NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 29

I give up.

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 28

I woke obscenely early next morning, having gone to bed obscenely early and slept like a very tired log; it was the first time in a long time that I'd woken up before Pond arrived with my coffee (not counting my fortnight at Bourneham, which was so unusual as a whole that it had already taken on a dreamlike quality in my memory), and I was rather at a loss what to do with myself.  Out of sheer boredom, I got up and had a bath, then started dressing myself.

Pond arrived when I was halfway done, with a silent red-eyed Massingale in tow (the boy hadn't been out of Pond's sight all night), and finished me up in my soberest Sunday suit, though I had no intention of going to church that morning.  As soon as I was dressed and had a couple of cups of coffee, I headed downstairs; it was still too early for breakfast, so I went to Lord Levondale's study, where the only telephone was located.

Telephoning to London on a Sunday was a tedious business, waiting ages to get through to the Lewes exchange and then to the Brighton exchange and then to the Westminster exchange, all of which were staffed by the absolute minimum number of operators in observance of the Sabbath.  And when I finally got through to Hyacinth House, the night porter was still on duty, and he wasn't sure he was allowed to ring Silenus's rooms or tell me if he was even in the hotel.  

I finally got the night porter to go wake up the hotel manager, who told me that Silenus was not in residence, but could most likely be reached at his brother's house in Devon, whither his messages and post were being forwarded.  Then I had to start all over again, from Lewes to Brighton to Exeter to Gelford, then getting hold of someone at Lydelands, the ancestral home of the Dukes of Gelford.

"Well, Sebastian, what gets you out of bed at such an unearthly hour?" Silenus's voice came booming jovially over the line.

"It's Jingo Faringdon," I said simply and perhaps a bit brutally, ignoring my own advice about revealing too much over the telephone, "He's been murdered."

"Oh, dear," he gasped, "My dear boy, I'll come right away.  Where are you?"

"I'm at Verevale Court in Sussex, a few miles south of Lewes."

"That will take me some time to reach," he said, and I could hear him flipping the pages of a book, an atlas or an ABC, I couldn't tell, "But I think I can get there by tea-time."

"I am relieved," I admitted, though I wasn't sure if I should ask Lady Levondale to invite him to stay, or let him make his own arrangements, "In the meantime, do you know anything about Detective Chief Inspector Netley of the Brighton CID?"

"I know of Netley, though I don't know him personally.  Immensely clever, but without ambition," he sounded thoughtful, and I could see him in my mind's eye, leaning back in a chair and folding his hands over his tummy--though of course he must have been holding a telephone receiver, so couldn't possibly be sitting like that, "I've always found it a propitious combination.  I think you can probably trust him as well as you trusted Summerill."

"That's a relief," I said, "I was rather suspiciously vague in my statements last night, not knowing how much I could tell him."

"Just remember that you can't help Jingo, now," he advised, "Protecting Dotty and yourself are your only responsibilities.  I'll see you soon."

He rung off then, and I sat at Lord Levondale's desk feeling rather blank with too many emotions: I was immensely relieved that Silenus was coming, but telling him about Jingo had reinspired the grief I'd felt the night before while keeping watch over his body, and so the relief was well-mixed with desolation.  

It was still too early for breakfast, though, so I took some paper from the desk and started writing out the statement that I knew Netley would require from me later.  I was painstakingly meticulous about it, just to kill time, and when I was done writing I bound the pages together with red string and sealing-wax, impressing my coat of arms onto each blob with the almost effeminately flashy carved garnet swivel-ring I'd recently taken to wearing (it was a family heirloom, 18th century, else I probably wouldn't have dared).

I folded the statement up and put it into my pocket, then went into the dining-room, where quite a lot of people were already having breakfast.  Despite my hunger, I was oddly reluctant to eat once I was confronted by the regiment of covered dishes, something about gorging myself while Jingo lay dead seemed somehow distasteful; but I had to eat, so I filled my plate with kidneys and porridge, neither of which I particularly care for, as a sop to conscience.

"Lady Levondale, I wonder if you could recommend an hotel," I sat down beside my hostess, having come up with a good cover-story to explain Silenus's impending arrival, "Lord Faringdon's godfather, Lord Arthur Longueville, wanted to come and lend his support, but I didn't know if there was any place suitable that could accommodate him."

"I hadn't realised their families were close," she sounded surprised, as I'd rather expected she would: having even a minor Longueville as your godfather is something people are likely to mention, the name being among the most illustrious in England, "But I won't hear of an hotel, Lord Arthur must come stay here.  I wonder where, though; I hate to put him on the third floor."

"I'm happy to change rooms, if it's any help," I offered.

"Do you think I should ask Lord Faringdon's brother and mother here, too?" she wondered, slightly baffled by the unexpected situation, "Lady Faringdon mightn't be able to go home until after the inquest, but I'm sure she'd want family around her in this trying time.  But I've never met them, and asking a family in mourning to come stay with strangers, I'd hate to be impertinent."

"I'm sure they would be delighted to come, Lady Levondale," I assured her.  I hadn't thought of poor Pongo or the Dowager Marchioness, "I'll telephone for you, if you like."

"You're very kind, Lord Foxbridge," she took my hand and squeezed it gratefully, "Such a help.  If you'll excuse me, I have to go talk to my housekeeper."

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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 27

The corridor was full of people, though, spilling in from the gallery overlooking the rotunda; fortunately they were intent on their own business (canoodling--though how the American magazines mean it, rather than the activity for which I'd adopted the word for my personal use) and didn't pay any attention to me and my unorthodox attire.  Well, one person noticed: at the far end of the corridor was Pond, standing in an elaborately casual manner in front of the door into the Faringdons' rooms and eyeing my muddy boots with horror.

"I wasn't expecting you to stand guard, Pond," I said as I came up to him.

"I deemed it wise, my lord," he responded, his eyes still riveted to the poor boots, "Until we know why and by whom Lord Faringdgon was killed, I think we can assume that Lady Faringdon and her servants are targets as well."

"Well, certainly, that's why I asked for you to be informed.  Are you armed or anything?"

"No, my lord, but I have been carrying things up here for Lady Faringdon so her servants don't have to come out, and to make sure nothing poisoned is brought in."

"I guess I'd better go in and talk to Dotty, pay condolences and all," I sighed, not looking forward to the encounter; Pond opened the door for me and I passed into the little passageway connecting the dressing-room and bedroom, knocking on the bedroom door, "Dotty?  It's Foxy, may I come in?"

"Oh, Foxy," she pulled me into the room and threw her arms around my neck, "This is terrible, what are we going to do?"

"I honestly don't know, Dotty," patted her on the back, "I'll call Silenus first thing in the morning, he'll know how to handle the police here."

"I didn't mean about the police," she let go of me and stalked over to the side-table where a box of cigarettes stood.  She was wearing a dark-blue velvet pajama sort of outfit with mink trim, and looked terrifically glamourous as she lit a cigarette and stalked around the room some more, "I mean about who killed Jingo and whether or not that person intends to come after me, and poor Stephen and Nadia."

"Stephen and...?" the names threw me off, though I figured out she meant the servants before I finished the query.  They were huddled together on a settee next to the roaring fire, the young valet weeping and the Gypsy maid comforting him, "You'll be safe here.  Pond can keep an eye out for Massingale tonight, since they're rooming together, and Wickson can stay here with you.  We'll figure out something long-term tomorrow."

"Thank Pond for us, he's been extremely kind this evening," Dotty stopped stalking and looked suddenly scared and weak, "How am I going to go on without him, Foxy?"

"I don't know," I responded again, feeling terrifically inadequate, "I'm sure you'll manage somehow."

"Yes, I suppose I will," she gave me a long, sad look, "I always manage.  But I loved him, I really did."

"I'm sorry," I didn't really understand what I was supposed to say: this wasn't your ordinary sort of condolence call, there was no formula for it.

"Thank you, Foxy," she sighed heavily and sat down on the elaborate couch in the middle of the room, "You'd better go, now.  I expect you missed dinner, you should go get something to eat.  Thank you so much for all your help."

"If there's anything at all I can do, just holler," I said, edging out of the door, "I'm going to take Pond with me for a bit, but he'll be back shortly."

"How is her ladyship?" Pond asked when I came out of the room.

"She's seems to be doing well enough," I replied, "She has a lot of toughness in her.  I'm starving, do you think you could get me something to eat?"

"I've already arranged supper in your room, my lord," he walked along the corridor with me.

"Thank you, Pond.  If you could help me get these boots off, you can take Massingale back down to the servants' hall and get some rest."
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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 26

When I got back to the house I was shocked to discover the Hunt Ball still in progress, the windows bright and cheerful music coming through the open front door.  I shouldn't have been surprised, it was only just after ten o'clock, and I had been explicit about not letting anyone other than Lord Levondale and Dotty know what had happened.  But it was a shock, nevertheless, and I found myself resenting the people inside for having a good time while I'd been off in the freezing dark woods mourning a murdered friend.

I also resented myself for suddenly thinking of Jingo as a friend now that he was dead, all his crimes forgiven and his memory fluffed about with a halo of regret for all my hard words to him.  I was angry at myself, too, for going all weepy and maudlin over the murder of someone I know when I had previously viewed the murders of strangers as merely interesting intellectual exercise.  It made sense that I would feel that way, a friend and a stranger will inspire entirely different emotional responses, that's what friendship is for; nevertheless, I felt like a hypocrite for all the tears I'd never shed for William, or for any of the other dead men I'd encountered in my travels.

Wearing a groom's boots and a coachman's coat over my evening clothes, all liberally besmattered with mud, I was anxious to get to my rooms without passing through the ball; going through the Hunt Room and a circuit of low corridors, I was able to get to take one of the corkscrew staircases from the ground-floor to the corridor outside my rooms.  
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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 25

Nope.  Not today.

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 24

"Oh, Jingo!" I sighed--or I sobbed, I can't swear to it--and sat down hard at the base of a tree.

