Page 69 of Unending Joy
“Have you really a goat now, Aunt Joy?” Benjamin demanded, eyes sparkling.
“I have. Lady Nibbleton of the Tent Chewing Brigade. You may parley with her after luncheon, but mind your hat. She is indiscriminate when it comes to eating.”
“And is it true,” Augustine enquired gravely, “that Lord Orville once carried off an entire cheese?”
“An entire Stilton,” Freddy supplied, arriving, “larger than your head, young sir.”
“Oooh,” whispered Charlotte, twirling again. “I want a cheese.”
“There are smaller cheeses,” Joy assured her, “in the food tent.
Joy stooped so they could all crowd around. “This year’s fête,” she announced, “boasts more delights than any May Day festival. You may test your arms at the Pie-Flinging Booth—Cook has baked special cream missiles—and at three o’clock there will be Blind Man’s Bluff on the south lawn, overseen by Quincy, who refuses to wear the blindfold but promises to bark impartially.”
Benjamin’s hand shot up as if in school. “Will there be pudding?”
“After the sack races,” Joy confirmed. “I have seen four kinds so far: lemon drizzle, ginger syllabub, gooseberry tart, and a chocolate sponge.”
“Capital!” he answered.
“A boy after my own heart. And—” Joy spread her arms wider—“the jewel in Heartsfield’s crown: the Cat Derby. Six famous racers, one velvet ramp, feather wands for reins, and a blue ribbon to the swiftest whiskers.”
A collective intake of breath greeted this. Even Nicholas’s thumb slipped from his mouth to express excitement.
Freddy adopted his most portentous baritone. “But derby racers must prove themselves worthy. There will be a Jockey’s Inspection first. Clean boots, brave hearts, and no smuggling sardines under your bonnet, Master Sylvester.”
“I would never!” cried Sylvester—though his grin strongly implied he might.
“Everyone present and accounted for,” Freddy declared. “Pirates, accountants, and goat artillery, form ranks!”
Chaos obliged happily: pennants tangled with cutlasses, baby Edmund burst into delighted shrieks, and Rose attempted to fasten a ribbon to Mortimer’s considerable middle with limited success. Westwood raised a hand like a drill sergeant and corralled the mass towards the orchard path, where tables waited under striped awnings. The children surged ahead, Lydia toddling after Quincy, Augustine already pretending to jot odds in his book.
Joy and her sisters lingered a moment, exchanging glances heavy with years of shared motherhood—and the faintest astonishment that they had somehow multiplied into such a carnival.
“Bless us all,” Patience murmured, “but our nursery will soon outgrow the house.”
Hope linked arms with her. “We always have Davenmere if needed.”
“At least there will always be hands to wave feathers.” Maeve adjusted Eliza’s sun bonnet. “And small voices to cheer when the goats stage a coup.”
Grace laughed. “We wanted adventure for our children. Joy has handed them a kingdom of misrule.”
Joy felt warmth rise to her cheekbones—part pride, part that old shy disbelief that life could turn out so richly unexpected. She caught Freddy’s gaze over a sea of bonnet ribbons and whisking tails. He lifted an eyebrow in silent invitation.Ready?
She nodded, her half-blurred vision swimming with colours: Lydia’s saffron sash, the deep blue of Augustine’s journal cover, the sleek black of Mortimer’s coat, Charlotte’s bright pink pinafore, and Freddy’s steadfast figure in oat-straw tweed guiding them all forward.
“Come, sisters,” she said, voice light and sure. “Before Lady Nibbleton relocates the pastry table, and before Lord Orville requisitions the cheese. The world may call this a mere country fête, but we know it for what it is: the finest fête ever assembled under one orchard’s boughs.”
When at last the time came for the actual derby, the children were sent to gather their assigned charges.
The Cat Derby of Heartsfield Grange had grown, over five summers, into a country legend: a velvet-lined ramp, twelve feet long, sloping from the start to a triumphal arch plaited with catnip and hawthorn blossoms. This year Frederica’s original litter—six venerable kittens now grown in their dignified middle age—were each to be coaxed down the course by one of the cousins brandishing a feather wand. The notion delighted every adult present. It also reduced the stable-boys to helpless laughter, for middle-aged cats were scarcely given to obligingfootraces. But the children took the assignment as solemn destiny. The competitors were:
Lord Orville—striped, long-bodied, and proud possessor of a half-missing ear from an early duel with a neighbouring tom. Jockey: Benjamin (Faith’s eldest, six years old).
Cecilia—gleaming grey with a scandalous fondness for snacks. Jockey: Sylvester (Hope’s eldest, now seven).
Camilla—silky tabby whose figure bore evidence of many cream dish triumphs. Jockey: Robert (Patience’s first, five and three-fourths).
Theo—steady, mellow, black fellow. Jockey: Augustine (four and a half).
