She bobbed a curtsey and withdrew, no doubt to find a looking glass with which to admire herself. The footmen had opened their presents and were preparing to quit the room when I motioned for William IV to come near.
“My lady?”
I handed him a small box. “This is not for you, William. It is for Rose.”
He opened it and lifted out a plain, slender gold ring. “I do not understand, my lady.”
Nin appeared then, rubbing thoughtfully against my ankles as I talked to William. “You cannot marry the girl without a ring. I know she is with child, and furthermore, I know you have been playing at being a ghost in order to visit her chamber at night.” I had initially suspected that a small woman might have found it difficult to master pattens, but later it occurred to me a man would find it equally challenging to walk gracefully in them. As part of his enquiries at church, Brisbane had questioned the maid who witnessed the apparition. She claimed the spectre was frightfully tall, something quite over eight feet, but allowing for exaggeration her description confirmed my suspicions. I smothered a smile at the notion of poor, besotted William cloaking himself in phantom draperies to visit his ladylove. “My husband has made enquiries in the village and has learned you come from a family of farmers. As it happens, Lady Hermia says Wee Ned is ready to leave work, and Whittle will need someone with a strong back to replace him. Wee Ned is above seventy, you know, and his rheumatism is playing up. He means to go and live at the seaside with his sister which means his cottage will be empty. None of the other gardeners have need of it, so it is yours if you want the position.”
“A cottage?”
“Not a large one, but big enough to keep a wife and child. You will not be rich, but I think you could be happy.”
His mouth worked, but no sound came out for a long moment. “My lady, I do not know how to repay you—” He broke off. Nin stared up at him adoringly then gave a pretty little yowl.
I was not so kind “Well, to begin, you can tell me what you did with the rings,” I said softly.
His brows flew up. “What rings?”
“The two rings that have gone missing from the Abbey. One was a sentimental coral piece of Lady Hermia’s, but the other was an emerald belonging to his lordship and quite valuable. If you give them to me, I will return them and nothing further need be said. I know you have been in difficulties because of the situation with Rose, but so long as the property is restored, there is no reason what you have done cannot be overlooked as a youthful peccadillo.”
“But I have stolen nothing!” His face had gone so white his freckles stood out starkly against the pale skin.
I stared at him. “But if you did not take them, who did?”
Just then, Nin pounced upon a piece of tinsel, clamping it firmly in her jaws. She trotted off, her tail waving sinuously. And I knew.
“Hell and damnation,” I muttered.
William flushed the colour of holly berries.
“My apologies, William. A lady should not swear, but I am provoked.”
“I heard nothing,” he said loyally.
I smiled. “Come with me.”
We followed Nin to the little alcove tucked behind the fireplace. As we watched, Nin slid between the stones, bearing her tinsel away in triumph. I looked to William.
“We must retrieve what she has lodged there,” I instructed. To his credit, William did not flinch. He contorted himself in exceedingly painful ways, but he had fished out all of her trophies while she paced and protested. It made for an interesting collection. There was Father’s emerald and Aunt Hermia’s coral ring, a pile of tinsel, a pocketwatch, a pen, and Jane the Younger’s teething ring.
“How on earth did she manage that?” Aunt Hermia demanded. We had gathered a crowd as we worked, and as everyone was well-lubricated with wassail, it was viewed with much hilarity. Eventually a protesting Nin was put into a basket and carried out, and the trophies were distributed to their rightful owners. Rose sat very close to William IV, and Hoots was issuing orders from his Bath chair while Aquinas went about the actual business of running the Abbey. Aunt Hermia, relieved Rose was not the culprit as she had feared, drank off two cups of wassail in quick succession, while Plum made eyes at our brother Benedick’s sister-in-law, a prissy young lady from Ireland whose accents grated upon the nerves but who at least kept him amused. I managed to pull Hortense away for a brief chat under the guise of admiring the decorations.
“Well? Are you to be my stepmama?” I asked.
