“We’re going to go up to the attic and find some costumes, and you’re coming,” Ashley told him.
“Oh, I am?”
Julie nodded. “Sure. Let’s go find stuff and get all dressed up. It will be fun.”
She, Ashley, and Jordan went up to the attic. Ashley seemed to know her way around. There were trunks everywhere with all manner of apparel in them. Jordan, who had at first seemed to think it was babyish to dress up, began trying on jackets, frock coats, and high hats with great enthusiasm. Julie found a dress for herself, and a handsome old-fashioned pin-striped jacket for Jon.
Christie arrived, happy and flushed from her ride, when they were still digging into trunks.
“Christie, we’re finding costumes.”
“I know. I was out with Aaron. He told me to come back and find something to wear. It all starts at sunset, he told me. Mom! This stuff is great! Look at this dress… can I take this one?”
“I imagine so,” Julie said a little uncertainly. “You all must be very careful with these things.”
“We will, Mommy. Promise,” Ashley vowed solemnly.
“Think your dad will like this?” Julie asked the kids.
“Sure,” Christie said. She glanced at her watch. “Where is Dad? It’s getting late.”
“I guess he’s been out on the ice all day,” Julie said.
“Maybe you should go out and find him, Mom.”
“I need to get Ashley cleaned up and dressed—”
“I’ll help Ashley,” Christie said.
“Jordan could go—”
“I’m still a little shaky, Mom. I’m trying to keep my strength up for the party tonight,” he improvised.
Now that was a truckload of bull, and Julie knew it. But all three of her children were looking at her. She didn’t know how to tell them that she wasn’t angry at their father then, she was just feeling awfully awkward around him. Wanting to try, maybe, but afraid to do it.
“I want Christie to help me dress,” Ashley said stubbornly.
“Mom, please go find Dad,” Christie said quietly.
“Sure. Sure. You all get ready, and whenever it starts, go on down to the party. Dad and I will be along. And you, young lady—Ashley Radcliff—you stay with your sister and brother.”
“I will.”
“And you two keep an eye on her.”
“Promise,” Christie said.
Julie left the house, hugging her arms across her chest. It had gotten colder since she had come in. It was going to be dusk fairly soon, and after that, it would be dark almost immediately.
She walked briskly, coming down to the pond area. Jon was still there.
Alone.
He was skating beautifully. Around and around the pond. Skating came naturally to him, and in the last two days he’d managed to make himself look like a pro. Julie stood by the ice, watching him, for a very long time. Once, she had been far more adventurous.
More fun.
She would have been out there with him.
Christie was wonderful that night. She ran a shower for Ashley, helped her into the old-fashioned dress, and was gentle with her hair. “Okay, squirt, Jordan is dressing, and it’s getting late. Can I trust you for just a minute while I get dressed?”
“Can I sit on top of the stairway and watch for people to come?” Ashley asked.
“Sure! Just don’t move until I come for you.”
Ashley raced out along the hallway and plopped down at the top of the stairs.
Mary was coming tonight, and she was anxious to see her.
As she sat, she could see how shadows fell even inside the house while the sun was setting. It didn’t seem that the electricity was on; maybe it wasn’t needed. Someone had set out a zillion candles and they seemed to burn brighter as the sun fell.
Suddenly, the front door burst open. Jesse Wainscott, very handsome in his rakish hat and frock coat, came in the front door.
“Clarissa!” he called hoarsely.
Mrs. Wainscott suddenly appeared at the door of the drawing room where they had come the first night. The two looked at each other. They looked at each other in such a way that Ashley realized she wasn’t breathing. They looked at each other with so much hurt, and so much happiness.
Then they went rushing toward one another. Gliding, flying… racing.
He swept her into his arms and kissed her.
“Excuse me,” Ashley heard, and she turned. Mary was there. Mary put a finger to her lips as she tiptoed past Ashley down the stairs.
“Mommy, Daddy?” Mary called at the landing.
And then she went racing to them, too, just as the door opened and a young man came in.
The brother, Ashley knew. Christie’s friend, Aaron.
They greeted one another, laughing, hugging, talking, hugging again.…
“Our guests will be here any minute,” Clarissa said.
“Yanks arriving,” Jesse said with a grin.
“Rebs all over the place,” his son answered with mock sadness.
They laughed, and Ashley found herself leaping up just as the door opened and a host of people entered the room. They came from the night, from the darkness, and in minutes the house seemed to be full, and music was playing and handsome men and women were sweeping the floor in beautiful circles as they danced and danced.…
“Whoa, squirt! Will you look at all that?”
Jordan had come to the landing. He reached down for her hand. “Come on, Ash, let’s go see if we can try to dance to that, huh?”
She didn’t answer him. She just followed him down to the party.
“Jon!”
Jon had spent the entire day on the ice. Thinking. Wishing. Praying.
It was Christmas. Maybe a man never got too old or too worn out to pray for the best on Christmas.
He heard his name called and turned, saw Julie, and smoothly glided over to where she stood.
“Hey! How was your day?” he asked her.
“Great! But the day’s almost over. I picked out a costume for you; is that okay?”
“That’s wonderful. Thanks.”
