The Cruel Count (Bantam Series No. 28) by Barbara Cartland Read Free Book Online Page B

“But what about you?”
    “I dare say I shall manage as you will,” Vesta replied coldly.
    She felt he was hoping that she would be uncomfortable. She moved ahead of him with her head high and told herself that however rough the Inn might be she would not complain.
    They walked through the low door into a room which held a large fireplace in which a big log was smouldering.
    There were two large wooden settles on either side of the fire and a table at the other side of the room with four rickety wooden chairs. There were no other furnishings of any sort.
    A middle-aged woman appeared wearing native dress. She was dirty and untidy and very unlike the smiling attractive women Vesta had seen in Jeno.
    Her apron was badly in need of a wash, her dress was stained under the arms and her dark hair was straggling down her back.
    The Count greeted her, and she replied in a dialect that Vesta found impossible to understand.
    It appeared that the Count was familiar with it, because after a long exchange of words between them he said to Vesta with what she thought was a mocking glint in his eye:
    “Bad news, I am afraid. The woman says her husband is out hunting for meat and is not likely to return tonight. There is in fact nothing to eat in the house.”
    “Nothing?” Vesta asked and realised as she spoke that, if not excessively hungry, she was certainly ready for a meal.
    “The woman says there is nothing,” the Count repeated. “She keeps hens and she will kill and cook one for us to carry away tomorrow. But that will certainly take time.”
    “If she has hens,” Vesta suggested, “then she should have eggs.”
    “That is of course an idea.”
    The Count turned to the woman and Vesta knew by the way she nodded her head that she agreed there were eggs.
    “Listen, do not offend her,” Vesta said to the Count, “but ask her if she would mind if I cook the eggs. Explain to her that I have just come off a long voyage at sea and my stomach is very weak. I would not like to hurt her feelings, but I am sure I can cook better than she can.”
    “Would it matter if her feelings were hurt?” the Count asked.
    “Of course it would!” Vesta said sharply. “Tell her what I have said.”
    The Count obeyed her and the woman shrugged her shoulders as if it was a matter of indifference to her who did the cooking.
    She walked through a doorway, which Vesta was sure led to the kitchen. She had been right when she supposed it would be dirty.
    There was grease on all the tables, the place smelt, and the pots and pans hanging over the fire-place burnt black were indescribably filthy.
    Picking up a basket the woman passed on through a door which led outside the Inn, and Vesta knew she had gone in search of eggs.
    A moment later there was a loud squawking and clucking from a hen, and she guessed that the InnKeeper’s wife was catching it to kill for their meal tomorrow.
    She looked round the kitchen wondering where to start, and then finding a pan she followed the woman outside.
    There was no sign of her and Vesta thought she must have gone into the wood after the hen who was reluctant to be slaughtered.
    But as she had expected, only a little way from the Inn there was a small cascade of water coming down from the side of the mountain and running between the trees.
    This was obviously where the Inn-Keeper procured his water, but Vesta realised that, while she could lift a bucket onto the stones under the cascade, once it was full it would be too heavy for her to move.
    She went back to the front room where she discovered the Count taking logs from a big pile in the corner and putting them onto the fire.
    “I am afraid I need some help with a water-bucket,” she said.
    If she had not disliked him so much she would have been amused at the expression on his face.
    “A bucket?” he questioned.
    “I have to clean a pan before I can use it.”
    He stared at her for a moment, then he smiled.
    She realised it was the first time she had