Read Online The Highlander by Kerrigan Byrne - Free Book Online

to meet you.” He swept his hand to the cluster of staff gathered in the kitchens on various perches all staring at her in peculiar silence.
    A collection of maids were gathered around a large table laid with tea, as a kitchen girl paused in the middle of clearing the evening meal to gawk. A handful of footmen, livery, and ground workers sat on rough-hewn stools at the cooking island, their meaty hands wrapped around tankards of ale as they’d been chatting with a portly cook as he turned a large spit adorned with what appeared to be some sort of lake fowl. They were all filthy and exhausted, peering at her from behind bleary eyes and sooty features.
    â€œHow do you do?” Mena pleased herself by saying around the heart beating in her throat as she executed a slight curtsy.
    She suddenly felt a pang of guilt for not getting to know her servants better. Though in her husband’s household, such familiarity would not have been tolerated. She’d been utterly isolated, even from the kindness of her staff.
    The men at the cooking island nodded back to her, their stares oddly concentrated as a few of them mumbled something that she thought was whit like?
    Hoping it was a local greeting, she replied. “It’s a pleasure.”
    â€œEnglish.” The cook muttered loudly enough for most to hear in his heavy French accent. “Humph.”
    â€œThat’s Jean-Pierre, our ill-tempered chef,” Jani informed her by way of introduction.
    In this situation, at least, Mena knew what to do. “Votre canard sent la perfection. Je peux seulement espérer goûter quelque chose de si délicieux pendant mon séjour.”
    All eyes shifted to the chef as his chubby face melted into a smile. “Madame’s French is perfection. I shall make for you a special dessert tonight. Please tell me you prefer wine to the Scotch swill these Luddites slurp like water.” He spat on the floor.
    â€œTruth be told, I am rather partial to the wines of Provence above all else.” Mena offered him the most dazzling smile through her veil, painfully aware that the so-called swill sold internationally for more money per volume than gold.
    â€œThen welcome to Ravencroft, mademoiselle!”
    â€œMerci.”
    â€œCome, come, Miss Philomena Lockhart.” Jani seized her hand and pulled her through the impressive kitchens with startling energy. “Dinner is to be served soon and the marquess has requested your presence there. We must hurry if you are to dress in time.”
    Mena had barely stepped away from the kitchens before it erupted into chaos. She couldn’t understand a thing they said, as they conversed in Gaelic, secure in the knowledge that a proper Englishwoman would not likely have learned their language.
    â€œThey like you,” Jani informed her as he pulled her down a narrow servants’ hall.
    â€œHow could you be certain?” Mena wrinkled her brow. But for the good impression she’d left with Jean-Pierre, her welcome had been decidedly cold.
    â€œYou must not blame them. There was a fire in the fields earlier today. It was a blessing that the storm came when it did, or this year’s winter crop could have been lost. Everyone is recovering from the fear and the excitement of that.”
    â€œOh, dear,” Mena exclaimed. “That’s terrible, indeed, was anyone injured?”
    â€œNo and we are lucky. But the fire is why no one was able to meet you at the train but the driver. I know that the marquess had planned to drive out to collect you, himself, and now, I think, he will be sorry that he did not.”
    â€œWhy do you say that?” Mena queried.
    â€œBecause, Miss Philomena Lockhart, we all expected you to be old and fat, not young and pretty.”
    â€œI am not so young.” Certainly not pretty. Mena thought of the many times she’d been told she was too fat. A flatterer, this Jani. She liked him immensely. “You may