Did I see the edge of a shade twitch? I studied the window where I’d glimpsed movement, but saw nothing more.
I did not wish to attract Symes’s attention, so I headed down the stairs to the kitchen. The smell of green and growing things faded behind me as the damp of the stairwell overcame it.
The door at the bottom of the stairs was wrenched open, and Jepson, the dragon of a lady’s maid, glared out at me.
“What do you want?” she demanded. “Haven’t you caused enough trouble? Miss Erica is dead, and it’s all your fault.”
She raised a hand, preparing to strike me.
12
I seized Jepson’s wrist and pushed her back across the threshold just as Mrs. Gamble stepped from the kitchen into the small foyer.
“Whatever are you doing?” She directed her words to Jepson. “Good heavens, woman, what is the matter with you? Come in, Mrs. Holloway, and have some tea.” With a scowl at Jepson, Mrs. Gamble headed back into the kitchen.
I released Jepson’s hand. We studied each other with narrowed eyes, then Jepson backed away stiffly.
“Have your tea,” she snarled. “But you get no thanks from me.”
She turned on her heel and marched up the stairs and into the garden, a bright white petticoat flashing beneath her dull black skirts.
“Never mind her,” Mrs. Gamble said as I shut the door and entered the stuffy kitchen. “She’s blaming everyone and the moon for Mrs. Hume’s death.” Mrs. Gamble moved to a dresser where she shoveled tea leaves into a pot. “It’s me she’s blaming most,” she said mournfully. She sniffled and carried the teapot to the table, waving me to a stool while she fetched a steaming kettle from the stove. “After all, it’s me what prepared the food.” Another louder sniffle as she poured a stream of bubbling water into the teapot. “She says she’ll have the police on me, the dreadful old biddy.”
“Anyone could have tampered with the basket once it left you,” I said soothingly. “From the footman who put it into the coach to the porter at the train and anyone who went near the baggage cart before the hamper was fetched.”
Mrs. Gamble nodded, only a little relieved. “That is so. But it’s servants who are always blamed when things go wrong.”
She was unfortunately correct. Cooks, maids, and footmen could so easily be sacked or even arrested for something not their fault, because we were convenient scapegoats.
“I will find out,” I said. “I promised Lady Covington. Now, tell me what was in the hamper.”
Mrs. Gamble returned the kettle to the stove and settled herself on a stool at the end of the table. The rest of the table’s surface was strewn with her accoutrements set out to make meals today—a rolling pin for pies, mortar and pestle plus bottles of oil for various herb sauces, a slicing knife for vegetables. “It is good of you, dear, though I’m not certain what you can do. I made that hamper special for Lady Covington. I didn’t know she’d not want it, or I wouldn’t have bothered, and Mrs. Hume would be alive.” She wiped away a tear that trickled down the side of her nose.
“You couldn’t have known,” I said.
“That’s not what the police will say.” Mrs. Gamble drew out a large handkerchief and mopped her face. “I made up a nice basket, full of things her ladyship enjoys. A couple of boiled eggs, a few slices of ham and soft cheese, strawberries—I found a good lot of them at the market—a few currant scones, some cream for them, and the lemon cake.”
“What became of the hamper last night? Was it brought back home?”
Mrs. Gamble nodded. “A porter from the train returned it this morning. Everything was gone—apparently, Erica tucked in when none of the others wanted much. Thanks heavens Sir Arthur only nibbled a little. He’s on the mend, her ladyship says.”
“That is good to hear,” I said in relief. “A pity there’s nothing left in the hamper. The remaining food might have been tested.”
“Aye, that’s true. But I know it were all right when it went into the hamper. I tasted the lemon cake myself.” Mrs. Gamble softened into a smile. “It is excellent cake, Mrs. Holloway. The family think me a genius. Thank you ever so much for sharing the recipe.”
“You flatter me, Mrs. Gamble.” The tea had finished steeping, and I forestalled Mrs. Gamble by reaching for the pot and pouring out for her. The trickle of steaming tea into the cups was calming as always. “It is only a question of mixing up the right ingredients.”
“And in what measure.” Mrs. Gamble took a noisy sip of tea. “That’s the true nature of cookery.”
“An oven that bakes evenly also helps. The dearest desire of every cook.” I blew on the tea to cool it and drank. The tea was very weak—she’d likely reused the leaves until they did little more than color the water.
“Well, we can only have what those upstairs decide to give us. I’ve been in places where I was expected to cook ten courses a night on a stove the size of this stool I’m sitting on. I ask you.”
“Some mistresses have no idea what is required, do they?” I gazed about the large room and at the gleaming stove, the myriad of hanging pots ready for any recipe, and a shelf holding pudding molds, a coffee grinder, and various long spoons. “You are well fitted out here.”
“Aye, the first Lady Covington understood she’d not have fine meals unless her kitchen had the latest in contraptions.”
“What was she like?” I asked. Perhaps the person wishing Lady Covington dead resented her for replacing the paragon of the first Lady Covington.
“A hard woman, by all accounts,” Mrs. Gamble said. “I didn’t work here when she were alive, as I told you, but I’ve heard much from the other staff and the family. She was the one behind Lord Covington’s success, everyone says. He inherited his position on the board, but when his first wife got her claws into him, he suddenly expanded the railway line and made money hand over fist.”
“What railway line is it, do you know? Does it go to Sydenham?”
“Heaven knows.” Mrs. Gamble shrugged. “They go all over, I think. I’m not one for riding trains.”
“I don’t like them much either, truth to tell. The present Lady Covington met Lord Covington through the railway, did she not?” I asked, remembering Cynthia’s letter of information. “Her first husband, Mr. Morris, was on the board as well?”
“Yes, indeed. A bit of a scandal when it first came out.” Mrs. Gamble rested her elbows on the table and warmed to the gossip. “Mr. Morris had died suddenly in an accident. The first Lady Covington was already gone by then—she took sick—a year before that. Mr. Morris was in a train crash.”