Through the Keyhole by Susan Law
Author:Susan Law
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780750964517
Publisher: The History Press
Published: 2015-03-16T00:00:00+00:00
They were hardly ever seen asunder ⦠her ladyship kept company more with the gentlemen than with the ladies. Lady Percy and Mr Bird seemed to be so particularly attentive to each other in public, that it was remarked by everybody; and the intimacy was in general looked upon as a criminal one.
At the end of September Bridget Fortune, the housekeeper at Ash Park, received a letter from her mistress saying she was bringing home company and directing her to have the beds well aired and get a good dinner. Anne arrived one afternoon in a phaeton with Bird, and for the next six months he was a regular visitor to the house, often staying for weeks at a time in the bedchamber adjoining hers. Becoming alarmed at the situation, Lady Augusta begged her sister to break off the connection, which was becoming the subject of gossip everywhere, but she stubbornly refused. Determined not to have her own reputation injured, Lady Augusta said she could no longer live under the same roof and on 15 November left Ash Park.
Anne moved to Bath for the winter season and then returned to Ash Park in the spring of 1778. Here she ordered her usual bedchamber to be freshly wallpapered and used the excuse to move into a spare room. William Bird made six or seven visits, which they arranged by letter. The footman Thomas Morris was often asked to take a parcel addressed to Bird for the Exeter coach and to collect a locked postbag of letters to which only Lady Percy and the postmaster had keys.
The estate gardener and gamekeeper William Froome, who took Bird out shooting, slept in a room directly over Lady Percyâs. At night he sometimes heard noises below as if someone was creeping about after dark, but he ânever looked to see what it was, for it was no business of hisâ. Froome noticed that Lady Percyâs maid, Mrs Sarah Reeks, seemed very troubled, and on Thursday 12 March she told him that, âshe had seen such a sight that morning that she never saw in her life, and she did not think Lady Percy would ever see her anymoreâ. Though too discreet to give him all the details, Mrs Reeks had taken a shift up to Lady Percyâs room and caught the lovers in bed, semi-naked. Bird had quickly jumped out of bed, snatched up his clothes and run out, in great confusion, across the passage to his own room.
In April 1778 Lady Percy moved to London, renting a furnished house in Brompton Row, near Knightsbridge, and continued to sleep with Bird. One morning the new housemaid, who was helping Mrs Reeks to make the bed, noticed stains on the sheets and remarked how much the bed was tumbled. Mrs Reeks laughed knowingly but said nothing.
The affair had been an open secret for far too long. Lord Percy was due to become the 2nd Duke of Northumberland, and what he needed was an heir, not a childless and troublesome wife.
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