Marian's Christmas Wish (5 page)

“I shall call her Elaine. Ariadne, indeed!”

Before Marian could say anything, Percy pulled her out
the door and closed it behind him. He did not relinquish his hold on her until
they were down the hall. He pulled her into the bookroom.

“Percy, he is odious! And . . . and
...
he has bad breath.”

Percy released her. “And twenty thousand pounds a year,
dear one. Mare, as long as he has breath—”

“But he’s going to change her name! Percy, you can’t do
this.”

“Don’t rip up at me, Marian.”

They glared at each other. “Oh, Mare,” said Percy at
last as he held out his arms again. “Give me a hug. We’ll see what we can do.”

She rested her head against his chest as he put his
arms around her and talked into her hair. “I don’t know what to do. I wish I’d
never listened to Mama’s letter. But here we are, and we’ll just have to see
what happens. I’ll go find Ariadne.”

He released her. “But don’t you go causing another distempered
freak, Marian. You’re not too old to spank.”

She took his words in better grace than she felt. “Very
well, Percy. Do you think should I apologize to the other gentleman, the tall
one?”

The first smile of the day crossed her brother’s face. “I
think not.” He touched her under the chin. “And in the middle of that Cheltenham scene last night, didn’t I hear him laughing? And upon my word, Marian, I have
never heard him laugh. Not that treaty-making is jolly business. Lord Ingraham
just doesn’t laugh. No, I don’t think he’ll demand an apology
...
or pinch your cheek, either.”

“He had better not,” she exclaimed, her hand going to
her cheek. “But why is he here?”

Percy shrugged. “He was going to London and I just
asked him on a whim. He chose not to go home this season.”

Marian opened her eyes wide. “But why ever not?”

“Oh, I do not know. It may have something to do with .
. . Well, Marian, I own I was surprised he accepted. But maybe he feels
uncomfortable . . . Well, relatives can be a chore at times like this.”

His words mystified her. “And do we become a chore?”

He looked at her and spoke with no hesitation. “You
cannot imagine how pleased I am to see you all again, even if we are all as
eccentric as we can stare. Other families are so
...
so boring.”

Marian took Percy’s arm and drew him down to her so she
could kiss his cheek. “Percy, I promise to stay in here until I am in a better
frame of mind.”

He enveloped her in a hug that threatened her breath. “Just
stand by me, Marian, and promise me that you will remember that our guests are
dignified and deserving of your deference. Sir William is a distinguished
servant of our poor king, and Lord Ingraham, my God, Marian, he is renowned in
international circles. Remember yourself.”

She remained where she was until she heard Percy’s
footsteps disappear down the hall. She went to the window and wrote, “I will
not be so impulsive,” on the steamy glass. As she stood there, she sniffed the
odor drifting up from belowstairs. Cook was making the Christmas pudding.

I shall go belowstairs, she thought, and stir in my
Christmas wish. I shall wish that the Reverend Beddoe will suddenly inherit a
fortune. And that Alistair will reform and lead a blameless life. And Percy
will . . .

The smile left her face. Marian Wynswich, grow up, she
scolded herself. You would do better to wish that you could learn to stay out
of scrapes.

No sudden flash of illumination brightened the
bookroom. She sighed and picked up the feather duster. There was only one thing
to do, and she would do it.

It had long been a source of family humor that whenever
Marian Wynswich was agitated, she took herself to the library to dust books.
Even her father knew to duck out of harm’s way when Marian came down the hall,
wielding the feather duster like Marshal Ney’s baton. “God help us,” he would
say, “Little Blue Eyes is loose on an unsuspecting world.”

And so I am, dear Papa, she thought as she entered the
library, closing the door carefully behind her. The instinct was to slam it,
but her mother was right: now that she was almost seventeen, it was time to put
away some childish things. She allowed herself a sharp click of the lock to
telegraph her displeasure to anyone lurking in the hall, but thought better of
it and unlocked the door. No one in the Wynswich family read except her and
Percy, and he was busy sealing Ariadne’s doom with that silly little man.

“Percy, you are in my black books,” Marian said out
loud as she attacked the first book that came to hand, shook it, dusted it, and
returned it to the shelf. She dispatched an entire row of books and then sat
down in Papa’s wing chair by the fireplace. She drew her legs up and sat
cross-legged, daring her mother to come in and scold her.

But Lady Wynswich never came near the library. Marian
leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes, wishing that Sir William would
discover another attraction far removed from Devon and leave the Wynswiches to
a merry Christmas.

“My peace is quite cut up,” she said. “Papa, why did
you have to die and leave us so poor?”

He could not answer, of course, no more than anyone
could who drank overmuch eggnog, stuffed his horse at a fence, and landed on
his neck with a crack. Last year, with its black gowns and improving thoughts,
had been ten years long. She had planned so carefully for this to be the best
Christmas ever, and here it was, turning to sawdust before her eyes.

“Drat!”

She got up and searched along the row of books until
she found
The
Odyssey.
At
such an impasse, only Homer would do. She would lose herself in the wanderings
of Odysseus, wishing herself anywhere but Devon.

A year had passed since she had opened the book. Marian
rested the book against her cheek and willed away an enormous tide of sadness.
When she was much younger, Papa had set a row of her favorite books along the
lowest shelf, never mind that it threw the volumes out of order.

“She wants to read,” her father had told the
librarian—back when they could afford a librarian. “She should be able to reach
her books without a ladder, or a rope swung from the ceiling.”

