Christmas Surprises Read online

  “You have, maybe,” he snorted. “I haven’t done a damned thing but offer him a tree. Why can’t you make her better if you have heavenly powers?”

  “I can’t make her want to live if she’s chosen to go to the other side. Her betrothed is waiting for her, and she senses it. There is little enough I can do for her. It was the vicar I wished to help.”

  “So no matter what I do, she’s going to die. What a charming Christmas that will be for the old man. I was supposed to learn a lesson from this? All I learned is that I’m helpless to change anything. I already knew that.”

  She made a noise of impatience. “Men! They must always have concrete results. It is not enough that you have made him happy and given him a little hope and faith. You must ask for miracles, too. No wonder your mother prays so hard for you that I’ve been sent down here to look into the matter. You are further beyond hope than that girl back there. At least she believes she is going to a better world.”

  “I certainly hope there is a better world than this one. If this is all I can hope for, I would just as soon put a bullet through my brain now and get it done with.”

  “My word!” She stared at him in astonishment. “What do you have to complain about? You’ve already admitted you have everything. Shall I arrange for you to be sent back here as a street urchin begging for scraps of bread?”

  “Never mind.” He brushed her off impatiently, no longer finding it odd to be talking to more than a shimmering wave of air. “What other fascinating lessons have you to teach me on this glorious day?”

  Since the sky loomed leaden with rain and the air was so moist as to be mist, his sarcasm was evident. Miffed, his angel didn’t reply immediately. Grabbing his chance in this unexpected silence, Jeffrey inquired, “Do you have a name?”

  That caught her off guard. He felt her glance at him in puzzlement. “Name? I suppose I must, but it hasn’t been important.”

  This was more interesting than learning lessons in behavior. Jeffrey took the long road into town. “I ought to call you something, I don’t believe the Bible mentions any female angels. Will Mary do?” She made what he assumed was a shrug of assent, and he continued, “Well, Mary, do you not remember who you were? How you died? Anything?”

  She sat silent for a moment, a rare silence, he was coming to realize. “No, not actually. Those things aren’t important once you leave earthly matters behind. I may have been many people at different times. I can’t really say. I am told that character is all we retain. We are supposed to observe and learn and improve our characters.”

  “And your character is so improved that you have been sent here to instruct me in how to improve mine?” The sarcasm was strong again.

  “Oh, I don’t believe my character is all that strong,” she answered airily. “I’m fairly young as these things go. I am easily bored and impatient. You irritate me immensely sometimes. I suppose those flaws will be corrected with time, but they are far less than your flaws. Even in my ineptitude I can see that you are a self-pitying man who cannot see the world around you through anything but your own selfishness.”

  “Thank you. I appreciate that,” he replied harshly, whipping the horse to a greater pace. “I have worked to pass bills that would educate the masses, relieve the poor, provide sanitation for slums. I suppose it is due to my character flaws that all these bills were voted down.”

  “You aren’t the only flawed character in this world,” she said with irony, “as much as you might think you are the only person in the world.”

  “I don’t believe I wish to hear any more of this adolescent inanity. I am beginning to believe you must have been a spoiled child and you have come down here just to amuse yourself by promoting your own silly notions. Go find an orphan to save. At least you will be accomplishing something.”

  A long sturdy brick building loomed into view. Instead of continuing the argument, Mary inquired with interest, “What is that?”

  Jeffrey shrugged. “A carriage factory.” He felt her glance of inquiry. He had become much too good at reading her thoughts. Perhaps she was just an extension of himself, after all, except that he knew what a carriage factory was. “Carriages are increasingly popular. There is a need for less expensive models. The village seemed to have a number of young men unable to follow in their father’s professions, and we have several fellows who’ve been disabled from the army. I just put the two needs together. They pretty much run things on their own now. It’s quite a nice carriage they build, if I do say so myself.”

  He felt her staring at him again. With irritation he asked, “What is it now?”

  “What would have happened to those young men if you hadn’t built that factory?”

