Free Garden Princess by Kristin Kladstrup

did?
    Once again, Adela was filled with doubts. “Never mind,” she told herself. “Hortensia’s gone off to write something. While she’s busy, I can find out the truth. I know I heard lots of people inside last night. The other guests might have been there. Marguerite might have been there, too, even if Garth didn’t notice her.” She was murmuring to herself, just like the cook at home, who was always cheering herself on as she worked:
Just a bit more flour then, and we’ll have a nice pastry.
Thinking of the cook made Adela think of food. Garth had spoken of a supper. She was more than hungry; maybe she could find something to eat inside Hortensia’s house.
    To her relief, the front door was unlocked this morning. She slipped inside, closed the door behind her, and looked around. She was standing in an entrance hall with a white marble floor, walls papered in green and gold, and a curved staircase leading to a second floor. A huge window at the top of the stairs let in the morning sun. It all seemed normal enough — even welcoming.
    There were several sets of double doors on either side of the entrance hall, all of them carved with elaborate floral designs. Adela peeked through one set and saw a large sitting room with two men standing at the far end of it. Their backs were toward her, and they were whisking feather dusters over the frame of an enormous, life-size portrait of Hortensia. Servants, Adela decided. But she couldn’t make up her mind if their presence was comforting or not. Did witches have servants?
    One of the men was elegantly dressed: his brocade coat, velvet breeches, silk stockings, and high-heeled shoes looked fancier than the footmen’s uniforms at home. The other servant’s clothes looked a trifle dowdy by comparison. In fact, they looked rumpled, as if he had been wearing them for some time. Adela waited for the men to turn around, but their feather dusters swished back and forth, back and forth across the base of the frame. The men weren’t even looking at what they were doing; they were staring up at Hortensia, who gazed down at them with her lovely smile. A smile that might (or might not) belong to a witch.
    It was the portrait, as lifelike as it was life-size, that helped Adela decide against making her presence known to the men. She tiptoed across the entrance hall to another a set of doors. Nudging them open, she saw a drawing room with tall windows and yet another portrait of Hortensia. The room was untidy, with pillows fallen off couches, chairs turned over, and playing cards tossed on and around several small gaming tables. There were dirty glasses and half-empty bottles lying about. Adela was just thinking that the portrait dusters would do better to spend their time in here when she saw that there was already a servant in the room. A young man lay stretched out in the middle of the parquet floor with his eyes closed, his hands laced behind his head, his ankles crossed, and a smile on his face. That he was a servant was apparent from the mop handle lying across his chest and the bucket of soapy water next to him. And yet he didn’t exactly have the look of a working man. He was handsome, with long auburn curls and a beautifully trimmed, perfectly symmetrical mustache with curled tips. His clothes were adorned with an abundance of lace and embroidery, and they looked at least twenty or thirty years out of fashion. Indeed, the clothes looked as if they might actually be that old, for the lace was torn and the embroidery faded and coming out in places. Adela had just realized that one of the man’s shoes was missing its heel when he stirred and moaned a few words that sounded vaguely like
Oh, my love!
He rolled over onto his side and began to snore.
    Adela slipped into the drawing room, softly closed the door behind her, and tiptoed across the floor to another set of doors.
    At last! Here was Hortensia’s banquet hall! Here was the supper Garth had talked about — or, rather,