A Yuletide Treasure

by Cynthia Bailey Pratt

“And all went well?”

  “Apparently so. Furthermore, she writes that she feels she need not stay more than another week or so. The nurse has proven to have a satisfactory grasp of her duties.” She didn’t mention that this was the second nurse and the third nursery maid. The first servants had been dismissed almost as soon as Mrs. Twainsbury arrived. “So you see, ma’am, I shall not have to impose upon you much longer.”

  “Imposition?” Lady LaCorte repeated as if her earlier hostility had been only a joke. “You’ve been an exemplary guest, helpful, courteous and unobtrusive. We shall miss you, Tinarose most of all.”

  “I like her very much.”

  “She’s a dear child. I’m afraid I haven’t been the most attentive parent of late. She feels the loss of her father keenly. When he was at home, they were all but inseparable.”

  Camilla nodded, remembering her own father so well. “I don’t know that anything you could have done would help her. We each must find our own way through grief.”

  “You are very wise for one so young. I won’t scruple to confess that when you first came among us, I was suspicious of your motives.”

  “Were you, ma’am?” Camilla said noncommittally. She recalled Sir Philip telling her how much Lady LaCorte dreaded the thought of losing her home to some interloping female.

  “I believe you may remember how very rude I was to you?”

  “No, I have no recollection of it at all.”

  Lady LaCorte laughed, pressing her hand against her side. “I know now that I was foolish to be so concerned. I thought you were another of those low, scheming creatures who besiege my poor brother-in-law.”

  “I’m not interested in his title.”

  “Oh, they buzzed about him even before he inherited here. There’s something about very dark hair and those light eyes that draws the ladies like bees to honey. My husband was not so handsome, but he and I never wanted anyone else.”

  “I envy you that,” Camilla said. “For all that has happened, I envy you the security of knowing that your husband loved you.”

  Lady LaCorte pressed her hand to her cheek, catching the sparkling tear. “Yes. I had that at any rate.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. I don’t wish to overset you. That was tactless of me.”

  Lady LaCorte chuckled, despite the tears that still glittered in her eyes. “I wish some of my friends had half your tact. If you only knew how many dreadful letters and visitors I’ve received in the last several months. Condoling with me on the one hand, terrifying me with tales of miscarriages, stillbirths, and other horrors on the other. I’ll never understand why women feel compelled to tell other women the worst sort of stories at a time like this.”

  Camilla could only look sympathetically. Bearing Tinarose’s concern in mind, Camilla wanted to encourage her ladyship’s lighter mood and not again cast her into the dismals.

  “I don’t mean to frighten you,” Lady LaCorte said. “No doubt it will be different when your turn comes.”

  “I doubt it. Some of the women at home are dreadful gossips and pass along every tale they hear, proclaiming that they only speak as they do because ‘I thought you would like to know....’ ”

  “That’s it, exactly. They are all so eager to tell you, from motives of purest charity, of course, all those things you have fought so hard to drive from your thoughts. As if I needed to be reminded that sometimes dreadful things happen.”

  “Or as if I wanted to know that one of my beaus was seen at the Assembly with another young lady, far prettier and better dressed than I could ever hope to be. Not that they saw her themselves—no, it is invariably a secondhand report.”

  “Or the disaster happened to the sister of a cousin’s old schoolmate. Yes, I know that one. Heaven preserve us from ‘kind friends.’ “

  “Heaven preserve us from our ‘own good,’ ” Camilla echoed with a shudder.

  Lady LaCorte laughed again, more freely than Camilla had ever heard her, though still tinged with bitterness. “My favorite is always ‘I know you better than you know yourself,’ usually as a preface to some piece of advice you’d not take if your soul depended upon it. I had a maiden aunt who was fond of that phrase. She also liked ‘When I was your age.’ Which we knew to be impossible. She could never have been younger than fifty-five, even when she was a babe in arms.”

  “We?” Camilla asked.

