Read Online Not Quite Darcy by Terri Meeker - Free Book Online

should know our hours by now. I’ve had the kitchen fire burning for half an hour.” She glared at Eliza through the crack in the door before turning to stomp down the back stairs.
    Eliza shut the door behind her and groaned. “Good god. Forty-hour work week—I didn’t love you enough when I had you.”
    She struggled into her still unfamiliar clothes, her head numbed with sleep. After struggling with the strange, split-crotch pantaloons, she pulled her maid’s uniform over her head.
    â€œNot-so-little black dress, I hate you already,” she grumbled. “It’s like my life is being directed by Tim Burton. With any luck, William’s best friend will turn out to be Johnny Depp and he’ll be my mission here. He’s American, after all. A girl can hope.”
    She scrunched her hair into a knot and stuffed it under her maid’s cap. Messy, but effective. Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she trudged down the back stairs until she reached the basement floor of the home.
    Of all the rooms in the house, Eliza disliked the dark and smoky kitchen the most. The place was a confusing maze of rooms and work stations: a larder, a pantry, a scullery. It was laid out as if aliens had read a badly translated description of a kitchen and tried to put one together with only determination and luck.
    Mrs. MacLaughlin stood in front of the range, which squatted, large and unstovelike in the center of the room. It inexplicably featured the only hot water in the house.
    Since Mrs. MacLaughlin was cook as well as housekeeper, this was her undisputed domain. Much of Eliza’s dislike of the place was due to feeling like an intruder in what was clearly claimed territory. Yesterday, the housekeeper had asked Eliza to fill the copper and had nearly had an aneurism when she’d filled a tea kettle instead.
    â€œBessie, fetch the black lead and emery paper from the scullery,” Mrs. MacLaughlin said.
    â€œI—uh—” Eliza replied.
    Mrs. MacLaughlin groaned and stomped heavily toward a closet. After a few moments of rustling, she procured a handful of unidentifiable objects and slammed them down beside the stove.
    Eliza couldn’t imagine how to clean a stove with lead and paper, so she watched as Mrs. MacLaughlin scrubbed the range. When the woman had finished, she lit a fire and set a pot of water on top. She sprinkled some oats into the water and thrust a spoon into Eliza’s hand. “Here, stir the porridge while I prepare the eggs and ham.”
    Eliza gripped the spoon and stuck it into the pot.
    â€œDidn’t you have kitchen duty in your previous position?” Mrs. MacLaughlin wore a suspicious expression as she watched Eliza stir.
    â€œNo. I don’t know a whole lot about this stuff,” Eliza said.
    The housekeeper pulled down a basket of eggs and began cracking them into a large ceramic bowl. “And you speak in a most peculiar manner with all your American words. Best you be speaking the Queen’s English now.”
    â€œYes, ma’am.” Subservience seemed to be a cure-all for whenever Mrs. MacLaughlin was feeling snippy. Which seemed to be always.
    The back door opened and Dora tumbled in, greeting everyone with a bright smile. Eliza returned the smile and threw in a wave for good measure.
    â€œSleep in, did you?” the older woman sniffed.
    â€œI got up at my usual time,” Dora breezed. There was so little guile in her that she didn’t see it in others. “Would you like me to tend the grates or assist with cooking, ma’am?”
    â€œTake your breakfast while I finish cooking for them that’s upstairs.”
    Dora grabbed a stack of bowls from a side cupboard and set them beside the bubbling pot. After scooping up a ladleful of porridge, she handed the dipper to Eliza and took her seat at the long, scarred wooden table.
    Eliza dished up a bowl and settled in beside Dora just as the back door opened.