Her Master and Commander by Karen Hawkins

majority of the barn empty. Or it would have been empty had someone not placed barrels at regular intervals with meticulously cut boards laid across them, end to end. The effect was a huge, table-like structure that ran the entire length of the edifice.
    Reeves had turned the barn into a dining hall. Worse was the bustle of what seemed to be an army of liveried servants.
    “Bloody hell,” Tristan said. What could Reeves possibly hope to gain with such a ridiculous thing as a dining table large enough to fit thirty or forty persons?
    Stevens stiffened. “Cap’n, cock an eye starboard! ’Tis Toggle, the lazy shifter!”
    Sitting at a barrel, plate before him, napkin tucked under his chin, was a large man with a round, roly-poly face. He wore a dirty white shirt that stretched over his paunch, which was only partially hidden by a long coat that draped down past his knees. His ensemble was only slightly less nattered than he, for his graying hair was roughly chopped about his melon head, a good bit of it standing straight up in the back, sorely in need of a good brushing.
    His eyes widened when he saw Tristan and he stumbled to his feet, fork and knife still clutched in his fists, a shiny stain on his chin. “Cap’n! I didn’t think—I mean, what’re ye doin’ out here?”
    Tristan clasped his cane tighter, but Stevens interjected, “Toggle, ye fool. Just whose barn do ye think this is?”
    The former bo’sun’s mate looked around, his eyes wide. “It belongs to the cap’n, I’d think, seein’ as how ’tis in his own yard.”
    “It is the cap’n’s, ye ninny!” Stevens shouted, face red. “Now put down yer fork ’n stand to like a real sailor, or I’ll have ye keelhauled and whipped within a day of yer life!”
    “Master Stevens, sir! I—I—I was just—” Toggle realized he was gesturing with his fork and hurriedly returned it to the table. “I was just helpin’ Master Reeves test the cook’s new recipe fer—” He looked past Tristan and Stevens, a hopeful expression on his face. “Master Reeves, what’s this called again?”
    “Beef polonaise.” Reeves walked past Tristan and Stevens to the barrel. He lifted the cover on the dish in the center, a mouthwatering scent rising through the air. “My lord. Master Stevens. Perhaps you’d like to test the recipe as well. It’s a wonderful wine sauce mixed with—”
    “No, we would not.” Tristan glowered at the butler. “How many servants did you bring with you?”
    “Twenty-one, my lord. It will take that many to set up a new household, although had I known you already had such a retinue, I might have left one or two of the footmen behind.”
    “I did not give you permission to make a dining hall out of my stables.”
    “No, my lord. You did not. However, seeing as how you are now the earl of Rochester, it seemed only fitting—”
    “What?” Stevens gaped. “The cap’n is an earl?”
    Reeves nodded wisely. “Indeed. He has just become the seventh earl of Rochester. He stands to inherit a great fortune, as well.”
    Stevens stepped back a pace, hand to his heart. “An earl !”
    “Keep it down!” Tristan growled, glancing around, though only Toggle and Stevens were within hearing.
    Toggle tucked his napkin more securely beneath his chin. “Master Reeves has been telling me all about the cap’n’s good fortune and how he’s one o’ the top peers in the land and how he can have this sauce fer every meal if he wishes it and—”
    “That’s enough!” Tristan caught Toggle’s rather vapid gaze. “I don’t want anyone to know of this. Am I understood?”
    Toggle nodded obediently, his attention already drifting back to his plate. “I won’t tell no one, Cap’n. Not a soul. Jus’…may I finish me rations?”
    Bloody hell, was his entire crew to be won over by nothing more than a tasty sauce? What kind of men were they, anyway? “Reeves! I will not have this.”
    The butler raised his brows. “Not have what, my lord?