“Our housekeeper. I gather that is what folk call them. Her husband got killed in the town near us back home in the Ozarks when some men wanted to take the money he had just received for the apples he grew. So she grabbed her kids and walked out of there. Saw our place, which has a stockade like a fort, and decided that was a safe place for her kids. She convinced Iain he needed to hire her. She became the one who cleans the place, cooks us meals, and nurses us. We built her a place, too, inside the stockade since she loved it so much.”
“It is like you have built yourself a small village.”
Robbie laughed. “Never thought of it that way, but it does, doesnae it.” He smoothed down his side of the cover, then moved to the third bed.
“What are ye doing?”
Belle squeaked in surprise at the voice from the door, but Robbie just grinned and turned to look at Geordie. “Making the beds. Just figures ye would wander in when we are almost done.”
Geordie walked over and lightly slapped the back of Robbie’s head before turning toward Mehitabel. “Miss Ampleford, we were wondering where ye would like us to put the horses.”
“Any empty stall. You might want to avoid the ones next to the donkey’s stall. He can get stroppy around an animal he does not know. The black horse doesn’t care, just so long as your horse doesn’t try to eat his feed.”
“Thank ye.” He turned to start out of the room.
“We can discuss what you pay and what you get and the few tiny rules I have when you get back.”
“Ye have rules?” asked Robbie after Geordie nodded his agreement and left.
“Just a couple. Ye already followed one—took your boots off when ye came in and set them on the boot rack.”
“What is this room?”
“The infirmary. My grandfather and my father were doctors. I learned a lot but not at a school, so that is why I put ‘nurse’ on my sign. I still get a lot of the folk in town coming to see me as if I am a doctor. No doctor has come to the town. Too small, I guess.”
“I dinnae think we have one either.”
“Maybe they will come now that the war is over.”
Robbie murmured a matching hope, then Belle went into the kitchen to put dinner on. As soon as she had the meal started she put a bit more food and fresh drinks on a tray and took it in to the men; the two others were already back from tending to their horses. They were a handsome collection of young men, she thought, and smiled as she poured herself some coffee from the pot she had brought in.
“This is verra nice. Thank ye,” Geordie said.
“Dinner will be ready in an hour and a half,” she said. “We’ll eat at the big table over in front of the fireplace. If you wish to do something, there are books in the room where you will sleep or in what I like to call the social room. It is the room with the carved wooden double doors. The social room also has cards, a chess set, and checkers.”
He watched her walk away and then looked at Robbie. “She reminds me a bit of David’s wife.” Geordie looked at James. “He’s one of the Powell brothers, shepherds we hired for the flock we have. Small, with a mile of hair, can do a lot of things, and will do every one to make a good living.”
“I wonder where the growling Thor went? I want to see what he looks like,” James said as he sat up straight.
Robbie replied, “Big, brown, and shaggy. Miss Ampleford says he is a mix of a lot of breeds. I saw him when she stepped aside and turned to go into the house, but he disappeared into the kitchen.”
“So there is a little white dog called Odin and a big brown dog called Thor.”
Geordie pointed to something curled up on the seat Belle had been in. “What is that?”
“I thought it was a pillow she was sitting on,” said James as he studied the lump of gray and white.
Belle walked out of the kitchen and saw the three men studying her cat. “That is my cat, Loki.”
“Those are all Norse gods, aren’t they?”
“Yup. Read a book about them that they had in the lending library. Thought they were interesting.” With a soft little grunt she picked up the cat, sat down, and the cat curled up on her lap.
“That is a big cat.”
“I know. Thor is scared of him.”
“Nay surprised. The size of those paws must give him a good smacking swing.”
