A Christmas Promise (24 page)

“I must get ready for the children,” she said suddenly, turning to the door. “Are you going to watch their concert?”

“If I do not,” he said, “it seems that I will have only myself for company. Yes, I shall watch them.”

She linked her arm through his as he opened the door and they proceeded into the hall and up the stairs. “The day will get better,” she said. “I promise. It is Christmas. Everything is new and wonderful at Christmas. No one is allowed to be unhappy at Christmas—even when nursing an aching jaw.” She laughed and he smiled back at her.

When she reached her dressing room, she hummed to herself and performed a few waltz steps with an imaginary partner before ringing for her maid even though she knew that she must have scarcely half an hour in which to get ready. But she paused suddenly, her hand on the bell, arrested by a new thought.

Wilfred! She had not spared him a thought all day, even though she had set eyes on him a few times. She had not thought of him. Whereas she had thought a great deal about her husband. She had admitted to herself that she loved him. But she loved Wilfred—didn’t she?

The answer was very obvious. No, she did not. He was not important to her any longer. Because she was fickle?
Was
she? Were her feelings so easily changed? But it was marriage that had changed her, she thought. The forced closeness and intimacy of marriage. It had made her see her husband’s attractiveness—not just the attractiveness of his person but that of his character too. And she knew now from what Sir Albert had told her that she was not mistaken. He had married her for her father’s money, yes. But it was to save the house and estate where he had grown up. She knew from the evidence of the past days that he loved Grenfell Park. He had not married her just out of the selfish desire to continue with an extravagant way of life.

She smiled softly and closed her eyes. She loved him. She tested the newness of the idea with her mind and whispered it to the room. Perhaps he did not care very deeply for her, though she believed that his feelings had certainly softened. Perhaps he would never love her. But she was not going to let that thought depress her. It was Christmas, and anything and everything was possible at Christmas. She remembered promising her father that she would have a wonderful Christmas for him. She also remembered his saying that she would be glad one day for the marriage he had half forced her into.

Well, then.

She turned to smile at her maid as the door opened.

T
HE EARL OF FALLODEN ENTERED HIS WIFE’S
dressing room to accompany her downstairs to the ballroom.

“We will greet people as they arrive,” he said. In truth, he was not much looking forward to the afternoon after all. Something like this had never been done at Grenfell before and he did not know quite how to proceed. He was somewhat regretting his impulsive offer of the afternoon before.

“Oh, yes.” She flashed him a bright smile. “They will be so happy, will they not, to be coming here. And the children will be so excited they will be feeling sick. I can remember when we used to perform Christmas pageants as children, my cousins and I. There was always that sick anticipation and then all the joy and triumph of having done it and of hearing the praise of the adults. They always praised us even if we forgot our lines or tripped over the hems of our costumes.”

She was alight with excitement and would remain so through Christmas, he guessed. She was flushed and beautiful and looked hardly as old as her nineteen years. He envied the fact that she could look forward to such an ordeal with pleased excitement.

“Eleanor,” he said, “don’t expect everyone to be too glad. For most of the parents and grandparents it will be an awesome thing to come here and be greeted by us. Most of them will not enjoy the afternoon. But they will talk about it and remember it for the rest of their lives.”

She looked at him incredulously. “What nonsense!” she said, laughing. “You may choose to play the part of stuffy earl, my lord, but I will not play stuffy countess.” She was not trying to quarrel with him, he could see. She was smiling. Her eyes were dancing with merriment.

“You don’t quite understand, do you?” he said. “They are not parts we can choose or not choose to play. They are there. We are the Earl and Countess of Falloden. To these people we are great personages, to be treated with some awe.”

Her smile faltered. “Are you warning me?” she asked. “That is it, is it not? You are reminding me who I have become so that I will not disgrace you by behaving with vulgar familiarity as I did at the school yesterday.”

Perhaps after all she was ready to quarrel. He reached out a hand and rubbed his knuckles along her jaw. “Hedgehog,” he said. “Let’s go down, or there will be no one to greet. And I like you very well as you are, Eleanor. I liked the way you were at the school yesterday.”

