Timeless Christmas Romance

by Laurel O'Donnell et al.

  “Shortly afterward, I assume, as according to the old stories, it was designed by the same Lady Ballister who now haunts us. It was her pride and joy. Sir Joshua, in his rage, took an axe to the garden, but once he had calmed down a little, he regretted his hastiness and replanted much of it himself.”

  “What a horrid man, to regret destroying a garden but not his cruel treatment of his wife.”

  Richard shrugged. “He was a proud man, and a knot garden was a showpiece.”

  How cynical. He was most likely right, but she didn’t like the hard man Richard had become—or perhaps had always been. She strode away down one of the alleys and then slowed, reminding herself once again that she was equal to anything, including letting bygones be bygones—not that Richard had anything strenuous to do in that regard.

  She took a deep breath, determined to compose herself. “The garden hasn’t been neglected for long.”

  “No, my predecessor lived here, and he died less than a year ago.”

  “With servants to care for him? No ghost to scare them away?”

  “Oh, the house has always been haunted, but country people are used to the occasional ghost. She appeared rarely under previous owners, causing little trouble―except for the Ballister Curse.”

  “Curse? What curse?” She whirled away, unable to believe she was to be confronted with more folly, and turned to face him again. “For heaven’s sake, Richard! First a ghost, and now a curse?”

  He went on as if she hadn’t reacted so strongly. “It’s part of the same story and the reason I brought you out here, Edwina. For John’s sake, we discuss it as little as possible.” He blew out a sigh. “Let me start at the beginning. Sir Joshua and Lady Ballister had a young son, the only bright spot in their miserable marriage. She seemed willing enough to abandon the boy when fleeing with her lover, but―”

  “Because she wouldn’t have been able to take him,” Edwina retorted. How typical of a male to assume the unhappy wife didn’t care about her child. “Since her husband didn’t get on with her, he might have been willing to let her go, but not with his heir.”

  “Exactly so,” Richard said agreeably, and Edwina suppressed her further annoyance. In the midst of all the nonsense about ghosts, she refused to be thought irrational—particularly since irritation at Richard for agreeing with her was irrational. Oh, if only everything he said didn’t feel like a needle digging into her flesh. She took another nibble of the biting, tonic rosemary.

  “If she had not taken the necklace, all might have been well,” Richard said. “How can we know? In any event, not long after Sir Joshua imprisoned her in the tower, the boy sickened of a fever. She pleaded to be allowed to nurse him, but Sir Joshua refused, and within a few days the boy died.” He angled his chin toward the ornate stone bench in one of the squares. “That bench is a monument to him. Come, I’d like you to see it.”

  Edwina sighed and followed him slowly down the narrow, curving path toward the center of the square. “Poor woman. How ghastly for her.”

  “She believed he would have survived if she had been allowed to care for him, and perhaps she was right. We shall never know the answer to that either. In her grief she laid a curse upon the Ballisters—that no firstborn son would ever inherit.”

  Edwina tsked. “How absurd, but one can’t blame her for lashing out.”

  “There’s more to it,” Richard said. “The curse would remain in force until the necklace was returned to its rightful owner, the mistress of Ballister Grange.”

  Edwina tried to summon another retort, but none came.

  “Rather takes the shine of virtuous grief away from it, doesn’t it?” Richard said. “Particularly since when Sir Joshua married again, he flouted the curse by not giving the necklace to his new wife.”

  Edwina huffed. “But as you explained earlier, he may have had to pretend the necklace had gone with the vanished lover. Besides that, he had no reason to fear the curse, since his firstborn son had already died.”

  “But what of his descendants?” Richard said. “He could have bequeathed it to the current Lady Ballister, leaving instructions with his lawyer about where to find it.” He paused. “No, I think he was too proud to give in. He couldn’t let his first wife win.”

