“You did that rather well,” she said, appraising him.
“I do lots of things rather well,” he replied, appraising her right back.
“Moira,” gasped Jane-one, staggering under the weight of the carpet rolls. “For pity’s sake.”
They were nearly caught the following night, lifting crates up to the attics, ready to be packed up on the night of the ball. Two of the under-footmen were still awake long after lights out. They’d cracked open their window, smoking contraband cigarettes, talking in hushed tones. Jane-two had to make a low whistle, her best impression of an owl. By then at least two dozen of the hired men were already crawling over the roof of the mews house to gain access to the garden and the eastern side of the house. They froze on their haunches, not moving until the footmen blew their lights out and the window juddered closed.
But otherwise the servants paid the Janes no mind. Cook had a good deal of violent and offensive opinions, but the Janes knew their rights: they’d been hired on as house-parlormaids—they sat outside her jurisdiction. The under-footmen were either too superior or too gauche to talk to girls. The head footman was very beautiful, but the Janes were never swayed by beauty. The other housemaids smoked, monitored their tea rations, took in the illustrated papers and avoided their chores when they could get away with it. A bevy of new servants came in daily, in expectation of the ball. Waiters, clock winders, glass cleaners, mechanics, a man with a splendid toupee who specialized in topiary. In other words, the Janes blurred entirely into the background.
“This is going to be easy,” said Jane-one.
“Too easy,” said Jane-two. “And note that down in the log. An assumption made is a day’s delay.”
Jane-one rolled her eyes, but she complied.
They only encountered Mrs. Bone when they crossed the kitchen. She was always caught in some degrading position, struggling with a mop and bucket, usually on her hands and knees, utterly subjected to the tyranny of Cook. “Cup of tea, girls, I beg you,” she whispered when they found her scrubbing the pantry floor, hands blistering from lime solution, eyes wild and bloodshot. “I’m gasping.”
“Sorry, Mrs. Bone,” they said. “We can’t be seen to be fraternizing with you.”
Alice Parker was permanently ensconced in Madam’s rooms, sewing all day.
“Now, girls,” said Winnie, when she sneaked around for the daily report, “Mrs. King says you have an objection to Alice. Tell me what the matter is. We can’t have discord in our ranks.”
“We do not wish to mistrust Alice Parker,” said Jane-two gravely, “but we do.”
“But it’s illogical. She’s done nothing wrong.”
Jane-one sighed. “She never comes down for dinner. She stays upstairs, mooning over Madam all day.”
“Those are her instructions.”
“We’ve all had our instructions,” said Jane-one witheringly. “But there’s no need to go off the deep end.”
Winnie shook her head, as Mrs. King had. “No complaining, girls,” she said. “You know the rules.”
They shrugged at that. No use banging the gong if nobody wanted their dinner. Miss de Vries, meanwhile, they rarely came across at all. This relieved them. You couldn’t trust a girl who’d clearly spent so much time drilling herself, manipulating her voice, her movements. People in this place talked of her as though she were remarkable: preternaturally calm, wise, serene. But the Janes just thought that Madam was a bully. She liked it when the under-footmen dropped things. She winced when they opened their mouths, as if their breath stank. She isolated people, gave them pointless tasks.
“There’s a piece of paper I need,” she said to Jane-one. “A letter. I’ve no notion where I put it. Find it, will you?”
A single piece of paper, in a house as vast as this, with countless drawers and closets? Jane-two marked it in her logbook of risks that very night. “She’s always inspecting things. She’ll know if we move something. This could cause a grave problem.”
Jane-one was practicing her handstands. It helped her concentrate. She could ponder the house’s tiniest parts, its atoms. She could picture millions of threads, long strings of numbers. Drapes and blinds and bulbs and figurines and carpet grips and candles. “You worry too much,” she said from the floor.
17
One week to go
Mrs. King had left this chore for as long as she could, but it could wait no longer. There was only a week to go. It was time to see William.
Certain appointments thrilled her. Some of them amused her. Some of them were tedious but necessary. This was quite different. It involved the digging up and dusting off of feelings.
Winnie eyed her from the other side of Mrs. Bone’s inventions room. “Something’s put you out of sorts,” she said.
“Not in the least,” said Mrs. King briskly, fastening her gloves.
“Who did you say you were going to see?”
Best not to obfuscate. “William,” she said.
“You’re not serious.”
Mrs. King buckled her belt, gave it a fierce tug. “It’s about the tiniest little thing. I wouldn’t even have mentioned it if you hadn’t asked.”
Winnie’s hackles were up in seconds. “Tell me,” she said.
Her temper was growing frayed. She’d been quick to anger ever since she’d discovered Mrs. King’s secret. Trust was such a precious thing. It broke so easily. There was no neat mending of it.
“No,” she said firmly. “I won’t.”
If she’d been sleeping properly, she might have kept her own cool. She might have taken Winnie further into her confidence. Winnie of all people would have understood. She was sympathetic to affairs of the heart. But Mrs. King was growing tired and edgy and she was running out of time.
Winnie stood aside to let her pass. What else could she have done? Wrestled Mrs. King to the ground? She’d never win in a struggle, and they both knew it.
“Good morning, then,” she said, voice tight.
“Good morning,” Mrs. King replied, voice tighter.
Mrs. King stood outside the garden door on Park Lane. The heat was rising, scorching the door handle. Around here, in the shadow of the house, the world had grown quiet, as if it had run out of breath. The cypress trees sagged, quite still. The sky seemed bigger than ever, the color of dust.
Mrs. Bone had been watching, and had reported back: he went out for a smoke at two thirty. Every day. Like clockwork.
Her eyes had narrowed. “Visiting a fancy man at night, were you?”
“Don’t listen to gossip, Mrs. Bone,” Mrs. King said.
Her affairs were hers alone. She reminded herself of her resolve: this wasn’t a romantic rendezvous. She was taking care of loose parts. This was all about business.
Right on cue, she heard footsteps on the other side of the wall.
The scrape of a match, the sound of the flare. He was lighting a cigarette. Why? To calm his nerves? Buck himself up?
There followed a long, suspended silence. He was taking a drag.
She stood outside the garden door and took a long, deep breath—and listened.
He was pacing. She could hear his footsteps circling, slowly, around that quiet shady spot behind the shrubbery.