The Tenth Gift Read Online Free Page B

Tregenna had been cursed by spriggans, for since the birth of Catherine there had been no other children; Cat herself suspected there had been little love lost between her parents. Margaret Harris had offered them both positions at the house, but Jane Tregenna regarded herself as far too much a lady to be a servant again. Instead, she had taken herself off to her brother Edward’s well-appointed home in Penzance, leaving Catherine to be taken under the Mistress of Kenegie’s wing, whereby she was generously offered not only the income of a bodyservant, but more education and encouragement than any girl of her upbringing had ever been bred for. Cat knew her mother harbored wild ambitions for her; she probably had her eye on one of the Harris boys. If she lost her position at the manor, she knew she would never hear the last of Jane Tregenna’s bitter tongue.
    “My pardon, ma’am. I had not meant to give offense. Matty … I heard a disturbance below and was concerned that there might be intruders.”
    “Going half-naked downstairs to investigate does not seem to me the wisest course of action. Had there been ruffians down there, you would have endangered yourself and placed me, as your guardian, in a most difficult position. Do you understand that?”
    Cat nodded slowly. “But my lady, I was not ‘half-naked’ I held a shawl over my shift to guard my modesty, I swear.”
    The Mistress of Kenegie smiled. “And would that have been your best shawl, Catherine, bearing the crewel roses?”
    Cat had the grace to blush. “It was.”
    Margaret Harris appraised the girl silently. Cat was nineteen now and comely, even though her hair was that unfortunate golden-red. Her mother, Jane Tregenna, was small and dark, worn out by life’s disappointments; her dead husband had been a crabbed, brown-haired man with the small, close features of the Lizard villages (where it was well known they had gone on all fours till the crew of a foreign vessel wrecked on the coast had settled among them and improved their stature and physical development). An unlikely marriage that had been, and one that hinted at compromises made under pressure: Jane was a Coode, a proper old Cornish family—reputable, deep-rooted, well-respected. The Tregennas were farmers from Veryan and Tregeare; John had been a third son without even a land-living to fall back on, which was why he had signed himself up as a militiaman. Not the best prospect for a pretty girl from a decent family, and certainly there was no clue in that parentage to the provenance of Catherine’s fox-red hair and long, straight limbs. Nineteen was a dangerous age: The girl herself should be married, and soon. She had seen how her sons William and Thomas watched Catherine as she moved around the house.
    “You saw your cousin this morning?”
    Cat frowned. “Yes, madam.”
    Margaret Harris smoothed her skirt. “He is a good worker, Robert. Sir Arthur has often said as much. It would not surprise me if he were to offer him the position of steward when George Parsons retires.” She watched the girl’s face for a reaction. “Of course, hewould be more likely to progress thus were he settled, with a family,” she pressed.
    “Oh, Robert has a great many family hereabouts,” Cat said airily. “There are Bolithos and Johns in every hamlet and farmstead from Gulval and Badger’s Cross to Alverton and Paul. Hell never leave the area: He has not that type of ambition.”
    “That’s not quite what I meant,” the lady said quietly. “He is a gentle and an able young man—not to put too fine a point on it, quite a catch for a country lass.” She fixed Cat with her lucent gray eyes until her meaning came clear.
    “Oh.” Cat stared at the patterned rug that stretched between them—the Turkey rug, her mistress called it. It was brightly woven with gorgeously dyed motifs in cream and crimson and umber, and it glowed like a living thing among the dull earth hues of the rest of the room: the