A Michaelmas Truce (The Mercer's

House Book 4) Mary Kingswood

Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://ebookmass.com/product/a-michaelmas-truce-the-mercers-house-book-4-mary-
kingswood/
A MICHAELMAS TRUCE

The Mercer’s House Book 4

A Regency Romance

by Mary Kingswood
 Published by Sutors Publishing

Copyright © 2023 Mary Kingswood

V1

Cover design by: Shayne Rutherford of Darkmoon Graphics

All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction.

Author’s note:
this book is written using historic British terminology, so saloon instead of salon, chaperon instead
of chaperone and so on. I follow Jane Austen’s example and refer to a group of sisters as the Miss
Wintertons.
About this book: A family in trade moving up in the world. A family of landed gentry stepping
aside for them. And the sons and daughters caught in the middle.
Madge Paton has been the mainstay of the Fletcher household for a quarter of a century, and even
though her role managing the household and raising the children has been usurped by Harry
Fletcher’s new wife, there’s still work to be done for a spinster aunt. She misses their Yorkshire
life, but things aren’t so bad in the south of England. If only she didn’t have to put up with that
irritating Morgan Plummer, and his argumentative ways.
Morgan Plummer has reached the advanced age of fifty without ever achieving anything in his life.
Invalided out of the army twenty years ago, he’s lived at his brother’s expense ever since. The
arrival of the Fletcher family in the neighbourhood has livened things up, and at last he has a
worthy opponent to spar with in grumpy Madge Paton. But both families dislike their bickering,
and they’re told to call a truce. To force them to get along, they’re given a puzzle to solve - find the
groom who set out to visit his mother and never returned. Two sensible, middle-aged people can’t
get into too much trouble with that, can they? But the past has a nasty habit of upending the best
laid plans…
This is a complete story with a happy ever after. A traditional Regency romance, drawing room
rather than bedroom. Book 4 of a 6 book series.
Isn’t that what’s-his-name? Regular readers will know that characters from previous books
occasionally pop up, or are mentioned. The Marquess of Carrbridge and his brothers (Lord
Humphrey, Lord Augustus and Lord Gilbert) were seen throughout the Sons of the Marquess series,
and in The Seamstress. Jacob Malpas, now the mayor of Sagborough, his wife and daughter Emmy
were in The Seamstress. The redoubtable Mr Willerton-Forbes, Captain Edgerton and Mr Neate have
been helping solve murders and other mysteries since Lord Augustus. Mr Alexander (Sandy) is the
cousin of Cameron, Lord Saxby, from Stranger at the Hall.
About the series: A family grown rich in the wool trade. The landed gentry they’ve displaced. And
the gentle daughter whose beauty will open the door to an even greater prize - the nobility.
The Fletcher family is moving from Yorkshire to a mansion in the south of England. After generations
in trade, can they escape their roots and be admitted to the leisured world of the gentry?
Their new home is Chadwell Park, in Hertfordshire. The Mercer’s House.
Book 0: The Mercer: the rich merchant and the poor widow. (a novella, free to mailing list
subscribers).
Book 1: A Winter Chase: the wild daughter and the reluctant clergyman.
Book 2: A Spring Dance: the flirtatious son and the prim paid companion.
Book 3: A Summer Game: the mischievous daughter and the strait-laced gentleman.
Book 4: A Michaelmas Truce: the cross spinster and the even crosser bachelor.
Book 5: An Autumn Courtship: the intellectual son and the flighty socialite.
Book 6: A Christmas Betrothal: the beautiful daughter, the unhappy son and the lost lover.
Want to be the first to hear about new releases? Sign up for my mailing list.
 Table of Contents
The Fletcher Family
The Plummer Family
The Heaman and Corsfield Families
The Landers Family
1: An Unexpected Arrival
2: Orchard House
3: A Truce
4: Little Difficulties
5: A Family Visit
6: Harmless Banter
7: Asking Questions
8: A Wasted Day
9: Patricia's Baby
10: An Unwanted Spinster
11: Determination
12: Maids In The Kitchen
13: Fairies
14: The Romanies
15: An Uninteresting Man
16: Markham, Willerton-Forbes And Browning
17: A Wedding
18: A Question Of Relations
19: News
20: A Visit And An Offer
21: The Apple Store
22: Family History
23: The Journey North
24: Home
25: Otterburn
26: Of Marriage
27: Answers
28: An Invitation
Thanks for reading!
About the author
Acknowledgements
Sneak preview: Book 5 of The Mercer's House: An Autumn Courtship: Chapter 1: An Invitation
 The Fletcher Family
Hi-res version available at my website.
 The Plummer Family
Hi-res version available at my website.
The Heaman and Corsfield Families
Hi-res version available at my website.
 The Landers Family
Hi-res version available at my website.
 1: An Unexpected Arrival
HERTFORDSHIRE, THE FIRST DECADE OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
JULY
Morgan Plummer was bored. Chadwell Manor was silent, the family all out, the servants tucked away
in the kitchen wing, and the children… he had no idea where the children were. Not his
responsibility, thank heavens.
He had spent the morning knocking balls around the billiard table to improve his carom shot,
which had always been his weakness. It was dull work, but then the Manor was a dull place these
days. His brother Owen was a splendid fellow, naturally, but dry as a bone and without a spark of
liveliness in him. Everything had been fine until Father had died and Owen had decided that economy
was to be the order of the day. Now even the Park was sold, and they were all squeezed into the
Manor like cattle, and the billiard table had to be taken down every time Sarah chose to hold a dinner
party.
Everyone was miserable under the new arrangements, he thought savagely, hitting the cue ball so
hard that it flew clean off the table. Sarah had been so proud to be mistress of the Park, and
understandably resented giving up its modern elegance for the decaying heap that was the Manor.
Michael was still miserable after that business with the heiress, and surely it was time he came out of
the dismals? Letitia — well, Letitia was always ill-humoured. She had been a wailing, unhappy baby
and now she was a wailing, unhappy woman. There was no doing anything with her, and that husband
of hers was no better, always on about ‘m’brother, the marquess’. As for Patricia, who knew what
went on in her empty head? What a family! James was the only one of the lot of them that Morgan
could honestly say that he liked.
It was James who put his head round the screen that separated the great hall from the entrance
hall, a cheerful smile on his face. He was always smiling these days.
“Good morning, Uncle Morgan. Is Mother about?”
“Out. All out. Gone to Ware for the day.”
“Have they?” James said vaguely, although he must have been told of the arrangement. He and
Julia dined at the Manor most evenings. “Well, no matter. I shall talk to Mrs Hoskins. I need a ham,
and perhaps a leg of mutton or a goose, if she has one. Oh, and some of the fish I brought yesterday.”
“Holding a dinner?” Morgan said, brightening slightly. Dinner at the rectory might be more fun
than the morose affairs at the Manor.
“Not us, no. It is for the Park. Some of the Fletchers are back.”
“So soon?” Morgan said, feeling a spark of interest. “Bored with Bath already, are they?”
James laughed. “Not bored. Outraged would be nearer the mark. Miss Whittleton’s reprobate of
a father turned up, and since she cannot bear to be within a hundred miles of him, Will Fletcher has
brought her here, together with her aunt, Mrs Greenwood. Naturally, there is very little food in the
house, and half the servants off to visit their kin. Tell Mother, will you? I expect she will invite them
to dine soon.”
“If I remember,” Morgan said, struggling to recall who Miss Whittleton was. Was that the
woman Will Fletcher was set to marry? And who was the reprobate father?
James laughed. “Hmm. Well, I shall tell Jefford. He will remember.”
“What about the rest of them? I thought they took the house in Bath for a month.”
“So they did, and they are staying on. There is too much pleasure in Bath to be foregone,
seemingly. Oh, but Miss Paton is here. She has no faith in the servants running the Park to her
exacting standards, so she is here to keep them up to the mark.”
“Ha! That termagant! I thought we had got rid of her for a while,” Morgan said, but he felt a
spike of excitement all the same. Miss Paton might have a barbed tongue, but at least she had a brain
in her head and could argue her points with energy.
James smiled and shook his head at him. “You two! You are like a pair of dogs fighting over the
same bone. What is it that riles you so much about her?”
“She is an odious, smug, puffed up fool of a woman,” Morgan said at once. “Irksome female, far
too opinionated. Never knows when to be silent. The most disagreeable person in Hertfordshire. Why
could she not have stayed in Bath and given God-fearing folk a rest from her irritating ways?”
He could continue in the same vein for hours, but with a laugh, James held up his hands in
surrender, and went off to the kitchens to see what he could scavenge for the Park. Morgan topped up
his brandy glass thoughtfully. Perhaps he would walk up to the Park and see whether her brief stay in
Bath had made the woman any less irritating.
~~~~~
Madge Paton looked with distaste around the servants’ hall of Chadwell Park, where Polly, the
kitchen maid, was frantically tidying away the remains of tea and cakes scattered over the long table.
“Well, I can see you’ve been having a fine holiday here while I was away. Drinking the best tea, no
doubt, and sitting at your ease all day. Have you done any of the jobs you were set, Mrs Graham?”
“Yes, madam,” the housekeeper said, twisting her apron in her hands. “The carpets are all
beaten, the linens are sorted and the window cleaning’s under way. If you could but have sent word
ahead, madam, but with most of the house under holland covers—”
“A letter was sent, but we made all haste to be here before the Sabbath. Best part of three days
on the road, to be greeted with nothing but disorder. Well, we’ll have to make do, I suppose. Send hot
water up to Miss Whittleton and Mrs Greenwood at once and—”
The apron became even more twisted. “The boilers aren’t lit, madam. Anthony has gone to light
them, but there won’t be enough for baths yet.”
“Hmpf. Ewers, then,” Madge said, more gently. “There will be kettles on the kitchen fire. We
must look after Miss Whittleton, you know, because she’ll be mistress here one day.”
“We’re right pleased to have her here,” Polly said, eyes shining, holding a precarious pile of
cups and saucers. “Master Will’s young lady… so excitin’! Will the weddin’ be here? Cos we thought
it was to be Bath.”
“Get those cups to the scullery, and never you mind about a wedding,” Madge said. “Is that one
of the family’s tea sets, Mrs Graham?”
She flushed pink. “We had them out for washing, madam.”
“Hmpf. Well, make sure nothing gets broken. Now then, Mrs Sharwell, let’s think about dinner.
What do you have in the meat safe just now?”
Mrs Sharwell was not the greatest cook in the world, but with a guiding hand, she could
produce a tolerable meal. Not that Madge was particularly concerned about impressing Eloise
Whittleton, who might be a distant cousin to the Marquess of Carrbridge, but was only a poor
relation, after all. Although Eloise was very ladylike and would doubtless make a gracious mistress
of Chadwell Park, in time, Madge privately thought that Will could have done much better for himself.
With his looks and the Fletcher fortune, he should have aimed a little higher than a poor relation,
however elegant.
Half an hour of inspecting the larders satisfied her that dinner wouldn’t be a total disaster. She’d
given Mrs Sharwell a few hints as to the type of dishes that would be acceptable. It was a pity there
were no fish to be had until next week, but they would have to make do.
Madge was good at making do. She had joined the Fletcher household years ago to help her
sister Edith with the children. Gradually Edith had left more and more of the management of the house
to her, and when Edith had died, Madge had expected to run things for ever. But Harry had chosen to
marry again and move the whole family to this grand pile in Hertfordshire and a more gracious style
of living. What Madge missed more than anything, though, was running her own house, and with Harry
and Lizzie still in Bath for a few weeks, she had the pleasure of being fully in charge again.
The kitchen was in a separate wing of the house, so Madge made her way back to the main part
of Chadwell Park, where the low ceilings and dark walls of the servants’ domain gave way to the
elegance and lightness of the family rooms. She would rather die than admit it, but the house pleased
her very well. Their Sagborough house had been large, stretching over five floors, but the rooms had
been modestly proportioned, and fitted up with solid furnishings that were designed to endure for
many generations. Chadwell Park, on the other hand, was all high ceilings and delicate plasterwork
and gracefully curvaceous furnishings, and although there were only two principal floors, the rooms
sprawled luxuriantly, one flowing into another.
Madge ought to feel like an interloper in such grand surroundings, but somehow there was a
rightness to it, she acknowledged. The Fletcher family might have their roots in trade, but they had
winched themselves up a notch in the world, and despite the antagonism of the aristocracy, this was
where they belonged. So far they had come! Harry’s great grandfather had set up the first warehouse
for the grandly named Fletcher’s Import and Export Company, buying a shipment of silk to sell beside
English wools and linens, and later adding cotton to the inventory. The business had grown until
Harry was one of the richest men in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and now here he was in a fine
country house, living like a gentleman. Not that he ever forgot his humble origins. The children might
have been raised as if they were genuine ladies and gentlemen, speaking and looking the part, but
Harry, bless him, was still a Yorkshire man at heart, despite his grand surroundings.
Madge walked slowly through the three principal saloons, noting the furniture and chandeliers
shrouded in holland covers, a thin film of dust coating every surface. Then she climbed the gently
curving stairs. On the upper floor, all was bustle, as a maid rushed past with towels and sheets and
pillows, and two more heaved an ancient box along the landing. Madge took one end of it, reading the
faded lettering.
“Mrs Greenwood’s… this first room, Mary. Young Mary, hold the door open. There now, just
set it down on the rug here. Is Miss Whittleton’s box up yet?”
“Yes, mum,” Mary said, bobbing a curtsy. “Both of ’em, in her room.”
Madge looked with critical eyes around the room. The bed was stripped, the furniture was still
draped in holland covers and the same sprinkling of dust lay everywhere. “Hmpf. Lots of work to be
done here.”
“Mrs Graham said to start with Miss Whi’leton’s room, mum.”
“Quite right.”
The room next door was only marginally better. Bedding was piled on a chair and a maid
struggled to fold holland covers as Eloise and Mrs Greenwood wrestled sheets onto the bed.
“The maids can do that,” Madge said sharply. “Let me send for some tea—”
“No, no, no,” Mrs Greenwood said. “You want us to sit about drinking tea while there is work
to be done?”
“You’re guests,” Madge said. “No need for you to work.”
“We are used to it,” Eloise said with a smile. “Besides, we have taken the servants by surprise,
so it is only fair that we help.”
“Surprising them is not the issue,” Madge said. “These rooms should have been kept ready, with
