The housekeeper set off again up the stairs. “There’s not much more to tell. You need know no more about it than that, anyway, and be sure not to mention it in the nursery. Or to Lord Thatcham himself.” She lowered her voice. “Especially not to him,” she murmured, “though he spends little enough time with John, of course.” She stopped and closed her lips, as though determined not to say more.

Philomena waited. There must be more to the story. The poor little boy had lost his mother, and his father seemed to go near him only to punish him. No wonder he was a difficult child. Perhaps the housekeeper would say more in a moment.

Mrs. Rivers proved her right. “I don’t know what will become of us all.” She sighed. “Nothing but bad luck’s come to the Hall lately. It was never like this, when I first came here as a scullery maid. Lord Thatcham was but a boy, then, and what a child he was. Always a wild one, scared of nothing and no one. Oh, the scrapes he was in when he was a boy. No matter how often Lord Thatcham beat him—that’s the old Lord Thatcham, the present master’s father, I mean.”

She scratched her head, as though finding her thread again. “Yes, no matter what the punishment, he just gave a great laugh. When Master Hugh laughed like that, even the governess found it hard to be angry.”

Philomena, fascinated, said nothing. It was difficult to imagine the stern, unforgiving Lord Thatcham as a wild boy.

Mrs. Rivers’ tongue ran even further away from her. “I remember the day he took his father’s favourite horse. It was a great, grey hunter, and Master Hugh was naught but a lad at the time, hardly tall enough to climb on the horse’s back. The horse took him to London and back in the day. Can you imagine? All those miles in one day? Only young Master Hugh would try that.” Mrs. Rivers chuckled. “By the time he returned, half the Hall was out looking for him, and his father’s face was purple. Ooh, the master was so furious. Master Hugh went without his supper for days, shut up in his room.”

She laughed harder and Philomena giggled too. Would anyone dare refuse to serve Lord Thatcham now? “Then he escaped. He climbed down the ivy. His mother kept that from the old Lord Thatcham. She had such a soft spot for the boy.”

The housekeeper stopped laughing and shook her head. “Our Lord Thatcham was still hardly grown when the old Lord Thatcham died, and some say it was his wildness that hurried his father off.”

Philomena’s smile died away. Could anyone truly blame Lord Thatcham for his father’s death? Why, the idea was ridiculous. No one held Joseph responsible for driving poor Samuel to his grave, though his drunkenness and dishonesty gave the poor tailor many a sleepless night. Unless…unless there was something else to the story? Could Joseph possibly have done something to hasten Samuel’s death? Some poisonous herbs in the tea, maybe? No. She should not let her imagination run away.