Return to Summerhouse (The Summerhouse 2)

As Zoë followed Amy into the house, they went down some stone stairs, then Amy seemed to vanish into thin air. Zoë felt frantic as she tried to find her, wandering from one stone room to another, and getting in the way of more oddly dressed men and women.

After about thirty minutes, she found a kitchen that was so busy it looked like a food processing plant—old and without electricity, but still it was a place that could deal with enormous quantities of food. There were half a dozen women in long dresses, their hair covered by white caps, rushing around everywhere. A huge, old, scarred table stood in the middle of the room and it was loaded with baskets full of vegetables, big bowls of berries, and dishes of cooked food.

In the middle of this was Amy and she was quietly, but firmly, telling everyone what to do and answering their many questions.

Zoë moved to stand beside her. “What are you doing?”

“Running this place,” Amy said. “It’s a twenty-four-hour restaurant. Thinner,” she said to a woman rolling out some dough on a marble slab. “It has to be thinner than that. Leave it that thick and it’ll break a person’s teeth.”

When Amy moved to another part of the room, Zoë went with her. “How do you know all this? You came here when we did. That means you’ve been here, what? Ten minutes?”

“I don’t understand it any more than you do,” Amy said, “but I think I’ve been here since he bought me from my father.”

When Zoë looked at her blankly, Amy said, “In my dream. Remember?”

“But wasn’t that just a few days ago?”

“In our time, yes, but I know I’ve been here for over a year. Put it in there!” she yelled at a young man with a lamb carcass over his shoulder. “So help me, Jimmy, if you drip blood over my clean floor I’ll make you clean it up!”

Amy looked back at Zoë. “I really can’t explain it, but I know this place as well as I know my own house.”

“What about the master?” Zoë asked, eyebrows arched.

Amy gave Zoë a look that made her stop smiling. “Wherever I live, I’m married to Stephen and I don’t take my vows lightly. Why don’t you go find something to do? I’m putting you and Faith in the yellow bedroom for tonight, and we can talk at supper. Until then, please find something to occupy yourself. I have masses of work to do.” With that, she ran after a young woman who was entering with a basketful of eggs.

Zoë stared at Amy’s back for a moment and thought of half a dozen scathing things to say

. If she didn’t want her and Faith to bother her while she worked, why the hell had Amy wanted them with her? It made no sense.

“Pardon, miss,” said a young man with another dripping carcass over his shoulder.

“Yuck,” Zoë said as she got out of his way. She had to move for a woman who was hurrying to the other side of the kitchen. Where was Faith? Zoë wondered. She must have run off as soon as they stepped out of the barn.

Zoë again moved out of the way of someone. Was she the only one who thought it was odd—not to mention impossible—to find herself back in time? Amy sure didn’t seem to think it was strange to one minute be in a world with computers and automobiles, and the next minute to be yelling at people carrying dead animals across their shoulders.

When Zoë had to move yet again, she found herself near a staircase and went up it. At the top was a small hallway with several built-in cabinets. She looked around, saw no one, and opened a cabinet door. It was full of serving pieces, trays, and big platters.

When she heard a noise, she quickly closed the door and moved back. She could hear voices but they seemed a long way off. She feared that if she saw anyone, she might be ordered off the place. If Amy was just the housekeeper, what authority did she have? She couldn’t order the owner to let her friends stay, could she?

Zoë walked quietly through the nearest doorway. She found herself in a dining room, a large area with a huge cherrywood table in the center. In the twenty-first century the table would be an antique, but here it looked brand-new. The chairs—all eighteen of them—were also new and the upholstery unworn.

Her artist’s eye saw the sheer beauty of the room. Along one wall were huge windows that let in the sunlight. The ceiling was decorated with great ovals of plasterwork, truly beautiful. The furniture along the walls was new and looked to be made by the same person who had made the dining table and chairs. There were porcelain ornaments on the two sideboards.

Zoë was no historian and knew little about antiques, but she was sure she was looking at the finest that money could buy in the eighteenth century.

“Do you like it?” came a male voice, and she turned to see a tall man, dressed all in black except for his white shirt, standing in the doorway. She knew who he was since she’d drawn him several times. He looked like the picture of Nathaniel Hawthorne that Faith had found in one of Jeanne’s books. In other words, he was divinely handsome.

More important, he had a manner about him that let her know he owned the house. If this man were wearing rags, he’d still be in command.

Zoë found that she was completely tongue-tied as she looked at him. Between his beauty and the fact that she was a stranger snooping in his house, she didn’t know what to expect. When did they do away with drawing and quartering as a punishment for crimes?

He walked across the room to stand beside her. “This furniture is modern and some people do not like it, but I do.”

When Zoë still didn’t speak, he went on. “My mother always said that a true aristocrat sits on gold, but I never liked gold furniture. What do you think?”

“No gold,” Zoë managed to say, then got hold of herself. “I didn’t mean to trespass, but—”

“I am used to Amy’s strays,” he said, smiling and looking even more handsome. “She is going to bankrupt me.” His words would have been offensive from someone else since they were referring to her, but from him, somehow, they put her at ease.