Leslie LaFoy (16 page)

“Aye. Upstairs maid, I was.” Her hands went to her hips. “An' I suppose you'd be a wonderin' how it was that I'd be findin' meself papered an' sold off for a scullery maid, wouldn't ye? Well, I'll be tellin' ye the tale so ye don't be hearin' it from others who'd be stitchin' the story with their lies. My employer was a London gent, fine an' fancy an' randy as any goat. Had him a string of mistresses, he did, his wife a knowin' 'bout 'em all. What she didn't know was that he was keepin' 'em by sellin' off her jewels on the sly.”

“And there came a day when she discovered something missing,” Claire supplied, having heard the story too many times to count.

“Aye, an' the goat didn't have the bullocks to stand up an' confess his crimes. Blamed the maids, he did. Mary Anne O'Malley an' me. We was hauled into the dock, we were, an' declared common thieves. 'Twas prison or be papered an' so we was shipped to the colonies. “ 'Twas James City, they said, where we be docked. An' where me papers was bought by Mr. Wyndom.”

It was such a common story. But for the grace of God, Claire might have very well have ended up bound into servitude just like Meg. “I'm sorry.”

“'Tisn't yer fault, Madam Rivard. I just want ye to know the true tale in case ye hear the other.”

“Duly noted, Meg. And please… Madam Rivard is the mother of Devon and Wyndom. Everyone's taken it into their heads to call me Lady Claire to distinguish between us. It seems easier to accept it than to resist.”

“Are ye a lady?”

“I was at one point in my life,” Claire answered. “Not that it mattered much then or in the years since.”

“But ye know how to cook.”

“Yes, I do. And well. What are you planning to prepare for meals tomorrow?”

Meg glanced around the kitchen. “Porridge for breakfast. 'Tis easy enough. After that…” She studied a ham hanging from a hook in the ceiling, shrugged, and looked back to Claire. “Maybe a ham for the midday meal an' what's left of it for the evenin'?”

“To be prepared how?”

“In the oven?”

“The oven would be fine,” Claire conceded. “Have you soaked the ham?”

“Soaked?”

“To remove the curing salts so that it's palatable.”

“An' what should it be a soakin' in, an' for how long?”

“Water,” Claire answered, knowing that they were going to have to start with the most basic of lessons. “Why don't you go fetch some while I get the fires going again.”

Meg dutifully went to the door, picked up the bucket, and then paused to ask, “Ye'll be a cookin' it tonight?”

“Partially,” Claire answered, moving toward the hearth. “For the most part, I'll be relighting and then banking the fires so they're ready to go in the morning when you're ready to cook the porridge and bake the daily bread.”

“I don't know 'bout bread bakin'.”

“I'll teach you. For now, please go get the water for the ham.”

Meg went, bucket in hand, while Claire stirred the ashes, searching for a few live coals. They were small, but there and sufficient. She was feeding bits of tinder to them when Meg returned from the well. Claire had her pour the water into a cauldron and then sent her back for more. By the time Meg returned the second time, flames were crackling up from the ashes and the ham had been placed in the cast iron cooking pot. Together, they lifted the massive weight and secured the handle on the fire hook.

Stepping back, Claire considered the brick oven to her right. “Why don't you restart the other fire, Meg, while I see what's in the stores.”

With a nod, Meg set to the task. Claire went about lifting lids from the various crates and barrels that lined one long wall of the stone room, from the crocks that, along with stacks of pottery bowls, filled the two openfaced shelves on the other long wall. Flour and salt.
Lard and vinegar. Sugar, both brown and white. Molasses and cornmeal.

“Are ye Mr. Devon's sister?”

“His wife,” Claire answered absently, opening the lower cupboard doors. Metal cooking pans were stacked neatly on shelves inside. “We were very recently married.”

“Ahhh. 'Tis the explanation then.”

“The explanation of what?” she asked, straightening, a flat baking sheet in her hand.

“Why ye hesitated to use his name when ye introduced yerself to me. 'Tis foreign to yer tongue yet.”

“Yes, it is,” Claire confessed, handing the pan to Meg and pointing to the central worktable. Getting a large bowl from the shelf above, she added, “In fact, I don't know that I'll ever become accustomed to using it.”

“Aye, ye will,” Meg assured her as Claire crossed to the other side of the room. “Sooner than ye think, prob'ly. 'Tis, to me thinkin', the easiest part of being married.”

