Page 29 of A Merry Christmas
Merry laughed, the sound small and grateful. She set aside a dozen for the nursery and arranged the rest on a good plate for the parlour, the little pale crystals of sugar catching light through the window. As she turned, the back door opened and a gust of honest winter shouldered in, bringing with it Joshua Fielding.
Her humiliation only wanted this, she thought bitterly. Joshua had been right all along. She had to escape because she could not allow him to see how much the betrayal hurt.
CHAPTER 11
Aletter from London lay on Joshua’s dressing-table, brittle with cold where the footman had slipped it under his door at first light. He recognized Renforth’s hand at once. He broke the seal and read the missive while standing, the fire at his back.
My dear Fielding,
I have it from two separate quarters that Lord Bruton is intent upon a match for his son with a young lady of fortune. The family name is Dunning. You will know of it if you read beyond the first page of the Chronicle.
The father is not eager, for reasons any man might claim who has heard of Tremaine’s activities. He knows of the debts and has smelled the cards. He hesitates, but fathers have been persuaded into worse by peers who talk of duty, estates, and the necessity of propping up titles that have leaned too hard for too long.
In short: the boy is to be provided for at the expense of a fortune. If your Gloucestershire business touches the honour of any lady, I would have her warned—by fact if possible, by inference if you must. I wish I might offer proof.
Yours sincerely,
Renforth
Joshua readit twice and folded it back to its original form. There was the truth, in black and white, the London shape of what they had tasted here in the country: a man to be mended with money, a father who mistook marriage for a son’s improvement, a name to be shored up with a dowry as one props a wall with a timber and pretends it will stand through the next storm.
It altered nothing he already believed, yet he still sought proof. He thought of Merry’s face in the church, the way she had looked straight ahead and forged onward. He had told himself he would not speak until she asked. He had also told himself he would have the truth ready when she did.
He dressed and took himself to the stables rather than to breakfast, leaving word for his mother that he had business in the village. Brutus stamped in the yard, his breath steaming patiently. Joshua mounted and rode out beneath the quiet sky, feeling the cold in his bones.
Besides the tavern, the grocer was the hub of news and gossip. He doubted any letters would arrive for him there, but it was as good an excuse as any to look in.
“Good morning, Mrs. Tanner. Have any letters arrived for the manor today?”
The postmistress, Mrs. Tanner, shook her head with a smile and a few cheerful remarks about the coming festivities. Joshua thanked her and turned to go when two farmers’ wives came in behind him, shaking melted snow from their cloaks. They were already deep in conversation.
“…and Lord Bruton’s cook says they have had the Dunnings down from London—his lordship’s own doing, she said. The young lady is to be settled before spring. A match with Mr. Tremaine, if you please, though they say her father has misgivings—what with his debts and the talk of cards and women…”
Joshua paused, his hand tightening on his gloves. Dunning was thename Renforth had written in his letter—the girl’s family. So it was true. Lord Bruton was parading his guest’s daughter as a prize mare, while Tremaine, no doubt, meant to secure whichever fortune would have him first, to keep the moneylenders at bay.
He bought drops of peppermint for the children, nodded a farewell to the gossiping matrons, and left.
By the time he returned to Wychwood, his thoughts had settled into grim order. Having left Brutus in the care of a groom, he crossed the courtyard to enter the kitchen, warm and fragrant with spice. There stood Merry, her sleeves rolled up, her hands dusted with flour and a curl escaping her bonnet as she bent over a tray of biscuits.
He might have watched her for a full minute longer, content simply to admire the ordinary miracle of competence, but other voices found him.
“…I tell you it is true,” a maid was whispering by the hearth. “Lord Dunning’s own daughter. I saw them in church. She sat so near Mr. Tremaine, you would have thought she were in danger of falling off the seat if he did not prop her up with his arm.”
“And me sister is the parlour maid at the manor. She said there is a betrothal brewing between Lady Lydia and the son.”
“Hush, you,” Cook hissed, clapping a spoon against her palm. “Mind your tongues. There is a lady at the table who need hear none of your cleverness.”
Silence followed, but too late. Merry had stilled. She set down the biscuit-cutter with a care that turned the act into a ceremony, brushed her hands on her apron as if they were dusted by more than flour, and looked up without looking at any one of them. Joshua could not have named the expression in that first instant—shame, hurt, acceptance?—only that it struck him like a cry muffled in linen.
Merry straightened slowly and set down the biscuits she had been holding. She murmured to one of the kitchen maids—Joshua could not hear the words but her voice trembled at the edges. Then she turned and fled through the scullery door into the yard, the sound of her boots fading across the stones.
“Poor lass,” Cook murmured, watching her go. “Something isteasing her this morning. Pale as milk, she is, and working herself to the bone for no good reason.”
Joshua’s throat tightened. He knew what was teasing her—a parcel of truth, wrapped in gossip and bitterness.
For a moment, he considered going after her, but pride was a stubborn creature, and he doubted she would thank him for finding her with tears in her eyes. He, too, knew what it was to need the dignity of solitude when one’s world shifted. No—’twas far better to give her time.
He turned away and stepped into the corridor.
