A Christmas Kiss (4 page)

“Yes, that's true, but I still don't see—”

“My Aunt Clarissa can help you. She has so many friends in Devonshire. Surely one of them must have need of a governess.”

“But would she recommend me for such a post without knowing me?” Miss Pennington asked reasonably. “She could scarcely, in good conscience, do such a thing, especially with the knowledge that Lady Carbery has turned me off.”

“But that's the beauty of my idea!” Jamie explained eagerly. “She's bound to get to know you if you're our house guest for the holidays. And then I'm sure she won't feel any hesitation in recommending you.”

The lane they were following took a turning into the wind. The many capes of Reggie's greatcoat flapped briskly, Jamie turned up his collar and pushed his hands deep into his pockets, but Evalyn didn't even notice the sudden chill. Mr. Everard's kind invitation had thrown her mind in a turmoil. She could not deny the attractiveness of his plan. The possibility of two weeks as a guest in a comfortable home, a Christmas holiday in which she would be treated with civility, even kindness, and the prospect of being assisted to find a new post, all these were infinitely more desirable than the prospect of begging for board from an unknown relative, and searching for employment without aid. But the proposal was too good to be true. She could not accept. There were too many obstacles.

She stopped and turned to Jamie. “Your generosity and concern quite overwhelm me, sir. I can't think why you should have taken this trouble about me. But you must see that I cannot accept.”

“No, ma'am, I can't say that I see that at all, can you, Reg?”

“No, indeed,” said Reggie earnestly, “it theemth like an exthellent plan to me.”

“But surely you both realize that it would be highly improper for me to travel alone in Mr. Everard's company,” Miss Pennington explained shyly.

“Oh, but I'll be going along too,” Reggie said with pride in having settled a ticklish problem with dispatch.

“Don't be an idiot, Reg,” Jamie muttered. “You would scarcely be viewed as a proper chaperone for a young lady. Miss Pennington's right. We need another female with us.”

The three of them walked on in silence. Just as the inn came into view, Reggie chortled. “I have it!” he exclaimed. “We'll hire an abigail.”

“An abigail?” asked Jamie, his eyes lighting up. “You mean some village girl?”

“There mutht be thome girl at the inn who would be thuitable. What do you think, Mith Pennington?”

“I think you are most generous, but I couldn't dream of allowing you to undertake such an expense in my behalf.”

“Nonsense,” Jamie put in firmly. “On that score I will not allow you to voice an objection. Reg has so much of the ‘ready' in his pockets that he'll not even notice the expenditure. The problem is solved, and you must now agree to come with us to Gyllford.”

Evalyn couldn't help but laugh at Jamie's readiness to spend Lord Reginald's money. Her laughter broke the strain and changed their moods completely. They refused to take seriously any one of the number of objections she tried to put forth. Their good spirits couldn't help but affect her own. The deep dejection which her plight had put upon her seemed miraculously to evaporate. A Christmas holiday at Gyllford! The thought of it lightened her heart and lifted her hopes. It was too tempting a prospect to refuse.

Still laughing, they swept her into the inn. Over her much-weakened objections, they looked for a girl to hire to be her abigail. The ridiculousness of the thought that she, a governess, would arrive at Gyllford with her own abigail made her laugh again. Within a very few minutes, the innkeeper's red-cheeked, excited niece had been engaged and had run off to pack her belongings. Then Reggie, in his grandest manner, demanded a private dining room in which Miss Pennington was to wait for them while they returned to Carbery Hall to take their leave.

Alone and breathless, Evalyn went to the window of the dining room. It overlooked the inn yard where, in the midst of much noisy bustle, the London stage was being readied for departure. The passengers were squeezing aboard, the luggage was being tied to the top, the ostlers were running about checking the horses. Evalyn felt a twinge of misgiving. If she had a proper sense of conduct and decorum, she would now be aboard that coach, crowded in among the passengers, heading for a bleak and unknown future. Instead, she was soon to be heading in quite another direction, in a private, luxurious coach, with her own abigail in attendance, and a full fortnight of holiday before her. Undoubtedly her character was not as strong as she had supposed. She was sadly wanting in rectitude. But her awareness of this weakness in her character did nothing to dispel a sense of happy anticipation such as she had never felt before. As she watched the London stage lumber off, there was not a glimmer of regret in her shining eyes.

