Anth - Mistletoe & Magic

by Mistletoe

  Mr. Goodman stepped easily aside, and Mr. Rose, deprived of his target, stumbled past, unable to stop before running crown-first into a supporting post of the loft. He crashed down upon Scrooge's coal scuttle with a clamoring of metal and lay still.

  Mr. Goodman bent and picked up the spectacles in the following silence, and wiped them carefully with his kerchief before handing them back to Catherine. "I'm terribly sorry about all this," he said. 'Til take him back to the inn."

  "Oh no, Mr. Goodman, I couldn't ask that of you," Catherine said, and found to her surprise that she was shaking. She did not know if it was her own anger, Mr. Rose's unkind words, or the narrowly averted violence that had her trembling so.

  "You do not need to ask. The man had too much to drink, and was not in his right senses. Please, try to forget what he said." He met her eyes, and the calm strength there helped to steady her, making her feel as if he held her safe in his arms. Her breathing evened out.

  "You are being too kind," Papa said, coming up onto the stage and staling down at the sprawled form of Mr. Rose. "He deserves to be dragged to a snowbank and left there 'till spring"

  "He's not worth the worry."

  "Eh?" Papa asked.

  "Of being hung for murder," Mr. Goodman clarified. "It would spoil my appetite for Christmas dinner. I do not think he is worth that."

  Papa laughed. Amy went to Mr. Rose and glared down at him, with a look in her eye that said she'd very much like to kick him. Catherine felt her mother's hand on her shoulder. "It's time to go home," Mama said.

  Amy came over and took Catherine's hand, squeezing it in silent support. The gesture put her on the verge of tears. The three of them left, leaving Papa and Mr, Goodman to deal with the unconscious Mr, Rose,

  Chapter Eight

  "Good gracious, Robert, what did you put in this?" Catherine asked her brother, after taking a sip of his eggnog. It was proudly displayed in an enormous crystal bowl surrounded by cuttings of holly, in the center of a lace covered table. She would not have been surprised to see blue flames rising from the heavy yellow drink, for certainly there was more of the nog to it than the egg.

  "I made it according to George Washington's own recipe. My friend from Virginia sent it to me. He says his family has made it this way for nigh on a century."

  Catherine took another sip, her head filling with the fumes of brandy, whiskey, and God knew what else. "Then I am surprised they survived this long, and surprised as well that we were not left under British rule!"

  Her brother laughed and filled a cup for another of his guests. He and his wife, Mary, had opened their house to friends and family for Christmas Eve, and the spacious rooms were crowded with New Englanders who had suspicions there was something irreligious in having a spirited Christmas party, but were reluctantly enjoying themselves nonetheless.

  Catherine wandered over to where a fiddler was playing lively music, to which a few couples self-consciously danced. Children raced about from room to room, playing their own games, and in another room the more sedate sat and conversed near the tree, its candles lit and carefully watched by more than one eye, lest fire should break out.

  Even as she watched guests and conversed with friends, part of her was constantly searching for Mr. Goodman. There was a small commotion at the door, and Catherine's eyes went to the figure entering there. Disappointment pulled at the muscles of her face when she saw the formal, well-tailored coat, but then the man turned and it was the face she sought above the wool muffler, bearskin nowhere in evidence.

  After that embarrassing spectacle at the barn, she had become leery of any move that might be considered forward or flirtatious on her part. She did not want anyone thinking she had the heart of a whore, and so although every muscle urged her to go and greet him she checked the impulse, holding back with a shyness that was new and painful.

  She stood half-hidden beside a potted palm, watching as the maid took Mr. Goodman's outerwear, and Robert went to welcome his friend. She willed him to look at her, to see her, and smile and come join her. She willed him to take her hand and lead her out to dance; to stand close and smile down into her eyes; to hold her hand against his chest and ask her not to return to New York, but to stay here with him, forever, as his wife and the woman with whom he would share his bed.

  He looked her way, and their eyes locked. She knew that all she felt was writ plainly in her eyes. "Heart of a whore," she heard Mr. Rose say in her head. She glanced away and to the side, her lids lowered, and then long seconds later she looked toward him again. The entryway was empty.

