Delsie

Chapter Eight

While the ladies were still engaged at their happy, feminine chore, deVigne came in unannounced. “I didn’t bother to knock, fearing the butler would be tired from her shopping,” he said.

“What is this?” Jane asked. “Delsie is surely not acting as her own butler. What is amiss with Bristcombe?”

“Mrs. Grayshott’s house is not yet in order,” deVigne told her. “She has a severe servant problem. Do you happen to know what happened to Betsy Rose, Aunt? We can discover no servants in the house but the Bristcombes-and the governess, of course.”

“She left a year ago, Betsy Rose,” Jane answered promptly. “She got married to a local layabout. I made sure she had got herself a bad bargain, but have seen her since in the village looking fine as a star. A silken gown the hussy had on her back. Baggage.”

“She must have nabbed herself a smuggler. The silken gown sounds like it. They bring in a good deal of silk here, as well as brandy,” deVigne thought. “Andrew didn’t replace her?”

“Lord only knows!” She threw up her hands. “I was here very little more than yourself, Max. Only to visit Bobbie. I don’t believe she ever was replaced. And are the Bristcombes jogging along with no help at all, then? No wonder the place is gone to rack and ruin. Still, I don’t know what Bristcombe can be doing if he is not working inside the house, for it is clear as glass he hasn’t touched the lawn or flowers.”

“The apples were allowed to rot. They were not picked at all,” Delsie added.

“This business must be settled at once,” deVigne stated. “Can you recommend a couple of village girls for us, Jane? For maid’s work.”

Delsie felt the old familiar annoyance at being relegated to an onlooker in her own life. “You forget, deVigne, I am more fully acquainted with the village girls than anyone else here. I have in mind a couple of my old students who will do very well. We had a few girls at the Parish School in the winter, when they were not needed at home for farm work.”

“Sorry.” He bowed his head to indicate his error. “I seem always to seek your approval for the wrong things. You will hire two girls yourself, then, I assume?”

“Certainly I shall. Did you put the ad in the paper about Mr. Grayshott’s debts?”

“Yes, and also inquired discreetly about any burglary in the village. There was none.”

This last statement had to be explained to Lady Jane, who was thrown into a tizzy of delight at the unexpected finding of a bag of gold in one’s orchard. She declared that she would run home that instant and have a look under her own trees. Her parcels were taken to her carriage by Lord deVigne, turned footman for the occasion. “My place for dinner tonight, Delsie,” the dame called as she left. These reminders always raised a glow of happiness in the widow’s bosom. It was so novel and pleasant an experience to belong to a family, and such a jolly, happy family too.

When she was gone, deVigne said, “Might this not be a good opportunity to discover the key of Andrew’s vault? It must be looked into for the settling of his estate.”

“Where should I begin to look? I haven’t a notion where he would have kept it.”

“Let’s start with his desk.’“

They went to the study and looked through drawers, which yielded a welter of papers, but no keys. “Here is something-the receipt for the Bristcombes’ wages for the last quarter of this year. He paid them two hundred and fifty pounds! You told me two hundred, deVigne.”

“Servants do get an increase from time to time,” he pointed out.

“Usually for improved service. They aren’t worth half that.”

“You are mentally comparing to your own salary as a teacher,” he said, correctly.

“They got room and board as well.”

“Along with all the sheets and towels they could carry off.”

“You may laugh at me all you like. They are overpaid, and I will be rid of them.”

“That is your affair. Now, about the keys-his bedroom very likely. He seldom left it the last few months.”

“There is a table covered with medicine bottles and things just by his bed. It may be there.” She excused herself and went to the room. She returned with not only the key, but another bag of gold.

“I found the key at the very back of the little drawer, hidden in a bottle under some pills,” she explained.

“You’re a sharp observer. How did you come to find it?”

“I pushed aside the papers-designs for some sort of an engine he had in mind, they looked like-and there was this one bottle. When I lifted it, it seemed very heavy, and then I saw the key, and at the very back of the drawer, this bag. It is just as I said. The pixies have been coming here for years and leaving bags of gold.”

The bag was emptied and discovered to contain the same sum, one hundred guineas. One bag of gold deVigne could credit having become misplaced in the garden by accident. He had thought it was Andrew’s entire savings, which he had somehow dropped in the garden while drunk, but two identical bags holding the same sum was more than coincidence.

“What the devil can this mean?” he asked, frowning.

“There are bound to be others around the house. Let us try if this is the key to the vault.”

