Her Royal Spyness (22 page)

“Think no more about it, my love. That much I can do for you. And I’d ask you to stay for lunch but I promised I’d go over to the widow next door. She kept on inviting me and I kept on refusing, and then I thought, Why not? What’s wrong with a bit of company?”

“What’s wrong indeed,” I said. I reached across the table and took his hand. “Can she cook?”

“Not as good as your grandma, but she ain’t bad. She ain’t bad at all.”

“Enjoy your lunch, Granddad.”

He looked almost bashful. “She can’t be after my money,” he said with a wheezy laugh, “so it must be my good looks.

Shall I meet you tomorrow, then? I’ll find out about your window cleaners and then we’ll go to Claridge’s.”

“All right,” I said, feeling my stomach twisting itself into a knot. Posing as a maid to get into a person’s room was serious business. If I was caught, I might well harm Binky’s cause rather than help it.

Chapter 19

Belinda’s mews and later Rannoch House
Sunday, May 1, 1932

Belinda roused herself shortly before five o’clock and came downstairs looking stunning in red trousers and a black riding jacket. This immediately reminded me that I had nothing to wear, even if I could get into Rannoch House, which didn’t seem likely. I lamented this to Belinda, who immediately opened up her wardrobe and fixed me up with a spiffing yachting outfit consisting of white skirt and blue blazer with white trim. It even came with a jaunty little sailor’s cap. The result, when I looked in the mirror, was quite satisfying.

“Are you sure you don’t want to wear this?” I asked Belinda.

“Good Lord, no. It’s not exactly the height of fashion, darling. You can get away with it, of course, but if I were to be seen in it at Cowes, bang would go my reputation.”

I thought privately that her reputation had probably gone bang already.

“Off we go, then,” she said, slipping her arm through mine.

“Belinda, I’m very grateful for everything you’re doing for me,” I said.

“Darling, think nothing of it. I would have been expelled from Les Oiseaux many times over if you hadn’t rescued me. And you are certainly in need of a friend at the moment.”

I couldn’t have agreed more. We took a taxi to the boat dock at Westminster pier, even though I suspect that neither of us had money to waste on taxies. But one had to arrive properly, as Belinda put it, and so we did.

The boat/ship/yacht currently tied up at the pier was large and sleek, bigger than any cabin cruiser I had seen—a sort of junior transatlantic liner. An awning had been erected on the rear deck (Is that called the poop? I’m not up in nautical terms). A gramophone was playing and couples were already dancing some kind of hop. I was so enthralled with the scene on board that I almost caught my foot in a rope lying across the top of the steps and would have sprawled forward if Belinda hadn’t caught me.

“Careful,” she said. “You don’t want to arrive headfirst. Now go down the ladder backward and watch your footing. I really don’t want to have to fish you out of the Thames.”

“I’ll try hard,” I said. “Do you think I’ll ever outgrow my clumsiness?”

“Probably not,” Belinda replied with a grin. “If deportment classes, gym at Les Oiseaux, and climbing those crags in Scotland haven’t cured you, I’d say you were destined to be clumsy for life.”

I lowered myself down the ladder carefully. I hadn’t reached the bottom step when hands came around my waist and lifted me to the deck.

“Well, look who’s here,” said a familiar voice and there was Darcy, looking devastating in a white open-necked shirt and rolled up sailor’s trousers. “I’m glad Belinda persuaded you to come.”

“So am I,” I stammered, because his hands were still around my waist. To my annoyance I found myself blushing.

“Aren’t you going to give me a hand, Darcy?” Belinda asked. Darcy let go of me.

“If you wish, although I thought you were capable of doing most things remarkably well.”

There was something in the quick glance that passed between them that I couldn’t interpret. It did cross my mind that his might have been the bed she shared last night. I was surprised at the rush of jealousy I felt. But then, I reasoned, why would she have insisted that I come this afternoon if she wanted him for herself?

“Come and meet our host,” Belinda said, dragging me away. “Eduardo, this is my good friend Georgiana Rannoch. Georgie, may I present Eduardo Carrera from Argentina.”

I found myself looking at a most suave gentleman, maybe in his late twenties, dark sleek hair, Ronald Coleman mustache, dressed impeccably in blazer and flannels.

