Interview with a ferret and a Miranda Sings award

Tags

A Miranda Sings award, Etopia Press, London Jewel thieves, Regency, Sally G Cronin, Shehanne Moore, Splendor, The Starkadder Sisterhood

 

AWARD: The Miranda Sings Award – A chance to say I Love Me! https://smorgasbordinvitation.wordpress.com/2017/09/24/award-the-miranda-sings-award-a-chance-to-say-i-love-me/

Here are the rules of the award...

• Announce your win with a post, and link the blogger who nominated you.
• Include the featured image on your blog post.
• Nominate 10 bloggers (or as many as you can think of) and link your awardees in the post.
• List 7 things you love about yourself. (This can be about your appearance, your personality, your achievements, etc.)

Rules

Don’t use negative connotation (i.e. Don’t say things like – “I’m prettier than an average person.” or “People have told me I’m smart.” You are pretty. You are smart.)

 

Mrs Ferret:    Beggin’ your pardon your  furryship creatures an’ meanin’ to give no affront. or that, but I thought it was seven things about me?

 

Mrs Ferret  : Well, I must say, again meanin’ no disrespect,  it’s not whot was agreed.

Mrs Ferret     :  You won’t be doin’ no Cossack dance, nor drinkin’ no vodka here.  Beggin’ your pardons and meanin’ no affront or that, not unless you wants ter meet with me broom handle and be swept out into the doostbin you won’t.  And you won’t be bullyin’ me like you did that artist hero of Shehanne’s whot came here and never got a word in yet. Now then . Three things about me that I like.

1. Well, contrary to the many words what are spoke about me 

I’m secretly very soft hearted, soft-hearted as any can be whot has been left ter fend for themselves in a bitter,  hard, cruel world, one step away from the workhouse at sixteen with a sister and young brothers ter support. You can ask Splendor herself about me soft heart.  But I got a good nose for sniffin’ out whot people are inside. I can always recognise another servant and I will look out for them. I just won’t be taken a loan of is all. But if I see someone needin’ a helpin’ hand, well, I think I can be counted on.

2  I love that I like people, people whot are interesting. Them that might have secrets. But I aon’t no gossip.  The things I could have told Stillmore about his ‘wife’ and her friend–cos, meanin’ no affront but I reads the newspapers and I knows about that Sisterhood lot. But I never. As for the goings on of him at Catterton whenever he deigned to visit …..

  I was discreet. As for me figuring out they wasn’t really married, he must have thought I stitched up the back of me mob cap.

3 I know I may only be a servant but I am very good at me job, unlike some I could name whot drinks on the job, I see everything runs like clockwork whotever house I am in, Catterton,

or His Grace’s place in London.  That’s because I take pride in knowing whot people want. Of course, meanin’ no affront and provided anyone would have had me. it would have been nice to have had me family roundabout me and a man to love me, but families require keepin’ and it really isn’t easy for women of my social class that way, as I found out when my husband left me. 

Thank you very much for letting me come by and get  a word in.

 I am going to give  you with the names of some bloggers. It would be more but Sallly has already bestowed the award on many whot come here and might like doing this kind of thing. Not everyone accepts awards. Though if YOU would like doing this, please do feel free. Meaning no disrespect but that you’re not here is probably on account of Shehanne not having time to look all the links up.

.

Catherine Cavendish http://t.co/NekQqtJiEc

Purva Narang.  https://t.co/WUn4iLM0b3

Jean Lee  –

Explore Jean Lee’s World

Sarah Potter http://sarahpotterwrites.wordpress.com/

Annika Perry http://annikaperry.wordpress.com/

Leslie Noyez http://www.nananoyz5forme.com/

Aquileana  http://aquileana.wordpress.com/

Christy Birmingham https://whenwomeninspire.com/

Extract…Mrs Ferret first raises her lovely head  

“This is Mrs. Ferret.”

So Splendor’s death hadn’t happened. Instead, the front door had swung open, because there weren’t any rugs on the flagstone floor to stop it. Splendor thought that was why the door didn’t just swing open, it almost removed itself from its hinges and careered across said floor. Before she was anywhere near it, which was not always the case. Penetrating cold blew out, not in. The sun hadn’t just gone behind a cloud on a nice day, Arctic winter had followed.