just the covers to remove. Look at the dust in here!”
“Good,” Mrs Greenwood said. “Nothing I like better than flicking a duster around. Off you go
now, and leave the bedrooms to us, Miss Paton.”
Madge reluctantly went back downstairs. She found one of the footmen precariously perched on
a ladder in the saloon, attempting to remove a cover from one of the chandeliers.
“No point trying to get the saloons habitable before dinner, John,” she said briskly, “or the
dining room, either. The parlour and breakfast room will do for today. I can give you a hand.”
Just then, a whirlwind tore through the entrance hall. “Aunt Madge! Aunt Madge! How are
you?”
The whirlwind hurled itself at Madge, almost knocking her off her feet.
“Good day to you, too, Julia,” Madge said, disentangling herself and straightening her cap. “I’m
as well as anybody can be who’s been jounced about in a carriage for three days. No need to ask if
you’re well, young lady. If your stepmother were here, she would say, ‘Decorum, Julia!’”.
“But she’s not here, is she, and I never was very good at decorum. Where’s Eloise? Still
upstairs?”
“Making up the beds,” Madge said, rolling her eyes. “See if you can drag her away from there.
It’s hardly fitting for the future mistress of this house to be doing the maids’ work. Is James with you?
And what’s become of Will?”
“James has gone to the Manor to get some decent food for you, otherwise you’ll be eating rabbit
stew, and Will has gone to the stables, naturally, because the horses are far more important than mere
people. I’m sure he’ll be here soon. I’ll just pop up and see Eloise…”
And with that, she was gone in a swirl of skirts. If John had not been watching interestedly from
his perch on the ladder, Madge might well have laughed, for there was no doing anything about Julia.
She had always been a hoyden, and marriage to James Plummer, the local clergyman, had not made
her any more ladylike.
As for Will, there was no doing anything about him, either. Much as he adored Eloise and would
put her wishes above all else, his horses rated a very close second. Naturally, he had gone to the
stables, and who knew when he might emerge from there?
“Why are you still up there?” Madge growled at the footman on his ladder. “We have two rooms
to get ready before dinner, and with lolpoops like you, we’ll be hard pressed. Come on, come on!
Shift yourself.”
Some steady work saw the parlour readied for habitation, and they had moved on to the
breakfast room when Keeble sidled in with an apologetic cough.
“Mr Morgan Plummer is here, madam. Are you at home?”
“Ha! That man! Well, if he expects us to be sitting about making polite conversation while he
drinks his way through our brandy, he’s very much mistaken. On the other hand, if he can fold holland
covers, he can come in.”
Morgan Plummer’s grinning face appeared in the door moments later. “Well, well, well, Bath
had enough of you, Miss Paton? Packed you off home, have they? You must have kicked up a rare old
dust to have to leave so hastily.”
“There were reasons,” Madge said with dignity. “Are you going to stand there like a statue, or
will you help John with these covers while I shift this mountain of dust? Less than a month since I left,
and look at the state of the place!”
With a long-suffering sigh, he tugged half-heartedly at a cover on one of the chairs. “And what
would you find to grumble about if everything were perfect, eh? Admit it, you love to grumble.”
“I admit no such thing,” she said briskly, picking up a feather duster. “I should have liked very
much to sit at my ease after such a journey. Three days on the road, and resting only in the hours of
darkness, to get here before the Sabbath. Not a wink of sleep have I had since we left Bath, and I’d be
in my bed now if I had my way. Have you never folded anything before, Mr Plummer? Look how
disorderly you leave these sheets. I should have done it myself, I dare say, if I wanted it done
properly.”
“So you should,” he said cheerfully. “So you may, if you wish, madam. Far be it from me to
offend your fastidious eye with my inept folding. Is there no brandy in this house to offer a thirsty
guest? You, fellow — find me some brandy, will you?”
The footman scuttled away as Madge rolled her eyes. “Useless man that you are, Morgan
Plummer! But all men are useless when there is work to be done. God put men on this earth to plague
women, and that’s the truth. If you’re not going to make yourself useful, you can keep out of my way.”
“With pleasure, dear lady,” he said, grinning, settling himself on the window seat and folding
his arms. “Do carry on. I should hate to interrupt your endeavours.”
It was fortunate that Will appeared just then, or Madge would have been tempted to throw
something at her unwanted guest.
“This place is a shambles,” Will said, his face thunderous. “Half the grooms are missing, the
stalls are unswept, the coach is still sitting in the yard where Murgatroyd left it, and he and Young
Murgatroyd are having to see to the carriage horses themselves. And that wretched, wretched dog—!
See what he did to my boots? A perfectly good pair of boots ruined. It is not good enough, Aunt
Madge. That animal has to go, no matter how much Rosie weeps and says he just needs training. He is
beyond redemption, I swear it.”
“We’ll see about the dog later,” Madge said. “I like it no more than you, but Rosie’s fond of the
creature, and your father always lets her have her way. Too soft by half, he is. He spoils those girls
rotten.”
“I have seen the dog tied up, for now, but we need a cage of some sort for him. But where are
all the grooms, that is what I want to know. Ah, Keeble,” he added, as the butler appeared with Mr
Plummer’s brandy. “Where have the grooms gone? There seems to be no one in the stables at all.”
“Matthew and Tommy are over at the farm helping their father, sir. I’ve sent Toby across to fetch
them back. Young Bill has taken Emperor to the farrier. And Dan Pritchard…” His face clouded.
“Yes? Dan Pritchard?”
“Dan went off to visit his mother two weeks ago, sir.”
“Two weeks! That is a long holiday.”
“It was only to be a week, sir. Mrs Pritchard lives on the other side of Ware, so it could hardly
be less. But he’s not back yet, and Mrs Graham met someone in Ware the other day who is from the
same village as Mrs Pritchard, and seemingly the boy never went to his mother’s at all.”
“So he has just vanished, is that it?” Will said.
“Mostly likely spent all his money on drink,” Madge said, with a sniff.
“I don’t think so, madam,” Keeble said. “He was always a good, sober young man, and past the
age of such foolishness. I’m more concerned that he’s met with an accident somewhere.”
 “Well, whether he has drunk himself to oblivion or fallen into a ditch, I am not sure what we can
do about it,” Will said. “I am going to change my boots.”
So saying, he stomped out of the room.
On the window seat, Morgan Plummer sipped his brandy, chuckling at them. Irritating man!
 2: Orchard House
Dinner that evening was a strange affair. Will was the only gentleman present, with Eloise and Mrs
Greenwood on either side of him, while Madge presided at the other end of the table. Fourteen-year-
old Bella and her governess had materialised from somewhere, explaining vaguely that they had been
on a long walk.
“Still here, Miss Crabtree?” Madge said to the governess. “I’d have thought your curate would
have carried you off by now.”
“He is a vicar now, Miss Paton,” she said with a smile. “However, there is a lot of work to be
done at the parsonage at St Agnes before we can marry, and I shall not leave Bella in the lurch. Not
until Mrs Fletcher has made alternative provision for her.”
“I shall be fifteen next month,” Bella said stoutly, “so I shall not need a governess.”
“Your stepmother may have something to say about that,” Madge said.
“Yes, but so will Pa,” Bella said. “Angie came out when she was fifteen, and I shall do so too.
Not properly out — I do not care about balls or the season in London or nonsense like that — but I
see no reason why I should not always have dinner with the rest of the family and sit in the saloon
with you afterwards, instead of being bundled off to the nursery like a child.”
“You still need supervision, young lady,” Madge said.
“You and Mama can supervise me,” Bella said. “And I can still practise the instrument and read
without a governess. Miss Crabtree will give me a list of suitable works. I need not give up my
education just because I have no governess.”
“A lady should never give up her education,” Miss Crabtree said. “There is always something
new to be learnt, a new book to read, a new piece of music.”
“Yes! I have been working on one of Eloise’s that Rosie sent from London, but it is quite hard.
Eloise, I hope you will write some easier pieces, for those of us who are not as accomplished on the
pianoforte as you.”
Eloise smiled at her. “I have brought a great number of pieces with me from Bath, so you will
be able to choose something simpler. What is it you are learning?”
“ ‘A Bonny Lass One Day’”
“Oh, yes, that has some tricky fingering, but I will help you.”
“Will you? Thank you! I do think you are clever to invent music as you do. There are those who
would say that only men should create music or books or sculptures, but in my opinion there is no
reason why ladies cannot do everything just as well as men.”
“A girl of fourteen should not have an opinion at all,” Madge said repressively. “Eat your dinner
and try not to put yourself forward in company, for no one wants to hear from a schoolroom miss.”
“Yes, Aunt Madge,” Bella said, but her smile suggested she was not in the least put down by the
reproof.
 The doorbell drew Keeble away, but he returned moments later with a note for Madge.
“One of the Manor grooms brought this, madam. He’s waiting for a reply.”
Madge unfolded the note and read it out loud.
‘Miss Paton, We should be pleased to welcome you, Mr Fletcher and your guests from Bath
at dinner tomorrow. Lady Plummer.’
“That is very kind of Lady Plummer,” Will said. “It will save Mrs Sharwell scratching round to
feed us on a Sunday. We shall accept, of course.”
“I suppose we must,” Madge said.
“You sound reluctant,” Will said, “but we will have a better dinner there than we could hope for
here, and it is a compliment to Eloise to invite us so soon.”
“It is not a very gracious invitation, though,” Bella said. “I expect Sir Owen made her do it.”
“Isabella Fletcher, it’s not your place to comment on such matters,” Madge said, “and you
should certainly not make ill-founded suppositions about someone far above you in rank.”
“What does rank matter?” Bella said. “Even if she were a duchess, she should be civil to us,
and that invitation is barely that.”
“That’s enough!” Madge snapped. “Keeble, pray tell the groom that we’ll be delighted to accept
her ladyship’s generous invitation. And as for you, young lady…” She turned to Bella, all straight
back and defiant expression. “… since you can’t behave in a ladylike manner, you may return to the
nursery. Immediately!”
“No! That is not fair! Will, tell her it is not fair!”
He raised a rueful eyebrow. “Aunt Madge stands in place of your mama just now, little sister, so
you must do as you are bid. If you go at once without making a fuss, I shall bring you some dessert
later.”
Madge watched the warring emotions chase each other across her countenance, before Bella
wisely settled on discretion. Meekly, she rose, curtsied to the company, and walked sedately from the
room. Miss Crabtree, displaying more embarrassment than her charge, followed in her wake.
It was Eloise who broke the awkward silence. “She is trying her wings a little, I dare say. My
own sister was just the same at that age, but she grew out of it very quickly once she was out in
society.”
“Perhaps, but she won’t convince anyone she’s ready to join society with such wayward
behaviour.”
“Poor Isabella!” Eloise said, shaking her head a little. “It is very hard to be left behind in the
schoolroom when the rest of the family is away, bent on nothing but enjoyment. She is a little lonely, I
expect. Has she no friends of her own age?”
For one second, Madge hesitated, but Bella was too difficult to explain to outsiders, and
besides, it was for Will to describe the family’s peculiarities to his future bride. “None,” she said
gruffly. “Will, are you keeping that raised pie all to yourself, or might it make its way to this end of
the table?”
~~~~~
The following day was Sunday. Madge was prone to take to her bed with a sick headache on Sunday
mornings, for the tedium of the liturgy and a lengthy sermon disagreed with her constitution, but on
this occasion, she felt she’d better make the effort. Will had obtained the keys to Orchard House,
where he and Eloise would live after they were married, and they were all to look around it after
church. There was no saying what unaccountable fancies might be agreed upon if Madge were not
there to guide their thoughts, so to church she must go.
The liturgy was as tedious as always, for Madge could never help thinking of the chores she
could be getting done if it were not Sunday, but James’s sermon was mercifully short and it was not
too long before they were out in the sunshine again. Eloise, naturally, was the focus of all eyes. As the
future Mrs William Fletcher, and therefore also the future mistress of Chadwell Park, she was a
person of interest to everyone in the parish, from Lady Frederica Kelshaw, an earl’s daughter, down
to Molly, the scullery maid with a most unfortunate squint, gazing avidly at Eloise with her mouth
ajar. There would be only one topic of conversation over the dinner tables that day.
Lady Frederica condescended to make Eloise’s acquaintance, and then the Plummer family
approached, after which she and Will were surrounded by well-wishers. Madge found herself
subjected to much interested enquiry on the matter of their abrupt return, but she turned all such talk
aside. The gossipers would find it all out soon enough, and she had no wish to add fuel to the fire.
Eventually, Will extracted Eloise from the throng and the Fletchers crossed the road from St
Hilary’s church to Orchard House. It was a fine, modern property, built no more than ten years ago,
although in a somewhat restrained style that Madge thought very plain. The short carriage drive
already showed signs of neglect, with weeds pushing through here and there, for all the servants had
dispersed to other employment.
Will opened the front door, and they entered a spacious hall with a high ceiling, deep yellow
walls, and a patterned tile floor.
“Oh, this is lovely!” Eloise exclaimed, gazing up at the intricate plasterwork on the ceiling. “I
had not expected anything so large.”
“Large means more servants and more expense,” Madge said, but Eloise only smiled at her.
There were four rooms downstairs, and while Madge grudgingly conceded that the drawing
room and the parlour next door, a morning room perhaps, were of adequate size, she was
disappointed by the dining room.
“This will only seat twelve or so,” she said, pacing it out. “You could use the other room,
though. You might get sixteen in there.”
“But the service stairs are beside this room,” Mrs Greenwood said. “There is a hook for a
chandelier here, too, for dining.”
“I doubt we will be entertaining more than twelve,” Eloise said, laughing. “This is perfect for
our needs.”
“North facing,” Madge said. “The light will be poor.”
“That won’t matter a bit in the evenings,” Mrs Greenwood said. “Anyway, I’d have said it was
more west than north.”
Madge sniffed to show her opinion of that.
They went up the wide main stairs to discover five more rooms above.
“This is the dressing room for the main bedroom, clearly,” Madge said, “and on the other side, a
night nursery and day nursery. The last room will do for a guest.”
“I hope we will have more than one guest at a time,” Eloise said. “My brothers and sister will
