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He had been killed in the Boer War in 1899, and that was when Denis – Dastardly Denis as Rose called him, a distant cousin of her father’s – had become heir. Any mention of Robert’s name threw the Earl into a state of depression as he brooded on how well he and his younger brother would have managed the estate.
    It did seem odd for a scullery maid with so little education to be as clever as Maud was. I wonder whether Robert was good at mathematics? Daisy thought.
    ‘I can fill some more bottles for you, my lady,’ Maud was saying. ‘It’ll be perishing cold in that pantry. Lucky it’s so small.’ She didn’t wait for an answer from Daisy, but took down some more of the stoneware bottles from the shelf above the range and poured boiling water into them, fitting the stoppers quickly and efficiently.
    ‘Oh, my lady,’ she called when Daisy was carrying the last two bottles out to place under the workbench, ‘Morgan left this for you last night.’ She held up a discoloured and water-stained print of a mouldering cottage with a hay wagon in front of it. The print had two large safety pins in its top corners. ‘Look,’ she said, turning it over. ‘He’s lettered that on the back. You see, my lady, it says N O A DMITTANCE . Morgan thought you should pin this on to the curtain when you’re working – so that no one opens the door accidental-like. He told me to make sure that you got it and to give you these frames too – you can choose which one you like the best when you have the photograph developed. I’ve washed the glass and polished the wood a bit. Morgan thought they looked like new.’ The girl’s voice was enthusiastic and her pale cheeks blushed at the memory of the chauffeur’s praise.
    ‘That’s lovely’ said Daisy admiringly. She smiled at the girl. ‘You and Morgan are friends, then,’ she said teasingly. Great-Aunt Lizzie would have a fit if she overheard her. She and Mrs Pearson, the housekeeper, had gone to great lengths in the past to keep male and female staff apart. Nowadays the only men apart from Morgan were the elderly stableman and, of course, the butler, but he was seventy if he was a day.
    ‘It’s just that we’re both orphans, my lady,’ said Maud demurely. ‘That makes a bond between us. Now, I’d better be getting on with cleaning the grates, if you’ll excuse me.’
    Daisy forgot about Maud as soon as she seated herself at her workbench, as she had named the old rough pine table. She put her camera in front of her and started to get ready for the work that had to be done in total darkness. Her godfather, Sir Guy Beresford, had trained her to do this, giving her some useless films so that she could practise again and again until she almost felt that she could do it in her sleep. She laid out everything that she would need: the can opener, the metal film reel, the film tank.
    Then she put the materials needed at the second stage on one of the shelves: a film developer, the dish for the stop bath, the fixer with hardener, and another dish for a hypo eliminator bath.
    By this stage there were footsteps outside on the kitchen corridor. Nora, one of the housemaids, was chatting to Mrs Pearson and the voice of Mrs Beaton, the cook, could be heard scolding Maud for not having enough hot water on the stove. Daisy felt a little guilty as she moved her feet on the warmers under the bench, but Maud did not reply. She was probably used to it.
    Then Daisy forgot about everything. Now was the tricky moment. She lit the covered lantern, went across the room and turned out the light, came back and blew out the lantern. It was essential that there was not one chink of light while she took the film from the camera and fed it on to the metal spool. She had done this so often with her head stuck in the cupboard in the dressing room that she was able to do it quickly and neatly, especially now she had so much extra room for her elbows. Then she picked up the spool and carefully inserted