“Smouch?” C.J. asked.
Cook enjoyed being able to teach the girl who could read and write a thing or two. “It’s what you call the black tea what’s been adul-te-rated. Tea is very dear, and poor folks can’t afford better. The stingy old gimp upstairs has no excuse but her greed.”
Bold enough to inquire what other potables and comestibles were routinely doctored, C.J. learned that the practice was widespread—quite a surprise for someone who had thought that nineteenth-century food and drink was much purer and healthier than the processed and packaged food of the twenty-first. Cook and Mary were proud to show off their superior knowledge, explaining to C.J. that if logwood dye was unavailable, black lead would be used to counterfeit Indian tea.
C.J. learned that gin was often faked with turpentine and sulfuric acid. The “preservatives” found in beer included a number of poisonous substances masquerading as “spices,” and it was frequently adulterated with treacle, tobacco, or licorice in order to achieve the desired color. Port was made to appear aged by the addition of supertartrate of potash.
As far as foodstuffs went, C.J. was revolted to hear that the pickle sellers’ wares owed their bright emerald hue to tincture of copper; the vibrant orange of a good Gloucester’s rind was achieved with red lead, and commercially baked bread was loaded with alum. Big Macs now seemed positively organic by comparison. C.J. reasoned that her Georgian counterparts must have developed constitutions of cast iron. What a miracle they lived to adulthood at all with such a noxious diet: if the comestibles themselves didn’t kill them, the copper cookware surely would finish them off!
This was the first time her ladyship was to entertain a visitor since C.J. had been banished to the kitchen. Lady Wickham had no choice but to order her upstairs to serve the tea, since she made a better appearance than the unfortunate Mary. Accordingly, C.J. scrubbed the coal dust from her face and hands, removed her filthy apron, and tried to make herself look as presentable as possible.
She entered the parlor with the heavy silver tea tray and placed it carefully on the sideboard. Lady Wickham’s guest was a well-dressed woman whose plump, dimpled countenance, framed by a profusion of gray sausage curls that poked impertinently out of her white lace cap, lent her an air of jollity—a stark contrast to her prune-faced hostess.
“I am pleased to see you out and about again, Euphoria,” said Lady Wickham as C.J. spread a white linen cloth on the tea table, then set down the teapot, sugar bowl and creamer, and a plate of lemon halves wrapped like bonbons in cheesecloth. “Miss Welles, Lady Dalrymple does not take cream. When you have finished serving the tea, you will return the pitcher to the kitchen before it turns.”
C.J. discreetly nodded in acknowledgment, laying the delicate cups and deep saucers from Lady Wickham’s best china service before each of the women. The hand-painted floral pattern was worthy in itself of admiration, but the aspect that C.J. admired most was the way the deep saucer allowed for the setting of a finger sandwich or biscuit right beside the cup, thereby eliminating the need for an additional plate on an already crowded tea table. How clever! And why were modern tea services not so configured?
“It does one good to take the air after such a lengthy period of mourning. Though I cannot say what you have ever done to merit preferential treatment, Eloisa,” replied Lady Dalrymple, her twinkling eyes indicating that she was speaking partly in jest, “you are my first social call since Alexander’s death. Were it not your natal day, I should have remained at home amid the comforts of my parrot, my pekes, and my grief.”
C.J. set out the three-tiered stand upon which sat two freshly baked currant scones, a few tiny finger sandwiches, and a meager plate of sweets—a lavish display indeed for Lady Wickham, although it would not constitute a proper meal for one person, let alone two. She eyed Lady Dalrymple, a generously proportioned, furbelowed woman, perhaps a generation younger than Lady Wickham. The caller’s full quilted skirt with its deeply flounced hem lent her a somewhat upholstered appearance. C.J. thought of Mother Ginger from The Nutcracker.
“You must forgive my curiosity for gaining the better of my civility, Euphoria. I never learned how the young earl met his end. Miss Welles, you have forgotten the plates!”
C.J. endeavored to cover her confusion, not to mention shock, apologizing profusely to Lady Wickham for her inattention. But did not the deep saucers serve the same office?
Lady Dalrymple released a weighty sigh and reached for a watercress sandwich. “I should have thought it was the talk of the ton, Eloisa.”
“I do not often visit the Pump Room for the latest gossip,” Lady Wickham replied, pointing to her gimpy leg with the tip of her walking stick.
Imagine C.J.’s astonishment when the two elegant noblewomen dumped their tea from the cups into the saucers! What sort of proper table manners were these?! Lady Wickham made a second demand for the tea plates, reprimanding C.J. for her lack of alacrity in the fetching of them. The plates’ most obvious necessity had now illuminated itself. C.J. beat a hasty retreat to the pantry cupboard for the proper dishes, returning to overhear the following conversation.
“Of course, ever since the trouble began on the Continent, it has been inadvisable for Englishmen to visit France on the Grand Tour,” Lady Dalrymple began. “My good friend, Lady Oliver, who has always had a rather impregnable opinion of the French, which naturally does not extend to the selection of her modiste, persuaded me to insist that my son visit the East instead. It has become all the fashion, you know, since the birth of the French Republic. One never knows what might happen to an English nobleman on French soil nowadays.”
Lady Dalrymple took a sip of the new tea and made a dreadful face, although she elected