The text was in Greek, of course. For all his rackety
ways, her father had recognized a fine mind and taught her Greek. It was her
pleasure and joy. Marian turned the pages, fanning them toward her. Poor,
wandering Odysseus would be her solace when everyone else nattered about trying
to snabble a husband for Ariadne. She retreated again to the chair, drawing
herself into a little ball. She would begin with the tale of the Sirens.

The door opened. Marian started and then relaxed. It
could not possibly be Lady Wynswich. She was probably even now raising herself
from her couch of suffering to extol Ariadne’s— Elaine’s—virtues to Sir
William. And she will titter and prattle until it is too much, thought Marian
as she drew herself into a tighter ball and peered out from the wing chair.

It was the tall gentleman of last night. Lord Ingraham,
Percy had called him. He was casually dressed in the garb of a country
gentleman, but possessed of an air that spoke of more exotic places than
Picton, or even Lyme Regis. She was struck by the excellence of his posture.
His back was straight, and in consequence, he seemed almost to reach the
ceiling.

Marian sighed, thinking of the hours and hours spent
with a book on her head to achieve the same effect. No one would ever dare put
a book on this elegant man’s head.

He was broad in all those places that a man should have
some width, and narrow where it served him best. This was not a man who would
require any subterfuge from his tailor to cut a figure that would make heads
turn.

I should not stare, she thought. It is vulgar of me.

His hair was black in places, as dark as her own, but
peppered liberally with gray. His nose was straight, even a little sharpish,
his lips set in a firm line. Ariadne would have sighed and called his bearing
noble; Marian thought him old.

And yet he did not have the walk of one well on in
years. His walk, while firm, had a spring to it. Marian concluded that he must
be younger than he looked, and turned back to Odysseus roped to his mast.

Her disinterest lasted only a moment. This was not a
man to be ignored, even for Odysseus. She watched Lord Ingraham out of the
corner of her eye as he crossed the room to the window and stood, rocking back
and forth on his heels, looking out at the bleakness of the landscape.

“‘Ah, lovely Devon, where it rains eight days out of
seven.’”

Marian covered her mouth so he would not hear her
laugh. She had not thought her rescuer of last night would resort to nursery
rhymes. After another moment spent in contemplation of England’s dreariest scenery, he turned the other way toward the books. Marian’s hand tightened over
her mouth.

Her eyes widened but she made no sound as she made
herself smaller in the chair. His cheek was scarred with the imprint of a
crisscross. She looked closer. It appeared almost like a tattoo, except that it
was red and raw-looking, a burn such as she could never have imagined. Her
stomach did a flip even as her heart went out to him.

Still he did not see her. His eyes were on the books.
He ran his finger across the gold binding of Lord Wynswich’s Shakespeare and
then traveled farther to the poetry of Ben Jonson, the essays of Donne, the
plays of Marlowe.

She watched as he squatted down, his back still
rod-straight, to look at the lower shelves, her shelves. He pulled out her
well-worn copy of Blake, rose to his feet, and cleared his throat.

“Do you recommend the Blake, my dear, or does it depend
on the weather?”

Marian squeaked in surprise. He turned to look at her.
Slowly she sat up and put her legs on the floor, smoothing her dress down and
wishing last night’s rag curls had done their duty.

“Sir, if we depended on the weather in Devon, we would never have the heart to even open a book. I recommend the Blake.”

He nodded. “The Blake it will be, my dear. Don’t let me
disturb you.” He made no move to come closer, but selected a chair across the
room, carefully turning it so the scarred side of his face was away from her
view when he sat down. He crossed his legs and opened the book.

Marian put down
The Odyssey
and rose to her feet. The gentleman did also. “Oh, no,
don’t bother,” she protested. “I was
...
I was supposed to be dusting. Please don’t bother.”

He nodded and sat down again, but he did not open the
book.

Marian picked up her book and gave it a fierce dusting.
“Sir, how did you know I was here? I was ever so quiet.”

“You were. Do you know that when you stand at the
window, your glance takes in the mirror over the fireplace? There you sat, all
gathered together, watching me. I thought at first that you were a maid, but as
a rule . . .” He craned his head slightly to look at the book in her arms. “As
a rule, maids don’t trouble themselves with Greek. I think you must be the
altogether singular Marian Wynswich. I believe we have already met.”

Marian came closer and he motioned to the chair
opposite his own. She sat in it without a word, too shy to speak, feeling
anything but singular. Drat Percy again.

“Is it that you are not allowed to talk to strangers?”
he asked at last.

She found her tongue. “Oh, no, no. I just . . . Percy
tells me I am not to rattle on and cut up everyone’s peace. Oh, truly I did not
mean to cause Sir William distress!” She put her hand to her mouth. “And now I
am rattling on. I had better leave, sir.”

“Oh, don’t.” He leaned forward and held out his hand to
her. “Let me introduce myself. I am Ingraham. Gilbert Ingraham.”

She took his hand. His clasp was firm and warm. She
shook his hand and, before a thought of discretion crossed her mind, reached
out and touched his cheek, resting her fingers for the tiniest moment on the
burn that desecrated his face.

If he was surprised, he did not show it. He did not
move as she traced her finger over the scar, her eyes filled with concern. He
scarcely breathed. His eyes were on her face as she gently pressed his cheek
and made him turn it toward her.

“Does it hurt?” she asked. “What do you do for it?”