I turned to see carrots, onions, celery, and potatoes piled high on the scarred oak table in the center of the room. “Right, yes—chopping.” What I did not see was a knife, which I suspected was an essential tool for chopping. “Er… have you seen a knife anywhere in your preparations?”
Godfrey merely pointed with the twig in his hand toward the far counter. Since there was nothing visible on top, I was left to open drawers until I located a knife.
After returning once again to the vegetables, I considered them with a wary eye. How was one meant to chop round vegetables without them rolling off the table? How big should they be?
The celery seemed the most likely to stay put. I ripped off a stalk and lined it up in front of me before wrapping both handsaround the knife handle and slamming it down. The celery rolled out from under the knife and shot across the kitchen.
“What the bleeding hell?” Godfrey exclaimed, clutching the back of his head where the vegetable had smacked into it.
“I am so sorry. It got away from me.”
The man humphed, eyeing me with trepidation before turning back to his task.
Having learned from my first mistake, I snatched another stalk and put it in my left hand, keeping the knife in my right. I was about to bring the knife down?—
“Stop right there!” Miss McAllen shouted from the doorway. “Put the knife down before ye lose a finger.”
“What?”
“Shoo—Stepping in the dung was amusing. Losing a finger is not.” She pried the knife from my hand by the handle before pointing at a nearby chair. “Sit there and dinnae touch anything.”
Cautiously, I followed her instructions as Lock strode in with fresh firewood, moving to assist Godfrey.
“Do not, under any circumstances, raise a knife like that with yer hand down below again. Do ye understand me?”
“I tried to keep both hands on the knife, but the celery went flying.”
“Oh, is that why it’s on the floor?” Lock asked.
Miss McAllen sighed. “Can ye bring me a chopping board?” she asked Lock before turning to me while he did as bid. “Come here, stand behind me.”
“I just sat?—”
“Just do as I say.” When I stood to peer over her shoulder, she grasped the celery in her left hand, just as I had.
“That’s what I did?—”
“No. Stop talking. Listen and watch. Don’t splay yer fingers aboot so they’re easy to chop off. Tuck them under so they’reharder to cut. Then, hold the knife like this and rest the tip against the board.” Shewaskeeping it much closer to the chopping board. “Rocking motion, not hacking motion or whatever the bleeding hell it was ye were doing.”
Carefully she rocked her hand down, slicing through the celery into even chunks. “See how I’m not cutting a finger off? Maybe consider that way.”
She turned, offering me the knife, handle first. “Ye try.”
Dutifully, I took it and tried to mimic her efforts. I was met with substantially more success than my first attempt, and Godfrey’s head remained unscathed. While my pieces were not nearly as fine or even, they stayed where I put them.
“Good. Where are the knives?” I nodded toward the open drawer. She returned to my side with a knife and board of her own, and reached for a potato.
“When they’re round—how do you…”
“Keep them from rolling off the table?”
“Yes.”
“Cut them in half first. Finish the celery and I’ll show ye the magic of the onion—it’ll be a revelation.”
“Thank you,” I murmured.
Lock announced he was going to go do something with the chicken that I didn’t understand and didn’t wish to contemplate while Miss McAllen did indeed demonstrate the mystical chopping of the onion.
