The scullery was at the front of the house, with a narrow window overlooking the area. Phyllis, the kitchen maid, was already there, pointing excitedly to the road, where a fine carriage stood, with four horses, two coachmen and two footmen in livery.
“Callers?” Betty said, but Margaret laughed.
“Miss Rochester is going out for the evening. Wait, and you’ll see her in all her finery.”
Within a very few minutes, Mrs Mayberry appeared carrying a portmanteau, and then a girl of perhaps twenty or so, in arather over-decorated evening gown and cloak, her abundant black curls elaborately dressed.
“Ooh, so pretty!” Phyllis said in hushed tones, as a footman held open the carriage door for Miss Rochester. “Such pretty hair.”
“That’s a wig,” Margaret said. “Her own hair is brown and straight as a stair-rod, but the gentleman likes black curls better.”
Miss Rochester stepped inside the carriage, the footman closed the door and tossed the portmanteau up to the coachman on the box, then hopped onto the back of the carriage. Almost at once, it creaked into motion, the horses stepping smartly away from the house and disappearing down the road.
“Where’s she off to, then?” Betty said.
“It’s not for the likes of us to know where madam’s nieces go to,” Margaret said repressively.
“She ought to have a chaperon,” Betty said.
Margaret looked about to speak, but then closed her mouth firmly.
They all drifted back to the servants’ hall and their afternoon chores, Betty still wondering aloud who owned the smart carriage, and where the girl might be going with an overnight bag. Scarborough, she decided. No doubt there was a ball or some such going on there.
Tess did not have to wonder quite so much. She had recognised the carriage, the coachmen and the footmen’s livery.
The only question in her mind was what Cousin Eustace’s interest was in Miss Rochester.
4: A New Plan
For the rest of the day, Tess could think of little but the unexpected sight of Eustace’s carriage taking Miss Rochester away. She had never thought Eustace had anything to do with Pickering, but she supposed he might have friends in the town. He had friends all over the place, and rarely seemed to be at home. As a single man, he could not entertain ladies at his own house, and there would be no evening parties at Corland, not with the family in such disarray, so presumably Miss Rochester was being taken elsewhere as Eustace’s guest.
Betty was still wondering over it, too, as they climbed into bed that night. “Wherever she was goin’, she should have had a chaperon,” she said sourly.
“There was no one else in the carriage that I could see,” Tess said.
“Don’t matter,” Betty said. “Her aunt should have gone with her… if she is her aunt, that is.”
“Why should Mrs Mayberry say she is the girls’ aunt if she is not?”
“Aye, that’s the question, ain’t it? This is a strange house and no mistake, Miss Tess. Mrs Mayberry is the mistress here, supposedly, but she acts more like a housekeeper than a respectable widow. And four young ladies in the house, but they never go out callin’, nor no one calls here. Ten days we’ve been here and that’s the first time any of those so-called nieces has left the house.”
“We never even see them,” Tess said. “We do the bedrooms while they are at breakfast, and we are stuck in the kitchen all afternoon and evening.”
“Aye, well, I nipped out to the privy in the garden the other evenin’, when Margaret were upstairs,” Betty said. “I saw amangoin’ up the garden path and round to the side door, the one by the stairs. So they do have callers, gentleman callers, but only to the back door and only in the evenin’.”
“Well, there is nothing in that,” Tess said. “A man might be hesitant to make a formal morning call to an all-female household, but he might be invited to join the ladies for tea after dinner.”
“But not goin’ anywhere at all, and then that girl sets off all alone with an overnight bag in a fancy carriage like that. Someone rich sent that rig, you may be sure.”
“Did you not recognise it?” Tess said. “That was Eustace’s carriage.”
“Master Eustace?”Betty cried. “No! Was it? But—?”
“Precisely,” Tess said with a smile.
“Hmpf,” Betty grunted, pulling the thin blanket up to her chin. “This place is too strange by half, Miss Tess, and we’re no further forward findin’ any trace of your father here. We’ve been into every room in the house, even the attics, and found nothin'. The sooner we get out of here the better.”
“A few more days,” Tess said. “I should like to know how long Miss Rochester spends with Eustace first. That is an odd pairing. Very odd indeed.”
