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The rather loud roar of a vacuum cleaner outside her bedroo sound was one she found iuest room where she&039;d spent a very restless day and silently cursed Lucian for assigning her this job So far, she hadn&039;t eneau off the night before, she&039;d spent several e for what lay ahead, then had marched back into the house determined to start at once
However, before she could ask any questions of the ht be either her life reeted her with a quiet "My room is the master bedroouest rooo check on Bessy and her calf and attend to a few chores I&039;ll see you when you get up toht"
Armand had then slipped past her and out of the house before she could even murmur a quiet thank-you Eshe had stared after hi the situation rather anticlimactic after her h, collected her bag, and gone above stairs to check out the guest rooms Each of them was nice, but Eshe&039;s favorite had been the rose-colored roo on the bed and then gone to poke through Ar hadn&039;t turned up anything of use There hadn&039;t been any handy-dandy little diary with a written confession of terrible deeds, or bloody weapons that ht have been used to behead past wives In fact, there hadn&039;t even been pictures or portraits of his wives or from the past The room had held a bed, a chair by the fire, a bookshelf full of books both old and new, and a closet full of clothes The en suite bathroom hadn&039;t been anyno more about the man than what brand of aftershave and toothpaste he used
Eshe had wandered the house after that, noting the absence of knickknacks and memorabilia It see of his past life or wives in the house Only the office held anything that told her theout in the open As with the rest of the rooms in the house, this one had no visible photos or portraits that suggested there was anyone in the world he cared for, but after picking the lock on the large bottom drawer of his desk, she&039;d found a collection of photo albums and a box that held miniature portraits The portraits had been older, fros of three women she presumed were his life nized both Nicholas and Thouessed that the daughter was Jeanne Louise, his daughter by his last wife, Rosaes, one had held pictures of his eldest son, Nicholas, and his wife, Annie, both looking happy at various functions, their wedding, on picnics, and so on Then there had been an albu to Inez in Portugal The last albu her froraduation from the university, and then at various family functions
Eshe had found that discovery so She had been told that Armand had cut all ties with his children and the rest of the fao and had never even seen his daughter, Jeanne Louise, since dropping her on his sister-in-law Marguerite&039;s doorstep after the death of the girl&039;s ested, however, that while he hadn&039;t seen her in person, he&039;d been keeping up with her life and what she was doing, and he did care about the girl The fact that he&039;d hidden those albums away, however, was rather curious The man lived alone There was no reason she could think of to hide the the matter, Eshe had locked the albums away back safely in their drawer, and then slid out of the room to await Armand&039;s return, her mind full of questions She&039;d waited for hi his living rooer until she couldn&039;t stand it anyone out in search of him She&039;d found the barn that held his dairy cows, a couple of pigs and goats, but he hadn&039;t been there She&039;d then gone through the other barns searching a good-sized one that held horses, and a henhouse full of sleeping chickens that had started stirring before she determined he wasn&039;t there and closed the door on the incredible stench co from inside, and then she&039;d checked the last barn to find it held a tractor, a riding laer, and various other fariven up after that and an to crest the horizon Tired, she&039;d sought out her roo she would start fresh in the evening However, tired as she&039;d been, sleep had not been easy to claim or keep It was bloody noisy in the country She often heard people comment on how noisy the city was and how blissfully quiet the country was in comparison, but she would have a couple of choice words on the subject in future They were full of crap Her apartment in the city was soundproofed, her sleep never disturbed by the sounds of traffic or city life The same wasn&039;t true out here While there wasn&039;t azillion other sounds instead; the deep thru of birds, the chirps of cricketsShe&039;d had the devil of a ti there
And now there was that dalowered at the door as the sound grew louder, suggesting it hadn&039;t been right outside her room at first but noas
The country definitely was not a quiet place, Eshe decided griainst the base of the door several ti deep in her throat, she threw the blankets and sheets aside and slid out of bed to stoeon, and all wound up to blast Arht up short when she dragged the door open and found a round little ain with the head of a vacuu just short of running the vacuum over Eshe&039;s bare feet when they appeared in place of the door "I&039;m sorry! Did I wake you?"
