Page 61 of The Secrets of Ashmore Castle

Cowling came back with champagne and various eatables. ‘Good wine this,’ he said, taking his seat. ‘I will say for Lord Wroughton, he knows his wine – or his wine-merchant does. Do you like champagne, Miss Sanderton?’

‘Very much.’ Nina felt languid after all the dancing, and as she was hungry too, she preferred him to do the talking while she ate. So she plied him with questions, and once she had got him started, he went on quite freely. He had interesting things to say about the King’s problems. ‘He thinks Buckingham Palace is in a shocking state and wants a whirlwind going through it. Waste everywhere, daft rules about who does what. Can’t so much as get a fire lit without applying to the master of this and comptroller of the other. One feller brings the coal, but he’s not allowed to touch the matches.’ He shook his head at the folly. Nina made an interested sound to keep him going. ‘His Majesty wants to modernise everything, but it’s like trying to shift a mountain. Everyone’s got their own interest in keeping things as they are. Like Osborne House, you see – there’s the King and Queen, don’t like the place, never go near it, can’t afford to keep it up, and what do they need it for anyroad, when they’ve got Sandringham? But can he get rid of it? Not on your life! The rest of the family throw up their hands in horror – what, sell dear Osborne? With all its precious memories?’

This, Nina realised, was sarcasm. ‘I suppose,’ she said cautiously, ‘they were all children there, and the old Queen—’

‘Aye, you’ve put your finger on it,’ said Mr Cowling. ‘It’s his brothers and sisters. Want the place for free lodgings. The fact of it is, they mean to live off him as much as they can. Well, I’ve told him – don’t you let ’em!’

It was an exciting conversation to Nina, concerning such high-up royal personages. It gave her a feeling like falling through the air – exhilarating, but potentially dangerous. ‘The King relies on your advice?’ she prompted.

‘He likes me to speak my mind. And I do. Mind, I don’t say he isn’t everything a king should be, and there’s no doubting when you’re in his presence that he’s as grand as our old queen was – more so. You wouldn’t dare speak out of turn, not without he asked your opinion particularly. He’s a very great man, our king,’ he assured her. ‘And he’s that full of energy, he’s wearing ’em all out, all those silk-lined courtiers. They’ve had it easy for too long. Why, he’s up till one in the morning, playing bridge, then back in his office at eight reading despatches. Lord knows when he sleeps! I have to say, Miss Sanderton, that I can’t get by without a decent night’s sleep. I like my eight hours. But I’m not the King.’

‘You must work very hard, though,’ Nina suggested, ‘with your businesses to run.’

‘You’re right,’ he said, seeming pleased. ‘Hard work, that’s been my watchword. Along with honesty and fair dealing. That’s how I’ve made my fortune – not by rooking folk with shoddy goods and deceiving words, like some I could mention. But,’ he seemed to recollect himself, ‘this is a poor way to be entertaining a young lady. You must be bored to tears with my nonsense.’

‘Not at all,’ Nina said, and meant it.

He looked at her closely. ‘I must say, I find you very easy to talk to, Miss Sanderton. I don’t know how it is, but when I saw you, when we first arrived, I sort of liked the look of you. The fact is, I’ve never had much to do with young ladies, so you must forgive me if I’m a bit awkward. I knew my wife from childhood, you see, she was like an old friend, and I never had to do much in the way of courting her. We married very young.’

‘Is your wife back in Leicester?’ Nina asked politely.

‘Aye, that she is – in Welford Road Cemetery. She died five years since.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Nina said, embarrassed.

‘Well, I’m sorry – sorry as can be. But there’s no need for you to be,’ he said. ‘And here I am, still not talking about things a young lady’d like to hear.’ He clapped his hand to his brow. ‘What kind of a noddy must you think me? You’ll go back to dancing with your friends after supper and tell ’em you were stuck in a corner with a complete nodcock.’

‘No, no,’ she protested politely. ‘It must have been a dreadful shock for you to lose your wife, when you’d been married such a long time.’

‘Well, it was,’ he acknowledged. ‘She was sixteen and I was twenty when we wed, and such a sweet pretty thing she was. She had a look of that young lady over there, the one with the glacé sarcoline pumps.’

‘Miss Bayfield,’ Nina supplied, from the direction rather than the shoe description.

‘Aye, as pretty and fresh as a bunch of violets,’ he said admiringly. He was silent a moment, gazing at Kitty, then went on talking about his late wife, a topic that lasted until people began to move.

Kitty came past on the arm of Lord Stainton. ‘We’re going back in, Nina. I’m dancing with Mr Courtlandt next,’ she said. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes bright – Nina guessed she had been enjoying her supper conversation just as much as Nina had, but for very different reasons.

Mr Cowling stood up. ‘I should deliver you to your first partner,’ he said. ‘Who are you dancing with next, Miss Sanderton?’

Carriages were provided on Sunday morning to take everyone to church who wanted to go, which, as Lady Wroughton was known to be a stickler, was everybody. The service was a long one, and the night before had been strenuous, and many a young lady had difficulty in keeping her eyes open and her mouth shut all the way through.

When they stepped out into the sunshine, some people stood and chatted, while others got into carriages in different combinations from the journey out, with the result that there were not places for all. Several people said they would like to walk back through the park on such a lovely day, rather than wait for the carriages to go to the house and return, and Nina was one of them. She felt stiff and stuffy and wanted fresh air and movement to clear her head. She had seen Kitty climb into a carriage with her parents, presumably summoned for an inquisition on the night before, so she knew she wasn’t needed.

Eight of them started off together, but by the time they turned in at the park gates they were well strung out. Nina, a good walker, was in the van with Lord Stainton – they had come together quite naturally and comfortably, like old friends. Mr de Grey and Miss Courtlandt started out with them, but soon began to lag behind, absorbed in a tête-à-tête. For a while Nina and Stainton walked in silence – one of the comfortable things, she thought, about real friends was being able to be silent together. Nina enjoyed the movement of her limbs, the verdant view and the sounds and smells of nature. The green of the park was decked in bridal white, hawthorn and chestnut, moon daisies and kex.

‘Who was that queer old fellow you went in to supper with last night, Miss Sanderton?’ Stainton asked at last.

‘Mr Cowling. He was one of the King’s party.’

‘So I saw. But he seemed to have a great deal to say. He quite monopolised you.’

He sounded almost peevish about it. Nina glanced up at him. ‘He was telling me about his wife, who died five years ago. He misses her.’

Stainton’s expression softened. ‘You were good to listen to him so patiently. But I believe you are always kind.’

‘No-one is always kind,’ she said. ‘And Mr Cowling was interesting when he talked about his business.’

‘Then to interest you I should talk about my business? Unfortunately, I’m only just starting to learn it.’