come to visit us, I hope, and I am sure Will has friends he would wish to invite.”
“The small room will do for a nursery,” Mrs Greenwood said. “No need at all for a dressing
room, I’d have said. That would leave three rooms for visitors.”
“No dressing room?” Madge said. “Eloise, you must surely want a dressing room?”
“I have never had one before,” she said. “Will, do you feel the need for a dressing room?”
“Not in the least. Aunt Madge, you know that Ma and Pa managed perfectly well all their
married life with a simple screen across one corner of their bedroom. I am sure the same will work
for us.”
“I’d have thought you’d want to do things properly, now you’re so grand,” she said, but Will
only laughed.
It was annoying to have her opinion so casually disregarded. Will she was used to, and a man
would always be more dogmatic, but she expected Eloise to take advice from one so much more
experienced in managing a household, and as for Mrs Greenwood! What right had she to put in an
oar? She lived in a very small way in Bath, with only a few rooms and one servant living in, so why
would she argue against Madge, who had been running the Sagborough house for years, and was more
or less running Chadwell Park now? It was unfathomable.
On the servants’ quarters, Madge had nothing to say, for the kitchen was better equipped than
any she had seen, and clearly no expense had been spared. There could be no discussion about
furniture until they could visit a warehouse. But then came the subject of decoration.
“You will want to repaint all these rooms in lighter colours,” Madge said, as they returned to the
drawing room. “These dark walls are too gloomy by half. Pale green, or perhaps lemon in here, and
rose in the dining room.”
“I don’t call this dark,” Mrs Greenwood said. “It’s a lovely warm colour, which will be
wonderful of a winter evening. You’ll have your instrument in that corner, Eloise, and with the fire
blazing away and a chandelier all lit up, just think how cosy it will be.”
“Gloomy,” Madge said, in ringing tones. “You mark my words, this is too dark a colour to be
anything but gloomy. And the dining room is worse, in my view. Pale colours, like the Park, that is
what this place needs.”
“The dining room is a lovely colour!” Mrs Greenwood said, lifting her chin pugnaciously.
“That’s silk on the walls, unless I’m very much mistaken, and it would be a crying shame to rip that
down.”
There was a pause as the two eyed each other with hostility.
“It is a little early to think about colours,” Eloise said smoothly. “I like the size and the
arrangement of the rooms very much. Will, what do you think?”
“If you like it, then I like it too,” he said, with a smile that made her blush like a schoolroom
chit, instead of a woman of five and twenty.
And that was the end of any sensible discussion. After that, they went round the overgrown
gardens, and examined the coach house, and Madge had little to say about any of that, so she was glad
when they went back to the rectory for tea and cakes.
As they walked back to the Park later, and their party became somewhat strung out on the long
walk up the drive, Madge found Will beside her.
“Aunt Madge, at the risk of offending you, I must ask you not to express your opinions on
Orchard House so forcefully. Eloise will decide for herself how she wishes her home to look, and
she will take her aunt’s advice into consideration before yours.”
“Then more fool her,” Madge said. “What does Mrs Greenwood know about decorating a house
of that size? I did everything of that nature in Sagborough, for your ma never had the least idea of
colours or aesthetic matters, so I think I might have a little more experience than Mrs Greenwood.”
“Whether or not that is so,” he said tersely, “she is Eloise’s aunt, to whom she is very close, and
we hope she will make her home with us. It would upset Eloise if you were to quarrel with her, and I
will not stand for that, I give you fair warning. So I expect you to be civil to Mrs Greenwood, and—”
“When have I been anything else?” Madge cried indignantly.
“—and not put yourself forward regarding Orchard House. Is that clear?”
Madge would not dignify such an insult with any reply, and stalked onwards, head held high.
~~~~~
Morgan had no great wish to have the Fletchers to dine that evening, but at least there would be two
full courses on the table, and something decent from the cellar. The Plummers gathered in the parlour
to receive their guests and indulge in the usual desultory conversation before the proper business of
the evening could begin and they could go through to the dining room.
Sarah was not happy to be entertaining the Fletchers.
“Why did they have to come back so soon, and without even warning the servants?” she
moaned. “It is too bad, I declare! I hope we are not to be expected to feed them very often, for the
price of beef is ridiculous this year. It is bad enough that they have taken our house away from us,
without emptying our larder as well. We shall be destitute, I am sure of it.”
 “Now, my dear, there is no danger of that,” Owen said gently. “We can well afford to entertain
now and then. Mr Fletcher paid a very good price for the Park, so we are very far from destitution.”
“Yet here we are squeezed into the Manor, which was barely big enough for Letitia and
Charles,” she said. “It is very disagreeable to be forced to make so many economies.”
For at least the hundredth time, Owen said, “There is no need for economy any longer, Lady
Plummer. A little more capital would not go amiss, but the time for severe economies is past. That
was only when we had the added expense of the Park, you see. My income is more than sufficient
now and even allows for some modest savings towards a dowry for Patricia. And if you like the idea,
we could revive the tradition of balls at Michaelmas and Christmas. Would that give you pleasure, my
dear?”
But Sarah looked at him uncomprehendingly. No matter how many times he explained it, she
never quite understood. Fortunately, the Fletchers arrived at that moment, and the subject was
allowed to drop, at least until the next time.
Young Fletcher’s intended bride, Miss Whittleton, was not a great beauty, but she had a figure
any man would admire, so no blame to him for snapping her up. She had not a penny to her name, but
Fletcher Senior was so obscenely rich that it hardly mattered. One might have supposed that a young
man like that, with all the good looks and dashing style of the sons of the aristocracy, might have
reached a little higher for a flower to pluck, but there was nothing objectionable in the lady and he
seemed happy enough in his choice.
The lady’s aunt, Mrs Greenwood, was the sort of rounded, apple-cheeked woman who might be
seen anywhere, chattering away inconsequentially to all and sundry, quite oblivious to the suppressed
yawns of boredom. Letitia abandoned her at the first opportunity, and even Sarah, who felt obliged to
play the gracious hostess, could not hide her lack of interest.
Miss Paton, her expression as severe as usual, was sitting a little apart, although whether
because she felt herself too superior to make conversation or because they could not stand her
company, Morgan could not say.
Sidling up to her, he leaned over one shoulder to say, “Evening, madam. Come for a proper
meal, have you?”
She bristled at once. “There is nothing wrong with Mrs Sharwell’s cooking, sir!”
“No? She used to be Letitia’s cook here, you know, but when we sold you the Park, we chose to
keep the best of the servants. Your Mrs Sharwell can hardly compete with a magnificent cook like
Mrs Hoskins. Her soufflés are positively sublime.”
“Mrs Sharwell was not well trained, I grant you, but with careful instruction she’s come on very
well.”
“But soufflés, my dear Miss Paton! Mrs Sharwell’s soufflés are sadly flat.”
“Who needs fancy stuff like that? If there are a couple of good roasts on the table, a ragoût,
perhaps, and a proper raised pie, the rest is neither here nor there. If we want fancy, then Mrs
Fletcher’s French man-cook will be here next week, and he will out-soufflé your Mrs Hoskins with
one hand tied behind his back.”
“A French man-cook, eh?”
“Mrs Fletcher took him on for the season in London and liked him well enough to keep him on
permanently. Not that I enjoy the sort of elaborate dishes he favoured, myself, for my tastes are
simple, but I will say this for him — when we entertained, he rose to the occasion magnificently. I
doubt you would find a finer spread of dishes in all England, excepting the Court, naturally.”
“Oh well, if Mrs Fletcher permits French ideas into her kitchen, then — Yes, Owen?”
“Jefford has announced dinner, Morgan.”
Sir Owen was not a man to show any sign of irritation, and his clipped tone was no more than
his usual manner, but Morgan knew his brother well enough to sense his displeasure. Sir Owen had
long since left behind his military career, brought home by the death of his elder brother, but the
discipline and strict adherence to the clock remained. Dinner was to be served at seven o’clock
precisely, winter and summer alike, and any delay was an unpardonable breach of good manners.
Unruffled, either choosing to ignore or not seeing the implied reproof, Miss Paton rose nimbly
to her feet and said cheerfully, “Excellent! Lead the way, Sir Owen.”
Being the last into the dining room, Morgan was obliged to take the only remaining seat, which
happened to be beside Miss Paton. “Ah, a raised pie,” he murmured into her ear. “Now you will be
able to see how it should be done.”
Naturally, she could not resist the challenge, so as soon as the soup was removed, they both cut
slices of the pie and commenced a detailed and very thorough debate on its merits or otherwise, for
while it was rather good, for a pigeon pie, Miss Paton would have it that it was barely tolerable. The
discussion lasted through the entire first course, and since, to Morgan’s great delight, the second
course included soufflés, there was no let up in hostilities until the ladies had retired.
“Morgan, what brings you to quarrel with Miss Paton so excessively?” Sir Owen said, as the
gentlemen settled down with the port. “You were so engrossed that you quite neglected Mrs
Greenwood on your other side.”
“Did I so? I was not aware she had anything to say to me, for she merely ate everything that was
within reach without stopping. As for Miss Paton, we do not quarrel. We merely exchange opinions.”
“That is like saying the French and the Russians were merely exchanging opinions at
Friedland,” Owen said. “Call truce, if you please, brother, for it distresses Lady Plummer to see the
two of you engaging in what appears to be open warfare.”
“I would not for the world distress Sarah,” Morgan said stiffly, “but it takes two to call a truce.
I would have no objection to Miss Paton if she would but express herself less forcefully.”
“I shall talk to Miss Paton,” Will Fletcher said. “She has always been… disputatious, shall we
say, but you seem to bring out the worst in her, Mr Plummer.”
“They bring out the worst in each other,” Owen said. “But you can do better, brother. I shall
expect you to be civil to the lady from now on.”
 “What, permanently?” Morgan said, horrified. “I can only stomach so much of that woman.”
Owen's lips twitched in what might have been a smile. “Shall we say until Michaelmas, then? A
few weeks of civilities is no great hardship. Surely you can agree to that.”
“As you wish,” Morgan said with a sigh.
Civil? Now where was the fun in that?
 3: A Truce
“A truce? What do you mean, a truce?” Madge said, as they sat at breakfast the next morning. “You
make it seem as if we are at war.”
“Well, that is exactly what it sounds like,” Will said wearily. “We are all tired of it, Aunt
Madge. Can you please at least try to be civil to the man, however irritating you find him?”
“I am always civil,” Madge said, frowning at him. “When have I ever been uncivil? But if he
expresses his derogatory opinions, then what am I supposed to do, let it stand? Smile sweetly and
allow him to abuse this family? I can’t do it, Will, and that’s a fact.”
“Yes, I expect you to smile sweetly and say nothing,” Will said sharply. “If you cannot speak to
him without arguing every last point in exhaustive detail, then it is best not to speak to him at all. We
hardly live in the Plummers’ pockets, so you will not see him very often, and surely it is not asking
too much for you to avoid contentious subjects when you meet him? And before you object, you know
perfectly well that Pa would say exactly the same.”
Madge had been about to do precisely that, but these words caused her to snap her mouth shut
again. He was probably right about that. Harry never minded when she chided the girls about their
transgressions, for she had helped to raise them and ever since Edith had died, the girls’ care had
fallen solely to her. She never hesitated to rebuke Ted, Will and Johnny, either, and even Harry
himself, if he stepped out of line. She had always had that licence within the family.
But outside it? Will had stepped in when she had countered Mrs Greenwood’s opinions at
Orchard House, and here he was interfering on behalf of Morgan Plummer, and yes, Harry would do
the same.
Will smiled and rested one hand on hers. “Dear Aunt Madge! You know we all love you, and I
accept that Morgan Plummer can be a difficult man, but it does nobody any good to have you
squabbling all the time. He has agreed to a truce, at least until Michaelmas, so I hope you can do as
much.”
“I confess to a little curiosity about him,” Eloise said, before Madge could argue the point
further. “He is Sir Owen’s brother, but does he have a profession? What is his history?”
“I understand he was in the army,” Will said. “He saw some action in America, I believe, but
after his return to England he received an injury which forced him to leave the army.”
“Ah, I noticed the limp,” Eloise said. “And yet here he remains. But perhaps he feels himself to
be too old to take up a different career, and I am sure his brother is fond of him and likes to have him
there. There is nothing quite like the closeness of brothers, is there?”
After which, the conversation turned to Eloise’s own brothers and Morgan Plummer was
forgotten. But not by Madge. She had noticed the limp, and had even teased the man about it once or
twice, but she had assumed that he’d acquired it by falling from his horse or a tree or some such
nonsense. It had never occurred to her that the idle and rather well-padded man with a brandy glass
constantly in his hand might once have had an active and even heroic past. It was disconcerting.
 ~~~~~
AUGUST
Chadwell Park was gradually brought back to its usual routine. The holidaying servants returned, the
holland covers were removed from the dining room, saloon and music room, and Eloise’s music
filled the house. The French man-cook arrived from London, together with an unexpected wife,
causing a flurry of concern about accommodation. All the senior servants had their quarters in the
basement below the main building, and the more junior members of the household in the kitchen wing,
but nothing was suitable for a married couple. In the end, Madge put them on the attic floor, where
Miss Crabtree already had her rooms.
It was not to be supposed that Mrs Sharwell would take kindly to the imposition of another cook
in her kitchen, especially one who was not even English.
“Have I not given satisfaction, madam?” she said stiffly, coming in state to make her complaint
to Madge in the parlour. “I understood about London, with all the fancy things madam wanted — balls
and suchlike, and guests for dinner every night, and hot suppers, too. It was too much for one person,
and I was glad of the help, even if I didn’t much care for the muck he produced. But so long as madam
was happy, and the young ladies had a lovely time, I never minded. But I never thought he’d be
