A Yuletide Treasure (10 page)

“Oh, were you there during the siege?” Tinarose asked.

“Briefly,” the doctor said. “But I was telling you about Paris. There I was, one of about fourteen doctors holed up in this tumble-down town house, assured by
la concierge
that her palace had housed doctors since the fourteenth century, and judging by the beds, I believed her.”

“Whatever were you doing in Paris, Dr. March?” Camilla asked, fascinated.

“A group of us were pressed into service by the army directly after leaving school. I knew it would be my only chance to see something of the world, and as my father made no objection, I went. After a little service in the south—”

“A little?” Sir Philip cried. ‘You were in that hellhole for six years, man! Tell her about Badajoz and Madrid.”

Camilla couldn’t help but be aware of the undercurrents at the table. Sir Philip, for whatever reason, seemed to want to turn his friend’s reminiscences into some other channel. The doctor, whether through having taken too much wine or just through a natural perversity, seemed intent on embarrassing his friend with his story.

“I want to talk about Paris,” Dr. March insisted. “So there I was, attached now in some convoluted fashion to Old Hookey’s Embassy to Louis, coming back to this dismal flat from a hard day’s service.”

“To wounded soldiers?” Tinarose asked, leaning forward with an elbow on the table.

“No, to some fat major’s wife who’d caught a bad cold just before some
soiree or
other. So imagine me, my coat flapping in the chill breeze blowing between the avenues, looking forward to a cut off the roast and a bottle of bad red wine, stumbling over a corpse on my very doorstep.”

“Dr. March!” Lady LaCorte said sharply. “We are at table, sir.”

But he only turned his handsome, smiling face in her direction. “Don’t be alarmed. He wasn’t quite dead. I rolled the body over and found, grinning up at me, my old friend from home. Rather a mess, he was, too.
You
see ...”

“Not a tale for the ladies, old chap,” Sir Philip said hastily, covering the doctor’s voice with his own.

But Dr. March simply repeated his remarks. “He’d been stabbed in the back.”

Everyone at the table, even the servants, stared more or less openly at Sir Philip. He only shook his head. “Coffee, I think, Samson.”

“Stabbed? Uncle Philip?” Tinarose looked at her uncle as if she’d never seen him before. “How... I mean, who did it?”

Sir Philip said nothing, turning his wineglass, seemingly absorbed in the tawny depths.

“He spun me some tale of an accident. Needless to say, I didn’t believe a word of it and still don’t. I patched him up, of course, and offered him a bed for the night. I swear I never thought about the roof leaking. He spent a few days with me and then disappeared. In another month, we all left Paris to accompany the Duke to Vienna.”

“I didn’t ‘disappear,’” Sir Philip said, speaking at last. “I simply arrived in Vienna before you. We met there, and I can’t say it was any warmer there than in Paris, except that waltzing is excellent exercise. Do you remember the Countess von Steich’s evening parties?”

At last the doctor let himself be led down another conversational path. Why had he told that story about Paris? She glanced at Sir Philip, now reminding the doctor of some chance-met young woman, and wondered, as perhaps she was meant to, about him and his past.

Samson returned and had another word in her ladyship’s ear. Camilla reluctantly gave her attention to Lady LaCorte when she tapped her knife against her crystal goblet.

“As our friends know, we have entertained but little since news came of my husband’s death.” Her voice sank for a moment; then she rallied. “Nevertheless, there are certain customs of the country that must be observed, more especially at this time of the year.”

Camilla had seen Tinarose look down into her lap and close her eyes at the mention of her father. But then she looked up and brightened at the hopeful trend of her mother’s words.

“Though it lacks some hours until midnight and the arrival of Stir-up Sunday, Mrs. Lamsard in the kitchen and Mr. Samson have persuaded me to stretch a point so that our guests might participate. Tinarose, will you ask Miss Grayle to bring down your sisters?”

“Yes, Mother. They’ll be so happy.”

* * * *

The kitchen looked very different from Camilla’s first visit there. Someone had hung ribbon-tied swatches of dried herbs and flowers from the ceiling beams, giving the whole room the mysterious, exciting smell of an apothecary’s shop. The cold glow of moonlight on snow that came through the high windows met the golden gleams of candles that burned lavishly on tabletop and counter, on windowsill and barrel.

