Jules had gone quiet, and the whole kitchen felt the tension. For the third day in a row, he was at his post shortly after noon, sending Ann—and Hannah—the sort of brooding looks that boded ill.
“Pardon me, ladies,” Henry said. “Mrs. Dorning is asking for a word with you, Miss Pearson.” Hannah looked up from the bushel of peas she’d be expected to shell before sunset. The object of the exercise was not only to prepare a sufficient quantity for the evening buffet, but also to give Hannah so much practice at a simple chore that she became efficient at it.
Already, her nimble fingers had the pattern down: twist off one end of the pod, twist off the other, split, run a thumb down the middle to dislodge the peas, discard the husk into a slop bucket.
“I won’t be gone long,” Ann said, untying her apron. “When the bushel is done, you will have some bread and butter, Hannah.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I can help for a bit, shall I?” Henry offered.
“Wash your hands before you touch one of my peas, Henry Boardman,” Hannah replied, “and you’re to help, not shirk your own duties while you gabble my ear off.”
How well Hannah knew the adolescent male. Henry saluted with mock seriousness and marched over to the sink.
“Mrs. Dorning is the colonel’s sister, isn’t she?” Hannah said.
“She is.”
“He worries about her.”
Very likely, Orion worried equally about Hannah. “You can visit the colonel and the boys again on our next half-day afternoon, Hannah. Or you could write a note, and I’m sure Henry would be happy to deliver it for you.” Henry was all of sixteen to Hannah’s thirteen or fourteen. The exercise would do him and his esteem in Hannah’s eyes good.
“I could send them a recipe for Mrs. Murphy,” Hannah said. “The crepes, maybe?”
“The boys would love your crepes. Perhaps you could make them a batch when next you visit, but ask Mrs. Murphy to help you with the pear compote.”
Ann hung her apron on a peg in the hallway, grabbed her cloak, and descended the steps that led to the tunnel passing between the Coventry and the Dorning dwelling on the opposite side of the street. The wine cellar and pantries ran most of the length of the street, and during the day, the passage was kept unlocked for Mr. Dorning’s convenience.
“Thinking to introduce your protégé to a fine claret?” Jules emerged from the shadows between two rows of wine bottles.
“I’m thinking to heed a summons from Mrs. Dorning. Perhaps you’re the one introducing himself to the claret.”
With Jules, to show weakness was to invite constant harassment. Ann had taken nearly a year to figure that out. He wanted only the ruthlessly focused in his kitchen, and he wore down the rest or taught them to keep their distance. Ann understood his methods, though she neither liked nor respected him for using them.
Perhaps the military was like that, harsh by design because the stakes were so much higher than a successful torte or roast. Ann would have to ask Orion when next they met.
“I’m making room for the next shipment of champagne,” Jules said, sauntering forth. “The footmen lose and break too many bottles, or claim to.”
Jules helped himself to the cellar’s inventory without limit and occasionally ordered some bottles opened for the rest of the kitchen staff. The footmen, dealers, and waiters never imbibed during working hours, because the customers came in close proximity to them.
Jules’s sporadic largesse was part of any tyrant’s strategy for maintaining control. Bread and circuses between battles and tantrums. When the wine did flow in the kitchen, Ann abstained. A mug of porter with the midday meal was fine, but to add alcohol to a long evening of work around knives, flames, and boiling saucepots was asking for trouble.
One of the first lessons any apprentice learned.
“I have never quite satisfied myself as to what sort of wine you would be, Pearson.” Jules prowled from between the racks, gazing down at Ann as if she were a plucked pullet that had yet to be consigned to a particular recipe.
“I am not a wine, I am a busy undercook, and Mrs. Dorning has requested a moment of my time. I’ll bid you good day.”
“It is a good day,” Jules said, taking up a lean against the wine rack. “My new sous-chef de cuisine starts this evening. Pierre comes very highly recommended.”
The wiser course would have been to bustle away, to pretend to have not heard that comment. “Your new assistant?”
“My new sous-chef.” Jules smiled as if he spoke about his firstborn son. “Pierre DeGussie has worked in Paris. He’s very ambitious, very competent. He claims to have more recipes in his head than Carême could dream of, each one more delicious and beautiful than the next. You might have to help him with his English cookery books.”
“A man with that many brilliant ideas will hardly need to read the humble recipes we publish here in London. Are we so shorthanded that you need another assistant?” And a sous-chef, not an undercook. How much was the talented Pierre to be paid, and was his lodging included in his remuneration?
Jules gave Ann a look designed to infuriate her—pitying, patient, a little sad. “You have been with me for more than two years, Pearson. I have seen your recipes, tried your wine pairings. You work hard, but the Coventry’s kitchen requires the sort of sophistication only a true chef can bring to the job. It’s as well you have an apprentice to train, for I’ve no doubt you will leave us soon enough for the joys of motherhood and domesticity.”
He waggled a bottle of wine. “That is always the way with les femmes. A few good years in the kitchen, then your true nature must have its due. There is no shame in this. No less authority than the good God Himself has ordained that it must be so.”
Jules turning up pious was absolute proof that he was scheming, if ambushing Ann with news of a new assistant chef hadn’t all but declared his intentions.
“I will look forward to meeting Monsieur DeGussie later today,” Ann said. “And if he needs any help with his English, I will instruct Hannah to provide it. She’s quite literate, and her French is good.” Hannah had those skills thanks to her own hard work and Orion Goddard’s ability to see the day when France and England were neighbors instead of former enemies.
Jules saluted with his bottle. “Ever gracious of you, as always, Pearson. Please give my regards to Mrs. Dorning.”
Ann dipped a curtsey and left, though even that minor display of manners sat ill with her. She did not work for Jules, she worked for the Coventry. Jules had not hired her, the previous owner had, and Ann hoped only the current owner could fire her.
Not a theory she wanted to test. She mentally left the exchange with Jules in the cellars, where it belonged, and presented a cheerful greeting to Mrs. Dorning.
Chapter Ten
“Goddard.” Xavier Fournier rose from a wing chair before a blazing hearth, his hand outstretched. “This is an honor and a surprise. You must sit and join me for a cup of tea. Or would brandy suit? One knows not whether to approach you from your English side or your French side.”
Fournier treated Rye to a charming grin and a crushing handshake. He was a dark-haired bear of a man who had taken to English fashions like a recruit to his grog. Fournier wore three watch chains across an exquisitely embroidered waistcoat. The fabric was maroon satin, the stitching blue, green, purple, and gold in a fantastic array of birds and flowers.