“Not more than two,” answered Sarah decidedly. “That’s supposing there’s an under-butler, which it’s likely there will be. The housekeeper, her ladyship’s dresser, the stillroom-maid, and four of five housemaids: that’s all that need concern you, miss, for it’s not to be expected that you’ll have much to do with the gardeners, nor the grooms. When are you to go?”

“Tomorrow! At least, I am to join my aunt at the Clarendon tomorrow.” She put up her chin, allowed her eyelids to droop, and said languidly: “I shall be spending the night at the Clarendon, Sarah: be good enough to pack my trunk!”

“You may be sure I will!” replied Sarah grimly.

“You will not!” cried Kate, abandoning her haughty pose.

“Indeed and I shall! Now, give over, Miss Kate! Who packed your trunk when you went to the Astleys, pray? I must get up your best muslin, too—which reminds me that you need to put fresh ribbons on it!” She bustled across the room to the dresser, and took her purse out of one of its drawers. “Take this, love, and go and buy yourself some! Dinner won’t be ready for above an hour yet, so you’ve plenty of time.”

Kate put her hands behind her back, vigorously shaking her head. “I’ll go, but I won’t take your purse. I have a great deal of money in my own—so much, in fact, that I shan’t grudge the expense of a hack to Bedford House!”

“Did her ladyship give it to you?” demanded Sarah. “No, I saved it!” said Kate, laughing, and backing to the door. “No, Sarah, no! I’ve had too much from you already. Keep some dinner for me, won’t you?”

She vanished through the doorway, and was not seen again until nearly five o’clock, when a hack deposited her in the yard, laden with packages.

“Well!” said Sarah. “A fine time to come home to dinner this is, miss! And what may you have been wasting your money on, if you please?”

“I haven’t wasted it—at least, I do hope I have not!” replied Kate, spilling her parcels on to the kitchen table. “That one is for you, and this is a pipe for Joe, and—oh, goodness, where is the snuff box I bought for Mr Nidd? It isn’t that, or that—oh, I put it in my reticule, to be safe! Tell me, Sarah, do you think Joe will like—Why, Sarah!—”

“I can’t help it,” sobbed Sarah, from behind her apron. “To think of you flinging your money away, and you with so little! Oh, you naughty girl, how could you? Didn’t you buy nothing for yourself? Oh, I can’t bear it!”

“But of course I did! Ribbon trimmings, just as you bade me, and—oh, all manner of things, to furbish me up a trifle!” said Kate merrily. “Sarah, do, pray, stop napping your bib!”

This had the desired effect. Sarah dropped her apron, ejaculating: “Miss Kate! How dare you? Where did you learn that nasty, vulgar expression? Not that I need to ask you! From Father, I’ll be bound!”

“Not a bit of it! From Tom!”

“Oh, you did, did you? And how many times have I told you not to go near the stables, miss? Yes, and I’ll tell you something else, which is that if you talk like that at Staplewood you’ll be back here in the twinkling of a bedpost!”

“Yes, Sarah!” said Kate meekly. She tore the wrapping from the largest of her parcels, shook out the Paisley shawl it contained, and swept it round her nurse. “There! Please say you like it!” she coaxed, kissing Sarah’s cheek. “It comes to you with my love, dearest.”

Mr Nidd, entering the kitchen some minutes later, was revolted to find his daughter-in-law peacocking about (as he phrased it) in a handsome shawl, and instantly demanded to be told what she thought she was a-doing of, dressed-up like Christmas beef.

“Oh, Father, Miss Kate has given it to me!” said Sarah, dissolving again into tears. “The very thing I always wanted!”

“Ho!” said Mr Nidd. “I might ha’ known it! Flashing the rags all over! Soon as I see her trapesing off, I says to myself: Wasting the ready! that’s what she’s a-going to do!”

“Did you indeed?” said Kate. “Well, in that case I won’t give you your snuff box, Mr Nidd!”

“You’ve never gone and bought me a snuff box, miss?” he said incredulously. “You’re gammoning me!”

“See if I am!” challenged Kate, holding the box out to him.

“Well, dang me!” said Mr Nidd, accepting it in one gnarled hand, and subjecting it to a close inspection. “Silver!” he pronounced, much gratified. “Well, I’m sure I thank you very kindly, miss—very kindly indeed I thank you! Ah, and whenever I helps meself to a pinch of merry-go-up out of this here box I shall think of you, and I can’t say no fairer than that!”

