The Heart Of Christmas: A Handful Of Gold / The Season for Suitors / This Wicked Gift

“And do you ever have the impression,” Julian asked without answering the question, which was doubtless rhetorical anyway, “that you ought not to simply label a woman as a certain type and expect her to behave accordingly?” Blanche, changing for dinner a few minutes before in the dressing room while he made do with the bedchamber, had informed him with bright enthusiasm that the Reverend Moffatt was planning to conduct a Christmas service in this very room sometime after dinner. And that the servants had asked to attend. And that they were going to have to see to it on the morrow that the little boys had a wonderful Christmas. If there was still plenty of snow, they could…

He had not listened to all the details. But Miss Blanche Heyward, opera dancer, would have made a superlative drill sergeant if she had just been a man, he had thought. Consider as a point in fact the way she had organized them all—all of them—over the decorations. They had rushed about and climbed and teetered and adjusted angles at her every bidding. She had been flushed and bright-eyed and beautiful.

On the whole, he concluded as an afterthought, he was glad she was not a man.

“And have you ever had a cook for all of three or four years, Jule,” Bertie continued, “and suddenly discovered that she could cook? Not that I have tasted any of the things that go with those smells yet, but if smell is anything to judge by…well, I ask you.”

The staff, it seemed, had been as busy belowstairs as all of them had been above. But their busyness had had the same instigator—Miss Blanche Heyward. Julian even wondered if somehow she had conjured up the clergyman and his family out of the blizzard. What a ghastly turn of events that had been.

“Do you suppose,” he asked, “anyone noticed the sudden appearance of rings on our women’s fingers, Bertie?”

But the door opened at that moment to admit their mistresses, who had come down together. Debbie clucked her tongue.

“Now did I do all that work on the kissing bough just to see it hang over there and you men stand here?” she asked. “Go and get yourself under it, Bertie, love, and be bussed.”

“Again?” he said, grinning and waggling his eyebrows and instantly obeying.

They had all sampled the pleasures of the kissing bough after it had been hung. Even the Reverend Moffatt had kissed his wife with hearty good humor and had pecked Debbie and Blanche respectfully on the cheek.

“Well, Blanche.” Julian looked her up and down. She was dressed in the dark green silk again. Her hair was neatly confined at the back of her head. She should have looked drably dreary but did not. “Are you enjoying yourself?”

Some of the sparkle that had been in her eyes faded as she looked back at him. “Only when I forget my purpose in being here,” she said. “I have already taken a great deal of money from you and have done nothing yet to earn it.”

“Perhaps I should be the judge of that,” he said.

“Perhaps tonight I can make some amends,” she said. “I have had a day in which to grow more accustomed to you. I may still be awkward—I daresay I will be because I am very ignorant of what happens, you know—but I will not be afraid and I will not act the martyr. Indeed, I believe I might even enjoy it. And it will be a relief to know that at last I have done something to earn my salary.”

If Bertie and Debbie, now laughing like a pair of children and making merry beneath the kissing bough, had been the only other occupants of the house apart from the servants, Julian thought he might have excused Blanche and himself from dinner and taken her up to bed without further ado. Despite the reference to earning salaries, he found her words arousing. He found her arousing. But there were other guests. Besides, he was not sure he would have done it anyway.

If this stay in Norfolkshire had proceeded according to plan, he would have enjoyed a largely sleepless night with Blanche last night. They would have stayed in bed until noon or later this morning. They would have returned to bed for much of the afternoon. By now he would have been wondering how long into the coming night his energies would sustain him. But there would have been all day tomorrow to look forward to—in bed.

The prospect had seemed appealing to him all last week and up until just last night. Longer than that. He had felt disgruntled and cheated all through the night and when he had woken this morning. Or when she had awoken him, rather, with her excited discovery that it had snowed during the night.

But surprisingly he had enjoyed the day just as it had turned out. And the kiss against the oak tree had seemed in some strange way as satisfying as a bedding might have been. There had been laughter as well as desire involved in that kiss. He had never before thought of laughter as a desirable component of a sexual experience.