“We should go in and clean up now. It’s almost dark.”
“Almost. Not quite.”
“You’ve gotten good.”
He gazed at her, brows arched. “Thanks. Why don’t you come out with me for a few minutes.”
“I told you… I’m afraid.”
She was afraid, but she hadn’t said no. Jon suddenly felt that it would be very important for them to spend time together, alone, now.
Afraid, but leaning on one another.
“I was hoping you’d come out,” he admitted to her huskily. “I left some skates for you by that tree stump at the pond’s edge.”
“Jon—”
“Please.”
He turned away from her, gliding swiftly out on the ice, spinning around the center.
“If I come out, will you come in?” she shouted.
“Yes!”
Jon could hear Julie muttering to herself. She walked around to the fallen tree where they had sat last night. She found the skates he had brought.
She laced them on as Jon slowly glided back to her.
She looked up at him, blue eyes very soft and pretty as she warned him, “You’re going to owe me for this one.”
“It’s almost Christmas. Give me this present, for old time’s sake.”
She hesitated and repeated, “I’m afraid.”
“We’re all afraid. Take a chance. On me.”
“If I stumble—”
“I’ll catch you. Trust me,” he told her.
She smiled hesitantly, then stood and accepted the hand he offered her. She wobbled out onto the ice. She started to slip. He held her securely. She was all right.
“You’re not bad,” he told her a second later as they moved over the ice. “Not bad at all for a Florida girl.”
“Thanks.”
With one arm around her steadying her, Jon carefully fol
lowed her strides with his own. In a few minutes, they were synchronized as they moved across the ice.
“You okay?”
“Sure.”
“Really?”
“No. I’m going to fall on my butt any minute.”
“I’ll let you in on a little secret. I already did that.”
“Jon?”
She was very serious then, her eyes wide and magical and very young, and he hadn’t thought that he’d ever live to see her looking at him the way she was looking at him now.
“Yes?”
She was going to speak, but suddenly her face went pale. He thought she was having one of her premonitions again, that she was going to panic and say that something was wrong with the children. And of course he’d agree, because there had been something last night. Something far more serious than Jordan had admitted. He just knew it.
“The kids?” he whispered.
“The ice!” she cried out.
Then he heard it. A splintering, cracking sound.
He couldn’t believe it. He had been on the ice all day. It had been as solid as granite.
But it wasn’t now.
Before he could even begin to move, Julie was suddenly screaming and the ice was giving way right beneath her.
She went down so fast that he wasn’t able to stop her. Her head went under the pool of water that formed in the great crack of ice. Jon shouted, falling flat down against the ice, desperately reaching for her. He just caught her wrists before even her hands could disappear into the dark void of water beneath them.
Chapter Sixteen
“Julie!” Her glove came free in his hand. He swore, catching her fingers again. “Julie, Julie!”
Her head bobbed to the surface. Her lips were blue; she was shivering. Her eyes met his in panic.
“Jon. Oh, God, Jon…”
“Julie, hold on, I’ve got you. I’m just inching back on the ice. I’ll drag you. Slowly, okay? We can’t crack any more of this, understand?”
She nodded. He moved backward. They heard a cracking again. He went still, then pulled very hard on her arms, trying to draw her body back up while he inched back toward the shallower shore area of the pond where the ice would be the firmest.
“Jon!” she whispered.
“Yeah.”
“You’ve got to let me go. This is all going to crack up in a minute.”
“I’ll never let you go.”
“You can’t let the kids be orphans!” she whispered.
“Julie, I told you to trust me.”
She nodded, keeping silent. He suddenly pulled himself up on his knees, and in doing so, managed to drag her out of the icy pool of water, and hard against him.
Soaking wet, shivering, sobbing, she leaned up on his chest. “You did it, you did it—”
“I told you to trust me!” he said, cocky now.
She smiled. And she kissed him with the coldest Mps he had ever tasted. It didn’t matter. It was a great kiss. Warm on the inside. Passionate. Grateful. Tender. Wonderful. Yet even as enwrapped as he was in that kiss, the sound of cracking ice was an instant warning that drew him from her.
“Jon,” she murmured, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”
“Julie, shush, will you? You should have, but the ice is cracking up more.”
“Hey, out there!” came a cry. It was Jesse Wainscott, Jon realized. Jesse and a group of friends. His guests had apparently arrived; his party was under way. The friends with him were all dressed up. Some in Union uniforms, with dark frock coats and slouch hats, some in Confederate gray, and some in simple old-fashioned dress. There must have been at least twenty people now hurrying from the slope that led down to the pond from the house.
Help was coming.
“Julie, hold very, very still,” Jon told her. “Listen. I’m easing you to my side. Look, there’s Jesse with a rope. Grab hold of it as soon as you can reach it.…”
Julie did as he told her. She rolled away from him, easing some of the strain from the ice as their weight evened out on it.
“Julie!” Jesse called to her. “Get the rope!”
Julie caught the line he had tossed her. “Slip it around your waist so that they can’t lose you,” Jon told her. She did as he ordered without question. Jesse and a friend started slowly pulling Julie in. The ice suddenly let out something like a shriek and began cracking again.