Eshe stared at the woman rather blankly as she quickly shut off the vacuu over what seemed obvious to Eshe was a perfectly clean carpet The vacuu hadn&039;t been necessary The wouest," she read from her mind It see iave in to the urge to bring that about herselfwith the vacuulad she had, Eshe read frouest was quite a looker, and she couldn&039;t wait to tell the girls at the beauty parlor when she went in for her weekly wash and rinse Oh, the girls would all be aflutter when they heard the elusive bachelor Areneau had hi bells in the future
Sighing, Eshe stopped focusing on the woer expression, only then beco her rie T-shirt she&039;d brought to sleep in While it covered everything that was important, it wasn&039;t exactly how she would have chosen to be dressed to meet the housekeeper
"I aning regret "Mr Argeneau did say you got in late last night and would probably sleep the day away I guess I just wasn&039;t thinking when I started to vacuued not to snort at the words, but forced a sht, I-Did you say Armand spoke to you? He&039;s already up and about then?"
"Oh ot here, which is unusual for hi to leave so unexpectedly to tend to family matters, he had to see to the animals himself today Poorthe far his daily article for the newspaper ear hi his daily article for the newspaper?" Eshe asked with a start Lucian hadn&039;t mentioned that to her He&039;d only said Armand was a farmer
"Yes, dear" The woman beamed as proudly as if she were his mother "Didn&039;t you know? He&039;s our own little celebrity in town He writes a daily interest article Everyone just loves it I gather writing runs in the family He has a nepherites novels, you know, but Ars for his little daily article and can&039;t i a book, but he&039;s a fine writer," she assured her, and then said aletically, "Mind you, he&039;s a bit eccentric, writing at night and sleeping during the day, and really, froh to keep a bird fed, but then Doris tells me most writers are a little different than the rest of us, and she would know She did read that book on the life of Heway? It may have been someone else," she admitted with a frown, and then waved that away and said, "I can&039;t remember now but I do recall he was a hell-raiser whoever she read about Why, he was into drugs, and sex, andWell, fortunately, our young Armand doesn&039;t do any of that" She frowned at her oords and then said quickly, "Well, the drugs at least I&039;h ere all starting to wonder since he never has ladies around or invites any of the local girls out or anything Doris is positive he&039;s gay and has a &039;friend&039; in the city that he sneaks off to visit, but now I can tell her about you and she&039;ll just have to shut up about that," she announced with satisfaction
"Yes," Eshe said a bit faintly, aed to babble all that without pausing for breath Dear Lord
"Well now, I&039;ll just put this away," the woht beside Eshe&039;s bedrooo down and see about getting you so for breakfast Why, you must be starved You missed breakfast and it&039;s well past lunch I&039;ll fix you so nice and we can chat while you eat"
Eshe watched wide-eyed as the little woman bustled off and then shook her head and closed the door to begin getting dressed as the woet back to sleep anyway, and if Aret in soht She intended to get him to talk today about his wives and how they&039;d died Lucian had merely told her their deaths all appeared to be accidents, but hadn&039;t explained what kind of accidents, and it seeure a way to slide such questions into a conversation without raising Armand&039;s suspicions about the real reason she was there No probleht dryly as she pulled on her leather pants froht before
Eshe had her pants only half on when the realization sank in that Aro make her some breakfast She didn&039;t eat, but that wasn&039;t what made her freeze with her pants still only half on It was the fact thatin the refrigerator A refrigerator she distinctly recalled stacking bags of blood in last night
Cursing, Eshe yanked her pants the rest of the way up and hurried for the door without even bothering to do theet to the woman before she saw the blood, Eshe practically flew up the hall and then down the stairs and up the hall to the kitchen She arrived in the kitchen door to find Arerator and poking around inside Eshe was about to take control of the wohtened and stepped away to set a carton of eggs and so a clear view of the open refrigerator and the food stacked inside There was no blood
"Oh ry, dear, to rush down here like that," the housekeeper said, drawing Eshe&039;s gaze away fro at her widely frooodness, you didn&039;t even brush your hair Well, sit yourself at the table and I&039;ll fetch you a coffee and sos and bacon cooked for you"
"Eggs and bacon?" Esheit to soet a better look inside Nope There was no blood in there at all
"I can understand your surprise," the housekeeper said with a laugh as she buerator door closed with her hip on her way past to retrieve a loaf of bread froerator last night you must have been horrified at how little there was in there As I said, Mr Argeneau doesn&039;t eat enough to keep a bird fed, but when he told uest, I hopped in the car and ran over to the ossip to everyone about a woman in the house, Eshe read from her mind ry amusement
"Oh my, I&039;ve just realized I didn&039;t introduce myself," the woman said with vexation as she dropped a couple of slices of bread in the toaster She pushed the button down to begin the toasting and then turned to hold her hand out toward Eshe "I&039;m Mrs Ramsey, dear Enid Ra her hand briefly and wondering where the blood had gotten to
"D&039;Aureus," Mrs Ra name What does it mean?"
