Read Online Betrayed Countess (Books We Love Historical Romance) by Diane Scott Lewis - Free Book Online Page A

Bettina forced a smile and dragged herself up the stairs, determined to complete her tasks. Four men grumbled and scratched their way out of room number three, leaving their body stench behind. She wrinkled her nose and pulled off the sheets. Kerra came in with a basket of dirty linen from another room.
    “How can these people stand to be so crowded up in the beds?” Bettina asked, thinking of the odious group that just plodded out.
    “All inns house their guests that way.” Kerra rolled her eyes. “Maybe you French manage inns different. But here only the rich can afford a bed to themselves. Now don’t forget to empty them chamber pots.” Kerra stuffed the bedding into her basket and strode out.
    Bettina looked down at the brimming pot of yellow liquid. The stink of urine was sharp, and her stomach rolled, this being the most gruesome duty of all. “ Merde .”
    She hoped she’d be paid well, because she couldn’t stand this constant labor much longer. Bettina had never pitied her servants before. Yet how had they done this, with a smile and a curtsy, for days on end? Wrinkling her nose, she picked up the pot, careful not to let the urine slosh onto her fingertips. She almost laughed at her naïve reliance that her degradation after the revolution would end when she arrived in Bath. She must make other plans, if she had the energy to filter any schemes through her exhausted brain.
     
    * * * *
     
    “Does you believe all the terrible events still happenin’ across the Channel? Has you seen the papers?” a customer with a pock-marked face asked Maddie as she filled his tankard.
    Bettina kneeled in the taproom fireplace to brush out soot. Grime clung to her hands and face. Her eyes stung. The coarse apron Maddie gave her had turned stiff and black. Almost a fortnight had passed since her arrival in Sidwell. She counted each day, thinking of the wages she must be accumulating. Now she dipped the brush in the bucket, listening.
    “Don’t get no newspaper round here. Waste of money.” Maddie handed the man his ale. “Speaking of money, you owe me from last time, your credit’s a mite thin.”
    “But I heard the rich is being pulled from their homes and beaten. People beheaded right in the streets of Paris, their hearts ripped out. One of the quality was set afire then stuffed down his own well,” the customer went on. “The poor has gone mad in France, to be sure. But it’s said not just commoners involved in these mobs neither. Some higher ups causin’ the discontent, too.”
    “ Mon Dieu.” Bettina cringed at the man’s words. It had to be exaggeration. She slopped out the brush and scrubbed harder; the vinegar burned her cut fingers, the clean smell masking the stink around her.
    “You can’t trust them French ,” Dory, Maddie’s other serving wench, snickered. Plump in her untidy clothes, she fluffed her frizzy yellow hair and glared at Bettina. “They be too full of prissy airs, an’ Popish ways.”
    “These happenings any worse than a man, or woman, clamped in the pillory, whipped, then stoned by the crowd till his blood’s drenched the dirt?” Maddie scooped up the coins laid on the tables. “Happens in England more than anyone do own.”
    “But it’s the poor here that’s tortured … mostly. Might do England some good for us peasants to revolt, get us our deserved rights. An’ how about some cheaper stout?” At this statement from another regular, the entire taproom burst into laughter.
    “The way you pay for yours, Benny, you must already think it’s free,” Maddie said, prompting more snickers before she bustled into the kitchen.
    Bettina shifted the bucket and sloshed black water onto the floor.
    “Best clean that up.” Dory stuck out her chest, jiggling above her dirty bodice. She pointed her toe and made no attempt to help. “Or Maddie will have your head.”
    “My head is fine where it is.” Bettina swiped back a sooty tendril of hair.
    “Be nice, Dory.” Kerra