  They halted in front of the bench. “I thought seeing the monument would help you believe the history of the Grange. The stone is quite worn now, but one can easily make out the cherubs—rather mawkish, I’ve always thought, and quite a contrast to the inscription.” He read aloud the words on the back of the bench: “‘Sacred to the memory of John Ballister, who died through the neglect of a faithless mother.’”

  “Oh, how unfair of that horrid man. He wouldn’t even let her tend the boy!” She paused. “Another John. Is it a common name in your family?”

  “No, but my wife’s father was also John, and she wished to name her son after him.”

  Something inside Edwina tightened at the mention of his wife, but she quieted it. Surely she wasn’t jealous of a dead woman. “It seems that both Sir Joshua and his lady were dreadful people, but I don’t believe in curses any more than in ghosts.”

  Richard’s voice was chilly. “Nevertheless, since that time, no firstborn son of the owner has inherited the title and estate. My uncle, the previous baronet, didn’t believe in the curse, or perhaps he thought it had at last outrun its course. He had three healthy sons until about a year ago, when his eldest son—a grown man of twenty-five―died suddenly. That spring, he, his wife, and the two remaining sons died in a yachting accident. The boat foundered in a sudden squall and sank.”

  Edwina sucked in an appalled breath. So that was what Mrs. Cropper had meant when she’d said it wasn’t surprising that the eldest had died.

  “Needless to say, I never expected to inherit the title. Even if the curse was real, only the firstborn of my male cousins needed to have died to fulfill its terms.”

  “Oh, my God,” Edwina said, sinking down onto the bench. “John.”

  “Precisely—now the curse is upon the life of my son.”

  “But surely you don’t believe that,” Edwina said, unable to do anything but gape at Richard, trying to read his face. “Or in the ghost.”

  “I don’t know what I believe,” Richard said. “So far, the evidence points one way and rational thought the other. But that’s not the point.”

  “No, the point is that you’re encouraging your children to accept all this utter nonsense as fact. If you would but tell them, and insist, that there are no such things as curses and ghosts…”

  “I tried, but John has always been a sensitive boy with a powerful imagination. He’s also extremely stubborn, and once he gets hold of an idea, he doesn’t let go.” Richard shook his head. “He believes in the curse, and that’s all that matters. Lizzie believes as well and fears for her brother’s life.”

  Edwina tried to think what to say, what to do.

  “Belief is a significant factor in one’s thinking,” Richard said. “John doesn’t sleep as well as he used to, and he is not as robust now as when we first heard the news that I had inherited. Telling John not to be foolish, and that he has a full life ahead of him, only makes him worse. I fear that he will sicken and die merely from believing that that is what will happen.”

  “But death can happen to anyone at any time.”

  “Ah, but there’s more to the curse,” Richard said. “The first John Ballister died at Christmastide, and so have all the firstborn sons since then.”

  Anger and disbelief swarmed up inside Edwina. This whole story was completely, utterly absurd, and she intended to tell him so and then leave this place.

  Then she saw the anguish on Richard’s tired face, and her fury died away. “That’s why you’re in such a hurry to find the necklace, and why Mrs. Cropper says you must marry quickly. John fears he will die this Christmas.”

  Richard nodded.

  “But not every heir died as a child, so even if there were a curse, it might not take him
until he was quite old!”

  “And had a son of his own to fear for,” Richard said. “Believe me, we’ve been over this ad nauseam. If he dies young and I have no more sons, the curse will end by default.”

  “He sees himself as a sacrifice?” The cold of the stone bench seeped through Edwina’s gown, but it was nothing to the horror in her heart.

  Richard hunched a resigned shoulder. He lowered himself to sit next to her. “Perhaps it makes the prospect of dying young less dispiriting. At least he will be doing some good in the process.”

  “But he cannot guarantee that you will have no more sons,” she said.

  “I shan’t remarry if I don’t find the necklace, so he can guarantee exactly that.”

