"Simple fare. When the place was still open, Beth-rae baked bread all morning, then cooked different types of stew or fish chowder. She's good with herbs and spices." He paused. "Come upstairs, and I'll show you the living quarters."
Although his tone remained casual, Magiere sensed a cautious tension in the old caretaker, as if there was more going on here than he indicated.
"How long have you been here?" she asked, following him up the staircase.
"Nine years," he answered. "Rose has been with us since my daughter… left us."
"Left you?" Leesil asked. Then he muttered under his breath, "Seems like people keep leaving this place."
Caleb didn't respond. Magiere held her tongue as well. The old man's affairs were none of her business.
The upper floor was as well tended as the lower. The top of the stairs emptied into the center of a short, narrow hallway. First Caleb showed her a large bedroom at the left end of the hall, somewhere above the common room downstairs, and proclaimed it to be hers. There was another room for Leesil at the midpoint of the hall, just across from the stairs, and a third small room at the right end of the hall. The last had likely been used for storage or other purposes. There was a sagging bed tucked into the corner, two pillows at its head, and a little mat on the floor.
"This is where we stay, Miss," Caleb said. "We don't take up much space."
For the second time that day, Magiere sighed in resignation. Leesil was right; they couldn't manage everything by themselves. Besides, she had no idea how to make spiced fish chowder and no time for tasks like cleaning the hearth if she was to learn how to run this place.
"What arrangement did you have with the bank?" she asked.
"Arrangement?" Caleb's brows gathered.
"What does the bank pay you?"
"Pay us? We've just been living here, tending the place, and were careful not to use up all the stores before the new owner arrived."
Magiere didn't know whom she despised more at that moment, the very poor or the very rich. The bank was able to arrange free caretakers, taking advantage of two people suddenly left without an employer.
"All right," she said to Caleb. "You two work for me, and I'll pay you a twentieth share of the house's profits, plus room and board." She pushed past Leesil down the hall and away from the small room. She stopped at the top of the stairs and looked back at them. "And I don't need that big bedroom. We'll switch places later this afternoon."
Leesil stared at her, then looked at Caleb and shrugged. A flicker, just a hint, of astonishment passed across Caleb's face, but he nodded as if such an offer was commonplace.
"That will be just fine," he said calmly. He moved down the hall past her and went quietly back downstairs, no doubt to inform his spouse of the changes to come.
Magiere stepped into the doorway of what would be Leesil's room and leaned against the jamb. Leesil strolled over to stand in the doorway next to her, pretending to examine the near-empty space. There was nothing to look at except the bed and an open-shuttered window in the far wall that looked out toward the ocean, its view only slightly obscured by the branches of a nearby fir tree. Magiere willed him to be silent.
"How uncharacteristic," he finally said.
"If you disagreed, you should have spoken up."
"I don't disagree."
Neither spoke for a short while. Between the two of them, they'd likely starved out entire villages for the price of her services. Magiere finally said, "I want a new life."
Leesil looked at her out of the corner of his eye, loose hair exposing his ears. He nodded and smiled.
"I suppose it's a start."
By sundown that night, Magiere's personal appearance and her world had altered considerably. Beth-rae arranged for a long, hot bath in the kitchen so she could scrub every bit of mud from her hair and skin. While she bathed, her clothing miraculously disappeared and was replaced by a muslin dressing gown. Still planning too many activities that night to remain in what she considered nearly night-clothes, Magiere went back upstairs into her small room. What was once a mere closet for three would do well enough for one.
Furnishings had been moved from one room to another, and all the comforts of a home surrounded her. Where there was once a bed barely large enough