'Downton Abbey' Recap: Season 4 Episode 6

Downton Abbey airs Thursdays at 8:00 pm and is available to stream by WTTW Passport members. Recap the previous episodes.
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It’s a few weeks later, and in an eerie throwback to the first time we met the Crawleys in April 1912, another fateful telegram arrives at Downton for Robert: this time, he must sail for America immediately to bail out Cora’s hapless brother Harold from a legal and financial scandal. Robert is livid to be dragged into the mess, and Bates, as Robert’s valet, is distressed as it will mean a weeks-long absence from his still-fragile wife Anna. 

Bates appeals to Mrs. Hughes, who turns to Mary with no choice but to let her in on Anna’s secret (but not her attacker’s identity). Mary, shaken, persuades Robert to take Thomas on the trip instead. Bates feels guilty, but Mary privately assures him that what happened to Anna wasn’t his fault. For his part, Thomas is excited to be going, and Molesley overhears him ordering Baxter to keep her eyes and ears open for him while he’s gone. Disturbed, Molesley later grills her about the exchange, but Baxter is silent.

In the midst of the preparations, Violet arrives with a slight fever and an ominous cough. They find Tom in the library with Evelyn Napier and Charles Blake, discussing the eagerly awaited herd of pigs that will be arriving at Downton the next day. Mary and Evelyn have a heart-to-heart about Blake. Mary still dislikes him; he underestimates Mary’s determination to help Downton survive and thinks Evelyn is blind where she is concerned. (Sadly, he probably is.) That evening as Anna is helping Mary undress at bedtime, Mary tries to convince Anna to go to the police to report her “unknown” attacker. Still terrified that Bates will retaliate, Anna won’t disclose who he is.

Edith tells Cora she’s going to London. She tries and fails to work up the courage to tell her mother about her pregnancy. Rose, due to be presented at court in a few months (after which she will be officially considered “eligible”), wheedles Cora into letting her accompany Edith to London. (Bad idea, again.)

Once there, Rosamond is rightly suspicious of Rose’s motives, but Rose insists that she wants only to shop and get together with “old friends.” History would suggest otherwise, and sure enough, Rose has made arrangements to meet up with Jack Ross. We next see them canoodling in a rowboat in a lagoon, where Ross, a realist, asks Rose what she thinks can possibly come out of their relationship. (In 1920s Great Britain, interracial unions were legal but very much frowned upon.) Rose naively declares, “Vive la différence!” They will ride it out for now.

New Relationships

Rosamond insists that Edith come clean about her own purpose for coming to London, and tearfully, she does: since Gregson has disappeared, she has decided to get an illegal backroom abortion. Rosamond, aghast, tries to argue against it: the procedure is unsafe and the family won’t turn against her if she gives birth to the child. Edith is skeptical. Unable to dissuade her from going through with it, Rosamond insists on accompanying her. The next day in the abortionist’s dingy waiting room, Edith begins to have second thoughts. And when she and Rosamond overhear a woman weeping through a door, Edith flees with Rosamond hot on her heels. Another solution will have to be found.

Isobel, concerned that Tom has no life outside the estate, encourages him to maintain his interest in politics. The region’s member of Parliament, John Ward, will be coming to speak in Ripon the next day, and she will get them tickets. But Isobel drops in on Violet and finds her bedridden and miserably ill. She has flu and bronchitis, and Clarkson worries that it could develop into pneumonia. Violet, incapacitated, is unable to object when Isobel rolls up her sleeves – with Clarkson’s approval, and feeling she owes the Crawleys for sticking with her after Matthew’s death, she will dedicate herself to nursing Violet back to health. Clarkson later admonishes the recovering Violet, who remembers nothing of Isobel’s herculean efforts, to give her the appreciation she deserves. Grudgingly, Violet does, and begins to genuinely enjoy Isobel’s company.

Violet’s illness means that Isobel is unable to attend the political event with Tom, so he goes alone. When he arrives at the event, there is one empty chair next to a pretty young woman also attending solo – forthright schoolteacher Sarah Bunting. Sparks fly.

A Surprise Friend, and a Surprise Villain

Alfred signals that he will be stopping at Downton briefly while he’s in the area visiting family. Mrs. Hughes and Mrs. Patmore worry about the effect his presence will have on Daisy. Carson attempts to hold him off in the village by lying that there’s “flu in the house.” But Alfred, unaware of any problem, comes to Downton anyway. Ivy, who has soured on Jimmy after his unwelcome advances, is especially pleased to see him. Daisy, still bitterly blaming Ivy for driving Alfred away, is not.

While all this is going on, Blake appears for dinner without Evelyn, who is dining with friends. Blake is curious to see the new pigs and suggests he and Mary walk down to the farm after they dine. Once they get there, they are alarmed to find the pigs’ water trough overturned and most of the herd dying from dehydration. Blake and Mary are forced to form a bucket brigade to the water pump in the barn and rehydrate the pigs, stat. Soon their bodies and evening clothes are caked with muck and Mary slips and falls in her high heels. As the hours go by, they manage to save the pigs, and Blake realizes that Mary has far more grit than he had assumed. As they collapse in exhaustion on benches in the barn, they laugh at their predicament and begin slinging mud at each other. Later, Blake is in for another surprise: down in Downton’s kitchen as dawn approaches, Mary cooks him scrambled eggs.

The next morning, to Evelyn’s dismay and everyone else’s astonishment, Mary and Blake are a lot chummier than they had been before. However, Mary learns from Cora that Tony Gillingham, presumably still engaged to be married, is inconveniently arriving for a visit that day – it turns out that Blake and Gillingham served together in the Royal Navy during the war. Evelyn is an awkward third wheel.

The unexpected arrival in the servants hall of Gillingham’s valet Green sends Anna and Mrs. Hughes into a tailspin. Later in the boot room, Mrs. Hughes grimly confronts him – she knows what he did and is watching his every move. As everyone is dining and Anna struggles to behave normally, Green casually reveals his whereabouts during Nellie Melba’s performance.

Bates puts it together: Green was Anna’s attacker.