“Nothing unusual in this household.” The wrinkles around the middle-aged housekeeper’s mouth folded into themselves as she pursed her lips.
“When do they sleep?” Betsy asked as they were led out of the room to the stairs.
“Their best sleep is a solid three hours in the middle of the day. One long nap. They are champion nappers. It’s the nighttime that continues to confound us.” Mrs. Roach paused on the landing of the second floor.
The sound of the babies’ cries increased. Mr. Redcake appeared in the doorway, his dark hair standing up in spikes around his temples and forehead. He held a baby against each shoulder. The white fabric on both sides appeared to be darkened with moisture. While he had a waistcoat on, his coat was missing. Betsy had never seen him dressed so improperly. The moment seemed dangerously intimate. The late hour, crying children . . .
Her father spoke. “So sorry to disturb you, sir. We’re just on our way upstairs. We shall be so quiet you won’t even know we are here.” He attempted to take Betsy’s arm.
She wrenched her arm from his grasp, forcing a smile when Mr. Redcake looked at her curiously. “You must need help, Mr. Redcake.”
“I will take one of the babies when I have you settled,” Mrs. Roach said, digging a finger into the corner of one reddened eye.
“Show my father upstairs,” Betsy said. “I’ll stay here until you return.” She stepped off the landing toward Mr. Redcake. “Shall I take one? What are their names?”
“Artie and Sia.”
“Which one has the more forgiving nature?” Betsy asked.
“Are you sure? You’ve had a dreadfully long day.”
“Yours doesn’t seem to have been any shorter,” she said, holding out her arms in what she hoped was an approximation of a safe baby hold.
“Err, you’ll have to peel one off my shoulder,” he said. “Their cheeks stick a bit.”
“Oh, I see.” She moved around to his left side and looked at the glued-on baby. Larger than she imagined, the baby had dark, curly hair, damp with sweat, screwed tight eyes, and a beautiful rosy pursed mouth that was matched by cheeks stained crimson. She glanced down at the small form and decided to start with an arm, placing it on her own neck. Then she tucked her hands under the baby’s armpits and slowly pulled it away from Mr. Redcake.
“I’m supposed to mind the head right?”
“No, that’s for the very little ones. Sia is nearly thirteen months.”
“I see.” She had very little experience with babies. Sia was not sweet-smelling, as she expected, and much heavier than she had seemed. However, the baby tucked her face against Betsy’s neck when she began to sway, instinctively, rubbing the baby’s back. Sia settled into snuffling sobs instead of full-throated screaming.
With one arm free, Mr. Redcake was able to secure a better grip on his son. Soon, both babies weren’t asleep but at least were much calmer.
“No nursemaids?” Betsy asked.
“They leave. Flightier by far than cakies,” he said.
“Our waitresses rarely come to us inexperienced. Are you only hiring green girls?”
He smiled, weariness showing in the creases around his eyes. “You do not know how often I have wished you were here managing my home life, Betsy. I feel as if I am dreaming.”
“My father is here,” she reminded him.
“Yes, of course, Miss Popham, he is.”
“But it is flattering to think you consider me capable of managing your home. I have no experience of homes like yours.”
“It isn’t so large; just a few rooms really. It is the area that is decidedly nice.”
“These babies are lucky to have such a lovely home, and we are very lucky you took us in. As soon as we can be out of your hair, after a payday or two, we shall go.”
“Not until you’ve managed us here just a bit,” he said. “I hope.”
“I’ll try to help you hire a nursemaid, but I would assume Mrs. Roach knows better.”
“You would think.” They shared a glance. “Now, before she returns, what is going on between you and your father? I’ve never seen you be less than respectful and loving with him, but the mood seemed very different now.”
“I feel that I cannot keep secrets from you any longer,” she said.
“I would prefer you did not.” Artie stirred his head, and Mr. Redcake began to move about the room.
