Withering Heights Read Online Free PDF

insensitive and unsympathetic. But I wasn’t used to dealing with Ben in this attitude of pale sorrow. I would much have preferred him to leap three feet in the air and clutch at his head before pounding up and down the room, as was customary when he was severely upset. Turbulence I could deal with, knowing I only had to count to ten and it would be over. I would straighten any pictures that had been sent askew, and whatever was wrong would get sorted out over a cup of tea or, when the rare situation warranted it, something stronger.
    “
Cuisine Anglaise
has a wide circulation, Ellie.”
    “Among people who call beef
boeuf
.” I couldn’t keep my hoof out of my mouth. “And they aren’t the sort to buy your cookery books by the dozens.”
    “Thanks a lot!” Removing his reading glasses, he set them down with painstaking precision.
    “It was meant as a compliment, Ben. Your strength is real food, eaten by real people, not trendy fashion food for the beautiful and bored. You appeal to the average person. Getting meals on the table isn’t a form of artistic expression for them. More likely it’s a matter of Mum and Dad getting the children to eat what’s put in front of them rather than dropping it on the floor for the dog or gagging on it until they’re ordered out of the room.”
    “Why didn’t you tell me this before I wrote the damn book? I could have stuck to advice on putting frozen dinners in the microwave,” said Ben. “That wouldn’t have required any ‘floury’ prose.” His smile did not take the edge off the words. But I didn’t have the sense to stop while I was behind. I was too upset that our evening had been ruined and he’d hardly told me anything about his overnight with his parents or how well the children had settled in before he started for home.
    “You’re not the only one to get less than bubbling praise at times.” I stirred restlessly in my chair. “But I don’t go to pieces when a client finds fault with a room design I’ve spent days working on.”
    “It’s not the same, Ellie. Being criticized in print is far worse—”
    “Than being told to my face I’ve done an inadequate job?” I got to my feet and had the sherry decanter in hand when Mrs. Malloy came teetering into the room, again with the feather duster. I had been picturing her snugly tucked up in the guest room with my copy of
Lord RakehelPs Redemption
. But here she was, a possible bright spot or at the very least an interruption, in an otherwise bleak moment. Tobias followed in her wake. Sensing disharmony, which he had made clear in thepast was not good for a cat of advancing years, he settled on the bookcase and turned convincingly to stone.
    Ben, who had risen for our overnight guest if not for Mr. Tobias, pointed an outraged quivering finger. “He’s sitting on
Cuisine Anglaise!
”
    “Good!” I flared. “He’ll stay sitting on it if I have anything to say about it!” Having poured myself a liberal glass of sherry, I returned to my seat and did my own impersonation of cat staring into space.
    “One look through
Cuisine
Whatsit the first time it arrived for you was enough for me, Mr. H!” Mrs. Malloy swayed with the breeze, or possibly the effects of a nip of gin in the kitchen, on her ridiculously high heels. But it was clear she had summed up the situation, as behooved a woman who had once commandeered Milk Jugg’s private detective agency. “As if I want to eat at those restaurants they write about. The ones where they put marigolds on your salad and hold up the bottle of wine so you can bow to it! And me a Christian woman! Idolatrous, the vicar would call it!”
    With Ben standing there like a bottle of sauce, I felt compelled to stem the flow of Mrs. M’s tirade. “
Cuisine Anglaise
is the periodical of choice for the person with the professionally trained palate.”
    “Biffy for them!” Mrs. Malloy’s bust having inflated to a dangerous size, I waited uneasily for the sound of an