Fairly Unexpected

Chapter 1: Miss Fairchild Makes Some Cakes

The wind was off the sea now, blowing cool and salty, perfectly balancing out the heat of the sun. Maisie welcomed the fresh sea air and the warm sunshine on her skin. Naturally there would be a great hue and cry about the ruinous effects of sunlight on her face and the impropriety of allowing the wind to tug her hair loose. She had at least brought her bonnet with her, though it was not on her head.

Between the wind and the sun, Maisie's face was ever red in the cheeks and she was prone to freckles across the nose. To her great amusement, the ever-proper Miss Smithfield constantly offered up a legion of remedies for these dire conditions: buttermilk, lemon juice, cucumbers, some sort of vile-smelling lotion... and she declared loudly that by no means should Maisie ever go out of doors without her head covered. Miss Smithfield meant well, but she had much more experience with young ladies of the beau monde than with castoffs such as Maisie and her sisters. The poor woman had some notion that if she supplied the Fairchildren with all her knowledge of deportment, etiquette, and elocution that they would each one day make a brilliant match.

Maisie left off walking by the shore and made her way up to the Saint Giles Inn. She spent much of her free time there chatting with her school friend Elizabeth Weeks who worked there now as a cook. No one in Saint Giles had tasted anything like the airy concoctions Elizabeth dreamed up. She was widely purported to make the finest, airiest pastries anywhere in Saint Giles or even nearby Liddington, which boasted several bakeries with chefs who had trained in France. It was no wonder Elizabeth had been promoted up from cooks assistant to focus mainly on the sweet cakes and pastries that brought in customers from miles around.

As Maisie entered the Inn, she was not surprised to find her friend in a flurry of activity, seeming to do twelve things at once. Mixing bowls, wooden spoons, baskets of eggs and a bowl of butter danced around the periphery of the kitchen. Elizabeth's round face was framed with unruly chestnut curls that were perpetually dusted with flour.

"Well, grab an apron, then," Maisie's friend greeted her with a wave of a rolling pin. "I thought we'd start with something simple, so we'll be making royal cakes." Elizabeth proceeded to direct Maisie on the selection and measurement of various ingredients: one pound of butter, one pound of sugar, one pound of flour, eight eggs, half a pound of currants, and small quantities of nutmeg, mace, and cinnamon.

It was no trouble at all mixing the butter with the sugar, but Maisie was completely overwhelmed by the task of dealing with the eggs. She'd never separated the yolks from the whites before, which Elizabeth thought should be quite a simple task. After the third failed attempt in which bits of yolk and eggshell found their way into the bowl meant for whites alone, Elizabeth cracked and separated all the eggs herself. Maisie was astonished how neatly her friend accomplished this without getting egg all over her fingers.

"Now is when it comes quite handy to have two cooks... I usually grab one of the younger Meadows girls, but we'll do this ourselves today." She produced two wire whisks and handed the bowl of whites to Maisie. "Beat that as quickly as you can to force quite a lot of air into the whites, but save your strength because you'll need to carry on like this for thirty minutes." Elizabeth took the bowl of yolks and did the same thing with her whisk.

"Now that we've nothing to do but thrash the eggs, you must answer my impudent questions. Tell me, Miss Maisie Fairchild, what grand plans do you have for your life? And answer true," Elizabeth scolded, as she deftly whisked her bowl of eggs without needing to glance at her work.

"Well," Maisie reflected. "As you already know, the wealthy girls from school have found husbands—for the most part. The scholarship girls have secured positions as governesses, paid companions or found some other suitable occupation..."