Betsy followed him. “It’s only that I discovered my father has been giving quite a lot of our money to the Church. Less than I thought to the Carters and more to the Church. We have nothing, and this is what he’s done.”
“Many do the same.”
“He can do what he likes with his money, but what about mine? Let us say some modest man—like Lord Fitzwalter when he was merely Ewan Hales, for instance—wants to marry me? What do I bring to the marriage? A trousseau of embroidered clothing and pillow slips and tea towels? Of course not; I never embroidered, I worked. A tidy sum of money to go toward our first home? No, that’s all gone to pay off my murderess mother’s victims. Maybe some family dishes or a grandmother’s old rocking chair? Of course not; that was all stolen by murder enthusiasts after my mother was arrested and we fled the boardinghouse in fear for our lives.”
Sia sniffled, and Betsy immediately fell silent. Her tirade had been in nothing much above a whisper, but she didn’t want to make the baby cry. Still, in her exhausted state, she wondered when she might set the heavy baby in her lovely white cradle.
Greggory sighed. “At least he didn’t spend it on drink. He didn’t beat you.”
“No, just kept me in line with fantasies about Christian duty, when it turns out he was in love with Mrs. Carter. I was working to pay for his pursuit of a woman who didn’t want him, not paying off a moral debt. And what has the Church done for me? Precisely nothing. I’ve been working since I was nine. Yet I was born to seemingly respectable married people who owned a comfortable boardinghouse and made a nice living.”
“I’m sure it was still a moral debt in his own mind,” Mr. Redcake said gently. “You are a tough young lady and you will rebuild. Starting now.”
“Not if I stay with my father. I know you’ll tell me my place is with him, but I cannot go on like this.”
“You are exhausted.”
She ignored that. “I am ready for independence. He can find a new wife now that Mrs. Carter is gone. I am going to board somewhere respectable and save my pennies for my own use.”
“He’s not a bad man, Betsy.”
“But he is a selfish, secretive one,” she retorted.
He settled Artie in his cradle. Betsy followed suit. Her lowering of Sia did not have the same practiced subtlety, but she managed to get the baby down without waking her.
Mr. Redcake lifted his eyebrows at her and turned down the lights, then they tiptoed from the room. Mrs. Roach met them on the stairs.
“That was easier than it often is,” the housekeeper whispered.
“Go to your bed,” he said, “both of you, now. I’ll sleep in the nursemaid’s bed tonight.”
Mrs. Roach nodded and escaped downstairs. He pointed up the stairs, and as much as she wanted to help, she knew she needed to rest. Redcake’s needed her, especially if the owner was exhausted. The pair of them had too much to manage.
The next morning, Mrs. Roach cooked a good early breakfast for the Pophams with the help of a kitchen maid, those being easier to find than help for the nursery. Mr. Redcake did not make an appearance, but the housekeeper said he was with the babies.
“How do you manage during the day?” Betsy asked, filling her plate high with eggs, rashers, and beans. Her stomach gurgled emptily after yesterday’s exertions.
Mrs. Roach put her hands to her cheeks. “You’ve seen the dust and soot and cobwebs around the house by now. We get on by neglecting the house and caring for the babies. We only lost the last nursery maid a few days ago.”
Betsy grinned. “I did wonder, because the house seems rather tidy to me.”
“Thank you, dear, but I assure you, my standards are higher than this. I have applicants coming today for a proper housemaid who can keep up the cleaning while I tend to the little ones.”
“I’ll be happy to help in the evenings,” Betsy said.
“As will I,” her father added. “These old hands might still remember how to bathe and feed babies.”
The housekeeper inclined her head. “I’m sure Mr. Redcake won’t mind. The poor man can have a nap.”
That evening, Greggory felt a sense of well-being as he looked around his dining room table and saw Mr. Popham at the opposite end and Betsy in the middle. He’d dined alone so often this past year. Only when Dudley was in town did he have a companion. The rest of the family did not expect him to entertain, though all of his cousins invited him to dinner about once a month when they were in town.
