“No, but they’re free to let that carriage house. Lady Summerston gave them the run of the place.”

How in hell could Strether know what Lady Summerston did or did not do, for she, the owner of Watermeadows, had been absent for some months and wouldn’t have had him as a candidate for cottage rental for all the money in the world, which he clearly didn’t have. But Eleanor Summerston had a large part of it. Having turned over Watermeadows temporarily to close friends but distant relations, the Floods, Lady Summerston had returned to her house in Belgravia.

“There you are, Melrose!” said Agatha. “We’ll have Lambert for a neighbor!”

Since his aunt wasn’t even a neighbor, that was unlikely. “If you call being a quarter of a mile away neighborly, Agatha.”

“Don’t be so literal,” she said as Dick plunked a sherry before her, for which Trueblood and Tio Pepe would remain forever unthanked.

“One has to be,” said Melrose, grimly. He decided at that moment that he would visit Watermeadows, something he had never done for he was afraid of seeming intrusive. But this matter needed to be intruded upon.

7

“He just turned up at the front door,” said Flora Flood, shrugging.

Melrose smiled. “You mean, like I did.”

“No, not at all. He came on his horse. And I didn’t mean you aren’t welcome.” She beamed her welcome.

Melrose certainly had turned up immediately after leaving the Jack and Hammer. He imagined turning up in a Bentley was a bit more acceptable than turning up on a horse. “It’s none of my business, Miss Flood—”

“Oh, Flora, please.”

“Flora. As I said, none of my business, but—”

“We’ll make it your business. Come on into the library.” One of her legs was in a brace and dragged.

He had met up with Flora Flood a few times before, but always in the Blue Parrot, a scruffy pub off the Northampton Road. And from their brief, Blue-Parrot-relationship, he realized he knew absolutely nothing about her, including what had happened to her leg.

“You must find it hard, keeping this place up.” Melrose had just stopped himself from asking why she didn’t have a butler.

“The thing is, Uncle Frank—who’s seldom here anyway—and I don’t have staff. And Aunt Eleanor naturally took Crick with her to London. He’s sort of her life’s blood.”

Remembering the condition of Crick, Melrose wondered whether the man could even be his own life’s blood. He should be working at Borings. “It’s an awfully large place to be managing on your own.”

“There’s not that much to do. Would you like some tea?”

“I’d love some tea.”

“Right. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“Please don’t go to any—” But she’d already gone. He’d forgotten she’d be doing it herself.