ALSO BY T E KINSEY

  The Lady Hardcastle Mysteries

  A Quiet Life in the Country

  In the Market for Murder

  Death Around the Bend

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2017 by T E Kinsey.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Amazon Publishing, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Amazon Publishing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  eISBN: 9781503956971

  Cover design by Lisa Horton

  CONTENTS

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ONE

  Lady Farley-Stroud set her cup and saucer down with a clatter. The occasional table beside the armchair in our drawing room wobbled precariously under the impact.

  ‘I shan’t hear another word on the matter,’ she said. ‘You shall both come up to The Grange for Christmas.’

  ‘But, Gertie, dear—’ began Lady Hardcastle.

  ‘Butts are for storing rainwater in the garden, Emily. You’re not going to sit down here on your own while the rest of our family and friends are swaying away on the top-ropes up at the big house.’

  Lady Hardcastle sighed. ‘You know I want to—’

  ‘But you’re afraid of placing even more of a burden on us. I know. You’re the kindest and most thoughtful person I know, m’dear, but you should just let Hector and me worry about the money. Actually, we’ll let Clarissa worry about it. She can sell the place when we’re dead and buried – that should settle all our debts, pay the death duty, and leave her enough for a slap-up feed to wish us on our way. As long as she goes easy on the slap-up feed.’

  It was a sign of how thoroughly I’d been accepted by Lady Farley-Stroud that she felt able to make jokes about her financial circumstances in front of a ‘mere’ lady’s maid like me.

  ‘Tell you what,’ she continued, ‘if you can get hold of a couple of geese and a crate of ale for the villagers, we’ll call it quits. Honour will be satisfied, and I can have the company of my dear friend at the most fractious time of the year. Goodness knows I’ll need an ally with Hector’s sister, Joyce, there. My own sister can only do so much to assist me, and Joyce will be the living end without a chum to guard my other flank.’

  ‘We can’t have that,’ said Lady Hardcastle. She paused a moment, and then sighed with resignation. ‘We shall be delighted to join you. I shall seek out the required tribute and see that you’re properly goosed in plenty of time.’

  ‘I say!’ said Lady Farley-Stroud with a surprisingly girlish giggle. ‘And you, Armstrong – you’re to come as a guest, not a servant.’

  ‘Thank you, my lady,’ I said. ‘But are you sure? What about Edna and Miss Jones?’

  ‘They’ll get their own invitations as villagers, of course. We invite everyone up for a meal and a drink on Boxing Day. We give the children a little something. But you, m’girl, shall be with family and friends. The villagers know you well enough now to think nothing of it, especially after all the things you’ve done for them. And it will do our relatives a bit of good to be scandalized.’

  ‘Oh, I can scandalize with the best of them, if you’re sure that’s what you want,’ I said.

  ‘As outrageous as you dare,’ she said. ‘So that’s settled?’

  ‘Yes, dear,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘Thank you.’

  Lady Farley-Stroud struggled to her feet. ‘Splendid,’ she said. ‘I’d best be on my merry way. Lots to do, lots to do. Thank you for the tea, dear.’

  Lady Hardcastle stood, too. ‘You’re welcome to drop in and drink our tea any time, you know that.’

  ‘Y’see? How could I not return such generous hospitality?’

  I rose to see her to the door.

  ‘I’ll find my own way out,’ she said, waving me back down. ‘Don’t mind me. You just hunt out your most comely frocks for the festivities and we’ll see you on Christmas Eve.’

  Giving a cheery wave, she swept out of the room accompanied by the rustling of her voluminous skirt.

  ‘I say,’ she called from the hallway. ‘Which coat is . . . As you were – I see it now. Cheerio, m’dears.’

  The door slammed behind her and she was gone.

  ‘So much for a quiet Christmas at home,’ said Lady Hardcastle.

  ‘We had a quiet Christmas last year,’ I said.

  ‘Only because I’d been shot. It wasn’t nearly as much fun as I’d have liked.’