Some time passed before he realized that while Ralph chatted easily with him about the differences between the flagship bakery and the Kensington one, Betsy didn’t seem to be attending. She had finished every drop of her soup and every bite of her fish, but her wineglass was still full and she’d barely touched her entrée of roast beef, asparagus, and potatoes. Was she too tired to eat?
“Our customers do seem to like sweets more than yours,” Ralph opined. “I can scarcely keep any fruit galettes in the cases, but Betsy seems to bring them home to us a couple of times a week.”
“No shelf life,” Betsy said. “But I have Winnie to set one aside for me at closing if any are left, before the others can get to them. There is often only one or two.”
“So we aren’t losing money,” Greggory said, swirling the wine in his glass.
“Not at all. At worst we have four or five left unsold a week.”
“Still, they do take up a fair amount of room. Our savory pies are quite a seller.”
“I love the galettes,” Betsy said firmly.
Greggory matched Ralph’s smile. “Then I shan’t touch them, Miss Popham.”
“I have yet to discern a pattern for what days they sell or do not,” she said sheepishly. “If I did, I’d suggest Mr. Soeur reduce baking on those days.”
“Any thought on hiring a bakery manager?” Ralph asked.
“Definitely. I’m considering it,” Greggory said as Mrs. Roach came in to remove the plates. “How did the interviews go today?”
“I hired a new housemaid,” she confirmed. “She will begin on Thursday. Day help only, I’m afraid. She lives with her mother.”
“We really haven’t the room here for more staff,” Greggory said. “I am fine with the arrangement as long as she arrives on time.”
“Yes, sir. Shall I bring in dessert now?”
“What is it?” he asked.
“We have a lovely caramel and apple trifle.”
“That’s a nice change,” Ralph declared. “We never take the time to make a pudding.”
Greggory suppressed a yawn. He didn’t know how Mrs. Roach had managed such a company-worthy meal with babes in arms all day, plus a housemaid hired. “I should have you ask at Redcake’s about a nursery maid, Miss Popham. Surely one of our cakies has a younger sister equal to the task.”
“Or two younger sisters,” she said.
He suspected he did not imagine the twinkle in her eye. “Yes, twins are a handful, I’ll admit to that.”
“It sounds like an excellent notion to me. Find a fourteen- or fifteen-year-old. Responsible but too young to waitress,” Ralph declared.
Greggory nodded. “I agree. With Mrs. Roach to supervise, there won’t be any trouble. And my children are healthy and strong. They just don’t like the night.”
“Do you expect more peace as the days lengthen?” Betsy asked.
“I have no idea, given how young they are,” Greggory said. “My youngest siblings are about a decade younger than me, and as a boy I had little interest in infants. I hadn’t expected to be in charge of a nursery, you understand.”
“Do you want a large family?” Ralph asked.
“This is as much as I can handle,” Greggory confessed as Mrs. Roach returned with a beautiful fluted dish lined with pastry and filled with the creamy almond-colored mixture. He scooped out portions, then she spooned a dollop of whipped cream over each of the three dishes.
“When you remarry of course,” Ralph said, when Mrs. Roach had returned to the kitchen.
“Papa! He might not be ready to think of any such thing,” Betsy protested.
“The children need a mother,” Ralph said.
“If you feel that way, why didn’t you remarry, if you don’t mind my asking?” Greggory asked.
“My faith in my ability to choose a good woman was sadly diminished after the truth about Mrs. Popham came to light,” Ralph said. “Discovering your wife murdered two people is enough to make a man remain single forever.”
Chapter Nine
B
etsy set her silver spoon back into her bowl, leaving the beautiful pudding untouched. Her father’s words made her wonder how he saw her, half his child and half his murderess wife’s. Had her existence put him off further attempts at fatherhood, too? “Excuse me,” she muttered and pushed back her chair.