  “I have three sisters and two brothers. We are scattered to the winds, these days. My younger brother emigrated to America, two sisters married attorneys, another teaches school in Winchelsea, and my older brother is a gentleman farmer in the north. He was always my favorite. If... If by some miracle, this child should prove to be a boy, I want to name him after Tom.”

  “An excellent name.”

  “I think so. Although I loved my husband dearly, I never cared much for the name Myron. It’s Greek, of course. So is Philip. I think his father was fond of Ancient Greece.”

  “He must have anticipated the modern madness for anything that smacks of ancient glories.”

  “When Myron and I first came to this house, there were the most dreadful copies of Greco-Roman statues in every corner and cranny. Over the years, I have arranged their disposal. I remember I gave one to old Dr. March. I believe he set it up in his back garden. It’s all right for him. He’s used to looking at naked torsos.”

  They went on talking, laughter coming more often and more easily as the minutes slipped past. Though Camilla never ceased calling her formally as ma’am or Lady LaCorte, and the older woman never forgot Camilla’s innocence, they found much common ground in their shared sense of the ridiculous and absurd. Yet, despite her unexpected enjoyment of Lady LaCorte’s company, Camilla was prey to the curious sense that Lady LaCorte was holding something back.

  When Mavis came in to give Lady LaCorte her strengthening cordial, both ladies blinked in surprise at the carriage clock on the mantelpiece. “It can’t be time for that yet!” Lady LaCorte said in protest.

  “Tis, my lady. Regular as clockwork.”

  Mavis gave her mistress a small wineglass filled halfway with water, then a small brown bottle. Lady LaCorte tipped some purple-brown liquid into the glass and, giving back the bottle, stirred the mixture with a glass rod.

  “Vile stuff,” she said. Grimacing, she tossed it off with the ease of a dedicated toper; then her expression grew even more squeezed as if she’d bitten into a lemon or tasted alum.

  “Thank heavens it’s only twice a day.” She sighed heavily and resumed her easy position on the chaise, her legs out in front of her, her back against the velvet-covered back.

  “I should go and let you rest. What Dr. March will think of me for chattering at you for so long.”

  “No, wait a moment. Thank you, Mavis. That will do.”

  When the door closed behind the little maid, Lady LaCorte took a firm grip on Camilla’s wrist. “Please be so good, Miss Twainsbury, to open that door, to see if she’s listening,” Lady LaCorte said in an urgent undertone.

  “Why should she?” Camilla asked.

  The tug on her arm spoke of desperation. “Go see.”

  More curious than concerned, Camilla did as she asked and reported back smartly. “Not a mob-cap to be seen,” she said.

  “Good. Sit down. Miss Twainsbury, I’m most reluctant to bring this up now....”

  Camilla sat down and leaned close to catch the hurrying words that tumbled out. “If something isn’t done very soon, not only will the children have almost no gifts, but the servants, too, will go away from Christmas empty-handed.” She stopped, swallowed as if the next words took great effort. “If you could see a way to possibly help me, Miss Twainsbury?”

  “Of course,” Camilla said, reassuringly patting her hand. “Whatever you want to do, let me know. I’ll be more than glad to assist in any way possible.”

  “You really are a very good creature. I’m determined, you see, not to let my husband’s... absence ... interfere with our usual holiday festivitie
s. But, alas, in my present state, I can hardly tiptoe lightly into the attics for that special box or scramble up and down ladders arranging the holly and the ivy. If you will be my mobility, Miss Twainsbury, I believe I can give my children the kind of Christmas-tide I wish to give them.”

  Camilla felt certain that it had cost Lady LaCorte to thus approach a girl she did not care for in order to ask a favor. Aware of Lady LaCorte’s jealousy, Camilla felt the only answer was to reiterate what had already been said. “I will do whatever I can to make Christmas at the Manor into an absolute delight. You have my word on that, Lady LaCorte.”

  Chapter Eleven

  In the late afternoon, with the golden light of a clear winter’s day sifting through the library curtains, Philip paced before the windows. As he came to each turn, he shot an anxious glance at Camilla’s bent head as she sat on the sofa, reading. In a burst of white-hot creativity, he’d written an entire chapter in one night. His right hand still felt cramped, and the pages, ill-spelled and ink-spattered, showed the effort. Also, his head ached from frustration.