“You did?” She looked at him uncertainly, warily. “It was not vulgar?”

“My grandmother might have called it so,” he said. “I am not my grandmother.”

“Oh,” she said, and took his arm.

People were going to be arriving at any moment, he thought, and felt foolishly apprehensive again. People he felt quite comfortable with out in the fields or in their cottages he dreaded meeting socially in his own ballroom. He would take refuge in his most stately manner, he supposed, and yet he did not want to behave that way. He wanted these people to be able to enjoy the concert and their children’s performances.

Then he saw the Transomes. Though perhaps it was unfair to use that single name, he thought, when actually he saw Gullises and Weekeses as well as Jason and Charles and Tim. Yes, and Bertie too. There they all were, congregated close to the ballroom doors and all in their best party humor—which was just a little more exuberant than their usual humor. Uncle Sam was rubbing his hands together.

“This is quite like old times,” he said, his voice booming even more loudly than it usually did. “Do you remember the Christmas pageants, Ellie? Your Aunt Irene was forever digging me in the ribs so that I would not laugh in the wrong places and wound you children’s feelings.”

“This is Christmas,” Uncle Harry said, beaming around at everyone. “Children and concerts and parties. What else is Christmas all about? Bring on the next generation, I say. Tom is doing his part all right. It’s your turn now, Ellie. And everyone else’s duty to choose partners as soon as possible.”

He chuckled as a chorus of “Oh, Uncle Harry!” came from the younger generation.

“Well, I’ll be making an announcement along those lines later tonight—after midnight,” he said with a wink for Aunt Beryl.

Mabel was blushing, the earl saw at a glance, and George was looking at her, thoroughly pleased with himself.

“On with the concert, I say,” Uncle Ben exclaimed, “and bring on the party and the tea. This is Christmas and time to stuff stomachs to overflowing. What say you, Randy?”

The earl could feel his wife looking up at him. Her arm on his was somewhat tense, and her eyes were anxious, he saw when he looked down at her. A few days before he would have been a little shocked and definitely taken aback. Now he was merely amused.

“For myself, Uncle Ben,” he said, “I intend to eat until my clothes are one stitch short of bursting at the seams.”

Everyone chuckled, himself included. Though he sobered quickly. There were several people coming up the stairs and approaching the ballroom. All of them looked rather as if they were on the way to their own executions. He mentally adjusted his manner and smiled.

And then the Transomes—including all the extras who might as well have borne that name, judging from their behavior—greeted his guests. Oh, they were not so ill-mannered as to crowd him out and give him no chance to do so himself. He shook everyone by the hand and bade them welcome to his home. His wife at his side did the same, though she also assured several anxious mothers that yes, their children had arrived some time before and were in a salon with their teacher getting ready.

But it was the Transomes who pumped the hand of every new arrival and boomed out greetings and laughed and chattered and reminisced about Christmases past and assured everyone that this was the very highlight of the season’s festivities and took everyone into the ballroom and seated them before the makeshift stage and sat among them to continue the conversations. And generally set all his guests so much at their ease that the noise level in the ballroom became almost deafening. As if there were a few hundred Transomes in there.

“Well,” the earl said, looking down at his wife when it seemed that everyone had arrived and was seated, “so much for grandeur and awe.”

“I am sorry,” she said, “if the occasion has been spoiled for you. But I will not apologize for my family. They have helped everyone to relax.”

“Including me,” he said, and she looked up at him in some surprise. “How I envy your family, Eleanor. They have so much capacity for enjoying life. One loses so much when one thinks and behaves only as one ought. As one ought by the standards of some aristocratic killjoy, that is.”

She smiled at him warmly, her eyes fully focused on his so that for a moment he forgot the roomful of noisy people just beyond the doors of the ballroom and smiled back at her.

“I am going to see if I can help Miss Brooks with the children,” she said. “I would be willing to wager—if it were ladylike to wager, of course—that at least a dozen last-minute crises have arisen.”

