On Her Majesty's Frightfully Secret Service (Her Royal Spyness #11)(5)
I sent Kathleen up to retrieve my suitcases and tried to think of a way around this. I could travel without a maid, I supposed. Many modern women did. Even Princess Zou Zou had flitted between here and London with no maid for the first month before she sent for her maid from Eaton Square. The problem was one really needed a maid to assist in dressing and undressing. So many dresses and blouses were made with tiny buttons down the back, impossible to do up alone. And frankly I had little idea of the correct way to clean the various items I wore. I tried to recall how awful Queenie had been. Did I have an exaggerated memory of her disasters? She hadn’t been too bad most of the time. And she had been jolly brave on a couple of occasions, helping to save me from dire predicaments. And she loved going abroad. So did I owe it to her to give her the chance to accompany me to Italy? I realized that it would not be the right thing to sneak away without telling her.
I waited until Kathleen, now rather weepy at the thought of losing me, had reappeared with my bags, then I went downstairs and found Mrs. McCarthy in the kitchen.
“If his lordship comes back, please tell him that I’ve borrowed the estate car for a few moments,” I said. “I’m going to see his great-aunt.”
“I will do that, my lady,” Mrs. McCarthy replied. “So I’m hoping it was good news that you had in all those letters?”
“It was, thank you,” I replied. “It appears I have to return to London immediately to meet the queen.”
“Fancy that.” A look of awe crossed her face. “Never did I think that I’d hear those words spoken in a house where I was working. But then I’m forgetting that you’re related to His Majesty yourself, aren’t you? Mr. Darcy told us about you being so highborn and quite pally with royalty.”
“So you’ll tell Lord Kilhenny, will you?”
“That you’re going to be meeting the Queen of England?” she asked.
“No, that I’m borrowing the estate car. I won’t be long.”
Then I hurried out before she could prolong the conversation.
As I drove through the village I looked at it quite fondly. It was comforting to know I would be back, that Darcy and I would visit his father and share festive occasions with him. At last a place where I would belong and be welcome. If I was ever allowed to marry Darcy, that is. I felt a knot in my stomach when I thought of meeting the queen. I could just imagine her smooth, imperious voice saying, “No, Georgiana, it is quite out of the question. You may not be permitted to marry him and that’s that.”
Maybe I was reading too much into that letter, I told myself. Maybe the queen just wanted to hear from my own lips that I wanted to marry Darcy. I negotiated the steep hill beyond the village and crossed over the little bridge. The stream was running high after so much rain. Then I turned in at the gate leading to Mountjoy, home to Sir Dooley and Lady Whyte, Darcy’s great-uncle and great-aunt. In spite of its name Mountjoy was not on a hillside, nor did it look joyful. It was a large ramshackle building with gables and a turret at one end. Chickens and ducks wandered across the forecourt. A few sheep and a cow looked over the fence from the field to my left. At the sound of the motor a pack of dogs emerged from the front door and jumped around me, barking wildly. As I came to a halt the owner of the house came out. Great-Aunt Oona was a large woman with many chins. She always wore an odd assortment of clothing and today she was wearing a purple silk tea dress with a fringed shawl over it, a flowery apron over that and to finish off the whole outfit gum boots.
“What in the name of goodness is all that row about?” she demanded. Then she saw me and a smile lit up her face.
“Well, aren’t you a treat to behold?” she said. “I was just saying to Dooley last night that we should go over and rescue you, now that Darcy has flown the coop. I expect it’s pretty bloody with just Thaddy there. Has he reverted to his old bad-tempered self?”
“He’s a bit grumpy sometimes,” I admitted. “He’s missing Zou Zou.”
“Well, of course he is. And worried about her, I don’t doubt. A round-the-world air race indeed! And that little contraption she’s flying is little more than paper and string. Still, it’s Thaddy’s own fault. I told him he should make his intentions known. Snap her up before some other man does. But you know him.”
I nodded. “Too proud,” I said. “Doesn’t think he has enough to offer her.”
“Absolutely right. Well, you’d better come inside, hadn’t you?” She led the way, shouting to the dogs, “Out of the way, you great stupid beasts,” and then bellowing, “Dooley, come down here on the double. It’s your favorite young lady come to see you.”
We went through into a sitting room where there was, as usual, nowhere to sit. Every surface was piled high with papers, books, a violin, a basket of eggs, a summer hat and a large tabby cat. Oona lifted the eggs from an armchair and motioned for me to sit.
“You’re in luck,” she said. “That girl of yours baked shortbread this morning. Got a deft hand with baking, I’ll say that for her. She’s a gem, she is. And Treadwell’s getting past it, although he won’t admit it.”
It was astonishing to hear Queenie described as a gem. “Disaster” and “hopeless” were more usual descriptions. It really did seem that she might have found her niche at last.