Shoving her down on a chair, he stalked to the large leather thronelike chair behind his vast mahogany desk. “You broke your promise,” he spat maliciously.

Blood gushed into her face, but she tried to put a smile on, a frown creasing her brow in confusion. “What in heaven’s name can you mean, darling? I’ve been busy with the cooking demonstrations, the contest. No time for breaking promises!” she tittered, not unlike a silly schoolgirl—a tactic she’d used to pacify her mother’s displeasure all those years before, equally as unsuccessfully.

    He ignored it, continuing crossly, “You promised me that you wouldn’t let your silly cooking demonstrations get in the way of my business.”

“Well, they don’t,” she said confidently, but inside her head, her mind reeled through the last few days. Had she missed something? Was there a dinner party that she’d failed to attend? Sir Strickland’s assistants always let her know when her presence was required, and she meticulously wrote them in her diary. It didn’t pay to forget these things. She wracked her brain. There must be something!

“Let me remind you,” he snarled, “that your presence was required at a lunch at the Ministry of Agriculture today.”

A flush of panic swept through her, at once hot and ice cold.

“There wasn’t anything in my appointment book.” She tried to keep her voice light, keep it from shaking. “Your assistants must have forgotten to let me know.”

Did I look at my appointment book before I said yes to the Middleton demonstration?

No, she wouldn’t have missed it. She checked her schedule every morning and evening, often more. Her husband was not forgiving at the best of times.

He leaned back in his chair, his fingers together in a point, like the steeple of a church. “Do you recall what it is that I do for a living?” There was a mean glint in his eyes.

Shaking, she began, “I’m so sorry, darling. There was nothing in my appointment book. I assumed you didn’t need me. I was at a demonstration in Middleton. It went jolly well.” She gave a little laugh, trying to lighten the sense of doom descending around her. “The Ministry of Food is so proud to have me doing their demonstrations. It’s so important that we keep on their good side, isn’t it, darling?”

There was a pause while Sir Strickland watched her squirm.

She wanted to run out, but she knew better than to try. It was safer to face the music, attempt to appease him.

    “Yes, your work is so utterly crucial,” he said sarcastically. “But wouldn’t you agree that my luncheons are far more important to the welfare of this household?”

“As I said, I’m so very sorry. Truly I am. I didn’t know that I was needed. All I do at these luncheons is talk about how wonderfully the war’s going when we all know that it isn’t. Your associates wouldn’t mind if I wasn’t there.”

“They are not me, though, are they?” He stood up and walked around the desk so that he was standing in front of her, his bulk menacing. “I’m going to be lenient, because I know how you can’t help making silly mistakes.”

“I know. I’ll try harder—”

“You’re not awfully clever, are you?” he said. “That’s the problem, really, isn’t it? I know I should have spent more time with you before we married. You were on your best behavior, pretending to be so resourceful, when you’re just as foolish as all the other silly women out there.”

She looked at the floor. If she argued with him, she would come out the worse. She had learned that the hard way.

“So, what should I do with you?” he asked, a seemingly innocent question.

But it wasn’t a question at all. It was a test.

And as if to back this up, he grabbed her blouse by the collar, scraping the side of her neck roughly with his fingernails.

“I’m so incredibly sorry,” she gasped, the heat of pain throbbing through her. As a girl, she had prided herself on never apologizing. These days it poured out of her mouth every day, fervently, as if in prayer. “I’m truly, truly sorry.”

“And?”

“It won’t happen again. I promise.”

“How can we be certain, though? How can we know that it won’t happen again?”

“Well, if you let me know in advance, then I can ensure I’ll be present at your luncheons, and—”

He released her blouse and turned back to the desk, beginning to calm down. “It won’t happen again if you give up your silly job, will it?”

    Something inside her seemed to turn brittle and crumble away, a tendon holding her heart together. Her shoulders caved in. “But it’s for the war effort,” she said feebly. How could she let him take away the one thing that was her own?

“Oh, you think that your work is more important than mine, do you?”

“No, no, of course not. That’s not what I meant. I only wanted to say that the demonstrations are crucial—”

“Oh, I think we both know why your cooking demonstrations are so crucial, don’t we? They’re crucial to Gwendoline to make her look important, aren’t they? You need them to show off to the village—to that ramshackle sister of yours, although why you think you need to compete with her I will never know.” He made a mock chortle. “Why she married that fool of an artist is beyond me.”

Lady Gwendoline felt her face fall. “They found his body, you know,” she said softly. “Matthew’s body and belongings.”

He made a derisive snort and looked down at the papers on his desk with impatience. “Of course he’d be the sorry type to get himself killed. And are we expected to honor him just because he died in battle?”

“There’s a memorial service for him tomorrow, in the village church.” Her shoulders became more upright, more certain.

He looked at her quizzically, a small laugh. “You’re not going to go, are you?”

“Well, I thought I should,” she said, half lost in thought. “She is my sister, after all, the only family member I have left.”

“Your family? Your family that despised you and cut you out of their will? You were always better off without them.”

She felt an odd shiver. That was her mother who did those things, not Audrey. True, Audrey hadn’t stood up for her when she was young, but she was a child herself. She wasn’t a bad person, was she?

Certainly not as bad as Lady Gwendoline’s husband when he was in a temper. His rages had increased since the war started, and the flowers and jewelry afterward had long since fallen by the wayside. She tried to ignore his rages, but they ate away at her sense of reason, her sense of who she was, deep inside.

    But more than that, they scared her. Her world had become one of treading on eggshells, following his rules, trying not to upset him. It was like she was trapped in a cage, taunted by a tyrant.

A small voice in her head whispered that the cage was of her own making.

He sneered. “I suppose now that you have no job, you might as well go to the memorial service. It’s important for us to keep up appearances.”

“Yes,” she said mechanically.

She watched as he settled himself back at his desk, flipping through a pile of papers. Half panicked by what he might do next, she stood up, awaiting his next tirade.

Then he looked up, mock surprise on his face that she was still there. “You’re dismissed,” he said as if she were a fool to wait for him to release her.

And she knew that she was.

In the hallway, once the study door was safely closed behind her, she stood, breathing slowly in an unusually measured pace. Normally she would race back to her reception room to plan for the day ahead, trying to keep busy so that she couldn’t hear the voices taunting her in her head.

But today she stood quite still, staring into the stream of sunlight beaming through the tall window into the long hall, the air static with tiny particles of swirling dust. Her job, the contest, even Chef James seemed to fade into the background as she realized with awful clarity that she couldn’t live with this any longer.

The Ministry of Food’s Sheep’s Head Roll

Serves 4 to 6

1 sheep’s head

Salted water

1 tablespoon vinegar ? teaspoon cinnamon 1 garlic clove, crushed 1 teaspoon chopped parsley 1 teaspoon chopped sage 1 teaspoon chopped thyme 1 teaspoon chopped chives ? teaspoon mixed dried herbs 2 pounds carrots, potatoes, rutabaga, or parsnip, diced 1 cup flour

? cup breadcrumbs Salt

Cover the sheep’s head with salted water and leave for 30 minutes. Drain and put the head in a large pot with cold water to cover. Bring to a boil to blanch it. Drain and wrap the head in a cloth to keep in the nutritious brains. Fill the large pot with fresh water, add the vinegar, cinnamon, garlic, herbs, and vegetables, then put in the head. Cover with a lid and simmer for 2 hours, or until the meat comes away from the head.