  All day, he’d attempted to steal half an hour of Camilla’s time, longing to hear her opinion of what he’d done. Yet she always seemed too busy to draw aside. Ever since she’d spent an hour closeted with Beulah two days before, she’d been scurrying about like a home-loving mouse, up attic and down cellar, whispering the corner with Tinarose or one of the other two children. When she wasn’t afoot on some errand, she was sitting, her hands full of busywork, with Nanny Mallow. Finally, he’d cornered her by promising her an uninterrupted tea. Uninterrupted, that was, by everybody but himself.

  Though he paused, hardly breathing, when she laughed and tried to peek when she made a pencil mark on a page, he was distracted from her reaction to what she read by the unexpected charm of her appearance. Something had changed her in just the two weeks since she’d come.

  He remembered thinking when he’d first met her that she was rather ordinary, except for her eyes. Her hair had been scraped back from her forehead, and her clothes had hung upon her. Yet more had changed than just her softer hair and a more refined fit. Perhaps she’d gained a little weight Certainly her cheeks were no longer as pale as wax. Yet none of these satisfied his curiosity. Something else had changed her. Or perhaps the change was within himself. Certainly she now seemed one of the handsomest girls he’d ever seen.

  At last, she turned over the last page of manuscript and straightened with a sigh.

  Philip, alive to every nuance of her behavior, came to pour her out a fresh cup. “That did not sound like the sigh of a girl enchanted by a tender love scene,” he said. “Please correct me if I am wrong.”

  “Oh, no,” she said brightly. “It was very romantic, indeed. The way he leapt over the garden wall to assure her that he still loves her despite everything was very affecting.”

  “Camilla,” he said in his deepest tone, “tell the truth. I’m an author; I can stand it.”

  She raised her hands as if to disavow responsibility. “Come now, Sir Philip. I’m no critic.”

  He laughed. “This from the girl who told me to my face that my characters, wholly imaginary beings created from my own head, wouldn’t possibly behave as I had written. Not to mention the girl who insisted that I rewrite half a chapter to save the family dog from a very pathetic fate.”

  “Too pathetic ...,” she murmured, showing the dimple that only appeared when she knew she was being wicked.

  “Mia! No critic, indeed.” He handed her a teacup, prepared with half a spoon of sugar and no more than a drop of milk just as she liked it. “Go on,” he urged again after she’d taken a sip. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. I swear it. Only...”

  “Yes? You know how I value your judgment.”

  This time, she sighed in resignation. “I don’t know quite ... It’s no more than the smallest ghost of a feeling. I hardly know how to express it.”

  He waited for her to resolve her doubts, delighting his eyes with the way one lock of hair fell from the upswept coiffure to touch her cheek and the base of her throat. She wore a pearl gray round gown, one of her own, with an open collar rising only in the back so that all of the smooth column of her neck showed. Her skin was as white as a Grecian goddess carved in marble, but her warmth suffused the marble with rose. Philip made a mental note to describe his heroine that way, which did not diminish how he felt about Camilla. He’d already noticed certain traits of hers transferring themselves to his fictional creation.

  Then she spoke. “I feel as if, for all Lucien’s pretty speeches, he’s holding back.”

  “Holding back?” he prompted when she paused again.

  “No, that’s not it,” she said hesitatingly. “It’s as if there’s a certain calculation that influences all his actions and speeches. I feel as if he doesn’t mean what he says in a deeper way, as if he’s only speaking of his love to persuade her not to betray him. Oh, I’m putting this very badly.”

  “No, no. I understand what you mean, I think. How can I improve it, do you think?” He smoothed his hair. “It’s not easy to put sincerity on a page with black ink,” he said. “Shall I fill my bottle with purple, do you think?”

  “No, Sir Philip,” she said with some relief in her tone. “Your handwriting is difficult enough.”