"Is it Lord Faringdon, my lord?" Daughtry came over and shone his own light on the body.  The knife-handle glinted brightly, a fairly ordinary hunting-knife with the Levondale crest carved on the bone inlay.

"You'd better go back and call for the police," I said, trying to force my mind into the comfortable task of organisation, "And inform Lord Levondale while you're at the house.  Ask him to inform Lady Faringdon and to set my man Pond to care for her and her servants.  But nobody else can know yet, and please do not use the word 'murder' on the telephone or mention Lord Faringdon by name.  Say 'death' or 'accident,' and 'a guest'; you never know who might be listening, and we don't want rumours flying ahead of an investigation."

"Yes, my lord," the stablemaster blinked at my sudden authoritative tone; he went back and remounted gracefully, but was reluctant to go, "Are you sure you should stay here alone, my lord?  What if the killer is still about?"

"I'll be fine," I got to my knees and started examining the body--Jingo's body--as best I could in the lantern's light, "He's been dead for hours, the killer is long gone by now.  Oh, go back by way of the river, would you? And bring the police here that way. We don't want a lot of traffic over that path we came in by, there may be clues."

"Very good, my lord," he submitted doubtfully, and went off through the willows to follow the riverbank out of the wood.

I knelt there for the longest time, my eyes darting around and recording evidence, but my mind reeling.  I had been half-expecting to find a body from the minute Dotty came to my door, Jingo's criminal activities made it almost inevitable that he'd be murdered sooner or later. Besides, it had become such a habit with me to find bodies that it no longer surprised me.

But even half-expecting it, I was bowled over by the reality of it.  I couldn't get over how similar this was to William's murder, the body in a similar position, the knife in a similar position, that same look of pained surprise on his face.  And I really couldn't get over the fact that this was Jingo, someone I knew intimately, someone who'd been a major influence on my young life, someone I'd sort-of-loved once.  That handsome face, that beautiful body, that rampaging sexuality, all that charm and all that wickedness, brutally snuffed out and gone from the world.  I found myself weeping, it was just too terrible to be borne.

But borne it must be.  After drying my eyes, I lifted Jingo's arm to test for rigor mortis; it was stiff but not yet immovable, which I knew meant he had probably been dead more than three or four hours but less than twelve; I'd seen him alive about seven hours earlier, so the time of death was sometime between noon-ish, when the hunt left this covert, and four o'clock.  The front of his waistcoat and the top of his breeches were drenched in blood, in a pattern that suggested running downward, so he'd likely been standing when he was stabbed, and the amount of blood indicated that the knife had been twisted around or pulled partway out and pushed back in, allowing for a substantial escape of blood.

As Silenus had taught me, I stood and faced a tree, miming stabbing motions with a short stick to get an idea of where the killer had been standing, how tall he might have been, if he'd been left-handed or right, if he'd held the knife with his thumb on the hilt or on the pommel, in order for the weapon to be standing at the angle it was.

I decided that the killer was right-handed and about the same height as Jingo, a little taller than me; he'd held the knife with his thumb on the hilt, and stabbed straight forward into the center of the solar plexus, then twisted the knife upward and to the side to slice the lungs and pierce the heart.  I further believed that the killer had held fast to Jingo's stock while he did this, as the white linen was wrinkled  and creased in a way that suggested being crumpled in a fist, and the stock-pin was bent.

The knife was easily recognised, one of the dozen kept on an open rack in the gun-room, which was right next door to the ground-floor room where we'd had our hunt breakfast; anyone could have taken it during the meal, or even days ago; so unless the killer hadn't worn gloves, there was no clue there.  The killer would have got a great deal of blood on him, though, so that might give us a lead if we examined people's clothes.

Getting up from my position, I replaced the blanket to what I hoped to be its original position, and went over to have a look at the horse and saddle.  The reins had been tied to a strong branch of the tree with an ordinary slip-hitch, not a fanciful sailor's hitch or anything distinctive like that.  The saddle was set neatly upright on the ground, the girth and stirrups tucked underneath--except for the left stirrup-leather, which had most likely held the stirrup we'd found outside the wood, and was fortuitously lying outside of the saddle so I could look at it without moving the evidence.

The leather strap was cut partway through across the underside, with a razor or a very sharp knife, and had torn the rest of the way to the surface.  I didn't know how long it would take for a cut like that to pull apart during a ride, but it seemed the killer would have had to know that in order to be on the spot when Jingo's stirrup-leather broke.  Could the killer have known exactly when the leather would break, though?

It seemed chancy to me, but it also struck me as a reasonable method to get someone to drop out of a hunt and loiter around in a predetermined range of space: one doesn't notice the underside of a stirrup-leather like one does a rein, and one doesn't pull hard enough on the reins for such a trick to work; and if the girth had gone, the victim would have fallen off and might have been injured, whereupon he'd be escorted back to the house. But a stirrup could go without your falling, you'd get down and have a look at it, and probably wouldn't notice the cut, only the tear; finding you couldn't fix it, anyone who stopped and asked if you needed assistance would be sent on, leaving you alone and on foot as the hunt disappeared into the distance.

To cut that stirrup, someone would have had to gain access to the stables sometime between the last time Jingo used the saddle, which would have been three or four o'clock the previous day (Jingo was a daily rider, like me, but always went out after lunch and returned before tea), and before Sirocco was saddled for the hunt.  It would be easy to find it in the tack-room, since Jingo had brought his own saddle, custom-made and blazoned on both sides with the Ponsonby crest in enamel and gold.

But how to be in the woods during the hunt without arousing suspicion?  That struck me as unlikely and difficult, everybody at Verevale was either in the house or on the hunt... or were they?  That would be my first point of investigation, was there anyone unaccounted for between, say, ten in the morning, giving him an hour or two to get to the wood before the hunt drew that covert, and three-thirty, when we returned to the house?

A clever murderer wouldn't be so obvious, though, so I didn't hold out much hope for that avenue of investigation.  But I had to think about something, for every time my mind paused it would fill up with Jingo's face, his mouth slightly open and his dead blue eyes wide in surprise and pain and even a little bit of pleading, as if to say No! Not me, not yet!  If I didn't keep busy, the police would arrive to find me keening and wailing over the body like a Greek widow.

I was alone in that wood with a corpse and two horses for what seemed like the entirety of the longest night in the history of the world, but it was really only about an hour and a half later that I heard voices and saw a half-dozen strong lights bobbing toward me from the direction of the river.

"Viscount Foxbridge?" a man asked me in a gentle, cultured voice while flashing a torch painfully in my eyes.

"Yes," I replied, flinching and bringing up my hand to shield my eyes.

"I'm Detective Chief Inspector Netley," he told me, turning the light upward so I could see his face, which was nice-looking in a faintly elfin way, and pleasantly creased as if it was accustomed to smiling gently, "You are able to identify the deceased for us?"

"The Marquess of Faringdon," I told him as he walked over to Jingo's body and pointed his torch at the face, which one of the constables had uncovered, "James Ponsonby, everyone called him Jingo.  We were at school together, and we're both staying with the Levondales."

"And how do you come to be out here, Lord Foxbridge?"

"Dotty, Lady Faringdon that is, asked me to look for him," I explained, "He hadn't come back from the hunt and she was getting worried."

"And why did Lady Faringdon ask this of you, rather than alerting her host, I wonder?" he walked back over and faced me, though he didn't shine the light in my eyes again.

"I have a talent for finding things," I offered lamely.

"And finding people?" he wondered, and even in the dark I could see his eyebrows lifted inquiringly.

"Occasionally," I said.

"I am extremely disturbed by what I find here, Lord Foxbridge," he pointed his torch at the ground between our feet and nudged the dead leaves with his toe, "You found another body with a knife in its chest, just two months ago?  Lord and Lady Faringdon were staying in the same house that time, too.  You don't find that remarkable?"

"Are you accusing me of killing Jingo?" I gawked at him.

"Oh, no, Lord Foxbridge, nothing like that," he smiled as gently as I'd thought he would, "But you must understand that one doesn't usually find quite so many stabbed bodies discovered by one young man, nor quite so many of the same names in such similar cases only two months apart, without there being a fairly staggering connection."

"Quite," I agreed, but had no idea what else to say.  There certainly were connections between the cases, though I couldn't tell Netley about any of them before I knew I could trust him.

"Quite," he echoed me, the gentle smile falling down into an ironic smirk, "Why don't you tell me about your movements and your observations from the time you left the house up to the time my men and I arrived?"

I did so, sparing no details and even giving him the benefit of my theories, though of course I left out all of the emotional stuff and any hint of why I insisted on coming out alone with the stablemaster instead of instituting a proper search in the first place.  He didn't write any of it down, nor ask anyone else to take notes, he just looked at me with his bright eyes and gentle smile until I ran out of words.

"Very lucid," he commented crisply after taking a moment to absorb it all, "I'll ask you to make an official statement to that effect later on.  For now, though, I think you should return to the house.  One of my men will accompany you."

"Thank you," I deflated a bit, not because he was dismissing me but because it had been an incredibly long day, and after that last bit of exposition I felt like a squeezed-out orange.  In other circumstances I might have tried to stick around to watch the police at their work, but it was cold and dark and I hadn't had my dinner.

I followed a uniformed constable out of the clearing and along the river-bank to the bridge, where a tractor-truck that had been commandeered from the home farm was waiting to haul the policemen back and forth; not a very elegant form of transport, but I was in no mood to care, it was faster than walking or riding and all I wanted was something hot to eat, something even hotter (and preferably alcoholic) to drink, and a fire sufficient to toast my feet.
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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 23

Tea was served in the great saloon instead of the library, to accommodate the numbers, and was a much noisier version of the meal than I like at that time of the day; after getting some tea and hot scrambled eggs into me, I bowed out and headed for my room, deeply desirous of a hot bath and perhaps a little nap before getting dressed for the evening.