"Gold," Eshe answered autoold They even seeht Very pretty, dear Striking"
"Thank you," Eshe murmured, and turned to make her way to the table as an excuse to keep her fro or hard Like those of all iht for better night vision It ht olden eyes and so had been called Castor the Gold when he&039;d fled Atlantis with the others He&039;d passed those eyes on to his children, though most of them had dark flecks in the to distract Mrs Raht her mind as she settled at the table, and then asked the first question she could co have you worked for Armand?"
"About five years now," Mrs Ra a coffee cup fro coffeepot beside the refrigerator As she waited for the last of the coffee to run through the drip filter, she offered, "That&039;s when he inherited the farm from his uncle It was nice when he did His uncle was never out here He had a er run it while he lived in the city and took in the profits It&039;stheh she knew that everything the woman had said was simply a cover story for Armand He actually owned several far the to another before his neighbors noticed that he wasn&039;t aging Each time he moved, the cover story was that he had inherited the farm he took over, but there was no uncle for hiiven to the old far Perhaps he let the to the city and leaving aood aboutdays if I have an appointment on a day I&039;m supposed to come in I only come out to the house on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, you see"
Eshe
"I do worry about hi the farood for him, really He works very hard, rarely leaves the farm, and has no social life to speak of I worry he&039;ll just stay out here and grow old on the far had the experience of a wife and children" Mrs Rah as she poured the now-finished coffee into the cup She perked up, though, as she added, "Still, he&039;s young, and now you&039;re herehio at the church on Wednesday nights, and the diner serves a good meal All the locals meet there And now that the harvest is over, there are a couple of fall fairs co hi to interact with him more"
"I&039;ll see what I can do," Eshe said as the woman crossed the room to set a coffee cup before her
"Good" Mrs Ra pan as well as the bacon and eggs to start cooking Eshe watched her for a moment, unsure whether she should tell her not to cook for her or not She certainly wasn&039;t going to eat the food On the other hand, the wo frohts, Eshe suspected Mrs Ramsey would be disappointed if she didn&039;t let her do it She could always du, Eshe decided Besides, Mrs Ra useful she could learn from her
"So, Armand doesn&039;t have any co forward to sniff at the black liquid stea scent, a bit bitter perhaps, but arones and John Maunsell They have a farather they&039;re his sister-in-law and brother-in-law," Mrs Raue "HeHe was already hen he moved here and can&039;t be more than twenty-six or -seven At least he doesn&039;t look any older than that"
Eshe aze on the food Mrs Raly delicious as it cooked
"Oh, there&039;s your toast" Mrs Ramsey bustled over to the toaster as the toasted bread popped into view She quickly shifted the slices to a srabbed a couple of jars of what appeared to be preserves and brought them to Eshe "Here you are, dear You start on that while I finish up your bacon and eggs"
"Thank you," Eshe s
"That one is marmalade, and this is strawberry ja the jars toward her "I eneau Though, truth to tell, I don&039;t think he has even tried the theing him more, but then I found a whole box full of theh, shook her head, and bustled back to the stove "You give theh, and see what you think Everyone else raves about the expectantly and reluctantly opened the jar of orange an to spread some on her toast She could have just controlled the woman and made her think she&039;d tried it, but was actually a little curious to see what it tasted like Eshe hadn&039;t been curious about food in a couple of centuries now, but decided not to think about that and what her sudden interest ht mean She had other nes and John over?" she asked as she replaced the lid on the nes is a sweet little thing, but I just haven&039;t found ed and then gestured toward Eshe&039;s as yet untried toast with the fork she&039;d been using to turn the bacon and said, "Give it a try, then, and tell me what you think"
Eshe picked up the slice of toast she&039;d spread marmalade on and took a bite, surprised at the burst of flavor that hit her tongue
"It is really very good," she told the woman honestly
Mrs Ramsey flushed with pleasure at the compliment and chuckled "You sound surprised Does it look to you like I ure
Eshe smiled faintly, and took another bite of the toast before asking, "Does Armand ever talk about his wives?"