Chapter 6
Julian awoke in his hotel room feeling quite satisfied. His only regret was in not being able to see Denver’s face as the vicissitudes – and mice – fell on him.
Ah, well, he could imagine it.
oOoOo
The first intimation that Thomas Denver had that all was not well was a faintly fishy smell. He frowned. He had not ordered fish for today, and he wished the servants would be more careful with their cooking. He dismissed it from his mind, however; servants were irritating and there was not a lot to be done about it, as new servants were no better. There was no proper servility these days, and the whole class was too damned independent. He did not frame too closely the thought that Wilcox, butler and partner in crime, was one of the worst, even as he did not dare frame too closely the thought that when this was over, Wilcox would not be marrying Clarinda, but would be suffering an unfortunate accident.
Denver acknowledged that Wilcox was the brains in their arrangement, but Wilcox was dangerous. And he would have to go. He knew too much.
Denver wrote a letter to the solicitor who handled Anne’s money, telling him that some upstart was trying to interfere in the estate. That ought to cause Ravenscar some trouble; the starchy Endicott was bound to at least stall the viscount. He decided to walk down to the nearest post office for the same-day delivery penny post in London, rather than send a footman, and pulled on his York-tan gloves.
He encountered an obstruction, and pulled out his hand, pulling the obstruction with it; which he promptly dropped, along with the glove.
“UGH!” cried Denver.
Wilcox appeared from his sanctum, soft-footed and predatory.
“What is it, sir?” he asked.
Denver, who had a horror of mice, pointed a trembling finger.
“It was in my glove!” said Denver, in a low, intense voice.
“Most unpleasant, sir,” said Wilcox, bending to pick up the mouse by the tail, fastidiously held in his gloved hands.
“Send someone with a penny to the post office; I’m going to have a brandy,” said Denver. He staggered into the dining-room to pour himself a stiff drink, and was about to throw it off when he happened to glance at the decanter, and saw its unwelcome visitor in the clear brown liquid.
Denver screamed like a little girl, throwing the glass from which he had been about to drink from him, and staring in horrified fascination at the rodent corpse frozen in time in swimming through his best brandy.
oOoOo
Julian was about to leave the hotel when someone he knew walked in.
Daisy the Dasher had been his first mistress, and he still recalled her with affection. He walked over to her and her escort, and raised his hat.
“Beg pardon, may I borrow Daisy to talk to for a moment? I won’t take her anywhere private, but I need some advice as I’m getting married.”
“R… Ravenscar? I… delighted, I mean… certainly,” stuttered the young man, looking anything but delighted. Julian offered his arm to Daisy and drew her to one side.
“I’d throw any of them up in an instant for you, Julian, you know,” said Daisy. “You’re getting married? She’s a lucky girl.”
“Luckier than you think,” said Julian, grimly. “And I wouldn’t tell you if I didn’t know how discreet you are, but I essentially rescued her from the clutches of family trying to drive her insane to get her money.”
“It’s not uncommon, alas,” said Daisy. “My friend, Maggie, she cut and run from an asylum, and every time her brother tries to get married she plasters herself all over him in public and tells all and sundry how he taught her to do her job as a whore when they were both in the nursery. He didn’t add that crime to his manifold shortcomings, but he did connive with the parents when she was left a honeyfall from an aunt.”
“Well, get me some details and I’ll see what I can do,” said Julian. “I’m sort of taking on a private asylum full to sort out, but never mind that. What I’d like to pay you to do is to write half a dozen very frisky letters to a man named Thomas, pretending to be from a mistress who is half educated and thoroughly vulgar, for his wife to find.”
“Oh, I like it,” said Daisy. “I’ll send a garter to tie them up and go on about how it arouses me to think of the garter we sported with tying up our correspondence.”
“Oh, yes, that’s perfect,” said Julian. “I should buy you a farewell gift….”
