“You are not a failure,” Orion said. “You are making a tactical re-evaluation of the terrain. Smart officers always reassess battle plans as the fight progresses, and you are no different. I’ll be doing some of that myself over the coming months, which we can discuss later. You can spend the winter cooking for Miss Julia and Miss Diana and impressing all of their friends.”
Ann sat up, though she knew her cheeks were splotchy and her hair was a fright. “My aunt has said she will introduce me to her friends, and they are all hostesses of some repute, at least in military circles. I have a silly hope that I can offer the ladies guidance regarding menus and presentation and that they will regard that advice as worth paying for.”
Orion brushed her hair back over her shoulder. “If you were a fussy, arrogant Frenchman, they would start catfights over who got to hire you first.”
“But I am simply Ann Pearson, spinster at large, and thus I hesitate to join my aunt’s household, even temporarily. I fear I will become the dull companion she longs to make me into and never escape that fate. She and her friends will flatter me into giving up my recipes, and I will have nothing to show for years of hard work.”
And all over again, Ann would be that schoolgirl longing for escape, longing to read cookbooks by the hour.
Orion levered up to wrap her in a hug. “You are thinking of joining the Upchurch household?”
“For a time, if I must.”
His arms tightened around her. “Perhaps that’s for the best, but, Annie, that is one place where I could not court you, even if I were to remain in London.”
Ann pushed him to his back and pinned his wrists. “Explain yourself.”
He kissed her, sweetly and lingeringly, the note of farewell breaking Ann’s heart. “Perhaps we’d best get dressed, Annie my love, and fortify ourselves with some apple tart.”
Ann climbed off the bed, though for once, the prospect of sampling a delectable treat held no appeal.
Chapter Fourteen
“Horace, I would never disobey you,” Melisande said, trying for a humble note, “but do you think it’s easy to come up with different offerings for every dinner?”
The brigadier did not immediately answer her question, but instead gazed upward, as if hoping the heavenly intercessors would fly forth with needed reinforcements bearing wagonloads of marital patience.
When Horace deigned to return to the topic at hand, he spoke in the clipped, quiet tones that he usually reserved for a footman who’d buttoned his coat incorrectly.
“There are cookery books without number, Melisande, and your accomplishments do include literacy.” His tone implied that she had few other accomplishments to equal even that humble achievement.
Melisande stared at her husband, who in his own mind was doubtless a warrior aging with dignity. To her eyes, he was becoming a pompous old nincompoop, and if she did not take him to task for his nincompoopery now, she’d spend the rest of her life pretending his insults and arrogance didn’t wound her.
“Despite my limited accomplishments,” she said, rising and bracing her hands on the desk, “despite my many shortcomings and errors, I have been a loyal wife to you, Horace Upchurch.”
He looked away, and that small gesture confirmed that Melisande need not be more specific. She could have abandoned him in Spain, deserted the almighty regiment and taken up with a handsome, passionate, French officer. Scandals of that nature had been commonplace, but she’d spared Horace such a resounding defeat.
They’d negotiated a truce only because she had been loyal to her spouse.
“I have been loyal to you as well, Melisande. I don’t see what ancient history has to do with you demonstrating unbelievably bad judgment by allowing Orion Goddard onto your guest list.”
Horace had been loyal too. In Spain, he had not been faithful—his infidelity predating Melisande’s, in fact—and thus his righteous ire at her straying had been tempered with reason. He had neglected his wife, leaving her to the flirtations of his junior officers. He’d also left her to suffer all manner of sly looks and unkind talk from the regimental tabbies, and for that, Melisande had been hard put to forgive him.
“Horace, you and Emily Bainbridge have kept company at the Coventry.” The shock registering in Horace’s eyes was pathetically gratifying. “She chatters, to put matters kindly, and Ann works at the Coventry. Imagine a situation where Ann has to nip out from the kitchen to monitor the state of the buffet, and she sees you and smiles at you.”
“Women smile. That signifies nothing.”
Good God, when had Horace become such a nitwit? “There are smiles and there are smiles, and believe me, Emily Bainbridge can tell them apart. Ann’s smile would be genuine and familiar, and in a moment of surprise, she might greet you with a pleasant, ‘Good evening, Brigadier.’ If she was harried or exhausted, which I gather she frequently is, she might forget herself so far as to greet you as Uncle Horace.”
“She would never.”
Melisande wanted to slap her husband. The urge was both tempting and terrifying. “You hang my entire standing and reputation as a hostess on that ill-informed assumption, Horace. Your invitations are universally accepted, but let word get out that some young woman at the Coventry is calling you uncle, and we would become objects of speculation.”
“Ann has more sense than to… to… acknowledge me in her place of work.”
“Ann,” Melisande said, leaning closer, “while still very much a girl, found herself a post as a London apprentice, saved years of quarterly allowances with nobody the wiser, ran off to London from one of the most exclusive boarding schools in the Midlands, and completed a lengthy apprenticeship you were certain she’d abandon in the first three months.”
That recitation would be enough to inspire admiration, were Ann not also such a source of vexation.
“She’s headstrong. She’s not stupid.”
“Fine,” Melisande said, straightening. “She is not stupid. Her discretion would never falter at the Coventry, though of all the clubs in London, I have no idea why you’d want to frequent that one… Unless the choice of which venue to visit wasn’t yours.”
Horace was so rarely flustered that to see him at a loss was curious. He cleared his throat, he looked out the window. He reached for his pocket watch, but must have realized that he was betraying guilt.
“Emily Bainbridge gambles,” Horace said. “Her husband has asked in confidence that those of us in a position to do so help her moderate her impulses. As his former commanding officer, I felt a duty to…”
Melisande cocked her head.
“There’s nothing between me and Emily Bainbridge, Melisande. She’s vain and silly, but I came across her on the walkway as I returned home from my club, and she inveigled me into joining her party.”
That much was probably true. Emily did not care for Horace’s excessive dignity and would have delighted in dragging him into a fashionable gaming hell.
“Back to Ann,” Melisande said. “Over the years, between here and Spain, you have asked me to coordinate perhaps forty of these regimental dinners. Assume the average number of courses is eight, though some have ranged as high as twelve, and assume each course requires a wine pairing. That is more than three hundred recipes, Horace, all chosen to create a memorable menu, not simply an edible dish. That is dozens and dozens of wine selections, dozens of different centerpieces and flower selections.”