But somehow it had never quite happened, and then Father had died and the scientific world began to drift out of reach. I don’t think it was ever malicious. It was simply that we had come as a set, Dr. Wilson and his daughter. If any of his old friends ever thought about me, it was probably with general goodwill. “Oh yes, Wilson had a daughter, didn’t he? Bit dowdy, but by god could she paint a terrestrial orchid!” And they’d make a mental note to see what I was doing these days and then they’d see an interesting lichen and then it would be five years later.
I couldn’t even be angry. It was hard to compete with a good lichen.
I got lost twice looking for the kitchen, but eventually found the dining room. It had high ceilings and elegant moldings. The table that ran the length of it had no tablecloth, though the wood had been polished until it nearly glowed, even under a thin film of dust. There were silver candlesticks on the mantle, but they were beginning to tarnish. The whole room had an air of disuse about it and the fireplace did not look as if it had been lit in months. It reminded me uncomfortably of our home during Father’s illness, as I closed off the rooms one by one tosave money. The rooms, when I walked through them, had the same oddly hollow feel, as if the echoes took a little longer to return than they should.
Just beyond the dining room, I found a narrow door painted the same color as the walls. I pushed it open and found, unsurprisingly, the servant’s stair. The sound of clattering crockery grew louder as I descended.
“Now I know those dishes aren’t done,” Mrs. Kent said as I stepped into the kitchen. Her back was to me, sleeves shoved to her elbows. “You can’t even have done the silver yet.”
“Um,” I said. “No?”
The housekeeper twisted around, blinked at me, then laughed. “Miss Wilson! Goodness, I thought you were young Sally. Never mind the silver.”
I smiled. “Quite all right. Err—I was hoping to ask you when I should call on Dr. Halder?”
“Lord, I don’t even send his breakfast tray up until ten. He keeps late hours, unless he’s getting up early to chase bugs around.” She glanced my way. “You’ll probably be wanting breakfast though.”
“I don’t want to be a bother—”
Mrs. Kent snorted. “Feeding people’s no bother. Do you want to eat in the dining room, or here in the kitchen?”
Remembering the air of disuse in the dining room, I suspected that reallywouldbe a bother. And the notion of sitting all alone in that quiet room, while Mrs. Kent ferried food up the stairs—God, no. “I’d rather eat down here, if I won’t be in your way?”
“Not at all.” Her smile seemed a trifle more genuine, and I wondered if I’d passed a test of some sort. She pulled a cast-iron pan from a back burner of the stove and cracked a pair of eggs into it. “You always up this early?”
“Force of habit,” I admitted. “But I don’t actually need anything but coffee at this hour, if you’d rather I ate when you’re preparing the tray for Dr. Halder.”
“Pfff. Makes no never mind to me. I keep the coffee on for myself and Mr. Kent.” She poured out a mug and handed it to me. I slid into a chair and spooned a little sugar into it. Smiley appeared to see if he could leave some cat hair in the sugar bowl, and seemed vaguely annoyed that I wouldn’t let him.
The mug was halfway to my lips when it occurred to me that it might have worse things in it than cat hair. Where had the water come from? Would there be mosquito larvae mixed in with the coffee grounds?
It’s coffee,I told myself sternly.The water was boiled to make it. Even if there’s mosquito larvae, they’ll be… er… pasteurized.I took a sip. It tasted like coffee. Nothing wriggled against my tongue.
“Anything you particularly like for breakfast?”
I blinked at Mrs. Kent. At the school, the teachers ate the same things as the students. (At least the junior teachers did. I had my suspicions about the headmistress.) Breakfast was oatmeal and an apple. Sometimes there was toast, and at Christmas there were often hotcakes, but the oatmeal was eternal. I had almost forgotten that there were other breakfast foods in existence.
“Um,” I said. “I… err… hotcakes? If you ever feel like making them?”
“I make ’em twice a week regular anyway,” Mrs. Kent told me. “Mr. Kent’s partial to them. Just eggs today though.”
“Eggs would be wonderful,” I assured her. “I love eggs.”
“Good.” She turned and slid two freshly cooked eggs onto my plate. “Bacon in a minute.”
“Bacon?”
She raised an eyebrow at me. “You don’t eat bacon?”
“Oh, Iwould! I do, I mean. It’s just… it’s been a long time.” Truth be told, if not for tiny, mushy bits of pink that occasionally turned up in the school supper, I would have had no proof that bacon was not a hallucination of my youth.
Mrs. Kent didn’t pry. I heard a sizzle and the smell of bacon drifted through the kitchen. My stomach growled loudly and I applied myself to my eggs.
“And Dr. Halder doesn’t mind?” I asked when two thick slices of bacon landed in front of me.
“Mind?”
“That we’re eating this well.” The headmistress would have fallen into strong hysterics at the notion of the junior teachers having bacon and eggs for breakfast. Even the coffee had been more than half chicory, and the milk so watered you could read through it.
