C. N. Williamson & A. N. Williamson: 30+ Murder Mysteries & Adventure Novels (Illustrated). Charles Norris Williamson
"The truth is, I have to go to the house on a disagreeable errand. I volunteered to do it for a friend, and I've forgotten the number. I've to break some bad news to one of the housemaids."
"Not Miss Jessie Adams, I hope!" protested the young man, blushing up to the roots of his light hair.
"Yes, it is poor Jessie," said the old woman. "You know her?"
"We've been walking out together the last six months. I suppose her father's took bad again, or--or worse?"
"He's living--or was when I left; but----" and the old-fashioned bonnet with the veil shook ominously. "Well, I must go and do my duty. I hope she'll be able to get home for a week or so."
A few minutes later, Joan, delighted with her disguise and the detective skill she was developing, rang the servants' bell at the Borrowdailes'. She had learned what she had hoped to learn, the name of one of the maids, and she had also learned something more--the fact that Jessie Adams had a father whose state of health would afford an excuse for absence; and the existence of a lover, who would probably urge immediate marriage if there were enough money on either side.
The old countrywoman with the brown veil was voluble to the footman who opened the door. She explained that she had news from home for Jessie Adams, and was shown into a servant's sitting-room, where presently appeared a fresh-looking girl with languishing eyes, and a full, weak mouth.
"Oh, I thought perhaps it would be Aunt Emmy!" exclaimed the young person in cap and apron.
"No, I'm not Aunt Emmy, but you may take it I'm a friend," replied the old woman. "Don't be frightened. Your father ain't so very bad, but your folks would be glad to have you at home if you could manage it. And, look here, my gell, here's good news for you. You may make a tidy bit of money by going, if you can get off at once--this very night. How much must you and that nice young man of yours put by before you can marry?"
"We can't marry till he sets up in business for himself, and it will take a hundred pounds at least," said the girl. "We've each got about ten pounds saved towards it. But what's ten pounds?"
"Added on to ninety it makes a hundred, and you can earn that by lending your place here for one fortnight to a niece of mine, who wants to be a journalist and write what the doings inside a smart house are like. She'd name no names, so you'd never be given away. All you'd have to do would be to tell the housekeeper your father was took bad, and would she let you go if you'd bring your cousin Maria in your stead--a clever, experienced girl, with the best references from Lord Northmuir's house?"
"My goodness me, you take my breath away!" gasped Jessie Adams. "How do I know but your niece is a thief who'd steal her Ladyship's jewels?"
"You don't know, except that I say she isn't. But, anyhow, what does it matter to you? You don't need to come back or ever be in service again. Here's the ninety pounds in gold, my dear. You can bite every piece, if you wish; and you've but to do what I say to get them before you walk out of this house. You settle matters with the housekeeper, and I'll have my niece call on her within the hour."
The girl with the languishing eyes and the weak mouth had her price, like many of her betters, and it happened to be exactly ninety pounds. Joan had brought a hundred, and considered that she had made a bargain. Jessie consented to speak to the housekeeper, and the countrywoman departed. By this time it was dusk. She took a four-wheeler and drove to the gates of the Park. In a dark and lonely spot the outer disguise was whisked off, and the paint wiped from her face. Underneath her shawl she wore a neat black dress, suitable for a housemaid in search of a situation. This, too, Joan had thoughtfully obtained at Clarkson's, whence her pale blue cloth had been despatched by messenger to Woburn Place. The bonnet was quickly shaped into a hat; the stuffing which had plumped out the thin, girlish form was wrapped in the shawl which had concealed it, and hidden under a bush. Joan's own hair was combed primly back from her forehead, and strained so tightly at the sides as to change the expression of her face completely. "Cousin Maria" was as different from Miss Joan Carthew as a mouse is from a bird of Paradise.