coming here and acting as if it’s his kitchen, and coming over all foreign when I say anything about it.
It’s not what I’m used to at all, nor what I expected, and that’s the truth. If he’s staying, then I’ll have
to consider whether to give my notice.”
Madge smoothed her ruffled feelings as best she could and gave the two of them a strict division
of duties to follow. It was hard to talk to the Frenchman, since his English was poor and Madge’s
French even worse, and she could never find anyone else to translate when it was needed.
With so much to do at the Park, it was several days before Madge had time to call at the rectory
to see how Julia was managing. Eloise and her aunt walked down to the rectory with Madge. It was a
pleasant stroll down the drive, crossing the lake by its elegant stone bridge and then into the welcome
shade of the avenue, its trees in the full majesty of summer.
“It is so beautiful,” sighed Mrs Greenwood. “How blessed you are, Eloise, to be mistress of all
this one day!”
“It is a little overwhelming, to be frank,” Eloise said quietly. “I devoutly hope Will’s papa lives
for a great many years yet.”
The arched gateway deposited them directly opposite the fine Norman church of St Hilary, and
nestled beside it the modest rectory, set back amongst shrubs. The garden showed signs of recent
work, for the lawns, long and unkempt when Madge had last seen them, had been scythed, and the
overgrown shrubs had been tidied. Here and there, the signs of newly cut branches showed pale
amidst the greenery.
A very young, rather harassed housemaid, duster in hand, answered their knock. “They’re out,
mum,” she said, bobbing a curtsy. “Went out straight after breakfast.”
“When do you expect them back?”
 “No idea, mum.”
“And you are?” Madge said.
“Ruth, mum.” The girl bobbed again, and then, as Madge looked her up and down, a nervous
third time.
“You’re what, precisely? A housemaid?”
“Yes, mum.” Another bob.
“Where’s the manservant? Or housekeeper, perhaps? Housemaids don’t answer front doors.”
“We don’t have neither, mum. Just me and Janet Pound. Oh, I s’pose Mr Lightwood counts. He’s
the master’s man, mum, but he’s out, too. Gone to Ware.”
“Hmph! Janet Pound, indeed! Well, ladies,” she went on, turning to Eloise, “there’s obviously
work to do here, so I shall wait for James and Julia to return. You may do as you please.”
“I promised Julia I would tune the instrument in the drawing room,” Eloise said. “Now is as
good a time as any. Aunt Beth?”
“Oh, certainly, and it may be that housemaids who don’t answer front doors might be permitted
to fetch tea and cakes? Or a biscuit… or macaroons. Does your cook make macaroons, Ruth?”
“I don’t think there’s any today,” Ruth said with a tenuous smile. “Mrs Pound’s made a cherry
cake, though”
“Cherry cake! How splendid,” Mrs Greenwood said. “Then I shall stay, too.”
Madge stood aside for Eloise to enter first, for she well understood what was due to the future
mistress of Chadwell Park. Whatever her thoughts about this milk-and-water southern miss with her
dainty ways, she knew what was proper.
The drawing room was a scene of devastation. Great piles of furniture were shrouded in holland
covers, the rugs were up, the curtains were down, and ladders, brushes and buckets of paint suggested
the nature of the undertaking. The pianoforte, however, was uncovered, its surface gleaming with
fresh polish.
“The workmen have gone to a funeral over at Froxfield Green,” Eloise said. “I expect that is
where Mr and Mrs Plummer have gone. Aunt Beth, Miss Paton, you may be more comfortable in the
parlour while I work on the instrument.”
Madge opened her mouth to protest at this cavalier dismissal. As if she could not decide for
herself where to go, and being comfortable had nothing at all to do with it. However, she had no wish
to quarrel with Eloise, not when she might, at some indeterminate time, be dependent on her
goodwill. Madge was the poor relation in the Fletcher family, her position precarious now that Harry
had a new wife. Eloise had been a poor relation, too, so perhaps she would understand, but
nevertheless, Madge would take good care not to get on the wrong side of her.
The parlour was a disordered mess, but at least there were soft chairs and rugs on the floor. Mrs
Greenwood sank into a chair with a sigh of relief, while Madge looked around in dismay at the
surfaces covered with papers, books and a half-completed acrostic. At least the place was clean, as
she discovered by running a finger along the mantelpiece, so Janet Pound and Ruth were doing their
job. Nor were there abandoned cups or glasses amidst the detritus. However, her hands itched to tidy
everything into neat piles.
The dining room across the passageway was even more of a disaster, the table covered with
half unpacked boxes, glassware, china and gleaming silver visible in them, straw packing scattered
over the floor. Madge recognised her own modest box in a corner, a gift ordered at vast expense from
a London shop. Kneeling down, she lifted a silver teapot from the straw, carefully brushing away the
last traces of dust. Then there was a sugar bowl, a slops bowl, and jugs for milk and hot water. James
and Julia, it seemed, had not yet found the time to unpack all their wedding gifts.
On the sideboard lay a paper with the beginnings of a list. The fourth item read, ‘Aunt Madge -
silver set’. Tutting, she picked up a pencil and added, ‘comprising teapot, two bowls, two jugs’.
With a smile of satisfaction, she settled down to search and sort and write.
Julia found her there some time later. “Good day, Aunt Madge. Oh, are you finishing our list?
How kind you are! I started with such good intentions, but you know how it is.”
Madge frowned at her. “Hmpf. I know how you are, young lady. Is this all of your wedding
gifts? Anything hidden away upstairs?”
“No, but there’s the cellar…”
“The cellar!” Madge cried, horrified, imagining vast piles of boxes and parcels stacked to the
roof.
Julia grinned at her, tossing her bonnet and gloves on top of a box of china. “Papa-in-law gave
us a barrel of something — I don’t know what, but James put it straight in the cellar. Everything else
is here, or is yet to arrive. Aunt Petronella is sending us rugs, apparently, as well as the silver
monstrosity. Did you come across it? It’s in that box from York over there. Isn’t it the most hideous
thing you’ve ever seen? James says it’s an epergne, but I can’t imagine what we’re supposed to do
with it.”
“You put it in the middle of the table when you have guests,” Madge said, fishing her niece’s
discarded bonnet and gloves out of the box and picking off the bits of straw.
“But why?”
“Well… I’m not really sure. An ornament, I suppose. But I doubt you’ll need to worry about it
for a long time, since you’re unlikely to be inviting anyone to dinner for some time, not in this
shambles. Where do you and James eat?”
“Mostly at the Manor, to be honest. James was in the habit of it before we married, and it’s so
much easier. When we can’t go there, we eat in the kitchen.”
“In the kitchen! Great heavens, Julia, whatever are you thinking? Do you eat with the servants?”
“There’s only us and Lightwood. The rest of the servants are still living at Orchard House, and
my fancy lady’s maid lives there, too, since the servants’ quarters here aren’t fit for habitation at
present. James has never had living-in servants before, apart from Lightwood.”
Madge gave a sigh of exasperation. “Julia Fletcher, whatever are we to do with you?”
“Nothing at all, because I’m completely and utterly and blissfully happy. Wedding presents and
servants’ quarters and dining tables are so unimportant in comparison. I am in love, Aunt Madge, and
it’s heavenly. The world may go hang for all I care.”
“Pft. Love! It turns rational creatures into dribbling fools, if you ask me.”
“Haven’t you ever been in love, Aunt Madge? If you had, you’d understand.”
“I’ve never turned into a dribbling fool, no. What I understand, all too clearly, is that you and
that young man of yours are as useless as a pair of kittens. I can see I am going to have to take charge
here or nothing will get done at all.”
Julia clapped her hands together excitedly. “Oh, thank you! I hoped you would say that. Can you
find us a cook? And a housekeeper, but principally a cook. Mrs Pound has a fine way with mutton, but
one likes a little variety now and then.”
Madge grunted. She would never dream of showing how much the compliment pleased her. “I’ll
do what I can. Lady Plummer would be the one to do something about it, for she must know better than
anyone where to find hard-working servants around these parts. But there, she’s not the helpful sort,
so we must manage as best we can. I’ll write to Allie, I think. She might know someone in
Sagborough she can bring with her when she comes to stay. At least you have gardeners. The gardens
look much better.”
“Three of them, believe it or not. They were from Orchard House, a father and two sons, and we
hardly liked to split them up. They’re such good workers. We shall be inundated with vegetables next
year.”
“Three gardeners, in a place this size! And no cook or housekeeper or manservant, either. What
about a coachman?”
“That can wait until we have a carriage. James keeps meaning to order one to be built, but he
hasn’t quite got round to it and we can always borrow the gig from the Manor.”
Madge rolled her eyes. “If you can find me an apron in this sorry excuse for a house, I shall
make a start on washing this china and getting it put away. Where is your china store?”
But Julia only pulled a baffled face and shrugged. Madge sighed and shook her head.
~~~~~
Morgan’s day had started badly at breakfast, and for once, it was not his fault. It was his brother’s
custom to ask each member of the family of his or her plans for the day. He never commented on these
proposals, but he liked to know what everyone was doing. Sarah and Patricia told him they were
paying calls. Michael was to talk to the steward about a barn. Owen merely nodded and passed on.
Morgan said, as always, “Nothing much. A walk this morning, if there is no rain. Mooch about
the house in the afternoon.”
 This usually elicited snide remarks from the women about how pleasant it must be to mooch
through life, and wondering why a man of fifty, with all his teeth, most of his hair and one slightly
misshapen leg, could not find gainful employment. Not that they ever phrased it so indelicately. They
said merely that they were astonished that he was not bored with so little to do, and after such an
active career in the army, too. And sometimes, if Morgan were disposed to quarrel, he would take
them up on it. But today, neither Sarah nor Letitia said a word.
When it was Letitia’s turn, she said, “Charles and I will go to Ware to collect the mail.”
“Again?” Owen said mildly.
“You know Charles is expecting a letter any day now,” Letitia said.
Charles was indeed expecting a letter, for he had written to every relative with whom he was
still on speaking terms to beg for an invitation for the shooting. Christmas, Easter and early autumn
were times of high excitement, because although mostly he was disappointed, occasionally some
hapless distant cousin, either forgetting what a bore he was or not yet aware of it, would issue the
much hoped for invitation. Then there would be celebrations indeed, but until that moment arrived, or
the calendar moved on too far to make the journey possible, he and Letitia lived in a state of fevered
anticipation.
For Charles was no less a personage than Lord Charles Heaman, and his brother was the
Marquess of Barrowford, who was further connected to some very important families. Although
Charles condescended to live on the charity of his father-in-law, who was merely a baronet and
therefore gentry, his proper place in society was amongst the nobility. That was where he truly came
alive.
“May we have the carriage?” Letitia said.
“Your mother needs it today,” Owen said.
“All day? Well, the gig, then. We could manage with the gig.”
“I have placed the gig at Mrs James’s disposal until her own carriage is available,” Owen said.
“You might ride, Letitia. You have a perfectly good mare in the stables.”
“All the way to Ware? And arrive looking like a scarecrow? I have no objection for riding
about the estate now and then, but a lady does not ride when she wishes to be fit to be seen.”
“You would be fit to enter the post office, I should have thought, but if you cannot bear the idea,
then Lord Charles might go to Ware alone. He does not spurn the idea of a long ride, I am sure. Or you
might wait for one of the grooms to go for the mail, as they usually do.”
Owen never raised his voice, or showed his displeasure in any way that an outsider would
notice, but nevertheless there was a certain something in his voice at times that would quell all but the
most persistent combatant. Unfortunately, Letitia was in that category, and would have continued the
argument indefinitely had Sarah not intervened.
“Morgan, why do you not run Letitia and Charles to Ware in your curricle? It is a fine day for an
outing, and you are none of you large. It will carry three without crowding, I dare say.”
 Oh, wonderful. There was all his pleasure in the day gone. Still, at least he could pass a little
time at the Bull while he waited for Letitia to argue with the post office man — ‘Are you sure there is
nothing for Lord and Lady Charles Heaman? Are you quite certain? Will you look again? You
might have missed it.’ The Bull sometimes had a tolerable brandy, and if not, the ale was perfectly
drinkable, in a pinch.
Still, it was indeed a fine day for an outing. He rarely agreed with Sarah, but for once, she was
quite right. The air was fresh and cool, the roads were tolerable, and Letitia and Charles were
mercifully silent the whole way.
And the best of it was that Morgan had barely settled down to his second brandy in the Bull’s
taproom before the two of them burst in excitedly waving a letter.
“Look! Look!” Letitia cried. “Cousin Hugo has written, and we may go at once and stay until
Michaelmas. Is that not splendid news?”
“It is indeed,” Morgan said, with heartfelt sincerity.
Thank the Lord! Six weeks of tranquillity at Chadwell Manor. Sometimes the least promising
day could end on a glorious note.
 4: Little Difficulties
Will was getting far too puffed up in his own esteem, that was the problem, Madge decided. When his
father was around, Will was held in check, but now that he was the sole man at the Park, he thought he
was quite the lord of the manor, handing out his orders. Now he wanted to hold a grand dinner for the
Plummers, to thank them for their hospitality when they had first returned from Bath.
“Dinner for thirteen!” Madge had said, horrified. “Will, half the saloons are still under holland
covers, we have hardly any food in the house and Monsieur Faucher has only been here for five days.
It cannot be done!”
She’d just returned from a long day spent at the rectory, was dripping wet from a sudden
rainstorm, and wanted nothing more than a cup of tea, a bath and dry clothes, in any order, when Will
had dragged her into Harry’s office.
“I am sure you can find a way,” he said coaxingly. “We have two cooks, after all, and Madame
Faucher often helps in the kitchen, I believe.”
“So she does, and gets in Mrs Sharwell’s way,” Madge said, removing her sodden bonnet with
distaste. “Matters are fraught enough between her and the Frenchman as it is, without asking them to
conjure up a proper dinner as well. There’s no need to reciprocate so quickly. It won’t be expected.
Leave it until the rest of the family arrive from Bath.”
“But I am going up to Sagborough next week to collect Allie and who knows how long that will
take? Allie fusses so, and as for travelling with small children… well, you know what that is like. I
thought it would be pleasant for Eloise to act as hostess here just once before Stepmother returns. You