“You are disappointed in me,” Blanche said now. “I am so sorry.”

“Not at all,” he told her, clasping his hands at his back. “How could I possibly be disappointed? Let me see. A night spent on the floor, an early wake-up call in the frigid dawn to watch snow falling, an expedition out into the storm in order to climb trees, murder my boots and risk my neck. The arrival of a clergyman as a houseguest, an hour spent finding occupation for two energetic infants, another hour of climbing on furniture and pinning up boughs only to move them again when it was discovered that they were half an inch out of place, a church service in the sitting room to look forward to. My dear Miss Heyward, what more could I have asked of Christmas?”

She was laughing. “I have the strangest feeling,” she said, “that you have enjoyed today.”

He raised his quizzing glass to his eye and regarded her through it. “And you believe that you might enjoy tonight,” he said. “We will see, Blanche, when tonight comes. But first of all, Bertie’s guests. I believe I hear the patter of little feet and the chatter of little voices approaching, as Debbie so poetically phrased it. I suppose we are to be subjected to their company as well as that of their mama and papa since there is no nursery and no nurse.”

“For all your expression and tone of voice,” Blanche said, “I do believe, my lord, you have an affection for those little boys. You do not deceive me.”

“Dear me,” Julian said faintly as the sitting room door opened again.

THERE WAS a spinet in one corner of the sitting room. Verity had eyed it a few times during the day with some longing, but its lid was locked, she had discovered. While the Reverend Moffatt was setting up the room after dinner for the Christmas service, his wife asked about the instrument. Mr. Hollander looked at it in some surprise, as if he were noticing it for the first time. He had no idea where the key was. It hardly mattered anyway unless someone was able to play it.

There was a short silence.

“I can play,” Verity said.

“Splendid!” The Reverend Moffatt beamed at her. “Then we may have music with the service, Lady Folingsby. I would lead the singing if I had to, but I have a lamentably poor ear for pitch, do I not, Edie? We would be likely to end a hymn several tones lower than we started it.” He laughed heartily.

Mr. Hollander went in search of the key. Or rather, he went in search of a servant who might know where it was.

“Where did you learn to play, Blanche?” Debbie asked.

“At the rectory.” Verity smiled and then wished she could bite out her tongue. “The rector’s wife taught me,” she added hastily. That was the truth, at least.

Mr. Hollander came back in triumph, a key held aloft. The spinet was sadly out of tune, Verity discovered, but not impossibly so. There was no music, but she did not need any. All her favorite hymns, as well as some other favorite pieces, had been committed to memory when she was still a girl.

A table had been converted into an altar with the aid of a crisp white cloth one of the maids had ironed carefully, candles in silver holders and a fancy cup and plate the housekeeper had found somewhere in the nether regions of the house and the other maid had polished to serve as a paten and chalice. The butler had dusted off a bottle of Mr. Hollander’s best wine. The cook had found time and space in her oven to bake a round loaf of unleavened bread. The Reverend Moffatt had clad himself in vestments he had brought with him and suddenly looked very young and dignified and holy.

The sitting room, Verity thought, gazing about her, had become a holy place, a church. Everyone, even the children, sat hushed as they would in a church, waiting for the service to begin. Verity did not wait. She began to play quietly some of her favorite Christmas hymns.

It was Christmas, she thought, swallowing and blinking her eyes. She had not thought it would come for her this year except in the form of an ugly selfsacrifice. But for all the lies and deceptions—with every glance down at her hands she saw the false wedding ring—Christmas had come. Christmas, she reminded herself, and the reminder had never been more apt, was for sinners, and they were all sinners: Mr. Hollander, Debbie, Viscount Folingsby and her. But Christmas had found them out, despite themselves, in the form of the clergyman and his family, stranded by a snowstorm. And Christmas was offering all its boundless love and forgiveness to them in the form of the bread and the wine, which were still at this moment just those two commodities.

