Gracious. Maybe there was a mix-up wherever Rupert was stationed and he was sent in error. Accidents happened, didn’t they? Even in the afterlife. Look what happened to Lucifer.
Beckett bustled in, full of gossip. Addie listened half-heartedly while her curls were tamed and coaxed into loose waves. But then something penetrated. “What did you say just now?”
“I shouldn’t be carrying tales. It’s wrong.”
“When has that ever stopped you?” Sometimes Beckett needed a bit of prodding, but not very often.
“Maybe I misheard.”
“Beckett! Out with it!”
“You probably won’t believe it. It does seem far-fetched, him being so much older.”
“Beckett!”
“All right, all right. They say downstairs that Lady Fernald is doing some barney-mugging with Mr. Davies, the society garden designer.”
Addie wasn’t shocked at all. “Good for them. Anyway, what do you mean, ‘older?’ They are much of an age, aren’t they? Somewhere in their fifties or early sixties?”
“Not the old Lady Fernald. The young one.”
“Oh!” Oh. Pamela! How awful. Poor Hugh.
But, really, it had been poor Pamela for years, hadn’t it? It would be understandable if she sought physical comfort—she wasn’t a living saint.
How awful anyway.
“Why do they believe this? And who is ‘they’ anyhow?” Addie wondered what sort of gossip her own staff got up to. They probably had a lot to talk about when Detective Inspector Hunter visited in April and then left the same day.
“The maids, mostly. Not her maid, Murray, though—the woman’s defended her mistress like a bull terrier. But young Lady Fernald was seen going in and out of his room at all hours.”
“Maybe Lady Fernald was consulting with him about the refurbishments.”
Beckett rolled her eyes. “Lady A, you are as innocent as a newborn lamb. I’m glad you’ve got me to tell you what’s what. They can’t be talking about plants and parterres at two in the morning. It’s unnatural.” She gave Addie’s bob a spritz of perfume. “There. You do look a treat.”
“From the neck up. I’m still in my slip. What do you advise I wear?”
“The dark green watered silk is ever so elegant. The emeralds, of course. All of them. Don’t be stingy—you want to outshine everybody.”
“I do?”
“You have your reputation to uphold. You can’t let your little riding mishap interfere with your glamorous feminine wiles.”
Beckett was a big fan of the moving picture shows and had ambitions for Addie. Addie was fairly sure any feminine wiles she once possessed, glamorous or otherwise, had atrophied.
“Very well. Light me up like Broadway.” They had recently spent five glorious months in New York, and the Great White Way was a sight to behold.
In an hour—after Beckett made “improvements” to Addie’s maquillage—she was downstairs in the drawing room with a sherry in her hand, surrounded by four good-looking gentlemen. Lucas had arrived to complement Mr. Cassidy, Captain Clifford, and Mr. Bradbury. He knew them all, and the chatter flowed around her, not that Addie was especially flattered to be in the middle of it. It was more by default. The twins weren’t down yet, nor was Pamela. Evelyn Fernald and her sister-in-law, Iris Temple, who had a grace-and-favour cottage on the estate, were across the room talking to Simon Davies. It was as if a line of demarcation was drawn between the Old Guard and the New.
Hugh rolled in with his valet, Jim Musgrave, and surveyed the scene with a sunny smile. There was a lot to smile about—handsome guests, and an even handsomer drawing room, its salmon-silk walls designed to showcase Pamela’s Dutch floral and fruit still lifes. On a new pink-veined marble mantelpiece, a pair of famille rose vases filled with apple blossom branches scented the air. A flowery needlepoint rug was underfoot, completing the effect.
Addie remembered the room as originally being dark, dim, and dreadfully Tudor, with armor and dead animals on the walls, but that was before Pamela. Her feminine hand was everywhere evident, with comfortable pastel upholstered furnishings and pillows, gilt tables, and pretty knickknacks scattered about. Briefly, Addie wondered how Evelyn had taken the changes to her late husband’s ancestral home—it was always difficult to please two mistresses, although Rupert managed, hadn’t he?
Hugh was not present at luncheon, so Addie greeted him with the warmth he always inspired. He had the world in the palm of his hand before the kaiser decided to poke his cousin, King George V, in the eye. Remarkably, chlorine gas-damaged lungs and a bullet lodged in his spine had not diminished his spirit.
“You’re as gorgeous as ever, I see.” She bent to kiss him.
“I try. I must keep up with this lot.” He pointed to the assembled gentlemen. “Look at them, Addie! Don’t they remind you of a Leyendecker advert for Arrow shirts? All the manly men, right here for your delectation. I think Jim does well by me, don’t you? And I can’t believe I actually beat Pam to the punch. Well done, Jim. Bonus for you.”
It was a running joke between the Fernalds that Hugh was usually late, and not just always by necessity. Naturally, it did take him longer to get ready, but he was a stickler when it came to estate matters and could often be found up to his eyelashes in his study poring over account books when he was supposed to be elsewhere. But that was probably why everything was so perfect here—the property was beautifully run.
The long speech caused Hugh to erupt in a cough, and his valet gave him a handkerchief. “No need for a bonus, Sir Hugh,” Jim said. Hugh had saved his life, and the valet had not forgotten it.
The men suddenly straightened up, and Addie turned. Pamela had arrived. Addie could be encrusted in emeralds right down to her toenails and she’d still fall short. Hugh’s wife was the most dazzling debutante of the 1911 season, and the ensuing years only honed her beauty. She was as kind as she was attractive, so Addie really couldn’t hate her. The woman sent flowers and fruit from her succession houses for months after Rupert died, which brightened Addie’s own spirits.
Pamela’s dress was simplicity itself, the kind of expensive simplicity that came out of the Parisian atelier of Madeleine Vionnet, if Addie was not mistaken. She was a vision in silver satin cut on the bias and clinging to her trim figure in all the right places, a spray of diamonds in her wavy dark hair the only jewelry besides her wedding rings. Addie now felt like a Christmas tree about to go up in flames.
“Hello, darling! Everyone,” Pam said, beaming. “Addie, I do hope you’ve recovered.”
“What’s amiss?” Lucas raised his eyebrow in concern.