Barbara Metzger (11 page)

* * *

His Grace was also listening to the midnight church bells, watching the first snowflakes, and thinking of Tony Warrington’s twins.

After the carolers left, young Prudence hanging on her Irishman’s arm, and castaway, too, if he didn’t miss his guess, Milsom had brought up a new bowl of wassail. Then the servants gathered in the Great Hall for the lighting of the Yule log. At the first tolling of the bells, His Grace had lit the enormous ash log in one of the huge fireplaces, using a bit of last year’s wood. He hadn’t the slightest idea if it was last year’s wood or yesterday’s, actually. Hell, he’d been at some dull house party or other last year, and the year before that, but Milsom would have carried on. He always did.

The butler had handed over the burning ash splinter, then toasted the House of Ware when the new fire caught. The servants lifted their glasses of wassail and said, “Here, here.” If the log burned till Twelfth Night, tradition went, Ware’s house would prosper.

How the bloody hell could it prosper if the butler had to light the fire and the servants make the toasts? There was supposed to be family and friends assembled, not paid retainers and one crotchety old cardsharp who needed two footmen to hold her up after an evening at the punch bowl. And he, Leland Warrington, the Duke of Ware, was supposed to pass that burning ember to his son, blast it! Damn his past wives!

Chapter Eleven

The stars, the sleds, the storybooks—nothing compared to the snow! In all of her thinking what fun the children could have with their new sleds, Graceanne had forgotten that the boys had never seen snow. There was nothing to do but to push the presents to the side, bundle the twins in their warmest clothes, and let them loose outside.

Oh, the wonder of it! Oh, the wetness of it! Thank goodness for the new mittens and caps and mufflers, for Les and Willy needed three sets of dry clothing, once before breakfast, once after, then again before church. Graceanne didn’t mind, hearing their laughter.

They danced in the snow, rolled in it, tasted it, tossed it. Heaven and the stained glass windows be praised, the boys were too young for hard and heavy snowballs, but they did manage a lopsided snowman with Graceanne to lift the head on. She did not dress the snowman in her old black hat, as Cousin Leland had suggested, not when every Christmas-morning worshipper could look out the church windows and recognize it. And not when she needed it for mornings like this, rather than ruin her new satin bonnet with such child’s play. Instead, she fashioned a merry wreath of holly and ivy for a crown, and cut up some of the foil stars for eyes and a nose. With a big red bow around his neck, the snowman looked as happy as she felt, even in her old black gown.

Breakfast in the nursery was a hurried affair because she’d promised to teach the boys how to make snow angels as soon as they were fed and dry again, and because their noisy excitement couldn’t be restrained in the still-sleeping house.

Outside again, Graceanne found there was no way she could explain the concept without lying down in the snow, waving her arms and legs up and down, then hopping up to show the boys the impression in the snow.
Now
the old black bonnet was ready for the dust bin. Willy and Les filled the parsonage yard with angels, then swore they weren’t too wet or tired to try their new sleds.

The hill behind the church wasn’t much of an incline, at least so Graceanne thought before she helped drag those sleds up it a hundred times, or so it felt. Leslie screamed the first time he went down, and every time after that. Willy just grinned. She finally convinced them they’d wear the sleds out if they didn’t stop soon. Besides, there were gifts for the rest of the family. Didn’t they want to see?

The Beckwiths were still at the breakfast table—Papa had thought a longer than usual grace was called for that morning—when Graceanne in her new black merino and the boys in their new nankeen suits entered the dining room.

“What’s this, daughter? You know I don’t permit those—”

“It’s Christmas, Grandpa! Look what we helped wrap!”

Willy handed the vicar a wad of tissue paper that Graceanne had to peel apart, the vicar refusing to touch it, to reveal a new pipe. Leslie held out a piece of paper, a ribbon, and a warm muffler.

“Very nice, very nice, I am sure, but you know I don’t approve of—”

“Here, Aunt Pru, all these boxes are yours. Mama didn’t let us help wrap.”

“Mama, how come Aunt Pru got more presents than Grandpa? Wasn’t he as good this year?”

“Hush, darlings, let your aunt open her gifts.”

Prudence dutifully pretended to be surprised by each new delight she uncovered, the peach sarcenet, the hat and gloves and fan, just as if she hadn’t whined and wheedled over every item. She permitted each boy to kiss her cheek, then wiped it.

When it was Mrs. Beckwith’s turn, Graceanne left the room.

“It was too heavy, Grandma,” Willy explained.

“And too fra-fra—Mama said don’t touch.”

“That’s ‘fragile,’ darling,” Graceanne said, wheeling in the tea cart. Both shelves of the cart were filled with the new dishes—cups, saucers, bowls, serving platters, teapot— all in a dainty pattern of violets and vines.