Ferret was an unfortunate name. The woman herself had the appearance of having dropped a guinea and found a farthing. Some people were so devoid of the desire to better themselves that they dressed in pinched black to match their expressions. Splendor’s desire was to show his majesty how unfazed she was by this rapid and unprovoked downturn in events. London and Babs Langley. She fixed a smile on her face. Her best.

“You will pardon me, Your Grace, openin’ door in advance of you ringin’.” Mrs. Ferret ignored the smile and her. “But Bates told me you was here. And had brought company. Young ladies.”

Was it a crime to be one? Splendor had never thought so before. But the look Mrs. Ferret failed to cast her said her education was sadly lacking that way.

“Yes.” Stillmore strode over the stone threshold into the pale white hall. “My wife and her friend.”

“Wife? Wife?” Mrs. Ferret’s voice rose. “Mr. Bates never said nothing about no wife.”

Stillmore stared at the ceiling. “Perhaps because he’s not married to her. Well. It happened, whether Bates said so or not. If I say she is, it should be good enough.”

Splendor swung her gaze around. “You mean, you take my getting out that cart as assent—?”

“Oh, sir, I never meant…” Mrs. Ferret interrupted. “Oh bless me no. I mean, I wouldn’t, bein’ mindful of me position here’n all, dream of offerin’ an affront. Excuse me, Your Grace.”

Mrs. Ferret touched a feeble hand to her breast, as if she wouldn’t take issue with him arriving on the doorstep with a two-headed hamster and saying he’d married it.

“Will I just show her downstairs, same as usual, Your Grace?”

“I will do that. Thank you.”

As usual? Splendor turned her gaze back, swallowed the hot tide that rose. Thank God in some ways. Remove this old bat from the equation and Catterton House might have her otherwise. From the outside it looked like a two-roomed cottage with a tower that stood like a sentinel. Inside though, it was a completely different fish. A whitewashed palace, with steps leading down to other levels that were set into the steeply dropping cliffside. It would be private here. The kind of place Topaz would be safe. The kind of place they could both hide.

Not if it was home to his women. Not when she’d thought London.

“But, of course, Your Lordship Grace.” Mrs. Ferret curtseyed so low it was a miracle she didn’t keel over on the flagstone floor. “And what about the other…lady, sir? Will she just be left sitting out there in the cart, while you…you know?”

“Yes. No. I… I mean…” Splendor burst out before she could stop herself.

“Not at all,” Stillmore said. “She will be coming in here. But would you have a problem with that, Mrs. Ferret?”

“No, Your Grace. All I were doing was asking.”

“Well, don’t.”

“Fine then I won’t. I’ll just go tell Bates to start peeling the vegetables for lunch. A light one will it be, Your Grace? Or do your guests require stuffing?”

---

The only thing he hates more than losing at chess is marriage…

 For Splendor, former servant to the London’s premiere jewel thieves, the Starkadder Sisterhoiod, pretending to be someone else is all in a day’s work. So when she learns of a chess tournament—a men’s chess tournament—with a ten thousand pound prize, pretending to be a man is the obvious move. The money will be enough to set her fiancé up in his own business so they can finally marry, and more importantly, it’ll pay off her bills and keep her out of debtor’s prison. But she doesn’t plan on her opponent, the rakish Kendall Winterborne, Earl Stillmore, being a sore loser—and a drunken one, at that. But before she can collect her prize, she finds herself facing the most merciless man in London across a pair of dueling pistols at dawn. Chess may be Splendor’s game, but she’s never fired a pistol. And dressed as a man with ill-fitting shoes on the slippery grass and borrowed glasses that make it hard to see, she’s certain she’s finally tipped her own king.

 Bitter divorcee Kendall Winterborne, Earl Stillmore, is the ton’s most ruthless heartbreaker. And he’s got three pet peeves: kitchen maids, marriage…and losing. So when he realizes the “man” opposite him has entered the chess tournament under false pretenses, he’s in the perfect position to extort the little chit. But that’s before the exasperating woman begins to slip beneath his skin, and soon all he can think about is slipping beneath her skirts. But the confounded woman is engaged to someone else, and worse—she’s nothing but a former kitchen maid, just like the one that lured his father into the marriage that ruined the family name. And his ex-wife taught him more than he cared to know about why marriage was the worst kind of checkmate of all…