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Page 233
a week earlier, so she didn't give him a chance to answer. "How about carrying some stuff to the kitchen for me?" She smiled sweetly at Will Shepherd, who blushed as he rose among the guffaws and jeers of his fellows. Their voices soon stilled as she recruited more of them.
Soldiers bussed dishes. Others dried pots and baking dishes or washed the tops of the tables. They were directed by a muttering René and teased into doing more by a playful Holly. Even Maitland, his sharp features more pinched than usual, pitched in amid the catcalls of his troops when Mariah shamed him into it.
When they were done, Mariah led them all back into the common room, where Thorn stood with Ainsley at the bar.
Holly followed. "What're you up to?" she demanded softly. "You've got Frenchie fit to be tied that all those men stormed his kitchen in such a manner. And now you've got 'em all lined up like for a Christmas wassail line, you do."
"I . . . I'll explain later." But Mariah doubted she could do that. Though she'd found Holly a dear, patient friend, how could she burden her with the secret that would make Mariah seem like a crackpot? "Now," she said, "it's time to thank our guests." She insisted that Thorn shake each man's hand. Though there were a couple of scornful glances and an occasional grip that looked as limp as wilted lettuce, each man complied.
Except Will Shepherd.
He hung back, and then, when he was almost the last man left, he said, "Pardon me, Miss Walker, but my stomach is churning something fierce. Nothing against your supper, of course, but the smell in here has made me ill. I need to use the necessary."
Maitland's narrow lips curved into an evil grin. The flaring of Ainsley's nostrils was all the more evident because of the way his thick nose turned up at the end, but the fire in his eyes seemed directed more at Mariah than toward the defiant soldier.
Mariah felt as though someone had rammed her in the gut with one of the logs Thorn was using to build the palisade. Instead of helping, of causing the two men to shake hands

 
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