‘I do not think that we should be in any great haste to rent this property out,’ Lady Radcliffe said as she and I strolled around what she, very optimistically, referred to as The Rose Garden. ‘It is conveniently close to Town – an easier drive than that to Whitebeams. It might prove useful.’
‘It could be absolutely charming,’ I said. ‘And it has little land to worry about, which is convenient. But perhaps that is not an issue. In my time, unless one has considerable resources, maintaining something the size of a park would be impossible.’
‘Indeed?’
‘The cost of staff,’ I explained. I had told her once that my entire apartment would fit inside her drawing room at Whitebeams and that I employed no servants, but I am not certain that she really believed me.
* * *
The next day was bright and sunny, so we sent a note around and received one in reply from Rowena to say that she would be delighted to come and that it was an excellent idea to include Miss Jordan.
I will make certain that she accompanies me, whatever it takes.
‘Interesting,’ I remarked, re-reading it as the barouche, the top folded down, drove the short distance to Tillingham Hall. ‘Rowena has obviously realised that something is strange. Beyond the murder, that is. Something involving Arabella.’
‘Worrying, would be more the word I would use,’ Lady Radcliffe said, frowning. ‘There is something very unhealthy going on and I do not like those young ladies being involved.’
‘They do have their mothers with them.’
‘Yes, there is that,’ she agreed as we stopped at the front door and the groom jumped down to knock.
Rowena emerged almost immediately, as though she had been hovering in the hall, too impatient to wait in the drawing room. Her red hair blazed out from under the brim of her straw Villager hat and her blue eyes were alert and intelligent – and serious, despite her ready smile.
‘Come on, Arabella, we don’t want to keep Lady Radcliffe’s lovely horses standing.’ She turned as she spoke, hooked her hand firmly through the arm of the young woman hesitating behind her and almost towed her down the steps.
Arabella Jordan was pale. So pale that freckles that I had not noticed before stood out across her nose and on her cheeks. When I had first met her I had thought her petite: now my immediate reaction was that she was suffering from an eating disorder, she seemed so fragile.
The groom helped both young ladies up into the barouche and they sat, as befitted the youngest in the party, with their backs to the horses.
‘I am so looking forward to this, Lady Radcliffe, thank you so much for inviting us.’ Rowena was being deliberately bright and cheerful, but when our eyes met I saw anxiety and an appeal in them. ‘The gardens at the Hall are charming, but it is lovely to be driving along and having such a view of the countryside. You must point out all the best sights, Arabella.’
‘I do not know this area very well,’ Arabella said, her voice flat. ‘My home is further south.’
‘Oh, but I thought you and your siblings played as children with the Prescott boys,’ I said.
‘Mr Alexander’s and Mr Horace’s sons, yes. Their estates border Papa’s.’
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Foolish of me to forget. So poor Lord Tillingham was not amongst your playmates?’
‘He was older,’ she said. ‘Six years older than Marcus, even.’
‘That seems like centuries when one is a child, doesn’t it? The difference somehow disappears as one gets older.’ I wasn’t too sure about that, not when it was a case of a nineteen-year-old girl being more or less instructed to wed a man thirteen years her senior. ‘After all, you were quite comfortable marrying Lord Tillingham.’
‘Yes,’ she said, her smile firmly in place now. ‘It was very suitable.’
I could almost feel the intensity of Rowena’s gaze on me. She wanted to talk, but not in front of Arabella. The carriage was bowling along a road running south, with the towering scarp of the Chiltern Hills on our left and gently sloping fields to our right. I could see a village in the distance: red tiled roofs and slow curls of smoke from the chimneys. And just ahead, a dense little coppice by the side of the road.
‘Oh dear, I should have…’ I lowered my voice and whispered so the coachman and groom could not hear. ‘I should have used the privy before we came out.’
Lady Radcliffe was as fast on the uptake as always. ‘Hedges!’
The groom twisted around on his seat. ‘My lady?’
‘Pull up by that stand of trees.’
‘Yes, my lady.’
‘You go with Cassandra, Rowena. Just to keep a look-out. I cannot see anyone, but there might be a hedger or ditcher or someone,’ Lady Radcliffe said.