  The heat of embarrassment touched her cheeks. For all that Mr. Goodman had defended her in the theater, perhaps he felt that she had deserved Mr. Rose's insults. Part of her believed he would be right to do so.

  Miss Linwood was even lovelier than the first time he had seen her, Will thought as she met his eyes from across the room. Her gaze was intense upon him, hungry and yet still. The dark green fronds of a palm formed tiger stripes across her breast, bringing to mind a great cat lurking in the jungle. She was wearing that same burgundy dress he had so admired before, its dark folds inviting touch like an animal's pelt.

  She broke the stare, suddenly glancing away in a bashful gesture that was not in character with the woman he knew. It took only a moment to understand that it was the altercation with Mr. Rose that had done this to her, that had made her doubt her natural instincts.

  For causing that moment of Miss Linwood's self-doubt, Will would gladly stuff Mr. Rose through a hole in the ice of the skating pond. He had wanted to do much worse to the man at the theater, but the stricken look on Miss Linwood's face had stopped him. Further violence would have served only to distress her more. No, far better to let Mr. Rose lie before her in his drunken stupor, knocked senseless of his own doing, and then gallantly volunteer to remove the offal from her sight.

  "Will, you must say hello to Mr. Abernathy," Robert was saying, and pulled him away before he could protest.

  Mr. Abernathy, the elderly president of a local bank, began yammering at him in words he could not understand. He saw the man's mouth moving, bits of spittle on his lips, but it was just noise to him, his thoughts obsessed with Miss Linwood and her hungry gaze. Countless impatient minutes went by as he sought holes in the conversation through which to bolt, and then at last he was free. He went in search of her.

  She was no longer near the palm, nor was she in the crowd around the table with its great vat of eggnog. He went from room to room, searching, replying to the greetings of others with only a fraction of his attention. Where had she gone?

  "Miss Linwood," a hoarse, low voice said behind her.

  She turned, happily expectant, then stepped back when she came face-to-face with Mr. Rose. "What are you doing here?" she exclaimed, and felt a sudden queasiness in her stomach, her heart beating rapidly in what was almost fear. She was in a hallway, having just come from the washroom, and at the moment there was no one else about.

  "Please, let me apologize," he said, grasping her hand. "there is so much I need to say to you."

  "We have nothing left to say," she said, trying to control her voice.

  "Please. Hear me out." He squeezed her hand, his eyes pleading. "You can give me that much."

  She didn't want to talk to him, didn't want to be in his presence at all, nor did she want Mr. Goodman to come upon them together and think worse of her, but Mr. Rose did not look like he would be easily sent away.

  "Please," he said again.

  "Not here," she said brusquely. It was not physical harm she feared from him, but another raw, emotional confrontation. If it could not be avoided, at least this time it could happen in private. After a quick moment of thought she led him down a different, unlit hall to the sunroom that had been shut up for the winter, its wicker furniture covered in sheets. She

  could see her breath on the cold air, the room dark and forlorn out of season, illuminated only by the blue reflections of moonlight off the snow outside.<
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  "Miss Linwood—"

  "Mr. Rose," she interrupted fiercely, gathering her courage and going on the offensive. "1 thought I made myself quite plain in the letter I sent to you with the hair comb. Our acquaintance is at an end."

  "My behavior was unforgivable, I know that, but I am asking you to please hear me out. Please. Miss Linwood, you cannot fail to know how I feel about you. I love you. There! I confess it! I love you, and I cannot live without you. If you were to deprive me of all hope of making you my wife, I think I should have to kill myself"

  Catherine looked at him in honor. "You don't mean that. You can't!"

  "But I do." He dropped down to one knee, and taking her hand began to smother it in kisses.

  "Stop it, Mr. Rose! At once!" she ordered, jerking her hand from his grasp.

  "Many me, Catherine!"

  "No." There seemed no other way to say it, no way in which to soften her answer. She was completely repulsed by him. Even his drunkenness had been better than this, "I will not marry you, and I shall never change my mind."

