True Story (The Deverells, Book One) Read Online Free PDF Page A

just like everybody else. Wearily she replied,
"Yes, that is when we ladies are at our most dangerous. That, and
when we haven't eaten for an extended period. As indeed, I have
not."
    She waited, but no offer issued forth
from those tight lips.
    "You do have a bed for me?" she
added.
    "There's plenty of beds," he snapped.
"But none aired."
    Having waited again to see if he might
come up with a solution, she finally suggested, "Perhaps while I
have something to eat, a bed could be warmed?"
    "Dinner was cleared an hour ago at
least."
    "But there is food in the kitchen?
Anything will do. I can cook for myself. I've had nothing all day
and although it may not be ladylike to admit it, I'm fair
famished."
    His lips parted in a tense murmur, as
if he feared the words might cost him coin. "Yes.
Madam."
    Removing her gloves, Olivia looked
around at the dark paneling and the shifting shadows of the
medieval hall.
    Suddenly she realized there was a man
standing on the stairs. He'd been there listening all along? Her
heartbeat scrambled for balance, like a cat on a rolling barrel.
But when the butler raised his oil lamp to point her in the
direction of the kitchen, she saw tongues of light lick not only at
the tall, still figure, but at a large, gilt frame surrounding
it.
    Her pulse slowed to a steadier pace.
Good heavens, it was only a portrait. Life-size.
    As the glow of the butler's oil lamp
arched over the picture, it revealed a large gash in the canvas and
a dark, blood-red stain, obscuring more than two thirds of the
man's face.
    "Is that Mr. Deverell?"
    "It is," the butler muttered, adding
stiffly, "Handiwork of the former mistress of the
house."
    "She was an artist?"
    He sniffed. "No, madam. I refer to the
wine stain. And the hole."
    "Ah." Something heavy and sharp had
gouged the canvas quite severely in the spot where his face should
be. "Must have been very satisfying for the lady. I wonder why she
didn't take aim at the real Mr. Deverell. She wouldn't be the
first, would she?"
    The butler cast her another frown.
"You'd be wise to keep such remarks and opinions to yourself in
this house, madam."
    "Yes, I daresay." It was the case in
every house in which she'd ever stayed, of course."The master has
been greatly maligned by uninformed gossip."
    "I'm sure. You must excuse me. When
I'm hungry and weary my tongue does tend to run on untended." She
could also blame it on the excitement of her journey, for she was a
long way from home now, a good distance from anything
familiar.
    The butler's brows had twisted into a
knot midway down his forehead and his nostrils flared so wide she
heard wind rushing through them.
    Olivia blinked innocently. "I have no
doubt Mr. Deverell is the most upright and benevolent of gentlemen.
A victim of malicious rumor. A veritable saint."
    He eyed her warily in the lamp's
glow.
    "I won't believe a word said against
him," she added. "I too have suffered from vile rumors and unkind
speculation, so you may rest assured your master has an ally in me.
I only meant that his wife must have been relieved to dispel her
pent up anxieties and frustrations on a portrait. We women suffer
terrible hysteria at times and for little reason, as you must know.
We are flighty, temperamental creatures, are we not? That is why
they call us the weaker sex. It's fortunate we have men and corsets
to keep us in our place or we might explode into little pieces."
She smiled brightly. "Do lead the way to the kitchens,
sir."
    As she followed the butler, Olivia
thought again of the coachman's shocked expression and his concern
for her body and soul while in the company of the reprobate Mr.
Deverell.
    Frail bit of a
woman , indeed. A quick snort of laughter
shot out of her and ended up speared on the end of the butler's
long nose, when he twisted his head around and glared over his
shoulder.
    "Are you quite well?" he
demanded.
    "Me? I am riddled with good health.
It's the men around me who don't fare so well."
    " Chin up, m'dear ," she