The Sandalwood Princess Read Online Free PDF Page B

dearest of all.
    Amanda’s own mother had existed briefly, a figure in a haze, a beautiful princess forever locked in the prison of her own fairy tale world. Smoke... and incense...
    Amanda shook herself out of her reverie to find her two companions staring at her.
    “What’s done is done,” she said. “Perhaps it will turn up. If the thief was the Falcon, and if he’s as clever as reputed, he’ll realise the figure’s worthless and discard it. You may even find it on your way home,” she told Padji. “If, that is, your knees haven’t frozen into that position. Will you get up?”
    “But I go with you,” he said, gazing up at her with misty brown eyes.
    Amanda stared back incredulously.
    “You most certainly do not;” Mrs. Gales said. Then, as though recollecting he was a native, and therefore congeni tally irrational, she patiently explained, “We could never arrange your passage at this late date, even if Lord Cavencourt permitted it, which I strongly doubt. The end of our long war with Napoleon has left a great many former soldiers in need of employment. Lord Cavencourt cannot in good conscience pay a foreigner for what an English servant can do.”
    “Unless, of course, the foreigner is French,” Amanda put in dryly, “and an excellent chef.”
    “My dear girl, you know I never meant—”
    “I know, Leticia, but that argument won’t wash.”
    “I can cook,” Padji cried, still gazing soulfully up at Amanda, his hands now folded in supplication. “I am an excellent cook, even the English food.” He launched into a staggering list of his gastronomic accomplishments, down to the art of soft-boiling eggs.
    “I’m sorry,” Amanda said gently. “Truly—because I’ll miss you dreadfully. But even if we could arrange it—which I know we can’t—to take you would be most unwise, and not fair to you at all. This is your country. You’d hate England. It’s cold and damp, and many people will treat you unkindly because you’re a foreigner and your skin is dark.”
    “I will be despised,” he said. “I will live as an untouchable, a leper. But I will serve you faithfully. And my mistress will not fill my mouth with scorpions and—”
    “Lud, but you have the most ghastly imagination, Padji. Oh, will you get up? What are you thinking of, to be grovelling in this way, a great strong man like you?”
    Padji rose. “Then you will take me with you?”
    Amanda sighed. “The ship sails tomorrow. To arrange passage at the last minute requires a great deal of money and influence. That means my brother must arrange it, and I assure you he won’t.”
    “But if it can be arranged, you will let me serve you?”
    “It can’t be,” she answered, her gaze flickering from the huge Indian to Mrs. Gales. “Roderick would never permit it, let alone help.”
    “Never fear, mistress, O beautiful and compassionate one, whose eyes burn with golden flames and—”
    “Padji, you must- “
    “Tomorrow. I will arrange it all, and tomorrow I will commence a new life, as your adoring slave.”
    Oblivious to her half-hearted and Mrs. Gale’s emphatic protests, Padji commenced a speech on the thousand ways he’d serve his new mistress. He’d just begun soaring to improbable heights of self-sacrifice—the eating of flies being deemed somehow necessary to satisfactory service — when the Cavencourt carriage was heard at the gate. Padji promptly crawled out a window and escaped through the garden.

Chapter Three
    Roderick accompanied his sister, her companion, and her maid on board ship, dutifully saw their belongings properly arranged, repeated for the hundredth time what Amanda must do upon reaching England, checked for the fiftieth time the papers entrusted to her, gave her a peck on the cheek, and departed.
    Not ten minutes after he’d gone, one of the mates appeared, requesting Miss Cavencourt’s appearance in wardroom. The captain wished to speak with her.
    “Miss Cavencourt has scarcely had time to