But it was not to be, at least not for a bit: I found Michael in my room waiting for me to come back, and he looked so fresh and innocent asleep on top of the covers, half-unwrapped from his dressing-gown, that I pounced on him like a Regency buck on a hapless milkmaid, pulling him onto the floor and ravishing him in front of the fireplace with my boots on.

"Wow," he gasped out when I let him up for air, "That was worth waiting around for."

"How long have you been up here?" I panted, tired but exhilarated.

"Oh, ages and ages," he said dreamily, "My stupid girth broke, I fell off my horse before we reached the third covert, and had to come back."

"That's too bad, you missed a fantastic chase."

"Don't tell me that," he punched me lightly in the ribs, "Let me pretend you've all been traipsing disconsolately around the park without finding, then I won't mind missing it quite so much."

"I really need a bath, now," I pulled away from him and sniffed at my arm.

"Wait, not yet, you smell wonderful," he hugged me close and breathed deeply.

"I smell like a combination stables and molly-house."

"Exactly," he agreed.

"You're a very odd boy," I shook my head and suffered myself to be sniffed a little while longer, until Pond knocked on the door to tell me that my bathwater was going to get cold if I didn't hurry.  If I'd been allotted a big bathroom like Rupert's, I would have taken him with me (Michael, I mean, not Pond), but instead I sent him off on his way while I got into the blissful tub and had a really good soak and scrub.

"What's all this?" I asked Pond when I came out of the bath and found him in the bedroom, tidying over four sets of evening-clothes that he'd laid out on the bed side-by-side.

"I volunteered your lordship's bedroom and bath, and my own services, for some of the young men who are staying to change for the ball."

"That's very white of you," I raised an appreciative brow.

"All of the valets and ladies' maids have volunteered to assist the hunt guests this evening," he replied, "I could not in good conscience refuse to take part on your lordship's behalf."

"Naturally.  Which of these is mine?"

"Your lordship's clothes are laid out in the dressing-room," he turned and gave me one of his microscopically offended looks, as if I'd accused him of treating me less regally than the hoi polloi, "Along with Lord Rupert's clothes.  His lordship's rooms have been given over to the use of four young ladies for this evening."

"You locked the connecting door, I trust," I glanced over to the doorway when I got to the dressing-room, strangely disturbed by the idea of a gaggle of girls so nearby while I was dressing.

"And blocked the hole, with the key on our side, my lord," he smiled at me.

"Well, let's fall to, shall we, before the rush?"  I would have preferred to have a nap first, I was uncomfortably sleepy after so much exercise, but I didn't want to be loafing around waiting to be dressed with a bunch of other blokes--I'd much rather be dressed already so I could watch them change. 

Rupert turned up and had a quick splash in the bathroom while I was being dressed, then came and lounged distractingly on the daybed waiting his turn; the other young men arrived in due course, and Rupert showed them where things were so Pond could keep working.  And when I was done, I sat and watched Rupert being dressed, which was extremely entertaining.

I was just about to go into the bedroom and get chummy with my temporary guests, but there was a knock on the door--the outer door to the corridor, not the dressing-room door into the little passage that connected my three rooms--and I answered it to discover Dotty standing outside looking distressed.

"Oh, Foxy, I don't know what to do," she pulled me out into the corridor, hissing like a steam-kettle in an attempt to whisper.  She was dressed already, and perfectly stunning in gold satin the same colour as her hair with an awful lot of diamonds studded about her person, "Jingo hasn't come in yet, and I'm worried."

"I'm sure he's just still at tea," I said soothingly, wondering why she'd come to me.

"No, I sent Massingale down to fetch him, and he's not in the house," she wrenched at the large chiffon handkerchief she'd been wringing in her hands, "I don't think he came in from the hunt."

"Oh, he must have done," I frowned, "Lord Levondale or the Master would have noticed if he hadn't come back with us."

"That's why I'm worried," she said, her voice cracking a little, "He can't have simply disappeared in between the stables and the house, something must be wrong."

"Well, really, Dotty," I felt a little exasperated, "You know what Jingo's like.  He's probably somewhere around the stables with someone."

"I thought of that, you idiot," she punched my arm, "Otherwise I would have started worrying an hour and a half ago."

"Well, what do you want me to do?" I rubbed my arm gingerly; the handkerchief twisted around her fist hadn't softened the blow at all.

"I know I've got an awful rind, asking you for help after everything we've done," she said, her tone changing to one of pleading, which infected me with more of her fear than her hissing and hand-wringing had done, "But I honestly can't think of anyone more capable of finding him than you."

"Well, alright," I replied, mollified, "I'll see what I can do."

"Thank you, Foxy," she threw her arms around me and kissed me on the cheek, wiped her lip-rouge off me with the wrecked handkerchief, and scurried back down the corridor to her own room.  And though the corridor was quite long and her door at the opposite end from mine, I heard very distinctly the key turning in the lock when she got there.

I stood there in the corridor for a bit, trying to think what to do.  I couldn't pull Pond away from his labours, but I also couldn't go to the servants or to Lord Levondale and start searching for Jingo--after all, it would be very awkward for everyone involved if I raised the hue and cry, then found him romping about in the stables or a folly somewhere.  But if he was trapped or hurt somewhere at a distance from the house, I couldn't hope to find him on my own.

The stables seemed like the place to start, and I figured that if I didn't find him there, I'd at least find out if his horse had been returned with the rest of them or if he'd come back early like Michael and any others who'd been unhorsed along the way; and then, only if it turned out he hadn't come back yet, I'd worry about who I could trust to take me looking for him.

The stable-yard was brightly lit and festive: though some of the horses were still being tended, most had already been stabled or put back in their horse-boxes; the grooms were starting their own little party in the coach-house, with a long trestle-table laden with food and drink and a Victrola playing some snazzy tunes that some of the boys were singing along with.  I asked after the Verevale stablemaster and was directed to the tack room in the corner of the stable block.

Daughtry, a great strapping sunburned chap who I knew Pond had a bit of a crush on, informed me that Lord Faringdon's horse hadn't returned early, but he hadn't checked to see if it had arrived when the rest of the hunt did--with seventy horses coming in at once, one horse more or less wouldn't be noticed, and they wouldn't inventory the tack until all the animals were settled.  But he took me down the rows and we discovered that Sirocco, the big black Arabian that had been assigned to Jingo, was not in his stall.

"I'll get some lads together and we'll start a search, my lord," he said when we'd ascertained that Sirocco wasn't still in the yard and hadn't been put in the wrong stall.

"Oh, don't do that, I'd hate to interrupt their party," I objected lamely, unable to think of a really good reason to keep the grooms out of it, but still not wanting more people aware of Jingo's absence than could be avoided, "If you can help me saddle a horse, and find me a torch, I'll go out myself."

"Certainly, but please allow me to accompany you, my lord," he frowned thoughtfully, appearing to get my real meaning and willing to play along with my ridiculous request, "If Lord Faringdon is injured, you'll need someone to help you give first aid and carry him back."

"Oh, of course, thank you," I was immensely relieved to not have to explain myself further.  

With very little help from me, Daughtry had a pair of sturdy-looking chestnuts saddled, got me into a spare pair of boots and an old coachman's cloak (it was a bit cold to be larking about in white tie), and filled two large carriage lanterns to light our way; we mounted and went out quietly onto the drive.

We rode on the lawn instead of the drive, since motorcars were coming up for the ball and the headlamps annoyed the horses, then turned at the unpaved path and followed the course of the hunt toward the first covert.  It was slow going in the dark, and so took a good deal longer than it had in the morning, though not near as long as it would have taken on foot.

"I remember seeing Jingo...Lord Faringdon, I mean, after we left the first covert, so I don't think he's in there," I said as we trotted along outside the trees, poking our lights through the branches and seeing nothing but more dark trees.

"If his lordship dropped out of the field further on, he still may have come this way returning to the stable, my lord," Daughtry pointed out intelligently, "If your lordship will follow the tracks of the hunt along the outside, I'll go up the stream path and search there, and meet you at the other end of the covert."

We went even slower as we examined the covert, and it felt rather eerie being out on horseback at night by myself, even though I could see Daughtry's lantern flashing occasional inside the copse.  I got to the end of the covert before he did, and started getting rather lonely before the stablemaster finally emerged.

A high gibbous moon broke through the clouds, and shed a good deal more light as we trotted along the open ground, so we reached the the second covert a bit more quickly.  But it was even more dense than the first covert, and our lanterns didn't penetrate at all.  We slowed practically to a crawl, and Daughtry made little forays into the wood when it loosened enough to allow a horse to enter.

"Here's a stirrup on the ground," he said, pulling up and dismounting about halfway along the edge of the wood, not yet in sight of the bridge we'd gone over twice during the hunt and again on the way back.

"Did you hear that?" I asked when a snickery kind of noise caught my ear, barely audible among the usual night noises.

"There's a horse in the wood," Daughtry replied after listening carefully for a moment, dropping the stirrup back where he'd found it, then remounted and led the way in between the trees in the direction of the sound. 

We rode in silence for a bit, penetrating deeper by a rather circuitous route, not really a path so much as a trail of broken underbrush, where it looked like a large animal had gone plunging through it, taking no particular direction, perhaps a boar crashing through trying to escape hunters coming from different sides--but there wasn't a forest for miles around that was big enough to contain a boar.  Leaning down from my mount, I examined the ground in the beam of the lantern, and saw that it was mostly clear of leaves and free of any tracks besides those of Daughtry's horse, as if it had been carefully swept. 

After a few minutes of this maze-like ramble, we came out onto a fairly large clearing, with the river two hundred yards away lightly screened by a loose line of willows on its bank, and more dense woods beyond it.  A big black horse was tethered to one of the willows, its saddle sitting beside it and its blanket gone, complaining gently and snuffing around for more of the grass it had already cleared from around the length of its reins.

"That's Sirocco," Daughtry rode over to the horse and dismounted again, soothing the beast and checking him by lantern-light for injuries.