Cream could not be more velvety soft than Joan's voice, the eye of a dove more mild than hers, as she conversed with Lady Henry Borrowdaile's housekeeper. And she was armed with a magnificent reference. There had been a Maria Jordan at Lord Northmuir's, as housemaid, in Joan's day there, but the real Maria had gone to America, and it was safe and simple to write in praise of this young person's character and accomplishments, signing the document Mercy Milton. At worst, even if Lady Henry's housekeeper sent the reference to Lord Northmuir's housekeeper, the imposition could not be proved. Maria might have had time to come back from America, and Miss Milton, now departed, might have consented to please the housemaid by giving her a written recommendation.
But Maria Jordan's manner as an applicant to fill her cousin's place was so respectful and respectable, and the need to decide was so pressing, that Lady Henry's housekeeper resolved to accept Jordan, so to speak, on face value. That same night Jessie Adams went home (or somewhere else), and her cousin stepped into the vacant niche.
Meanwhile, Joan had, on the plea of picking up her luggage, driven to one or two cheap shops in the Tottenham Court Road, and provided herself with a tin box and a suitable outfit for a superior housemaid. She was thankful to find that she would have a room to herself, and delighted to discover that Jessie Adams and Mathilde, Lady Henry's own maid, had been on terms of friendship. Their rooms adjoined; Jessie had been teaching Mathilde English in odd moments, and Mathilde had often obligingly carried messages to the enamoured greengrocer.
Joan lost not a moment in winning her way into Mathilde's good graces, wasting the less time because she had already made preparations with a view to such an end. She had bought a large box of delicious sweets, which she pretended her own "young man" had given her, and this she placed at the French girl's disposal. It happened that Lady Henry was dining out and going to the theatre afterwards that night, and Mathilde, being free, visited Maria easily in her room, where she sat on the bed, swinging her well-shod feet and eating cream chocolates. Maria, in the course of conversation, chanced to mention that her "young man" was the partner of a French hairdresser in Knightsbridge; that the two were intimate friends; that the hairdresser was young, singularly handsome, well-to-do, and looking out for a Parisienne as a wife. This Admirable Crichton was in France at present, on business, Maria added, but he would return in the course of a fortnight, when Maria's "young man" should effect an introduction, as she was sure that Monsieur Jacques would fall in love at first sight with Mathilde.
Mathilde pretended indifference, but she thought Maria the nicest girl she had met in England, far more chic than Jessie; and when she heard that her new friend longed to be a lady's maid, she offered to coach her in the art. Maria was gushingly grateful, for though she had (she said) already acted as maid to one or two ladies, they had not been "swells" like Lady Henry, and lessons from Mathilde would be of inestimable value.
"I suppose," she went on coaxingly, "that if I showed you I could do hair nicely, and understood what was wanted of a lady's maid, you wouldn't be took ill, and give me a chance to try my hand on Lady Henry? Practice on her Ladyship would be worth a lot of lessons, wouldn't it? My goodness! I'd give all my savings for such a chance in a house like this! Think of the help it would be to me afterwards to say I'd been understudy, as you might call it, to a real expert like Mathilde, Lady Henry Borrowdaile's own maid, and given great satisfaction in the part! It might mean a good place for me. I ain't jokin', mademoiselle. I've got twenty-five sovereigns saved up, and if you'll have neuralgia so bad you can't lift your head from the pillow for three or four days, those twenty-five sovereigns are yours."
"Mais, for me to have ze neuralgia, it do not make that milady take you for my place," said the laughing Mathilde.
"No, but leave that to me. You shall have the money just the same."
"All right," said Mathilde, giggling, scarce believing that her friend was in earnest. "I have ze neuralgia demain--to-morrow."
Joan sprang up and went to the new tin box. She bent over it for a moment, with her back to Mathilde; then she turned, with a stocking in her hand--a stocking fat in the foot, and tied round the ankle with a bit of ribbon. "Count what's there," she exclaimed, emptying the stocking in Mathilde's lap.