Marian's Christmas Wish (20 page)

Lord Ingraham stood resting his arm against the
fireplace mantel, in the company of two other gentlemen. He just stood there,
and his gaze made her blush and look away, wondering where his habitual
expression of lazy amusement had gone. There was something else in his
expression this time, and she did not understand it.

Lady Ingraham came forward, carrying a small girl. “How
lovely you look, my dear,” she exclaimed as the child nodded solemnly. “That
particular shade of yellow quite becomes you. One and all, may I introduce
Marian Wynswich? You have already made Alistair’s acquaintance. Marian is his
older sister, and they have come to spend Christmas with me.”

Marian dropped a little curtsy as Lord Ingraham came
forward. The amusement was back in his eyes, she noted with some relief.

“My family, Marian. Sister Louisa, brother-in-law
David, and nieces Lizzie, Honoria, and Emma. Surtees over there is already
educating your brother in the ways of St. Stephen’s, I don’t doubt.”

Alistair glanced up from his conversation across the
room long enough to grin at his sister and put both thumbs up. “Mare, no one in
Picton would recognize you,” he called, and then went back to his discussion.

Marian laughed out loud. “Alistair! How am I ever to
even pretend a little dignity with you about?”

To Marian’s delight, Lady Hammerfield came forward.

“Brothers have that ability to totally disconnect one,
do they not?” She tucked her arm through her brother’s and leaned against him
for a moment. “And then they are away too long for silly reasons, and we even
get to missing them.” She looked up at him. “He will tire of us soon enough,
particularly when I ask for his London home from which to launch Lizzie this
spring.”

Gilbert groaned and raised his eyebrows at Marian. “Do
you see what you have brought me back to?”

She twinkled her eyes back at him. “And you love it,
Lord Ingraham, you know you do.”

Washburn announced dinner and they followed him into
the dining room. Marian found herself seated between the oldest Hammerfield
daughter and Lady Hammerfield. Her mind was blank of conversation, and she was
grateful when the daughter leaned toward her. “Actually, I am Elizabeth,” she
whispered. “Surtees seems to delight in calling me Lizzie, and it has caught
on.”

Marian smiled. “And I will always be Mare to my
brother, even when we are both halt and lame with age. How is it they know what
maddens us?”

She felt herself relaxing. The Hammerfields were
clambering to hear the earl’s story of the sea battle and his French captivity,
and she was happy to let the conversation run around her. She watched Lord
Ingraham with his family and wondered why she had not really noticed until just
this moment how handsome he was.

But it was more than that, she decided after the fish
was removed for the venison. Gilbert Ingraham was not the kind of man to leave
one in doubt about anything. For all his adventures, he was steady. She thought
of her father as she pushed the venison around her plate and listened with half
an ear as Lady Hammerfield described Emma’s recent bout with chickenpox. Papa
could leave me so off balance, she thought. I always know where I stand with
Gil.

The thought made her look up from her plate and smile
at him. Lord Ingraham. seated at the head of the table, caught her glance. “Marian,
we amuse you?” he asked, then all heads turned her way.

“You do,” she agreed. “I have always enjoyed amiable
people and good food.” She continued eating as the others chuckled.

And then Lizzie was speaking to her. “Marian, do you
come out this spring? Are you seventeen?”

She shook her head. “Not until March.”

“Good God, the infantry,” exclaimed Lord Hammerfield in
a loud voice, and Marian frowned. She did not understand the remark, any more
than she understood why Gilbert Ingraham blushed because of it and then coughed
discreetly.

“Perhaps we will see each other in London this Season,”
Lizzie continued.

Marian shook her head again. “It’s not likely. I won’t
be coming out.”

Lizzie stared and then laughed. “How can you bear to
waste all those drawing lessons, and singing lessons, and Italian dancing
masters, and tutors who insist on speaking only French from nine to three?”

Marian put down her fork and tried to ignore the little
hollow spot in her stomach that seemed to be growing. “Oh, I never could draw
very well, and my singing is saved for solitary walks. And as for dancing
masters, well, I suppose the damp of Devon kept them away.”

“But surely you speak French?” Lizzie persisted.

“No, not much, really. Well, not unless you count the
little bit that everyone learns who lives on a smugglers’ coast.” She meant the
remark to be lighthearted, and the stares of the Hammerfields baffled her.

Silence grew heavy about the table and suddenly Marian
understood. I have no accomplishments these people consider normal, she
thought, and I will not have a Season in London. Our home is going to be sold
this spring, and I am sitting here in a borrowed dress. She looked at Alistair,
and his face was more stern than she had ever seen it before. Alistair
understands, too. Her appetite gone, she put her hands in her lap.

“Ah, but Marian can read Greek and Latin better than I
can,” Lord Ingraham was saying softly. “And I daresay she has read every book
in her father’s library.”

“What is that to anyone?” Lord Hammerfield said
suddenly.

“Don’t tell me it will become the rage.” He brightened.
“Tell me, my dear, how you plan to snare a husband.”

Something in the tone of his voice raised the fight in
her. “It won’t be my face or fortune, either, Lord Hammerfield,” she said in a
clear voice. “But then, it was never my intention to ‘trap’ a man like a rabbit
in a snare. That does neither man nor woman credit, no matter how vaunted the
title.”

Lady Hammerfield gasped, and Marian instantly regretted
her words.

“I have no plans beyond a quick return to Picton, when
the roads are clear again,” Marian mumbled.

After a tiny pause, Lady Ingraham carried the conversation
onto new byways and Marian had only to look interested and remain silent until
the endless dinner concluded. She didn’t dare look at anyone else, and as the
meal dragged on, she fought the ridiculous urge to slap down her napkin and run
sobbing from the table. Gil addressed one or two harmless remarks her way, but
she could only shake her head and make herself small in her chair.