Using her hand to scoop flour from the barrel, Claire asked, “Do you have a husband, Meg?”

“Oh, I did for a wee while. But he took up with Mary Agnes O'Roarke, an' I'd been married to him long enough to know that she was a doin' me a favor in takin' him off me hands. I let him go an' said a novena for poor Mary Agnes. 'Twas no prize she was gettin'.

“Now, Mr. Devon… I be a thinkin' he's a prize worth a fight to hang on to. Not that I've seen more o' him than his comin' an' goin' from the main house, mind ye. But even from a fair distance, a girl can see he's a handsome, strappin' man.”

“More handsome than Wyndom?” Claire teased, pausing as she put the flour bowl on the table.

Meg Malone laughed softly, amusement sparkling in her eyes. “Mr. Wyndom's fair enough o' face, to be
sure. He's a bit of a lummox, but it makes me heart light to watch him bumble about. An' truth be told, he's the finest gent what's ever slid 'tween me sheets. Not that others ain't tried, mind ye. Like ye, I be a picker an' a chooser.”

“Well, in all honesty,” Claire replied on her way to the shelves for the crocks containing lard, salt, and baking powder, “I have to admit that I didn't pick or choose Devon.”

Meg came along to help, accepting the larger lard crock and asking, “Yer da picked him for ye?”

“My uncle, actually.”

“Ah,” Meg sighed dreamily, “but it's got to warm yer heart to know the man was down on his knees beggin' yer uncle fer yer hand. An' the rest of ye that goes with it. Not that a gentleman like him would be mentionin' that.”

The image of Devon Rivard down on his knees, begging anyone for anything, was preposterous. She didn't know him well, but she certainly knew that Devon would never humble himself in any fashion. And God help the poor fool who had the audacity to suggest that he consider it.

“Mr. Devon did ask fer ye, didn't he?”

Hadn't he declared her to be the last person on earth he would have chosen to marry had he a free choice in the matter? Or had that been something she'd said of him? It had been a very long day and she couldn't remember things quite clearly. But regardless of who had said what to whom, it was the way they both felt. “It's a very complicated situation,” Claire said, putting the crocks down on the table and hoping Meg wouldn't press for a fuller answer.

“Complicated or no, boils down to ye an' the mister makin' the best o' it an' sharin' a bed as husband an' wife, right?”

She thought about lying, but quickly realized that if
getting an annulment depended on witnesses testifying that the marriage hadn't been consummated… “We were married only this afternoon and—”

“This afternoon! An' ye be a spendin' yer weddin' night in the kitchen with me?”

“Hunger rearranges one's priorities,” Claire quipped, deciding that she'd come back later to the issue of her and Devon being strangers. And their determination to keep it that way.

“To the end of appeasing that hunger,” she went on, “and while we have the oven fire going, I'm going to teach you how to make biscuits. If you'd be so kind as to show me where the larder is. We'll need milk.”

D
EVON CHANCED A GLARE
in his brother's direction and found him sitting on one of the dining room chairs, struggling to push the tops of his stockings up under the lower edge of his breeches. Good God Almighty, the idiot couldn't even get his clothes on in the proper order. The ache in the back of his head deepening, Devon closed his eyes, still not trusting himself to speak and thankful that Wyndom had displayed the uncommon good sense to keep his mouth shut and not push the issue.

“I don't see that who I choose to sleep with is any of your business, Dev. And Lord knows I'm not the first man who's ever dallied with the family cook.”

So much for good sense. Deliberately crossing his arms over his chest to lessen the chance of swinging a fist at his brother, Devon answered tightly, “Just because others have committed stupidities doesn't give you leave to follow in their footsteps. Mary Margaret Malone is a servant, and while she may be an indentured one, she's just as much legal property as any of the slaves. The rules that apply to your congress with them apply to her as well. Is that clear?”

“The rules aren't laws,” his brother shot back, pulling on a boot. “They're rules you made up because you think that's the way the world should work.”

“My roof, my rules,” Devon countered simply. “As long as you live here, you'll abide by them.”

“They're stupid rules. If Mary Margaret's willing, then—”

“And who do you think is going to be the one who will have to feed and clothe the babe she might well hand you this winter?”

Wyndom pushed his foot into his other boot and shrugged. “If it's my child, then I will.”

