The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows - Olivia Waite Page 0,30
her small surprise and vast delight, Mrs. Griffin blushed and said yes.
Chapter Six
Agatha had never seen Mrs. Flood in skirts before. Granted, they’d only met twice now, but Agatha was mortified to realize that after the first shock she’d assumed Mrs. Flood wore men’s clothing perpetually, and not only when she was minding bees.
Instead, Mrs. Flood stepped out of her house in a cinnamon frock, the color bringing out the gold lights in her short curls and turning the hue of her eyes into something like sapphire.
She looked, in a word, delicious, bobbing forward to lead the way through the deepening twilight.
Agatha could only follow helplessly, in the plain gray dress and a faded paisley shawl she’d changed into at Mrs. Stowe’s. If Mrs. Flood was a rare spice, savory and sought after, Agatha was a lichen scraped off some dismal northern crag. She had never felt so ancient.
Respectable widow, indeed. She almost wished for the blue coat back again: at least it had some color to it.
Dear god, when was the last time she’d cared at all about her appearance beside the usual category of Are there stains on this skirt? or Is this sleeve going a bit threadbare at the elbow? Not since . . .
She almost stopped walking as realization staggered her: not since Thomas. And, before Thomas, with Kate. The two times in her life she’d spent ages before her mirror, turning this way and that to check the fall of a gown, the line of a seam, the placement of a necklace or ribbon. She clenched her hands together and for a moment felt the ghostly pressure of the wedding band she hadn’t worn in two years.
She was so distracted by the revelation that before she realized it, she walked into the Four Swallows and into a raging battle.
Halfpennies were flying through the air like musket fire. They pinged against the floor and off the wall behind a chestnut-haired woman standing in the front corner. One tan hand held a drooping sheaf of ballad sheets. The other was raised to snatch flying coins out of the air. Any she caught she tucked into the deep front pockets of her overskirt, which bulged with rolled-up broadsides, lyrics, and songs. Behind her a boy of ten or so scurried about, gathering up fallen coins. He had the same chestnut hair, but skin a shade paler than his mother.
Agatha batted one poorly aimed halfpenny away from her face, and started as a hand tugged on her elbow.
She turned to see Mrs. Flood laughing and shaking her head. “Looks like Nell’s performing tonight—come on, we’ll be out of range in the back.”
Once past the front cluster of the audience the crowd calmed somewhat. Agatha nodded at Mr. Downes and a few other pressmen at the long central tables, sharing drinks and food and conversation. Another group in one corner was playing cards; a solitary figure at the bar was hunched over her ale with a book in her hand. Agatha recognized the other three beekeepers from her first meeting with Mrs. Flood, sitting variously around the room.
Agatha and Mrs. Flood found an empty pair of chairs against the wall. The barmaid brought two foaming tankards and promised them pasties, as the ballad singer’s voice rang out to start her next song.
Agatha took a swallow of beer and paused, blinking. “This is quite good.”
Mrs. Flood leaned back, radiating smug local pride. “Has the poor beer you find in London taught you that every tavern waters down its ale?”
Agatha snorted, then lapsed into silence. She couldn’t remember the last time she hadn’t hurried over a meal, trying to get back to work as quickly as possible. But there was no project waiting for her at the end of tonight. Nothing left undone, nothing hovering anxiously over her shoulder. It made her feel restless, and she shifted in her seat.
The girl came by again with the pasties, and Agatha was relieved to have an excuse for being tongue-tied. It helped that the pasty was at least as good as the ale, if not better: curried mutton with onion and peas.
They did not have the corner to themselves for long: Mrs. Flood seemed to know everyone, or everyone seemed to know her, and soon Agatha had been introduced to brown-skinned Mr. Biswas, Mr. Koskinen all pale and red-haired, his curly-haired wife with intelligent eyes, and two young men, tall Mr. Thomas and broad-shouldered Mr. Kitt. Mr. Thomas lived on half pay from the