Her father and Greggory half-stood, unable to rise completely because she moved so quickly. Without meaning to, she found herself in the kitchen, her refuge in the home she had lost. Mrs. Roach and a young woman stood as she entered. “Please sit down,” she said. “I’m sorry. I left my trifle on the table. If you could just set it in the pantry, I’m sure I’ll want it later.”
“Of course,” Mrs. Roach said, still holding her fork.
She dashed into the hallway, then went to the back of the house and splashed cool water on her face at the sink in the bathroom. Didn’t her father have any sympathy for her mother? Had he saved it all for the Carters and himself? He’d spent so much money on prayers to rescue her mother from purgatory. The nasty thought came that maybe spending all of Betsy’s income was a way to punish
her
. Still feeling upset, she went out the back door and half-collapsed on a bench in the tiny garden. Grass mixed with floral scents to create an enticing spring atmosphere, but inside her head, all she found was gloom and funereal black.
Feeling numb, she watched the sun set and the moon and stars dimly take over. The world followed its accustomed patterns, while her life fell off its rails. Her mind blanked and became calm, though she knew all her fears were simply waiting to resurface when she went back inside. While leaving her father might be frowned upon by most, she could live respectably nearby in ladies’ chambers. She would have two rooms and a small kitchen, along with a cleaner. Her salary would easily pay for it with money left over, assuming she could keep her funds. But there would be no help from her father’s wages if Simon Hellman or Victor Carter stole from her. How long would Mr. Redcake keep paying for security around his business? Was that money needed to pay for a bakery manager?
She rubbed her forehead. So many concerns came to mind when one ran a business.
“You are thinking very hard, Betsy.” Mr. Redcake sat down next to her on the bench, locking his fingers around the seat. His right pinky brushed her skirt.
“You shouldn’t call me Betsy.”
“It’s just us. Your father has gone up to bed, and Mrs. Roach is with the babies for now.”
“Doesn’t sound carry up from the garden?”
“No. Good windows.”
“Oh. I’m used to flimsier houses.”
His hand lifted, and he stroked down her arm until he found her hand, then entwined his fingers in hers. She forgot to resist as he asked, “How are you? You left dinner so abruptly that I was afraid the pudding had gone off.”
“I didn’t even taste it. I’m sure it is delicious.”
“What was wrong?”
“I couldn’t listen to Papa for one more second. Meeting my half sister, Mrs. Carter’s and Manfred Cross’s deaths, Simon Hellman lurking around again; it’s all brought my mother back. All the confusion I felt, like when I was that very young child and she was taken away, returned.”
“Who cared for you? Do you know?”
“Neighbors, I suppose. Not the boarders in my house. They were all men like Mr. Carter. Traveling salesmen, that type of person.”
“I wonder why your father didn’t protect your mother.”
“She must have seemed the sort of woman who could take care of herself.”
“Like you.”
“Yes. Like me.”
“Is that what you want? To always care for yourself?” he asked.
“Of course not. I want a family, just like any other woman. But I do not know how to make that happen. It’s as if when my mother poisoned those men, she poisoned my life, too.”
“I don’t imagine that Mr. Cross’s death will be found to have anything to do with you. Even if Victor did it, it would be in response to his sister coming to see you that day.”
“I don’t want it to be Violet’s fault either.”
“That makes it Victor who is to blame, not either of you.” He said it in a firm tone. “Both of you ladies have the right to make a living.”
“Many men would say we don’t. That our roles are to care for our fathers or brothers until a husband comes along.”
“No Redcake thinks like that,” he said, squeezing her hand.
“No, you have a good business model, employing women, and we all know we are lucky to have such good positions. I don’t believe there are any better-paying jobs for women in London than mine.”
“You’ll keep your money from now on,” he said, pounding his free hand against his thigh. “I will have a word with my Uncle Bartley. He has a great deal of influence on your father.”
She stiffened. She didn’t want help from the Redcakes. “I’m not going to live with him any longer, and we don’t work in the same shop, so there is no need.”
“Are you certain?”
