Free A Broom at the Masthead (The Drowned Books Book 1) by M J Logue

Thankful said, in a very odd,
slightly strangled voice. She glared at him, and he bit his lip and looked
innocently out of the rain-streaked window, and Gillespie nodded.
    "Aye,
mistress, that you’d not want to be troubled with, unless you've a mind to
discuss sheep-scab and the application of Stockholm tar. Though if you're
inclined to look over the accounts and see what that shameless rogue at Wycombe
has been charging for wormy timber, I'll not say you nay."
    She had made her
point, and he had made his, and both understood each other. Also, she was
increasingly aware, as the chill of stone and plaster struck at her tender
parts, that under that all-enveloping cloak she was wearing nothing but a
shift, and that as soon as she stood up her naked feet were going to become all
too apparent. She shot her husband a quick glance, and glanced as quickly down
at herself, and his eyes widened briefly as he realised exactly what she meant.
    "Perhaps
you could show me how the work progresses?" he said. "I can
see you're hot to be investigating those boxes, my tibber. Well, I've done my
best, poor instrument that I am -" he handed her the blackened, greasy
knife, point first, and Gillespie stiffened, as if he thought no decent woman
should be handling such a utilitarian implement. "Get on, then, gal."
    "Aye,"
Gillespie said, with a deep growl of disapproval, "And I'd speak to you
privately about that, too, Major Russell! Porcelain, mistress, from the Indies -"
    "China,"
he murmured, and she thought his bailiff might explode.
    "China,
then! Brought in special, at the Lord knows how much expense, with not so much
a stick of decent furniture in the house! So aye, you might have dishes the
like of the King's, but you've got nothing to sit down to like a civilized
woman!"
    "Are you
suggesting that my husband is profligate , sir?" she said, bridling,
and Thankful snorted.
    "Well, my
sister must be turning into her grave, then."
     
     
    15
     
    "Not exactly profligate,"
Eadulf said grimly, "but Russell! What were you thinking ?"
    He closed his
eyes, and put his head back against the rough, warm plaster of the bare little
room off the hall. Office, indeed. Little more than a cupboard, windowless and
airless, and containing no more than one large, worn, and very utilitarian Army
paychest, big enough to sit on. The lock of the thing had defeated the most
determined looters of both the King and Parliament's Armies, over a course of
almost twenty year's campaigning.
    There was a
great sword-slash across the iron-bound lid, which caught on his breeches as he
shifted uncomfortably. Put there by Colonel James Wardlaw and his band of
bloody brigands when they sacked the baggage-train after the battle of
Edgehill, and it had made that paychest one of the most distinctive in the
Army. He'd have known it anywhere, and he'd grown rather attached to it. (He
had a reluctant soft spot for Wardlaw, too, especially after they'd made the
disgusting old reprobate the governor of Plymouth.)
    Eadulf propped
his elbows on his knees and gave another disapproving grunt. The question about
what Russell had been thinking was not, clearly, a rhetorical one.
    "Can we
afford it?" Russell said, though he knew what the answer was. He was
sitting on it.
    "Aye, we
can stand it, as ye well know!" Eadulf said irritably. "But Russell! Look at this place - it's half a house in the middle of God-knows-where, can ye no'
wait at least till the woman's cold in her grave afore ye start thinking of
setting up housekeeping, and stuffing the house wi' trinkets and gauds for the
lassie?"
    "You know
the answer to that," he said mildly, though he considered himself
reproved.
    "Aye. I do.
But does she?"
    "Have you
ever known me lie?"
    His bailiff
snorted. "No. Well, the once, though I wasn't complaining at the time.
I've known ye evade any number of questions, mind. Well, I'll not have ye
perjure yourself, major, so you'll pardon me if I'm as straightforward as you
are yourself. She's a