Gwendolen Page 19
Lady Pamela finished her breakfast in an abstracted silence, then went upstairs to her dressing-room where she found Pletcher, her dresser, laying out a muff and pelisse for her excursion to Bruton Street.
“Pletcher,” she said suddenly, “Will you go and ask Brill to come and speak to me?”
Pletcher bustled out of the room and in a few moments Brill, Lord Wynstanley’s valet, appeared.
“Brill,” said Lady Pamela, who never believed in beating about the bush, “where is Lord Wynstanley?”
Brill, who had known both her and her brother since they had been a pair of enchanting and extremely troublesome children and he a second footman, showed no surprise at this direct attack.
“I could not say, my lady,” he replied woodenly.
“Don’t be stuffy, Brill,” Lady Pamela advised kindly. “He has gone to Whiston
Castle, hasn’t he?”
On further cross-examination, Brill admitted that he had packed a portmanteau for his lordship at some hour past eleven the previous evening.
“Well, look here, Brill,” said Lady Pamela. “Don’t tell Lord Nevans, I mean, don’t say he’s gone to Whiston Castle. Say – oh, anywhere else. And I want you to have a post-chaise fetched here for me at once. I must go to – to Lady Ashlock.”
“Yes, my lady,” Brill said resignedly, and went off.
“Pletcher,” said Lady Pamela, when her dresser returned to the room, “I want you to pack a portmanteau and my dressing case for me. I am needed at Lady Ashlock’s for a few days. An express arrived this morning.”
Pletcher, well aware that Lady Pamela was on very close terms with her cousin Lady Ashlock. a dashing young matron now in residence with her husband and baby in Kent, said she hoped there was No Trouble.
“Well. yes. There is. Little Giles has the measles,” said Lady Pamela, wondering if
one-year-old babies had the measles. “I am leaving at once,” she went on, “and I shan’t need you with me.”
“Shan’t – need – me!” said Pletcher, astounded and affronted.
“No!” said Lady Pamela firmly. “And now, do hurry with the packing.”
When Pletcher had departed, she filled her reticule with a plentiful supply of bank notes and gold guineas, then wrote a note for her grandfather which – however much he might doubt its truth – he could not disprove until he had got in touch with Lady Ashlock in Kent.
By that time Lady Pamela considered she would have arrived back from her own journey into Wiltshire.
Brill now arrived with a post-chaise and the gloomy tidings that is was starting to snow – which news did not daunt Lady Pamela in the least as she trod down the stairs and out the front door.
READ MORE