Read 'Twas the Night After Christmas Online
Authors: Sabrina Jeffries
Tags: #Romance, #Regency, #Fiction, #Historical, #General
'Twas the Night After Christmas
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To the Biaggi Bunch—thanks for always having faith in me!
And to the love of my life, who lost his parents at a young age. This one’s for you, babe.
April 1803
N
o one had called for him yet.
Eight-year-old Pierce Waverly, heir to the Earl of Devonmont, sat on his bed in the upper hall of the Headmaster’s House at Harrow, where he’d lived for three months with sixty other boys.
Today marked the beginning of his first holiday from Harrow; most of the other boys had already been fetched by their families. His trunk was packed. He was ready.
But what if no one came? Would he have to stay at Harrow, alone in the Headmaster’s House?
Mother and Father would come. Of
course
they would come. Why wouldn’t they?
Because Father thinks you’re a sickly weakling. That’s why he packed you off to school—to “toughen you up.”
His chin quivered. He couldn’t help that he had asthma. He couldn’t help that he liked it when Mother showed him how to play the pianoforte, which Father called “dandyish.” And if he sometimes hid when Father wanted to take him riding, it was only because Father always berated him for not doing it right. Then Pierce would get so mad that he would say things Father called “insolent.” Or worse, he’d start having trouble breathing and get panicky. Then Mother would have to come and help him catch his breath, and Father
hated
that.
He scowled. All right, so perhaps Father
would
leave him to rot at school, but Mother wouldn’t. She missed him—he knew she did, even if she didn’t write very often. And he missed her, too. A lot. She always knew just what to do when the wheezing started.
She
didn’t think playing music was dandyish, and
she
said he was clever, not insolent. She made him laugh, even in her infrequent letters. And if she didn’t come for him . . .
Tears welled in his eyes. Casting a furtive glance about him, he brushed them away with his gloved fist.
“What a mollycoddle you are, crying for your parents,” sneered a voice behind him.
Devil take it. It was his sworn enemy, George Manton, heir to the Viscount Rathmoor. Manton was five years older than Pierce. Nearly
all
the boys were older. And bigger. And stronger.
“I’m not crying,” Pierce said sullenly. “It’s dusty in here, is all.”
Manton snorted. “I suppose you’ll have one of your ‘attacks’ now. Don’t think I’ll fall for that nonsense. If you start wheezing with
me,
I’ll kick the breath out of you. You’re a poor excuse for a Harrovian.”
At least I can spell the word. You couldn’t spell
arse
if it were engraved on your forehead.
Pierce knew better than to say that. The last time he’d spoken his mind, Manton had knocked him flat.
“Well?” Manton said. “Have you nothing to say for yourself, you little pisser?”
You’re an overgrown chawbacon who picks on lads half your size because your brain is half size.
Couldn’t say that one, either. “Looks like your servant’s here.” Pierce nodded at the door. “Shouldn’t keep him waiting.”
Manton glanced to where the footman wearing Rathmoor livery stoically pretended not to notice anything. “I’ll keep him waiting as long as I damned well please. I’m the heir—I can do whatever I want.”
“I’m the heir, too, you know.” Pierce thrust out his chest. “And your father is just a viscount;
mine’s
an earl.”
When Manton narrowed his gaze, Pierce cursed his quick tongue. He knew better than to poke the bear, but Manton made him so angry.
“A fat lot of good that did you,” Manton shot back. “You’re a pitiful excuse for an earl’s son. That’s what comes of mixing foreign stock with good English stock. I daresay your father now wishes he hadn’t been taken in by your mother.”
“He wasn’t!” Pierce cried, jumping to his feet. The glint of satisfaction in Manton’s eyes told Pierce he shouldn’t have reacted. Manton always pounced when he smelled blood. But Pierce didn’t care. “And she’s only half foreign. Grandfather Gilchrist was a peer!”
“A penniless one,” Manton taunted. “I don’t know what your father saw in a poor baron’s daughter, though I guess we both know what she saw in
him
—all that money and the chance to be a countess. She latched onto that quick enough.”