Camilla heard whispering and perceived in the shadows of the large room that others had come for the ceremony. She felt her own strangeness. Everyone belonged to the Manor in some way, whether they served it in house or field, or lived under its roof and cared for it. For she’d known from her first conscious step in this house that it was well loved.

When she hesitated on the doorstep, knowing herself to be an outsider, Dr. March was behind her. “Is something wrong?”

“No, I... What is Stir-up Sunday?”

The doctor looked at her with surprise. “You don’t know?”

“No, sir.”

“And you do live in England?”

“Not a day’s journey from here. Is this custom so universal? I have never heard of it.”

The doctor tilted his head to one side in a motion that might have been a shrug. Whatever hilarity had affected him at dinner seemed to have faded. “Usually it is done among the lower classes; servants and so on seem fond of it.”

“Perhaps that’s why I’ve not heard of it. We keep only one servant, and she is unusually taciturn. Some weeks she hardly speaks at all.”

“You must find the Manor a most remarkable change,” he said with a lowered voice. “It’s an interesting house, nearly as interesting as the people who live in it. As for the pudding,” he said, in a more normal tone, “my father would no more miss stirring the Christmas pudding than he’d refuse to go out on an emergency visit.”

“But a doctor isn’t of the lower classes.”

“Perhaps not in such an enlightened place as you come from, Miss Twainsbury. What is the name of your place of residence?” She told him, and he nodded. “You wouldn’t happen to be in need of a doctor’s services there?” he asked with his quick smile. “Well, no matter; I can’t leave Bishop’s Halt while my father needs me.” He fell silent.

“And Stir-up Sunday?” Camilla prompted.

“Oh, yes. Pray excuse me. This is the time when every member of the household, oldest to youngest, gives the Christmas pudding three stirrings. Each person is to make three wishes, one of which is certain to come true before next Christmas.”

“What will you wish for, Dr. March?”

“The usual sort of thing, I suppose. Riches beyond avarice, long life, and a pair of warm slippers.”

“Warm slippers? Among such grand wishes, you wish for warm slippers?”

“I did say that only one wish would come true, didn’t I? Wealth and health may come or not, but my housekeeper always makes my father and me warm slippers for Christmas.”

“Perhaps if you didn’t wish for slippers, one of your other wishes would come true,” Camilla said.

He laughed. “I’ve never been one to take mad risks,” he said. “Unlike some I could name.”

“You mean Sir Philip? He hardly seems like the reckless sort.”

“Didn’t you hear what I told you at the table? I don’t know what happened in Paris, but I do know that wasn’t the only time I found him in mysterious circumstances. I used to know him so well. We were always friends. Lately, though, I feel as if I only know the outer man, this gentle squire pose he’s adopted since coming back to the Manor.”

“You think he is playacting?” Camilla asked.

“Can a man change so much? He was a wild boy, almost uncontrollable. As a youth, he took mad chances. True, he always came out of them well, barring a broken arm or some such, but I worry....”

“I’m a stranger here, Dr. March,” Camilla said, suddenly feeling as if she were being warned to stay away. Perversely, this warning only made her want to explore forbidden territory more closely. “Such things are not my concern.”

“No, of course not.”

Sir Philip came to them. “Come, come, no conspiracies,” he said. “You can’t share your wishes, you know. As guests, you must stir first.” He took Camilla’s hand in his warm clasp and tucked it beneath his arm. “Come along.”

They waited, however, until the younger two children came in, shuffling along in matching quilted robes with felt slippers upon their feet. The doctor and Camilla exchanged a glance. “Tell me the joke,” Sir Philip whispered in her other ear.

“Nothing important. What happens now?”

“Listen,” he said. His breath was warm and fragrant with the wine he’d drunk at dinner. She found herself breathing in a little more deeply, feeling how close he stood beside her.

Camilla had only ever drunk water or sweet cider at meals. She’d found the one glass of rich red wine she’d had, served with a chine of beef and removes of pigeon pie and salmi of woodcock, to be both delicious and drying. She’d had to request a glass of water from Mr. Samson and had been glad, thereafter, to be served the same drinks as Tinarose.

Nevertheless, the single glass of red wine must have done something to disturb her equilibrium.

Why else would she feel this urgent temptation to lean against Sir Philip, to feel his strong arm come about her waist in support? She’d been raised to stand firmly on her own two feet and to know right from wrong no matter what clever disguises wrong took on. It must certainly be wrong to wish to rub her cheek against the smooth wool of his coat like a cat finding her master. Only the unaccustomed taste of alcohol could explain this sudden sapping of her moral fiber. She vowed she’d never take another glass.