  ‘Well, this will be fun, too. We’ve never had a proper country Christmas. We’ve celebrated in London, Shanghai, Calcutta, Paris . . .’

  ‘We have,’ she said. ‘And that peculiar time in Berlin with Count Pfumpfel von Schnerfenflerf.’

  ‘I’m reasonably certain that wasn’t his name,’ I said. ‘But I agree it was a most peculiar affair. Wasn’t there a boar hunt at one point?’

  ‘Indoors,’ she said. ‘With his grandchildren standing in as boars.’

  ‘With papier-mâché tusks.’

  ‘How on earth did we smuggle you into that one?’

  ‘I was posing as your pal,’ I said. ‘I was Lady Philomena Fitzwilliam-Barratt, mining heiress and girl-about-town. We were trying to pinch some papers from some dreary Prussian colonel or other.’

  ‘Good lord, so we were. Didn’t his wife slap you?’

  ‘There was a . . . slight disagreement,’ I said. ‘She objected to the overly familiar way I was talking to the colonel, and I objected to her trying to slap my face.’

  ‘She ended up on her backside on the ballroom floor.’

  ‘She must have slipped,’ I said, innocently.

  ‘We have had some fun, haven’t we?’

  ‘Always,’ I said. ‘And Christmas at The Grange will be just as much fun.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re right,’ she agreed. ‘We’d better get ourselves organized. What was Gertie’s shopping list again?’

  ‘Two geese and a crate of ale,’ I said. ‘For the villagers.’

  ‘Oh, I think we can do better than that. They’ll need more than one crate of ale for the villagers. And two geese isn’t nearly enough. Half a dozen? We should add a side of beef and a couple of cases of champagne for the big house. Better make it half a dozen cases – do you remember that awful stuff they had at Clarissa’s engagement party? And a couple of turkeys. Oh, and some brandy. And port. We should get them some Bordeaux for the beef. And Burgundy if you do manage to get any turkeys this late in the day. Although they’ll probably have their own. So get Burgundy, anyway. And something sweet to go with the pudding. Sauternes? And get some sherry from Harvey’s – it’s not Christmas without sherry.’

  ‘I’ll telephone the wine merchant,’ I said.

  ‘Good girl. There’s only a week to go so I think you might have to find a butcher in town. I doubt Fred Spratt will have geese and beef to spare.’

  She was probably right, but I planned to visit Fred in the morning, anyway. I always liked to support the local shopkeepers and I thought I’d at least give him a chance. ‘Leave it to me,’ I said to her retreating back as she left the room. ‘We’ll do them proud.’

  ‘And find a confectioner’s,’ she called. ‘Lots of delicious sugary things for the little ones.’

  There had been a blissful few moments just after she had accepted the invitation when I believed I was going to have an easy and relaxed Christmas. It never pays to get one’s hopes up.

  * * *

  Lady Hardcastle’s vintner in Bristol treated me to the expected amount of teeth-sucking and we shall have to see what we can do-ing when I telephoned him. It seemed very important to him to make it plain just how much I was putting him out, and how much of an effort would be required to supply so much booze at such short notice. Of course, this was followed by the equally expected reassurances that he would move Heaven and Earth to make sure that one of his most valued customers was taken care of. I imagined him chuckling to himself and dancing a merry little dance as he contemplated this unexpected boost to his profits. Perhaps there would be an even more luxurious Christmas for himself, Mrs Vintner and all the little Vintners.

  Fred Spratt, the village butcher, made no such fuss. He was as affable and helpful as ever, and assured me that the extra meat would be delivered to The Grange in plenty of time. Mrs Spratt wished me a merry Christmas while their daughter, my good friend Daisy, asked whether she’d see me at The Grange.

  ‘I shall be there,’ I said. ‘With Christmas bells on.’

  ‘You comin’ up on Boxin’ Day with the rest of the village?’ she asked.

  ‘We are. And we’re having Christmas lunch with the family, too.’

  ‘What, even you?’

