“If you’re talking about Cedric,” Virginia replied, “I don’t think there is a large font of goodness to depend upon.”

Charlotte nodded. “Cedric has always thought only of himself. I believe he’d turn out his own mother if it suited him.”

As we walked down the hall, Huxstep was tapping on a pair of gilded double doors set back in an alcove. The door opened to reveal a rather beautiful young man with big, dark eyes and a Mediterranean look about him.

“Mr. ’uxstep?” he asked. “What is zee mattaire?”

“Her Grace requests that you wake your master and tell him that Lady Irene has been taken ill,” Huxstep said.

“But ’e is not ’ere,” Marcel said. “He rises early, and he say he have urgent matter to attend to. He instructs me to bring him a cup of coffee to his study.”

“Ah, thank you, Marcel,” Huxstep said. We followed him down the stairs and I watched him tap on a door then open it cautiously. “Your Grace?” he asked.

Then he pushed the door open wider. “He doesn’t appear to be in his study after all,” Huxstep said to me, coming out again and shutting the door behind him. “Perhaps he went into breakfast.”

“Ah, breakfast. That’s what we need,” Charlotte said, taking Virginia’s arm. “I never did finish my kidneys.”

We were on our way to the breakfast room when we passed Frederick.

“Have you seen His Grace recently?” Huxstep asked.

“Not recently, Mr. Huxstep, but I saw him heading for the front door a good hour or so ago. I asked if I should fetch his overcoat or a brolly, as the weather looked most threatening. He said he’d be fine in his tweed jacket and that he wouldn’t be gone long. He was just going to take another look at the possible building site, and he had a letter in his hand.”

“A letter?”

“Yes, Mr. Huxstep. I asked him if it needed posting but he said he’d pop it in the letter box in the lane as he was going that way and it was important that it catch the first post. I then suggested that the chauffeur could run it into the village, but he said it wasn’t necessary and that a walk would do him good.”

“I see,” Huxstep said. He paused, frowning. “And did any of his young friends accompany him, do you know?”

“I couldn’t tell you that, Mr. Huxstep. I didn’t see anyone else. I shut the front door behind him then I went back to my duties.”

“And this was some time ago, you said?”

“A good hour or more.”

“Was it not raining when he set out?”

“I don’t believe so, Mr. Huxstep, although the sky certainly looked nasty enough.”