“I’d as soon have cash, lovey,” said Daisy. “I want to retire; I was thinking of opening a little florist’s shop, me da having been a grocer, and me understanding that sort of thing, and I’d get sentimental if you bought me jewels and I’d come over silly and not want to sell them.”
Julian laughed.
“Well, maybe I shall get you something purely sentimental just because as well,” he said. “Are you set on being a florist? Only I have three actual insane girls, one of whom is a fire-raiser, who need someone to care for them and if you and maybe Maggie were interested….”
“We can do that,” said Daisy. “I can’t say I like the idea of being up at all hours to go buy flowers.”
“Well, I’ll let you know when I have a suitable place. Meet you here in a couple of days with the letters?”
“I’ll have them done for tonight, if you like.”
He raised his hat.
“Perfect.”
Julian drove back to his house to keep his fellow conspirators apprised of what was going on.
Anne laughed and laughed at the thought of the mice.
“Uncle Thomas hates mice; he’s scared of them,” she said.
“Even better,” said Julian. “I met an old mistress of mine,” he said. “She taught me everything I know about bedroom matters.”
“Oh, good; one of us needs to know,” said Anne. “Amicable, I hope?”
“Very; I’m paying her to write to Thomas as if she was his mistress.”
“Oh, delicious! That will really irritate Aunt Amelia.”
“I asked her to be vulgar.”
“Even better! I fear I could not write such letters for you, so I am glad you know an expert.”
“Her friend is a whore because she was treated like you.”
“We must help her!”
“I hope to. In the meantime, Daisy wants to retire; she must be in her thirties, still lovely, but it won’t last forever. So, I suggested paying her to care for the true lunatics from the asylum where you were.”
“Indeed, she is wise to get out when she can. Are you worried that I would not receive her? I will, of course; if she has taught you what to do, I will be in her debt.”
“You are an amazing girl, and I think I am falling in love with you.”
“I think I already fell in love with you when I fell into your arms, and looked up at an angel,” said Anne.
He put his arms around her.
“Right now, I feel more protective than amorous,” he said.
“Right now, I need more protection than anything else,” said Anne.
oOoOo
Amelia Denver found the next mouse, in her sewing basket, and yelped; but removed it firmly. She was, after all, expecting the vicar and sundry local ladies to afternoon tea.
The two-tier plate of cakes was brought in by Wilcox on the dumb waiter, along with tea, and a plate of dainty sandwiches. Mrs. Denver steeped the tea and poured.
“And how is your poor niece?” asked the vicar, who had been profoundly shocked, but who also disliked the Denvers cordially, and prayed for the grace not to suspect them of being the unwitting cause of their niece’s madness.
“She has responded to treatment, and we have sent her to a finishing school for difficult girls in Switzerland,” said Mrs. Denver, glibly.
The vicar gave a genuine smile.
“Ah, excellent, I am sure the mountain air will bring balm to her soul,” he said.
“I don’t know about that, I gather she’s sickly,” said Mrs. Denver. It was the narrative they had decided upon, to be followed by the news of the girl’s untimely death. “Can I help you to some cake?”
“Thank you,” said the vicar, who endured the indifferent cake from the Denvers’ indifferent cook.
Mrs. Denver lifted the covers of the plates, releasing the mice designated Albert and Charlie by Julian, who was incorrect, as they were actually Albert and Charlotte. They had caroused within the cake, and now, let loose, made a bid for freedom amidst shrieking women, and proceeded, once safely in the wainscotting, with the rituals to produce a new generation.
Pandemonium raged; and Julian would have been proud of his rodent proteges. Half the women had climbed on chairs, and the vicar, feeling that he should do something manful, seized the poker from the fire irons, but only succeeded in breaking the teapot, which streamed hot tea, to add to the confusion. The tea-party broke up with tears, and a degree of despite towards Mrs. Denver, and the vicar excused himself in a hurry after apologising for the tea pot, so that he could be at home before he collapsed into howls of laughter.
oOoOo
Julian drove back to London, not having checked out of his hotel, and met up with Daisy, whose youthful protector had gone rather sulkily back to the auspices of his parental home.