  "I cannot live without you," he pleaded, tears in his eyes, his hands grasping at her skills. "I'll kill myself."

  She was furious that he would try to lay that guilt upon her. "I will not accept responsibility for your actions, Mr. Rose," she said harshly, trying to hide the quavering of her voice, hoping that her words were true. "You will leave this house, and never speak to me again. Good-bye." She yanked her skirts out of his hold and left the room, slamming the door behind her against the sound of his sobs.

  In the empty hall she suddenly had to lean against the wall, her knees shaking and her breath short, nausea roiling her stomach. The muted sobbing quieted, and then she heard the outside door to the sunroom open and then swing shut, and she knew Mr. Rose had at last gone. She closed her eyes and listened gratefully to the silence.

  Minutes passed, and then she heard a concerned male voice, its timbre familiar and welcome. "Miss Linwood, are you unwell?"

  Catherine opened her eyes, and saw Mr. Goodman silhouetted against the faint light from the end of the hall. She released a shaky breath. "No, just a bit shaken. Mr. Rose was here. He asked me to marry him, then threatened to kill himself if I refused." She felt more than saw the sudden tension her words created in him, and quickly added, "I turned him down, and he left. He offered me neither insults nor harm." And then, the guilt she had said she would not accept crept in. "Do you think he will do himself an injury?"

  Whatever feelings he was experiencing, Mr. Goodman held them under tight rein, asking only, "Was he drunk?"

  "I don't think so."

  'Then he should be out of danger's way for the moment. I'll send word to the inn to have someone keep an eye on him." She heard him take a breath, his hold on his temper apparently not quite as solid as she had assumed. "That was an unkind, manipulative thing of him to say to you, and I hope you do not allow it to trouble your thoughts. Mr. Rose is responsible for his own actions, and you are in no way to blame for whatever he does or does not do."

  She touched her temple, brushing back a wisp of hair, feeling the dampness of perspiration on her brow. She tried to meet Mr. Goodman's eyes in the dim light, still not as certain of her innocence as she wished to be. "Have I behaved badly toward him?"

  He came closer, to where she could make out his features. His expression showed no hint of judgment, his eyes telling her that he understood what she was feeling. "You did not behave badly. There is no way to save a heart from being crushed, when you cannot return its regard."

  Chapter Eight

  Page 370

  Did he mean the he would have to do the same to her? She gazed intently into his eyes, and suddenly knew it was not so, however much her fears may have tried to persuade her otherwise. This warmth in his eyes was meant for her alone, speaking of a desire that matched that in her own heart. A tingling awareness of his nearness ran across her skin. She wanted to touch him, and wanted him to touch her. She wanted to feel his lips pressed against hers, and his amis coming around her, enveloping her in the quiet strength that hid beneath his humble exterior.

  She swayed toward him, one hand rising to lie against the broad warmth of his chest. He inclined his head to where their lips were a bare inch apart, her breath mingling with his. She caught a faint scent of spices and soap from his skin, and felt his heart beating beneath her palm.

  They held the pose for an eternal moment, their breathing the only sound in the dark corridor, and then he reached up and clasped her hand on his chest, bringing it down. "Your family will be wondering where you've gone off to," he said, drawing back.

  She ducked her head, disappointment cold upon her skin. At his prompting she slid her hand up to the crook of his arm, and let him lead her back to the party.

  * * *

  It was almost 2:00 AM. and still Catherine could not sleep. Amy breathed heavily in her bed, only her face visible under the mound of covers, and the house was quiet. Despite the late hour, despite the eggnog from earlier in the evening, and despite the questionable relief of having made a final, irrevocable, face-to-face rejection of Mr. Rose, she could not rest.

  It was not the anticipation of Christmas morning that had her tossing and turning. It was that long moment in the hall, when she had been on the verge of kissing Mr. Goodman. He had known what she wanted, and had wisely, honorably, chosen against stealing a kiss from her in the dark hallway of her brother's house, while she was yet vulnerable from the trouble with Mr. Rose.

  Damn Mr. Goodman, and his noble heart. She had wanted that kiss.