Mrs. Beckwith held up one teacup to see the light shine through the delicate porcelain, and started weeping.

Willy frowned at his mother. “I told you plates weren’t a happy present.” But Leslie put his arms around his grandmother, who clutched the teacup to her breast, and said, “Don’t cry, Grandma, you can play with our toys.”

* * *

The boys were so good—and so tired from their morning in the snow—that Graceanne felt comfortable leaving them beside her mother in the family pew during the church service. She was so happy today, in fact, that she didn’t even resent that no one in her family had thought to buy the boys any gifts. That her father should have done so was out of the question, and her mother hardly left the house, but Pru? That she might have spent a ha’penny of her pin money on her own nephews never occurred to her. Graceanne shrugged and joined the choir behind the pulpit, determined that nothing was going to spoil the rest of this perfect day.

The joyous uplifting of voices in song that she expected was not quite so joyous, not nearly perfect. There were some stuffed noses and scratchy throats among those who had spent the chilly night out caroling, and there were some bleary eyes and unsteady hands among them, too. One seat was empty altogether. When a particularly sour note sounded next to her, Graceanne shuddered and turned to her sister. Yes, Pru was definitely off key today, and off her looks, too. In fact, Graceanne noted, the chit had a decided greenish cast to her complexion. The one piece of dry toast on her plate at breakfast must not have meant Pru was waiting for the noonday feast after all.

Good, Graceanne thought, and not just because Pru hadn’t bought the children Christmas presents or complimented her on her new gown and hairstyle. Maybe Prudence would learn from experience if her head ached enough, Graceanne thought, for surely neither Papa’s sternness nor Mama’s vagueness were teaching the girl moderation.

When Graceanne turned back to check on the twins, her mother was sitting alone on the bench. Before she could panic overmuch, Graceanne saw the boys ensconced on the seats next to Leland, in the Warrington pew. Lady Eudora was asleep, snoring slightly, and the duke was his usual handsome, elegantly attired self, smiling at her when he noticed her attention. He, at least, seemed to admire her new look.

She’d gathered her hair into its usual bun that morning, but then raised the knot of hair higher on the top of her head, held with two tortoiseshell combs. Then she’d draped the black lace mantilla over the whole. It wasn’t quite a match for the lace on her soft woolen gown, of course, but with Tony’s pearls, she felt quite the thing. Leland’s warm regard seemed to agree with her assessment. It brought a flush to her cheeks, too.

The boys were playing with the duke’s quizzing glass, a different one from last night’s, necessarily so. Gracious, he must have a drawerful of the things, that he let three-year-olds play with them. After he collected all the pieces, he offered the boys peppermint balls from a little sack in his pocket. He must have come prepared, Graceanne thought, unless the highest peers in the realm usually carried sweets with them to church. She doubted it, and felt warmer toward Ware because of that, warmer than she wanted herself to feel.

* * *

After the service, Graceanne had to endure the comments of all her longtime neighbors about how nice it was of His Grace to take such an interest in the boys. She smiled and nodded, yes, it was. And she was looking a real treat, too, Squire remarked in his tally-ho voice. “One thing doesn’t have aught to do with t’other, does it, missy?” he asked with a wink and a grin before his wife pinched him and dragged him to their carriage.

Of course the duke was next to greet her. Where else would he be when she was wishing the ground to open up, but right there to see her embarrassment? His hazel eyes were twinkling, but Leland merely bowed over Graceanne’s hand and asked if he might call after taking his aunt home, for he had a few trinkets for the boys he’d like to deliver.

“For the boys? You didn’t need to buy gifts for them. I told you I was going to. All that money you gave me…”

“I didn’t have to. I wanted to. Isn’t that the spirit of Christmas?”

* * *

The spirit of Christmas was hopping up and down and running to the window every other minute to watch for their beloved Collie’s arrival.

“But it is snowing again, darlings. His horses might have trouble getting through the drifts.” Two identical lower lips started to tremble. “But I’m sure he’ll try. Come, let’s look at the new picture book until he gets here. If he doesn’t come, we’ll go play in the snow again.” Where His Grace and his curricle had better be, ditched, for disappointing little children on Christmas Day.

But no, they soon heard carriage wheels crunching in the snow. The boys scampered down the stairs, which they were never supposed to do, squealing, which they were certainly not permitted to do in this part of the house. They were trying to open the door—another taboo or Graceanne would never know where they were—but luckily they were still too short to reach the latch.

Graceanne shooed them aside, straightened her skirts, and said, “Now, remember to bow, and do not ask if he brought you anything.” Then she opened the door.