A child had been born on this night more than eighteen hundred years ago, and he was about to be born again as he had been each year since then and would be each year in the future. Constant birth. Constant hope. Constant love.

“My dear friends.” The clergyman’s voice was quiet, serene, imposing, unlike the voice of the Reverend Moffatt who had conversed with them over tea and dinner. He smiled about at each one of them in turn, bathing them—or so it seemed—in the warmth and peace and wonder of the season.

And so the service began.

It ended more than an hour later with the joyful singing of one last hymn. They all sang lustily, Verity noticed, herself included. Even one of the coachmen, who was noticeably tone-deaf, and the housekeeper, who sang with pronounced vibrato. Mr. Hollander had a strong tenor voice. Debbie sang with a Yorkshire accent. David Moffatt sang his heart out to a tune of his own devising. They would not have made a reputable choir. But it did not matter. They made a joyful noise. They were celebrating Christmas.

And then Mrs. Moffatt spoke up, a mere few seconds after her husband had said the final words of the service and wished them all the compliments of the season.

“I do apologize, Mr. and Mrs. Hollander,” she said, “for all the inconvenience I am about to cause you. Henry, my dear, I do believe we are going to have a Christmas child.”

Chapter Six

HENRY MOFFATT was pacing as he had been doing almost constantly for the past several hours.

“One would expect to become accustomed to it,” he said, pausing for only a moment to stare, pale faced and anxious eyed, at Julian and Bertie, who were sitting at either side of the hearth, hardly any less pale themselves, “after two previous confinements. But one does not. One thinks of a new child—one’s own—making the perilous passage into this world. And one thinks of one’s mate, flesh of one’s own flesh, heart of one’s heart, enduring the pain, facing all the danger alone. One feels helpless and humble and dreadfully responsible. And guilty that one does not have more trust in the plans of the Almighty. It seems trivial to recall that we have hoped for a daughter this time.”

He resumed his journey to nowhere, back and forth from one corner of the room to the other. “Will it never end?”

Julian had never before shared a house with a woman in labor. When he thought about it, about what was going on abovestairs—and how could he not think about it?—he felt a buzzing in his ears and a coldness in his nostrils and imagined in some horror the ignominy of fainting when he was not even the prospective father. He remembered how glibly just a few days before he had planned to have a child of his own in the nursery by next Christmas or very soon after.

It must hurt like hell, he thought, and that was probably the understatement of the decade.

There was no doctor in the village. There was a midwife, but she lived, according to the housekeeper, a mile or so on the other side of the village. It would have been impossible to reach her, not to mention persuading her to make the return journey, in time to deliver the child who was definitely on its way.

Fortunately, Mrs. Moffatt had announced with a calm smile—surely it had been merely a brave facade—she had already given birth to two children, as well as attending the births of a few others. She could manage very well alone, provided the housekeeper would prepare a few items for her. It was getting late. She invited everyone else to retire to bed and promised not to disturb them with any loud noises.

Julian had immediately formed mental images of someone screaming in agony.

Debbie had looked at Bertie with eyes almost as big as her face.

“If you are quite sure, ma’am,” Bertie had said, as white as his shirt points.

“Come, Henry,” Mrs. Moffatt had said, “we will put the children to bed first. Perhaps I can see you in here for a few minutes afterward, Mrs. Simpkins.”

Mrs. Simpkins had been looking a delicate shade of green.

That was when Blanche had spoken up.

“You certainly will not manage alone,” she had assured the guest. “It will be quite enough for you to endure the pain of labor. You will leave the rest to us, Mrs. Moffatt. Sir,” she said, addressing the clergyman, “perhaps you can put the children to bed yourself tonight? Boys, give your mama a kiss. Doubtless there will be more than one wonderful surprise awaiting you in the morning. The sooner you fall asleep, the sooner you will find out what. Mrs. Lyons, will you see that a large pot of water is heated and kept ready? Mrs. Simpkins, will you gather together as many clean cloths as you can find? Debbie—”

“Ee, Blanche,” Debbie had protested, “no, love.”

