Page 4 of Death at the Dower House
I was honestly surprised we hadn’t heard the roar of the Hispano-Suiza’s engine already.
“He’s probably waiting for it to be time to go pick up the Peckhams,” Christopher said.
“All the more reason to force some food into him before he leaves again. He looks ill.”
“You’d look—” Christopher began, and then shook his head. “Sorry, Pippa.”
“Think nothing of it. You’re right. If I had lost my mother under the circumstances he lost his—” instead of to the influenza epidemic that had ravaged the Continent seven years ago, “I’m sure I’d look terrible, too.”
I hadn’t seen my mother in five years by that point. I’m sure that made the loss easier to bear. So did the fact that I had a new family around me, to hold me and pet me and make sure I was all right. It didn’t seem as if Crispin had anyone. No siblings, and a father who had never seemed to be very affectionate even when his son was small.
And that didn’t make him my problem, especially as he was someone I didn’t particularly like, who didn’t particularly like me back. But even so—
I turned toward the staircase. “I’m going to wash my hands before we eat. Get him inside, Christopher. I don’t care how you do it. Hit him over the head and drag him into the breakfast room if you have to. If he doesn’t take better care of himself, he’s going to die, too, and that won’t help anyone in the slightest.”
Except perhaps Uncle Herbert, who would be second in line for the title with Crispin out of the way. But that was a horrible thing to think, and would be a worse one to express, especially to Uncle Herbert’s son, so I didn’t mention it.
Christopher nodded. “I’ll get him.”
“I’ll be down by the time the tray arrives,” I said, and headed up the staircase to the lavatory while Christopher went in the other direction, toward the door to the outside and the courtyard.
Two
The Peckham familyarrived in time for tea, and they did not need Crispin’s help in doing so. Instead, they had their own enclosed Crossley saloon car, similar to the touring car the old duke kept for outings, but with a burgundy body instead of shiny black. It was driven by a chauffeur, while Mr. Peckham, Constance’s brother, sat enthroned in the passenger seat in solitary splendor.
I had never met the man, but I had a vague picture of Constance in my head, from the last time I had seen her five years ago, and he looked like an older, male version of the girl I remembered. Soft, brown hair and brown eyes in a pleasantly round, somewhat placid face. He was dressed in the same style of casual newsboy cap Crispin had on earlier, with a similar, belted, sport-back tweed coat. But while Crispin is tallish and trim, young Mr. Peckham was shorter and stout. The emphasis the belt put on his waistline was not as flattering as it had been for St George.
Naturally, I would never say so. Not to St George, and certainly not to Mr. Peckham. Nor did I have the chance. Peckham bounded out of the car and directly to the back seat, where he made a very big deal out of handing a young lady out of the motorcar and onto the gravel of the courtyard with exquisite care.
She wasn’t his sister. And it was difficult to blame him for his enthusiasm, as the lady was stunning.
I have no particular doubts about my own attractiveness, to be fair. Nor do I think I estimate my looks in any way too highly, either. I’m a reasonably attractive young woman of twenty-three, with bobbed, brown hair, a trim figure, and even features. Although St George has been known to call my nose pointy—as in, “Keep your pointy nose out of my affairs, Darling!”—I have it on good authority—Christopher’s—that it is actually more upturned than pointy.
I don’t generally scare any eligible gentlemen off with my looks, in other words. But I know when I’m beaten, and this was someone on a different level of attractiveness than I could ever aspire to be.
Tall and slim, she must have been close to Christopher’s height, and taller than Mr. Peckham, at least in her elegant triple-strap shoes. I would call her build willowy, which means it was perfect for the drop-waist dresses that were popular this decade. (My own figure is also well-suited to the current fashions. I’m not willowy, however, but rather what they call boyish.) The frock she had on was a gorgeous creation of pink and blue crepe de chine that simultaneously managed to play up the blue of her eyes, the pink in her cheeks, and the sunny gold of her hair. I heard simultaneous indrawn breaths on either side of me, and deduced that even Christopher wasn’t immune to such splendor. And it appeared that she had managed to put roses into Crispin’s cheeks, for which I supposed she ought to be commended. Not that I planned to do any commending anytime soon.
“Philippa?”
Unnoticed by any of us, during the time it had taken Mr. Peckham to withdraw the vision of beauty from our side of the motorcar, the chauffeur had extricated his employer as well as Miss Constance Peckham from the other side, and now Constance was standing in front of me, looking nervous.
I smoothed out the cynical expression I was certain was on my face, and dredged up a pleasant, welcoming smile instead. “Constance! It’s lovely to see you, after such a long time!”
I leaned down—she’s quite a bit shorter than me, and decidedly not boyish—and air-kissed both her cheeks. She made smooching noises in return, and we leaned back and assessed one another.
“You look good,” I said, and hoped I managed to keep the surprise out of my voice. It might just have been getting out of the Godolphin uniform that made her look so much better than I remembered. In the younger forms, it was pinafores, but towards the end, the uniform had consisted of shirts and ties, heavy dark stockings, lace-up shoes and boaters, and nobody looks good like that.
Well, let me rephrase the sentiment: the only people who look good like that are the golden goddesses, like the one who was being swept towards the front entrance right now by a combination of Mr. Peckham, who held jealously onto her arm, and Crispin, who was doing his best imitation of the young lord of the manor, welcoming the new guests into his domain.
Christopher, showing more sense than his cousin, had offered Lady Peckham his arm, while Tidwell conversed with the Peckhams’ chauffeur, probably about where to stow the motorcar. Alfred and the first footman, Hugh—the Astleys isn’t the sort of family to rename their footmen James and John—were pulling bags from the boot of the Crossley and dragging them into the house. For a group of people who were only planning to stay two nights, the Peckhams had brought a lot of luggage.
“Who’s the beauty queen?” I asked Constance, since we were perfectly alone by then, and nobody could hear me.
She made a face. “My mother’s ward. A friend’s daughter from the Continent, come to live with us.”
“Really?” I was from the Continent myself, and had lived with the Astleys since 1914, when my mother, Aunt Roz’s sister, sent me away to England for my safety.
Constance nodded. “Her name is Johanna de Vos, from Holland. Her parents were killed in the shelling.”