His Grace was framed in the doorway, his curls all windblown and the shoulders of his greatcoat powdered with snow. He was wearing a grin as wide as the one she’d put on the snowman, and his booted foot was raised to kick at the door for entry, since his arms were heaped with mounds of packages.

“A few trinkets for the boys, you said. Why, you look like Father Christmas himself!”

“They are not all for the children,” the duke told her as she led him into the parlor. Where else was she to entertain a visiting nobleman? Upstairs in the nursery again? Her family prepared to depart when Leland added, “I was having such a fine time shopping that I bought gifts for everyone.”

Prudence, who had been drooping over a fashion magazine, perked up like a half-dead seedling that’s just been watered. She wasn’t getting to attend the party at Squire’s tonight, despite having a new gown, but Lucy Maxton never got a gift from a real live duke. Pru hurried to help relieve Ware of the gifts, so he could shrug out of his greatcoat.

Of course it was left to Graceanne to take the damp coat to hang in the hallway and go to the kitchen to order tea. When he raised an eyebrow as if to ask why she was still acting the menial, Graceanne laughed and said, “It’s the maid’s day off. Oh, how I have wanted to say that like some grande dame come down in the world. But it truly is the new maid’s holiday, and I really don’t mind, if you’ll promise not to let the children act like pigs at the trough of your gifts while I am gone.”

It was Pru, however, who was in a snit when Graceanne returned. The duke had let the brats each open a present, sets of wooden jackstraws, but he made the rest of them wait for Graceanne’s return. “What took so long, Grace? You should not keep Cousin Leland waiting.”

“Cousin Leland? His Grace is no cousin of yours, Pru.”

“He is too, by marriage.”

Graceanne looked toward her mother to remonstrate with Prudence over her coming ways, but Mrs. Beckwith was anxiously trying to explain jackstraws to Willy, and why it wasn’t a good idea to stick them in his ear. Leslie was playing with his set on the floor between the duke’s legs while Leland conversed with the vicar. Leslie’s chubby little fingers wouldn’t manage that game for a few years, but he seemed to be having no trouble whatsoever shoving the narrow pieces down His Grace’s high-top boots.

“Leslie, Wellesley, come get our present for Cousin Leland. No, Your Grace, do not—”

There was a crunch, a snap, a “Blister it! What the deuce?” and another crackle.

“—stand up. Yes, well, I apologize for taking so long, but we seemed to have misplaced the gift the boys and I made for you.”

The package the boys proudly handed to him seemed to have been misplaced in the dustbin. There were crumbs and smears and a few rips in the paper. “You shouldn’t have,” he said, and sincerely meant it.

“Open it, Collie, open it!”

So the duke stepped back, gingerly, and sat down again. He untied the string. Actually, he had to cut the knots with his pocketknife, which he hastily tucked back in an inside pocket. The paper fell off by itself to reveal a dirty sheepskin square protecting—what?

“It’s a pen wipe, Collie! We made it out of the lamb hats from the pageant. See, we colored it here, and Mama showed us how to put your initials here. See?”

“I see it’s the finest pen wipe I have ever owned,” the duke nobly swore while Prudence snickered and the vicar snorted, “At least I got a pipe.”

Leslie was looking uncertainly from one adult to the other. Willy was frowning.

“But I do not smoke,” the duke whispered to the boys, “so this is a much better present.”

Then he started handing out gifts, with only an occasional cracking sound as he moved around the room. To the vicar he gave a leatherbound volume,
A Dissertation on the Proof of the Existence of Angels,
by a well-known Oxford don. “I visited my old religion professor and had him sign it for you. It’s not ancient, but it might be a worthy addition to your collection.”

“You mean you know Robert Jordan? I believe him to be one of the foremost theologians of our day. Why, he—”

The reverend would have gone on, but Ware had turned to Mrs. Beckwith with a soft, flat bundle. Inside was a tablecloth runner and napkins, the finest damask embroidered with clusters of violets. “However did you manage that?” Graceanne asked when her mother seemed struck speechless.

He grinned. “I cheated and bribed Anstruther to lend me the illustration of the dishes you ordered. While I was in Oxford I had a clerk at one of the linen-drapers search out anything that matched.”

“All that trouble,” Mrs. Beckwith cried. She was weeping again, and one of the boys, dashed if Leland knew which, told him not to worry. “Grandma didn’t like her dishes either.”

“Lud, I never thought of that. I can exchange them—” So he had to be reassured that Mrs. Beckwith adored her new dishes, and her new linen.

The duke next handed Graceanne a small box that looked ominously like jewelry. “I cannot accept…that is, it wouldn’t be proper for me to…” What she meant was that she’d die of mortification if Leland handed her the diamond bracelet or whatever expensive frippery gentlemen gave their mistresses.