“I am going to need you,” Blanche had said with a smile. “Merely to wield a cool, damp cloth to wipe Mrs. Moffatt’s face when she gets very hot, as she will. You can do that, can you not? I will be there to do everything else.”

Everything else. Like delivering the baby. Julian had stared, fascinated, at his opera dancer.

“Have you done this before, Blanche?” he had asked.

“Of course,” she had said briskly. “At the rectory—ah. I used to accompany the rector’s wife on occasion. I know exactly what to do. No one need fear.”

They had all been gazing at her, Julian remembered now. They had all hung on her every word, her every command. They had leaned on her strength and her confidence in a collective body.

Who the hell was she? What had a blacksmith’s daughter been doing hanging around a rectory so much? Apart from learning to play the spinet without music, that was. And apart from delivering babies.

Everyone had run to do her bidding. Soon only the three men—the three useless ones—had been left in the sitting room to fight terror and nausea and fits of the vapors.

The door opened. Three pale, terrified faces turned toward it.

Debbie was flushed and untidy and swathed in an apron made for a giant. One hank of blond hair hung to her shoulder and looked damp with perspiration. She was beaming and looking very pretty indeed.

“It is all over, sir,” she announced, addressing herself to the Reverend Moffatt. “You have a new…baby. I am not to say what. Your wife is ready and waiting for you.”

The new father stood very still for a few moments and then strode from the room without a word.

“Bertie.” Debbie turned tear-filled eyes toward him. “You should have been there, love. It came out all of a rush into Blanche’s hands, the dearest little slippery thing, all cross and crying and—and human. Ee, Bertie, love.” She cast herself into his arms and bawled noisily.

Bertie made soothing noises and raised his eyebrows at Julian. “I was never more relieved in my life,” he said. “But I am quite thankful I was not there, Deb. We had better get you to bed. You are not needed any longer?”

“Blanche told me I could go to bed,” Debbie said. “She will finish off all that needs doing. No midwife could have done better. She talked quietly the whole time to calm my jitters and Mrs. Simpkins’s. Mrs. Moffatt didn’t have the jitters. She just kept saying she was sorry to keep us up, the daft woman. I have never felt so—so honored, Bertie, love. Me, Debbie Markle, just a simple, honest whore to be allowed to see that.”

“Come on, Deb.” Bertie tucked her into the crook of his arm and bore her off to bed.

Julian followed them up a few minutes later. He had no idea what time it was. Some unholy hour of the morning, he supposed. He did not carry a candle up with him and no one had lit the branch in his room. Someone from belowstairs had been kept working late, though. There was a freshly made-up fire burning in the hearth. He went to stand at the window and looked out.

The snow had stopped falling, he saw, and the sky had cleared off. He looked upward and saw in that single glance that he had been wrong. It was not an unholy hour of the morning at all.

He was still standing there several minutes later when the door of the bedchamber opened. He turned his head to look over his shoulder.

She looked as Debbie had looked but worse. She was bedraggled, weary and beautiful.

“You should not have waited up,” she said.

“Come.” He beckoned to her.

She came and slumped tiredly against him when he wrapped an arm about her. She sighed deeply.

“Look.” He pointed.

She did not say anything for a long while. Neither did he. Words were unnecessary. The Christmas star beamed down at them, symbol of hope, a sign for all who sought wisdom and the meaning of their lives. He was not sure what either of them had learned about Christmas this year, but there was something. It was beyond words at the moment and even beyond coherent thought. But something had been learned. Something had been gained.

“It is Christmas,” she said softly at last. Her words held a wealth of meaning beyond themselves.

“Yes,” he said, turning his face and kissing the untidy titian hair on top of her head. “Yes, it is Christmas. Did they have their daughter?”

“Oh yes,” she said. “I have never seen two people so happy, my lord. On Christmas morning. Could there be a more precious gift?”

“I doubt it,” he said, closing his eyes briefly.

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