  “You don’t wish to marry again?” Now why, of all the questions she might ask, had she chosen that one?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “Not at all,” Richard said. “Why saddle myself with a wife if I don’t need to?” Mary had been a good wife, but she’d never got over her jealousy of Edwina. It didn’t matter that Richard was a faithful husband. What mattered was that he had loved Edwina passionately, while for Mary he felt only affection. Their marriage would have been far more pleasant if Mary had never known about Edwina, but after that day in the park, she’d made it her business to find out.

  He’d only ever wanted to marry one woman—the one sitting next to him—but there was too much mistrust between them now. If they could manage to get along for a while, it would be accomplishment enough.

  For now, but not for the future. He tried to imagine another woman here, his new wife, while Edwina stayed as governess, and knew at once that it was impossible. Despite all commonsense, his passion for Edwina had wakened from its long dormancy and clamored for his attention.

  He must ignore it. “However, a marriage of convenience is a minor sacrifice compared to the one John envisages.”

  Edwina stood, smoothed her skirts, and headed toward the house. “I daresay you will find someone suitable,” she said briskly.

  Richard followed. “I daresay.”

  After a silence, Edwina said, “John wants to experience a full life, poor boy. That explains why he is so desperate to learn as much as he can as quickly as possible.”

  “Yes, for it was his ambition to be a great scholar. It still is, I suppose, so he is studying himself to death instead of playing like any ordinary child.” Richard tugged at his gloves, straightening them unnecessarily. “He does not wish anyone to pity him and prefers that we not discuss it.”

  Edwina bit her lip. “What an appalling problem, but there must be some way of solving it.”

  “There is only one way: we must break the curse.”

  “There is no curse,” Edwina said through gritted teeth.

  “Perhaps not, but as long as John believes in it, there may as well be,” Richard said. “Therefore, I must find a way to break it that he will believe as well. Whether the Grange is really haunted is neither here nor there, but I must save my son. Hence my intention to bargain with the ghost.”

  Edwina turned, a slight frown creasing her brow. “Even assuming the ghost does exist—which I refuse to admit―why would she agree to your bargain? The necklace means a great deal to her. Why would she trust you with it when there is no Lady Ballister to give it to?”

  “Because she knows how much I care about my son?” He laughed humorlessly. “I suppose not, seeing as one must assume she knew the effect her curse would have on future generations.” He paused. “No, it will have to be because I have a reputation as an honest and reliable man. I cared about my wife, I do my best with my children, and I have never valued riches over human beings.” There it was, that sarcastic note entering his voice again. It served no useful purpose, so he must subdue it. “I may not be as pure in heart as Lizzie romantically assumes, but I don’t want the necklace for its monetary value.”

  “Because you don’t need the money,” Edwina said, hurrying through a gap in the holly hedge, flinging the words over her shoulder. “What if you were in debt? Would you be as sure of your motives then?”

  “I’m not in debt,” Richard said testily, “so that’s irrelevant.” And never had been, although he certainly knew what a debtor’s prison was like. What a piece of ill luck that had been. Ill-timed as well… Rather too much of a coincidence, now that he came to think of it...

  “So is what the ghost wants or doesn’t, because she’s not real,” Edwina said. “You can only find the necklace by searching for it.”

  “Which I am doing,” he said, changing direction. “Let’s go in by the front door.”

  “And what if you don’t find it? What will you do then?”

  “I’ll buy one and pretend to find that instead.”

  ~ * ~

  So much for honest and reliable. “That’s a horrid deception!”

  “If there is a ghost, and if she really does guard the necklace, I shall find it,” Richard said. “If she doesn’t exist, the necklace may still be here someplace, in which case I shall find it. If it isn’t here, there’s no harm in a charade.”

  “I suppose not,” she admitted, “but I don’t like the idea of deceiving John.”

  His worry lines deepened. “Nor do I, but I’ll do whatever I must to save him.”

  “I understand that, but if the ghost knows you would trick your son…” She huffed. “Oh, how absurd. Now I’m talking as if I believe she exists.”

  He smiled, and her heart turned over. Why must he make long-forgotten love well up inside her, when she had finally found sufficient reason not to despise him and was content with that?

