Lily Lang by The Last Time We Met

six the next morning, Miranda gave up on the effort to sleep, rose from bed and dressed. She had not heard Jason return to his suite the night before, and she wondered with rather more curiosity than was proper where he spent his nights now that she had commandeered his suite.
    She once again made her way down to the hall beside the kitchens, where the staff members of Blakewell’s greeted her like an old friend and quickly ushered to a seat of honor at the head of the table. They had told her this huge, vaulted chamber with its massive oak table and constantly replenished cold buffet was a place of rest, where they could come whenever they had a spare moment to ease their aching feet and take a cup of tea.
    Polly, the pert kitchen maid, slid into the seat besides Miranda, carrying a plate of ham and eggs.
    “Morning, Miss Thornwood,” she said cheerfully as she ate her breakfast. “Will ye be helpin’ out in the kitchens again today?”
    Miranda smiled at her. “If Monsieur Leblanc wishes it.”
    “Oh, he’ll wish it all right,” said Polly. “It was right nice of ye, helpin’ out Harriet like that.”
    Miranda shrugged, a little embarrassed. “I don’t have anything to do here, anyway. How’s your palm?”
    Polly, who had accidentally picked up a hot bowl with her bare hand the day before, held it out and showed it to Miranda. “Not too bad, thank you.”
    Miranda, well acquainted with burn wounds from tending to the kitchen maids of Thornwood, examined the blistered area carefully. “We’ll soak it in milk and honey again today,” she said. “And don’t use this hand to pick up anything heavy. It’ll irritate the skin.”
    Polly grinned at her, showing the space between her two front teeth. “I’ll leave the heavy liftin’ to ye, Miss Thornwood.”
    Miranda laughed. “We had better leave all the heavy lifting to Mr. Briggs, I think.”
    Peter Briggs, the footman who so resembled a bullfrog, took one look at Polly and flushed scarlet. Polly gave him a bold wink, then turned back to Miranda.
    “Is it true ye knew Mr. Blakewell when he was a lad?” she demanded.
    Immediately, all other conversation at the table stopped. A dozen avid gazes fixed on Miranda. Disconcerted, she picked up her cup of tea and took a sip before saying cautiously, “Yes.”
    “Truly?” demanded one of the footmen sitting at the other end of the table. “What was he like? Was ’e always such a cold-blooded blighter?”
    “Ye mind yer language in front of Miss Thornwood, Daniel Pooley,” said Polly sharply.
    “I was jist curious,” said Daniel, looking injured. “I meant no disrespect, Miss Thornwood.”
    “Of course not, Mr. Pooley,” said Miranda, smiling at him. “As for Mr. Blakewell…” She trailed off, remembering the baby sparrow Jason had raised in a box in his room, his daily visits to play cards with old Mrs. Tilford, the housekeeper’s ancient and bedridden mother. “I suppose he’s changed a great deal.”
    “What was he like?” demanded Polly. “I can’t think of him as a wee lad. Every time I try I just see ’im like he is now.” She frowned. “Only smaller, I guess.”
    Miranda couldn’t repress a smile. “I assure you Mr. Blakewell was a boy once,” she said, and recounted, to the great hilarity of the assembled staff, the time he had let loose two dozen frogs in the carriage of a certain Mrs. Finchly.
    This very dignified and obese lady had called to criticize Miranda for not only running, but running barefoot and bareheaded, through the main thoroughfare of the village. Having delivered her lecture to a very sullen ten-year-old Miranda, whose hair had not been brushed in over a week, Mrs. Finchly finally departed. The carriage had barely rounded the first corner of the long drive when the door had flung open, ejecting the hysterical lady, now shrieking like a choleric piglet and covered in frogs. Afterward, Jason had been found doubled over and overcome with laughter in a rose bush