“It is on the tip of my tongue to advise you to stay away,” he said, “on the assumption that the sight of the countess will only intensify the crises and create a dozen new ones. But I am learning not to trust the tip of my tongue. Go, then.” He almost added the words “my love” but stopped himself just in time. There was amity between them as they had agreed, first in London and then during the journey down to Grenfell. Perhaps there was a little more than amity. But he must make no assumptions about her feelings. He must not rush his fences.

He watched her hurry down the hallway to the small salon that was serving as a dressing room for the children. And he felt totally relaxed, he realized, and ready to enjoy the coming hour or two. All his dread and his fear of awkwardness had disappeared. Strange, he thought. He was learning a great deal from his countess about how to be an effective earl and landlord. When he had expected to have to be the teacher, he was in fact the pupil.

A cit’s daughter. A coal merchant’s daughter. Eleanor. His wife. His love. He smiled after her disappearing figure and turned toward the ballroom. The level of conversation dropped a little as he entered, and a few of his laborers looked as if they thought they might be expected to scramble to their feet. But he smiled and nodded about him and took a seat at the back and remembered Uncle Harry’s words.

Yes, this was Christmas. Children and excitement and anticipation. And warmth and fellowship. How fortunate that Christmas had found him at last. How fortunate that Mr. Joseph Transome, needing to settle his affairs in a great hurry before his death, had fixed his attention on him when choosing a husband for his daughter.

He wished suddenly that Mr. Transome were still alive so that he could thank him.

Everyone had come, Eleanor assured the children. All were eagerly anticipating the concert. And no, of course they would not forget their lines or their steps in the dance. One never did when the big moment came. And if by chance—by some very strange chance—they did, then Miss Brooks would be ready to prompt them and all their parents would love them and feel proud anyway. And she was so looking forward to seeing their performances, she assured them. She could scarcely be more excited if she tried.

The children were still highly nervous when she left them and Miss Brooks looked taut enough to snap in two. But at least she seemed to have left them in a mood of nervous excitement rather than nervous dread. She smiled as she hurried back to the ballroom and remembered what Uncle Harry had said. It was her turn to produce children so that the next generation could perform Christmas pageants.

She hoped—oh, she hoped it would be soon. Two nights of loving and it was the very middle of her month. Perhaps already … But she must not expect anything too soon. If she did, she would only be doomed to disappointment if nothing happened. She must have patience. And she must hope that her husband had meant what he said when he had told her that she must expect him nightly from now on. If not this month, then, next month or the month after. She so wanted to be with child. With
his
child.

She smiled brightly at everyone when she entered the ballroom, noted the lowered noise level, and responded to it.

“They are all ready,” she said. “Now if they can just force their legs to obey their will, they will be here within a few minutes.”

There was general laughter as she took the chair beside her husband’s, smiled at him, and set her hand in his. Too late she realized that the last gesture was probably quite inappropriate. But she could not withdraw her hand without being conspicuous. His own had closed about it warmly and rested it against his thigh.

“Oh, my lord,” she said, “I am so glad you suggested having the concert here.”

“Are you?” he said. “And so am I.”

But before she could wonder at this new warmth between them—in him as well as in her—Miss Brooks appeared in the doorway, followed by the children in silent single file. There was a sudden hush, Uncle Sam began clapping and everyone followed suit, and the children filed up onto the stage to sing their first pair of Christmas carols. Three or four voices sang sweetly in tune. The rest growled along somewhere in the base octaves of the pianoforte. Eleanor smiled and leaned forward in her seat.

There were choir renditions and solos and duets and recitations and dances. And finally the Christmas pageant itself, in which Miss Brooks had ingeniously devised speaking parts for every single child. Mary spoke in a whisper that probably even the baby Jesus could not hear; Joseph boomed out his lines in a voice that would have put even Uncle Sam to shame; the angel of the Lord forgot her lines, but the shepherds were so busy being sore afraid that Miss Brooks was able to prompt her quite unobtrusively; one shepherd brought his crook down on the bare toes of another shepherd and prompted lines that were not in the script, not to mention a little unrehearsed hopping on one foot; one king’s turban fell down about his face as he knelt to lay frankincense at the foot of the manger and Mary had to help him readjust it; the heavenly host inexplicably consisted of the growlers rather than the singers.