  ‘Even, as you say, me.’

  She laughed. ‘I don’t mean no insult,’ she said. ‘But you knows what I means. They don’t usually have servants to dinner.’

  ‘Wh
en I was a girl,’ interrupted Mrs Spratt, ‘I used to wonder whether they might have servants for dinner. I was terrified of the people in the big house near where I grew up. I was sure they must be terrible monsters who ate their servants.’

  ‘Ma!’ protested Daisy. ‘That’s disgustin’.’

  ‘What is, dear?’

  ‘Talkin’ about eatin’ people.’

  ‘Really? What do you think goes in your dad’s pork pies?’

  ‘Ma!’ said Daisy again.

  ‘As far as I know,’ I said, ‘I’m not on the menu. And I’ve been asked to wear a – what did she say? – a “comely frock”. My guess is that I’m expected at table.’

  ‘And none deserves it more than you, m’dear,’ said Mrs Spratt. ‘You and your mistress has been a breath of fresh air to this village, not to mention how many ne’er-do-wells you’ve brought to justice between you. You put on your best frock and go to that dinner. You can be our representative at the top table.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Spratt,’ I said. ‘I shall scoff and quaff on behalf of all the village.’

  ‘You do that, my girl. And if you gets a chance, drink some champagne for me.’

  ‘You’re a lover of champagne?’ I asked.

  ‘A’n’t never had none,’ she said. ‘But I’ve always fancied a drop. It always seemed like the height of luxury to me.’

  ‘Then I shall toast you if I get a chance,’ I said.

  She smiled warmly.

  By this time, Mr Spratt had finished his calculations and he showed me the bloodstained scrap of paper he’d been working on.

  ‘Would that be acceptable?’ he asked.

  I looked at the numbers. ‘It seems a fair price to me,’ I said. ‘Send the bill over as soon as you can and I’ll make sure you get paid in plenty of time for Christmas.’

  We exchanged farewells and another round of ‘Merry Christmas’ before I made my way home again in the chill December air.

  I found Lady Hardcastle in her study, catching up with some correspondence. I assured her that both meat and drink were well in hand, and then lingered at the door.

  ‘Did you want something, dear?’ she asked.

  ‘Not really,’ I said. ‘Mrs Spratt brought me down with a bit of a bump just now, that’s all. She said she’d never drunk champagne. And I thought of all the times I’ve drunk it – on missions all over Europe, at Codrington Hall, even just here in the evening because we fancied it. I just wanted to tell you how glad I am that you invited me to be part of your madcap world all those years ago.’

  ‘The pleasure has been entirely mine, Flo, dear,’ she said. ‘I’d be dead in a ditch somewhere were it not for you. Or living here on my own, lonely and batty, surrounded by parakeets.’

  ‘Parakeets?’ I said.

  ‘I would have turned to them for company.’

  ‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Well, I just wanted you to know that I don’t take my privileged life for granted.’

  ‘I never imagined for a moment that you do,’ she said. ‘But you’ve given me an idea. Do you think The Grange could make do with just five cases of fizz?’

  ‘I should imagine they could make do without any at all if they had to.’

  ‘Splendid. In that case – oh, I say, it’s all about cases, isn’t it? – in that case we shall hold one back and give a bottle each to the village shopkeepers who have kept us so splendidly supplied with essentials throughout the year.’

  ‘What a good idea,’ I said. ‘What about Edna and Miss Jones?’

  ‘I’ve bought them each a pair of those lovely kid gloves we saw in that little shop in Bristol. I thought that would combine elegance and practicality in one useful gift. But I see no reason why we can’t treat them to a bottle of chammy each as well.’

  ‘And me?’

  ‘You’ll have to wait and see,’ she said.

  I left her to her letter writing and went upstairs to see what sort of a state my best frock was in.

