The Princess & the Pea (24 page)

Watkins again lifted his eyebrow the tiniest bit. Her stomach plunged much further.

"We do have a cook, don't we, Watkins?"

For a moment what might have been sympathy glittered in Watkins's eyes.

"The cook is sick."

"Hell and damnation."

The three kitchen maids gasped at the rude indiscretion. Cece didn't care. She paced up and down the massive kitchen past huge warming ovens, a preparation table that seemed to go on forever, even a fireplace she could literally stand in. The castle kitchen was an intriguing mix of old and new. Copper pots and pans hanging from cast-iron hooks, their surfaces shined to mirror brightness, reflected her passage.

If only her mother was here to advise her. No, that would be the coward's way out of this dilemma. And if she was to become the Countess of Graystone, it was only right that she should be able to handle such a situation. Still, she wasn't the countess yet, and if her mother was available, Cece would be more than willing to thrust this entire endeavor into her parent's capable hands.

She pulled to a halt and studied the servants lined up before her. The two on the ends were similar in appearance, both dark-haired and short, with rounded figures. Like bookends, they flanked the middle maid. Taller and thinner than the others, the girl's fair hair was of that indefinable color somewhere between blond and brown. All three were of indeterminable ages, but she didn't think any were much older than she, or much wiser. And all three appeared, if not exactly terrified, then at least more than a little apprehensive.

"Do any of you know how to cook?"

They shook their heads quickly and nearly in unison. Cece sighed and tried to fight the panic rising within her.

"None of you knows how to cook anything?" Cece cast them a hopeful look designed to forge alliances and create the impression that servant and master alike were all in this together. "Anything at all?"

The maid on the far end raised a timid hand. "Cook 'as been lettin' me cook vegetables of late. Carrots, onions, potatoes."

"Excellent!" Cece beamed and clasped her hands together. "And your name is?"

"Mary, miss." The maid bobbed a quick curtsy.

'"scuse me, miss," the other half of the bookend maids said tentatively. "I pretty much bake the bread 'ere. 'Ave for a few years now."

"Splendid!" Cece said with a satisfied smile. "And you are?"

The girl dropped a curtsy exactly like the first maid. "Ellen, miss." She nodded toward Mary. "She's my sister."

"I thought as much." Cece murmured. She turned to the middle servant. A head taller man the other two, she appeared a year or two older.

"Desserts, miss," she said sheepishly and dipped a curtsy. "I'm Willomena. Cook 'as been teaching me to do desserts."

"Did you have dessert planned for tonight?" Cece said hopefully. "If it's already made, that's one less thing to worry about."

The maids traded swift glances: then the tall one stepped forward, apparently the spokesperson by virtue of a silent vote." 'Twere the oddest thing, miss. We all knew about the party. 'Er ladyship 'asn't 'ad a party 'ere since the old earl died. But aside from the dustin' and the moppin' and the scrubbin', and that more fer the 'ouseguests than anything else," she said confidentially, "there 'asn't been a lick 'o preparation for this party."

"No bread," Ellen said somberly.

"No menu," Mary said soberly.

"Nothing," Willomena said solemnly. She shook her head in dismay. "What 'as the castle come to, I ask you? It's a disgrace."

"A scandal," Mary moaned.

"Oh. the shame of it," Ellen lamented. "The 'orrible shame."

For a moment Cece could only stare at the trio, the import of their words escaping her in the sheer absurdity of their dismay. It was exceedingly nice to have servants who held their positions with pride. Still, a party was nothing but a party, after all. And even in the rigid societal structure of 1890s Britain, a social disaster would, in time, be forgotten. Beyond that, it was still morning. She and this downhearted trio had the entire day to come up with some kind of miracle.

"Well," Cece drew a deep breath, "if there is nothing planned, then we can do nothing wrong. That is to say, anything we do should be quite acceptable."

The maids exchanged looks once again, seemed to reach a unified response and turned matching smiles toward her.

"Very good." Cece nodded. "Now we seem to have the ability to take care of some of the superficial details of this dinner. Still... none of you know how to cook..."

She directed her gaze to Mary"... beef?"

Mary shook her head. Cece turned to Willomena. "Lamb?"