Jamie and Reg walked back to Carbery Hall to pack their belongings and make their farewells. They were quite satisfied with themselves; they had done a good deed, and they had succeeded in spite of some ticklish problems. “I think we sailed rather neatly over some rough waters,” Jamie boasted as they walked briskly down the lane toward Carbery Hall.

“Yeth,” agreed Reggie, “but I don't think it will be clear thailing ahead.”

“Why not? My Aunt Clarissa will handle things from here on,” Jamie assured him airily.

But Reggie shook his head. “Your father and your aunt are bound to wonder why you brought her,” he said thoughtfully. “Mith Pennington'th a mighty pretty thing. I'd wager anything you like that they'll think you're enamored of the girl.”

Jamie hooted. “What? Me? You're addlebrained. They know me better than that! If you're making yourself uneasy over such nonsense, you're crazy as a coot!”

Four

A
grandfather!
the word had burst upon Philip with the effect of a gunshot. Now, two weeks later, back at home at Gyllford, it still had a way of jumping into his mind. He stood at his shaving mirror and stared at his reflection. The hair at his temples had already turned more grey than black. When had it happened? How was it possible he had not noticed it before? Those grey hairs had encroached upon his head as the years had encroached upon his youth, in stealthy stages, bit by bit. He remembered how he'd laughed at the first pale hair that had appeared among the dark, as if that grim reminder of the impending future were a joke of nature. The reality of aging had seemed so far in the future that the warning had appeared ludicrous. But now, before he'd had a chance to accustom himself to the realization, he'd become quite grey, and his youth had disappeared.

A grandfather. Philip shook his head and grinned at himself ruefully. He was not usually given to such mawkish, feminine musings. Besides, Jamie wasn't even married yet! Forty-four years of life did not make one ancient, not by any means. What he needed was a good breakfast, a brisk walk on the grounds of his beloved Gyllford, and a couple of hours at his desk, wrestling with the logic of his antagonist, Burke, to put him in a more sensible frame of mind. But the lift that the thought of his writing always gave him was soon dispelled by the realization that his house was filling with guests. Gervaise and Sally were already in residence, and the whole Covington family was expected to arrive this afternoon. The duties of a host would keep him from his desk all day. He sighed and, his depression returning, he went reluctantly down to breakfast.

Clarissa and Sally were already settled at the table in the breakfast room, drinking their second cups of chocolate. Gervaise was lingering over the sideboard, loading his plate from the generous buffet with cold meats, smoked fish and coddled eggs. The sight of his cheerful countenance did a little to lift Philip's spirit. Gervaise's very appearance occasioned smiles. He always tried valiantly to dress as befitted a man of style and substance, but his girth and his indolent nature were constantly at war with his clothing, and winning. Without warning, a button would come loose here, a seam would split there. His much-harried valet would send him forth tailored and pressed to perfection, but Gervaise would return to the dressing room before long, looking sadly rumpled and shabby. Now, just minutes after leaving his dressing room, his waistcoat buttons already gave the appearance of being strained beyond their strength. Philip was sure the middle one would pop off before Gervaise's breakfast was completely consumed.

All unconcerned, Gervaise's eyes twinkled and his round cheeks creased in a welcoming smile for Philip. “There you are, my boy,” he greeted warmly. “We've been wondering if you had overslept this morning.”

“I must apologize to you all. I had no idea you would all be so prompt. I dawdled in front of my mirror, I'm afraid.”

“Not you, Philip, surely. I've never known you to do so before,” Clarissa said in amused surprise.

“That is because you never told me how grey I'm growing, my dear. I noticed it this morning with quite a shock.”

“Nonsense!” Sally laughed. “It makes you look quite attractively distinguished.”

Philip bowed his thanks and turned to the sideboard. Was Sally still determined to pursue a useless flirtation with him? Bother the holidays, he thought, bother the guests and bother this whole interruption of his pleasant life's routine! His day was quite cut up.