“Very,” she said, half-smiling. “Maybe I will take rooms with Violet.”
“Not while Victor is at large. I want you to stay here until then.”
He released her hand. She thought he would leave, but instead, her back tingled as his hand moved up to her shoulder, leaving a tantalizing trail of warmth. Without meaning to, she turned toward him as he settled his fingers around her upper arm and pulled her close.
She closed her eyes, half-hoping, half-fearing he would kiss her again. What would it mean if he did? She stopped thinking when she felt his breath on her nose. She lifted her chin and his soft lips met hers. A low animal sound like a moan came from deep inside her, and she wrapped her fingers around the vee of his waistcoat, fitting her mouth to his more securely.
Oh, she knew he couldn’t be courting her, yet she wasn’t sure if he realized that. But she needed this, the touch of another person, the passionate kiss of a real man, who showed he knew how to love by the tender care he took of his motherless children. He was a worthy man.
“Betsy,” he murmured before deepening their kiss.
She let him tease open her lips, plunder the recesses of her mouth with his tongue. Remembering the duel of lovers, she stroked the side of his tongue and heard him gasp in response. His free hand went into her hair and she felt the mass of it give way under his tunneling fingers. She would look a fright, but it didn’t matter. The tips of her breasts hardened as she crushed herself against him, rubbing herself wantonly. Her body remembered how to receive pleasure, but she could not take Greggory Redcake as a lover. That intimacy was only meant for a man she might marry.
But who would want a murderess’s daughter? The thought sent ice through her veins. She pulled back, disengaged. Before he could ask, dazedly, what had gone wrong, she had stood, whirled, gone back to the house, hiding in the pantry with her pudding until she heard footsteps on the stairs and knew he’d gone up.
Grace peeked into the kitchen, where Betsy was inventorying linens the next afternoon, five minutes before the tearoom closed. “Prissy just came in; she’d like to speak to you if you have a moment, Miss Popham.”
Betsy wrote down her count on her clipboard and set it on the mound of towels she’d just finished. “Thank you, Grace.” She rubbed at her eyes after the cakie had gone. They felt gritty from lack of sleep. She’d cursed her cowardice with Mr. Redcake half the night, but she needed to dissect the situation like some kind of scientist. What did he want? What did she want? Other than his body against hers.
She wiped her hands on her apron and patted her hair, then went to see what her half sister wanted.
Prissy sat at the table closest to the kitchen. Not a favored table, because ladies liked to be seen in the front window of Redcake’s. At least they used to, before the murder. Usually, the cakies had to stop taking orders after the doors were closed but still had to go through an entire service with the last group of customers. Now, a minute or two before the doors closed, the tables were almost empty, and no one clambered to be seated at the last minute.
Betsy sighed. Would she need to consider reducing the number of cakies? Violet would have to be the first to go, and that would leave her as impoverished as Betsy was now, until next payday. Her father wouldn’t be able to come to a Carter’s rescue now either.
“Why so glum?”
“Lack of trade,” Betsy said, sitting down. She noted Prissy’s fashionable attire of a brown leg-of-mutton sleeved blouse and a chestnut walking skirt. While the fabrics weren’t expensive, her sister looked fresh and prosperous, while her own bedraggled gray cheviot dress with black military braid badly needed ironing after its trip from Chiswick to Kensington in a wooden crate.
“I thought murder would raise Redcake’s profile, not lower it.”
“Not for our brand of clientele.”
Prissy shook her head sympathetically. “Ninnies. As if a jewel thief being murdered has anything to do with them.”
“You can see where they might think so.”
“Why?”
“A jewel thief?” Betsy shrugged. “Jewel thieves prey on the wealthy.”
“Ladies are wearing their jewels in a tearoom?”
Betsy smiled. “You might be surprised. The brooches, especially. The older ladies do like to adorn themselves. Shocking rings, sometimes.”