  * * *

  On the day before Christmas Eve, Edna and I made an unfashionably early start and decorated the house with the requisite quantity of ribbon, tinsel, and garlands of assorted evergreens. Lady Hardcastle wasn’t fond of Christmas trees, but we managed to persuade her to let us put one up in the hall. Once we had decorated it with yet more tinsel, and glass baubles and candles, then set a glittering star on the top, even Lady Miseryguts had to concede that it gave the house an air of festive jollity.

  I had placed the orders for her Christmas presents shortly after her birthday at the beginning of November. The first part had arrived promptly and was safely hidden in the attic. As the weeks dragged by, and Christmas drew ever closer, I had begun to despair of the second part arriving in time. But when I telephoned to try to establish whether I needed to think of something else, I was assured that the item had been made to my exact specifications and was awaiting final finishing. It would, they said, be dispatched in good time. They offered to gift-wrap it as a way of thanking me for my patience.

  It was with some relief that I answered the door on Christmas Eve morning to find the postman struggling with a cumbersome package addressed to ‘Miss Florence Armstrong, Littleton Lane, Littleton Cotterell, Glos’.

  ‘There you goes, miss,’ said the postman as he handed it over. ‘I must say, me heart sank to me boots when I saw it at the sortin’ office. “How am I goin’ to carry that as well as all me letters?” I says. But they just laughed. “Pick ’e up,” they says. “Mind you don’t strain yourself.” So I braces meself and puts all me strength into it. I fell flat on me backside, didn’t I? It don’t weigh nothin’ at all. You been buyin’ empty boxes?’

  ‘It’s a special package of London Fog,’ I said. ‘I bought it for Lady Hardcastle to remind her of home.’

  He looked at me for a second before his face split into a grin. ‘You had me goin’ for a moment there,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry, I i’n’t fishin’. We takes the privacy of the public very seriously at the Post Office. None o’ my business what you bought. I just thought it were funny it was so big but weighed so little, that’s all.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I’d happily tell you more, but it’s a surprise.’ I dropped my voice to a conspiratorial whisper to emphasize my point. ‘She might overhear.’

  He tapped the side of his nose. ‘Mum’s the word,’ he said. ‘Merry Christmas.’

  I turned back inside and picked up an envelope from the table beside the door. ‘And a merry Christmas to you, too,’ I said as I handed it to him.

  The coins inside the envelope jingled slightly as he took it, and he smiled as he tucked it into the pocket of his tunic.

  ‘Much obliged to you, I’m sure,’ he said. He touched the peak of his cap in salute as he turned and retreated down the garden path.

  I struggled inside with the unwieldy box just as Lady Hardcastle emerged from her study.

  ‘Oh, I say, what have we got here?’ she asked excitedly.

  ‘Never you mind,’ I said, and immediately cursed myself for not saying it was something for the kitchen.

  She gave an exaggerated wink. ‘Sufficient unto Christmas Day are the presents thereof, eh?’ she said.

  ‘Something like that,’ I said, resignedly. ‘No peeking, though.’

  ‘I wouldn’t dream of it.’ She leaned back slightly as she appraised the package. ‘It’s big, though, isn’t it? I’m beginning to wonder if I’ve misjudged my present to you now.’

  ‘A certain amount of gift-related anxiety is part and parcel of the Christmas holiday,’ I said. ‘I’m glad to be the provider of perturbation for once. The boot is usually on the other foot.’

  ‘Is it boots?’ she said.

  ‘You’ll have to wait and see.’

  ‘Sea?’ she said. ‘A model steamboat?’

  I raised an eyebrow. ‘With all due deference and respect, my lady, shut your potato trap and get out of the way. I’ve got work to do.’

  She stepped nimbly aside and I carried the package through to the kitchen.

  * * *

  At seven o’clock that evening, Lady Hardcastle and I were dressed and ready for the commencement of seasonal festivities at The Grange. I was, for only the third time since it had been bought for me as a birthday gift, wearing my ‘new’ green gown. With its richly embroidered bodice and the glittering beads and sequins on the sheer silk that fell over the skirt, I wondered if I might look altogether too much like a Christmas tree.