will not mind that, will you?”
“Oh, I see it all now. This is about you and Eloise playing at being king and queen. Pft! Will, if
you want to do this, you’re going to have to take on some of the work. Talk to Mrs Sharwell and the
Frenchman, and see what they need, and send the grooms to Ware to get it.”
“I cannot spare any grooms to go galloping off to Ware for nutmeg or lobster, not now that my
new hunters have arrived,” he said crossly. “Dan Pritchard is clearly not coming back and—”
“He’s not returned?” Madge said sharply.
“No. Probably taken the King’s shilling, foolish boy, and I have Tommy and Young Bill clearing
out the stables at Orchard House, for Mrs Reynell never had more than a pair of carriage horses there.
There are no grooms to spare for shopping expeditions.”
“Then you will just have to decide what is more important to you, Will — Orchard House or
this wretched dinner, because I cannot do everything myself, not when I have the rectory to straighten
out.”
Will frowned. “I wish you would not interfere with Julia and James, Aunt Madge.”
“Interfere? I am helping them get the house in order, because if it were left to them, nothing
would ever be done.”
“Yes, but they have barely been married a month, and they hardly know which way is up. Leave
them alone and give them time to come down to earth, for pity’s sake.”
“A fine thing to say when you are sleeping under their roof, Will Fletcher. Not exactly leaving
them alone yourself, are you?”
“Two nights, that is all,” he said, his voice terse. “I stayed there for just two nights when we
first arrived, since it is hardly proper to sleep in the same house as Eloise until we are married, as
you know perfectly well. But as soon as I could, I moved across to Orchard House.”
“Without furniture? Without servants?” Madge said faintly.
“James lent me a mattress, and Lester is managing to heat enough hot water from the kitchen fire.
I do not need to eat there, after all. I shall go to the next Ware market to see if I can pick up some
respectable servants. Eloise has the furniture in hand. She brought catalogues from Bath with her.”
Madge shook her head in irritation. Nothing goaded her more than not being needed. “You have
everything arranged, it seems, but if you want this dinner, you’ll have to help, and Eloise, too. You
can start by picking up another footman from Ware, even if only temporary. Dan Pritchard used to
make a very respectable extra hand for dinners, but none of the other grooms are fit for indoor work.”
“Oh, that is no problem,” Will said airily. “Monsieur Faucher’s son can do it. A fine-looking
young man, who has some experience already with indoor work.”
“His son? I had no idea he even had a son, still less that he was here,” Madge cried.
“Faucher asked if he might come, and I permitted it,” Will said loftily. “He arrived today while
you were at the rectory. Ah, there is the dressing bell. I shall see you at dinner, Aunt Madge.”
And giving her a quick smile and a peck on the cheek, he swept out, leaving Madge speechless.
~~~~~
Madge was not by nature rebellious, so she meekly abandoned the mammoth task of making the
rectory fit for habitation. In just three days, she had cleared the wedding presents from the dining
room, found storage for all of them, and made inventories of the glass, silver and china, with
suggestions for additional items which might be needed. She had looked forward to having a thorough
attack on the linen cupboard, and then the kitchen, but all such pleasures were now suspended in the
need to arrange a dinner for thirteen people in just three days.
Mrs Sharwell and the Frenchman stood stiffly side by side in the kitchen, both bristling with
suppressed affront, assuring Madge that, naturally, they would rise to the occasion. At least, Mrs
Sharwell said so. There was no knowing what the Frenchman said, for even when he attempted to
speak English, his accent was so impenetrable that Madge caught no more than one word in ten.
Happily, the son was fluent in both languages, so whenever Madge said, “I’m not sure I understand
you,” he stepped in smoothly to interpret.
André Faucher was a fine, tall young man of nineteen with a ready smile and a roguish eye who
would make an attractive footman, and would doubtless cut a swathe through the younger female
servants. Madge sighed. How many would have to be despatched back to their families with a purse
of five or ten pounds and a promise of baby garments later? Perhaps when Harry and Lizzie arrived
from Bath, they could be persuaded to send André back to wherever he came from. Madge
disapproved of young, handsome footmen. They were nothing but trouble.
It was fortunate he was there to interpret his father’s ramblings, however, for despite the house
boasting any number of French speakers, none of them could be relied upon to be around when
wanted. Will and Eloise were busy at Orchard House, and Bella and Miss Crabtree never seemed to
be in the schoolroom these days, and what they were doing gallivanting about all over the countryside
was more than Madge could tell. Frivolous things, she supposed, like collecting flowers for the
schoolroom, or sitting about with easels somewhere, instead of reading about kings and queens and
the Wars of the Roses from books, as they should be.
The dinner turned out to be only for eleven in the end, for Lord and Lady Charles Heaman had
gone off to visit cousins. This was a lucky circumstance, for it provided a useful subject for
discussion when no other suggested itself. Will had Lady Plummer beside him, and by way of
enquiring as to the exact degree of kinship of these cousins, and the style of house they kept, and the
nature of the countryside surrounding it, he contrived to draw out the conversation for the full length
of the first course.
There then came a lull in proceedings, for the first course was cleared away and the second had
not yet appeared, and even Will seemed daunted. Julia and James chattered away as usual, however,
Eloise conversed equably with Sir Owen and Mr Michael Plummer, and no one made any comment
on the lengthy gap between courses. Eventually, in rather a trickle, dishes began to appear. Even so, it
was a very long time before all was arranged and they could begin eating again.
When the four gentlemen had been left to their port and their male discussions, the ladies
disposed themselves about the withdrawing room while Eloise went immediately to the instrument in
the adjoining music room.
Madge took the opportunity to take Keeble aside.
“Whatever happened? Was there a crisis in the kitchen?”
He licked his lips, as if wondering what to say.
“Come, come, Keeble,” Madge said impatiently. “Is it the Frenchman?”
“No, madam. It’s Mrs Sharwell. There was… erm, a disagreement over the fondues and
meringues, and coming after the dispute over the sorrel sauce… she… she walked out, madam. Said
she won’t be put upon a moment longer, and if a usurper wants to take her kitchen from her, he’s
welcome to it, madam, so M’sieur had to scrabble round to get the second course ready. I am very
sorry, madam. I hope it didn’t spoil your evening.”
“Where is Mrs Sharwell now?”
“Gone to the Manor. She has friends there who will find her a bed for the night if she doesn’t
want to come back here.”
“What a to-do about nothing. Sorrel sauce, indeed! Was there any sorrel sauce? I didn’t notice
any.”
 “No, madam. They both made some, but Mrs Sharwell threw M’sieur’s through the window, and
then he threw hers after it.”
“Great heavens! Such tantrums. Even so, this might kill two birds with one stone, Keeble. We
have one cook too many, and the rectory is in need of a cook. I shall suggest the idea to Mrs James
now, and if Mrs Sharwell puts in an appearance tonight, you may mention the idea to her.”
Relief flooded his face. “Thank you, madam, for we couldn’t have gone on as we were.”
That much, Madge agreed with.
But the evening’s upsets were not yet finished. When Madge returned to the withdrawing room,
she found that only Lady Plummer and her daughter Patricia remained.
“Where is everyone?” Madge said. “What are they about to be leaving you all on your own like
this? But Julia is always thoughtless.”
“I gave them permission,” Lady Plummer said loftily. “Mrs James is showing Miss Whittleton
and Mrs Greenwood the secret stairs.”
“Well, of all the foolish things—! To be scrambling about on those narrow, twisting stairs with
naught but a bit of candle! We shall be lucky if none of them breaks her neck, I suppose.”
Lady Plummer showed no sign that this would be of the slightest concern to her.
Meanwhile, Patricia, who had been twisting a handkerchief restlessly in her lap, now gave a
convulsive sob.
“No, no, I’m sure they will be fine,” Madge said hastily. “You mustn’t take everything I say
seriously, you know.”
But Patricia only sobbed again, and a tear rolled gently down her cheek.
“Oh, pet, don’t take on so,” Madge said. “Let me get you something… brandy. A glass of brandy
will be just the thing to make you feel better. They’ll be fine, you just wait and see.”
“She is not upset over that,” Lady Plummer said disdainfully, as if even her own daughter-in-
law was of no concern to her. “It is because Letitia has taken the children with her.”
At which Patricia fell into weeping in good earnest, a wholehearted, shuddering, all-consuming
bout of weeping that had Madge, never the most demonstrative person, hugging the poor child fiercely
and wondering how her own mother could sit and watch and do nothing.
“But they’ll be back, pet,” Madge said, when the worst of the storm had abated somewhat.
“Lady Charles will come back soon, and bring the children back, too.”
“Not until Michaelmas!” Patricia wailed. “Weeks and weeks away! How shall I bear it?”
At which her mother heaved a long-suffering sigh.
“Why, you’ll just have to make do with Allie’s children,” Madge said.
“Allie?”
 “The eldest Fletcher daughter. Mrs Jack Ewbank now. She’s coming to visit soon, and she is to
bring all three of her children.”
“How old are they?” Patricia said eagerly.
“Susan is three, Anne is two and little Jack is just one.”
“Oh, babies!” Patricia cried, clapping her hands excitedly. A beatific expression settled on her
usually blank countenance. “Three babies! When do they come? And how long will they stay?”
“Will goes to fetch them on Monday, and they will stay all summer. As long as Allie wants,
really, for we are fixed here ourselves. Or at least, until Jack wants his wife back. There now, that’s
cheered you up a bit.”
Patricia beamed at her. “Three babies,” she said happily. “Three lovely babies.”
Lady Plummer sighed.
~~~~~
‘To Miss Margaret Paton, Chadwell Park, near Ware. Dear Aunt Madge, with friendly greetings to
Will, Eloise and Mrs Greenwood. Oh, and Julia and James, of course. We are having the most
wonderful time. I have decided that Bath is the most perfect place in the world, even better than
Sagborough, for everything one might ever want is to be found here. It is the greatest pity we are
not here during the season, when there would be assemblies at both the Upper and Lower Rooms
every week, but at least we have now had the felicity of a ball at the Upper Rooms. It would have
been the shabbiest thing to have left Bath without a single ball. Pa said I must have danced quite
through my slippers after all the balls we attended in London, but oh, I have plenty of spare pairs!
You cannot imagine how magnificent the Upper Rooms looked. I think I prefer it even to York’s
Assembly Room. It all went off very well after Mama’s careful planning, you will be pleased to
hear. We were all in our best looks and had very little to vex us, except that the ice cream melted
before it could all be eaten, which was a great pity. I will not bore you with the details of all our
partners, but I must tell you of one — Lord Albury danced with Rosie, and now we have received
an invitation from his aunt to dine with them. Mama is in such an excitement, as you may imagine,
and coming as it does just after the invitation to Epping, which I expect you know about, she is all
in a twitter about Rosie’s Great Prospects of Securing a Lord, and giving us noble connections. I
do think Lord Albury would suit her very well, for although he is not terribly handsome, not like
Will or Ricky Jupp or Mr Armitage (do you remember him from London?) he is not plain, either,
and he is a very agreeable man who would look after Rosie well. I do think she needs someone to
look after her. Must dash, as we are off to the Pump Room again. Every town should have a Pump
Room, in my opinion, where one may meet all one’s friends at once. What could be more
convenient? I hope you are all well, as we are. Your affectionate niece, Angie.’
~~~~~
Will left to collect Allie in a post chaise and four, in order to be back with Eloise on the earliest
possible day, for they had settled on Michaelmas as the date for their wedding, and the banns would
be read soon. Eloise and Mrs Greenwood were busy about Orchard House, with several servants in
place and much of their furniture already ordered from Bath, and a pianoforte for Eloise from London.
The smaller items were got from Ware or Hertford.
Madge was left with nothing to do but fret over the Frenchman now in sole control of the
kitchen, ponder how long she must wait before she could get back to work at the rectory, for nothing
would get done without her, on that point she was certain, and wonder where on earth Bella and Miss
Crabtree got to, for they seemed to be out all day, every day, whatever the weather.
Bella was very much on her mind lately, for Eloise had sidled up to Madge one day to ask
whether all was well with Bella.
“For I happened to overhear her talking to herself one day in her room. It was not intentional, as
I was merely making my way to the stairs, but her door was open and as I passed by, I heard her voice
speaking as if to another person. ‘Yes, I agree with you,’ she said. Yet I could not see any other
person with her. I wondered if—”
“There’s nothing wrong with Bella,” Madge said sharply. “She has a vivid imagination, no more
than that.”
“Ah. Imagination,” Eloise said. “I see.”
But of course she did not. It was hard for outsiders to understand Bella. In Sagborough, where
people had known her all her life, no one took any notice of her funny ways, but these southerners
were inclined to think she was insane. Madge had no time for such judgemental folk, but it set her all
on edge, nevertheless.
So one day, when she saw Bella returning late in the afternoon, drenched to the skin and
practically dropping from exhaustion, she accosted Miss Crabtree at once.
“Whatever is this, to be bringing Bella home in this state? Why, if she doesn’t catch a chill, it
will be a miracle. Go upstairs at once, child, and get out of those wet clothes. Anthony, send Young
Mary up to Miss Bella’s room at once, and enough hot water for a bath. Go on, quickly now! Great
heavens, Miss Crabtree, what are you thinking?”
“I beg your pardon, ma’am, but the rain caught us by surprise. We should not have gone today if
I had known. You know I would never knowingly injure Bella, and the rain only began in earnest as
we entered the Park. May I go to her? I should wish to assure myself that she is being properly
attended.”
“But where were you?”
“We walked to Froxfield Green, ma’am.”
Now, there was nothing in this to surprise anyone, for Froxfield Green was a much bigger
village than Danes Green, having a number of shops and an inn from where letters might be sent.
Being not quite three miles away across the fields, it was an easy afternoon’s walk there and back.
No, there was nothing in a walk to Froxfield Green to alarm her. It was the sudden flush of
consciousness on Miss Crabtree’s face that suggested something untoward.
“You have been dragging my niece across country so you can hob-nob with Mr Leadbetter, I
suppose.”
 “Well… there is much to do at the parsonage. The painting…”