  He shrugged irritably. “How am I to know? Isn’t that your department? They would have gone off to London, I suppose. There’s always work there.”

  “But you allowed them to stay here, close to their families. You kept them out of the gaming hells and slums of the city. If it hadn’t been for you, they could be roaming city streets now, starving and stealing for a living. You have changed lives. You can do so again. Can you not see that?”

  “I can do nothing,” he declared angrily. “Money built that factory. My mother could have done it. Anyone could have done it. It brings in a tidy profit. It does not save those children in St. Giles. It does not prevent the young men in other towns from going to London and losing themselves. It changes nothing.”

  “Do I have to throw a child in front of runaway horses so you can rescue her before you will recognize your importance?”

  Her tone bordered on the furious, and he felt the distinct flutter of wings as he brought the curricle to a stop in front of the tinsmith. To hell with her. He would have Susan’s present made. And then he would go next door and inquire about that shawl. Hallucinations be damned.

  * * * *

  Jeffrey cursed as he pulled up the drive and recognized the coach and carriages halted in front of the stairs. His family had arrived. Somewhere in the long weeks of boredom, he must have lost track of time.

  He stumbled over trunks and satchels in the foyer as he entered the front door. The high-ceilinged, spacious hall seemed filled to overflowing with chattering women in billowing skirts and crinolines, fat sausage curls bouncing as they all tried to hug him at one time. There seemed an inordinate amount of baggage and crinoline for three women, and as he impatiently allowed his mother to buss his cheek, he realized why. They’d brought along a fourth female.

  He recognized Emma Wittingham at once, and his first impulse was to flee. His second impulse was to strangle his mother.

  Before he had time to do either, a male voice intruded upon the happy homecoming.

  “By Jove, that’s a fine billiard room you have, Darcourt. The table needs refurbishing, however. I know just the fellow to do it. I’ll send one of your grooms to fetch him first thing in the morning. Did a fine job on my father’s, and his didn’t have half the weight of yours.”

  Davenport! What in hell was Davenport doing here? Instead of strangling his mother, Jeffrey thought he might just leap all these trunks and throttle the intruder. He was contemplating the effort involved when the younger man apparently stubbed his toe on something in the hallway and went down, arms flailing, taking with him a centuries-old suit of armor.

  Above the clatter of metal, the wails of women, and the rush of footsteps to the downed man, Jeffrey thought he heard a waspish voice saying, “Rotten company you keep, I must say.” He glanced swiftly around and saw the brief shimmer of his taunting angel at the top of the towering armoire on the far wall. Mary gave him a mischievous grin and disappeared again.

  Well, he had to grant she knew how to judge character. Rodney Davenport was a penniless bounder who lived off his father’s title and his friends’ generosity. His blue blood with a hint of royal purple gave him entrance to all the best homes, but it didn’t pay his bills.

  Apparently the leech had been invited to suck Darcourt’s blood for
a while. He wondered which of the foolish women in his life had made that decision, and didn’t have to guess long when he saw his younger sister weeping and holding the fallen man’s hand.

  Damnation! He strode across the foyer and jerked her to her feet, pushing her into his mother’s arms. “Damned clumsy of you, old fellow,” he declared unsympathetically to the downed man. “Suppose you know a blacksmith who puts armor together too?”

  Davenport dusted himself off, striving not to look sheepish as he pulled his legs back under him. “Don’t know what came over me. One minute I was up, the next I was down. Best have that floor looked at, Darcourt. Could be a flaw in the flagging.”

  Darcourt rather suspected a flaw in the character of a certain angel, but he had sense enough not to mention his assumption. He held out a hand to help the hapless young lord up. “Just stay clear of Susan and you’ll not come to any harm, Davenport.”

  With that brusque declaration and ignoring Susan’s wail of protest, Jeffrey stalked out of the foyer in the direction of his study. The door was too heavy and too old to slam, but its firm closing notified the rest of the inhabitants that his lordship had no desire to be disturbed any further.