Without further ado it was tried, and it opened the vault, which was found to contain another ten of the canvas bags, each with what looked intriguingly like a hundred guineas, though they did not count them. “Where did they come from? I don’t understand!” the widow wailed, more chagrined than pleased to have this small fortune in her hands. No more did deVigne seem pleased.

“Could it be an income from some source, some investment?” she wondered. “He was used to be a partner in the shipyards, was he not?”

“He was the major owner. The Blewes Shipyard used to be the Grayshott Shipyard. He took Blewes in as junior partner when he married. When Andrew began drinking after Louise’s death, Blewes gradually took over, becoming first senior partner, then later buying Andrew out entirely. Andrew foolishly put his money into unsound investments that went broke. He was always looking for a get-rich-quick scheme, instead of contenting himself with a good dividend. He blew the last of his money in setting up a small manufactory in Merton to produce a contrivance of his own invention. Some mechanical contraption to turn a spit it was, for roasting meat, you know. Quite clever, really, but it didn’t catch on. He had no commercial enterprise going at the time of his death, however. I have been to see his solicitor. I can’t imagine where this money could have been coming from. It is an utter mystery to me.”

“I’ll be arrested. I know it as surely as I am sitting here,” she said resignedly. “You have married me to a thief! Oh, what shall I do with all this money?”

“I suggest you return it to the vault for the time being, and keep a close hand on the key. Here, take this bag you saddled me with too.” He handed back the bag he had taken for her.

“Yes, you are eager to clean your hands of the evidence, and palm it all off on me,” she charged, accepting the bag gingerly, as though it were dirty, and stuffing it into the vault with the others. “That is twelve hundred guineas we have found today, and we haven’t even begun to look about the house yet.”

“He wouldn’t have left it sitting around the place under plants or on window ledges. He wasn’t that senile.”

“Never mind trying to put a respectable face on it, calling it senility. He was an alcoholic, which is much worse. I shall have a good look around as soon as you have left.”

“Is that an oblique hint for me to leave, and without a glass of Andrew’s excellent brandy to prepare me for the cold winds of December?” deVigne inquired.

“I hope I am not so uncivil. Let us go into the saloon, where I endeavor to keep a few twigs smoldering to ward off the worst of the weather.”

DeVigne went to kick the few logs into flames, while the widow fetched the decanter and one glass. She had no taste for the strong beverage. When she returned, deVigne sat very much at his ease, fingering a bolt of black crepe she had bought that morning.

“Thank you,” he said, accepting the glass. “May I make a suggestion? I cannot speak for others, but for myself, I like a very small glass of brandy, not a brimming vessel. I can’t drink the half of this, and it is a shame to waste it.” He carefully tossed half a glass into the fire, where it flared into leaping flames, blue and green.

“How lovely!” Delsie exclaimed, smiling at the show. “Now I know something useful to do with that dreadful drink.”

“Wastrel! If you discover a hogshead of the stuff you don’t want, I’ll take it off your hands.” He turned back to the materials on the sofa beside him. “Pity you must be confined to black for a year. You would look well in brighter colors,” he mentioned, examining her face, as though selecting his preferred shade.

She felt a sudden warmth at the personal tone the conversation was taking. “I am used to black,” she answered dampingly.

“I have never seen you in anything but dark colors.”

“I didn’t begin wearing black till after my mother’s death. I was obliged to dress somberly when I worked at St. Mary’s. Now, of course, I am a widow, and when they put me in Bridewell for possessing stolen money, I daresay I shall have to wear black there too.”

“I shall use my influence to have you transported if you prefer it, ma’am,” he offered kindly.

“I knew I might depend on you to do the right thing by me, so caring as you have been for my every comfort! Pray make it America, and not Australia. I think I would prefer even wild Indians to the sultry climate that prevails in the latter.”

“You may be sure I shall do all in my power to ease your shipment to America. Plead for the widow, like the Good Book says. I’ll see if I can’t get you isolated from the murderers and the less desirable of the criminal element. But seriously, where could he regularly steal such a sum? One would think even the most simple-minded of victims would tumble to it after a couple of times, and take some precautions to prevent ten or twelve repetitions.”

“What was the one bag doing in the orchard, that is what I cannot fathom.”

“Right in the orchard was it, or at the edge?”

“In the middle, under one of those little runted trees. Why are those two smaller than the others? Do you know?”

“I believe Sir Harold told me, after I returned from a season in London one year, that two trees had died, and Andrew replaced them. It is not unusual to lose a tree. I have a couple of smaller ones in my own orchard, but they never produce gold, only apples.”

