“I will do my best, Mrs. Redfern.” I kept myself from heaving an exasperated sigh. Venting my frustration in front of Mrs. Redfern and Tess would do no good.
Mrs. Redfern turned and stalked out. Her rigid anger told me that Lady Clifford was busy making difficult requests upstairs as well.
Tess, who’d been listening in apprehension, burst out, “What we going to do?”
Holding my anger was becoming more difficult by the minute. “We will do what we are told. It is what we are paid to do.”
“But—”
“You will have to learn, Tess, that whatever the mistress of a house wants for her meals, you prepare it. It is her house, her food, her wishes.”
“But Lady Clifford ain’t the mistress, is she?” Tess slopped lemon custard onto the table as she filled the tart shell. She hastily wiped up the drops with one finger, which she popped into her mouth.
“She is a guest of the mistress. Besides, this house belongs to Lord and Lady Clifford’s son-in-law, as his lordship reminded me when he came down to purloin the best burgundy.”
I snatched up the cut potatoes and dumped them into a bowl. They’d keep if I filled the bowl with cold water—I could use them for a shepherd’s pie or perhaps a bubble and squeak for the staff if Lady Clifford did not want them. The rest of the vegetables would make a salad or soup, and I knew the servants would make short work of a lemon tart. I saw no benefit in throwing away perfectly good food.
“Well, it ain’t right.” Tess carried the tart carefully to the oven and set it inside. She closed the door without banging it, as I’d taught her, but made her annoyance known by slamming down the towel she’d used to shield her hand from the heat of the oven. “We work hard and then it’s not wanted.”
I shared Tess’s frustration, but it was part of my task to keep her calm. “We don’t yet know what she wants.” I filled the bowl of potatoes with water from a pitcher, then sat down, suddenly tired. “We have to wait and see.”
“And then prepare the entire meal at the last minute.”
“Too true, my girl. So we might as well pause a moment and refresh ourselves.”
Tess plopped herself onto a stool and snatched up a bit of carrot, chomping on it. “Don’t mind if I do.”
“Is Caleb well?” I asked her.
Tess had been walking out with Caleb Greene, a young constable whose beat included Mount Street, since last autumn.
Her cheeks went pink. “He is perfectly well. A good soul, Mrs. H. But don’t worry. I won’t be rushing off and marrying him. I’m not daft.”
“Marriage is not always a bad thing, Tess. With a kind man, you’d be happy and have no worries.” Though my marriage had been awful, I’d observed good ones, like that of Joanna and Samuel Millburn, and knew they were possible.
“Rot that. I’d be cooking and cleaning, like I do here. But here I get paid.” Tess crunched another carrot. “I prefer working with you, Mrs. H., to looking after a man. Why can’t men look after themselves, anyway?”
“Because it’s put into their heads from the time they are born that only women can make their lives comfortable. Or so I believe. I never had a brother, so I really don’t know how they are raised.”
“I’d say you’re right. My brother’s not right in the head, so he’s a different case. I need my wages to take care of him. A husband might not be so understanding.”
“Caleb might.” I’d met the lad, and he seemed to have a sensible head on his shoulders.
However, I did not trust myself to be the best judge of male persons. Daniel, for instance. I’d first met him when he’d delivered goods to a house I worked in several years ago. I’d thought him only a deliveryman who did odd jobs for whatever he could earn, a personable, winsome fellow with a good heart.
Later I learned that not only did Daniel have a son, but that he could change his persona at will. He might become a City gent, or a dandy who frequented the ballrooms of Paris, or a scruffy tramp. He did this on jobs for the police—he was not part of the police, he’d tried to explain, but I was not supposed to know that, or anything about this part of his life, in fact.
I did know Daniel’s job was perilous, and I’d been pulled into the danger with him from time to time. I had lately been thinking it would never do to put my daughter in the same sort of danger.
“Speaking of marriage,” Tess said, as though reading my thoughts. “Mr. McAdam ought to marry you. Take you away to that house of his in Kensington. You could look after him and James, and I could come cook for you.”
She’d suggested this before. In fact, it had become a favorite topic, Tess’s dream of a better life.
“Mr. McAdam is too busy for a wife.” I rose. Idleness did not suit me. I’d make a start on the shepherd’s pie, which would take time to bake.
“You could help him,” Tess said. “You could find out things, as you do. Be a detective or some such, like those Pinkertons, or in the stories Caleb reads.”
“Nonsense.” I bustled to the larder for butter and cream so I could start mashing the potatoes. “I am a cook,” I said when I returned, “and this is all I’ll likely ever do. I am fortunate that I do it well, so that I can be hired in good houses.”
“Just wait.” Tess watched me with a smile. “When Mr. McAdam goes down on one knee, you’ll change your mind.”
I doubted very much that Daniel had marriage in his thoughts. He liked my company, and that was all. I kissed him far more often than I should, but we were not young innocents. We knew exactly how far any spooning could go before it became shameful and scandalous. Both of us had raised children out of wedlock, and neither of us was in a hurry to be in such a situation again.
“That will be enough of that,” I told Tess severely. I pushed a bowl heaped with fresh green peas at her. “Shell that lot. I’ll need them for the shepherd’s pie.”
Tess good-naturedly pulled the bowl to her and reached in for a handful of pods. “I do love a good shepherd’s pie. Put in lots of juices, Mrs. H.”
“I intend to.”
I heard a bang of the outside door, and Elsie scuttled into the kitchen, her cheeks flushed. “It’s that handsome vicar, Mrs. Holloway. Upstairs in the street. He’s asking for ya.”
7
I quickly rinsed and wiped my hands, snatched up my coat, and charged up the stairs.
I found Mr. Fielding, resplendent in his vicar’s suit and dog collar, waiting patiently a few houses down, in the direction of Hyde Park. The day had turned fine, blue breaking through the hovering clouds.