Vera finished her tea, smirking, as John sat, his head spinning with all the threats she had leveled at him.
"I'll see you in the morning, John," she called, cheerily, on the way out.
He sat, his mind frozen. Then, slowly, he gathered his thoughts. He was in Mrs Hughes' sitting room. He couldn't stay there, so he took the tea tray back to the kitchen, and handed it to Daisy. Then he walked out the back door. He needed air, and to be away from any walls. Vera was putting walls around him, and he felt like he'd entered an invisible prison. He walked, not noticing where he was going.
When the Boers shot at him, even when they hit him, he had been trained to cut off all his emotions, putting the terror away, while he aimed, shot, reloaded, following orders even with his leg in agony. He tried to box up his rage at her the same way, but as he did so, he realized that there was a difference here, that he was trying to be a soldier and an officer at the same time. He was willing to do whatever it took to keep her quiet, but he didn't trust her, and he hadn't a clue about what he should do to stop her, besides giving in to her demands. There was a reason the officers never carried heavy weapons, it was so that they could do the thinking, while others fought. He knew, better than most, how to fight, but he also knew that a fight went better when it was organized, and that was a skill he lacked.
That thought took him back to the house. He knew where he could find an officer he could trust. He made his way to Lord Grantham's study, knocked on the door, and entered.
"Bates?" Lord Grantham looked up from his papers, perplexed. This was not a room Bates ever used.
"Sir, your lordship, I need to talk with you." Bates started, flustered by his slip. He hadn't used the wrong honorific in years.
Lord Grantham tilted his head a bit. He could see the man was quite agitated. "I heard from Carson that Mrs Bates was here earlier, so I'm assuming that's what brought you here."
"Yes, m'lord, she came to ask me to hand in my notice."
"Surely, you're not going to do that simply because she asked. You just told me last week that you intended to get a divorce and marry Anna."
"I did, and that is what I still want. But Vera, well, she's making threats. She had a job, as a lady's maid to Lady Flintshire, and used her position to gather gossip about your family, gossip she has threatenened to sell to the newspapers unless I return to her."
"What?" Lord Grantham drew his brows together and shook his head in disbelief. "Really, Bates, what could she possibly tell a newspaperman?"
"Well, your lordship, that's just it. She plans to use the fact that I work here as proof that whatever she says must be true. She doesn't care so much about the gossip, just that she can use it to hurt me. I can't let her attack you this way, and … I don't know what to do, except give in to her."
Lord Grantham was touched that Bates felt he should go to such lengths just to protect the Crawley family, but more, he was puzzled that Bates saw a need for such action.
"Look, Bates, if she tries to peddle some sort of nonsense to the papers, it won't wash. They have to have some sort of - not proof, quite, but something more than the lone rantings of a maid who has never even worked here. Besides, what she's doing is blackmail, and not very good blackmail at that."
Bates bit his lip, not sure how to explain what Vera had threatened.
"Oh, spit it out, man! You must think there's some substance behind her threats."
"Yes, m'lord. I just hate to say it." Bates paused. "It goes back, before the war started, when the Turkish gentleman came for the hunt."
"Good Lord." Grantham gestured for Bates to sit down, but Bates remained standing. "she can't be trying to claim that he was poisoned, or some such thing? I mean, he died naturally, the death certificate said as much. Who would care about the death of a Turk, anyway? They are our enemies, now."
"No, it's not his death, m'lord, it's, well, where he was."
"He was in his bed." Honestly, sometimes Bates went overboard in his need to protect his betters.
"Well, the gossip has it that he'd become very friendly with Lady Mary, and that he had gone to her room, and died there." Bates looked at the floor as he said this. He'd rather anything than face Lord Grantham while making such an accusation, but it would be even worse to walk away from the man, and leave him ignorant of a scandal that involved his family, and unable to organize a counterattack.
Lord Grantham didn't react for a moment. He was often like that, when a crisis developed. Bates knew what was coming, though, and he kept his head down, anticipating it.
"Good God, Bates, that's ridiculous! I would sue the paper for libel, and that would be the end of it. No one would dare publish such nonsense."
"I hope you're right, m'lord, but you do see that I still have to leave, so that your family won't have to read such things."
"I don't see that at all, Bates. You must tell her that you are not threatened by her made-up nonsense, and that she must leave. I can have her thrown out of the Grantham Arms tomorrow."
"But that's just why I'm so worried, sir. She didn't make it up, she heard it."
"Of course she made it up. The Turk was found in his bed, and that's an end to it." Lord Grantham said that firmly, but, once it was said, he began to think that perhaps Bates had a point, and he needed to investigate, himself, a bit. "Bates, I'm glad you came to me with this, and I will consider if there is anything either of us should do, but for now, don't worry about it. I can't imagine why such nonsense is being talked about in my cousin's house."
Bates nodded, and left.