Sally Trevelyan looked at him musingly. If he had calculated a manner meant to attract her, he couldn't have found a better. As he turned back to the breakfast table with his plate of beef and eggs, she motioned him to the seat beside her. Philip seemed not to notice; he took a seat beside his sister. Sally smiled to herself. Let the man struggle. She had two lovely weeks before her—there was plenty of time.

The Covingtons arrived at mid-afternoon. Hutton, the Gyllfords' imperturbable butler, announced the arrival of the carriage to Lady Steele and managed to throw open the front door, descend the steps and take a magisterial stance at the bottom before the coach had come to a complete stop—and all without hurrying his usual dignified gait. Clarissa and Philip followed soon after, making an impressive welcoming party for the new arrivals.

The six-year-old twins spilled from the carriage first, racing past their hosts and up into the hall with all the abandon that five long hours of suppressed energy can stimulate in little boys. They were followed out of the carriage by their sister Marianne, a seventeen-year-old miss with bouncy curls and warm blue eyes now shining with the excitement caused by this prolonged escape from the schoolroom.

Next came her father, Edward Covington, whose usual, anxious expression was now replaced by a smile of relief that the journey had ended without mishap. Twenty years of marriage to the good-natured but hapless Martha had etched a number of worried creases into his forehead and a sense of nervous fearfulness into his spirit. Life with his Martha, he was wont to remark, was a series of crises and disasters for which she was neither to blame nor able to resist generating.

Martha herself was the last to be helped from the carriage. She eagerly hugged and kissed Clarissa and Philip with effusive warmth. Then she turned to the footmen who were attempting to unload the great number of boxes and trunks that the Covingtons found necessary for their survival away from home. “Be careful with that one, please,” she urged, “for it contains all the children's gifts for Christmas morning. And that one has the wine, does it not, Edward? Clarissa, we've brought you some of that excellent Madeira Edward discovered on the Continent last year. Oh, and that one goes to Marianne's room, if you please.”

Keeping up a steady stream of warnings and instructions, Martha moved with the rest of the party to the front hallway. This large, high-ceilinged room had become a sea of activity. Old friends were greeting each other with kisses. Children were being tossed in the air. Wraps were being removed and carted off up the stairs. Footmen were weaving their way through the press loaded with boxes and trunks. Suddenly, one of the twins, having had enough of the petting and patting of his elders, darted across the stone floor without heed and collided with a footman who was staggering toward the stairway under the burden of a large trunk which he carried on his back. The impact caused the man to stumble. The trunk fell to the floor with a tremendous crash and burst wide open.

The entire assemblage gasped and turned to stare at the wreckage. Martha's corsets, stays and undergarments, and the pots of rouge she had hidden among them, all lay exposed to public view. Martha, aghast, responded as she always did in times of crisis—she swooned. Clarissa and Edward bent over her, administering vinaigrette and soothing murmurs. The guilty twin made loud excuses. The servant stammered his apologies. Lord Gyllford tried to still the hubbub by urging all the other guests into the library where a fire and refreshments were waiting.

In the midst of this confusion, the front door opened to admit Jamie and his party. The little group, rosy-cheeked and in excellent spirits after an invigorating ride through the English winter countryside, stood stock still surveying the chaos, their smiles fading into puzzled concern.

Lord Gyllford came forward to greet them. “Don't look so appalled,” he said, smiling reassuringly at his son. “We've had a bit of an accident with a trunk, but it will all be set right in a few minutes. How do you do, Reggie? It's good to have you with us.”

“Sir, I'd like you to meet Miss Evalyn Pennington. Miss Pennington, this is my father.”

Philip turned, looked down into Miss Pennington's upturned face and felt an unfamiliar lurch somewhere deep in his chest. The serene grey eyes smiling up at him were set in a face whose sweetness of expression struck him with complete surprise. Could this calm, composed, and lovely creature possibly be the choice of his immature, scatterbrained son? He felt quite breathless with shock as, for one frozen moment while he stared at her, the world around him ceased to exist.