"What's he doing so far into this wood?" I wondered, playing my lantern's beam around the clearing, looking for clues.  

"The reins are hitched to the branch, not just caught," the stableman replied, "Lord Faringdon must have brought him in here for some reason."

"Is that the horse-blanket?" my beam crossed a reddish tartan something-or-other strewn with leaves at the opposite edge of the clearing from the horse.  I slid down from the saddle and went to investigate.

It was the horse-blanket, but under the horse-blanket was Jingo with a knife sticking out of his chest, quite dead.

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2,372 Words

31,990 Total Words

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 22

Too tired and drained to write.  Damned Dickens Fair.

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 20

I stopped in the great hall and chatted briefly with a couple of chaps I knew only slightly, one who'd been at Magdalen and the aforementioned Tollemache who'd been at Eton, and they introduced me to various sisters, uncles, and houseguests in their retinues without any of them making any kind of impression on my memory--no fault of their own, of course, but when everyone is wearing essentially the same thing, and talking about the same thing, you have to be fairly spectacular in the way of personality or looks to stand out.

Since there was nothing more interesting to do, I headed to the stable-yard, going around by way of the chapel-wing instead of the front door, partly to avoid the crush in the courtyard where mounted riders were already congregating and partly to stay inside for as long as I could.  The grooms were all busy, so I saddled Samson myself and got mounted, though I asked one of them to double-check my buckles to make sure I did it right.

The stable-yard was rather chaotic, with several horse-boxes being unloaded and another several being pulled in behind battered estate vans, horses being led by grooms and horses being ridden, and dozens of people dashing about trying to fetch and carry without being trampled underfoot.  Through a dark tunnel under one of the curved colonnades, I entered the forecourt where the chaos was a little more genteel but just as noisy as people clattered about aimlessly on the cobbles and chatted to each-other in voices that echoed off the stone walls.
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263 words...

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 19

When I got down to the dining-room, I discovered that guests were already arriving, and there were a number of strange women scattered about with tea and toast.

"Oh, Lord Foxbridge, how smart you look!" Lady Levondale exclaimed, partly to pay a compliment and partly to alert the new people to my identity.  Out of the entire party, she and the Duchess were the only ones who hadn't taken to calling me Foxy, "Breakfast is a little light this morning, since we'll be eating again in an hour or so."

"A jug of coffee, some toasted bread, and thou," I paraphrased facetiously, going into a sweeping bow to kiss her hand, "O, Wilderness were Paradise enow!"

"Frivolous boy," Lady Levondale giggled delightedly, then started introducing me around, "Have you met Mrs. Feversham? She's our nearest neighbour."

Mrs. Feversham was a stout bird of fifty summers dressed in tweeds so broken-in they didn't appear to be sewn and buttoned together so much as to have grown on her like moss.  Seven other ladies of similar variety and vintage were introduced as well, all near neighbours (or as near as one can get to an estate the size of Verevale), and only one was wearing a riding habit.

"Are you not hunting this morning, Lady Levondale?" I asked, parking myself halfway down the board with my coffee, toast, and a dollop of kedgeree.

"Oh, no, I haven't hunted in years," my hostess replied, crossing her legs uncomfortably, "Not since Michael was born.  So we have a little card party for those who don't hunt, amusing ourselves as best we can while the others are off on the chase."

"That sounds like fun," I lied.  Playing cards with tweedy lumps like Ma Feversham all day sounded dreary in the extreme.

More people were wandering into the house, though most seemed content to mill around in the great hall instead of coming into the dining-room; I felt an odd pressure to bolt down my kedgeree and go, especially after Lady Levondale left the room; her place was taken by the lumpiest of the tweed lumps, a Mrs. Tollemache of Summerease House whose son was at Eton with me, though I didn't remember him beyond the name--Tollemache can be pronounced so many different ways that it sort of sticks in your head when you find out how any particular Tollemache says his own name (the Tollemaches of Summerease House pronounce themselves 'tool-make,' in case you were wondering).  I ate so fast trying to get away from her that I nearly gave myself indigestion.

"Oh, you're not hunting, Dotty?" I ran into the marchioness in the doorway, surprised to see her dressed in a skirt and cardigan with some quite handsome pearls.

"My visitor arrived early," she said mysteriously, "Makes the horses jumpy."

"Visitor?" I wondered.

"I forget sometimes how grotesquely innocent you are in the ways of women," she smiled and patted my cheek, "You'll find out when you get married."

"Oh, one of those," I nodded sagely, "I do know enough about women's things to know I'm better off not knowing at all."

"Ah, to be a fly on the wall behind your and Caro's marriage bed," she slid away from me toward the tea-pots, "It'll be like Adam and Eve on their first date, won't it?"

"Probably," I agreed, laughing.
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557 Words
27,765 Total Words

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 18

Just can't today.

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 17

The morning of the hunt dawned with perfect hunt weather, bracingly cold but not freezing, with a thin cloud-cover that softened the light without obscuring it.

"I look bloody fantastic!" I gasped when Pond moved out of the way so I could get a load of myself in the cheval glass.  The exquisite black serge hunt jacket was brand-new, just arrived the previous day from Poole's, for which I'd had a lengthy and very thorough fitting when I stopped briefly in London between Bourneham and Verevale.  At the time, sitting for what seemed hours on a saddle in the back of the shop, I'd been bored out of my mind and resented the painstaking measurements; but now with the jacket on, I saw it had been worth every tedious minute.

The Poole hunt jacket had been Pond's idea.  I usually get my suiting done at Anderson & Sheppard, widely considered the most fashionable of Savile Row tailors, beloved of the Prince of Wales and your better West End headliners; J. Poole & Co., on the other hand, dresses HM the King, and specialises in officers' uniforms and those ruthless black suits you see in Whitehall and the City.  I mean, my father goes to Poole's, and that's all I needed to know about the place; Pond had to practically drag me in there by the nape of the neck, like a Nanny with a tantrum-throwing child.

But Pond is always right when it comes to clothes: that jacket was a dream, slim and sleek with the most ravishingly crisp shoulders and the smoothest pocket-flaps imaginable, yet immensely comfortable and allowing a full range of movement.  With a high white linen stock, glove-close cream doeskin breeches, and my best black boots polished to a liquid sheen, I looked quite simply delicious.

"Very smart, my lord," Pond agreed, his eyes traveling greedily over the faultless lines of the jacket, caressing the shoulder-seams as if he couldn't believe they were real.

"Oi, Foxy," Lord Rupert came in from next door, sloppily shoved into parts of his riding habit and carrying the other parts in his arms, "I wonder if I might borrow your valet for a minute? All the footmen are downstairs getting the hunt breakfast ready."

"I don't own him, Rupes," I laughed at his comical appearance, his shirt buttoned wrong and his braces dangling, his left sock coming off and flapping on the floor, "You can ask him yourself."

"I would be delighted to assist your lordship in any way I can," Pond bowed and started immediately to work on him, starting with the shirt buttons.

"Oh, thank you...er..." Rupert hesitated, unable to recall my valet's name, though I must have mentioned it before.

"Pond, my lord," he whipped the poorly-laundered stock off Rupert's neck and tossed it fastidiously in my laundry basket, then started wrapping him up in one of my spares.

"Thanks, Pond.  I say, Foxy, that is a spiffing jacket," of course he was calling me Foxy, now.  No matter how early or often I invite people to call me Sebastian, it just takes one person calling me Foxy and everyone else starts catching it like a cold.  With Jingo and Dotty using the name incessantly, it spread through the house by midweek, and I even overheard servants referring to me by my school nickname.

"Isn't it?  It just arrived from the tailors," I preened at the compliment and tried not to giggle as Pond stood up on tiptoe to knot Rupert's stock.  He's a fairly diminutive chap, and though I'm only a couple of inches taller than average, he stands comfortably eye-level with my necktie-knot and I can see over the top of his head; but Rupert is a good six or seven inches taller than me, and poor Pond looked like he was trying to hang a window-curtain.

"I'm going to look like I crawled out of a second-hand bin, standing next to you," Rupert said enviously.  His habit was well-cut and of good quality, but had indeed seen better days, and wasn't very well pressed.

"Nonsense, you look quite handsome," I went over to the open box where my jewelry was kept and chose some pieces to give him, having a hard time finding things that didn't have my initials, my crest, a fox, or flashy stones on.  While Pond was busy getting his socks and breech-cuffs sorted out near the floor, I came over and pinned a shiny gold bar with a tiny enameled horse onto his stock, then replaced the plain silk knots in his cuffs with elegant octagonal gold links, "And now just a little bit handsomer.  With my compliments."

"I can't take these," he frowned at the link in his right cuff, "They're from Cartier."

"You don't like Cartier?" I looked at him with surprise. I knew his pride would require a token objection to a valuable gift, but I hadn't expected him to recognise the maker.

"Oh, I like Cartier," he fingered the link thoughtfully, "But they're too expensive."

"Hardly," I dismissed the objection, "I never wear them, and I want you to have them."

"Well, thank you," he sounded touched, though somewhat distracted, as Pond was more or less pushing him into the armchair so he could put the boots on.

"My pleasure," I kissed him on top of the head and went over to the bureau to get my hat, gloves and crop, "I'm going downstairs, I may actually die if I don't get my breakfast immediately."
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920 Words

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 16

To say that I was perturbed by this turn of events would be the understatement of all understatements.  Deeply rattled wouldn't even come close.  In fact, I'm not at all sure there is a word or phrase that would adequately describe how I felt as I stumbled back to my room and fell into the regal Venetian throne chair beside my fireplace, where I sat staring at my shoes in a dazed manner.

"Twenty minutes until the dinner-gong, my lord," Pond came in a few minutes later, no doubt wondering what had become of me.

"Right-oh," I said, but didn't move.

"Are you unwell, my lord?"

"No, I suppose not."

"Can I help?" he asked, coming around in front of me to look into my face,  I suppose something in my voice alarmed him.

