Yes, Mary and Spratt were in Liverpool. Violet said that Spratt’s niece (IIRC) was getting married there.
Sorry, I meant Liverpool.
I understand that Spratt is not Mary’s servant, but I don’t see why a servant would disclose info like that that would bring embarrassment to his employer or her family. What was the upside? It’s not like Violet would later find out he knew and didn’t say anything.
Considering Mary’s outing with Lord Gillingham was morally dubious according to the commonly held conventions of the time, especially for aristocrats, Spratt may have felt he was dutybound to let Violet know of her wayward granddaughter so she is aware enough to provide guidance.
Granted, this might also have been a case of his personal moral outrage at Mary’s violating the norms of the time getting the better of discretion. However, it didn’t seem Violet was too put out by Spratt’s tattling…especially considering she herself has demonstrated great capacity for prying secret information of this type from her younger more junior family members.
Oh I know where the photograph was last…Mrs. Hughes wouldn’t hold onto something obviously personal of the family’s for long, I would think she would be handing it over asap (irregardless of putting 2 + 2 together) right?
I wonder…I am sure she would know based on it’s location it was “sensitive” and wouldn’t want Edith to feel she was holding it over her or overly curious. Maybe Hughes will leave it in Edith’s new room quietly.
Mrs. Hughes no doubt figured it out and may hand it to Cora and simply say it was found during the clean up–thus allowing Cora to figure it out.
I can’t believe Spratt hasn’t been canned yet. He embarrasses his employer by snubbing her guests and now he is gossiping to her about a family member. Who wants a personal servant like that?
Especially when Violet could have that dark haired latino Mosley.
@TempeMom - you made me laugh out loud!
Since it was found in Edith’s room, Mrs. Hughes should give it back to Edith. Edith is an adult. She doesn’t need to have her mother knowing everything.
But, IMO, the fact that we don’t know what happened to the photo suggests it may reappear in a later episode … Things/people do have a way of popping up later or at an inconvenient time.
I finally watched the last episode, “sympathy butters no parsnips” (Mrs. Padmore) hahaha. What do you bet that Mr. Carson will reconsider?
Also, I generally don’t like Miss Bunting but she didn’t seem so out of whack this time. The Russians were a tinderbox waiting to explode, or a waterfall, or both.
Is Edith really going to confess to her father next week? Then we’ll get to see him explode.
I think something will happen to marigold’s adoptive mother, and illness or accident. and make it easier for Edith to get her back.
I knew Mary would sleep with Tony and not find it 'satisfying" “he is nice but”"… How does one tell him that. yikes.
greenwitch, I forgot about “sympathy butters no parsnips.” I might have to use that sometime. 
The snubbing of guests does make one wonder.
However, considering Violet is the matriarch of the entire family and Mary is her granddaughter and thus, a much more junior member of it, what he did may have been considered part of his duties depending on the employer. Also, if the information is kept within the family, it may not have been viewed as negatively as opposed to Spratt disclosing it to those outside the Grantham family household.
Actually, someone who hasn’t officially married and established his own household or married off to her husband’s household would still be viewed as minors regardless of age according to the norms of that period. Especially if the unmarried adult children are still living at home. Since the household she lived under is that of Lord Grantham & Lady Cora…the servants technically had to defer to them if there was a conflict between the younger/more junior members of the family and the head of the household.
I don’t see Lady Mary as all that “junior” in her status. She is eldest child of the current Earl and the mother and sole legal guardian of the next Earl. She is co-manager of the estate, and perhaps most importantly, as heir to Matthew’s fortune, she is the one with all the MONEY.
I’m sure there are other factors and nuances at work here, but it’s plain that Mary’s opinons and wishes carry enormous weight around Downton Abbey, as well they should. It would not be in any person’s interest, particularly a servant’s, to cross Lady Mary. Spratt is either very stupid or he has for some unknown reason chosen to play a dangerous game of intrigue.
If Mary remarries does her money go to her new husband or would she keep control of it?
I don’t think that’s the issue; she did make a comment about having learned a great deal and she looked quite pleased about it. I think she realized he probably would make a good friend with benefits, but not such a great husband. Her comment did make me wonder what she learned from Tony that Matthew didn’t know about (or didn’t let her know he knew about, anyway).
While Mary is the eldest child of the current earl, Violet is the Countess Dowager which means she technically outranks even the current earl in the family when it comes to social/family matters like her get together with Lord Gillingham.
Violet also may be financially independent per the conditions of the estate’s will when her husband passed on though the current Earl gets control of the vast majority of the estate.
Also, my understanding of the period is that she has guardianship over the money for her son, but once he comes of age…he takes full control of most of the money and Mary gets a small portion per the norms of that period. In short, Mary does not have full control of her husband’s money.
Depends on how the will is drawn up.
It could or the will could have been written in such a way that she maintains guardianship of the money for the son until he comes of age and that none of it goes to the new husband or their children. The latter was sometimes done to ensure not only will the child of the deceased father gets his/her inheritance, but only the father’s natural born children get the money.
I’ve also read of some wills of wealthy persons of the period that the widow loses access to the estate of her deceased husband should she opt to remarry.
I thought the money was left to Mary because George wasn’t born yet so they didn’t know if the baby would be a boy or girl. That’s way they made an issue of having to pay “death duties” twice.