She gave me her gentle, beautiful smile. “I am afraid I must refuse.”
“Refuse? On what grounds? Is it because of Brisbane?”
“No. Nicky is like a son to me, and nothing more. You know this better than anyone, although your father has not been so easy to persuade. Hector spoke with Nicky before he proposed to me, and he believed your husband’s assurances that we are fond of each other, but nothing more. Of course, then I turned down his proposal of marriage, and he immediately thinks, La! She loves the boy and they have both lied to me.”
I smiled at the notion that anyone would refer to Brisbane as a boy. “I do understand your attachment to each other, and I know it for what it is, Fleur. But if you truly only love Brisbane like a son, why did you turn Father down?”
She gave one of her graceful Gallic shrugs. “I must refuse because I do not wish to be the Countess March. I am not the sort of woman who would like to spend her time in the country. Can you see me, hiring servants and opening village fêtes? Next you will have me bottling fruit and spinning wool! No, I am a creature of the city, and in the city I will stay.”
“But why does Father look so happy if you have refused him?”
She flapped a hand. “Because he did not really want to marry, either! Your father is a man of habits. Bellmont is his perfect estate where he can play at being king in his castle. He does not wish for me to disarrange things. But when he first proposed marriage to me, he believed my refusal was absolute, that I did not wish to see him again. Before we could come to an understanding, you and Plum were injured and his children must always be his first priority.”
“I am sorry for that, Fleur.”
“I am not. It makes him the man I love.”
“You love him? Truly?”
“And he loves me. But we do not need to be married to be in love. No, that is an old-fashioned way of thinking, and I am a very modern lady, no?”
“Where does that leave you?”
She gave a Gallic half-shrug. “In the shocking position of being official mistress of the Earl March.”
“Oh, heavens,” I murmured.
Her eyes were shining. “It is a very long time since I created a scandal. I am quite looking forward to it.”
CHAPTER TEN
Silent night! Shadowy night!
Purple dome, starry light!
Pouring splendour of centuries down,
Gold and purple, a glorious crown,
Where the manger so rude and wild
Cradles a sleeping child.
“Silent Night” pub.1881, Scribner’s Monthly
Some time later, the children beckoned us to the dining room. They were dressed in an assortment of nightdresses and robes, some with turbans wound around their heads, others with fantastical eastern draperies forming their costumes.
“What are you meant to be?” I asked my nephew Tarquin. His brown woolen robe was stuffed unevenly with humps.
Behind his spectacles, he rolled his clever eyes. “I am a camel, Aunt Julia. A Bactrian camel. They are Asian ungulates, you know. We had to make one because we couldn’t find one in the village.”
“I should think not.”
“It is quite alright,” he informed me. “We found almost everything else.”
The boy did not exaggerate. The noise from the dining
room was deafening, and the smell when the doors were thrown open was thoroughly foul.
“Good God,” Father demanded. “What have you children done?”
“We are presenting the story of the Nativity in tableau with animals,” said Tarquin’s sister Perdita. She was dressed as one of the kings with a long beard of blue wool liberated from her mother’s knitting basket. Father roared with laughter at the sight, and I clasped Brisbane’s hand in mine.
We were escorted inside and told to find seats, but most of the cast had overturned them, for in addition to the costumed camel, there was a cow I had sent down to the Rookery from London. The peacock I had brought from India along with his pale wife—Feuilly and Madame Feuilly—stood in lofty disdain as they surveyed the chaos. Several piglets, doubtless siblings of our Christmas feast, ran under the furniture and squealed in terror while one of my nieces, sporting fake whiskers as the innkeeper, fed them plum puddings. The dogs were there as well—Crab the mastiff and Brisbane’s lurcher Rook were guided by the shepherds while Mr. Pugglesworth and Florence sat in the manger on top of the doll meant to be the infant Jesus. Chickens clucked and shrieked as the cats, Peter Simple and Christopher Sly, stalked them behind the manger, and somehow Nin had liberated herself from her basket and joined the cast, imperious as an empress on a cushion carried by one of the kings who had lost his frankincense. Over it all, Grim perched on a bust of Shakespeare, quorking his delight.