As though the entrance of the children was a signal, from every corner of the room servants stepped forward to stand beside the large, well-scrubbed table in the center of the room. Camilla saw now that an enormous bowl stood in the center, ringed about with garlands of dried flowers. A topiary tree made of some evergreen plant stood beside the bowl. The cook, Mrs. Lamsard, stood behind the bowl, wearing her dazzlingly white apron but having added what was evidently her very best bonnet.

At her nod, the servants broke into song. Camilla couldn’t quite make out the words, something about the sun or the Son. She found herself smiling at Sir Philip as he sang along, tunelessly and all but inaudibly under his breath. “This is my favorite part,” he said.

Merridew started it. “Suet for Bartholomew,” he said, leaning forward to touch the bowl, and then turned to the man next to him.

“Sugar for Matthew,” he mumbled, several front teeth missing. He touched the bowl and turned to a younger woman.

“Raisins for Mark.”

“Currants for Luke.”

“Crumbs for John.”

Camilla looked up at Sir Philip, puzzled.

“There are thirteen ingredients in a good Christmas pudding,” he whispered. “One for each Apostle and Christ, too.”

“What does Judas get?” she asked softly.

“I don’t know. The egg shells, perhaps.”

When the reading of the ingredients came to an end, Mrs. Lamsard beckoned Camilla forward. Camilla hesitated, not sure of her place in this ritual. Sir Philip gave her a little push. “Go on.”

Coming nearer, she saw that from several branches of the little tree, silver charms hung twinkling. As she watched, Mrs. Lamsard pulled the charms off, one at a time, and dropped them into the bowl, “Wedding ring means marriage,” she said, her curiously deep voice rumbling like heat in a chimney. “Button means bachelor. Thimble leaves an old maid. Tuppence is lucky.”

She dropped the last charm into the dark brown batter. The semisolid mass accepted it with the sound of a kiss. Mrs. Lamsard picked up a wooden spoon. “Three times you stir, sunwise, and you makes your wishes,” she said.

Camilla met the woman’s eyes and raised her eyebrows, mouthing, “Sunwise?” With a thick forefinger, Mrs. Lamsard drew a circle showing her the way to go.

Camilla knew just enough not to say her wishes aloud. The memory of childhood games played with her sister came back. One must never ever tell a wish, for that breaks the spell, spilling all the luck out of it so that it will never ever come true.

She had no intention of making a wish. She didn’t believe in wishes or dreams. Such things were for children and not always for them. Yet as she pushed the thick wooden spoon through the batter, knowing this was an ancient action carried out through the centuries, she found herself wishing that she might always have the warmth of friends, the nearness of family, and ... Her gaze lifted for one turn of the spoon, seeking out Sir Philip. Impulsively, she wished for a love that would banish her loneliness, outlast her youth, that would grow warmer and deeper with the passing of the years.

Was that too great a wish for a Christmas pudding? Perhaps she should wish for a packet of needles or a skein of wool, two things she was sure to receive this Christmas as at every Christmas. But she decided as she gave the last stir to be bold, to be, perhaps, foolish and to wish for love.

After Camilla, the doctor stirred the pudding. He looked like a pagan god making preparation for a sacrifice, noble, remote, exalted. Tinarose couldn’t take her gaze from his face. For Camilla, who knew he was thinking about slippers, some of the fascination of his remarkable good looks faded.

After the guests came the master of the house. Though he smiled as he took up the wooden spoon, polished like glass from countless Christmas stirrings, when he began his turn, he kept his eyes downward, as if concentrating seriously on his wishes, Camilla wondered what such a man as Sir Philip could desire. He seemed to have everything, a fine home, a close family, status in his community. Perhaps he thought of his late brother. It would explain the pensive expression he wore throughout the superstitious ceremony.

As Lady LaCorte stirred, she kept her left hand flat against her side, as if transferring some of her wishes to her unborn infant. Her daughter looked shyly at the doctor as she took the spoon in her hand. The smaller girls giggled as they passed the spoon from biggest to littlest, then ran laughing back to the governess’s skirts. And so it went, among the servants, from old Merridew down to a frightened-looking dairymaid, her fingers red from cold.