“You have had Bella supervising the workmen?”
“Painting… we have been painting. It was Bella’s idea, in fact. She has been enjoying herself,
Miss Paton, choosing the colours and papers, and mixing the paints. She is developing such a good
eye for colour.”
“You are supposed to be teaching her music and French and the use of the globes and such like,
not letting her wield a brush like a common labourer. She is supposed to be raised as a lady!”
“I know, but—”
“And how long has this been going on?”
“Only a few weeks, but—”
“A few weeks! Great heavens, how am I to explain this to Mrs Fletcher? You have been
negligent of your duties, Miss Crabtree.”
“I am very sorry, ma’am, truly. It will not happen again.”
“Indeed, it will not. You will leave this house first thing tomorrow morning.”
 5: A Family Visit
Bella took the news of Miss Crabtree’s departure serenely.
“Mama will bring her back, I expect, and even if she does not, I do not need a governess any
longer.”
“We’ll see about that,” Madge said. “When your mama hears what has been going on—”
“Which was all my idea,” Bella said. “None of it was Miss Crabtree’s fault. I have been having
a lovely time, doing real things instead of learning about people who have been dead for hundreds of
years, and now you have spoilt it. I wish you would not interfere, Aunt Madge. Everything was
wonderful until you arrived from Bath.”
There was no point arguing with her in such a mood, so Madge said no more. Harry and Lizzie
would be back from Bath soon enough, and could deal with Miss Crabtree and Bella as they saw fit.
Perhaps they would even take her back, for Harry was soft-hearted, especially where women were
concerned. So apart from assuring herself that Miss Crabtree had found a safe refuge with friends at
Froxfield Green, and was not sleeping under a hedge or, infinitely worse, sharing the parsonage with
Mr Leadbetter in advance of their wedding, she thought no more on the matter.
The imminent arrival of Allie, the eldest Fletcher daughter, with her three small children,
necessitated a change in the arrangements in the household. Bella had been sleeping in the night
nursery, but now she would have to move out to make room for Susan, Anne and the baby.
“Now that Julia has gone, you will be able to share with Rosie and Angie,” Madge said.
“I want my own room,” Bella said calmly.
“Nonsense. It will be good for you to be with your sisters. You have been too much alone, young
lady, and now that Miss Crabtree has left, your sisters will look after you and remind you to practise
at the instrument and read your books when I am too busy to watch over you.”
“I do not need my sisters to remind me,” she said scornfully. “Nor do you need to watch over
me. I am almost fifteen, Aunt Madge, so you need not treat me like a child. I want my own bedroom.”
“There is nothing to spare, not with Eloise and Mrs Greenwood here, and Allie to be
accommodated. You are not having my room, young lady.”
“I shall sleep in the old nursery.”
“The old nursery? Which room is that?”
“The big room in the attic. It is all one room, with just a curtain to separate the sleeping part.
Dorothea likes it there.”
“Dorothea, Dorothea!” Madge said impatiently. “If you want me to treat you like a grown
woman, you will have to forget about Dorothea, Bella.”
“I dare say she will go away eventually, but while she is here, I need a room of my own where
she can stay when I have to be somewhere else. We will sleep in the old nursery.”
 “I wonder why there is an old nursery, or rather why anyone saw fit to create a new nursery. It’s
not as if the house is centuries old and the way it’s used has changed over time. Well, you had better
show me this old nursery.”
It was indeed the largest room in the attic. In most houses, the attic was a glorified lumber room,
filled with the forgotten detritus of generations, or else divided into minuscule cubicles for the
servants. At Chadwell Park, the attic was all bedrooms, the same size as the principal rooms below,
the only difference being the sloping ceilings. The old nursery was two floors above the saloon, and
just as large.
Madge had taken no notice of the room on previous inspections, for there was no visible
furniture, only tall cupboards along the inner walls and low ones under the outer walls, where the
ceiling sloped almost to the floor. Now she discovered the cupboards housed a multitude of
schoolroom equipment, from small desks with matching chairs, to easels and paints, books, a rather
good pair of globes, and numerous rolled-up papers showing letters or flowers or maps of counties
and countries, ready to pin to the wall.
“Still fully equipped,” she said musingly. “Why not move all this to the new nursery? Why buy
new globes? There is nothing wrong with this pair.”
Tucked away behind a partition lay a previously unsuspected sleeping bay, with a crib, a bed, a
few child-sized items of furniture, and a curtain to be pulled across at night. On one wall was a
painting of a child with angelic golden curls, and beneath it on a shelf, a vase of fresh wildflowers.
“Who is the child?” Madge said.
“No idea. Miss Crabtree and I examined the picture carefully, front and back, but there is
nothing to identify her. One of the daughters of the house, probably. Dorothea thinks she is dead.”
“Because someone leaves flowers for her?”
“Exactly. The vase had wild flowers in it, but they had wilted, so Dorothea and I put fresh ones
there.”
“Whoever the child is, she can hardly have been anyone important, or the portrait would not
have been abandoned up here,” Madge said briskly. “Well now, what are we to do with you, Bella? I
can see the attraction in this room, but I can’t be happy about you being up here on your own,
especially now that Miss Crabtree has gone.”
“Being alone does not trouble me, Aunt.”
“Well, it should do. It is not natural to be so solitary. Besides that, those Frenchies are just down
in those end rooms, and that is not something that your pa would like, not with that boy of theirs living
here with them and maybe tempted to wander about at night, as boys of seventeen are apt to do when
there are girls nearby. I knew no good would come of engaging foreigners, and now look where we
are — instead of a cook, who could have stayed in the basement where he belongs, we have his wife,
too, and now the son and who knows how many more there might be? And there they are, living cheek
by jowl with the family! I don’t know what the world is coming to, truly.”
Bella laughed and wrapped her arm around Madge’s, giving it a squeeze. “Poor Aunt Madge!
What a great trial we all are to you. But there is no difficulty. All that is needed is to close off that end
of the attic. The Fauchers would have the three rooms at the southern end, and they could use the
secret stairs to the basement. Then they would not need to come into this part of the attic at all.”
“Hmpf. That would work, I suppose,” Madge said reluctantly. “But your Pa and Mama will
have the final say.”
“Of course,” Bella said, lowering her eyes demurely. But there was a smile of triumph on her
face all the same.
~~~~~
Allie arrived in a train of two post chaises, an elderly travelling coach and a laden luggage wagon,
the sides painted in bright colours ‘Ewbank & Sons, Brewers of Quality Ales, Beers and Stouts since
1674’. Madge had been warned about the luggage wagon, for many of their Sagborough friends had
opted to send their wedding gifts for Julia with Allie, but she had not expected to be greeted with a
brewer’s dray. It was rather a pity Lizzie wasn’t there to see it. Madge smiled inwardly as she
imagined Lizzie’s expression.
Stepping down from the first post chaise, Allie gazed up at the imposing edifice of Chadwell
Park.
“Goodness! It’s huge!” she cried. “Rosie’s sketches did not do it justice, not in the slightest.
Aunt Madge, how lovely to see you again after all this time! And Bella — I swear you have grown
another inch, dear. Ah, and that must be Will’s Eloise.”
Eloise and Mrs Greenwood had waited at the top of the steps while the family reunions went on,
but now they came down to be introduced, and since the children had disembarked, the elder two
running about wildly after their confinement in the coach, there was no hope of formality, or even
sensible conversation.
Apart from the children’s nursemaid, Allie had brought two other servants with her, which
puzzled Madge until she explained. “You asked for a cook for Julia, and a housekeeper if one was to
be found, so here is one of each for you.”
“Mrs Sharwell is Julia’s cook now,” Madge said.
“Oh. But perhaps Eloise would like a cook?”
“We have already installed one from Bath,” Will said. “This one will just have to go back to
Sagborough. Julia will be glad of the housekeeper, however, to run the house, for it needs the hand of
experience to get the place straight.”
Madge bit back the retort that she could have provided the hand of experience if only she had
been allowed. Really, Will was impossible these days!
They had barely moved into the house, and the luggage was still being brought in, scattered
higgledy-piggledy across the tiled floor of the entrance hall, when Patricia Plummer arrived, her
bonnet askew as if donned in haste, and her face aglow.
“Where are they? Oh, there is one! Oh, the little darling. Come to Auntie Patricia, sweetheart.”
 Kneeling down, she opened her arms wide, and without a second’s hesitation, three-year-old
Susan walked straight into them, little Anne not far behind. Picking Anne up, and holding out a hand to
Susan, she smiled at them beatifically. “Come, my angels. Let us go to the nursery and see what we
can find, shall we? Keeble, milk and cakes whenever you can manage it.”
And so saying, she sailed off to the stairs, the nursemaid carrying the baby in her wake, leaving
the assembled company in the hall staring in astonishment.
~~~~~
Dinner that evening was a lively affair, as Will was busy catching up with Eloise’s news, and Allie
was talking across the table to Julia, regaling her with all the Sagborough gossip. Madge said nothing,
keeping her eye on Bella to be sure there was nothing amiss in her behaviour, for with Miss Crabtree
gone, it fell to her to supervise. However, the child behaved with decorum, for once.
Now that Mrs Sharwell had left, the food served was all French, for Madge’s efforts to
encourage some plainer dishes seemed to fall on deaf ears. Every few minutes, Allie stopped
chattering to exclaim, “Whatever is this?” while holding up some unidentifiable and unappealing
object on her fork. Keeble usually stepped in to explain that it was a fricandeau of turtle, or perhaps
braised grouse with cabbage, or spitchcocked eels with anchovy butter. Then she would try it, declare
it to be rather tasty, and resume her conversation. But Madge wondered when any of those dishes had
been agreed with Monsieur Faucher. She had ordered a much plainer dinner, but the man just cooked
whatever he wanted.
Allie was not a person who minced her words, so as soon as the ladies withdrew after dinner,
she began.
“Now then, I hope someone is going to tell me the full story about your hasty departure from
Bath, for not a word of explanation did any of you put in your letters, and I assure you the whole of
Sagborough is rife with speculation. I am certain it must have been a great scandal of some sort, or
you would never have left in that harum-scarum way.”
“No scandal,” Eloise said calmly. “My father arrived, so I left.”
Allie’s jaw dropped open. “Goodness! There must be a big story here.” She waited expectantly.
Eloise smiled. “My father abandoned his family to live abroad for thirteen years. We had no
idea whether he was even alive, and depended entirely on his brother even to put bread on the table.
As soon as my father heard that my mother had died, he married his—” She threw a quick glance at
Bella, watching wide-eyed. “He married again and returned to England.”
“Heavens! But you saw him in London, didn’t you? I believe that was mentioned in one of the
letters. You did not rush away from London.”
“Seeing him at a ball for several hundred people is one thing, for there was no need for me to
acknowledge him at all, and in fact, our paths rarely crossed,” Eloise said. “He moves in a somewhat
different circle from Will and his family, with whom I spent most of my time latterly. But to meet him
in the Pump Room at Bath, as we assuredly would have done eventually, would be a very different
case. And my sister welcomed his presence, which was decidedly awkward. So Will kindly brought
me here, and now we shall be married in the church here by James Plummer, and I find myself not
regretting Bath at all.”
“Then he is not to give you away in church?”
“No, indeed! He has forfeited all right to such a privilege. I hope that one or other of my
brothers will give my hand to Will, but if not, Mr Fletcher will do very well. You are very lucky, all
of you, to have a father you can be proud of. I wish mine were less of a snake, but at least I shall have
a father-in-law to be proud of.”
“He is the best father in the world,” Allie said, “unless anyone wants to do something he
disapproves of, and then he is the worst. He still refuses to help us get our own house.”
“You have the Fullers Road house, and a lovely big place it is, too,” Madge said, impatient with
such a tired old argument. “You’re never satisfied, Allie.”
“It may be big, and certainly we have more room now than when we were squashed in with
Jack’s family, but we still have to share with Ted and Cathy, and I am so tired of living in someone
else’s house, Aunt Madge. I want my own house.”
“I think that is very natural,” Eloise said, “but for my part, I should be happy to marry Will the
sooner, even if it meant sharing. Waiting until everything is perfect would be too trying. But that is
easy for me to say when I have a house already.”
Allie’s face softened. “Yes, I couldn’t have borne it if we’d been forced to wait. But Jack’s
parents made room for us, somehow, and we squeezed in, and they were so happy when Susan came
along. I hardly had a chance to hold my own baby! Everyone has been very kind, and now that we
share with Ted and Cathy, I have no complaint to make of them, none at all. Still, I can’t see why Pa
should have made it over to Ted. We are there on sufferance, and I think I have just as much right to it.
But since it is theirs, Cathy deserves to have her house to herself, without Jack and me and our three
bairns cluttering up the place. Every woman wants an establishment of her own.”
“I am sure Jack will soon have enough saved to buy you a place of your own,” Madge said
soothingly.
“He will eventually, and he has his eye on one of those lovely new houses in St Ethelreda’s
Square,” she said, with a sigh. “That would be perfect. But there are places we could rent until then.
The Crastons’ house in Harlington Terrace is empty now, and that would suit us very well. Fully
furnished, and Lady Craston has such exquisite taste, everybody says so. Emmy Malpas has dined
there, and she said it is beautiful inside, and such an excellent location.”
“Could you afford to rent?” Madge said. “A house like that would be expensive and think of the
extra servants and the amount of coal you would need! If Jack has to pay rent and extra wages, he will
have less to save for that house in St Ethelreda’s.”
“Yes, but Pa could afford it easily,” Allie said, lifting her chin a little. “Look at all the money he
must have laid out to buy this place, and heaven knows what London cost, and then renting the house
in Bath — the Royal Crescent, if you please! And now he has bought Orchard House for Will, and I
do not begrudge a penny of that, but if he has money to burn, he could spend just a little on my
comfort, too, it seems to me.”
Madge sighed. Allie was such a trying girl, and the long weeks of her visit stretched endlessly
before them.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 Cost of maintenance.

