voice, “when it comes to this sort of thing. Once I’d explained the effect I’m going for, he got the layout worked out in half the time it usually takes me. Quarter!” he added with a burst of generosity. “And drew up a neat little plan, too. This here, that there, we’ll be done in no time.”
“It looks very complicated. I can’t wait to see the result this evening.”
“Want me to explain it to you?”
“No, never mind, thanks. I don’t want to get too technical for my readers. Besides, I’m really more interested in the party and the guy, and all the history. I’m afraid the fireworks are somewhat of a sideline as far as the article is concerned. According to my editor, they rather go in for big fireworks displays in America, especially on their Independence Day in July.”
“July! Hmph, silly time to have fireworks, if you ask me. What about the children, eh?” He cast a fond glance at his grandsons, who promptly stopped squabbling about which bottle to use for a particularly large rocket. “It doesn’t get dark till ten o’clock at night.”
“I expect they’re allowed to stay up late. It’s a holiday, unlike Guy Fawkes.”
“My great-grandfather tried to have the fifth of November proclaimed a holiday. I didn’t tell you this bit, did I?”
“No,” said Daisy, busy scribbling in her idiosyncratic version of Pitman’s shorthand. “What happened?”
“Sir John, that was. Jack’s named after him. He actually went up to Parliament and proposed a bill, or whatever it is they do. Not a very political family, I’m afraid, but that was before Reform, so he had no trouble getting elected. Getting his bill passed was another matter. No one else was interested. I suppose . . .” Sir Harold huffed and puffed a bit. “I suppose it just goes to show the Americans were happier to be rid of King George than the English were not to be rid of King James, what?” He chortled, very pleased with himself. “I say, Jack, Miller, listen to this!”
While he repeated his joke, Daisy wrote it down. It ought to appeal to her American readers, though Jack’s and Miller’s laughter was at best polite.
“You’re putting that in your article, eh, Mrs. Fletcher?” Sir Harold was delighted. “Respectable hobby for a lady, writing. You might have a go at talking my Barbara into trying her hand at it, instead of sticking her nose into men’s business.”
Daisy had no intention of sticking her nose into Babs’s business. “I’d like to take a look at the bonfire,” she said, “and the guy.”
“The guy’s up at the house. We’ll set it out on the front porch for people to see as they arrive; then Biddle will bring it down to the fire. He’s in charge of setting off the fireworks. I’d like to do it myself, but can’t desert my guests, what? Here he comes now. Hi, where have you been?” he shouted to the grizzled man coming down the steps. “You’re late!”
“Sorry, sir,” Biddle said soothingly. “Her la’ship needed more greenery for her vases. Here I be now, sure enough.”
“So I see, you fool. Jack, give Mrs. Fletcher a hand down the steps. She wants to see the bonfire.”
The lowest terrace was separated from the meadow by a ha-ha. Unlike the broad, shallow flights between terraces, the steps down the ha-ha wall were much narrower and quite steep, with the wall itself on one side and no railing on the other. The drop from the top was only ten or twelve feet. Normally, Daisy would have taken the steps in her stride, but unbalanced as she felt these days, she was glad to have Jack going down in front of her, half sideways, his hand steadying her.
“Thanks!”
“My pleasure. Any questions about the bonfire?”
“I’ll ask these chaps, thanks.”
“Right-oh. I’ll go back to playing with the Meccano, then.” He grinned. “When you’re ready to come up, call out and I’ll come down to push from behind.”
“You still are a horrible, cheeky schoolboy, I see,” she retor
ted with a smile.
The bonfire was a good fifteen feet tall by now. The farmhands were climbing ladders to add fuel to the top. Daisy spent twenty minutes talking to them, learning how they used a framework of timbers and netting to pile the stack of wood and brush high so that it didn’t fall over.
Ready to return to the house, she eyed the hill with misgivings. It was all very well coming down, but as she had said last night, going up was a different kettle of fish. She was about to hail Jack to request his aid on the ha-ha steps, when a “Hulloo” came from behind her, from the direction of the village. Miller appeared on the footpath through the belt of trees.
“I’ve brought my car down to give you a lift, Mrs. Fletcher. It didn’t seem like such a good idea you climbing all those steps.”
“That’s awfully kind of you, Mr. Miller. I was just thinking I didn’t much fancy the climb.”
Miller’s car was a Jowett. “Not the most elegant of vehicles,” he said, apologizing, “but the engine is unusually reliable, and when you build aeroplanes, reliability is what you tend to look for in an engine. Mrs. Fletcher, may I ask you something?”
Daisy turned on him her “misleadingly guileless blue eyes,” as Alec persisted in describing them. “Ask away,” she said hopefully, as she had said to Jack last night. “I won’t promise to answer until I’ve heard the question.”
“It’s no good asking any of the family, because they’ve got their own axes to grind, one way or another. You’re looking in from the outside, yet you grew up with all this tradition stuff, father to son in an unending line century after century.”
“Well, the Dalrymples didn’t quite manage that, but I know what you mean.”
“Do you think it’s wrong of me to encourage young Tyndall to break with tradition?”
“Oh dear, I’m not really the best person to ask. I’m not exactly a traditionalist myself. If you’d heard what my mother said when I decided to work for a living . . .”
“Your writing isn’t a hobby?”
“Certainly not!”
