A Dangerous Collaboration (A Veronica Speedwell Mystery) Deanna Raybourn (books to read for self improvement .TXT) 📖

“In the name of seven hells, Veronica, I did not mean that,” he protested. “And no, I do not miss amputating limbs and mopping up after a flogging.”

“I thought floggings went out with Napoléon,” I said, plucking a humbug from his palm.

“Just because something is forbidden doesn’t mean it won’t flourish,” he told me. He put the paper twist on a stone and brought another sharply down upon it, breaking the last humbug in half. He handed the larger piece over to me.

Just then, a pair emerged from around the corner of the cottage, young Peter from the inn and Daisy the castle maid. Peter was carrying a covered pail and Daisy was hurrying him along.

“Mind you come along smartly, lad. Mrs. Trengrouse will not wait for that,” she warned him. She caught sight of us and bobbed a swift curtsy.

“Hello, Daisy. What brings you down to the village?” I asked.

Peter brandished the pail. “Chicken dung, miss.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Daisy clucked her tongue at him. “Do not speak to the lady of such things,” she scolded. “Now, get on to the castle and take that straight to the laundry or I will make you the worse for it.”

He darted a hopeful look at Stoker, who obliged him with the last piece of humbug. He grinned as he put it into his pocket with grubby hands.

“Thank the gentleman!” Daisy told him.

Peter bowed. “Very kind of you, sir.”

“You are most welcome, Master Peter,” Stoker replied with a courtly inclination of the head.

Peter scampered off and Daisy looked after him with an exasperated expression. “More trouble than a dozen monkeys, he is.”

“Dare I ask what Mrs. Trengrouse requires of . . . that?” I asked.

“The chicken leavings? ’Tis for scorch marks, miss. I was put up from laundrymaid to chambermaid but the new lass scorched a sheet when she was ironing and Mrs. Trengrouse was fit to be tied, she was. Now we have to soak it in a mixture of what the chickens give with a bit of vinegar and fuller’s earth to make it right again.”

Just then Mertensia emerged from the cottage. “Hello, Daisy. Chicken dung, I presume?”

“Yes, miss.”

Mertensia turned to us. “Mrs. Polglase’s chickens are the most prolific on the island for that sort of thing. Off you go, Daisy. Mrs. Trengrouse will be looking for you.”

The maid hurried off and Mertensia turned to us. “Mrs. Polglase the elder is having a difficult morning, but she wanted very much to meet our visitors. Will you oblige her?”

We expressed our willingness to do so and Mertensia guided us into the cottage. It was neat as a new pin, with freshly whitewashed walls and scrubbed stone floors. It was one main room with a sturdy table and chairs and a set of shelves with a loft made up for sleeping. In the back wall, a Dutch door had been cut, giving onto a hen yard, where a raucous clucking could be heard along with a woman’s voice as she shushed them patiently. Inside the cottage, a fire of good hardwood was burning in the hearth, and near it a bed had been arranged and fitted with blinding white linens—no doubt the handiwork of Mrs. Polglase’s excellent chickens, I surmised. In the bed, a tiny old woman of indeterminate years, anywhere between eighty and a century, peeped out from a pile of shawls and blankets and scarves, her little head topped by a vast cap of the sort worn by French queens and superior parlormaids of the last century.

“Mrs. Polglase, this is Miss Speedwell and Mr. Templeton-Vane,” Mertensia shouted.

The old woman smiled vaguely and a plump figure bustled into the cottage through the Dutch door. Mertensia made the introductions again, presenting us to the younger Mrs. Polglase, a woman of perhaps fifty with a broad, comely face and a hearty handshake.

“Welcome you are, and how kind of you to come and visit Mam,” she said with a nod towards the withered little woman in the bed.

“I mentioned we had visitors and she insisted,” Mertensia told her.

“She does take an interest,” Mrs. Polglase said. “Her mind wanders more often than it stays at home, but she always likes to hear of the castle folk.” She turned to us. “My mother-in-law used to provide eggs and chicken feathers for the castle from her own flock before she grew too old to manage. Very proud of her roasters, she was.”

“The finest chickens in Cornwall, I have,” the old woman piped up. She stared at us with a suspicious eye. “Have they come for a chicken?”

“No, Mrs. Polglase,” Mertensia told her. “These are our guests at the castle.”

The older Mrs. Polglase pushed herself up just a little, peering out from the assorted blankets and shawls. “Be that Miss Rosamund?” she asked, scrutinizing me with rheumy eyes.

Mertensia sucked in her breath, but the younger Mrs. Polglase merely pushed her mother-in-law gently back onto the pillows. “Now, Mam, you know Miss Rosamund is dead. That is Miss Speedwell, a guest at the castle.”

The old woman gave a fretful toss of the head. “I want Miss Rosamund. She were reading a book to me and she hadn’t finished. ’Twere a very good book too. About elopements and a brothel,” she added with a sharp nod.

Her daughter-in-law tucked in her coverlets tightly, immuring the old woman in the bed. “Brothels and elopements! You’ve no call to hear about such things at your age,” she said firmly. “You need a nice dose of your tonic from Miss Mertensia and a good nap.”

“I need a man,” the old woman said with a long, thoughtful look at Stoker. He stepped sharply behind me.

“Save me,” he muttered into my ear.

“Now, Mam, have done,” her daughter-in-law told her. She gave Stoker an apologetic glance. “Think nothing of it, sir. She does wander in her wits, although she was a bit of a light-skirt in her day.”

“Reading Clarissa cannot have helped,” Mertensia put in repressively.

The younger Mrs. Polglase laughed. “Bless