“Señor Carrera.” I held out my hand and he brought it to his lips.

“Delighted to welcome you on board my little tub, Lady Georgiana,” he said in perfect English without trace of a foreign accent.

“Little tub!” I laughed. “Did you sail it all the way from Argentina?”

“No, I regret it was just from the Isle of Wight. Although she is supposed to be up to an Atlantic crossing. I have not been back to Argentina since my parents sent me to Eton. Obviously I’ll have to go back sometime to take over the family business, but until then I make the most of the delights Europe has to offer.” He let his gaze linger first on me then on Belinda in a most suggestive way. “Let me find you some champagne.”

Belinda nudged me as he moved off. “See what I mean about charming foreigners? Any Englishman you meet would say, ‘What-ho, old thing,’ and start talking about the cricket or at most the hunting.”

“He is rather dashing,” I said.

“His mother’s Argentine English. Between the two families they own half of Argentina. Not a bad catch at all.”

“Are you angling yourself or are you telling me to cast my line?” I whispered.

She smiled. “Haven’t decided yet, so feel free. My theory is always that all is fair in love and war.” Again I wondered if she was referring to Darcy.

“So where did you meet Darcy?” I couldn’t help asking. “Was it at the party last night?”

“What?” she appeared distracted. “Darcy? Oh, yes. He was there. He may be a little too wicked for you, Georgie, but I can tell you that he’s certainly still interested. He asked a million questions.”

“About what?”

“Oh, this and that. Of course everyone was speculating about the murder. They were all on your side, by the way. Nobody in the room could believe that Binky could drown anyone in a bathtub.”

“Did they have any theories on who might have done the drowning?”

“None at all. But I can tell you that de Mauxville was not the most popular man in the world. Everyone agreed that he cheated at cards and did not behave like a gentleman. So I think it’s safe to say he had his share of enemies.”

“No suggestion as to who they might be?”

“If you mean did anyone own up to the murder, the answer is no. The murderer could be quite outside of our set. If de Mauxville has criminal connections it could be a falling-out of thieves.”

“Goodness, I hadn’t thought of that,” I said. “But we’d have no way of checking up on criminals.”

“Everyone got a glass in their hands?” Eduardo called. “Right-o. Take a seat and hold on tight so that we can cast off.”

“Let’s sit here, on the side, so that we’ll get the heavenly breeze in our faces,” Belinda said, hoisting herself up onto the rim of the boat with her feet on the teak seat. I followed suit. “I’m sure we’ll be going very fast, if I know Eduardo. He also drives racing cars, and he flies.”

“Like Peter Pan?”

She laughed. “A plane, darling. A dear, dinky little plane. He’s promised to take me up sometime.”

As if on cue a motor roared to life, making the whole boat throb with power.

“Ready to cast off,” Eduardo shouted as someone rushed to release the ropes that held the ship fast to the jetty. Suddenly we took off with such force that I was thrown backward. I made a futile grab at the smooth side of the boat as I went flying off into the ice cold water. Around me the water was churning madly and the thrashing of propellers boomed through my ears. Gasping, I fought my way to the surface. I’m a strong swimmer and wasn’t particularly scared until I realized I was being dragged along. Something was wound tightly around my ankle and I couldn’t reach it because of the speed at which I was being dragged. I fought to keep my head above water long enough to scream, but I couldn’t without getting a mouthful of water. Surely someone must have seen what had happened. I had been surrounded by people. Belinda had been sitting right beside me. I waved my arms frantically. Then there was a splash, strong arms came around me, and the motor was mercifully cut. I was dragged back to the ship and hauled back on board. Everyone was making a big fuss of me, while I sat there, gasping and coughing like a landed fish.

“Are you all right?” Darcy asked, and I saw from his wet state that he had been one of those who dived in to save me.

“I think so,” I said. “More shocked than anything.”

“You’re lucky you didn’t bash your head on the side as you went in,” another voice said and I looked up to see the stiff, upright form of Whiffy Featherstonehaugh. “Because then you’d just have gone under and we might never have noticed you.”

I shivered. Whiffy patted my shoulder awkwardly. “Anyway, my dear Georgie, I regret to inform you that there are no fish big enough in the Thames to warrant using you as bait,” he said. The typical Englishman’s way of offering sympathy. I noticed he was not wet.

