What is the setting in the novel, Mistress Masham's Repose?

The story takes place in England in the 1940s. World War II has taken a great toll on the expansive Ducal estate of Malplaquet. The heavy "war taxes," combined with generations of willful and extravagant spending by the owners of Malplaquet have left Maria, the present owner, impoverished, and her onceproud estate is a crumbling ruin.