God, how many times had they had this conversation? Hadn't they had it once already today? When was it going to sink into his brother's pea-sized brain? “You don't own a damn thing in your own right. You have no money aside from the allowance I give you and show absolutely no inclination to earn any on your own. And before you can say it, sitting at a card table hoping for luck to smile on you just once in your life isn't considered gainful employment.”

“Not by you, anyway.”

“Not by anyone.”

“You know,” Wyndom snapped, gaining his feet, “you've been a royal bastard to live with for the last two months. I figured it had to do with Darice Lytton kicking you out of her bed and that if there was one bright spot in having Lady Claire forced upon you it was that she might be able to twist you up in the sheets and knock the harder edges off of you. What the hell were you doing in the kitchen tonight? Why weren't you pinning your new wife to the bed like any self-respecting man would be?”

He so wanted to give his brother a flat nose to go with his fat lip. Devon fisted his hands and used every ounce of self-restraint he possessed to keep his arms folded. “We will have this conversation once and only
once, Wyndom,” he declared with deadly calm. “First, I am not a mindless rutter like you or our father. Second, the decision to leave Darice Lytton's bed was mine, not hers.

“Third—and most importantly—Claire's an intelligent woman who clearly understands that there's nothing to be gained in being shackled to a man on the verge of bankruptcy and whose house could pass for an insane asylum. I don't need another mouth to feed around here or another body to clothe. We're both aware that the long-term existence of this union is in neither of our best interests and that we'd both be better off to legally end it as soon as her uncle forgives the debt—
your debt
—that has us mired together.”

“Don't you ever get tired of being so damn honorable and self-sacrificing, Devon? Christ, you've positively refined it to an art. Bed the woman and then swear that you didn't so you can get your goddamn precious annulment when the time comes. No one cares whether or not your testimony is true. Either seduce Lady Claire or go throw yourself on Darice's mercy. I don't give a damn which you do, but I'm sick and tired of you riding my ass from dawn to midnight. Do me—do us
al
l—a favor and pick a woman to ride for a change, will you?”

There wasn't nearly enough pleasure in knocking Wyndom on his well-ridden ass, but there was some. His knuckles smarted, but Devon took satisfaction in knowing that his brother's nose had to hurt even worse. He watched as Wyndom struggled to sit up with one hand clamped over the center of his face. “If I ever find you with Mary Margaret again, I'll geld you. That's a promise.”

Wyndom glared up at him and snarled from behind his hand, “Don't you think having one foul-tempered eunuch in the family is enough?”

“I'm going out to the kitchen to escort Claire back to the house,” he declared, ignoring the taunt. “By the
time I return, I expect you to have taken your loathsome carcass somewhere well out of my sight.”

“Is Williamsburg far enough?”

“Not by half,” Devon replied, turning on his heel and striding through the door to the butler's pantry and out into the cold night air.

Halfway between the house and the kitchen he stopped and expelled a hard breath. It rose in a silvery cloud around him as the cold cut through the linen of his shirt to chill his skin, his blood, and his temper. The pounding in his head eased, leaving him aware of aching muscles and a battered spirit.

God, for two shillings he'd sign it all over to Wyndom, climb on his horse, and ride away without ever looking back. No one would blame him. Even if they did, he'd be far enough away that he'd never have to listen to them. Of course, a war with England was looking more likely every day; he could just be patient, enlist in whatever army his fellow colonists could muster, and claim patriotism was a more noble calling than that of being a warden to ingrates and fools. With any luck he could get himself killed. As fates went, it was preferable to spending the rest of his life here listening to the whining and waiting for the debt to slowly crush him.

Maybe, if revolution came soon enough, Claire Curran could be a widow. She could sniffle into a laceedged handkerchief and regret the good man she'd had and lost. With a wry smile, Devon continued on to the kitchen. Truth be known, he had no idea how Claire would receive any news of his death. Had he considered the question earlier in the day, he'd have bet Rosewind that she'd have been the first in line to dance on his grave.

But then she'd brought him a basin of snow for his hand. It was an act of kindness he hadn't expected and—considering the way he'd treated her—didn't
deserve. His smile broadened as he remembered that moment. The way she'd openly surveyed his chest, her violet eyes bright with appreciation… Until she'd realized what she was doing, of course. And then she'd blushed and stammered and tried to get away. He'd been surprised by that glimpse of an innocent. And he'd felt more than a little guilty for some of the things he'd said to her earlier in the day. They'd been based on assumptions that weren't true.