Page 13 of Unearthing the Smuggler's Heart
"I think you will find that a stuffed hen is a much more pleasant dish if no one has eaten the stuffing before it can be cooked," Jade Ferris observed without so much as a glance up at him.
He opened his mouth to argue, but could think of nothing to say that contested the truth of her statement. Instead, he just stood dumbly while she finished up her scribbling, her narrow fingers smudged with indigo, and took another sip of his coffee, hoping it would provide some clarity to what he was witnessing.
"There," she said, blowing on the ink. "We will try this, and see how it fares, Mr. Tennyson. Of course you must amend it as you learn what is effective and what is not. The galley is your kingdom, after all."
His cook took the sheet from her and squinted at it.
"Can you read, Tennyson?" Mathias blurted out, startling the other two.
"Of course I can read," Tennyson shot back, clearly affronted. "A vicar's son, ain't I?"
Mathias thought it best to abstain from responding.
Jade Ferris pushed her chair back and stood, shaking the wrinkles out of her smocked green dress. The chaos of hair around her seemed to bother her not at all, and she made her way over to the urn and helped herself to her own cup of coffee, apparently completely unaware of his shock at this whole business.
"We've recovered some broken eggs before they could spoil," she said happily, turning to Mathias and gesturing toward a brown, clay bowl full of whipped yellow foam. "It is quite good fried with whichever vegetables you favor tossed in. Shall I make you one?"
"I'll make it," Tennyson grumbled, setting the document carefully down on one of his tables and securing it under a plate and patting Jade familiarly on the shoulder, a gesture which seemed to register to the young woman as entirely natural. "I've got tomatoes and olives this morning, if it please you."
Mathias generally favored only a piece of fruit first thing in the morning, and something hot a few hours on, but he could see that this was not the time to indulge his usual habits. He nodded, admitting to himself that the dish did sound appetizing, and attempted to peer at the document under the plate as discreetly as possible.
It was obviously one of her blank schedule sheets, he realized, but instead of filling out tasks at the time slots, she had created a grid with lists of ingredients, each with a number and letter next to them. He immediately looked away lest it give him the vapors.
"I want to make myself useful," said Jade Ferris, so clear and near to his side that it made him startle. "I haven't much to offer in the way of seafaring, but I'd like to earn my keep."
She was looking up at him so guilelessly, those big eyes throwing his own reflection back at him with something like hope.
He had no idea how to handle this woman.
"I'm certain Cook is thankful for your aid," he said lamely, gesturing with his mug to Tennyson. "But you needn't feel obliged to labor while you're here. You are a guest, not an indenture."
Ah, finally. There it was, a little tick of amusement turning up the corners of her lips. Progress! Progress when he was not being intentionally entertaining was still progress, wasn't it?
"I do not like to be idle," she confessed.
He nodded, a bit of tension easing from his shoulders. He understood that much, at least.
"We will find you some amusements to add to your undertakings," he assured her. "There are plenty of ways to occupy oneself that do not involve tedium and labor."
She tilted her head at him, blinking thoughtfully. "I suppose that must be true," she said, though she sounded far from convinced.
It was at this moment that Isabelle Applegate entered the galley, stifling a yawn behind her knuckles and giving a sleepy smile of greeting all around. "Good morning," she said, her eyes dropping to the stolen cup of coffee in Mathias's hands. "That's mine."
"It's cold now," he said defensively, gulping down the remaining contents before she could snatch it from him. "I'm sure there is more."
"I'll make more," Cook said, in a tone that seemed to Mathias a little bit overly put-upon.
"Have the rest of mine," Jade said, extending her cup to Isabelle. "I've had too much already, I think. I'll need to run circles around the upper deck if I'm not careful. Besides, I should get started on the pantry if I want to be finished by luncheon."
"The pantry?" Isabelle asked curiously, accepting the cup and bringing it to her lips.
"Oh, have you not heard?" Mathias snapped, winning startled looks of rebuke from both women. He cleared his throat, a bit of embarrassed heat creeping up his throat, and watched as Cook passed the pantry key into Jade's capable hands. He supposed the only thing left to say was obvious, and so he asked, "What time is luncheon?"
She did it again, the corners of her lips ticking up into the faintest suggestion of a smile. She seemed to survey him, like a prize fighter sizing up his opponent as she gripped the key to her side. "One o'clock," she said, with a tinge of something in her tone that might have been taunting...orteasing?
"One o'clock," echoed Tennyson in a singsong voice from the coffee urn. "Precisely one o'clock!"
Mathias sighed.
