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“I can explain,” Amy said, moving so she was on the other side of the table from him.
“I would like to hear it.” All of the women in the kitchen had stopped working and were staring at him. There wasn’t a woman on the place—except Amy and Beth—who hadn’t fluttered her eyelashes at Russell Johns.
“Zoë is a friend of mine and she’s new here,” Amy began, then picked up some carrots and started scraping them.
“And so you felt the need to lie to her about me?”
“She likes to paint and draw. She never stops. I thought you two might get on well together.”
“So you told her I was a scrawny little thing with bad teeth and that I needed lessons? That she needed to teach me?”
The entire room stopped and listened, with a few of the younger women trying to suppress their giggles. They were used to Miss Amy going at the master, but she’d never done anything to Mr. Johns.
“I wanted her to feel at ease with you,” Amy said. “I wanted her to meet you without knowing who you were at first. You know, Russell, you can be a bit intimidating to an innocent young girl.”
“Innocent? She has the conceit of my old painting master. Has she even seen my work? Has she seen that I need no lessons?”
“No…” Amy said slowly. “I didn’t let her see for fear that your great talent would make her put down her brush and never pick it up again.”
Russell opened his mouth in astonishment. “Do you not fear for your soul when you tell such lies?”
“Only a bit,” Amy said. Her head came up. “What have you done with her? So help me, if you threw one of your great rages and called her some name, I’ll put sand in your meat pies.”
When Russell said nothing, Amy looked at him hard. “You didn’t do anything, did you? Who did you tell her you were?”
He turned to the women standing at the side. “I want a basket packed. Fill it with the best. And put some perry in there.”
Amy walked around the table to him. “You didn’t tell her who you were, did you?”
“I had no chance to tell her,” he said. “She came to me with the idea that I was someone else. You told her that.”
He was glaring down at her in a way that intimidated most people, but Amy didn’t back away. “What did you tell her your name was?”
“I have many names,” he said, not looking at her but watching the women pack a basket full of food.
“What are you up to?” Amy asked.
Russell took the basket a woman handed him, then smiled down at Amy. “Do not worry about us. I am going to let her give me drawing lessons.” Turning, he walked toward the back door. “MacKenzie is my mother’s name,” he said over his shoulder.
Amy looked back at her kitchen staff. They were all standing still, doing nothing, but gazing at the place where Russell had been. She could practically see their hearts beating. “Work!” she said sharply as she clapped her hands twice. “Is that soup ready? Check that the oven isn’t too hot. Agnes, tuck your hair up. I don’t want any in the bread.”
Amy turned away from them so they wouldn’t see her smile. She knew that underneath his giant ego Russell was a good man. And she also knew that if she’d introduced Zoë and him as they actually were, they would have instantly taken a professional dislike to each other. Russell would have wanted to let her know that this was his commission and he wanted no competition. And Zoë would have been disdainful of his work even if it rivaled Michelangelo’s. All she’d wanted to do was to get them to spend a few hours together before the truth was told. She had a feeling that if they got to know each other, they’d become friends, maybe even very good friends.
Amy refused to let herself think about what would happen when they left in three short weeks, but she believed in taking love whenever and wherever it could be found.
So now Zoë and Russell were going off on a picnic with a box of art supplies. It couldn’t get more romantic than that.
She took the smile off her face before she turned back to the army of people working in the kitchen.
Fourteen
“It’s beautiful here,” Zoë said, her hand on a tree branch above her head, as she looked across the lake. Behind her MacKenzie was putting out the food on a cloth.
“Aye, it is,” he said, glancing at the lake, but his eyes were spending more time on her. “Come and eat and show me what you did while I was away.”
Turning, she smiled and went to sit on the cloth across from him. “What’s this?” she asked as she picked up what looked to be a pewter mug.
“Perry,” he said as he opened the art case. “Have you not had it before? It’s made from perry pears.”