  He found himself waiting for his nagging angel to scold him for his behavior, but she remained ominously silent. Perhaps she had given up on him and gone to find a deserving orphan. He hoped so. His overdeveloped conscience had seen him scorned and laughed at enough in the halls of government. Now that he’d decided to write off the rest of the world as too foolish to reform, he didn’t need an arbitrary angel acting as a social conscience for him.

  Jeffrey went into dinner that evening grimly braced for feminine chatter and Davenport’s inanities. His disposition did not improve as he watched Susan giving the handsome cad adoring looks. His sister might not be the brightest example of the feminine gender, but she was a good-hearted girl, far too good for a rake who would only spend her money and break her heart.

  “If you’d been in London where you belonged, you could have kept that coxcomb from getting anywhere near her.”

  Darcourt gritted his teeth and glanced surreptitiously around. The tin angel ornament had found its way onto the sideboard. Its bent halo made the figure look as if it were bowing its head, either in devotion or laughter. He didn’t intend to discover which. He decided to try ignoring her. He certainly wasn’t in any position to respond to her challenge.

  “Well, what festivities do you have planned for the holidays, old boy? A Christmas ball? A New Year’s hunt? I haven’t been on a good hunt in a devilish long time. Looks like you’ve got good country for it around here.” Davenport drained his wineglass and motioned for the footman to fill it again.

  Jeffrey hovered between signaling the footman not to waste any more good wine on their tasteless guest or allowing the clodpole to drink himself under the table. He settled on the latter as the simplest solution. Sipping at his own glass, he responded irritably, “We are only just out of mourning, Davenport. A ball would be a trifle disrespectful, don’t you think?” He raised his gaze to the ceiling and muttered under his breath, “Of course, you don’t think. How foolish of me.”

  A soft giggle sounded in his ear, and he almost smiled to himself. He rather liked having his angel agreeing with him for a change. It put him considerably more in charity with the world around him.

  As Davenport started to respond to his host’s cutting speech, his wineglass tilted. A cascade of fine burgundy spilled down the young fop’s immaculate linen and splashed across his garishly embroidered waistcoat. He stared down at himself in amazement, while everyone watched him with polite interest.

  A footman hurried to hand him a napkin. Choking, Davenport shoved his chair back and dabbed frantically at the obviously expensive waistcoat. Jeffrey continued contemplating the ceiling, while the women made consoling noises about his valet surely being able to get the stain out. Davenport continued to sputter.

  “Ghosts!” he declared, feverishly wiping at his clothes. “Haunts. Didn’t do that myself. Hand pushed. Know it.” He gave his host an enraged look, but Jeffrey was too far away to be the man behind the accident.

  “So sorry, old fellow,” Jeffrey said innocently. “Sometimes the family specters take a dislike to someone. I can understand if you want the carriage brought around.”

  Davenport glared.

  “Ghosts?” Emma inquired warily. “You have ghosts?” She scanned the room as if expecting to see them walking out of the walls in procession.

  “One or two,” Jeffrey drawled at the same time as his mother said reassuringly, “Of course not!” She turned and gave her a son a glare which quelled any further conjecture before going on, “The house is scarcely that old. The armor is just an eccentricity of Jeffrey’s grandfather.”

  “Oh.” Emma succeeded in still looking uncertain, but she smiled tentatively at her host. “You are quite right about the ball, Lord Darcourt. It would be most inappropriate. It is good to know that there are still a few people in this world conscious of what we owe the fallen.”

  Darcourt nearly choked on his wine at this prepared little speech. Arbitrarily, he responded, “I thought a few dozen guests for New Year’s would be pleasant.”

  Emma’s eyes brightened. “Of course. You are exactly right. A few good friends to remind us of all that we have to be thankful for.”

  Idly, a smile of derision tugging at the corner of his mouth, Darcourt said, “Of course, this is much too short a notice. I think I’ll ask the vicar to give us a service on remembrance that evening.”

