Yankee Wife by Linda Lael Miller Read Free Book Online

and lit it.
    She was just replacing the beautifully painted globe when there was a knock at her door. Expecting Mrs. Chilcote, or perhaps Millie, Lydia smoothed her hair and crumpled skirts and went smiling to admit her company.
    A slender young woman, just into adolescence, stood in the hallway, where two lamps burned at either end of a long cherrywood table. She was as beautiful as Millie, though in a different way, for her hair was maple-colored and her eyes a soft brown.
    Lydia felt an unexpected twinge, surmising that her caller had to be Charlotte Quade, Brigham's older daughter, and she was somehow certain that the child resembled her mother.
    Unmistakable hostility glinted in the wide, fawn-soft eyes. “Papa says you're to come down to dinner or we'll eat without you,” she said.
    Inwardly, Lydia sighed. If she hadn't been so hungry, she'd have sent Mr. Quade an equally rude message via this irritable little messenger. Instead she simply said, as though having a pleasant encounter at a tea party, “How do you do, Charlotte? I'm Miss McQuire, and I'll be most happy to join you for supper, if you'll just lead the way to the dining room.”
    Charlotte tossed her lovely head, narrowed her eyes for a moment, and turned on her heel. “I don't understand why Uncle Devon had to bring you here in the first place,” she said, without looking back, as she progressed toward a rear stairway in long strides. “We certainly don't need you.”
    Lydia made no reply, since any comment she might make would certainly be met with more of the thirteen-year-old's brutally direct logic.
    They started down the stairs, passed through a kitchen where a man in overalls, suspenders, work boots, and a plaid woolen shirt sat at the table. Dirty pots and pans were everywhere, and he was perusing a thin, crumpled issue of the Seattle Gazette .
    â€œThat's Jake Feeny, the cook,” Charlotte said idly, as though Mr. Feeny were inanimate and unaware of their passing. “Papa hired him after the Indian woman left.”
    Lydia nodded at Mr. Feeny, and he smiled at her, bright, wry eyes twinkling.
    In a dining room as tastefully ostentatious as the rest of the house, the Quade family had gathered at a long table. A blaze chattered on the hearth of a large brick fireplace, and Devon rose at Lydia's appearance, followed reluctantly by Brigham.
    She took the only open place, at Brigham's left, and felt unaccountably self-conscious when he drew back her chair before returning to his own.
    The conversation resumed, a merry flow of laughter and talk, and the food was delicious. Lydia concentrated on putting away her share of chicken and dumplings and canned green beans cooked with bacon. She wanted to put on a few pounds of insulation in case her fortunes took another unexpected divergence and she found herself out in the rain.
    â€œI think we should send Miss McQuire back wherever she came from,” Charlotte proclaimed suddenly, and the tide of happy interchange dried up instantly.
    â€œLet's send Charlotte instead and keep Miss McQuire,” Millie countered, pausing to put out her tongue at her sister.
    Lydia lowered her fork to her plate and sat with her hands folded in her lap. Although she would have done anything to prevent it, her gaze swerved to Brigham. She wasn't looking for a champion, needed no defense from the silly attacks of a child, and yet she expected something.
    Mr. Quade glowered at his elder daughter, taking a white dinner napkin from his lap and setting it aside. “Perhaps you would prefer spending the rest of the evening in your room, contemplating the drawbacks of rudeness.”
    â€œI'm sorry, Papa,” Charlotte said meekly.
    Brigham's response was firm. “It wasn't me you offended,” he pointed out.
    Charlotte turned her amber eyes to Lydia, and the defiance Lydia saw in their depths belied the child's words. “I apologize, Miss McQuire. I shall not be rude in the