“It is madness,” Brisbane said, and he laughed until tears gathered in his eyes.
“It may be madness, but it is an entirely March Christmas,” I told him. “And do not forget, this is only half the family. The rest will be here for Twelfth Night.”
But that is a tale for another time.
* * * * *
End Notes
1 THE DARK ENQUIRY, Lady Julia #5
2 DARK ROAD TO DARJEELING, Lady Julia #4
3 SILENT IN THE SANCTUARY, Lady Julia #2
4 SILENT IN THE GRAVE, Lady Julia #1
5 SILENT ON THE MOOR, Lady Julia #3
Meeting the Marches
*Hector March, the Earl March (b.1817) His beloved wife, Charlotte, is deceased. He divides his time between his Sussex estate, Bellmont Abbey, and his London home where he is active in Parliamentary debate, particularly over the question of Irish Home Rule. His hobbies are Shakespearean studies and quarrelling with his hermit.
His children are:
Frederick, Viscount Bellmont “Monty” (b. 1846) Married to Adelaide Walsingham. Resides in London. Represents Blessingstoke as a Member of Parliament.
Lady Olivia Peverell (b.1847) Married to Sir Hastings Peverell. Resides in London where she is a prominent political hostess.
Hon. Benedick March (b.1848) Married to Elizabeth Pritchett. Manages the Home Farm at Bellmont Abbey and is acknowledged to be Julia’s favourite brother. His two eldest children, Tarquin and Perdita, make an appearance in two of Lady Julia’s adventures.
Lady Beatrice “Bee” Baddesley (b. 1850) Married to Sir Arthur Baddesley, noted Arthurian scholar. Resides in Cornwall.
Lady Rupert “Nerissa” Haverford (b.1851) Married to Lord Rupert Haverford, third son of the Duke of Lincoln. Divides her time between London and her father-in-law’s estate near Nottingham.
Lady Bettiscombe “Portia” (b.1853) Widow. Mother to Jane the Younger. Resides in London.
Hon. Eglamour March (b.1854) Known as Plum to the family. Unmarried. A gifted artist, he resides in London where he engages in a bit of private enquiry work for Nicholas Brisbane.
Hon. Lysander March (b.1855) Married to Violanthe, his turbulent Neapolitan bride. He is a composer.
Lady Julia Brisbane (b.1856) Widow of Sir Edward Grey. Married to Nicholas Brisbane. Her husband permits her to join him in his work as a private enquiry agent against his better judgment.
Hon. Valerius March (b.1862) Unmarried. His desire to qualify as a physician has led to numerous arguments with his father. He pursues his studies in London.
*Note regarding titles: as the daughters of an earl, the March sisters are styled “Lady”. This title is retained when one of them marries a baronet, knight, or plain gentleman, as is the case with Olivia, Beatrice, and Julia. As Portia wed a peer, she takes her husband’s title, and as Nerissa married into a ducal family, she takes the style of her husband and is addressed as Lady Rupert. Their eldest brother, Frederick, takes his father’s subsidiary title of Viscount Bellmont as a courtesy title until he succeeds to the earldom. (It should be noted his presence in Parliament is not a perk of this title. Unlike his father who sits in the House of Lords, Bellmont sits in the House of Commons as an elected member.) The younger brothers are given the honorific “The Honourable”, a courtesy which is written but not spoken aloud.