See (in this volume)

GERMANY: A. D. 1899 (JUNE).

KIEL:
Opening of the Baltic Canal.

See (in this volume)

GERMANY: A. D. 1895 (JUNE).

KIENNING, Anti-missionary riot at.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1899.

KIMBERLEY, Siege of.

See (in this volume)

SOUTH AFRICA (THE FIELD OF WAR):
A. D. 1899 (OCTOBER-NOVEMBER); (OCTOBER-DECEMBER);
and 1900 (JANUARY-FEBRUARY).

KINGSHIP BY DIVINE RIGHT:

German revival of the doctrine.

See (in this volume)

GERMANY: A. D. 1894-1899.

KIS, The city of.

See (in this volume)

ARCHÆOLOGICAL RESEARCH: BABYLONIA: AMERICAN
EXPLORATION.

KITCHENER, Major-General Sir Herbert (afterwards Lord):

Sirdar of the Egyptian army.
 Expedition to Dongola.

See (in this volume)

EGYPT: A. D. 1885-1896.

KITCHENER, Major-General Sir Herbert (afterwards Lord):

Final campaigns against the Dervishes.

See (in this volume)

EGYPT: A. D. 1897-1898.

KITCHENER, Major-General Sir Herbert (afterwards Lord):

Dealing with the French expedition at Fashoda.

See (in this volume)

EGYPT: A. D. 1898 (SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER).

KITCHENER, Major-General Sir Herbert (afterwards Lord):

In the South African War.

See (in this volume)

SOUTH AFRICA (THE FIELD OF WAR):
A. D. 1900 (JANUARY-FEBRUARY), and after.

KLONDIKE GOLD FIELDS, The.

"Many years ago gold was known to exist on the Yukon. The
Hudson Bay Company's men tested the bars of the main river,
and found 'the color,' but not in sufficient quantity to
warrant working. The reason is, that, in the disintegration of
the rocks by the smaller streams and the action of frost and
melting snow, the metallic burden of the waters is dropped in
the causeway of the smaller tributaries; only the finest float
gold and the lighter sand and gravel being carried as far as the
Yukon itself. In 1880, after years of fruitless search on the
main stream, a body of prospectors under the protection of
Captain (now Admiral) Beardsley, United States Navy, landed at
 the head of Lynn Canal, crossed the divide, and proceeded to
explore the head-waters. Not much being found at first in
Canadian territory, the prospectors descended the river to the
region near the lower end of the Upper Ramparts. In this
region lies the boundary, formed by the one hundred and
forty-first degree of west longitude from Greenwich. Here the
Yukon receives from the southwest a tributary called
Forty-Mile Creek. A few miles of the lower part of this creek,
including its mouth, are on the Canadian side of the line: the
head-waters—on which the gold is chiefly found—are, for the
most part, on the American side. In this vicinity the first
substantial deposits were discovered, many of which are still
worked. …

"The site of the new diggings—which have produced an

excitement recalling the 'Fraser River rush' of 1857—is on a
stream tributary to the Yukon from the northeast, wholly in
Canadian territory, and entering the main river about fifty
miles eastward from the boundary. Here a mining camp, called
Dawson City,—after the head of the Dominion Geological
Survey,—has been established. … The stream above referred to
has been named the Klondyke,—signifying 'reindeer': on some of
the older maps it is designated Reindeer River. It is said
however that the name should really be Throndak,—a Tinneh term
meaning 'plenty of fish.' The existence of gold on this stream
and its branches appears to have been first made known by
Indians. One of the first prospectors to locate upon it with
success was J. A. Carmich, who staked out his claim in August,
1896, and with two helpers, in a few weeks, washed out over
$14,000."

W. H. Dall,
Alaska and the New Gold-Field
(Forum, September, 1897).

KNIGHTHOOD: Victorian Order.

 See (in this volume)
VICTORIAN ORDER.

KNOSSOS, Archæological excavations at.

See (in this volume)

ARCHÆOLOGICAL RESEARCH: CRETE.

KOKANG: Cession to Great Britain.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1897 (MAY-JUNE).

KOREA: A. D. 1895-1898.
Nominal independence of Korea.
Japanese influence supplanted by Russian.

On the 7th of January, 1893, the independence of Korea (see,

in this volume, CHINA: A. D. 1894-1895) was formally
proclaimed at Seoul. For a time, Japanese influence
prevailed, and the party favorable to it controlled affairs.
But Russian jealousy gave encouragement to the opposing
faction, headed by the queen, and the latter succeeded at
length in thwarting most of the aims of the Japanese. The
result was a revolutionary conspiracy in October, carried out
by a murderous band which broke into the palace and killed
three women, one of whom was supposed to be the queen. The
assassins were dressed in Japanese costume, and were said to
belong to the "soshi," or hireling cutthroats, of that
country; but the Japanese government indignantly repudiated
the crime, recalled and arrested its Minister, who was
suspected of complicity, and forbade its subjects to enter
Korea without special permission. Russian influence,
nevertheless, became dominant soon after; the king yielded to
it completely, and obtained riddance of opposing ministers
with Russian support. In the end, Russia and Japan came to an
agreement, nominally establishing a joint protectorate over
 Korea; but practically the Japanese seemed to be fairly
shouldered out.

{289}

In the later part of 1897, the Russian Minister to Korea

brought about the dismissal of an English official, Mr. Brown,
who had been the financial adviser of the Korean government
and its commissioner of customs, putting a Russian in his
place, and secured a written agreement that none but Russians
or Koreans should fill that important post in future. The
vigorous remonstrance of the British government, however,
caused this action to be reversed.

Russia and Japan came to a new understanding in 1898, more

favorable to the interests of the latter in Korea. This was
embodied in a protocol, signed at Tokyo on the 25th of April,
1898, in terms as follows:

"I. That the Governments of Japan and Russia, recognizing the

sovereignty and complete independence of Korea, shall in no
way directly interfere with the domestic government of that
country.

II. That in order to avoid misunderstandings in the future,

whenever either Japan or Russia is applied to by Korea for
advice or assistance, neither contracting party shall take any
steps toward the appointment of military instructors or
financial advisers without previous consultation with the
other.

III. That Russia, recognizing the great progress made in

commercial and industrial enterprises by Japan in Korea, and
the great number of Japanese subjects residing in the
settlements, will do nothing to injure the development of the
commercial and industrial relations between Japan and Korea."
 United States Consular Reports,
August, 1898, page 591.

A reform party had begun to manifest influence at this time,

even aspiring to representative institutions in the
government. Various progressive measures were undertaken in
1898; the gold monetary standard was adopted; American
engineers were engaged to plan roads, bridges, etc., and new
ports were opened.

KOREA: A. D. 1900.
Strategic importance of Korea to Russia and Japan.
Japanese jealousy of Russian encroachments in
Manchuria and its grounds.

"Considerable as are the material interests which Japan is

building up in Korea, it is still from the strategical point
of view that she is most deeply concerned with the future of
the Korean peninsula, which, in the hands of a great military
Power like Russia, would be a permanent threat to her safety.
And the Japanese appear to be firmly convinced that, when
once Russia is firmly seated in Northern China, she must
inevitably seek to absorb Korea. In any other hands but her
own the Korean peninsula would always be a wedge
inconveniently driven in between her older acquisitions on
the Pacific seaboard and her more recent acquisitions in the
Gulf of Chi-li, nor could she regard her strategical position
in the Far East as thoroughly secured so long as she did not
command one shore of the straits through which lies the
natural waterway between her two naval bases at Vladivostok
and at Port Arthur. … Port Arthur is situated practically on
an inland sea to which the approaches can be dominated not
only by positions already in the hands of other European
Powers, such as Wei-hai-wei and Kiaochau, but by the Korean
peninsula and islands as well as by the Japanese archipelago,
from Tsushima down to Formosa. With Port Arthur as her main
base Russia's position as a naval Power in the Far East would
 be subject to natural limitations not altogether unlike those
which hamper her in the Black Sea and the Baltic.

"Considered in this light the question of Russian

aggrandisement in Northern China is so closely interwoven with
that of the future of Korea that it must necessarily wear a
much more serious aspect for Japan than for any other Power
—so serious, indeed, that not a few Japanese deem the time to
be close at hand when Japan should retort upon Russia in
precisely the same terms which the latter used in 1895 and
demand the evacuation of territories where her presence must
be a permanent threat to the independence of the Chinese
Empire and the peace of the Far East."

London Times,
Tokio Correspondence, December 27, 1900.

KOTZE, Chief-Justice:
Conflict with President Kruger of the Transvaal.

See (in this volume)

SOUTH AFRICA (THE TRANSVAAL): A. D. 1897 (JANUARY-
MARCH);
and 1898 (JANUARY-FEBRUARY).

KROONSTAD:
Temporary seat of Orange Free State government.

See (in this volume)

SOUTH AFRICA (THE FIELD OF WAR): A. D. 1900 (MARCH-
MAY).

KRUGER: President Stephanus Johannes Paulus.

See (in this volume)

SOUTH AFRICA (THE TRANSVAAL): A. D. 1885-1890, and after.
KUANG HSU, Emperor of China.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1898 (JUNE-SEPTEMBER), and after.

KUMASSI, or COOMASSIE:
Occupation by the British.
Siege and relief.

See (in this volume)

ASHANTI.

KURAM, The:
Inclusion in a new British Indian province.

See (in this volume)

INDIA: A. D. 1901 (FEBRUARY).

KURRAM VALLEY, British-Indian war with tribes in the.

See (in this volume)

INDIA: A. D. 1897-1898.

KWANGCHOW WAN, Lease of, to France.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1898 (APRIL-AUGUST).

KWANG-SI, Rebellion in.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1898 (APRIL-JULY).

{290}

L.
LABOR COLONIES: In Australia.

See (in this volume)

AUSTRALIA; RECENT EXTENSIONS OF DEMOCRACY.

LABOR CONFLICTS.

See (in this volume)

INDUSTRIAL DISTURBANCES.

LABOR LEGISLATION:
Compulsory insurance in Germany.

See (in this volume)

GERMANY: A. D. 1897-1900.

LABOR LEGISLATION:
Eight-hours day in Utah.

See (in this volume)

UTAH: A. D. 1895-1896.

LABOR LEGISLATION:
New Zealand Labor Laws.

See (in this volume))

NEW ZEALAND: A. D. 1891-1900.

LABOR LEGISLATION:
Workmen's Compensation Act in Great Britain.

See (in this volume)

ENGLAND: A. D. 1897 (MAY-JULY).

LABOR LEGISLATION:
The United States Industrial Commission.
 See (in this volume)
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (JUNE).

LABRADOR, Recent exploration of.

See (in this volume)

POLAR EXPLORATION, 1893-1900, 1896.

LABYRINTH, The Cretan:

Its supposed discovery.

See (in this volume)

ARCHÆOLOGICAL RESEARCH: CRETE.

LADRONE ISLANDS:
Sale by Spain to Germany.

See (in this volume)

CAROLINE AND MARIANNE ISLANDS.

LADYSMITH, Siege of.

See (in this volume)

SOUTH AFRICA (THE FIELD OF WAR):
A. D. 1899 (OCTOBER-DECEMBER);
and 1900 (JANUARY-FEBRUARY).

LAGAS, The ancient city of.

See (in this volume)

ARCHÆOLOGICAL RESEARCH; BABYLONIA: AMERICAN
EXPLORATION.

LAGOS.

See (in this volume)

NIGERIA: A. D. 1899.
LA GUASIMA, Battle at.

See (in this volume)

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (JUNE-JULY).

LAKE SUPERIOR CONSOLIDATED IRON MINES:

In the United States Steel Corporation.

