Dandy Gilver and the Proper Treatment of Bloodstains by Catriona McPherson

the hobnails on his heels ring out against the stone steps as he descended to the sub-basement where, I guessed, the beer cellar must be.
    ‘All part of what plan?’ I asked the lads once he was gone. John grinned again and Harry gave me a long appraising look.
    ‘Don’t encourage them,’ said Phyllis, who had taken up her sewing again.
    ‘All the valets are Trots,’ said John. ‘Just waiting for the word and then ccrrrkkk!’ He drew a finger across his throat. ‘The lords and masters struck down while they get their morning shave and the revolution begins. Easiest way, really.’
    ‘Disgraceful!’ said Stanley.
    ‘You should recruit Miss Rossiter, Harry,’ said John. ‘Get the lady’s maids as well as the valets and you’re laughing.’
    ‘Eldry would have plenty to say if she caught you sweet-talking Miss Rossiter,’ said Phyllis to John. I looked at her, startled. Poor plain Eldry and this rather arrogant young man? Surely not. But I thought, from John’s shout of laughter and Phyllis’s look of mischief, that this was a tease more than an indiscretion.
    ‘You wouldn’t dare go on like this if Mr Faulds could hear you,’ said Stanley.
    ‘Aye, we would,’ said John. Stanley flushed.
    ‘Well, you wouldn’t dare if we had a butler like the butlers that trained me,’ he said. ‘Like the butler I’ll be one day.’
    ‘Oh Stan,’ said Clara, stretching out a long leg and poking the footman with her toe. ‘Don’t let him rile you, he disnae mean anything by it.’ But Stanley was not to be soothed.
    ‘I’ll go and help Mr Faulds,’ he said, rising and patting at imaginary specks on his waistcoat. ‘Heaven knows, he needs it.’
    ‘That’s my boy,’ said Harry. ‘We’re all workers together. We shall surely overcome, united in toil.’
    So Stanley’s exit was marred by yet more giggling and his slightly pendulous cheeks were aflame as he passed me, his pop eyes shining.
    ‘They were saying on the train that Baldwin and Pugh are meeting tonight,’ I said, hoping to sound knowledgeable, wondering what Miss Rossiter would, and therefore what I should, make of the affair.
    ‘Uncle Arthur’ll never give in,’ said Harry.
    ‘Fingers crossed,’ said a small voice. I started. It was the first time since I had come into the room that Mattie the hall boy had spoken. With his white-blond hair and his pale skin, he appeared not only childlike but positively elfin and anything less like a troublemaker could scarcely be imagined.
    ‘They’ll be awright, Matt,’ said Phyllis, and she and Clara swooped down on him from each side and kissed a cheek each. ‘Mattie’s worried about his family, Miss Rossiter. With the lock-out, you know.’
    ‘Mrs Hepburn’ll give you such a basket to take to them on your day off, you’ll not be able to carry it,’ said Clara, trying to make him smile. ‘You’ll have to eat the lot to keep your strength up and then you’ll have an empty basket and your ma’ll leather you and call Mrs H. all sorts and you’ll wish the strike was all you had to trouble you.’ Mattie did, indeed, give a small chuckle at that.
    ‘Who’s this and what are they calling me?’ said Mrs Hepburn, coming back in with an enormous tray, steam rising from six deep plates of soup. Eldry followed with another tray and Millie brought up the rear with a breadboard and butter dish. ‘Where’s Mr Faulds and his shadow got to now, then? This soup needs supped before the pies get over-browned. Come on, come on – get your legs under. You too, Fanny. Grub’s up.’
    The journey from the servants’ hall after dinner was a long one. Of course, any upward journey is hindered by the recent ingestion of pea soup, sausage pie and treacle pudding – I was blowing like a whale by the second landing – but it was more than that. Across the linoleum, past the scuttles, up the worn stone steps, across the glittering tiles on the ground floor, past the hall table with its salvers, up the