“When Mr. Summers was killed, were you already in bed?” I asked. “Or did you wait up to undress Mrs. Summers.”

“No, my lady. She said she didn’t need no help and I could go to bed.”

“So you didn’t find out that Mr. Summers had died until the police came and the servants were woken up again?”

“That’s right.” She nodded.

“Did the police check Mr. Summers’s bedroom and bathroom, do you know?”

She looked puzzled now. “I couldn’t really tell you. They told us to wait in the servants’ hall until we were questioned.”

“And were you allowed to clean the rooms the next morning?”

“Well, I wasn’t allowed in the bedroom because Mrs. Summers took to her bed for the day. I was going to clean the bathrooms but Mrs. Mannering told me to leave them and not disturb Mrs. Summers. Mr. Summers’s bathroom was a mess but Mrs. Mannering said she’d take care of it.”

“You saw his bathroom? What kind of mess was it?”

“Oh, you know. The usual. Wet towels all over the place and water on the floor.”

“It was always like that?”

“Well, this looked a little worse than usual. More wet towels on the floor. He got through ever so many towels. I couldn’t understand it personally. At home we all took a bath once a week in front of the fire and used the same towel.” She gave an embarrassed grin.

I was trying to find a way to ask whether she had noticed any blood on the floor but I couldn’t come up with a way to phrase it before she said, “Why are you asking me all these questions?”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Mr. Summers was murdered and the police are saying my friend did it. I am sure she didn’t. So I am just trying to get straight in my own mind how he could possibly have been killed and whether any of you servants noticed anything.”

“But he was stabbed in the lady’s room.” Elsie looked perplexed. “That’s what we heard.”

“While she was in her bath,” I pointed out. “She came back and found him lying there.” I hesitated. “Do you know, was Mr. Summers in the habit of walking around with no clothes on?”

She really looked shocked now. “Oh no, miss. I’ve never seen nothing like that. Nor heard about it from the rest of the staff. He was always quite a proper sort of gentleman. In fact he apologized to me once when I was cleaning in the bath and he came in in his underclothes.”

She clearly wanted to get back to her task but I couldn’t resist asking, “Is everyone else happy to be working here, do you think?”