See (in this volume)

TRUSTS: UNITED STATES: THE CLIMAX.

LAND BILL, Irish (1896).

See (in this volume)

IRELAND: A. D. 1896.

LAND SYSTEM, The New Zealand.

See (in this volume)

NEW ZEALAND; A. D. 1891-1900.

LAND TAXATION:
In Australia and New Zealand.

See (in this volume)

AUSTRALIA: RECENT EXTENSIONS OF DEMOCRACY.

LANDLORDS, Irish, New League against.

See (in this volume)

IRELAND: A. D. 1900-1901.

LATTIMER,
Conflict of striking coal miners with sheriffs' deputies at.

See (in this volume)

 INDUSTRIAL DISTURBANCES: A. D. 1897.

LAURIER, Sir Wilfrid:

Prime Minister of Canada.

See (in this volume)

CANADA: A. D. 1890-1896, and after.

LAWS OF WAR.

See (in this volume)

PEACE CONFERENCE.

LAWTON, General Henry W.:

Command at Santiago de Cuba.

See (in this volume)

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1898 (JULY-AUGUST:
CUBA).

LAWTON, General Henry W.:

Military operations in the Philippine Islands.

See (in this volume)

PHILIPPINE ISLANDS: A. D. 1899 (JANUARY-NOVEMBER).

LAWTON, General Henry W.:

Death.

See (in this volume) PHILIPPINE ISLANDS: A. D. 1899-1900.

LECHER, Dr.:
Twelve-hours speech.

See (in this volume)

AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: A. D. 1897 (OCTOBER-DECEMBER).
LEE, General Fitzhugh:
U. S. Consul-General at Havana.

See (in this volume)

CUBA: A. D. 1897-1898 (NOVEMBER-FEBRUARY);
and (DECEMBER-MARCH).

LEE, General Fitzhugh:

Command at Havana.
Report.

See (in this volume)

CUBA: A. D. 1898-1899 (DECEMBER-OCTOBER).

LEICHAU PENINSULA, Leases in, to France.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1898 (APRIL-AuGUST).

LEO XIII., Pope,

See PAPACY.

LÈSE MAJESTÉ.

A hurt to Majesty.
Any offense or crime against the sovereign.
For lèse majesté in Germany,

See (in this volume)

GERMANY: A. D. 1898; and 1900 (OCTOBER).

LEX FALKENHAYN, The.

See (in this volume)

AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: A. D. 1897 (OCTOBER-DECEMBER).
LEX HEINZE, The.

See (in this volume)

GERMANY: A. D. 1900 (MAY).

LEXOW INVESTIGATION, The.

See (in this volume)

NEW YORK CITY; A. D. 1894-1895.

LIAOTUNG PORTS: A. D. 1895.

Russo-Chinese Treaty relating to.

See (in this volume)

CHINA: A. D. 1895.

See, also, references from PORT ARTHUR;

TALIENWAN; and FÊNG-TIEN PENINSULA.

LIBRARIES, The gifts of Mr. Andrew Carnegie to.

Of neither the manifold items nor the stupendous total of the

gifts made by Mr. Andrew Carnegie for the founding or for the
assistance of public libraries in America and Great Britain is
there any authentic account; but a tentative record of them,
compiled mainly from the news columns of the "Library
Journal," and published, on the 17th of March, 1901, in the
"Buffalo Illustrated Express," is probably not far from
correct. It begins in 1881, with the founding of a public
library at Dunfermline, Scotland, the birthplace of Mr.
Carnegie, who then gave for it $40,000. Two years later, he is
said to have given $50,000 to a library at Inverness. In 1885
the New York Free Circulating Libraries were helped by him to
the extent of $5,000. In the following year his benefactions
were raised to their larger scale by his gift of $250,000 to
the Free Public Library of Edinburgh; besides which he gave
$28,000 to the Workmen's Library of the Keystone Bridge Works,
 and smaller donations elsewhere. In 1889 he founded the
Carnegie Library at Braddock, Pennsylvania, at a cost of
$300,000.
{291}
In 1890 he contributed $325,000 to the founding of the
Carnegie Free Public Library at Allegheny, Pennsylvania, which
the city undertook to support; he replaced the Cambria
Library, which the great flood at Johnstown had destroyed,
expending $65,000 in that kindly work; gave $40,000 to a
library at Fairfield, Iowa, and $9,000 to another at Augusta,
Maine. Five thousand dollars to a library in Airdrie, $50,000
to one in Ayr, and $2,500 to a third at Jedburgh, all three in
Scotland, are the gifts recorded in 1893 and 1894.

In 1895 Mr. Carnegie seemed to be crowning his munificence by

the creation, at Pittsburg, of the great institution,
combining library, art gallery, and museum, on which, between
that year and 1899 he is said to have expended no less than
$3,860,000. In the same year he founded a small library at
Wick, in Scotland. In 1897 the donations appear to have been
small. In 1898 Dumfries, in Scotland, received for a public
library $50,000 from his open purse, and $250,000 went from it
to the creation of the Carnegie Library at Homestead,
Pennsylvania, the seat of the Carnegie works.

Hitherto the stream of Mr. Carnegie's bounty to public

libraries had been a rivulet: it now, in 1899, began to pour
like the fertilizing flood of the Nile, and that first
twelvemonth of the amazing tide was celebrated by American
librarians, at the annual meeting of their Association, as
"the Carnegie year." In reality, it but opened a series of
"Carnegie years," which have filled the period since, and may
still go on. As compiled by the "Express," supplemented by a
later record in the "Library Journal" for April, 1901, the
list of the library gifts and offers of Mr. Carnegie, from the
beginning of 1899 until March, 1901, includes $5,200,000,
tendered to the city of New York for branches to its Public
 Library (see below); $1,000,000 tendered to St. Louis;
$350,000 to the city of Washington; $260,000 to Syracuse;
$125,000 each to Atlanta and Louisville; $100,000, or $150,000
(there seems to be uncertainty as to the sum) to Seattle;
$100,000 each to Richmond, Conneaut, Grand Rapids, Ottawa,
Ont., and the State College in Pennsylvania; $75,000 each to
Lincoln, Nebraska, Springfield, Illinois, Davenport, Iowa,
Tacoma, Washington, and the Bellevue Medical College, New
York; $50,000 each to San Diego, Oakland, Duluth Sedalia, East
Liverpool, Ohio, Steubenville, Sandusky, Connellsville,
McKeesport, Beaver, Beaver Falls, Tyrone, Pennsylvania,
Clarion, Oil City, Fort Worth, Dallas, Cheyenne, Dubuque,
Ottumwa, Emporia College, East Orange, York, Coal Center and
Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, Chattanooga, Houston, San Antonio,
Vancouver, British Columbia., Aurora, Illinois, Lewiston,
Maine, Niagara Falls, Yonkers, Canton, Ohio, Montgomery,
Alabama, Marion, Indiana, Galesburg, Illinois, Schenectady,
New York, and Hawick, Scotland; besides a great number of
lesser sums, ranging from a few hundred dollars to $40,000.
The total of the library gifts and proffers of Mr. Carnegie,
from the beginning to March, 1900, is thought to exceed
$23,000,000.

To many other educational institutions Mr. Carnegie has been

munificently generous, giving, for example, $500,000 for the
Manual Training School of Cooper Institute, New York; $250,000
to Birmingham University; $50,000 to the engineering
laboratory of Stevens Institute, Hoboken; $50,000 to the
Edinburgh Technical School, and making other gifts of like
kind.

LIBRARY,
New York Public, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations.
Andrew Carnegie's offered gift.

"The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden

Foundations, was formed by the consolidation, on the 23d of
May, 1895, of the three corporations, 'The Trustees of the
Astor Library,' originally incorporated January 18, 1849, 'The
Trustees of the Lenox Library,' originally incorporated
January 20, 1870, and 'The Tilden Trust,' originally
incorporated March 26, 1887. … In the agreement for
consolidation it was provided that the name of the new
corporation should be 'The New York Public Library, Astor,
Lenox and Tilden Foundations'; that the number of its trustees
should be twenty-one, to be selected from the thirty-three
members of the separate boards; and that 'the said new
corporation shall establish and maintain a free public library
and reading room in the city of New York, with such branches
as may be deemed advisable, and shall continue and promote the
several objects and purposes set forth in the respective acts
of incorporation of 'The Trustees of the Astor Library,' 'The
Trustees of the Lenox Library,' and the 'Tilden Trust.' … In
December, Dr. John Shaw Billings, United States Army
(retired), was chosen Director, but he did not enter fully
upon his duties until June, 1896. …

"At the time of the consolidation the Astor library owned its
site and buildings, had an endowment fund of about $941,000,
producing an annual income of about $47,000, and contained
267,147 volumes. The Lenox library owned its site and
building, had an endowment fund of $505,500, producing an
annual income of $20,500, and contained about 86,000 volumes.
The Tilden Trust possessed Mr. Tilden's private library,
containing about 20,000 volumes, and an endowment fund
estimated at $2,000,000, making the total number of volumes in
the New York Public Library 373,147, and the total endowment
fund about $3,446,500. … The joint libraries now contain about
500,000 volumes and 175,000 pamphlets."

Immediately upon the completion of the consolidation of the

three libraries, the city of New York was asked to provide a
suitable building for the great institution contemplated, and
the ground covered by the old reservoir, on Fifth Avenue,
 between Fortieth and Forty-second Streets, was suggested as an
advantageous site. "The result of this appeal, which met with
cordial public support, was that an act was passed by the
legislature and approved May 19, 1897, giving the necessary
authority to the city to issue bonds for the construction of a
library building, the result of which was that on November 10,
1897, the plans prepared by Messrs. Carrère & Hastings, of New
York City, were selected and approved, and were laid before
the Board of Estimate and Apportionment of the City of New
York on December 1, 1897. These plans were approved by the
Board of Estimate and on December 8 a contract was entered
into between the City of New York and the New York Public
Library, by which the library building to be erected upon
Bryant Park was leased to the New York Public Library. … The
sketch plans provide for a building about 350 feet in length
and about 250 feet in width from east to west, giving shelving
for about 1,500,000 volumes and seating capacity for about 800
readers in the main reading room. …

{292}

"Plans and specifications for the removal of the Forty-second

Street reservoir and laying the foundations for the new
building having been approved the contract for this work was
awarded to Mr. Eugene Lentilhon, and the work of removing was
begun on June 6th, 1899."

Handbook to the New York Public Library, 1900.

In October, 1900, it was stated in the newspapers of the city

that Mayor Van Wyck, Controller Coler, and the other members
of the Board of Estimate had come to an understanding
regarding the consolidation of all the libraries of the
Greater New York under the New York Public Library. "It was
announced officially that all the smaller libraries would be
allowed about the same amount of money for maintenance this
year as was allowed last year. A practical plan of
 consolidation will be perfected, and when the matter comes up
before the Board of Estimate next year it was agreed that the
libraries would be put under one head. … It is proposed to
spend $5,000,000 on the New York Public Library now in course
of erection in Bryant Park on the site of the old reservoir.
It will be four years before the building can be completed.
Controller Coler's idea is to gradually merge the smaller
libraries so that when the new building is completed New York
will have the largest and best equipped library for sending
out books of any city in the world."

On the 12th of March, 1901, Mr. Andrew Carnegie addressed the

following letter to Dr. Billings, the Director of the New York
Public Library, making a proposal of unparalleled munificence:
"Dear Dr. Billings: Our conferences upon the needs of greater New
York for branch libraries to reach the masses of the people in
every district have convinced me of the wisdom of your plans.
Sixty-five branches strike one at first as a very large order,
but as other cities have found one necessary for every sixty
thousand or seventy thousand of population, the number is not
excessive. You estimate the average cost of these libraries
at, say, $80,000 each, being $5,200,000 for all. If New York
will furnish sites for these branches for the special benefit
of the masses of the people, as it has done for the central
library, and also agree in satisfactory form to provide for
their maintenance as built, I should esteem it a rare
privilege to be permitted to furnish the money as needed for
the buildings, say, $5,200,000. Sixty-five libraries at one
stroke probably breaks the record, but this is the day of big
operations, and New York is soon to be the biggest of cities.
Very truly yours, ANDREW CARNEGIE."

In communicating this extraordinary proposal to the New York

Public Library Board, Dr. Billings made the following
statement of the plan contemplated in the suggestions he had
made:
 "In the conferences referred to by Mr. Carnegie the
suggestions which I have made have related mainly to a free
public library system for the boroughs of Manhattan and The
Bronx. I have stated that such a system should include the
great central reference library in Forty-second street and
Fifth avenue, about forty branch libraries for circulation,
small distributing centres in those public school buildings
which are adapted to such purpose, and a large travelling
library system operated from the central building. Each of the
branch libraries should contain reading rooms for from 50 to 100
adults and for from 75 to 125 children, and in these reading
rooms should be about 500 volumes of encyclopædias,
dictionaries, atlases and large and important reference books.
There should be ample telephone and delivery arrangements between
the branches and the central library.

"To establish this system would require at least five years.

The average cost of the branch libraries I estimated at from
$75,000 to $125,000, including sites and equipment. The cost
of maintaining the system when completed I estimated at
$500,000 a year. The circulation of books for home use alone
in these boroughs should amount to more than 5,000,000 of
volumes a year, and there should be at least 500,000 volumes
in the circulation department, with additions of new books and
to replace worn out books of at least 40,000 a year.

"With regard to the other boroughs of greater New York I have

made no special plans or estimates, but have said that about
twenty-five libraries would be required for them."

LIBRARY, The Temple, of ancient Nippur.

See (in this vol.)

ARCHÆOLOGICAL RESEARCH: BABYLONIA: AMERICAN
EXPLORATION.

LIBRARY, The U. S. House of Representatives: