The Way to a Gentleman's Heart - Theresa Romain Page 0,3
spare till the afternoon, but if you want to watch me at work, that’s your business.”
The tone he’d expected; her turning on her heel, he’d also been prepared for. The sight of the academy’s servants’ quarters as she led him along was something new in his experience. A winding space with whitewashed walls and timber beams, it was divided with shelves holding every sort of household ware and cleaning supply.
The kitchen space was huge, much bigger than the equivalent room at his Lincolnshire estate, with a stone fireplace large enough for a man to step into if it hadn’t been crossed by an intricate arrangement of spits and hobs and hooks. There was a wall of ovens set into brick, atop which a long cooking surface—of some kind of metal, maybe?—held pots larger than any Jack had ever seen. They were practically washtubs, able to hold gallons of soup, and from them, savory smells issued forth.
At the center of the room was an immense table, wood-topped and scarred by cuts from kitchen implements. From a seat at one end, a young blond woman wearing a tidy white cap peered at Jack. A mountain range built of apricots surrounded her.
“Mrs. Redfern? Is everything all right?” she asked in an accent of pure Yorkshire. It made Jack smile—not only to hear one of the northern accents that sounded like home to him, but to hear Marianne addressed as Mrs. It must be an honorary title, for he knew she’d never married.
He couldn’t say the same. Which was part of why Marianne wanted to flay him alive.
“Miss White,” Marianne said in a crisp, formal tone. “Permit me to introduce an old acquaintance of mine. Mr. Grahame.”
“Grahame?” The girl perked up. “That’s a Lincolnshire name, isn’t it? Are you related to Lord Irving?”
“I’m his poor relation,” Jack admitted. “Or so his lordship thinks of my branch of the family. We’ve got land, but no title. His bunch of the Grahames have both, which as you know, makes them better.”
The kitchenmaid, he presumed she was, giggled at this.
“Are you indeed still poor? I thought you’d taken steps to remedy that.” Again, that crisp voice from Marianne. She had plunged her hands into a giant bowl of...he had no idea what it was. It looked like flour and butter, but the way she was squishing it to bits, he couldn’t imagine what it would become.
“No, I’m not poor anymore,” he said, feeling almost reluctant to say so. He reminded himself of the words he’d rehearsed so carefully: I am not here to apologize. He couldn’t, for if he did, it would make the last eight years of his life nothing but a wrong decision, a wrong path traveled.
A boy in livery ran in just then. “Any of the ovens needin’ coal, mum?” he tossed over a shoulder as he lay hands on a full scuttle.
“They’re all right, Evans,” Marianne replied, “but check again in a half hour, please.” When the boy bobbed his head, then tore from the kitchen as swiftly as he’d entered, she turned to Jack with a faint smile. “Oh, for the energy of the young. Now I see that if you’ve something to say to me, there will be other ears about.”
“Can you walk out with me?” As if he were twenty-two again, and she twenty, and he were calling on the neighboring landowner with an eye to the eldest daughter.
“I can’t get away for a minute until luncheon is tidied away. However...” She eyed the mountain range of apricots. “How are you at cutting fruit?”
“I’ve used a knife before, if that’s what you’re asking, and I can tell stone from flesh. Why?”
“That’ll do.” Her faint smile turned wicked. “Sally, I’ll need you to see to the young ladies’ luncheon today. You’ll find everything you need in the larder and the meat safe.”
“Oh, mum!” The young woman—surely she could be no more than twenty?—popped up from her seat, eyes wide and eager. “Do you mean it? Cut it and plate it and everything?”
“The footmen can help you with the plating, and they’ll take the dishes upstairs to the refectory. But they’ll be yours to command.” Marianne added as if an afterthought, “I’ll just need you to prepare everything in the servants’ hall.”
“Oh. Not in here?” The girl’s light brows knit. “But shouldn’t I finish with the apricots?”
“You can’t do that and arrange luncheon.” Again, that wicked smile. “Mr. Grahame wishes to visit a kitchen? He can become a kitchenmaid for a while.”
Miss