Dead Man's Chest by Kerry Greenwood

Author:Kerry Greenwood
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Allen & Unwin Pty Ltd
Published: 2010-01-16T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Hunger is the best sauce in all the world.

Miguel de Cervantes Don Quixote

Phryne was idling on her balcony when she heard a knock at the back door and realised that the Irish maid Máire had come and there was no one to let her in. Dot had taken her costume and gone swimming on her own. Phryne suspected she had gone to find her affianced Hugh, and why not?

Cursing lightly, she ran down the stairs and admitted the young woman, struck afresh by how positively translucent she was.

‘Come in, Máire, no work today, but you must let me give you breakfast—provided you cook it for yourself,’ said Phryne. ‘And since we are retaining you, here is the money for the next three days as well.’

‘That’s too much, Missus,’ the girl exclaimed.

‘Fair wage,’ said Phryne. ‘Now just take it, there’s a good girl, and you could cook me a slice or two of toast while you are at it.’

‘Of course,’ murmured the girl. She undid her headscarf, put on her apron, and began slicing bread. She seemed to divine where everything was by some sort of housekeeping sorcery. Phryne settled down at the kitchen table. She liked kitchens, as long as no one expected her to do any work.

‘What can I use in your fine kitchen, Missus?’ asked the girl.

‘Anything your heart desires,’ replied Phryne. ‘You ought to get a hat, though. That scarf isn’t going to keep the sun off your skin.’

‘I don’t wear it for that,’ said the girl, putting the big frying pan on the stove and melting a chunk of butter. ‘Could you fancy a few eggs and some bacon, now, and a little soda bread?’

‘If you want to cook it. I would really like a toasted sandwich with tomatoes and bacon.’

The girl took down the haunch of bacon which Ruth had purchased and began to slice it.

‘Fine bacon, now, I’d love a taste of the bacon. Not that fish isn’t good,’ said Máire a little hastily. ‘But when it’s nothing but fish you begin to crave for flesh. Now I’ve got some pennies we can buy some bacon, butter and lard and some more flour.’

‘What about potatoes?’ asked Phryne. ‘Oops. I mean, you need chips to go with the fish.’

Máire did not take offence at her assumption that the Irish needed perpetual potatoes.

‘The dad and Gráinne have an agreement with one of the market gardeners. They let us take tatties, neaps and parsnips and carrots—and fine strong cabbages—and we leave him fish. His wife cooks this sort of fish soup. They’re from Italy, to be sure. Take any trash fish, octopus and mussels and prawns—the dad picks ’em out of the bait basket. So we got bags of tatties and a fine meal they make. But I cannot take to them tomaties. New taste to me.’

‘Never mind, you’ll get used to them. And you may eat as much bacon as you wish.’

There was another tap on the back door.

‘My cousin Michael, he’s come to see it’s all right with me,’ apologised Máire.

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