Jon tried to balance, but the sheet of ice on which he lay suddenly went completely vertical.
He felt the slashing pain of the cold water against his flesh. And he started to go down.
He couldn’t go down. He couldn’t risk losing the opening. He began to pray. God, forgive me for bitching! Give me a chance, please, God, one more chance.
He jackknifed his legs to shoot to the surface in the opening of the ice. He reached out a hand, and it was taken.
Julie. Julie had his hand.
“Julie!” he gasped out. He was shaking. Blue.
Freezing, drowning, and dying, probably. And he could still hear cracking ice.
“Julie, get out of here—”
“Trust me,” she told him.
He thought she smiled. She was trying to hold him so tightly. She couldn’t possibly have the strength to hold him much longer.…
She didn’t have to. Jesse was there. The men had rigged up more lines.
“Around your waist, Radcliff, you know the drill,” Jesse Wainscott told him cheerfully. “We’ll get you to the house and warmed up in no time.”
And miraculously, he was out of the ice. Men were cheering, laughing. He was being clapped on the shoulder. He was covered with one gray frock coat and one blue one, and then Julie, encompassed herself in borrowed wool, was at his side, and they were making their way back to the house with Jesse introducing him to his friends all the while.
The house looked wonderful. Warm.
Alive.
It was ablaze with lights. Candles burned everywhere. Couples danced across the polished floors to the cheerful sound of a half-dozen fiddles being played upon the stairway. Tables had been set up with punch, crystal cups, and all manner of fine food: hams, fowl, casseroles, cakes.
“Mommy! Daddy!” Ashley shrieked as they came in the front door. She came running to them, throwing herself against them. Jon and Julie hugged her instinctively in return; hugs never felt so good, Jon thought, as they did when they came right after you thought you’d never feel another hug again.
“Ashley, baby, you’ll get all wet and cold,” Julie said at last, easing Ashley away.
The fiddles stopped.
The dancers all paused and looked at them in surprise.
Clarissa came forward. “Julie, Jon! What on earth happened?”
“The ice, my dear,” Jesse informed her. “It cracked.”
“Oh, Jesse, how could such a horrible thing have happened here?” Clarissa cried with dismay.
“No harm done, my love. They’re a bit wet, and very cold, but alive and well,” Jesse said.
Christie had come over with a handsome young man in a Union uniform, who was quickly introduced as Aaron Wainscott. “Mom, Dad! Didn’t you even think to test the ice?”
Jordan stood next to her, shaking his head. “Parents can be so irresponsible! Didn’t you two think?” he demanded. “What did you think we’d do without you?” he asked softly.
Jon grinned sheepishly at his son. “I’m sorry, truly sorry. We’ll never do anything so careless again.”
“Never,” Julie vowed.
“Sorry, folks!” Jon said. “We certainly don’t mean to put a damper on the party.”
“Just go on up and get into a hot tub and get changed and we’ll have warm whiskey for you when you get back down,” Jesse said.
“Thanks,” Jon said. He looked around. It was a strange party, all these men dressed up like Yanks and Confederates and milling around together. What the hell, it was northern Virginia. “Thanks, you guys, all of you.” He saw that the two men he’d met by th
e oak the other night were two of the ones who had helped pull him and Julie out of the pond. “Thanks—you saved our lives.”
“Our pleasure,” one man replied. “Get on out of those things before you freeze your missus!”
Jon nodded. He and Julie doffed their borrowed wool coats and hurried up the stairs. Jon was already stripping off his clothing as he closed the door. Shaking, shivering, their teeth chattering as they told each other how scared they’d been, they finished discarding their icy wet garments in the too-small old-fashioned bathroom. Jon turned the shower on hot, insisting Julie get in.
“You get in.”
“You can go first—”
“Julie, go.”
“No, Jon, you’re bluer—”
“Julie—”
He paused, determined to dispense with the argument. There were times when it was quite convenient that Julie was fairly small and slim. He picked her right up and stepped into the shower stall with her.
Steam rose around them and hot water pelted deliriously down upon them.
“Okay?” Jon asked her as the water sluiced over them both.
“Okay,” she agreed, smiling. “Jon?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“For what?” The water ran through his hair, down his face, over his back. It was so damned good to be alive. “Julie,” he said, “I was the guilty party, remember?”
“But it’s Christmas, right? It’s all about forgiveness. It’s so amazing, the amount of things you can think of at once when you think you’re dying! I’ve been horrible, too self-righteous to forgive you—and you were right in a way! We had split up; I was naive to think that you’d become celibate because we weren’t together. It was just that you were so special to me—”
“Julie, Julie, you were special to me, too. That’s why it didn’t work with anyone else.” He grinned. “Literally,” he admitted.
“But it’s not just the past—”
“No, it’s the future,” he said. He took a deep breath. “Julie, we can’t change the world. Modern life is hard. Life is always hard—it’s part of the greater scheme, so it seems. We can’t change bad things, but we can help each other through them.”
“Jon,” she said breathlessly. “You hate your job.”
“I’m quitting my job. If you think we can make it if I do.”
A Magical Christmas Page 18