"I don't see how," I looked up at him.

"You can tell me about it while we're getting dressed," he put out his hand to get me out of the chair.

"I don't think I can," I said, taking his hand and standing up, "I don't think I can say it aloud."

"Shall I send word that your lordship is ill and can't come down to dinner?"

"No, I guess I'll get dressed," I went into the dressing-room and started peeling off my tweeds like a sleepwalker.  I was so shocked I couldn't even think about how shocked I was; my mind was humming like an engine, the thoughts like pistons going up and down so fast that I couldn't hear one separate from another.

I went down to the drawing-room and got a couple of cocktails into me, which seemed to numb the turmoil just enough that I was able to talk and walk around like a normal person—or so I assume, since nobody asked me if there was something wrong or if I was feeling ill, as Pond had done. I had no memory of walking or talking, nor of going in to dinner and eating a meal, but I must have done.

Excusing myself from the drawing room at the earliest polite moment, I went back upstairs and sat staring at the fire in my dressing-room until Pond showed up to undress me, ages and ages later.  And as I sat there, I kept ricocheting between the two columns of thought that had emerged from the chaos over the last couple of hours: Must I? and Can I?

Obviously, I had no legal obligation to give Jingo anything; but did I even have a moral obligation?  None of the people in that house was a relative, or a schoolfellow, or even a friend of long standing.  In fact, the only person at Verevale with any such claim on my loyalty was Jingo himself.  

On the other hand, I did like most of the people there, and would happily become friends of long standing with them, particularly those whose photographs I'd be buying from Jingo.  I hated to think of what being blackmailed would do to them: it would dim that wonderful light of eager conquest in Michael's bright and handsome face; it would introduce a note of shame and fear to Lavinia's and Abigail's long-standing friendship; and imagine the squalid things poor Rupert would have to do for Jingo and Dotty, since he didn't have a penny to bless himself with.

I have been taught to believe that if one can be of assistance, one must be of assistance.  I could save a half-dozen or so people from the emotional and financial distress of blackmail; I could certainly cough up twenty thousand guineas without breaking the bank, and easily spend the night with a man I'd already slept with hundreds of times already: therefore I should save that half-dozen or so people.

But then there was the problem of Dotty, which brought me immediately to the Can I? column of my thoughts.  I knew perfectly well that I could sleep with Jingo, my body's reaction to his nudity earlier showed that I still wanted him despite how much I'd come to dislike him.  But how could I possibly allow myself to be intimate with Dotty?  It would feel like I was cheating on Caro, for one thing; for another, it would debase to a sordid expedient something that I considered my proud duty to the Saint-Clair heritage.  And could I even perform with Dotty?  I had no idea, I'd never tried anything like it.

Mightn't that, on the other hand, be a good reason to try it with Dotty?  I mean, wouldn't it be better to know if I was actually capable of the act before I got married?  On the other other hand, though, wouldn't my feelings for Dotty make being with her an entirely different sort of experience to being with Caro?  Were the two acts even comparable?  Again, I had no idea.

The bottom line was that the very idea of laying a finger on Dotty Faringdon terrified me right out of my skin.  But since my objection to Dotty seemed to be made more of fear than any real moral or practical considerations, and since it had been drummed into my head since infancy that a Saint-Clair never allows fear to turn him from a necessary task, I began to feel that it was practically my duty to go through with it.

That was a very energising thought: my duty.  It actually helped me pull the complicated dilemma together under one heading, organising the whole mess into one easy to consider (if potentially difficult to perform) responsibility.  I may not like it, I may not want to do it, but the Saint-Clair motto is Fide Sanguinis Fæce, 'Loyal to the Last Drop of Blood.'  And in this case I didn't even have to exsanguinate myself in loyalty to my new friends, I just had to hand over a great wad of money and engage in some probably-not-unpleasant exercise.

I was so bucked up, in fact, that I was able to unburden myself to Pond with the whole story while he was changing my clothes.  He was even less enthusiastic about it than I was, and thought I was an idiot to give in to Jingo's demands; but he at least understood why I felt I had to.  I started to feel like a knight getting put into armour instead of a rather silly toff getting put into pajamas, with my faithful squire by my side and a two-headed dragon waiting out in the arena.  I even imagined a bit of fanfare as I marched off down the corridor to the Queen's Room and knocked at the bedroom door instead of the dressing-room.

"Good evening, Lord Foxbridge. Come in," Wickson opened the door to me and gestured gracefully.  She was very short and squat, with grizzled hair and a face creased and oily like a walnut, a caricature of an old Gypsy woman though faultlessly dressed in a stylish black uniform.  I wondered if she was, in fact, of Romany stock, though domestic service is certainly not the sort of career one finds Gypsies embracing.

"Foxy, darling, you actually showed up," Dotty was lounging elegantly on an ornately feminine couch in the centre of the ornately feminine room, dressed in a gossamer negligée with great feathery cuffs and absolutely nothing on underneath, like a sultry blonde Cleopatra, "I didn't think you would."

"Evening, Dotty," I said tersely, trying to be gracious but missing the mark somewhat.  I had to admit that she was alluring, even to my male-oriented eyes, as rosy-warm and inviting of caresses as one of those Victorian courtesan paintings you find in the better class of saloon bar; it made me feel rather nervous.

"Ah, here's our brave little soldier," Jingo came in from the bathroom, beautifully draped in a long Arab kaftan of silky gold tissue, nearly as sheer as Dotty's negligée and twice as sexy, "Come to sacrifice himself on the altar of depravity for the sake of his friends."

"Your cheque," I reached into my pocket and produced the long strip of paper, folded discreetly in half.

"Many thanks," he plucked it out of my hand, unfolded and examined it, then walked over to the magnificent Florentine writing-desk up against one wall, "If it makes you feel any better, you're paying for my little brother Georgie's education.  You like Georgie, don't you?"

"Oxford's not that expensive," I said, though it did indeed make me feel better: Jingo's younger brother, Lord George Ponsonby, called Pongo at school as Ponsonbys usually are, was a smaller, prettier, and much sweeter version of Jingo; he fagged for me in his first two years (and my last two years) at Eton, and I was extremely fond of him—an entirely Platonic fondness, I hasten to add, as young Pongo wasn't nearly the tart I was at school.

"He'll need a little income of his own when he comes down, won't he?" Jingo wrote out a fairly lengthy note and folded the cheque inside it, then put it in an envelope and sealed it with his signet ring in red wax, "Massingale, take this down to the post box in the hall, would you?"

"Yes, my lord," the young valet scurried forth from whatever corner of the room he'd been hiding in.  As extravagantly pretty as the boy was, with his golden curls and bottomless brown eyes, he had nevertheless mastered the knack of blending into the woodwork, which marks the best servants.

Wickson went out right after Massingale, leaving me alone with Jingo and Dotty; and they just sat there, Jingo at the desk and Dotty on the couch, staring at me.  Not just staring, either, but smirking at me, as if expecting me to do something amusing.

"So, do you come here often?" I laughed nervously, hoping to ease the tension with a joke.

"You're a sweet boy, Foxy," Dotty got up and walked over to me, putting her hands on both sides of my face and kissing me softly on the mouth; her perfume enveloped me in a warm delicious cloud of ginger, vanilla, and cinnamon, like a fresh-baked cake, "I really do wish you were staying, I absolutely adore redheads."

"Here's all the film we took this week," Jingo said, carrying a large and expensive-looking alligator dressing-case with pretty gilt fittings, "I'd appreciate having the case back, it's part of a set."

"You're giving me all of it?" I took the case, which wasn't as heavy as it looked, "Not just the ones I asked for?"

"Not giving, no," Jingo put his arm around my shoulder, and Dotty was still standing close, with only the dressing-case between us, "I'm selling them to you for twenty thousand guineas."

"Wait, you wish I was staying?" I was nearly as confused as I'd been before.

"We don't like unwilling playmates, chum," Jingo kissed me on the cheek and gave my shoulders a friendly little shake, "We just wanted to see how far you'd go."

"You mean, you were just pulling my leg?" I glared at him, "I've been worried to death for the last three hours and you were just kidding?"

"I wanted to knock some of the smugness out of you," Jingo laughed, sliding his hand slowly down my back and letting it rest at the base of my spine, "I won't lie, it's given me enormous pleasure to watch you moping around all evening like Joan of Arc heading for the stake. But I guess I went too far, that's why I'm throwing in the rest of the film, sort of an apology for upsetting you."

"Oh," I couldn't even think of what to say.  Though immensely relieved, I was also oddly disappointed: it's rather jarring to work yourself up to some brave act of self-sacrifice and then find out it's not needed; all that putting-on of armour, all the fanfare and the banners, then the dragon folds his tent and goes home for his tea, "Thank you."

"If you ever change your mind, you're always welcome, Foxy," Dotty said to me, back on her couch with her steamy Cleopatra pose, but her tone gentle rather than provocative.

"Good night, old man," Jingo walked me to the door and let me out into the corridor, giving me another friendly kiss, "Off to your bed of virtue."

"Good night," I replied rather mechanically and went back to my own room, swinging the case thoughtfully as I went.

Honesty bids me admit that I was half-tempted to go back and see what it would be like with the two of them—curiosity is my most defining characteristic, after all.  But the other half wanted to run as fast as I could into my room and Pond's protective sensibility, and that was the half that won the toss.

"They didn't make me stay the night, after all," I told Pond when I came into the dressing-room, where he was still tidying up.

"But they gave you the film you requested?"

"They gave me all of their film!" I said gleefully, "To apologise for teasing me.  Wasn't that sweet?"

"Well, for twenty thousand, I should think they'd throw in a few extras," he said, taking the case from me and putting it on the dressing-table so we could examine its contents, "You could buy a substantial farm for that kind of money.  Just the film, though, not the cameras?"

"I didn't ask for cameras," I frowned at the idea, "Rather like asking a barber for his razors, what?  Tools of their trade and all."

