“Something has vexed you,” he said as Ann closed the door behind him. “Tell me.”
He made no move to take off his greatcoat, but stood in her foyer, hat in hand, gazing down at her. He looked as if he’d wait until spring, did she ask it of him.
“I fear I will be poor company today, Colonel.”
“Rye. The war is over, I’m told. I will leave you in peace if that’s what you want, but allow me to pass this along first.” He withdrew a bottle from one inside pocket and a paper-wrapped parcel from another. “A token of my esteem and a snack.”
“Brandy?” Excellent brandy, judging by the label, the kind Mr. Dorning kept in his office rather than behind the bar. “And gingerbread, still warm.” The aroma alone gave away the nature of the snack.
“The weather turns disagreeable, and you have a professional’s interest in fine spirits. I thought Miss Julia and Miss Diana might appreciate the occasional nip as well. The gingerbread is because I found the scent enticing on such a chilly day.”
“The ladies do have a medicinal dram,” Ann said. “Nightly, when Miss Julia’s rheumatism is acting up. Thank you.” The cordiality of the gestures—brandy and warm gingerbread—interrupted the rhythm of Ann’s bad mood, as did the colonel—Orion’s—delicacy.
He had the gifts of silence and patience.
“I am at peril for losing my post,” Ann said, taking Orion’s hat from him and hanging it on a hook. “I have failed to be meek and submissive, failed to treat the addition of one needed apprentice as the great imposition on Jules Delacourt’s generosity that it isn’t. Your coat, please.”
“Just because I am here doesn’t mean you have to receive me, Ann. For the past two years, my own commanding officer has been out when I call upon him. This is your home, not Delacourt’s kitchen.”
And that was why she wanted Orion Goddard to stay, because she needed a reminder that life wasn’t all about Jules’s moods and tantrums, because she needed fresh gingerbread she hadn’t had to make herself.
“Surrender your coat, sir. I have looked forward to your visit, and you are right: This is my home, and here at least I should be safe from the drama at the Coventry.”
He passed over his coat, so much heavier than the cloaks Ann and her housemates wore. She took a whiff and smiled. Lavender, gingerbread, horse.
“How is our Hannah?” Orion asked when Ann had shown him into the parlor. “And no, you need not get out the tea tray. The gingerbread is for you and the ladies. I’ll pick up another loaf for the boys on my way home. Greetings, your highness.” He offered Boreas a friendly scratch on the shoulders and left the cat purring on the desk blotter.
“Our Hannah is a hard worker,” Ann said, setting the brandy bottle and gingerbread on the mantel. “She takes direction well, doesn’t complain or chatter, and is already making friends with the underfootmen.”
Orion went to the window, taking a sniff of the last bud to bloom from his bouquet. Ann had saved the roses that had faded, though the scent of dried petals wasn’t nearly as vivid as that of a fresh flower.
“What sort of friends are these underfootmen?”
“The kind who know I will take it very much amiss if they presume on Hannah’s innocence.”
“Hannah will take it very much amiss, as will I. She can give a good account of herself in a fair fight. Shall we sit?”
Ann took a wing chair, though she wanted to pace. She wanted, actually, to cook something complicated. Double consommé, perhaps. Time consuming, with lots of heat and loud chopping.
Orion took the other chair and passed Ann the shawl that had been draped over its back. “For your knees.”
“I’m not…” Except she was a little chilled. “Thank you.” The shawl was a soft merino and warm from having been near the hearth. “Jules was in rare form last night, and when I ought to have been sleeping, I was instead thinking of all the things I should have said or done differently. He is angry with me, and I must be made to suffer.”
“You doubtless threaten him. Reliving battles is a soldier’s particular burden. Is Hannah the problem?”
What exactly was the problem? For all her lost sleep, Ann hadn’t put that question to herself. “The conflict has been brewing since the day Jules arrived. Jules demands competent assistants, but only if they lack ambition. He wants the blind respect due a despot, and like a despot, he rules with a combination of charm and cruelty.”
“The army had officers like him. They sometimes met with accidents.”
“Accidents?”
“A gun misfiring, a girth breaking in the heat of battle, tainted meat.”
“A war within a war?” Ann had never considered that military life and a London club kitchen might have some similarities.
“Justice, of a variety enlisted men understood well and officers learned to respect. The average recruit went to war because he had few other options, or in some cases, he was choosing between transportation and war. The army expected foot soldiers to cover thirty miles in a day, carrying up to sixty pounds of gear. The average soldier became as tough as old shoe leather, and such men can be pushed only so far.”
“How did you deal with them?”
The cat rose from the blotter, stretched luxuriously, and leaped onto the arm of Orion’s chair.
“Permission granted,” Orion said as the wretched beast took up a place on his lap. “My mode of command was to keep the men focused on fighting the enemies rather than among ourselves.”
“Enemies?”
“The opposing army, of course, but also cold, disease, bad rations, mud, rain, heat… Moving an army across Spain was a challenge in itself, much less with the occasional siege, battle, or ambush thrown in. Wellington understood that and was fanatic about supply lines, and about commending every possible soldier who deserved notice in the dispatches.”
Ann toed off her slippers and curled up in her chair. “Jules seldom praises anybody. His words of thanks or encouragement are more precious than rubies.”
“Then he’s an idiot. Praise should be given honestly and often. What happens if you lose your post?”
Another question Ann hadn’t managed to face. “I am in disgrace. Jules can see to it that I never again ply my trade this side of Hadrian’s Wall.”
“You’ve tried to make peace with him?”
A pragmatic solution. “I’ve been making peace with him for more than two years, Orion. Last night, he tripped me when I was carrying a full platter of sliced meat. The platter broke, the meat was ruined, the whole kitchen heard the noise and saw me fall…” That was the part that had cost Ann the most sleep.
“Go on.”
“There I was, on my knees on the tiled floor, and nobody would help me up. Those tiles are hard, the floor was slippery, and my knee hurt. Jules stood by, barking at the footmen to clean up after me, at the scullery maid to see to the mess I’d made, and at me to get back to work slicing more meat. My knee needed ice, my apron was a mess, and yet, I knew—I knew—that if I so much as put on a clean apron, he’d trip me again, and the next time, I might be carrying a pot of boiling water.”