  And what if she had gotten it? What if she had squeezed a declaration of love from Mr. Goodman, what would she have done then? Would she truly be willing to stay in Woodbridge, to be Mr. Goodman's wife, if he would have her?

  In a heartbeat.

  The opera, the symphony, the theater, the artists and the writers, the bustle and sense of something new around the next comer that was New York; all that she would gladly give up, perhaps even without Mr. Goodman to go to. She was weary of New York, and the lifestyle in which she did not fit except with constant effort. She preferred unsophisticated Woodbridge, where her awkward watercolor could hang upon a wall without comment. She could be herself here, and most especially she could be herself with Mr. Goodman.

  She heard a faint jingling of sleigh bells, jing a jing a jing, coming from outside, breaking into her thoughts. A reluctant smile sneaked its way onto her lips. Santa?

  Jing a jing a jing.

  Who would be out at this hour? She slipped from under the covers, and wrapping her robe around her against the chill, went to the window, picking up her spectacles on the way. She put them on, and moved aside the curtain to look at the moonlit night.

  A sleigh was coming down the middle of the icy lane, drawn by two bay horses. As she watched, it came to a halt and a figure in a bulky bearskin coat hopped out, rummaged in the bags of goods piled in back, and then came toward her house.

  She dropped the curtain, heart thumping, standing frozen for a moment, and then she threw off her robe and dashed for her clothes, Cursing under her breath at all the fastenings it took to get them on.

  Corsetless, her skirt half unbuttoned and her coat covering the equally undone state of her bodice, she dashed down the stairs in her socks and sat on the seat by the door, shoving her feet into her boots, wrapping the laces several times around her ankles in lieu of lacing them. She was out the door a second later, taking only a moment to notice the two small packages on the front step, running carefully on the icy ground to where the sleigh now waited, several houses down.

  She reached it just as Mr. Goodman returned from another house. He stopped in his tracks when he saw her. Her breath was coming in gasps after her slippery sprint, and she hung onto the side of his sleigh.

  "Miss Linwood!" he whispered loudly, "What in God's name are you doing out here?"

  "As if you should be the one asking me such a question, Mr. Goodman! What are you doing out
here, is more to the point," she whispered back, as conscious as he of how easily their voices would carry in the night.

  "It's a secret. No one was supposed to see me."

  "You might have thought to take the bells off your horses, if you were so anxious to go undetected."

  "I did," he said with exaggerated patience.

  "For heaven's sake, I heard them from my room," she said, moving toward the horses to point out his obvious error. She squinted, then moved her hands over the leather harnesses. There were no bells.

  He raised his brows at her from over the backs of the horses.

  "But… I heard them" she said. "Did someone else go by?"

  "You're the only moving creature I've seen. You know, Miss Linwood, you have an uncanny knack for catching me at tasks where I would prefer to remain undiscovered."

  "Poor you," she said, and gave him a mock pout. She climbed into the sleigh.

  "Miss Linwood! Come down from there!"

  "I am going with you. I couldn't sleep, and this promises to be much more entertaining than staring at the ceiling all night."

  He hesitated a moment longer, then climbed up next to her and took the reins, setting the horses in motion with a light slap. "I'm going to be out all night, you know. You're going to get very cold."

  She found the buffalo skin that was shoved to one side in a crumpled heap, and shook it out. "I shall be quite comfortable." As the horses trotted down the center of the street, it began to snow, light feathery flakes that fell gently around them. "Look, it's snowing," she said, then cocked her head to the side, frowning. "It's odd to see that, with the moon so bright."

  He looked up at the night sky with her, to where the sky was nearly free of clouds. "Perhaps it is being blown off the trees and rooftops."

  "Mmm," she said doubtfully. There was no wind.

  The snow, as if possessed of a mind of its own, followed them in gently gusting flurries as they made their rounds of the town, and traveled out to the neighborhoods where the mill workers lived with their large families, Mr. Goodman stopping at houses where there were children and leaving gifts upon the doorstep. the snow swirled behind them as they drove out to farms, and it covered their tracks when they left, removing all traces of their passing. At the far edge of her hearing, Catherine thought she could detect the faint jingling of sleigh bells.