Eduardo appeared with a blanket in one hand and a brandy in the other. “I’m so frightfully sorry,” he said. “I can’t think how that happened.”

“It’s just Georgie,” Belinda said, helping to put the blanket around my shoulders. “Things seem to happen to her. Accident-prone, you know.”

“Then I’ll watch out for albatrosses on the voyage,” Eduardo said. “Come down to the cabin and I’ll find some dry clothes for you.”

“So you have to almost drown a girl before you can lure her to your cabin these days, eh, Eduardo?” someone asked.

Everyone was making light of the episode, the way people do after they have had a fright. Belinda went down below with me and helped me into Eduardo’s striped fisherman’s jersey and a pair of baggy trousers about five sizes too big for me.

“Honestly, Georgie,” she said, laughing and looking worried at the same time, “who else but you could fall off a boat with her foot tangled in a rope?”

“I can’t imagine how it happened,” I said. “The beastly thing was absolutely knotted fast around my ankle. I tried to get it off but I couldn’t.”

“I’m going to watch over you like a hawk for the rest of the trip,” she said. “Now come back on deck and let’s see if we can dry out your clothes.”

“They are your clothes and I’m afraid they are rather the worse for being in Thames water,” I said. “It tasted foul.”

Darcy was waiting as I came out of the cabin. “Are you sure you’re all right?” he said. “My God, you look like a drowned rat. Are you sure you wouldn’t rather I took you home?”

I had to admit that I wasn’t feeling too well. I must have swallowed gallons of Thames water and I was still shivering, probably with delayed shock.

“If you really don’t mind,” I said. “It might be best. But I don’t want to spoil your afternoon.”

“I am also, as you might notice, pretty darned wet,” he said, “and Eduardo didn’t offer to take me to his cabin and dry me off.”

I laughed.

“That’s better,” he said. “You looked as if you were about to pass out a minute ago. Come on, let’s see if Eduardo knows how to back this thing up.”

A few minutes later we were moored, once again, at the jetty.

“Watch out for ropes this time,” Belinda called after me. “See you tonight.”

Darcy hailed a taxi.

“Belgrave Square, isn’t it? What’s the number?” he asked.

“I can’t go home,” I said dismally. “The police may still be there and anyway the house is surrounded by reporters and the morbidly curious.”

“Then where are we going?”

“I’ve been sleeping on Belinda’s sofa,” I said. “I do have a change of clothes there and I can wash out the clothes she lent me before they are stained forever with this Thames water.”

“You want to go back to Belinda’s place?”

“I can’t think where else to go right now,” I said, and my voice wobbled. “The problem is that it’s her maid’s day off and I only know how to cook baked beans and I was so looking forward to a lovely picnic.”

“I tell you what,” Darcy said. “Why don’t we go back to my place? Don’t look like that. I promise to behave like a gentleman and there is good wine in the cellar and I know a great place to have a picnic. And I am about to catch pneumonia myself and you wouldn’t want that, would you, especially after I dived into that awful water to rescue you.”

“How can I refuse,” I said. “And it does sound a lot better than baked beans.”

The taxi now whisked us in the direction of Chelsea and stopped outside a pretty little blue and white shuttered house. “Here we are,” he said.

Darcy opened the front door and ushered me through to a tiny living room. No heads or shields on the walls, no portraits of ancestors, just a couple of good modern paintings and comfortable sofas. This is how ordinary people live, I thought with a pang of envy, and I pictured myself living in a house like this with Darcy, doing the cooking and cleaning myself, and . . .

“Give me a second to go and change,” he said. “If you want to rinse out those wet clothes there’s a sink in the scullery.”

Thanks to living alone at Rannoch House, I now knew where a scullery was to be found and went through a small, neat kitchen to the room beyond. Here I ran the sink full of water (hot water, oh, the bliss of it; I almost jumped in with the clothes) and plunged the clothes into it. When they came out, I did notice that the white skirt had now become light blue, but hoped it might go away when the garment dried. I opened the door to find a place to hang them and found myself beside the Thames. I was in a small, pretty garden with a tiny lawn and a tree that had just burst into leaf. Beyond was a jetty. I stood there entranced until I was found by Darcy.

“Now you’ve seen how the plebs live,” he said. “Not bad, eh?”