Recipe for March Wassail
Drinking wassail is an ancient tradition. Dating back to Saxon times, the word itself comes from the greeting “wæs hæl”, roughly translated as “be you healthy”. In the counties of southern England renowned for cider production, drinking wassail originated as a bit of sympathetic magic to protect and encourage the apple trees to bear fruit. While wassail and other punches were very popular during Regency times, by the later part of the 19th-century, they had been largely supplanted by wines and other spirits. The Marches, however, care much more for their own pleasure than for what is fashionable. They serve their wassail the old-fashioned way, out of an enormous wooden bowl mounted in silver with a roasted apple garnish. Their wassail is, as tradition dictates, served quite hot and is deceptively alcoholic. Proceed with caution.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Core a dozen small apples. (You will only need ten for the wassail, but leftover roasted apples are delicious with cream, yogurt, or ice cream.) Loosely spoon brown sugar into each apple place in a casserole dish with a small amount of water. Bake until tender, approximately 45 minutes.
Meanwhile, gently warm 2 pints hard cider. (This is not available in the juice aisle of the grocery store. It is wonderfully alcoholic and tastes deeply of apples. You can find bottled varieties at wine and liquor stores, but the very best is fermented by apple farmers for their own use. Find one and befriend him. The Marches get their cider at the source from the Home Farm at Bellmont Abbey.) To the warming cider, add four cinnamon sticks, crushed with a mortar and pestle, and four pinches ground cloves. (In a bind, ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon may be substituted for the sticks.) Grate in fresh ginger and fresh nutmeg to taste. Lord March’s secret ingredient is a cup of his very best port, added just in time to heat through.
When the apples are plump and bursting from their skins, remove them from the oven. Put one into a heatproof punch glass and ladle the wassail over. The March family recipe calls for a garnish of a fresh cinnamon stick for each glass.
This recipe will serve six Marches or ten ordinary folk.
Aunt Hermia’s Recipe for Winter Potpourri
From the French for “rotted pot”, potpourri was originally this damp version preferred by Aunt Hermia. The high moisture content caused the flowers to fade as they decayed, so the mixture was traditionally kept in porcelain jars with pierced lids. When placed on the hearth, the warmth from the fire caused the fragrance of the potpourri to waft through the room.
Layer the bottom of an earthenware crock with partly-dried rose petals. (The depth should reach to the first joint of your forefinger.) Sprinkle with sea salt to cover and add a splash of brandy. On top of this, place a layer of partly-dried lavender mixed with carnation petals. Sprinkle this with sea salt to cover and splash with brandy as well. Continue to layer, repeating pattern of petals and salt and brandy and pack firmly. When jar is not quite full, place a heavy china plate on top. Weight the plate with a clean brick wrapped in linen and seal the crock.
Place on a high shelf or a dark corner and leave it be for two days. On the thi
rd day, stir the mixture, then leave to cure for a fortnight. By this time, the petals and salt shall have formed a sort of damp cake. Break this up with your hands, crumbling it gently. To this crumbled cake, add broken cinnamon sticks—two for each layer of petals originally placed in the crock—and half a dozen bay leaves. Add a palmful of carefully dried orange peel and sprinkle over a palmful of powdered orrisroot. Mix gently. Finish with a final splash of brandy and turn again. It is best to leave it be for another fortnight, but if necessary, it may be used at once. Spoon it into a porcelain jar with a pierced lid and place near a source of warmth.
Don’t miss any of the Lady Julia Gray stories! Rediscover the mystery and romance of Deanna Raybourn’s bestselling series in this classic novella.
Midsummer in England—an auspicious time for a wedding. Brisbane has taken charge of the music. Julia has, perhaps mistakenly, authorized her sisters to choose the dress. And Belmont Abbey is overflowing with guests awaiting the blessed day. What could go wrong?
Combine the close-knit chaos of village life, pagan traditions bursting through staid Victorian conventions, and the congenial madness that tends to swirl around Lady Julia’s family, and you get an unforgettable wedding. But add in a dangerous past nemesis who has come to wish them not-so-well, and their day to remember just might take a fatal turn…
Originally published in 2013
Midsummer Night
Deanna Raybourn
CONTENTS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
A Mysterious Season Page 6