While she had been shopping, someone else had supplied their every need. The kitchen table was cluttered with more food than Grammaine had seen in one place for months. There was a whole side of ham, several loaves, a sack of oats, two wheels of cheese, even a bag of dried fruit and a basket of apples. Compared to the mean fare that Poldry had managed to find at Chalcaster it was a wonder to behold.
‘Cook,’ she said, ‘where has all this come from?’
The stout woman gave her a dour look. ‘He’s waiting for you in the drawing room, ma’am.’
‘He brought all this?’
‘And very proud of himself he was, too.’
‘Was he indeed?’ Emily passed by the groaning table and stepped through into the next room.
Sure enough, by a smouldering fire and sitting in the chair that had once been her father’s favourite, was Mr Northway.
She stared at him for a long time, without trusting herself to speak, and he looked back at her with that familiar insolent smile of his. They were like two duellists, each waiting for the other to make the first move.
‘My dear Miss Marshwic,’ he said at last. ‘Or may I call you Emily now, to avoid confusion with little Alice?’
‘You may not. What is the meaning of this, Mr Northway?’
‘Do not search for meaning in all things, Miss Marshwic.’ He settled himself more comfortably into the chair. ‘Can a man not pay a visit once in a while?’
‘You are not welcome in this house,’ she told him. ‘You have never been welcome in this house. And as for your . . . gifts . . .’
His raised hand stopped her, despite all her determination. ‘Before you make some noble stand, Miss Marshwic, you should know that nobody but I will profit if you refuse my little gesture. You will neither feed the poor that way, or help the needy. Instead, it will all return with me to the town hall, and my staff will eat a little better, and yours a little worse.’ His deep-set eyes watched her keenly between blinking, to see how she would react.
‘Do you expect gratitude?’
‘Heaven forfend!’ he laughed. ‘Consider a little talk with you my reasonable payment for goods delivered. After all, enmity or not, it would be a poor show of hospitality to throw me out into the cold.’
She left her response so long that he began to shift his feet uncomfortably, before finally she sat down on the chaise-longue across the room from him. ‘I would not dream, Mr Northway, of throwing the King’s duly appointed representative from the house. Do you have a purpose here, or are we simply the beneficiaries of your noted charity.’
‘The sole beneficiaries,’ added Northway. Am I not solicitous of your well-being?’
A myriad of angry responses queued up on the tip of her tongue, and were bitten down. She let his goading pass her by in a single deep breath, and instead looked him in the eye. ‘Do you think I can be bought, Mr Northway?’ She was proud of herself, for her control.
But he just raised his eyebrows, insufferable as ever. ‘Can you? How much is the price per pound, I wonder? What currency would suffice?’
She stood at once, her hard-won composure abruptly falling away from her. ‘I feel hospitality has been served. I would like you to leave now. Poor Alice will not enter the house until you are gone.’
‘How very sensitive of her.’ He showed no signs of moving. ‘As it happens, I have a reason to be here other than simple benevolence. A warning, in fact, that there are house guests even more unwelcome than me, of late.’
‘I find that hard to believe.’
He paused a moment, and she wondered whether he was reining in a temper that she had always guessed at, though never seen. His smile only widened, though, as if feeding on her displeasure. ‘Miss Marshwic,’ he continued at last.
‘Mr Northway.’
‘You will no doubt find this hard to believe also, but I hold you in high esteem. Your conversation, whilst somewhat on a single note, is at least free and untrammelled by social nicety. How refreshing to find someone who will hate me to my face, rather than simply talk ill about me behind my back. However, I am here in my official capacity, and if you will not hear me personally, then hear the words of my office when it warns you. The brigand known as the Ghyer has returned.’