"And with them, they can just go ahead and take dozens more photographs next week," he pointed out, "Are you going to buy those, too?"

"I didn't think of that," I admitted, peering into the case.  There were about thirty shiny little cans of film rolls in there; if each roll recorded one encounter, there had been quite a lot going on at Verevale Court in the last six days.  There was also a very attractive leather-bound notebook, which contained a long list of paired (and in some cases grouped) initials and dates with a number corresponding to a label on each can of film.  As I expected, ML was the most common monogram on that list, paired at least once with almost every other monogram in the book—if they could hook that boy up to the electricity somehow, they wouldn't need a generator.

"How do we know these are the actual films?" Pond went on, picking up one of the cans and shaking it by his ear, "They might just be random rolls of film."

"I could have them developed to make sure," I suggested, pleased to notice that he hadn't said 'my lord' in quite some time, like when we were just friends, "Though I do believe Jingo gave me the real thing.  He's a blackguard, but he's pretty straightforward about it."

"If you say so," he closed the case and took it over to the wardrobe to stow out of sight, "But you shouldn't go alone to a negotiation. You always pay the first price anyone asks."

"What's the point of being rich, if you have to haggle like a rag-and-bone man?" I shrugged, "Can you find someplace secure to keep that film?  Jingo wants the case back, and he didn't give me the key."

"Twenty thousand and he can't even spare the case?" he shook his head in exasperation; he brought the case back out and transferred the cans into a drawer in the bureau, locked it, and handed me the key, "Better put that on your watch-chain.  But aren't you just going to destroy it all?"

"I suppose I should make sure it is the real thing, first," I said, though the only real reason I wanted to get the film developed was to see what was on it.  Plain old prurient curiosity, of course, but there it is.

"Uh-huh," his tone conveyed just how much he believed my specious rationale, "Will there be anything further, my lord?"

"No, thank you, Pond," I smiled and reached out for his hand, "And really, thank you, Pond.  You've been a real brick tonight."

"One endeavours to give satisfaction, my lord," he smiled back at me and executed a grandiose little bow after shaking my hand.

I got into bed with my diary, which I had been neglecting of late, and sat up for more than an hour catching it up on my doings.  And nobody dropped in for a visit, so it really was a bed of virtue, as Jingo had said.  I had a hard time getting to sleep, and eventually had to turn the light back on and pick up my book; I didn't feel even remotely virtuous, I just felt lonely.
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2,790 Words
26,288 Total Words

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 15

To say that I was perturbed by this turn of events would be an understatement of the most extreme nature.  Deeply rattled wouldn't even come close.  I'm not so sure there is a word or phrase that would adequately describe how I felt as I stumbled back to my room and fell into a chair to sit staring at my shoes in a dazed manner.

"Twenty minutes until the dinner-gong, my lord," Pond came in a few minutes later, no doubt wondering what had become of me.

"Alright," I said but didn't move.

"Are you unwell, my lord?"

"No, I suppose not."

"Can I help?" he asked, coming around in front of me to look into my face,  I suppose something in my voice alarmed him.

"I don't see how," I looked up at him.

"You can tell me about it while we're getting dressed," he put out his hand to get me out of the chair.

"I don't think I can," I said, taking his hand and standing up, "I don't think I can say it aloud."

"Shall I send word that your lordship is too ill to come down to dinner?"

"No, I guess I'll get dressed," I went into the dressing-room and started shucking out of my tweeds like a sleepwalker.  I was so shocked I couldn't even think about how shocked I was, my mind was humming like an engine, the thoughts like pistons going up and down so fast that I couldn't hear one separately from another.

I went down to the drawing-room and get a couple of cocktails in me, which seemed to slow things down enough that I was able to talk and walk around like a normal person--or so I assume, since nobody asked me if there was something wrong or if I was feeling ill, as Pond had done.  But I had no memory of walking or talking, nor of going in to dinner and eating a meal, but I must have done.

Oh, fuck it all.  Why won't people let me alone?

NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 13

The rest of the week went plodding along its prescribed course, offering only a few deviations from the comfortable routine.

I went riding most mornings right after breakfast, and within a few days Samson and I were the best of friends; he responded to my very thoughts, it seemed, before I even shifted the reins, and was an absolutely fearless jumper.  Sometimes Michael would join me on these morning rides, and once Lord Levondale came along with us, but for the most part it was just me and Samson hacking about the country and going out of our way to hop every fence and hedge in the place.  A couple of times I rode into the village during my peregrinations, visiting the shops and popping into the vicarage to say hello, though it was too early in the day to visit the pub and get to know the villagers there.

I was going to miss these daily rides in the spring when I went back to London for the Season--I'd gotten rather lax around the midriff last summer without daily riding (or any other form of exercise that didn't involve a private room and a like-minded friend) to keep me in trim.  Perhaps I'd go to the trouble of keeping a horse or two in Hyde Park and become an habitué of Rotten Row.

The wooing of Lavinia, and the worrying of Lord Levondale and Michael, progressed apace: I often spied the latter two casting concerned looks at me and Lavinia when we'd sit with our heads together over a game of backgammon or an illustrated paper; from a distance it looked like we were whispering sweet nothings to each other, though in fact we were usually talking about art or literature, or exchanging views on the other guests' behaviour (of which she mostly disapproved).

I could tell, when I was alone with Michael (which wasn't often, but always delightful), that he wanted to quiz me about my intentions, and on occasion seemed just about to let loose with an admonishment of my behaviour toward his sister, but I always managed to divert his attention when he looked like his trend of thought was headed in that direction.  Whether Lord Levondale was having similar urges to take me aside for a man-to-man talk, I couldn't say, but he often looked like he had something of the sort on his mind, stroking his chin or pursing his mouth when he looked at me.

Rupert and Lavinia weren't hitting it off as buddies, as I'd hoped they would, though they got along well enough and were spending a good deal of time together (usually when I was out riding or shooting, pastimes Lavinia did not care for); Rupert and Abigail, however, were getting on like a house afire: she hung on his every word, which is always gratifying to a chap, and he found her breathless enthusiasm a nice change from the blase sophistication of the society girls his mother had been throwing at him.

The Duchess seemed satisfied with how things were going, though, and Rupert reported that she'd been sweet as cream to him all week.  She also seemed to take quite a shine to me, believing that I was a loyal supporter of her aim to get hold of Lavinia's money through marriage, and was extraordinarily courteous to me whenever our paths crossed--she even winked at me in a manner that can only be called 'conspiratorial.'

I tried my best to quash my revulsion over these winks--after all, my own father had done the very same thing, dangling after an heiress to save the family bacon (though he hadn't been anywhere near as broke as the Gosforths were, and had his own coronet to offer), and it was only by pure chance that he and my mother had actually fallen in love with each other.  On the other hand, I don't particularly like my father, so perhaps that's not the best comparison to draw.
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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 12

Since it was Sunday, Pond put me into a dark suit instead of my riding togs, and I went down to breakfast to see who else would be observing the rites that morning.  I was rather disappointed to discover that Lavinia did not intend to go to church, as I had lots of stage-business planned with carrying her prayer-book and handing her on and off the kneeler like a parfait gentil knight; but she was something a secularist, and only went to church on high holidays because it was expected of her as a member of the manor family.

In fact, very few people came down at all, most of the party breakfasted in bed, preferring a good lie-in on Sundays (as I did when I was in Town); I opted to go to church anyway, since I was already dressed for it and curious to see what the villagers were like.  I was the only male who went to the village in Lady Levondale's car, though, and I felt rather conspicuous in a bevy of females, my hair burning bright in a row of demure hats, right up front in the Levondale pew of the Church of Saint Michael Archangel.

I can't say I enjoyed the sermon, which was read by a young and rather good-looking vicar in an unconvincing nasal monotone.  I tend not to listen to sermons much, anyway, unless they're delivered with some theatrical pulpit-pounding and hallelujah-shouting, but I found this one kind of annoying—dull but obtrusive, like a fly buzzing around my ear.  When I someday become Earl of Vere, patron of nine livings, I'm going to make sure my vicars know how to put on a show.

Still, I enjoyed sitting in the really beautiful eighteenth-century church, wedged in between the Duchess and Miss Beckett Haven, admiring the pre-Raphaelite stained glass windows (which, according to a banner wreathing Saint Michael wrestling a demon in the largest window behind the altar, were installed to commemorate the death of the eighth Earl of Vere in 1875) and reveling in the gorgeous music of a cathedral-worthy pipe organ (donated by the first Lord Levondale upon his arrival in 1876).

After church, I was deluged by farmers wanting to greet me: though the village and the home farm were let along with Verevale Court and the park to the Levondale family, the rest of the farming in the surrounding parish was done by tenants of the Earl of Vere (which was news to me, I'm sorry to say); so when word got around during the sermon that the red-headed boy up front was their landlord's heir, I became an instant celebrity.

It also transpired that the living at St. Michael's was one of the nine in the Earl of Vere's gift, which made the handsome vicar my new best friend, as well; he and his sister invited me to luncheon with such enthusiasm that it would be churlish not to accept, and I was borne off to the vicarage along with a clutch of village biddies representing the Altar Guild while Lady Levondale and the rest of her party returned to Verevale Court in the car.

The vicarage dining-room was a noble chamber, elegantly proportioned and furnished with excellent taste, but it was a little crowded with the Reverend Mr. Aylesford, Miss Aylesford, the five-member Altar Guild, several farmers who'd dropped in for a friendly chat and were encouraged to join the party, and me all crammed into it; but we had a pretty festive time, anyway, over the simple but plentiful board.  Since I would of course be unable to converse on local matters, I was instead interrogated on my various appearances in the newspapers and society rags of late, including the murder at Foxbridge Castle; and even being careful to relate the heavily censored or downright fictional official versions of events, I held my audience spellbound, always gratifying to a dyed-in-the-wool showoff like me.