And then they were through. “I don’t know what others’
plans are,” Lord Hammerfield said as he stood up and stretched, “but I yearn
for a spot of quiet in Mama’s parlor.”

Alistair stood. “And I intend to explore this charming
city with my sister.” He held out his arm to Marian, and she took it
gratefully. “That is our earnest intention, Lord Ingraham,” he said as the earl
opened his mouth to speak. “Weil just tramp about and admire the place. Shall
we, Mare?”

She let him take her from the room. She gave him a look
of extreme gratitude and darted upstairs. She had pulled on her old boots,
grabbed up her cloak, and ran down the stairs and out the door while the
Ingrahams were still in the dining room.

Alistair took her arm again. He was walking fast, but
she had no trouble keeping up with him. Marian wanted to wear herself out with
walking. She did not trust herself to speak.

They strode the length of Upper Pulteney and onto High.
The sweepers had done their work and the sidewalks were clear of snow. The air
was cold, but water dripped from every eave, little jewels catching the
Christmas Day sun.

Alistair stopped finally on the bridge overlooking a
street neither of them could remember, and put his arm about her. “We really
don’t belong here, do we?” he said, more to himself than to Marian.

She shook her head. “It’s one thing to be poor at home,
where it’s all a joke how Ariadne can stretch a shilling until it shrieks, and
I can mend a dress six different ways and escape to Papa’s books. Homer doesn’t
mind if I have holes in my stockings. After all, he was blind.”

Her little joke was wasted on Alistair. “Well, we have
fulfilled your Christmas wish.” He sighed and leaned on the bridge railing. “I
am supposed to see Lord Ingraham’s tailor tomorrow. Dash it, Marian! What have
we got ourselves into?”

They both stared down into the street below and allowed
cold reason to wash over them. Marian twined her fingers through Alistair’s.

“You will do as you are supposed to at St. Stephen’s,
and you will get your commission. I will return home and help with Ariadne’s
wedding, and Mama and I will move into the vicarage. Nothing’s changed. Come
on, brother, we’re getting cold here.”

She started to walk, but Alistair held her to the spot.
“You’re sure nothing’s changed?” he asked. “Something’s different. Dashed if I
know what, but something has changed.”

“Nothing has changed,” she insisted, wondering why her
words carried so little conviction to her mind.

They walked slowly back to the house, losing their way
several times and then stopping to ask directions of a lamplighter, who had
begun his evening rounds.

The house was quiet when they returned, and Marian
sighed in gratitude. “Is no one about, Washburn?” she asked hopefully.

“I rather think not, miss,” he said. “Lord Hammerfield
is slumbering in the parlor, and the women are looking at pattern books in Lady
Ingraham’s room.”

She couldn’t bring herself to go to her room and just
sit there. If I have nothing to read, I will brood, she thought, and I don’t
need that. “Washburn, where is the library?” she asked.

He bowed and gestured with his hand. She followed him,
after blowing a kiss to Alistair. I shall find one book and retreat, she
thought as she followed the butler. He led her to the back of the house.

She tiptoed past the billiards room when the sound of
balls and sticks cracked the stillness. “Surtees, you have gotten much too
expert in my absence,” she heard Gilbert complain.

The library was blissfully empty. “Thank you, Washburn,”
Marian whispered. She looked around her. If Papa’s library was a sparkling gem,
this one was the crown jewels and the Peacock Throne of Persia, all roiled into
one. Floor to ceiling was a solid mass of books. She took a deep breath,
inhaling the odor of morocco leather until her mouth watered.

Where there were not books, there were portraits, dark
oils in handsome gilt frames. She wandered about the room, stopping last to
admire the painting over the fireplace. It could only be the Ingrahams of many
years ago, with an older man, looking much like Gil, dandling a small boy on
his knee. The sisters were grouped about their mother, who bore about her, then
as now, an undefinable air of quality.

“Distinguished crew, eh?”

Marian jumped and put her hands behind her back.

Lord Ingraham entered the room and closed the door behind
him. He still carried his pool cue. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“I suppose I am a trifle on edge,” Marian said. “It is
nothing.”

He put down the cue and came to her side, looking up at
the portrait. “You’ll have to forgive my brother-in-law,” he said after an
awkward silence. “He only sees his children as investments.”

A hundred angry words rose to her lips. To her
amazement, she calmly sorted through them all and discarded every one. “How
sad,” was all she said.

“You would not look on your children that way, would you?”
he asked after another pause.

Her eyes flew to his face. “Oh, no! A child needn’t be
accomplished—oh, I detest that word—to be loved. And people are not to be
entrapped and snared.”

“No, they ought not, my dear,” Lord Ingraham agreed. He
gestured toward the sofa, and they sat down. “And what would you do, Marian?”

She looked at him, a question in her eyes.

“To get a husband, I mean?” he asked, his own eyes
bright with that same expression that had so puzzled her before.

“Oh, now you are bamming me,” she said. “Gil, I told
you that I did not think marriage would be at all comfortable.”

“You are begging the question. That will not do as an
answer, Marian.”

She regarded him seriously. “If I were to marry—and I
say
if
, for you know the idea does not appeal to me—I could only do it
for love.” She sighed and fingered a strand of hair that had escaped the
dresser’s pins. “And that much love would probably consume me. I don’t do
anything by halves. As you may have noticed.” She raised her hands palm-up in a
gesture of appeal. “But I probably would not mind at all. That is, if I loved
enough,” she concluded.