  “If you were the ghost, would you give me the necklace?” he asked.

  “To save John? Yes, of course.” She dammed up the fountain of useless love. “For any other reason, definitely not.”

  His expression faded from rueful inquiry to scornful indifference. She knew she was being irrational—after all, of what value was a necklace to a ghost? At least a man could put it to good use, even if he was in debt―but when it came to Richard Ballister, she couldn’t afford to give a hypothetical inch.

  Be practical, then. Be as no-nonsense as he is. She halted, one foot on the bottom step of a graceful flight that led to the massive, carved front doors. “Setting aside the fact that ghosts don’t exist, how can you work on two assumptions at once? It’s impossible!”

  Richard was right behind her. “Why? It’s like having two different strategies at cards or chess. The next step depends on other factors, such as the fall of the cards and the opponent’s move.”

  She wasn’t sure she liked the sound of that; games were one thing and reality another. “I wonder why the ghost didn’t cause much trouble up till now, apart from the curse.” Oh, damn! She didn’t believe any of this nonsense, but once again she was acting as if she did. “Did no one else look for the necklace?”

  “Indeed they did. One of my predecessors even recorded where he searched. I think it’s the recent treasure seekers who have disturbed her, so to speak. The legend says the curse will end when the necklace is given to the rightful lady of the Grange—which it won’t be if a treasure seeker makes away with it.”

  “You make it sound as if the ghost wants the curse to end.”

  “John seems to think so, and why wouldn’t she? Perhaps she regrets her hasty action so long ago. Perhaps she is consumed with guilt for the sadness she has caused. Perhaps she can’t bear to harm another innocent firstborn son. I can only hope so.”

  Again, Edwina remembered the words that had awakened her in the night: You’re finally here, thank the Lord. Come, we must save him!

  No. Surely not. She hurried up the steps.

  “Do you see now why it doesn’t help to disagree with John’s conclusions?” Richard said.

  She shook off the memory of that voice. “Very well, I shan’t disagree anymore, but if I suddenly pretend to believe, he will see right through it.”

  “Perhaps you will come to believe,” Richar
d said. “The ghost may yet visit you at night.”

  Should she tell him about the voice? Trying to decide, she pretended to examine the carving on the doors, a woven geometric design vaguely reminiscent of the strapwork in the Great Hall.

  “Perhaps Lizzie’s footsteps woke you before the ghost had a chance,” he said, politely waiting to open the door—and then he turned. “Ah, here is our vicar. He doesn’t usually accompany John home, so I assume he wishes to meet you.”

  Thankful to avoid any more talk about the ghost, she followed him back down the steps. John ran up ahead of a grey, middle-aged man with a stoop and a tentative smile.

  “We got on wonderfully with Greek lessons today,” John said. He waved a sheaf of papers by way of proof. “Didn’t we, Mr. Bickford?”

  “Yes, indeed,” the vicar said. “No more Aesop for you. You’re a clever young fellow and advancing at a great rate. And this is the new governess—a lady who reads Latin! Unusual, but John is pleased, as he can spend more time with me on Greek.”

  Richard introduced them. “I hope you have the courage to remain at the Grange a while, Mrs. White,” the vicar said.

  She shook his hand. “I hope so, too.”

  “There are a couple of strangers at the Duck’s Head, Sir Richard,” Mr. Bickford said. “I don’t blame Teas for giving them lodging—everyone’s so poor hereabouts, and worse since no one will stay at the Grange—but I fear they have come to make a nuisance of themselves.”

  “I’m sure you’re right,” Richard said, “but the dog will warn me, and I’ll load a weapon or two just in case.”

  Mr. Bickford shook his head sadly. “What a pity you had to get rid of your gamekeeper. You shouldn’t have to defend your own house.”

  Richard shrugged. “Until I find the necklace, I have no choice.”

  The vicar said his goodbyes and ambled away, tut-tutting. “Far too attractive for a governess,” he murmured well before he was out of earshot, “widow or not.”