After spending an abnormally long time at the table, the good Rev. walked with me part of the way back to Verevale Court, telling me funny stories about various interesting characters in Verevale village that I should be sure to meet next time I came down.  He was a really nice man, and a good storyteller despite his nasal voice; it seemed a shame that he should choose a profession that requires him to address a crowd on a regular basis.

I got back to the house in that doldrums hour before tea-time where there's absolutely nothing to do if you're not already doing something, so I went into the saloon and examined the platoons of Restoration aristocrats whose penurious descendants had been forced to flog the family portraits to stay afloat.  It was a fascinating collection, and I found myself wondering if the aristocracy had really borne a distinct family resemblance those days, or if all those fishy eyes and sensuous mouths were just a fashionable convention.

Then there was tea, after which I went and shot some more skeet, after which I dressed for dinner, after which I flirted with Lavinia in the drawing-room, after which I scowled at Jingo across the dining-table, after which I turned the pages while Lavinia played the pianoforte, after which I played billiards with Rupert, after which I got ready for bed, after which I had a naughty interlude with Michael in his room, after which I went back to my own room and went to sleep.  Life in a country-house can get rather repetitive.  But then, I suppose, life in an office would be repetitive as well, so I shouldn't complain.
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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 11

When I got out of the bath, I went and had a poke around in my dressing-room while Pond laid out my afternoon ensemble, peeping into drawers and examining the paintings,

"What's through here?" I asked, stopping and rattling the handle of a door that I hadn't used yet, "It's locked."

"Lord Rupert Gosforth's room, my lord," Pond replied from the depths of the wardrobe.

"Really?" I knelt down and peeked through the keyhole, and saw a little slice of an opulently decorated room with an awful lot of draperies, like the film set for an Arabian harem.  Then I remembered Pond telling me about the keys being the same in big houses, so I took the key out of one of the other doors and tried it.  It worked, so I poked my head through and cried out, "Hullo-ullo! Anybody home?"

"What?" Rupert came through another door across the room, looking absolutely yummy dripping wet with a towel around his waist, "Oh, it's you, Foxbridge. What's up?"

"I just discovered we're neighbours, my dressing-room's right through there," I explained, crossing the room toward him, And since he was wearing a towel and I was wearing a towel, it seemed an opportune moment to get to know one another a little better; so I pushed him back into his dressing-room and got comfortable on the little daybed in there.

"You're really something," he told me a while later when we were standing together in the shower-bath (his bathroom was much nicer than mine) and rinsing off the residue of our exercises.

"You're pretty something, yourself," I wrapped my arms around his narrow waist and nestled my head into his clavicle--he was just so wonderfully tall.  But the water got cold pretty soon, so we had to get out and start getting dressed, "By the way, I've thought up a plan to get your mother off your back about pursuing Lavinia.

"Really? How?" he looked at me with interest as he climbed into a lightweight suit of long underwear.

"You're going to tell her that you and I have hatched a plot for seducing the girl," I lounged into an armchair to watch him dress, "I'll be pitching the woo at Lavinia with all the energy of a strong-armed bowler; meanwhile you're going to be spending time with her, getting to know her, and getting to be jolly good chums with her.  But of course I'm not going to marry her, I've just been toying with her affections.  Her heart is broken, but here's good old Rupert with a shoulder to cry on, and she marries you on the rebound.  What do you think?"

"You're devious," he gaped at me with admiration, then frowned, "But do you really think she'd marry me like that?"

"No, of course not," I grinned at him, "That's just what we're going to tell your mother so she thinks everything is in hand and therefore leaves you alone."

"Oh, ah," he got into his trousers next, which I found interesting: I always put mine on (or rather, Pond puts them on me) after I have my socks, shirt, collar, and necktie on, "But why? I mean, I understand you're flirting with her just for fun, and she knows you're not serious.  But Mater will wonder why you'd do all this for me."

"Then she's underestimating your charm and attraction," I told him with a wink, "If she wants to know why you and I are in cahoots, tell her it was all your idea and I'm just going along with it for fun."

"That she'd never believe," he'd finished his shirt and pulled up his braces, then added a jumper, then did up his necktie--Harrow, by the way, so he must know Bunny and Twister, and I'd have to ask him for scurrilous tales later on--and sat down to put on his socks and shoes, "I'll tell her you're doing it for a bet, she understands gambling."

"Well, I'd better go get dressed," I got up and came over to give him a quick kiss before leaving, "Pond must be wondering what became of me.  I went through a strange door and never came back."

"I hope you'll leave it unlocked," he grinned down at me, "I'll come surprise you in your bath sometime."

I didn't think Pond would like that, but didn't say so, and scurried back to my dressing room; there I found Pond comfortably ensconced in the armchair with his feet up, doing a crossword puzzle and looking at me with exasperation.

"And how is the weather in Wonderland, my lord?"

"Lovely, thanks," I went and stood in my dressing-spot by the tall glass so he could start to work.

(Note: please see yesterday's installment for the narrative section that belongs here)

I went down to dinner with a lighter heart, laughing at myself for a fit of jealousy over a married man, and resumed my campaign of conspicuously wooing Lavinia.  With Abigail and Rupert in on the game, too, it was a lot more fun; we created a foursome over some board-games after dinner, with both of them shooting well-rehearsed jealous glares at me and Lavinia, and we had a pretty good time all evening.

I had to wonder, though, if the prank was really going to fool anyone.  So far our intended audience seemed to take the appropriate degree of interest in our interchanges, but they might shrug it off after giving it any serious thought. There were just too many questions of probability.

Our ages, for one thing: it didn't make sense for someone my age to go pelting after an unmarried woman (dare one say spinster) of twenty-eight, too old to seriously consider as marriage material and too dangerous for anything other than marriage; I might go after a married woman of any age, but unmarried women are usually left out of the bedroom-hopping game because they have a much harder time explaining unexpected pregnancies.

And then there was the question of my looks, which would obviously give me entrée into just about any bedroom in the house; with beautiful women like Dotty Faringdon and Virginia Vandekamp lying around loose, what in the world would a beautiful youth like me want with a dowd like Lavinia?

The element that would really sell the scenario is my queerness: of course I would flirt ostentatiously with a female to divert suspicion from my true nature, and the best candidate for such an exercise would be a woman who was unlikely to expect me to go any further than flirtation—if I flirted like that with Dotty or Virginia, I might be expected to follow through in some way, either in the bedroom or at the altar.  And of course Lord Levondale and Michael would consider Lavinia too much an innocent to even know what a queer is, so of course she would take my flirtation seriously and begin to fall in love with me.  It would be the perfect set-up.

But I was unexpectedly reluctant to let anyone at Verevale know I was queer—aside from those I intended to be queer with, I mean.  In London you can get away with these things, there's so much going on among so many people that nobody can know very much about anyone; but the world of country houses is very small indeed. Though the members of the aristocracy and gentry don't all know each other, we're so interconnected through mutual friends and overlapping family that information spreads fast from stately home to stately home.

I hadn't really given much thought to this sort of thing in the past: as Julia said, buggery is practically an institution in public schools; and going through a queer phase at University is so common as to be almost acceptable. But as an adult, such things carry rather more severe consequences, and any generalised knowledge of my nature could lose me friends and make social activities awkward.

Worse, it would taint those who are close to me.  Even if I didn't give a fig for my own reputation, I had to consider Caro and Twister: if everyone knew Caro's fiancé was queer, she might lose respect, which I know is important to her; and Twister would be unable to associate with me at all, I'd never see him again unless I murdered someone.

Or was I being unnecessarily cautious?  After all, I know several queers in our little world, more indiscreet than I, but have never heard any scuttlebutt about them from any 'county' sources; why should I assume that people would talk about me?  The subject itself was taboo, most people who knew such a fact would be reluctant to repeat it, especially in mixed company.  Unless I got tangled up with the law, it was unlikely that anybody would know or care what I got up to at night, or with whom.

Well, I could keep that revelation under my hat until and unless it was needed. In the meantime I was having too much fun to really care if the prank worked at all.  I'm not sure why I enjoy flirting with women so much, perhaps it's because I'm not weighed down with any sort of worry over my success with them, or maybe it's just the pleasure of having a second personality, such as Caro enjoys when she goes out as Charley.  Either way, I was enjoying my after-dinner pastimes almost as much as I was enjoying my after-bedtime activities.

But only almost.

While Pond was undressing me and putting me into my pajamas, I thought about whether I should get in bed and wait to see who showed up, or if I should go visiting on my own initiative.  With the former I risked spending the night alone if nobody came to call, and with the latter I risked being out when someone interesting did come to call; there was also the possibility that more than one visitor would show up, or that I'd intrude on an assignation already in progress.  It was rather a toss-up.

"Do you really spend every night alone in your room when we're in the country?" I asked Pond, my dilemma reminding me of what he'd said earlier about the rarity of below-stairs canoodling.

"Yes and no," he frowned at a small wrinkle in my dressing-gown lapel, "At Foxbridge Castle, I'm always alone in my own room; but when we're visiting other houses, I usually share a room with another servant, generally another visitor's servant.  Here, I'm sharing with Lord Faringdon's valet."

"And I assume that 'sharing' isn't a euphemism in this case?" I sighed as he went after the wrinkle with a little thimble-like contraption he uses for spot-fixes—a waste of energy, since I was just going to take the silly thing off, and more than likely drop it on the floor, before anyone would see it.

"Young Massingale is really not my type, my lord," he looked at me dubiously, wondering if I'd been paying any attention in all the time I'd known him, "But he seems a nice enough lad.  We haven't spoken much, but he's friendly and personable.  The Verevale servants are quite taken with him."

"Not to be personal or anything," I borrowed his disclaimer for boundary-crossing remarks, "But don't you get kind of, I don't know, lonely?  Frustrated?"

"Not really," he shrugged, something he hardly ever did around me anymore, "I'm happy to do all my hunting when we're up in London, or Plymouth or Oxford as the case may be, and then have a rest when we're in the country.  There are too many difficulties involved with getting off alone with a bloke on a country estate, there's very little privacy and everyone knows everyone else's business; I think it would make me tired."

