Page 9 of Blueprints, Battlelines and Ballrooms
In a tradition as old as time—his time, at least—the Hempel family took to the ice in the winter.Whenever the pond in the park at the far end of Honeysuckle Street froze over firm enough, the Hempel children would sling their skates over their shoulders and march side by side down the street to cross the road.They would tie their steel-and-leather blades over their boots, then set sail across the ice.The small pond lacked the glamour and convenience of the bigger parks, where traders set up kiosks that hired out skates, but the intimate setting only made winter more magical.The familiar laughter and calls of his siblings bounced through the air in a tumble of jests and encouragement, lending warmth to his journey home at the end of a cold day.Johannes sucked in a breath, and the night clung to his lungs before he exhaled it as mist into the dusk.
He paused beside a bench where his brother-in-law Phineas sat.Phineas shot him a silent nod of greeting, then returned his focus to Hazel, the youngest child in the Hempel clan.She was watching her siblings with bright blue eyes and lips purple with cold.Almost everyone who lived in the street was out on the ice tonight, even his parents.The Viscount Hamish Dalton caught his wife Iris by the hand and spun her in a jubilant circle.The soprano Odette took the hand of the recently returned diplomat Benton.Benton half crouched to swing her in a wide, elegant circle before releasing her into a swirl of laughter.
‘Partners in crime, those two.’Phineas nudged his chin in their direction, before returning his attention to Hazel.
‘Do you think they’re… a couple?In secret?’Johannes asked.He always seemed to be the last to figure things out, whereas Phineas seemed to know everything.It would be nice not to be the last to know aboutsomething.
‘Let us hope not, for our small street would once again make the press.’Phineas shook his head with a laugh, then leant back into his usual settled seriousness.‘Alone, they skirt scandal, but together, they encourage one another to dance closer to the flame.But a couple?They’re both far too self-involved for that.They demand adoration and aren’t so good at returning the sentiment.’
Hazel squatted on the ground.She poked at leaves and small clumps of snow with her mittened hand.How serene and innocent the movement, how completely unaware of the expectations of the world she was… Out on the ice, the other end of the Hempel line—his eldest sister Rosanna—tapped her best friend Elise’s arm, pointed at the far side of the pond, then set off, likely on a determined path to victory.Rosie could turn anything into a competition.
‘Should your wife be skating in her condition?’Johannes asked.
‘Are you going to tell her she should sit on the bench and watch?’Phineas replied.
‘Most definitely not.Last time I told Rosie not to do something, she wrestled me to the floor and thwacked my forehead with a spoon until I apologised.And we weren’t children.It was just a few years ago.’Johannes laughed.‘You aren’t skating?’
Phineas’s brow furrowed.‘I’ve been tasked with watching Hazel.She is meant to be providing me with practice.But no one has explained what we are practising for.’
Johannes rolled his lips to suppress a smirk.Phineas grumbled like it was a chore, yet he’d likely have done it without being asked.For reasons known only to Hazel, the youngest child in the Hempel brood had formed a gentle attachment to his elder sister’s aloof husband.And Phineas, for all his grouching, was happy to sit in quiet contemplation and take in turning leaves or falling snow with her.Johannes couldn’t count the amount of twigs or crunched leaves Hazel had brought his stoic brother-in-law while chattering about them in her own language.But he did know it would precisely equal the number of times that Phineas had listened, nodding gently, and told her how lovely they were.
He would make a wonderful father.
Johannes brushed snow off the wooden slats, then sat beside Phineas on the bench.Hazel shuffled along, steadying herself against the wood until she reached him, bumping hard against his knee.‘Yo, yo,’ she said, her vowels as plump as her cherry-tinted cheeks.She bounced on the spot and patted his leg with her mittened hand.‘Yoyoyo.’
Out on the ice, his younger siblings skated and spun in flashes of red, as fast as robins.Johannes tightened Hazel’s bonnet string and straightened her earmuffs, trying to remember which of his siblings had called himYoyoas they were first trying out their words.The first of them he clearly remembered arriving in the world was Beatrice.Rosie had always been there, older, wiser, and determined to push against any wall that threatened to hold her in place.Elliot was much the same—a constant presence in Johannes’s life—and he remembered Beatrice as a swaddled baby in the bassinet beside his parents’ bed.After Beatrice’s birth, Nanny Abigail had been hired to help with the rambunctious children who stomped around Honeysuckle Street like they owned all of it.Johannes hadn’t known it then, and he had railed against the imposition to their freedom just like Rosie, but it had been around that time that things had started to improve for the Hotel Aster.Year on year, bookings had increased, and the hotel’s reputation had grown, not through advertising but through personal recommendations and word of mouth.A few years later, the Hempel family had propelled themselves from workers to wealthy, landing firmly in the heart of middle-class London, which both adored and detested them for it.
Elliot, his younger brother, slushed to a stop, then pivoted to face them.Younger and shorter than himself, Elliot was twice as fast with his wit and on his feet.He’d become obsessed with sports since going away to study, which meant their mother alternated between worrying about him injuring himself on a variety of fields and him injuring himself with his homemade fireworks.
‘There’s no rain forecast for tonight.I’ve been experimenting with coloured pinwheels.Want to light some?’Elliot asked.
‘I can’t risk these.’Johannes held up his gloved hands, palms in, and wriggled his fingers.‘Now that they are the creators of a prize-winning design.’
‘You won something?’Elliot half shouted the question, and it shot into the crisp air like a beacon.A few of the Hempel siblings changed trajectory to skate over.Ammie and Nova arrived first, bumping against Elliot, bubbling with questions.Mother, attuned to any excitement amongst her children as a sign of trouble, soon joined the throng until the entire Hempel family was hovering at the edge of the ice.They tottered on the spines of their skates as they threw questions over the top of one another.
‘Was it a house?’
‘A church?’
‘Parliament?’
‘A water fountain,’ Johannes laughed.Bless them for their ignorance.They cheered him like he’d won a commission for the Queen.‘In Chelsea.By the horse trough.’
‘You’re a proper architect now.’Elliot raised his voice over the clamour.The others quietened.‘When will you be moving to your own accommodations?I’d love my own room.’
‘It was a small competition for a water fountain.Only a guinea for the prize.’Johannes shoved his hands beneath his thighs.‘And you have employment.Youmove out.’
‘You’re older,’ Elliot shot back.
‘Your salary is higher than mine,’ Johannes protested.
‘I am still younger.What would people say?’
‘A celebration!’Father clapped his hands over his head.Even gloved, his firmness squashed every petty argument as he drew the focus of the family to himself.Somehow, Johannes had grown a foot and a half taller than his father, but despite his lack of height, the man owned every space he set foot in.He loved his children unflinchingly, demanded the best of them constantly, disparaged them when they made silly mistakes—and no one in all of London would dare say a bad word about them within earshot of him if they knew what was good for them.‘This requires a proper celebration.Home to get changed, then to the hotel.We shall dine at the Aster tonight!’
The family, especially the younger children who lived a life of routine that centred on the home and the street, cheered louder than before.They staggered with angular awkwardness onto the thinly snowed grass before collapsing onto seats or the ground to tug at their skates.
‘Becoming involved in the affairs of one Hempel was enough trouble,’ Phineas said, his tone as crisp as the air.The soft look in his eyes as he followed Rosie while she unstrapped her skates belied his words.‘I am not prying, but you may need to hear the question.You are in secure employment, and yet you still live at home.What do you plan to do with yourself?’