“If that ingenious husband of mine has invented a means of turning apples to gold, it is a pity the secret died with him. Bobbie calls them the pixie trees, and says they are more valuable than all the others put together. Is it usual for a smaller tree to have a better yield?”

“No, it is some nonsense they’ve been filling her head with. I wouldn’t encourage her to believe that ignorant sort of superstition.”

Again the widow bristled. “I have not been filling her head with superstition, milord. It is Mrs. Bristcombe. I am trying to discourage the idea of pixies.”

“Sorry again, cousin. Why is it I invariably raise your hackles?-and I am fairly walking on eggs, too. You are very sensitive, I think?”

“Perhaps it is rather that you are insensitive,” she replied, and felt she had gained a point, though it was a somewhat arbitrary charge.

“Let us hope that under your tutelage I shall become more finely attuned to your sensibilities, ma’am. Jane is kind enough to tell me I am a biddable fellow, and we are all, we bachelors, more amenable to being led by a pretty young lady than anyone else.”

Delsie’s eyes widened at this leading statement, but before she could give voice to any objection, he spoke on calmly. “No, don’t try to quell me with one of your schoolteacher’s scowls. I have been out of the schoolroom a good many years. And never had such a delightful tutor when I was in it either,” he finished with a little suggestion of a smile. Then he immediately arose. “I have a distinct sensation I should take my leave, before the teacher brings out her ruler to slap my knuckles.”

As he entered the hallway, Bristcombe lounged in through the front door, wearing shabby clothing and with his face not shaved.

“Ah, the mysterious vanishing butler!” deVigne said ironically, raking the man from head to toe, his eyes lingering on the incipient beard, the muddied boots. “Mrs. Grayshott has been wondering where you keep yourself these days, Bristcombe. When a lady pays a good sum for a servant’s time, she expects him to perform his duties. You do not appear to serve as a butler in this establishment. At least one hopes it was not your intention to show me the door in that getup. From the jungle at the front door it is clear you have not turned gardener. May one inquire how you do manage to fill your days?”

“I’ve been getting wood,” he said, though he carried no wood with him.

“Mrs. Grayshott will be happy to hear it. While we catch a glimpse of you, there are a few points that want mentioning. You will leave lights burning for Mrs. Grayshott when she is out in the evenings, and remain up and about till she is safely returned, after which you will lock up carefully. Do you understand?” he asked, in a polite tone that carried an unmistakable threat.

“Yes, milord,” Bristcombe mumbled sulkily.

“Good. Otherwise it will be necessary to find servants who know their duties.”

DeVigne was not chided by so much as a glance for his interference on this occasion. Delsie was happy to have the unpleasant chore of a scolding done for her. DeVigne took his leave, and Bristcombe came into the saloon after Mrs. Grayshott.

“Begging your pardon, Mrs. Grayshott, but me and the missus would like to go visiting my folks tomorrow. Just five miles down the road past the village. Sunday was our regular day off when the master was alive.”

“By all means, go ahead.” And what a relief to be rid of you, she added to herself.

“We’ll go after your luncheon and be back by dark, or soon after. I’ll be here to lock up for the night, and leave the lights on for you and all,” he added in quite a humble tone.

She was half pleased and half angered that the baron’s brief lecture to Bristcombe had proved so efficacious, when she had been wrangling to less avail with the wife for two days. She took her purchases upstairs and spent an agreeable hour going through fashion books choosing patterns for her new gowns. Next she went to the escritoire and wrote the notes to the village girls she wished to come to her. She would send them into the village with a servant. The recipients would not appreciate having to frank them. This done, she began sorting through the desk to discard those items belonging to her predecessor that were now useless.

She debated for five minutes whether to keep or discard the printed stationery bearing the name Mrs. Grayshott. Her inclination was to throw it into the grate and burn it up as fast as she could, so much did she dislike the name, but in the end thrift overcame inclination, and she kept it for rough notes and lists. As she reassembled the drawers to her own convenience, she recalled Bobbie mentioning a secret panel at the back of one. Worked with a button, she had said. She examined drawers for buttons, and found, cleverly concealed on the underside of the top drawer, a little button. When she pushed it, a soft click was heard, and the back panel of the drawer fell forward to reveal another canvas bag. “Oh, no!” she moaned softly to herself, pulling it out. No counting was necessary. She was becoming very familiar with the weight of a hundred gold guineas.