"I'm glad I'm not in service, that kind of monasticism would drive me batty."

"I am also glad your lordship is not in service," he said with a tiny tiny smirk on his face, "You'd be a nightmare to work with."

"Good night, Pond," I laughed out loud, "Go sleep the sleep of the righteous."

"Thank you, my lord," he bowed, as wooden-faced as always but I could tell he was laughing inside, "Good night."

By then, I'd decided that I'd take pot luck in my own bedroom, so I went in and got comfortable in the bed, resumed the adventures of Lord Peter, and once again fell asleep with the book open on my face.  When I woke up the next morning, Pond was bringing me my coffee, and I couldn't decide whether or not to be disappointed that I'd slept undisturbed through the night.  After all, I'd really needed the sleep.
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NaNoWriMo 2014 - Day 10

I went looking for Lavinia, but she wasn't in any of the downstairs rooms, so I assumed she must be in her own room; sticking my head into a pantry or servery of some sort, I startled a couple of young housemaids in deep conversation, who gave me directions to the south-east corner of the third floor.  I apologised in florid terms for disturbing the maids, which made them giggle, and took the service stairs behind them up to the third floor.

Arriving a little out of breath, I listened at the door for a moment before knocking (one of my worst habits, I'm afraid, listening at keyholes) and heard a storm of girlish giggles coming from within.  Since it was more than one voice, but didn't sound like the intimate sort of giggles that one is loath to interrupt, I straightened up and rapped the panels smartly.

"Come!" Lavinia shouted imperiously, so I opened the door and went in, startling her, "Oh! Lord Foxbridge, I thought you were a footman, please forgive me."

"Not at all, I should apologise for invading your sanctum," I gave a courtly bow, sticking close to the door and taking a quick look around the room; it was very pretty, all glimmering pink satin and needlepoint roses, but not as frilly or precious as pink rooms often are, "And please, do call me Sebastian."

"Sebastian, please come in," she stood and gestured for me to join her on the sofa by the fire where she and Miss March* were sitting, "I hope you don't mind, but I let Abigail into our secret, and she's been helping me practice 'adoring' facial expressions."

"I'm glad you did," I sat down in the middle of the sofa, in between Abigail and Lavinia, "We'll need an accomplice if we're going to convince people, and your own close friend is the perfect candidate."

"This is going to be so much fun!" Abigail clapped her hands in delight, "I've never helped play a prank on anyone before.  What exactly are we going to do?"

"Well, after I talked to Michael last night, and he taxed me with my flirting with Lavinia, I came up with a plan.  We're going to make them feel guilty, make it look like I'm leading you on, and that their meddling in your love-life has set you up to get your feelings hurt."

"How do we do that?" Lavinia wondered.

"I'm going to keep on flirting with you, but I've already told Michael that I don't mean anything by it, it's just a sort of habit I have.  He may tell your father, or he may not, I'm not sure.  In the meantime, Abigail, you are going to tell Michael and Lord Levondale--introducing the topic in as 'by-the-way' a conversational manner as possible--that you think Lavinia is actually falling in love with me and wants to marry me.  Lavinia will start flirting back at me--but slowly, sort of warming up to it, if you see what I mean, like you're trying it on for size; if you started chasing after me like a dog after a bone, they'll know we're pranking them.  Which reminds me, should we let your mother in on the secret?  I'm not entirely comfortable playing this joke on Lady Levondale."

"Not right away," she answered after thinking it over a moment, "She might give the game away too soon.  I'll let her know once we've got Daddy and Michael going."

"I've had another idea that I hope you'll like," I turned to face Lavinia, "I thought of a way to use this prank to get the Duchess of Tyne as well, but I'll need your help."

"What for?" she wondered.

"Well, Lord Rupert and I were talking last night over billiards, and he was telling me that his mother actually brought him here for the sole purpose of courting you.  Apparently the family are broke, and she's using poor Rupert to catch an heiress.  And though he wants to please his mother, he doesn't really want to get married yet, and he feels very sordid about treating you as an object to be won.  So what I'd like you to do is just be chummy with him, like you two are becoming friends--and he's a very nice young man, I'm sure you will get to be friends with him."

"I suppose," she looked doubtful, "But how will that 'get' the Duchess?"

"She's going to be nagging Rupert to flirt with you, and plotting to get the two of you off alone together, and all those disagreeable matchmaking tricks; so we have to trick her into thinking he's doing what she wants. Rupert's going to tell his mother that he and I have cooked up a ruse between us, where I'm going to chase after you like ninety while he works on being your best pal; then, when I inevitably break your heart, he'll be there to pick up the pieces and you're sure to marry him on the rebound.  As we go along with our prank on Lord Levondale and Michael, the Duchess will think everything's going according to her plans, and she won't meddle.  What do you think?"

"I like it," she frowned thoughtfully, "One prank catching three victims, it's very efficient."

"Won't your secret fiancée be jealous?" Abigail asked in a conspiratorial whisper, as if the walls had ears.

"Hardly," I laughed, "Even if it was possible for her to hear about it all the way in Nice, she'd just think it was funny.  Actually, she'd take over the operation and sharpen the prank up to be truly devastating.  She's brilliant at this sort of thing.  And it's not really meant to be a secret, I'm engaged to Lady Caroline Chatroy.  She just doesn't want to announce it until either the second week of July, or at her mother's annual ball at the end of August, in order to get the maximum gossip-column noise."

"Lady Caroline!" Abigail squeaked with awe, "But she's absolutely gorgeous! And always so beautifully dressed.  I'd give anything to be even a little bit like her.  You're so lucky."

"Don't be so gushy, Abbie," Lavinia reproved her friend, "You'd think we were still in school, swooning over fashion magazines and pasting pictures of celebrities around our looking-glasses."

"I still do that," Abigail admitted sheepishly, and leaned close to me to whisper again, "I made a whole découpage of Hollywood actresses on a screen in my bedroom at home."

"Who's your favourite?" I grinned encouragingly, charmed by the idea of a découpage screen, wondering if I could make such a thing in my study--if so, Messrs Gary Cooper and George O'Brien would be prominently featured.

"Oh, Greta Garbo, definitely," Abigail gushed girlishly, "Though I also adore Myrna Loy."

"Garbo's wonderful," I agreed, "But I'd have to say Clara Bow is my favourite.  She's pretty and funny."

That remark started us off on an absolute orgy of film-star prattle, and Abigail's knowledge of actresses and their roles was truly profound: I couldn't name a film she hadn't seen, and she named dozens I hadn't even heard of.  All this while, Lavinia didn't participate, but just sat back and smiled indulgently at us, sometimes shaking her head in disbelief but otherwise just watching.  I got the idea that she'd spent much of her life just watching.

It was getting on for tea-time before we exhausted the subject, so I asked Lavinia to check that the coast was clear before I left her room; it's not really scandalous at a country-house for a bachelor to visit an unmarried young woman in her bedroom during daylight hours, but we wanted to save that kind of thing for later in the game, preferably with gossipy witnesses.

Going downstairs for tea, I felt suddenly as if I was forgetting something; then I realised that it was the first time since I'd been at Verevale that I'd gone upstairs and come down again without changing my clothes.  I briefly considered going in and at least changing my necktie or grabbing a fresh handkerchief, but my nearly-empty stomach dissuaded me, and I went in to tea with a good appetite.

During the meal, people got to discussing what rooms they were in, why the rooms were called what they were called, and which floor or side of the house their rooms were on.  This was a pretty common second-day topic, making it easier to find each-others' bedrooms at night: though it wasn't talked of openly, bedroom-hopping is as recognized a country sport as fox-hunting.

I didn't usually take much part in that sport, since in most of the houses I've been to it was a predominantly man-and-woman pursuit; but at Verevale I was actually surrounded by men who had already expressed an interest in me (Sir Peregrine, as one would expect, in the Egyptian Room to the north and Lord Rupert in the Moorish Room to the east of my southwest corner room, and Michael right above in the Blue Room).

But I also discovered during this exposition that Chester and Mamie Vandekamp were in the Gold Room, in the northeast corner of the third floor, and Jingo and Dotty were in the Queen's Room at the northwest corner of the second floor; so what was Chester doing in the second-floor corridor the previous evening, when I met him on the way to dinner?  Had Jingo or Dotty (or both) already been at him before he molested me in the lift?  I somehow doubted he'd been visiting Sir Wilfrid or Sir Peregrine.

Much to my own surprise, I felt insanely jealous that the Faringdons got to Chester before I could--and I had to wonder if that reaction was due to an unsuspected depth of feeling for Chester, or to my dislike and distrust of Jingo and Dotty.  The latter seemed more likely, but struck me as unpleasantly childish.  And maybe Chester had just been borrowing a collar-stud or something, and I had no reason to be jealous at all.

After tea I went out skeet-shooting with Lord Levondale and Sir Wilfrid, just to brush up my birding skills; there was going to be a shooting party on Tuesday morning, with various local gentry coming along for the fun, and I hate to blast away uselessly at practically-unmissable game with a lot of witnesses about.  I'm a merely adequate shot at the best of times, but without practice I might accidentally pot a beater.

Dressing for dinner, I brought Pond up to speed on all I'd learned and conspired about during the course of the day, and he gave me the details of the below-stairs version of bedroom-hopping (which consisted mostly of rather chaste banter and the occasional slow-dance by the gramophone after dinner--servants, as a class, are rather less licentious than their so-called betters, and belowstairs affaires des cœurs such as we had at Foxbridge are rare); I also canvassed his views on Chester's possible liaison with one or both of the Faringdons, and he soothed the green-eyed monster by pointing out it would be unlikely that he'd come out of the Queen's Room fully and properly dressed for dinner if he'd been doing anything untoward in there.

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Note for those following along in real time: I changed Abigail's surname from Smallridge to March.