Willomena's gesture mirrored Mary's. Cece faced Ellen with a sinking heart. Her voice held a note of last-ditch hope. "Poultry? Fish? Game?"

Ellen looked as if she wanted to say anything but what she did. "Just bread."

"Vegetables." Mary added.

"Dessert." Wfllomena sighed.

"That is a problem." Cece leaned back against the table and raised a skeptical brow. "Any ideas, ladies?"

"Don't you know'ow to cook, miss?" Mary blurted.

"Me?" Cece snorted in derision. "Why on earth would you think I'd know how to cook?"

"You're from America, miss." Ellen said, as if that explained everything.

Wfllomena nodded eagerly. "We read a lot of stories about America, miss. About brave pioneer families crossin' the whole country—"

"About cowboys and Indians and scouts and gunslingers." Ellen said eagerly. "About the Wild West, mostly."

"With people named Dead Eye McCall and One-Shot Willie and Sam the Serpent Saline." Mary released a heartfelt sigh. "It sounds bloody excitin'."

"Dime novels." Cece said under her breath.

"And you bein' from there and all, we thought sure a little thing like cookin' wouldn't present a problem." Unblemished faith shone in Wfllomena's eyes. "For an American."

"Yes, well..." How much better could things get? Not only was she expected to plan and execute an evening for sixty-four people, but the staff with which she had to pull it off apparently viewed her as a combination of Buffalo Bill and Lady Liberty.

She eyed the trio before her cautiously. Confidence practically glowed about them. It seemed that in their eyes, America—more specifically, the Wild West—was as close as one could get to heaven on earth. And anyone even remotely connected with that paradise was a virtual saint.

"I'm from Chicago, ladies." Cece said. "It's extremely civilized."

The expectant expressions before her did not fade. She tried again.

"I don't live in the Wild West. I'm not stout-hearted pioneer stock. I've never met a real Indian. And the only time I've ever even been around cooking was ..."

Like lightning before a storm, unforgettable memories flashed through her mind.

"... Fork Tongue Frank," she said softly.

The expectant faces in front of her faded and she was swept back to the summer she was twelve years old. The months her mother always referred to as "that unfortunate incident with your father." It was the most wonderful time of her life.

Henry White was indeed a self-made man. beginning his career as a cowboy on the open range. Henry quickly decided there was little future in the rugged life of cattle drives and working other men's herds. He suspected the way to make his fortune was closer to the market end of the beasts' progress from prairie to table. With the small amount of money he had saved he started his own meatpacking venture in Chicago.

Henry had a knack for beef and business. By the time Cece was born the Whites were quite prosperous. By the time she hit twelve he was proclaimed king of the meatpacking industry.

Perhaps it was his success that triggered the "unfortunate incident." Perhaps it was merely the realization that there would be no son to cany on the family business. Or perhaps it was simply his charming wife's penchant for spending his hard-earned money freely and without a second thought as to where it came from, and the same inclination he saw developing in his daughters.

With the declaration that "at least one of his children should damn well know where the money to support this family comes from." Cece was whisked from the eminently civilized world of Chicago to the last two months of a Wyoming cattle drive.

And she had loved it.

Her days were spent on horseback with men who were rough and rowdy, land and funny. Men who tried to watch their salty language around her and failed. Men who looked on her less as the big boss's daughter and more as a little sister. Cowboys.

Her favorite was an old, gnarled gnome of a man: Fork Tongue Frank. Frank O'Malley ruled the chuck wagon with a wooden spoon in one hand and a barely hidden bottle of whiskey in the other. In spite of his short stature, the little Irishman was bigger than life and absolutely fascinating. His tongue indeed was forked a little. O'Malley claimed it was the legacy of his great-grandpa who was part rattler. Other cowboys said he'd actually fallen in a drunken stupor and slit the end of his tongue on a broken bottle, and that it just grew back that way. But Cece liked O'Malley's version best.

She hung around his wagon with a tenacity that he rewarded by spinning tales that mixed Emerald Isle leprechauns with frontier natives. He even took her into his confidence and shared some of his culinary secrets.

"If ya drop somethin' on the ground, wipe it off fore ya throw it back in the pot." Fork Tongue's gravelly voice still rang in her mind, as if he'd spouted his wisdom just yesterday. "Men don't mind a bit a grit, long as the vittles is nice and tasty.

