“So how do you propose to explain my presence?” I asked.

“Suitably vague, I think. Old friends with your royal grandmother and invited you to stay for a while. Maybe recuperating from an illness and needed good, country air. Yes, I think that should do it.”

I wondered why we needed a good reason to invite me until I realized that of course it was no longer her house. It was presumably up to her son, the present duke, to do the inviting. And he was a self-confessed woman hater. I wondered what he’d say about my arrival.

Chapter 5

KINGSDOWNE PLACE, EYNSFORD, KENT

Dear Diary, I have fallen on my feet for once. It’s gorgeous.

As the Bentley came to a halt outside the front steps, a bevy of footmen rushed out to open the doors for us.

“Welcome to Kingsdowne Place, my lady,” one said, assisting me from the backseat. He was dressed in a smart, black livery with gold buttons. It was almost like being back at Buckingham Palace. Another footman was attempting to assist the dowager duchess from her seat.

“I am not quite an invalid yet, Frederick,” she said. “There is no need to lug me from the backseat like a sack of coals.”

“Sorry, Your Grace.” The boy turned scarlet.

“Come along, my dear,” she said to me, using her cane to stride up the steps ahead of me. We entered a magnificent foyer. In the center a broad staircase ascended to a landing, where it divided in two to rise to the next level. The walls and ceiling were painted with enormous Renaissance-style Italianate murals of Greek gods and goddesses. While I tried not to gawp, the duchess said, “I don’t suppose your maid has arrived yet with your things, so you won’t be able to change for luncheon. But I’ll have Frederick show you up to your room so that you can have a wash and brushup after the journey.”

Oh, Lord. They didn’t change for luncheon here, did they? Did that mean something for the morning, an afternoon tea dress for tea, a dinner gown and something different for luncheon?

I was relieved when she added, “One’s clothes do get so crumpled on the journey that I always like to have them pressed as soon as possible.”

I gave her a weak smile.

“And when you’re ready come down to the Long Gallery. I’ll have sandwiches and coffee served there. I expect you’re famished after that long trip.”

It hadn’t been much more than an hour, but I’d avoided Mrs. Tombs’s earlier, halfhearted attempt at breakfast and was certainly ready to eat. Frederick picked up my overnight bag and jewelry case and set off up the grand stair. I followed, finding it hard to take my eyes off the voluptuous, half-nude figures and cupids that covered the walls and ceiling. At the first landing, we turned to the left and set off down a hallway, which seemed to go on forever. Along the walls the Altringham ancestors glared down at me from their portraits, each one with the bulging, pale eyes that were obviously an inherited trait. From the look of some of them, I wondered if insanity might also be an inherited trait, in which case a breath of fresh air and fresh blood from Australia might be a good thing.