She hadn’t been so livid in years. She’d certainly never imagined it possible for her to be angry at him, she who’d only ever thought of him with the fervent devotion laid at the feet of a beautiful saint.
Perhaps she was more enraged at herself, for her abysmal failure, for believing that she’d achieved sorcery and enchantment enough to release him from the spell that bound him, and made him taste only in shades of gray.
She tried to take refuge in rationality. If he didn’t like her food, then he didn’t like it. It wasn’t personal. None of this was personal. And of course he hadn’t meant to saddle her with the making of a sandwich; the request only came to her because of her own long-standing insistence that she, and not her subordinates—many of whose working day started at half past six in the morning—took care of Bertie’s late-night whims.
But he was not allowed to have human faults. Not when she’d held him in such esteem, such perfection of memory. Not when she’d lived chastely and reverently in deference to that memory. Not when she still—
She rose, went to the escritoire, and pulled out a piece of writing paper.
“Be so kind as to wait a minute,” she said to Dickie as she unscrewed the cap of her fountain pen.
The footman who came into the library bore not a tray of foodstuff, but a folded note and a look on his face reminiscent of Prior’s silent dismay earlier in the evening. Why was it that anything having to do with dining or the cook sent everyone in the house scrambling for their smelling salts?
The note, written in French, went a long way toward answering Stuart’s question.
Dear Sir,
Dinnertime in this house is half past seven. When I have all my forces marshaled at Waterloo, I cannot be expected to wage a campaign in Leipzig at the drop of a hat.
The venue for dinner is the dining room. Generations of effort have gone into building, maintaining, and bettering the passage between the kitchen and the house. Years of training and practice are necessary before the house staff and the kitchen staff achieve such coordination that food arrives on the table piping hot and cooked to perfection. You may not, at will, decide that the library, at the opposite end of the house, serves your purpose better. It disrupts the entire process for everyone else involved.
My responsibilities in this house extend to producing breakfast, luncheon, and dinner. If you wish to dine at other times, your request must be made in advance. Mr. Bertram Somerset understood this. I’m surprised that you, sir, reputed to be a man of the people, have so little grasp of the consideration due those who labor on your behalf.
Yours humbly,
Verity Durant
P.S. The larder in the warming kitchen has bread, butter, and a meat pie, enough to hold you until breakfast.
Stuart was not unaccustomed to receiving irate letters. An MP never pleased all his constituents. And a barrister who won more cases than he ought to occasionally heard from incensed members of the opposing counsel. This note, however, went beyond irate, evidenced by the violence of its writing. At several places on the page the nib of the fountain pen had torn through the paper, the letters not so much jotted down as slapped onto the page, the t’s and i’s barely crossed and dotted in the wrath of the one who wielded the pen.
He very seldom allowed himself anything other than a measured response. But he couldn’t seem to think clearly. He was hungry. He was hungry because she’d served him food that had been the culinary equivalent of a siren song—he could no more eat it than a sailor of antiquity could relax and enjoy the music as he sailed into the rocky cliffs of Anthemusa. And now she would throw a tantrum because he wanted something as undemanding as a sandwich?
He pulled out a piece of his own stationery, and replied in French.
Dear Madame,
Are you trying to lose your position?
Your servant,
Stuart Somerset
Her return message came a few minutes later.
Dear Sir,
Are you hoping to be rid of me?
Yours humbly,
Verity Durant
No one would blame him if he did rid himself of her. Quite the contrary. He’d be applauded for his high standards and his gentlemanly consideration for his wife-to-be’s delicate sensibilities.
Not to mention he’d never again be subject to the unwanted provocation of her cooking, the sybaritic beguilement of it. Never again covet her food with such inconvenient, hypocritical hunger.
Dear Madame,
Not yet. But I could easily change my mind.
Your servant,
Stuart Somerset
She watched him from just beyond the reach of the dim light, through the narrow opening of the door—her archangel come to earth, his halo dented, his wings less than immaculate.