No American heiress knew how to run the enormous household her English husband expected her to manage-with no preparation or training or even assistance. She knew nothing of how the food was purchased and meals made to appear on the table, how the clean linen was accomplished, the dust done away with, the tradesmen paid. Her ignorance often led to serious problems with the servants, for they recognized her inexperience and exploited it to their best advantage.
Consuelo was in the habit of rising at seven, breakfasting in her apartment, and then spending several hours at the desk in the morning room where she conducted her household duties: meeting daily with the butler, the housekeeper, and the cook; going over their household accounts; checking inventories and seeing that the tradesmen were paid; and dealing with staff problems. When there were guests, she had the extra work of seeing to their comfort, planning elaborate meals, arranging entertainment.
Of course, the four guests staying with them this week posed no problem at all, compared to the thirty-King Edward and Queen Alexandra, together with an assortment of dukes and duchesses-who had been invited to Blenheim for a gala weekend at the beginning of August. This wasn’t the first time the Royal couple had been guests of the Marlboroughs, and Consuelo knew what a daunting responsibility it was to feed and amuse not only Their Royal Majesties and the other luminaries, but to accomodate the various entourages of valets, maids, footmen, and grooms. Altogether, a hundred people would be sleeping in the house, and there would be a fine hubbub and hullabaloo below-stairs.
For Consuelo, visitors usually brought a welcome respite from the long, dispiriting days when she and Sunny were alone with nothing to say to one another, with nothing to share, certainly not love and scarcely even friendship. She would especially enjoy playing hostess to Edward and Alexandra, would enjoy dressing up and wearing her jewels, usually kept in the London bank-the nineteen-row pearl dog collar her husband had bought for her, the long rope of perfect pearls that had once belonged to Catherine the Great, as well as her diamond tiara. She hoped she would feel better by that time, not as tired and low-spirited as she was now. She had even left her guests early the night before, angry at her husband and irritated with Gladys, who was behaving like a spoiled child.
Consuelo had been barely nineteen when she came to Blenheim-much too young and inexperienced, she knew now, to have taken on the monstrous burden of administering such a huge enterprise. When she might have been enjoying the pleasures of a glamorous, carefree youth, the Duke had made it clear that her chief duty (next to producing a male heir, of course) was to manage the enormous house and its complex and often inharmonious staff. The situation was made even more uncomfortable because Marlborough’s aunt, Lady Sarah Churchill, had acted as his hostess and chatelaine during his bachelorhood. The butler and housekeeper had been loyal to her, resisting Consuelo’s efforts to undertake her new responsibilities and make necessary changes.
Even now, with six years of experience behind her, Consuelo felt that she didn’t do a very good job. Marlborough felt so, too, and frequently took her to task for not paying the proper attention or for being too soft in her dealings with the staff. He told her she should try to be more like Lady Sarah, who was extraordinarily well organized and had a great firmness with everyone, especially those who were slow in executing her orders.
Looking over the accounts on her desk, Consuelo had to admit that they were rather in a muddle. The trouble was that she had to rely for everything upon Mrs. Raleigh, the housekeeper, and Stevens, the butler, who had both been in service at Blenheim for several decades. She was confident that she could trust them, although they were both getting on in years, Mrs. Raleigh especially, and she often found herself wishing that they would keep a tighter rein below-stairs, where some of the servants seemed unacceptably lax.
Of course, Consuelo thought with a sigh, it was becoming harder and harder to find good household help. Many young men had gone off to the Boer War, many young women were taking factory jobs in the cities, and service was not the attractive alternative to agricultural labor that it had once been. Stevens had just stepped in to ask permission to hire a new page to replace Richard, who had been promoted to third footman because the third footman had gone to America. And here was Mrs. Raleigh, wanting to hire yet another housemaid, a replacement for one who had apparently left without permission-more surprisingly, without asking for a character or for the pay that was due her.