"And remember, girl, nothin' fills the empty spot in a man's belly like beans. And a splash of this—" he held up his bottle with a twinkle in his eye—"makes even the worst food this side of kingdom come and back again mighty tasty."

Fork Tongue showed her how to bake corn bread over an open fire, and even the cook in the grand house in Chicago had, through the years, occasionally allowed Cece into her sanctuary for a blissful afternoon of baking corn bread and reliving memories.

The last day of the drive, right before the crew headed the cattle to the railroad in Cheyenne for the trip to Chicago, the cowboys marked the end of the long, arduous trail. She suspected now that the celebration had been more for the benefit of a twelve-year-old girl man anything else. With the wisdom of age, she had no doubt the real celebrating came after the cowboys had their pay firmly in hand and could take advantage of the saloon and whatever other forms of entertainment the cattle town had to offer.

But on that final day, under Frank's watchful eye, the men dug a pit, lit a huge fire that burned to slow, smoldering embers and patiently roasted a carcass. It took all day and was without a doubt the most delicious thing Cece had ever tasted.

Beef cooked over an open fire. Corn bread. A rather meager offering of culinary expertise. Still...

She narrowed her eyes and surveyed the trio of maids. If nothing else, they were eager and willing. "Willomena. what's the best dessert you can prepare? Your specialty, as it were?"

Wfllomena drew herself up with pride. "That would be trifle, miss. I make a trifle better than anyone."

"Makes you think you'd died and gone to 'eaven." Mary said.

"Knocks your socks right off your feet, it does." Ellen added enthusiastically.

"It sounds perfect." Cece grinned. "Ellen, do you know how to bake corn bread?"

"I can bake anything, miss." Ellen said modestly.

"She knows her bread, all right." Wfllomena said.

"And a tasty job she does too." Mary chimed in.

"Never made corn bread, though." Ellen frowned, then brightened. "But if you can give me some 'elp as to the basics ..."

"Basics, Ellen, are about all I can give you." Cece said wryly. "Now, ladies, with your able assistance I think we can pull off this evening."

She folded her arms across her chest and smiled slowly.

"I have an interesting idea."

"What in the name of all that's holy is going on here?" Jared stopped dead in his tracks beside Lady Millicent at the top of the short flight of stone steps leading from the castle terrace to the formal gardens.

"It is quite impressive, isn't it?" Lady Millicent murmured, slanting him a sidelong glance to gauge his reaction. She was not disappointed.

"Impressive ... and altogether unexpected." He stared, appreciation and astonishment rampant on his handsome face.

From their vantage point on the steps, the gardens and surrounding lawns were laid out like a carpet at their feet. Guests invited to Lady Olivia's gathering meandered amid roses and hedges and blossoms of all kind. Violinists strolled among ladies and gentlemen who greeted one another and chatted amicably like the old friends and neighbors most of them were.

On the lawns edging each side of the formal beds, rows of tables set with white linen and the castle's best silver and crystal glittered in the deepening twilight. Tapers twinkled from multi-armed candelabra and competed for attention with the gardener's best blooms, overflowing urns and vases in a lush display of light and beauty. Everywhere his gaze fell, lanterns winked from perches on trees and fountains and nooks and crannies he'd never imagined existed, competing for attention with the very stars in the heavens.

"Impressive may not do it justice," Jared offered Millicent his arm, and the couple proceeded down the steps.

Millicent nodded her approval. "It does look like something from a fairy tale."

"Doesn't it though. By jove, I didn't know Mother had it in her. Something this—" he gestured to the fantasy setting before them"—fresh. Creative. Original. I'll say this for her: It may take her a few years, but when she decides to finally rejoin society and entertain once again, she certainly does it up right."

"Jared ..." Millicent stopped on the bottom riser and frowned at him reproachfully. "This is not your mother's doing."

"It's not?" Confusion colored his words. "Then who ...?"

"Cece did it."

His puzzled expression deepened. "What on earth do you mean 'Cece did it'?"

Millicent considered him for a long, thoughtful moment. "You really have no idea at all, do you?" He shook his head and she took his arm in the same manner she'd use to gently break news of a calamity to an unsuspecting innocent.