“He’s a nice boy, thank you for treating him with respect,” said Daisy. “He half expected you to throw him out.”
“I should, perhaps, apologise for trespassing on your time with him,” said Julian.
“No, no, the poor boy doesn’t have your stamina,” said Daisy. “Are these the right sort of thing?”
Julian read rapidly through the letters. Thanks for a ‘luverly necklace of sparklers’ and some insinuations around a slang term also used for the hand-warming muff of Isabella mink had him chuckling.
“Really, Daisy, ‘You and I will think of my garter, and what we did with it and where it has been?’ the mind boggles.”
“Yours might, dearie, but you never had any problem maintaining a stiffie without help,” said Daisy. “Oh, you sweet, innocent boy. A constriction stops it going down.”
“Oh!” said Julian, in sudden revelation. He blushed. Daisy patted his face. “Er…” said Julian, “How do you know he has difficulty?”
“His sort often do,” said Daisy.
“I love the way you suggested that he likes… discipline,” said Julian. “With luck, his wife might try it on him.”
Daisy sniggered.
“Amateurs always get carried away,” she said. “He might just have problems sitting for a while.”
“Somehow, I find myself unmoved to sympathy by his coming vicissitudes,” said Julian. “And I like it that the garter letter is the latest, so I can leave that and Amelia will know what she is looking for.”
There was a lot of yelling in the dining room when Julian slipped in to the Denver house later.
“Wilcox, are you doing this to me?” howled Denver.
“No, sir, it’s not me,” said Wilcox. “I’m puzzled as to what is going on. Plainly someone is doing something.”
“Fire the rest of the servants and replace them!” cried Denver. “One of them’s been bribed.”
“I can’t think of any other explanation,” said Wilcox.
“I can, but we shall have to see what happens next,” said Denver.
“You think your wife’s out to get rid of you?” asked Wilcox.
There was a long silence.
“That… is possible,” said Denver. “Only how could she make the candles burn green? You’d better replace them with ones from the butler’s pantry.”
“Yes, and I’ll take the rest of those and have a look at them,” said Wilcox. “Seems to me the wick has been doctored somehow.”
He would find the pins; ah, well, thought Julian, the other plans might well be successful.
He was not to know that the news of green flames had already caused most of the maids to flee, some of them packing their band boxes as he stood there.
Julian felt he was safe in going into the study, and pushing the garter-tied letters to the back of a drawer. The Denvers did not share a bedroom, so using that was completely out of the question; but Julian had a thought.
He slipped into the withdrawing room and thrust the supposedly most recent letter down the side of the cushions of what he guessed to be Thomas Denver’s chair. It faced the dining room door, and Mrs. Denver could scarcely fail to see a scrap of white sticking up. Julian did not think there was a woman in the world who could resist the urge to look. Thomas Denver would have had another decanter brought, and more brandy placed in it.
And that should be good for a lovely row, he thought, happily.
And if they were replacing all the servants, he might perhaps sit with them in their hall tomorrow or the next day to hear all about the family tribulations.
Julian left again, chuckling.
He had noted which companies Thomas held shares in, and most of his income came from being the major shareholder in a Jamaican plantation. And the time of year was very fortuitous, the back end of the hurricane season.
There was time to drop in a letter to the Morning Post which would be printed on the morrow; a mocked-up column purporting to be an article in a colonial paper. Julian knew a printer.
“We hope none of our readers hold any interest in the Glory Hope Plantation on Jamaica, since the sad news reached us last night that a terrible hurricane ripped through it on the 10th of August, flattening everything, scouring the very soil away, and causing much loss of life. The saddest thing this correspondent has ever seen was of a negro child literally ripped from his mother’s arms and tossed in the wind like a rag, even as she was thrown into a wall with such brutality that life was instantly bereft.”
And if that did not bring the share prices crashing through the floor, thought Julian, nothing would.
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