  Before Emma could make a complete cake of herself and agree with this inanity also, Lady Darcourt intervened. “We’ll do no such thing. Poor Mr. Cooper has enough on his hands with his daughter so ill. I think a gathering of the neighbors will be more than suitable. The girls and I will undertake the preparations so you needn’t put yourself out, Jeffrey.”

  Well, his mother had never been entirely stupid. Bowing his head in acknowledgment of her better judgment, Darcourt retired to his study as soon as was decently possible after dinner. Let Davenport and the ladies make plans for the holidays. He needed to decide if he should plan for committing himself to an institution if he continued imagining all mishaps could be laid at the feet of his imaginary companion.

  “I’m not imaginary,” Mary said irritably, materializing near the Christmas tree. “Shall I rearrange this room to prove it to you?”

  Sitting in his favorite leather chair, drawing on his cigar, Jeffrey contemplated the vision flickering in front of the evergreen. He could still discern very little of her face, but he could sense her mood well enough without seeing her expression. That was an insane thing to think about–something that couldn’t be real, but he had already accepted his growing insanity. It relieved the boredom, in any event.

  “I’ve always wanted that desk turned to the window, but it’s too heavy to budge. Would you mind seeing to it for me?” he asked idly, more out of curiosity to see how far his insanity would go than because he really expected her to do it.

  “If I move something, it will have to be for a better reason than that. I’m not a magic fairy come to grant you three wishes. What are you going to do with that overgrown popinjay? Christmas is a sentimental season, and it is already obvious that your sister has formed an attachment. She’s quite likely to accept his offer.”

  “I’m quite likely to bounce him out on his ear if he dares ask,” Darcourt responded complacently. “He’ll get the picture soon enough and hie his way off to greener pastures.”

  Mary groaned and rolled her eyes heavenward, disappearing in the direction of the tin angel now residing on the mantel. “Lord Darcourt knows it all again! Go out there now. Open your blasted eyes and use your brain for something besides pickling.”

  The shimmering image disappeared. Jeffrey contemplated the ornament on the mantel for a while longer. He didn’t have to go to the salon if he didn’t want to, and he most certainly didn’t want to. He tolerated the company
only because it was the holiday and he couldn’t very well keep his family out of their ancestral home. Beyond that, he had no desire to keep them entertained. It was much more peaceful entertaining himself. A good book, a good cigar, and a warm fire, that’s all he needed. The nagging inner voice that added a good woman in his bed would be welcome didn’t come from his angelic visitor.

  Cursing under his breath, he found himself putting out the cigar, shoving the angel in his pocket, and strolling down the hall in the direction of the sounds of music. Someone played the piano while his sister sang one of the old Christmas carols. The sound soothed his irritation somewhat, until he walked into the room.

  Susan sat unnecessarily close to Davenport on the piano bench. She looked at the popinjay with wide-eyed attention as she sang, and he smiled down at her with all the charm and sweetness he could muster. Jeffrey wanted to gag. Before he could interrupt this fascinating little scene, the lid of the hideously expensive grand piano suddenly slammed shut. The two musicians yiped and jumped, startled. Music sheets flew into the air and scattered about the room. Emma and Lady Darcourt looked up from their sewing with widened eyes. Both caught sight of Darcourt standing in the doorway at the same time.

  The pair at the piano turned and looked accusingly at him, but he was much too far from the instrument to have caused the incident. He smiled and strolled into the room, hands in pockets. “Better watch it, Davenport. Our resident ghost has taken a definite dislike to you.”

  “There is no such thing as ghosts, Jeffrey,” Susan declared bravely. “You must have someone come and look at the instrument at once. There must be some flaw in the structure!”

  Did he imagine it, or did he hear the hints of an angelic chuckle? He responded with more humor than he might have otherwise. “I think Davenport must be the flaw in the structure then. Suits of armor and wineglasses and piano lids never had a tendency to fly about before.”