Even Sarah felt that he had expressed his gratitude with rare grace. He then, and with great care, transferred the contents of his horn box into the new silver one, handing the old box to Sarah, with instructions to throw it away, since he had no further use for it. After that, he sallied forth, bound for his favourite hostelry, where, no one could doubt, he had every intention of offering his cronies pinches from his box. The discovery, later, that Kate had bestowed a handkerchief on his youngest grandson only abated his satisfaction for as long as it took him to assess the respective values of a silver snuff box and what he designated a Bird’s Eye Wipe.

Chapter III

By five o’clock two days later, the chaise that bore Lady Broome, her niece, and her abigail, was nearing its destination, and her ladyship woke up. Miss Malvern, bright-eyed and alert, had not slept, but had divided her time between reverently stroking the sleek ermine muff which Lady Broome had bestowed upon her, squinting down to admire the matching stole about her shoulders, observing with interest the country through which four fast horses were carrying her, and speculating on the sudden change in her fortunes.

From the moment of her arrival at the Clarendon Hotel, she felt that she had been pitchforked into another, and more affluent, world. Received with great civility, she was led upstairs to my lady’s apartments, a large suite of rooms looking on to Albemarle Street, and welcomed affectionately by my lady, who kissed her, held her at arms’ length, and exclaimed ruefully: “How very pretty you are! And what charming taste you have! I don’t wonder at it that that horrid young man made up to you! Ah, Sidlaw, here she is—my little half-niece! My love, this is Sidlaw, my dresser, and once, like your Sarah, my nurse!”

Not for nothing had Miss Malvern spent six months in a gentleman’s establishment: Miss Sidlaw’s mien might be forbidding, and her curtsy majestic, but Miss Malvern knew better than to offer her hand. She smiled, and acknowledged the curtsy with a gracious inclination of her head, well aware that by this manner of receiving an introduction she had risen from the status of Poor Relation to that of a Lady of the First Stare.

Dinner was served in my lady’s private parlour: not a large dinner, but one of great elegance, beginning with a soup, going on with lobster, dressed in a sauce known only to Jacquard, reaching its climax in a capilotade of ducklings, and ending with a dish of peu d’amours. Miss Malvern, abandoning herself to the flesh-pots, enjoyed every mouthful.

While she ate, she lent an attentive ear to my lady’s discourse, which was devoted to the glory of Staplewood and the Broomes. She learned that a Broome had been one of King James the First’s braw new knights; and that ever since that day son had succeeded father in an unbroken line; she learned that while none had achieved fame, many had been distinguished; and she learned that each one had made it his business to enlarge, or to embellish, the original manor. Lady Broome promised to show her the sketches and plans of the house over more than two hundred years, adding: “My part—or, rather, Sir Timothy’s—has been to improve the gardens, and to build a belvedere, commanding a view of the lake.”

There was an appreciative twinkle in Kate’s eye, but her aunt was choosing a peu d’amour, and she did not see it. It seemed to Kate that although Lady Broome might have outgrown a girlish desire to marry a duke she still had her fair share of ambition. It was directed into worthier channels; her enthusiasm for the Broome family was certainly not assumed; and when she spoke of Staplewood it was with reverence, and a great deal of knowledge.

She sent Kate early to bed, warning her that she must be ready to start on the long journey at five in the morning. “You won’t object to traveling all day, I hope? I don’t care to be away from Sir Timothy for more than three nights—and I never sleep well in posting-houses.”

“Of course I don’t object, ma’am!” instantly responded Kate. “I have frequently travelled all day, in the Peninsula, and over shocking roads! In antiquated carriages, too, when I have had no horse to ride.”

“Ah, I was forgetting! I am afraid parts of the road are very bad, but my chaise is particularly well-sprung, and I employ my own postilions. A sad extravagance, when I go about so little nowadays! But when one is obliged to travel without male escort trustworthy boys are a necessity. Now I am going to take you to your bedchamber, just to be sure that you have everything you want for the night.”

She cast a keen, critical glance round this apartment, but Kate’s gaze fell on the ermine stole and muff laid out on the bed, and remained riveted. “But—those aren’t mine, ma’am!”

“What are not yours? Oh, the furs! Indeed they are! The first present I have ever given my niece: do you like them?”

“Oh, yes, yes, but—Aunt Minerva, I do thank you, but you mustn’t crush me with benevolence!”

Lady Broome laughed. “Mustn’t I? Foolish child, do you mean to throw them back at me?”