Pierce shoved him hard. “You shut up about my mother! You don’t know anything! Shut up, shut up, shut—”
Manton boxed Pierce’s ears hard enough to make
him
shut up. Pierce stood there, stunned, trying to catch his bearings. Before he could launch himself at Manton again, the servant intervened.
“Perhaps we should go, sir,” the footman said nervously. “The headmaster is coming.”
That was apparently enough to give Manton pause. And Pierce, too. He stood there breathing hard, itching to fight, but if he got into trouble with the headmaster, Father would never forgive him.
“Aren’t you lucky?” Manton drawled. “We’ll have to continue this upon our return.”
“I can’t wait!” Pierce spat as the servant ushered Manton from the room.
He would probably regret that after the holiday, but for now he was glad he’d stood up to Manton. How dare the bloody bastard say such nasty things about Mother? They weren’t true! Mother wasn’t like that.
The headmaster appeared in the doorway accompanied by a house servant. “Master Waverly, your cousin is here for you. Come along.”
With no more explanation than that, the headmaster hurried out, leaving the servant to heft Pierce’s trunk and head off.
Pierce followed the servant down the stairs in a daze. Cousin? What cousin? He had cousins, to be sure, but he never saw them.
Father himself had no brothers or sisters; indeed, no parents since Grandmother died. He did have an uncle who was a general in the cavalry, but Great-Uncle Isaac Waverly was still fighting abroad.
Mother’s parents had been dead for a few years, and she had no siblings, either. Pierce had met her second cousin at Grandfather Gilchrist’s funeral, but Father had been so mean to the man one time at Montcliff—the Waverly family estate—that he’d left in a huff. Father didn’t seem to like Mother’s family much. So the cousin who was here probably wasn’t one of Mother’s.
Pierce was still puzzling out who it could be when he caught sight of a man at least as old as Father. Oh. Great-Uncle Isaac’s son. Pierce vaguely remembered having met Mr. Titus Waverly last year at Grandmother’s funeral.
“Where’s Mother?” Pierce demanded. “Where’s Father?”
Mr. Waverly cast him a kind smile. “I’ll explain in the carriage,” he said, then herded Pierce out the door. A servant was already lifting Pierce’s trunk onto the top and lashing it down with rope.
Pierce’s stomach sank. That didn’t sound good. Why would Mother and Father send a relation to pick him up at school? Had something awful happened?
As soon as they were headed off in the carriage, Mr. Waverly said, “Would you like something to eat? Mrs. Waverly sent along a nice damson tart for you.”
Pierce liked damson tarts, but he had to figure out what was
going on. “Why did you come to fetch me home? Is something wrong?”
“No, nothing like that.” Mr. Waverly’s smile became forced. “But we’re not going to Montcliff.”
A slow panic built in his chest. “Then where are we going?”
“To Waverly Farm.” He spoke in that determinedly cheery voice adults always used when preparing you for something you wouldn’t like. “You’re to spend your holiday with us. Isn’t that grand? You’ll have a fine time riding our horses, I promise you.”
His panic intensified. “You mean, my whole family is visiting at Waverly Farm, right?”
The sudden softness in his cousin’s eyes felt like pity. “I’m afraid not. Your father . . . thinks it best that you stay with us this holiday. Your mother agrees, as do I.” His gaze chilled. “From what I gather, you’ll have a better time at Waverly Farm than at Montcliff, anyway.”
“Only because Father is a cold and heartless arse,” Pierce mumbled.
Oh, God, he shouldn’t have said that aloud, not to Father’s own cousin.
He braced for a lecture, but Mr. Waverly merely laughed. “Indeed. I’m afraid it often goes along with the title.”
The frank remark drew Pierce’s reluctant admiration. He preferred honesty when he could get it, especially from adults. So he settled back against the seat and took the time to examine the cousin he barely knew.
Titus Waverly looked nothing like Father, who was dark-haired and sharp-featured and aristocratic. Mr. Waverly was
blond and round-faced, with a muscular, robust look to him, as if he spent lots of time in the sun. Pierce remembered now that his cousin owned a big stud farm with racing stock.
Most boys would be thrilled to spend their holiday in such a place, but Pierce’s asthma made him less than eager. Or perhaps Manton was right, and he really was a mollycoddle.