Consuelo frowned. Page boys and housemaids and scullery maids came and went, but it was rather strange for one to just up sticks and leave. And now was a difficult time to hire a new maid. “This will be the second new housemaid in a fortnight,” she said disapprovingly, “and with Royalty coming in less than three weeks. There will scarcely be time to train her.”
“The new maid, Bess, has recommended a woman with whom she was in service at Wilson House, in London,” Mrs. Raleigh said. “If she is as good as Bess, she will be a treasure.”
“Bess is good,” Consuelo agreed, “experienced and quite responsible.” Bess had been with them for only a few weeks, but she had already proved her worth by volunteering to look after Gladys Deacon, whose own maid had been requisitioned by Gladys’s mother. Gladys (who was hard to please) had spoken favorably of the woman. Consuelo frowned, going back to the previous subject. “The housemaid who has left, Mrs. Raleigh. When was she last seen?”
“I believe it was Friday night at bedtime, Your Grace,” Mrs. Raleigh replied thinly. “Ruth, who slept with her, missed her in the morning when she woke up.”
Friday night, and today was Thursday. “A search was made, I suppose,” Consuelo said, thinking uneasily of the gardener who had drowned himself in the lake in a fit of despair the winter before.
“Oh, yes, Your Grace,” Mrs. Raleigh replied quickly. “There wasn’t a sign of her anywhere. She had been here just since May, so I supposed she got homesick and left. Nothing is missing,” she added, pursing her narrow lips. “I made a careful check of all the rooms she worked in, just to be sure.”
Consuelo felt a sudden impatience with the woman, although she understood Mrs. Raleigh’s concern. Not long ago, a valuable china box had disappeared from a table in the Green Drawing Room. Marlborough had discovered it missing, and a housemaid was accused. After everyone was thoroughly upset, he had told Consuelo that he himself had taken the box to see if its absence would be noticed. Since then, Mrs. Raleigh had supervised the housemaids more closely, although her supervision did not appear to extend to the nighttime hours, or to the locking of doors. Presumably, the missing maid had got out through an unlocked door.
Consuelo tried to conceal her impatience. “What was the girl’s name? Who on the staff knew her best?”
“Her name was Kitty, Your Grace.” Mrs. Raleigh watched uneasily as Consuelo wrote it down. “I suppose Ruth would have known her best.”
“Then I should like to speak to Ruth,” Consuelo said, feeling that somebody ought to make an effort to get to the bottom of this, and if Mrs. Raleigh wouldn’t do it, she would have to. What’s more, she was curious. It wasn’t like housemaids to disappear without their wages. “Now, if you please,” she added firmly.
Ruth was summoned from her duties and stood nervously before her, a sturdy young girl, pleasant-faced, her thick brown hair bound up under her cap. She could scarcely be sixteen.
Consuelo softened her tone. “Tell me, Ruth, what you think might have become of-” She looked down at her notes. “Of Kitty.”
“I’m sure I don’t know, Your Grace,” Ruth said, biting her lip. “She went to bed same as me, but when morning come, that would be Saturday morning, she was gone. Sneaked right out, she did. Quietlike, or I would’ve heard her. I told Mrs. Raleigh straightaway,” she added, as though she were afraid she might be accused of concealment.
“Did she go off with someone, do you think?” Consuelo asked. “Did she have a young man?”
The girl frowned. “A… young man? I don’t think so, Your Grace. She never said.”
Consuelo tried another tack. “Well, then, where was she in service before she came here?”
“Welbeck Abbey, Your Grace,” Mrs. Raleigh put in officiously. “She had a fine character from the Duchess of Portland’s housekeeper. And before that, at Carleton House, in Manchester.”
A fine character. Consuelo knew what that meant. It wouldn’t surprise her if half the characters the new hires presented were forged, and although the housekeeper and butler were supposed to check, they didn’t always. But perhaps Ruth knew where the girl came from.
