She seized a napkin and wiped her mouth. She lumbered to her feet, panting with rage.
“Out!” she shouted. “And never darken my doorstep again.”
“I didn’t know anyone actually said that apart from the stage,” said Harry equably. “If Freddy was not blackmailing you, why are you so furious?”
Mrs Freddy rang the bell. “Because of your impertinence. Because I am a respectable woman without a stain on my character.”
“Unlike your dress, madam? You are covered in food. You are a walking menu.”
The footmen entered. “Throw him out!” howled Mrs Jerry, collapsing back in her chair.
“It’s all right, I’m going,” said Harry.
As he walked outside, he wondered if he had been too blunt. He reflected ruefully that he would not be able to contact Rose because he had nothing to tell her, and in the same moment wondered why that should matter so much.
¦
“So pleasant to see you looking your old self again,” sighed Lady Polly. “We have decided to launch you back into society by gentle degrees.”
To her mother’s surprise, Rose did not object but merely lowered her long eyelashes and said meekly, “Yes, indeed.”
“There are various cards here. We will go through them and decide which ones to accept.”
Rose’s sharp eyes caught sight of a name – Mrs Angela Stockton. She picked up the card. Mrs Angela Stockton was requesting the pleasure of the earl and countess and their daughter at a lecture she was giving on Rudolf Steiner.
“This looks interesting.”
The countess raised her lorgnette and studied the card. “It’s for tomorrow afternoon. Too late to accept now. Besides, who is Rudolf Steiner?”
“It would be interesting to find out.”
“I have no intention of going, even although the woman is perfectly respectable.”
“I would like to go – with Daisy.”
“As to Daisy,” said Lady Polly, “I fear you may have become over-familiar with her.”
“I agree. So I am going to make her my companion and hire a lady’s maid.”
“Out of the question.”
“It was Daisy who persuaded me to leave my working life. You are always worried that I will do something disgraceful. Daisy takes care of me. Why, she was even shocked that I should threaten to tell society how you arranged for the road and railway station at Stacey Court to be blown up so that the king would not visit us.”
“Quite right. I hope you have dropped that silly nonsense.”
“I’ll need to think about it. Of course, were Daisy elevated to my companion, I wouldn’t dream of mentioning it.”
“We spoilt you,” said Lady Polly bitterly. “Most young gels who behaved the way you have behaved would have been locked up in the asylum by now. Wake up!” she suddenly shouted at her husband.
“Hey, what!” The little earl blinked like an owl.
“Tea is served and your daughter wants to make that maid of hers a companion.”
“And what does Cathcart have to say about that?”
“Cathcart! He has nothing to say in what our daughter does or does not do.”
“You must admit he saved her bacon on more than one occasion.” The earl rang the bell and when the butler answered it, he said, “Brum, fetch the telephone.”
“My lord, that instrument does not detach from the study. It is necessary for one to go to the machine.”
“Well, go to it and phone that Cathcart fellow and tell him to come here.”
“It would be better to send a carriage for him,” said Rose quickly, fearing that Miss Jubbles would take the call and not pass it on. “His office is in the Buckingham Palace Road. Number Twenty-five-A.”
“Very well, jump to it,” said the earl. “By Jove, do I see Madeira cake?”
¦
Looking down from the window, Miss Jubbles saw the carriage with the crest on the panels drawing up outside and a liveried footman jumping down from the backstrap.
She heard footsteps on the stairs. The footman entered. “I am here to take Captain Cathcart to visit the Earl of Hadshire.”
Miss Jubbles’s heart beat hard. That girl again!
“I am afraid,” she announced in tones of stultifying gentility, “that Captain Cathcart is not here. He has gone abroad.”
“And when is he expected back?”
“He did not say.”
“When he returns, tell him to contact his lordship immediately.”
“Certainly.”
And then Miss Jubbles heard that familiar tread on the stairs. Harry had suffered a shrapnel wound during the Boer War, and on the bad days, walked with a pronounced limp, and this was one of the bad days.
He entered the office and paused in the doorway. He had recognized the earl’s carriage outside.
“Captain Cathcart,” cried the footman, who recognized Harry from his visits to the earl’s home. “Your secretary said you had gone abroad.”
Miss Jubbles’s face was red with mortification. “I am sorry, sir,” she said. “When I said abroad, I meant abroad in London.”
“That’s all right,” said Harry. “But the earl is a client and an important one. You knew I was due back here late afternoon because I told you.”
“I am so sorry. I forgot.” And with that, Miss Jubbles burst into tears.
“Don’t take on so,” said Harry. “I have to pick up some papers from my desk. There’s nothing else for you to do this afternoon.”
He went through to his office. On his desk was a small vase of freesias, imported from the Channel Islands. He scowled down at them. They were expensive. He took some papers off his desk and walked out.
“Miss Jubbles,” he said gently, “I appreciate the flowers but they are much too expensive a gift. Please extract the amount from petty cash.”
“Oh, sir, they were only a little present.”
“Please do as you are told,” ordered Harry, “and enter the amount in the petty-cash book.”
Tears rolled down Miss Jubbles’s cheeks. “Here,” said Harry, handing her a large handkerchief. “Now, I must go.”
He was beginning to suspect that his secretary’s feelings for him might be a trifle too warm, but never for a moment did Harry guess at the depth of the obsession that would cause her to sleep with the handkerchief against her cheek that night.
Harry turned in the doorway. “And do not accept any more cases. I am going to be tied up with one important one for the foreseeable future.”
¦
“Come in, Cathcart,” cried the earl. “Tea?”
“No, thank you. Do you have a problem?”
Rose had been sent to her room.
“It’s Rose again. She wants to make that Cockney maid of hers a companion. She does give Daisy the credit, I gather, for having persuaded her to get back in society.”
“I think it might be a very good idea,” said Harry. “Daisy’s demeanour is suitable, and with the right clothes she would not occasion comment.”
“But companions have
“Then give her one. Any respectable recluse you know of in Hadshire who died recently?”
“Well, let me see. There was Sir Percy Anstruther.”
“Married?”
“Married a girl half his age, who ran off and left him.”