  He picked up the ink-daubed pages and rifled through them. “I shall reread it myself. Perhaps that will show me how to improve it.”

  Camilla seemed about to speak but turned away.

  “Camilla...,” he began, tossing down the pages and following her. “What else?”

  “Nothing. Do you think we’ll be able to go riding again tomorrow? I need the exercise, and I hope to find a few necessities in the village.”

  “Camilla?”

  She would not turn toward him, still concealing her eyes, those talkative eyes. Philip touched her hand as he’d done before. Yet, suddenly, it wasn’t enough. He wanted his arm about her waist, her body turning toward his, his hand on her cheek to bring her lips under his. But it would be unseemly, improper, and the most natural thing in the world.

  Before he could either conquer his need for her or surrender to it, she was returning the pressure of his fingers, though still with face averted. “I’m afraid....”

  “Ah, don’t be.”

  “I think... I fear that this lack is not in Lucien. I think it may be in the author, Sir Philip.”

  “Don’t you think you could stop calling me sir?” he said tenderly. “You have been Camilla to me now for days.” He paused in the very instant of raising her hand to his lips. “What do you mean? You’re afraid the lack is in me.”

  She nodded and let her fingers slip from his. Somehow that hurt him more than her words.

  “Come and sit down,” he said.

  “No, I... I’ve said too much as it is. No doubt I am a fool with too much imagination. I should go. The children and I have some things to do together. I promised.”

  “No. Camilla, please.” Philip motioned to the sofa. “Please sit down and just talk to me. About anything you like. Have you heard from your mother today? I saw there was a letter from her in the post Merridew collected.” He wondered if Mrs. Twainsbury’s letter had overset her. He wondered if he had, by some unconscious error caused by his exhaustion last night, written something in his chapter that she should not have read. He couldn’t have mistakenly used her name in place of his heroine’s? It was possible, considering how much he’d begun to identify one with the other.

  “As a matter of fact, there was. She says that my little niece is of such a lusty disposition that she feels no qualms in cutting her visit short. She’s very grateful to you for permitting me to stay at the Manor for so long.”

  “Grateful? It is we who should be grateful to her. It’s difficult to imagine this house without you in it. I know Beulah feels the same way. You know that Tinarose does.”

  “I hope you will allow her to visit us. Mother is quite taken with her already,
just from what I have written.”

  “You write to her about us?”

  “Naturally. I have no wish to keep secrets from my mother.” She looked away then, though she’d been giving him furtive glances once the subject changed from his emotional shortcomings. Instantly, Philip was agog to know what secrets she was keeping from Mrs. Twainsbury. He also wanted acutely to know what she’d written about him.

  “Can you tell me now, do you think?” He sat back in the deep corner of the sofa, obtaining a full view of her.

  She sat curved in upon herself, as if the self-confidence that had been building in her day by day had all flown. Philip realized this was the difference he’d noticed. She neither gazed about her with an air of slightly affronted surprise as she had done at first, nor sat with lips tight and hands folded, too cowed to speak. It hurt him with quite a sharp pang to see her looking less strong than he knew her to be.

  “I’ve told you I hardly know what I mean. It’s a feeling, and one should not speak of feelings.”

  “Why not? They’re the only things we truly own.”

  “But such matters are too intimate. My mother says—”

  “Yes,” he said, not wishing to hear another of Mrs. Twainsbury’s aphorisms. The woman seemed to have made a perfect religion out of respectability and conformity, two altars at which he could never bring himself to worship for long. “I hoped we are close enough friends to talk about such things.”

  “I believe that we are ... Philip. Very well.” She folded her hands in her lap. “It seems to me that you hide your true self from everyone. I have heard often how kind and sympathetic you are and of your goodness to the people of Bishop’s Halt and your dependents.”

  “But in reality I’m a monster of selfishness and depravity?” he asked. “You’ve guessed my secret!”

  “Don’t joke. It’s as if you are playing the part of the good uncle and the kindly landlord when in reality you don’t want to be here at all. You want to go back to your other life. I hear it in your voice whenever you speak of your travels.”