Page 74 of The Secrets of Ashmore Castle

‘Is she nice?’ Rachel demanded.

‘Are you madly in love with her? Does she like horses? When will we see her?’

‘On Saturday,’ Giles answered. ‘Mama is to invite them all here. Yes, she’s pretty. She’s very shy. And I don’t know if she likes horses. But,’ he dredged up from the meeting in Lord Leven’s house, ‘she knows a lot about paintings, so you’ll have something to talk about.’

‘Does she paint?’ Alice asked.

‘I really don’t know,’ he had to admit. Alice gave him an odd look, but Rachel hurried on with the next, more important question.

‘Are we going to be bridesmaids?’

‘I think it’s for her to decide, isn’t it?’ Giles said. ‘She may already have chosen friends or relatives of her own.’

‘Her sisters?’

‘She doesn’t have any sisters, as far as I know.’

‘Oh, good,’ Alice said. ‘I mean, sad for her, but we’ll be her sisters once she’s married, and she’s bound to ask us to be bridesmaids if she hasn’t any of her own.’ She giggled suddenly. ‘To think of you being married!’

‘Why is that funny?’ Giles asked.

‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘You just don’t seem like a husband.’ And she giggled even more at the word.

James came upon Crooks in the boot-room, contentedly polishing his lordship’s dress boots. He leaned in the doorway and watched him until Crooks’s content dissolved under the scrutiny and he threw him a nervous glance.

‘Difficult times ahead for you, Mr Crooks,’ James said, oozing sympathy.

‘What? Why?’ Crooks felt a prickle of fear. James had that effect on him.

‘Well, this honeymoon for a start. Like you said, how can you keep up standards in foreign parts?’

‘Oh! But I believe Paris is quite civilised,’ he said nervously.

‘Civilised?’ James hooted. ‘The French? They don’t even have proper privies, not like England. Dreadful smells – and the diseases that go with ’em.’

‘Really? I thought—’

‘And Italy’s worse, not to mention all those banditti roaming the streets, cutting people’s throats.’

‘Surely one is safe inside the hotels,’ Crooks said.

James shrugged. ‘In London you would be. But these foreign hotel clerks … I’ve heard they take bribes from the criminals to turn a blind eye while they ransack the guests’ rooms. And if anyone should disturb them at their wicked crimes, or happen to be in the room when they burst in, well, dead men tell no tales.’ He passed a finger across his throat in dreadful mime.

Crooks paled, but he said bravely, ‘I’m sure the best hotels must be safe, or one would hear about it.’

‘One does, all the time,’ James said solemnly. ‘There was a piece in the paper only last week.’

‘I didn’t see it.’

‘But you don’t read that newspaper, do you? Only his lordship’s Times. And then there’s the food. That greasy foreign stuff, and you with your delicate digestion! I pity you, Mr Crooks, really I do. Insolent porters, dirty sheets, fleas, food that’s close to poison … So much to put up with, and at your age. But you’ve always been one to do your duty, no matter what it costs you.’

He pushed himself upright and stalked away, leaving Crooks staring blankly at the space where he had been, the evening boot forgotten in his hand.

‘What is the matter with you, Nina? You’ve been answering in monosyllables. Your mind is clearly elsewhere.’ Aunt Schofield had been trying to engage Nina in conversation ever since she arrived, and finally lost patience at the end of luncheon.

Nina roused herself. ‘Oh, I’m wondering how Kitty is getting on, that’s all.’ She had come back to Draycott Place to see her aunt while Kitty and her parents paid the visit to Ashmore Castle. The house seemed cramped after Berkeley Street, and too quiet.

‘Is that all? You don’t seem in spirits.’ Nina didn’t answer, fiddling with her butter knife. Aunt Schofield sighed. ‘I hope you haven’t been spoiled by your experiences.’