“I told Mrs. Fair that she and I should take tea here sometimes, to keep an eye on the parade of fashions, because this is the most likely place to see local ladies of taste, but she thought we would stick out like a sore thumb.”
“Not now,” Betsy said.
“I stick out just being here at all,” Prissy said frankly.
Betsy watched Violet and Grace close the door to the tearoom, then went to take final orders from the last three tables, which held a mother-daughter pair, a local professor’s wife with her sister, and a banker’s wife alone, all habitual Redcake’s customers who were set in their ways. “Not for long. We’ll think of something.”
“You had better, but that isn’t why I came. I know you had to move and I wondered if any of your wardrobe was damaged in the process. Do you want any help sorting through your clothes? I won’t charge you; I just wanted to offer.”
“That’s terribly sweet of you, but there’s not really any point until I find a new place to live. I’m thinking of moving into ladies’ chambers on some respectable street in Paddington.”
“What about Ralph? Does he want to be closer to his bakery?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m on my own because I have to be, but you aren’t. Isn’t your place with your father?” Prissy’s lovely dark eyes held real curiosity.
“I want to build a trousseau,” Betsy confided. “I can’t do that if he’s in charge of my money. We could go on like this forever, and I’m already twenty-two. I’ll be twenty-three in September.”
“You want something to bring to the marital bargaining table.”
“Exactly. Before it is too late. I should have clothing, kitchen linens, dishes.”
“Of course,” Prissy agreed. “And Ralph simply has no interest in you marrying.”
“No.” Did he hope her mother’s tainted line would end?
“It’s not uncommon for a family to want a daughter at home, but when there is only one child . . .” Prissy took a sip of her tea. “He must want grandchildren.”
“He may not, given who my mother was.”
“You can’t think he’d be afraid you would breed”—Prissy bent her head so close to Betsy that she could smell the chamomile scent of her hair—“a murderer.”
She sighed. “He might. I’m realizing he’s much more religious than I’d previously thought. He keeps to himself in the evenings, and I’ve never known what he reads. Now I think it’s all prayer books and philosophy.”
“How dreadful. Romantic novels for me.”
“Me too.” Betsy folded her hands on top of the table. She needed to take care of her skin. It looked rough.
“Have we been spoiled for regular gentlemen thanks to our reading taste?”
“Regular gentlemen, yes. All men, no,” Betsy said, remembering Mr. Redcake’s kiss.
“That almost sounds specific in its generality,” Prissy said with a quirky grin.
Betsy noticed Prissy’s cheekbones were more pronounced than hers. She had excellent bone structure and would probably age better. “I cannot sort my own feelings.”
“About who?”
Betsy missed Lady Hatbrook desperately. Could Prissy take her place as confidante? “Can you keep a secret? I can’t tell anyone here, even the girls I’m closest to.”
“Oooh.” Prissy leaned forward, locking her lips with a pretend key. “Sister secrets. I’ve simply longed for them.”
“There is a certain gentleman who has kissed me a time or two,” Betsy admitted.
Prissy’s lips curved. “How delightful. You like him?”
“Very much, but he’s unsuitable.”
“Poor?”
“No, too wealthy for me.”
“Never say he’s another aristocrat,” Prissy said. “Grace told me there was a rumor you used to step out with a man at Redcake’s who was secretly the heir to an earldom.”
“Four years ago, long before the truth came out,” Betsy said.
“Who do you have your hooks into now?”
“I don’t have any hooks into anyone,” she retorted, before continuing in a gentler tone. “But he’s attracted to me. I just don’t know what he wants. I want to be married, but I never thought anyone really decent would want me. I thought I’d have to set my hopes low.”
“Why? You have one of the best positions a lady could have in London. I agree you can’t set your cap for an earl, but anyone else ought to be within your sights.”
“Because of Mother. Don’t you find your background makes you a bad prospect?”
“I’m not like you, with a father who kept focused on what happened. I knew of course, I was older than you, but my grandparents raised me to be my father’s daughter, not my mother’s.”