‘Where are you going, Miss MacNichol?’
Flora explained her mission and Mr Rolfe looked positively flustered, his eyes darting to the carriage clock on a side table. ‘I will call Peggie to collect the kitten and then have her return him to you when he has been outside.’
‘I thought that I too might take a breath of fresh air.’
‘That is not possible now. Mrs Keppel is expecting a guest for tea any second.’ Mr Rolfe called for Peggie, who appeared a few seconds later to take Panther out of Flora’s arms.
‘Don’t worry, miss, I’ll take care of him for you. I love cats, I do.’
The maid dashed off, and Mr Rolfe escorted Flora back to the main stairs, glancing constantly towards the front door. As Flora mounted them, she heard a carriage pull up outside. ‘He’s here, Johnson. Open the door, will you?’ Mr Rolfe said to the footman, who leapt to do so.
Wishing she could stay and see who this special guest was, but too frightened to disobey the butler’s orders, Flora hurried up the stairs, passing Mrs Keppel’s parlour, from which a strong, flowery perfume emanated. Up in the sanctuary of the floor above, she peered over the banisters, catching the sound of a male voice and heavy footsteps ascending the stairs. Whoever it was had a deep, throaty cough and a strong whiff of cigar smoke permeated the stairwell. Leaning over further to try and catch a glimpse of the man, she felt a hand on her shoulder, pulling her back.
‘Now, Miss MacNichol, it’s best we don’t spy on anyone in this house,’ said Nannie, giving her an amused glance.
A door shut on the floor below and the footsteps receded behind it.
‘Mrs Keppel must never be disturbed when she is entertaining in the afternoon. Do you understand?’
‘I do, Nannie.’
Flora, red-faced with embarrassment, retreated to her bedroom once more.
16
Two weeks later, with the help of Barny, Mrs Keppel’s own lady’s maid, Flora drew in her breath as the whalebone corset was tightened and she thought her ribs might crack under the pressure.
‘There, it’s done.’
‘But I can’t breathe . . .’
‘No, none of you ladies can, but look,’ Barny said, pointing in the mirror. ‘Now you have a waist. You’ll get used to it, Miss MacNichol, all the ladies do. It’ll loosen off after a while. It’s just new at the moment.’
‘I can barely move . . .’ Flora muttered as Barny gathered a swathe of ice-blue silk and beckoned Flora to step into the middle of it.
‘Mrs Keppel’s right about this colour suiting your complexion. She’s right about everything, mind you,’ said Barny approvingly as she fastened the tiny seed-pearl buttons at the back of the dress.
‘Yes,’ Flora agreed whole-heartedly. If she was Cinderella, then Mrs Keppel was without a doubt the fairy godmother of 30 Portman Square. From the scullery maid to the finely dressed guests who appeared almost every night for dinner on the floors below, everyone adored her. She seemed to carry with her an almost magical aura of calm. Never did she have to raise her voice to get what she needed; one word was usually enough.
‘She’s like a queen,’ Flora had commented to Nannie one day last week after returning, starry-eyed, from her first shopping trip with Mrs Keppel and the girls. They’d visited Morrell’s toyshop, where the staff had bowed to her every request.
Nannie, normally so staid, had burst into laughter at Flora’s expression. ‘Aye, that she is, Miss MacNichol, and who’s to doubt it?’
Flora had begun to learn the rhythms of the house and the characters who dominated it. Just like Mrs Keppel herself, the staff who worked for her were, on the whole, charming and appeared to see it as an honour to be part of the Keppel household. Mr Rolfe and Mrs Stacey, the cook, ruled the roost, while Miss Draper, the housekeeper, and Barny had the privileged position of preparing Mrs Keppel and her private parlour for entertaining, which meant hours of flower arranging, tidying, dressing and primping.
The little Flora had seen of Mrs Keppel’s husband, ‘Mr George’, as the staff called him – a gentle giant of a man with a kind face and a soft voice – she had liked. Every night, Sonia would disappear to her father’s sitting room to curl up on his knee, whereupon he’d read tales of adventure, which Sonia would repeat to her later.
During the past two weeks, she had spent most of her time on the nursery floor attempting to help Nannie and Moiselle, for want of anything else to do. In the evenings, she and the children huddled round the fire in the day nursery toasting crumpets as Flora told them stories of her childhood at Esthwaite. Violet feigned disinterest, her head buried in a notebook, in which she wrote less often than she chewed the end of her pencil, but Flora knew she listened.
‘You drove your own pony and trap?’ she confirmed, after Flora had told them about Myla.
‘Yes.’
‘Without a driver? Or a nursemaid or a servant?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh, how I long for that kind of freedom,’ Violet breathed, then promptly returned her attention to her notebook.
At least, thought Flora, bringing herself back to the present, she now was in possession of enough clothes to outfit a royal court comfortably, and she hoped Mrs Keppel would be agreeable to her taking walks in the park across the road, and maybe further afield in London. After spending so much time inside, Panther wasn’t the only one who felt like a caged animal.
‘May I dress your hair, Miss MacNichol?’
‘Thank you.’ Flora sat down in front of the dressing-table mirror and Barny began brushing out her long, thick hair with a silver-backed paddle brush.
Although everything else about the household was now reasonably clear in Flora’s mind, one mystery remained: the identity of Mrs Keppel’s afternoon guest. Flora always knew when he was due to arrive as the entire household seemed to descend into a state of palpable tension. The first thing that heralded the guest’s arrival was the sound of Mabel and Katie polishing the brass rods on the stairs just as Flora rose from her bed at seven in the morning. They would begin at the top of the house and work their way down. At noon, the florist would arrive to fill the parlour with sweet-smelling roses, and after lunch, Barny would disappear into Mrs Keppel’s boudoir to ready her mistress for his arrival.